Blame it on the rain

Storm clouds gather in Copenhagen, Denmark

The weather can make or break a place. No matter how majestic, picturesque, or well renowned a place is, it has the potential to fail miserably if the weather is off key.

Daylesford, Victoria – the postcard rolling hills, quaint shops and boutique restaurants. Countryside as seen in a lush period drama. But not so pretty with slashing rain, gale force winds and thunderous grey skies. Unfortunately, the weather helped generate a rather gloomy slant on Daylesford – a grit your teeth, just shut up and like it, kind of forbearance.  My niece and I had some excellent meals, a fantastic time at a Hepburn Springs spa and in general, enjoyed our stay. But we also sighed a lot. We drove to the pretty lake ready for a brisk walk, but instead sat silently in the car enjoying the view through persistent drizzle before driving away for another latte. The lavender farm driveway required a sturdy four-wheel drive vehicle (we didn’t have one) and when we got to the property entrance we discovered it was completely flooded anyway. We were also creeped out by some odd things. At a lovely restaurant there were prints from local artists on the wall. We shared a table with a scribbled ink drawing of ‘Marianne’. Marianne seems to have been locked up in the attic and fed raw tuna and rotten tomatoes. The look of anguish and torture on her face almost put us off dessert. Marianne, beloved of someone, sent shivers up our spine. Then we had to walk out into an icy dark country night, full of whistling winds and unfamiliar squeaks.....

Beijing was equally ‘ruined’ by below freezing temperatures that inhibited walking and breathing, let alone proper, joyful sightseeing (see Beijing Disconnect). But it’s not always the cold that has an effect on your holiday happiness. In the Spanish Sierra Nevada mountains I was on a walking tour and every day it climbed to well over 30 degrees Celsius. Had I been at home I would have been sitting under a pleasant air conditioner sipping iced tea. But if you sign up for a walking tour, you really should go walking. So every day I would slip on my warm chunky hiking shoes, grit my teeth and go out into the Spanish countryside.

It was glorious and fragrant with herbs and citrus trees. The blue sky was grand and overwhelming. We picked our own cherries and mulberries and dipped our grateful hands into cool fountains. But we also walked up a bare and shale covered mountain with the sun beating relentlessly. The back of my legs were so burnt I could only sleep on my stomach that night. My feet were swollen and my head pounded with a killer headache.  The thing that irked me was the British tourists who kept looking at my quizzically and snorting incredulously if I dared to say something mild like, ‘Good God it’s hot’. ‘Surely’, they said, ‘you would be used to this heat?’. Oh yes, I know what this heat feels like – I just don’t like it! Apparently, because I’m Australian, I should be immune to unpleasant feelings of being fried by a demonically hot sun. Surprisingly then, I confess I am not.

Overcast but recognisably pretty - Ponza 'before'

Unfortunately, I think the rain is always worse that the heat. When the sun grills you, at least you know it’s summer/holidays and that’s the proper way of things. In Ponza, it was summer but it rained in biblical proportions. Mum, dad and I had arrived for an overnight stay on the little island just down the ‘road/sea’ from Capri. You can see it can’t you – white washed stone, idyllic blue sea, Campari and lemonade. We sat on low wall at the beach, watching kids kick around a soccer ball and eating cheese and bread. Ah bliss.

The next morning it was grey. Nothing serious. Nothing to worry about.  Just overcast. We managed a little sightseeing, and then, just before lunch, it started to pelt down. Bucket down. Niagara Falls. It  creating spontaneous cascades down the quaint white washed steps. We collected our luggage and headed towards the ferry terminal. The ferry was at least two hours away so we huddled together under a veranda wretchedly wet and gloomy, the rest of our sight seeing written off as just too hard. The restaurant who’s veranda it was took pity on us (or, if your cynical, spotted an easy sale) and opened early just for us. We sat contentedly eating steaks and translating signs for the lovely restaurant owners until it was time to head to the ferry terminal. They kindly offered us giant black plastic rubbish bags, so we scampered across the terminal carpark in our impromptu raincoats, luggage flapping, arms waving, shouting in consternation. I tried to tip toe through the water but I looked down and realised it was half way up my calf anyway. At that point I laughed my head off, gave in and splashed happily through the rain.

Ponza 'after'. Barely recognisable. 

The thing about extreme holiday weather is that it’s association is never forgotten, good or bad. Never mind the spectacular scenery, the picture perfect setting, I’ll remember Ponza as the island on which we could have relaunched Noah’s Ark.

Rome | Home

Colosseum, Rome

When I visit Rome, I have a sense of being home, of coming home. Why this should be is curious. I do have an Italian passport but no Italian would ever regard me as such. Ever. I accept that, I understand. I am Australian first.

Perhaps I feel a sense of comfort because Rome looks so familiar, even at the first visit. Almost everyone in this world would have some sense of what Rome looks like. It’s large. Rome is so large in many dimensions  – time and space. But also less conventional ideas of dimension like memory and connection. There are so many layers of history in the buildings  and under your feet and they’re not neatly layered one on top of the other but merged together to create one overwhelming present. The Roman practice of rarely knocking anything down but rather, enterprisingly, using the existing structure as a foundation creates so many mesmerising tableaus – the modern day apartments merging with a classical structure like a vine that hugs a trellis.  

At the centre of Rome (for me) is the Colosseum. It’s broken, but it’s solid. I’ve only ever experienced Rome when it’s shimmering hot and the cicadas are deafening. Walking towards it from the train station, the Colosseum emerges from bright heat, curved and grey against an achingly blue sky. You try to shut out the tourists masses (of which you are one) and picture the gladiators and lions, etc., a task made harder by the fact that there are chubby modern day Italians wielding plastic swords and smiling for the cameras. Inside the Colosseum it’s ugly. It’s ugly because it’s all cavities and unfinished walls and yawning arched doorways. But it’s beautiful too. Because it’s standing, because it’s a real thread of connection which we can follow, hand over hand, back into the past. Because the outer walls are delicately layered like wedding cake tiers. Because the colonnades are lofty and grand. Because there are gasps of astonishment and smiles of incredulity. People stand around gazing and shaking their heads (and laughing and taking silly photos). It seems as though once you have seen the Colosseum, you can say you’ve seen Rome.

The British Grand Tourists of the 18th century were equally enamoured of Roman history but their experience was raw. The Roman Forum was referred to as the Campo Vaccino – the cow field –because indeed it was full of cattle and goats and rubble and rubbish. Rome was dirty, dusty and hot, very hot, when compared to London. When I see Rome, I see the togaed Senate, but I also see pale young Englishmen, dressed in wool suits, pulling charcoal and sketchpads from their satchels. They must have walked around the Forum with their superior swagger and sophisticated sensibilities, dutifully appreciating the heck out of every monument but without really seeing them. I see them wrinkling their noses at the unfamiliar, head constantly dipping into a guide book which told them exactly what to see, what to avoid and how to feel about both. I see their shocked and disappointed faces when they look up– ‘oh, there are live Italians and they’re lazy, poor and trying to swindle me of my money!’.

On the contrary, Romans seem enterprising, forthright and self-assured. The Roman character was crystallised in my mind when I watched a scene unfold in Piazza Venezia. A clean cut kid, maybe ten years old, was sweetly playing classical music on a violin, busking for change in prime tourist hunting ground. The carabinieri came by, had a quiet word and gently asked him to move on. I was too far to hear why – perhaps he didn’t have a permit? His reaction was comical and shocking at the same time. He started shouting and waving his hands around, angrily, with vehemence. His indignance – he wasn’t doing anything wrong! His disdain for authority (so young!) his passion (so vibrant!). His cunning and entrepreneurial air! But the carabinieri were firm. Surprisingly patient, but firm; completely accepting of his outrage and indolence but casually threatening too. Move it. Now.

View from the Duomo, St Peters 

I can sympathise to a degree though – with being shocked by the present. I remember climbing the 320 steps to the top of St Peter’s dome, my body bending to accommodate the curvature of the structure. Inside the dome it was light and surreal. The fantastic height already takes your breath but then you shake your head in astonishment as you realise that all the cherubs, saints and angels you first viewed from far below are not merely painted (as if that was easy) but in fact, depicted in complex and detailed mosaic. Outside the dome Vatican City was laid bare for me. The colonnades and streets formed an easily recognisable key shape – the key to the church, Pope and heaven itself. My head was full of Michelangelo and Bramante, of 16th century Popes and political religious power struggles. I stood for a moment of contemplation alongside my friend, eating sweet summer peaches and nectarines, utterly at peace and content.

And then, strangely, I hear cheap dance music. Someone up there, an Italian, was blasting bad Italian pop on a little radio. I was immediately annoyed and outraged – such a modern intrusion on such a spiritual place and moment! But then I laughed. This is Italy today, not two thousand years ago, not six hundred years ago and not even two hundred years ago. I was being one of those an insular and blind Grand Tourists I mocked, and I had no right, no right at all. I had to accept all of Rome. We sometimes think time has stood still. We don’t like to remember that Romans need to embrace and respect their past (I don’t think they can’t avoid it), but somehow they move forward too. We need to move with them.