Thursday 29 November 2012

Of Souls, Lost and Found





The coffin was at least ten feet tall and before it knelt a wimpled woman sombrely lighting a candle. The crowd around us began to move with the pounding of a brass band and the air soon grew warm with the moving bodies and the fragrant clouds of hashish smoke. 'What is going on?' you may well cry. If you're lucky I may let you know in a paragraph or two. Then again I might get carried away, completely forget and you'll be forever in the dark. Whatever the case we must first go back to our farm in the distant, misty hills...

Following the events of my last missive we spent another week or two in the hills of northern Italy, counting goats and wishing away the mist that had engulfed the valley. Outside the farmhouse windows only a few hazy metres were visible so we holed-up, built fires and baked bread. Luckily, we also had a couple of very welcome visits from folks back home. It wasn't that Nic and I had become entirely bored of each others' company but I had noticed her eying up the wood chopping axe with a rather evil glint in her eye and I can't deny that an over-baked focaccia hadn't struck me as a rather effective bludgeon. Anyway, one of the reasons for this chapter of our trip was to give us a taste of country life and help us decide if we might one day flee to a leafy idyll of our own. On one of our last nights among those dripping trees and muddy paths we felt like we were much closer to an answer and it wasn't an answer we had particularly expected. We needed a city. We wanted a city and a gallery and a cinema and a shop and a pub and people and life and energy and music and markets and bustle and buildings and art and bohemianism and a complete and utter lack of goats.

So with mud still dropping from our boots and labrador hair still matted in our clothes we hit the glittering streets of Milan. Past Gucci handbags, handmade brogues and newly-engineered faces we pushed our way into a gloriously decadent shopping arcade. I like to think we cut our own dash in our Indian trousers, lost luggage jumpers and practical raincoats and I've no doubt a few high-fashion heads must have been turned by this fresh new style. We met our friend Claudia for drinks and woke up the next morning with the pleasant feeling of being on an unknown floor in an unknown room, back on the road again.

Bidding farewell to the lovely Claudia (pronounced the English 'Claw-Deer') we ran the rails to Turin to meet another and equally lovely Claudia (this time pronounced 'Cloudier' in the Italian fashion) who we had met on the banks of the Ganges a lifetime ago (i.e. in August). She inducted us into her rather wonderful city, its beautiful streets, wintry hills and pleasantly bohemian air. We spent a lovely couple of nights eating with borrowed friends, drinking into the night at pavement bars and walking the streets through air perfumed with chocolate, wine and hot pizza. Turin was certainly beautiful but, on top of that, and unlike many of Italy's tourist cities, it felt real.


It was in Turin that we witnessed the bizarre funeral described in the first paragraph. It was not in fact a funeral for a person but for a nightspot. Alongside Turin's Po River there is a whole strip of bars and clubs that have been serving Turinese party-goers and squatters for decades. In the last couple of weeks the council decided to close it all down on the grounds of health and safety. The 'funeral' took place outside the council offices and was a strangely joyous protest against this decision. It struck me as a very European scene - on the one hand a source of joy was being stupidly crushed in the name of health and safety but on the other it showed our sense of freedom and willingness to argue our corner, to stick our fingers up to the powers that be. 'It is so good to be back in Europe' said Nic, though whether she meant the protest or the chocolate shop around the corner I can't be sure.

With new friends in Turin

After such Claudia-based fun, we headed to Venice where there were no Claudias to be found but instead a big old city unfeasibly built on a lagoon. Arriving by train over the misty waters and emerging to see gondolas ripple the canals was rather wonderful and it is an undeniably beautiful and quite unbelievable city. It also seemed an appropriate destination being home to that other Silk Road traveller, Marco Polo (the copier). However, it did feel like Venice's true soul had long since been strip-mined by tourists greedily prospecting for romance. I would still recommend anyone to go as it is still utterly unique but, if you want an Italian city with soul, Turin is the place for me.

So, as we find ourselves back on the road with city maps and train tickets clogging our pockets, we look east once more. In fact, we've already crossed into a new land. But that'll have to wait for next time for we must return to our cell. We're currently in a prison. But, as I said, that'll just have to wait.





Monday 12 November 2012

A Slight Return

This has been a long time coming. Believe it or not, we've been so busy I haven't had time to write. Almost like we're normal people with normal jobs. Though thankfully not quite yet...

A few days after leaving the smoky pall of Delhi's streets we found ourselves chasing goats across a knobbly Italian hillside, gasping for breath and grasping for horns. But first, before I get carried away with tales of bucolic bliss, we must head south! Southwards and magically backwards in time, to a time before now, a time that was approximately eight weeks ago! To a plane hitting a Roman runway and a pair of vagrant Britishers being engulfed by a wave of reverse culture shock. Yes, Finn and Nic had re-entered Europe and they wanted cheese.

Blinking into the bright Roman sunlight we marvelled at the traffic that swept hushingly by, the streets free from smouldering piles of litter and the miraculous lack of pavement-dwelling livestock. We walked and walked through streets that appeared almost contrived in their 'distressed' beauty and a hundred piazzas that alone would normally be a town's main draw. We ate and drank wine and felt at home (albeit a slightly sunnier version of home).

Before coming to Italy we signed up with the organisation WWOOF which, if you don't already know, is a network of farms that host volunteers, providing them with food and board in exchange for labour. Our first farm was near Modena in the north of Italy and proved to be a rather lucky landing. We were housed in boutique luxury in an old farm house and fed four courses of delicious food every night from the restaurant kitchen. In exchange for such comforts we worked long days that involved building goat fences, chasing goats, clipping goat's nails. Less goaty pursuits included helping out in the restaurant, cutting lavender and picking almonds. Each morning we would walk the dogs up to the top of the hill where we would look down on the misty green valleys stitched with vineyards and olive groves, grinning stupidly at yet another surprising and joyful chapter of our epic year.

Our second placement was quite a different experience. Gone was the luxury and in was a wooden room and an old camp bed within earshot of a pair of snoring pigs. Dinner comprised entirely of ingredients grown organically on the farm, homemade cheese, the cured meat of the previous occupants of the sty and bread made from their own flour. But before eating, the family would sing a song. These songs whether Christian, Buddhist, Hindu or Native American were sung with gusto by the whole family. The table itself was surrounded by bookshelves and a great untidy stack of board games which provided the entertainment in the absence of computers, TVs or mobile phones. But there was not much time for entertainments, long hours were spent in the fields, in the felt-making kitchen or juicing grapes. They lead a hard but true life and one that we learnt much from.

I spent quite a lot of time digging massive holes in the ground (while Nic sieved grain in the granary) and it was back-breaking work. However, as I've found before with such labour, I finished the day with a feeling not unlike that following meditation, a sort of connection to everything, a state where food tastes better, water is heavenly and a shower like a rebirth. Not that showers came too often, water was precious and they were generally only enjoyed once or twice a week (or in the father's case perhaps monthly). All water was conserved, the run off from the taps being collected in small basins with which to flush the toilets.

The days started early, the sun would just be creeping above the mountains, turning the clinging clouds mauve and orange while the valleys were full of mist, distant farmsteads and villages rising out of it like islands from a milky sea. Though it was cold and our still warm beds called to us, it felt so good to greet such a day and to spend it, after so much idleness, properly working.

Part of our reasoning for this current chapter of our trip was to see if we could live in the countryside and leave behind the city life. We still don't know either way. After eight weeks or so of relative isolation we travelled to Florence where we helped set up a market stall selling produce from the farm and überhippy felt ware. Florence was hardly a bustling metropolis but it was good to be back surrounded by beautiful buildings, art and design. It was also good to meet other travellers again and talk the evenings away, swapping tales and card games.

We're now back at our original farm, house-, goat- and dog-sitting while the owners are on holiday. We have time to reflect and cook and walk and empty their cellar of wine. The other night, I collected dead wood from the forest and built a lovely fire upon which we cooked kebabs on sticks (as we'd learnt to do in Kyrgyzstan) and toasted flatbreads on the coals. We watched the embers die down and the night sky light up and, not for the first time this year, felt like the luckiest man alive (Nic had already gone in because her feet were cold and was probably tired of me banging on about the beauty of fire.)

We currently have no idea where we head next but we're happy to be back in more northern climes with the leaves turning red and the smell of snow in the air.