August 15th is otherwise known as Ferragosto here in Italy. This holiday is a very big deal, here. It has ancient and Christian origins. Emperor Augustus (yes, that's for whom the month is named...as an aside, it bears mentioning that his birthday fell in this month. We know this because his original, given name was Octavian, and that name is attributable to his being born in the 8th month of the year) declared this a festival month, designated at least in part to reward those who'd labored over the summer harvest.
If you ask a contemporary Italian about the meaning of Ferragosto, the more mature one will tell you that this is the feast day for the Madonna's assumption into heaven (she literally ascended into heaven when she died, whereas the rest of us soul-float and leave our corporeal selves below, if we're headed in that direction). The church behind my apartment held a morning mass for this occasion. My bathroom was filled with the sounds of the organ and the choir. And the bell-ringing on every half hour - from all area churches - during the mid-morning was remarkable.
The more secular Italian will tell you that Ferragosto is the beginning of his or her annual summer holiday leave (although the more religious Italian will hastily add that this is true for them, too). The modern tradition of taking leave during this holiday dates back to the 1920s. In true Fascist fashion, any citizen - ranging from the most modest to the most well-off - could have 1, 2 or 3 days off.
Imagine being in a city of approximately 5 million people. For some of you, this is very easy.
Imagine having well more than a half of that population vanish. For as little as one week and as much as four or even six weeks (the Fascists would be aghast).
Imagine that population - comprised of staff and whole businesses - of your dry cleaner, your fishmonger, your pharmacist, your banker, your bus driver, your doctor...even (to my horror) your favorite gelateria....also your favorite grocer.
All of them are on beaches or mountaintops somewhere. Every one of them. Sunning themselves and not thinking about you.
The only poor souls who are stuck working during this phase are the ones who serve the tourism industry: select restaurant staff (on or near the major sites), employees at major attractions, hoteliers...and (to my horror), the marginal and chain gelaterias...and the tiniest of grocery stores.
I've been told that women are advised to not get pregnant in October/November, because even most obstetricians are on holiday in August. The pharmacies all conspire to make sure that at least one is open within a given area. So you might get heat stroke trying to find that pharmacy, but rest assured, one is open somewhere.
People are only half-joking when they say that this city becomes a little spooky. Pardon my Walking Dead reference, but when you can saunter by yourself across a Roman street that is bereft of traffic, only to then turn the corner to find hordes of sweaty, dragging tourists with slack jaws and glazed eyes stumbling around IN Piazza Navona, you can't help looking for Rick and Daryl.
When you arrive back at your own door, you keep your back to it while fiddling with the key and the lock and furtively looking around at...the sheer absence of people.
Oddly - for a person who grew up in the mountains, who had to train herself to lock the front door because she did never had to, at home - a greater sense of safety is conferred upon a city sidewalk heavily populated with strangers who don't even notice or care about you. Take them out of the picture, and it's admittedly creepy.
Bright side, you ask? Is there a bright side to this emptying out of a very large urban center?
Is there one? I suppose if you're Roman and you stay, then it's a lot like living in your favorite college town during holiday and summer breaks; you can actually park, you can probably get a table at a decent restaurant, and the line at the grocery is really short.
For the new person living here, there could be a bright side, if all of the right things are in place.
Here's one of those things:
There's our little chariot, after her sea voyage. I saw her for about 5 minutes as she was deposited outside the garage where she'll live. She was then whisked away into said garage by a nice man named Mariano. That garage is located three blocks behind this:
That's the high court of Italy. It will take 15 minutes' walk - if the traffic isn't too bad - to get to that garage from our apartment.
Why, you might ask, didn't I hop into our chariot right then and there and take her for a spin in these mostly deserted streets? After all, everyone says that this is the best time to try driving in Rome - when it is relatively empty.
Fine idea, I'd reply, if it weren't for the fact that the other aforementioned things are mostly not in place.
I have an international driver's license. One for the plus column.
Now, for the negative.
Our chariot has to have proper tags ("oh, you will wait for about two months for those" said one Italian to me, characteristically shrugging his shoulders and lifting his half-opened hands upwards - the very embodiment of 'feh, what are you going to do - complain?!?') and a super important sticker that enables her to be in the historic center of Rome, where only vehicles who have that sticker are allowed to roam.
This is, in many ways, a funny place. Locals will fully admit to being neck-deep in bureaucracy. I signed my name more times for a basic bank account here than I signed for a mortgage in the U. S. I cannot change my ATM card PIN to something more memorable. And there is no signing the back of a check and sliding it into an ATM machine for a deposit. Instead, I must go to the bank, see a teller, and then sign my name three times on two different pieces of paper, avowing that I just made the deposit.
I read once that Romans have this saying: si effettua una legge, facciamo una scappatoia: 'You make a law, we make a loophole.' There is this kind of attitude about flouting authority, exhibited most regularly when you see Romans get on and off busses without ever validating a pass, or evoked when hearing about how there are ex-pats who have lived here for decades without the proper documentation....and authority can indeed be very lax, here. We strolled thru Fiumicino airport with two recently arrived, foreign cats, but no one stopped us (it took more energy and time and resources than I care to detail to have the right health certificates and whatnot, so we were totally ready for it) to see the proper paperwork. We were not asked to provide documentation of our residence here in order to obtain cell phone plans, even though we were told we absolutely would.
But the threat of getting caught is ever-present, I'm told. And discovered infractions can be very expensive. VERY expensive. The fine for not having a validated bus pass is several times the cost of the pass itself.
Combine that with the awareness that Italian street signs are plentiful and confusing, and well...you just don't want to accidentally drive into the wrong area, back out while thinking that surely, no one saw you, and then arrive home several days later to a big fine delivered in your post - because a camera caught you.
So our chariot sits and waits for her required accessories. And that's what can happen to the bright side: dimmed by requirements and at least a healthy regard for authority - whether or not it will ever come near you.
And to many of my work colleagues back home: the irony is not lost on me. I wrote the bulk of this entry on the day that you went back to work - the day *I* went back to work, for 20 years straight. It was indeed so very strange to listen to church bells on every half hour, reminding Rome that vacations had begun, when I knew that people elsewhere were scribbling in fresh calendars, sitting in meetings, and sharing what happened on their too-brief summer break.
Hello to you all, from my vantage point, where it is quite unbelievable that everyone can and mostly does take a vacation at the same time, until I consider that in many places, everyone can and mostly does go to work at the same time. May your stresses be few, and your students be brilliant. And if they aren't brilliant, then may they be of favorable temperament. And if not that, then at least do this: drive your car to your dry cleaner and pay for your bill with a credit card, then drive to your big, brightly lit grocery store heaving with choice, and get the best fish and the best ice cream you can afford. Stop by the pharmacy and pick up your prescription, preferably from a drive-through window. And eat that ice cream while you pay your phone bill online.
And send photos. Because...August.
If you ask a contemporary Italian about the meaning of Ferragosto, the more mature one will tell you that this is the feast day for the Madonna's assumption into heaven (she literally ascended into heaven when she died, whereas the rest of us soul-float and leave our corporeal selves below, if we're headed in that direction). The church behind my apartment held a morning mass for this occasion. My bathroom was filled with the sounds of the organ and the choir. And the bell-ringing on every half hour - from all area churches - during the mid-morning was remarkable.
The more secular Italian will tell you that Ferragosto is the beginning of his or her annual summer holiday leave (although the more religious Italian will hastily add that this is true for them, too). The modern tradition of taking leave during this holiday dates back to the 1920s. In true Fascist fashion, any citizen - ranging from the most modest to the most well-off - could have 1, 2 or 3 days off.
Imagine being in a city of approximately 5 million people. For some of you, this is very easy.
Imagine having well more than a half of that population vanish. For as little as one week and as much as four or even six weeks (the Fascists would be aghast).
Imagine that population - comprised of staff and whole businesses - of your dry cleaner, your fishmonger, your pharmacist, your banker, your bus driver, your doctor...even (to my horror) your favorite gelateria....also your favorite grocer.
All of them are on beaches or mountaintops somewhere. Every one of them. Sunning themselves and not thinking about you.
 |
| I shot these Closed for the Holiday signs in a sort of 'hail of bullets' fashion. It was easy; each business was next door to the other, and all were directly across the street from me. A bar, a pasticceria, a small store, and a deli. They not only take vacations at approximately the same time, they have the same signage. |
I've been told that women are advised to not get pregnant in October/November, because even most obstetricians are on holiday in August. The pharmacies all conspire to make sure that at least one is open within a given area. So you might get heat stroke trying to find that pharmacy, but rest assured, one is open somewhere.
People are only half-joking when they say that this city becomes a little spooky. Pardon my Walking Dead reference, but when you can saunter by yourself across a Roman street that is bereft of traffic, only to then turn the corner to find hordes of sweaty, dragging tourists with slack jaws and glazed eyes stumbling around IN Piazza Navona, you can't help looking for Rick and Daryl.
 |
| AND with a full moon. Yikes. |
When you arrive back at your own door, you keep your back to it while fiddling with the key and the lock and furtively looking around at...the sheer absence of people.
Oddly - for a person who grew up in the mountains, who had to train herself to lock the front door because she did never had to, at home - a greater sense of safety is conferred upon a city sidewalk heavily populated with strangers who don't even notice or care about you. Take them out of the picture, and it's admittedly creepy.
Bright side, you ask? Is there a bright side to this emptying out of a very large urban center?
Is there one? I suppose if you're Roman and you stay, then it's a lot like living in your favorite college town during holiday and summer breaks; you can actually park, you can probably get a table at a decent restaurant, and the line at the grocery is really short.
For the new person living here, there could be a bright side, if all of the right things are in place.
Here's one of those things:
There's our little chariot, after her sea voyage. I saw her for about 5 minutes as she was deposited outside the garage where she'll live. She was then whisked away into said garage by a nice man named Mariano. That garage is located three blocks behind this:
That's the high court of Italy. It will take 15 minutes' walk - if the traffic isn't too bad - to get to that garage from our apartment.
Why, you might ask, didn't I hop into our chariot right then and there and take her for a spin in these mostly deserted streets? After all, everyone says that this is the best time to try driving in Rome - when it is relatively empty.
Fine idea, I'd reply, if it weren't for the fact that the other aforementioned things are mostly not in place.
I have an international driver's license. One for the plus column.
Now, for the negative.
Our chariot has to have proper tags ("oh, you will wait for about two months for those" said one Italian to me, characteristically shrugging his shoulders and lifting his half-opened hands upwards - the very embodiment of 'feh, what are you going to do - complain?!?') and a super important sticker that enables her to be in the historic center of Rome, where only vehicles who have that sticker are allowed to roam.
This is, in many ways, a funny place. Locals will fully admit to being neck-deep in bureaucracy. I signed my name more times for a basic bank account here than I signed for a mortgage in the U. S. I cannot change my ATM card PIN to something more memorable. And there is no signing the back of a check and sliding it into an ATM machine for a deposit. Instead, I must go to the bank, see a teller, and then sign my name three times on two different pieces of paper, avowing that I just made the deposit.
Contrarily - well, to me, at least - this is a very cash-heavy economy. No, none of that very American approach to flashing your credit card for the purchase of a bottle of soda here. I can't even set up an automatic pay-to entry on that bank account for paying my cell phone bill. I have to drop by an authorized dealer - who could be a tobacconist, actually - and submit to that dealer an otherwise blank slip of paper with my handwritten telefonino number on it, along with cash. He handles the rest. To be a bit British about it: the tobacconist 'tops up' my phone account.
But the threat of getting caught is ever-present, I'm told. And discovered infractions can be very expensive. VERY expensive. The fine for not having a validated bus pass is several times the cost of the pass itself.
Combine that with the awareness that Italian street signs are plentiful and confusing, and well...you just don't want to accidentally drive into the wrong area, back out while thinking that surely, no one saw you, and then arrive home several days later to a big fine delivered in your post - because a camera caught you.
 |
| Sure, they're translated here, but when you have 5 mad Italians honking their horns behind you, that is not the time to try looking up what 5 of these things at one corner of two one-way streets may mean. Amusingly, more than a few resources I've consulted insist that all of these are very intuitive. |
And to many of my work colleagues back home: the irony is not lost on me. I wrote the bulk of this entry on the day that you went back to work - the day *I* went back to work, for 20 years straight. It was indeed so very strange to listen to church bells on every half hour, reminding Rome that vacations had begun, when I knew that people elsewhere were scribbling in fresh calendars, sitting in meetings, and sharing what happened on their too-brief summer break.
Hello to you all, from my vantage point, where it is quite unbelievable that everyone can and mostly does take a vacation at the same time, until I consider that in many places, everyone can and mostly does go to work at the same time. May your stresses be few, and your students be brilliant. And if they aren't brilliant, then may they be of favorable temperament. And if not that, then at least do this: drive your car to your dry cleaner and pay for your bill with a credit card, then drive to your big, brightly lit grocery store heaving with choice, and get the best fish and the best ice cream you can afford. Stop by the pharmacy and pick up your prescription, preferably from a drive-through window. And eat that ice cream while you pay your phone bill online.
And send photos. Because...August.
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