Playing Outside the Walls

          The driver of the oncoming car gestured in irritation out his window, slowing almost to a stop as he neared us. Later we thought perhaps he had said, “E, ma cosa vedono qui?!” (“Hey, what do you see here!?”), but then our reply to the rush of strange sounds we heard so quickly leaving his mouth, Cosa? (“What?”) was met by our interlocutor with a sound of exasperation, a change in gesture, and a refusal to continue this exchange with us, the apparently inept American tourists. Just before the first car sped away the driver of the next, to avoid crashing into the first, (or maybe just desiring his turn) slowed down and glared at us out his open window with reprobation and incredulity, and, without uttering a word, raised both hands—temporarily not concerned that this was a narrow and steep mountain road in the woods with a turn just ahead—in a gesture that seemed to say, “What the hell are you doing, you idiots? I’ve got places to be! It’s Sunday afternoon!”

            We’d decided to go outside the walls this weekend (although we do live outside the walls we often head inside them, to the heart of Lucca, for weekend shopping, meandering, entertainment), way outside the walls, all the way to the Orecchiella Natural Park in the mountains near the border of Tuscany and Emilia-Romagna. Our Sunday started with a breathtaking train ride up the Serchio Valley to Castelnuovo di Garfagnana and then close to an hour’s bus ride to the park up and up and up, past villages, bell towers, a fortress, the even higher Alpi Apuani mountains to the west, switchbacks, with honking aplenty before every one of our numerous turns, bumper to bumper encounters with oncoming vehicles where we barely squeezed past or made the other car back up until he found the last corner—generally slightly wider than the rest of the path—to allow us to pass, on past terraced agriculture, fields, then woods, and finally squeezing up into a tiny parking lot and stepping out into the Orecchiella’s’s cool, mountain air. As one always prone to car-sickness, I’m not sure if it was breathing in that delicious oxygen or just being off the bus, but I felt my body relax immediately.

            Nikolai and Ingrid glowed with excitement as they ran around the hillside, discovering the pond, the deer and rams, the rock face of the mountains just beyond us peaking out behind the clouds. Later we ventured further afield, walking through woods and meadows with gorgeous views into the distance, an alpine garden with thousands of flowers in bloom, and then on trails that led even more off the beaten track. I felt myself relax again, even more deeply, as we were now away from most of the park visitors as well. Ah, solitude! We ventured downhill on a trail through some brush, Ingrid forging ahead with Niko close behind. So nice to not have to watch out for traffic!

            Our legs, hunger, and a four year old’s patience didn’t keep up with our enthusiasm, however, and when we found ourselves at a junction with a road: Botanical Gardens over a kilometer to the left and, possibly, a way back to the park to the right, we had to make a choice. We had a map and thought heading to the right would be quicker than retracing our steps back up the trail we’d come down. It turned out to be quite a bit longer. Tired and bellies in need of appeasement, we soon stopped for a drink from our water bottle and another doling out of hunks of the loaf of bread we’d bought at the park entrance. Would my bad knee give out before we made it back? Was this in fact the right way? We opted to stick with our decision to head up the road and I decided to get a picture of it to mark our adventure within an adventure. A picture of the road and the car coming down it would also provide a scale of comparison (as in, look at this narrow road our bus had to go up!).

            We don’t know exactly what the driver’s words actually were. “What the *!$%#@ are you doing here?”, “Why the *$!@# are you taking a picture on this road when there is nothing to see?”, “This is a crazy place for the four of you to be eating bread!” are all very probable translations. Whatever it was, he probably did have something on us (hey, it wasn’t our first choice to be snacking on a strip of long, narrow and hilly pavement far from the park we’d strayed from!) Nevertheless, it felt like another reminder that there were some basic agreements of Italian civilization that we were obviously not abiding by, some cultural givens so basic that we must be either incompetent, foreigners, or both, that we must be in the wrong place, and, most definitely, were fuori le mura.

            “Outside the walls” was a blog title easily born due to truths of geography—the walls being crucial to Lucca’s layout and identity and our location outside of them being, in fact, where we now live—but also because of the obvious metaphorical corollary. Although we’d love to have some integration with the culture and people and the life they live here, we do realize we’ll always be outsiders. And part of that is definitely chosen. Fashion’s enclave within Italian culture, for example, will be an area we probably won’t throw ourselves into hoping to achieve complete native-like appearance. It’s hard to imagine Lauren donning her finest dress, five, six, or seven inch heels and putting on an hour’s worth of make-up to venture to the supermarket on her bicycle. And as for me? I pledge to stay away from the bright purple pants and yellow shirt combinations.

            There are other ways in which we might really want to blend in with the culture and people and become insiders that we know will ultimately remain elusive, successful communication coming to mind at the top of the list. Still, despite realizing that we won’t ever be mistaken for a native, that isn’t going to stop us from asking our Italian teachers for some colorful, authentic words and gestures to have at the ready for the next time arms and words are angrily flailed at us. It’s not that we want to retaliate. It’s not passive aggression necessarily or looking to start a fight. It’s deciding to play the game. Just because we’ll never actually make it “inside the walls” doesn’t mean that we won’t try. Therein lies all of the fun.