Impressions from Italy (Satis Shroff)

Italian Impressions:

A Journey to Peschiera (Satis Shroff)

The sleek, white ICE 5 (intercity express) from Hamburg on its way to Zürich arrived on time at 8 am at Green City Freiburg’s railway station. It was a chilly morning and it had rained heavily in the night. The German weather frog on TV had said it’d be raining throughout the week in south-west Germany.

When the ICE sped past the vineyards and blue hills beyond Schallstadt and Ebringen, the sun suddenly appeared and the clouds way to a blue sky. The ICE crossed the Rhine and after a short stop in Basle, Switzerland’s second biggest town. The azure mountains in the distance were a delight. A lot of Swiss passengers got in, which you could easily discern from their guttural Swiss dialect, as they laughed and talked with each other merrily. On the opposite platform a group of elderly people with rucksacks boarded the train patiently. Yes, when you’re pensioned, you don’t hurry, and take your time.

The sleek train left Basle and headed for Zürich as noiselessly as it had come.

The German railway was offering, what it called, the most beautiful stories about love. Ewig treue oder Kuss und Schluß? The old question, topical, full of tension like always. The question proposed heartily and abundantly replied by: Hermann Hesse, O. Henry, Max Frisch and Marian Keyes.

Outside in the Swiss countryside grey clouds started appearing over the horizon till they formed an ominous dark canopy..

In Zürich, a big Turkish family was in the process of boarding another ICE, opposite to the one I was sitting in. A blue-eyed slender blonde with a child on her small, flat hip, was helping her Turkish friends get into the train. Beautiful, lithe second-generation Turkish ladies, with their hooded mothers and a lot of baggage. They were all gesticulating, shouting to hurry up, and finally they managed to make it.

In Zürich I had time at my disposal to visit the ‘India! India festival’ with Bollywood dance and fashion shows, music and dance workshops, bazaar, Bollywood DJ parties and,of course, so-called ‘exotic’ food. This year Madhya Pradesh Tourism was the guest. You could hear Indian music and see Indian’s colours at the Bahnhof bazaar, buy the latest Bollywood CDs, saris, salwar kameez till early morning. Can you learn Bharatnatyam within 60 minutes? Do a Siddhayoga crash-course in another 60 minutes with Charu Diwan?

I had to jump into a Swiss train and within a short time it reached Aierolo, a wonderful, scenic place with high, steep, snow-capped mountains. On the right you could see an endless queue of cars on their way to the Gotthard Tunnel. The came Faldo, with hills that had pine trees, like in the Black Forest, but Mother Nature was not wild here and the Swiss foresters had everything under control. There were scores of tunnels, waterfalls, mountain streams and greenery where you looked. Bellinzola was sunny and after Locarno, with its lovely blue hills and lake-side scenery, the train pulled up at Chiasso via Balerba, a small station. Italian-style houses started appearing in abundance, houses that Herman Hesse preferred to paint in water-colours.

This time Trenitalia, a train with not much comfort and you were reminded of the song sung by Sir Swivel Hip: ‘I’m All Shook-Up.’ If you’d held a tumbler of liquid cream in your hand you’d have schlagsahne by the time you reached your destination.

It was 2:05 pm when the train moved towards Venice after I had changed the trains again. This time it was a comfortable train and the passengers were different. Young, fashionable African ladies in tight leather skirts and white blouses, wearing gold necklaces and high heels. Really chic. An Italian lady was on her way to Venice and wanted to know if that was the right train.

‘Si, Senora!’ I told her.

She gave me a thankful smile replied, ‘Mille Grazie!’ as she went down the aisle with her luggage-on-wheels. A group of rucksack tourists came by, speaking English with heavy American accents. Junior Year Abroad, I thought, and I was right.

Outside, old electric trains were parked in a siding and they were coloured uniformly in blue and white. Milano was expanding and it took a long time to go past its suburbs. There were also rusty, big-wheeled freight trains and a series of beton bunker-like houses.

* * *

PESCHIERA II (Satis Shroff)

Piscus means fish in Latin, and the coat of arms of the idyllic fishing town Peschiera, located at the southern tip of the Garda lake, are two silver eels and a golden star, revealing that fishing was the main trade of till tourism came with its hotels, cottages and four-star camping places.

As you walk on a Monday morning an aroma of grilled sardines overwhelms your nostrils. Peschiera has 10,000 people and a small river, Mincio, which is the only outlet for the water of Garda, which is Italy’s biggest lake, the other two being Lago Maggiore and Como. Since it was of strategic importance, the Scaliger constructed a fortification there, and was later further developed in the 19th century by the Austrians with caserns and protection walls.

‘When God painted the world, the colours fell from his hands and covered the land over the Lake Garda,’ say the lake dwellers even today. The lake lies in the Italian provinces: Cenetia, Lombardy and Trentino. The colours of this landscape are: blue, green and turquoise with lush Mediterranean vegetation on the lakeside and cliffs. The wind, the weather and time of the day work their magic on the water-surface. To the north, we have alpine, craggy and steep-walled cliffs, reminiscent of fjords. In the south the mountains become hills and hillocks and lose themselves in the wide Po Valley.

Under the soft light you see palms, citrus trees, olives, mimosa and the air is filled with Mediterranean aroma. The lake Garda is 52 km long and 17km wide.

Once upon a time, 300 million years ago, the Garda was a tropical sea, which retreated later. The sea arm was carved by glaciers and they deposited high mountains that in the end separated Lake Garda from the Adriatic Sea. The Garda town received its name from the nymph Engardina. When you walk along the lanes of Garda town, along the elegant harbour promenade and the yacht harbour, you see everyone’s busy. The elegant restaurants and chic boutiques catch your eyes. The villas and the old palaces have changed hands and belong to private persons. Here’s where the noblesse spend their holidays.

To the right and left of lake Garda we have the oriental and occidental panorama highways. You see the cars snaking their way. If you can get away from the maddening tourist-crowd, you can discover hidden jewels of Italian culture. When the German poet Goethe came to malcesine, he was attracted by its tranquillity and beauty. I felt the same way whereever I went in Italy, whether it was Venice, Chiogga, Rome, Florence, Peschiera, Desenzano right up to the northern Garda: Riva and Torbole. Nietzsche’s favourite place was Hotel Sole wheneever he came to Lake Garda. The hoel lies in the Old Town, right near the waterfront. The hotel has been renovated and it’s quiet, despite the bustle of the market and tourists in the adjacent areas.

The cobalt blue lake, the sleek, white yachts, the colourful boats daubed in red or blue in the lakeside. The sun does down and the light go on like clusters of glittering diamonds between the waterfront and the sky. Elderly people holding hands, young people experience their first holiday kiss near the romantic lakeside. There’s love, pure magic in the Mediterranean south.  Most tourists prefer pizza, tortelloni or spaghetti. In Volta Mantovana you can try out  ‘Tortelli di zucca’ or ‘Mantovana’s speciality ‘Capunsei,’ which is gnocci. You can wash it down with the local wine. I preferred a Bardolino Rosa, a light rosy wine but the red Bardolino is also good for a sumptuous dinner. As a dessert you can order either ‘Chisol’ or ‘Sbrisolona.’ If you prefer to do a bit of wine-tasting you can visit the wine-cellar and the oil-mill, where you’ll be pampered with classical Veronese wines.

For your gastronomic delight you can do a boat-ride from Peschiera to Malcesine, where you can enjoy typical local dishes. You can begin with zucchini cream with olives and lake fish crostini. Then you try Bruschetta with olive oil from Malcesine. Then there are mouthful cheese tid-bits filled with apple and honey. I’d suggest sweet-water crabs and donkey meat from Lombardy, served with Polenta, as well as trout, tortellini from Emilia Romagna. You can also try noodles filled with scamorza-cheese, pike with Mediterranean herbs and pumpkin-cream, Baldo-truffles and Ricotta from Gargano. The finale is a coffee served with a grappa to digest all.

* * *

Verona: The City of the Eternal Julia

It was the German writer Heinrich Heine who wrote in 1828 about Verona as ‘the gateway of Italy, a place where you can enjoy the golden sunshine of lovely Italy. Goethe was also fascinated by Verona. Since the Germanic winter is long and cold, Verona was treasured as the first stop for the German folks walking with their possessions, seeking refuge from the cold nordic forests by crossing the Alps, much like the Tibetan folk running away from penury or communism.

I went to Verona by local bus, a one hour ride from Peschiera, and sauntered around the arena, where a Cleopatra awaited to be photographed with you, the arena serving as a historical backdrop. Endless chic, elegant shops along the shopping lanes, and all lanes and alleys led to the big fountain and Plaza, which were surrounded by cafes, gelati shops, Vietnamese seeking a quick profit, selling souvenirs from Venice all the year. A begging old woman was given a warning receipt by a uniformed policewoman with a verbal warning to beg elsewhere. The chic shops of Dior, Zara, Gucchi, Prada attracted pretty Veronese women and those on a shopping-spree in Verona.

The number of visitors since those days of deprivation has increased steadily and they’ve learned to cherish and appreciate the culture and climate of sunny Italy. Verona has a population of 300,000.

The most famous attraction is the Roman arena which turns into the most visited Open-Air Opera-House of Italy, and the Palazzo Capuleti in which Shakespeare’s tragedy ‘Romeo and Julia’ is staged.

You do the sight in the city of Verona by going on foot. Some of the churches in Verona demand entrance fees. The arena of Verona is 128m long, 109m wide and a well-visited oval for opera-friends.