The local bus, dispensing and collecting en route, makes its own slow transition – as does the overnight train. Languages change at the border; memories of the place just visited can be carried with you. Flights move too far too fast. It is as if your memories cannot keep up and are lost, amongst too swift impressions of the utterly new.
Athens
Monastiraki square bubbled with the bustle of Athenians and tourists alike. Fruit sellers, bananas hanging from the awnings of their wooden stands, bellowed the price of their wares in rich resonant voices. The sweetest seedless grapes were piled up in bunches. Heart shaped chocolate donuts wafted their merciless scent through the crowds. Koulouri, sesame bread rings, were sold hot. But in this land of treats, baklava was king.
On every corner, hunks of meat rotated on vertical spits, dripping oily juice. Olive skinned men brandished large steel knives, watching the meat brown before carving a few more slices. Each portion was adeptly stuffed into a pita with a handful of salad. A blend of garlic, yoghurt and cucumber – tzatziki – was then smothered inside the warm bread pocket, it was sprinkled with chilli powder, and another hot gyros was doled out to the next hungry Greek.
Gyros is sold everywhere, in tavernas, tourist restaurants and fast food stands, and is Athens’ tastiest, cheapest, and most convenient meal. Few streets are without a local outlet of some sort, complete with a gyros master carving away, his belly bulging from years in the trade. Continue reading Athens>>
Rome
A single coin thrown into the Trevi Fountain, with your right hand, over your left shoulder, is said to ensure a return to Rome. The tradition might have originated in ancient Rome, when an another, older fountainhead existed here, at the meeting of three roads (tre vie) and end of an aqueduct, which served Romans for more than 400 years. The water, if drunk before a journey, was thought to impart good fortune and promise a speedy return.
More modern superstitions suggest that throwing two coins ensures a marriage, three coins a divorce. And the faithful throw about €3000 into the pool below Neptune’s sculpted feet every day. It piles up steadily in the shallow water and is collected at night, funding a supermarket for hard up Romans. Continue reading Rome>>
Florence
An earthy rainbow of suede belts hung from rows of open air market stalls, iron railings groaned under the weight of plush leather jackets. Wallets were fanned out on display: classic black, brown ostrich leather, warm beige, all tagged with the outline of a splayed cow’s hide, “Genuine Leather” stamped in gold on each.
Tourists stroked potential purchases, humming and haring to impartial companions. Faces solemnly examined the goods, a few pairs of eyes glinted like kids’ in a sweet shop. The scent of leather wafted pleasantly between the shoppers and I recalled the words of a tour guide from my first visit to the city. “Don’t be fooled by the soft, supple feel of imitation leather, or the leather mark they copy onto fakes,” he warned. “And, whatever you do, when the salesperson assures you that genuine leather has leather’s genuine smell, don’t be fooled by the can of spray on leather that the thing’s been hosed down with either.”
Our journey to the city had been tiresome. Europe’s efficient train system faded into memory as a series of announcements left us running between platforms while the elusive departure point of our onward train was established. We arrived at the next junction to discover that our connection had been delayed by an hour. Iain passed the time napping on a waiting room’s bench. A further hour’s delay was announced. Continue reading Florence>>
Venice
I sat in Hotel Caneva’s small reception area, chatting to Stephano, the night time receptionist. Water, displaced by passing boats, lapped up against a rudimentary wooden barricade, erected to keep guests from the slimed over steps leading down to a small canal. Gondoliers, standing stiff above tourists, shouted echoing “Hoys!” as they twisted blind past the building’s dark exterior.
Stephano had worked in London, which he explained his easy, if imperfect, use of English. “I remember,” he told me, “when I arrive, I tell the owner of the hotel that I will be staying two years. He did not believe me,” he laughed, “but I stay two years. Exactly!” Continue reading Venice>>
And in Vienna…
We had ninety short days in Continental Europe. The period was dictated by my Schengen visa (which all South Africans require, unless, like Claire, they possess other, more useful passports) and meant skipping through Austria – with only one full day and two nights in Vienna and two days of hiking in the Alps, sleeping in a caravan near Innsbruck – on our way from Germany’s south to Italy’s north.
We feel qualified to write about neither, and would, besides, have only a dull list of sites to impart. But we feel it worth mentioning that, in the course of our pleasant day’s meander through Vienna, we stumbled on hundreds of two metre high, brightly painted fibreglass bears, filling an enigmatic circle in Karlsplatz. All were facing inwards, arms outstretched.
The United Buddy Bears were, like us, visiting Vienna. Each bear had been painted by an artist in one of the UN’s 192 member states and represented something of their origin: a rather dull wildlife and savannah motif covered South Africa’s bear, a pie eyed and lustful bear represented the Netherlands. Come to promote “tolerance and international understanding,” they were sold at auction in aid of UNICEF, the UN’s Children’s Fund. By November, €1 315 000 had been raised.
The unusual exhibit was more compelling than any museum I’ve entered: adults mingled slowly, smiling at the names of unknown countries, children touched the bears, giggling. Claire and I took photos of those that represented every country we, at that stage, thought we’d visit. You can click on the image above, or here, to see them. Only their stomachs are visible in the thumbnails, clicking through will display the entire bear.
