I meet the daughter in Bologna at a hotel where we’ve stayed before, right in the heart of the city. All Italianate rooms, a beautiful old wooden elevator and a smelly dog that sleeps most of the day in the lounge. It’s pouring so we decide to order in Indian and watch Eurovision; as you do in Italy.
Next morning we have a belated southern hemisphere Mother’s Day. The daughter has found a great cafe where they have the most amazing selection of flavoured croissants. I choose pistachio. When I bite into it, it oozes thick pale olive pistachio cream; divine. They have raspberry, chocolate, hazelnut, you name it, they have invented it. It is a croissant above and beyond, taken to a new level that only Italians can do. It’s a student town so it’s packed with young Italians and those less fortunate beings who are trying to get the casual glamour that we all try to attain but without the inherent success.
I find a beautiful little linocut shop run by a woman and buy a small print of when Bologna also had a system of canals, which have been all but cut off except for one that we found the year before when we came to check out the Bolognese citta to see if the daughter would want to study here. She didn’t. She chose the smaller version of Modena.
We consume a platter of different cured meats and cheeses for lunch, sitting high up on stools in a crowded lane full of restaurants and market shops and people. That night we go for cocktails in a converted old chapel. I have a passionfruit margherita which is so strong I am very conscious of not falling off the stools we’re seated on. It’s a beautiful setting, frayed, decayed and softened with time, the coloured frescoes take us back. I can’t walk to the next planned restaurants. We eat here and the next day we’re back in Modena.
I stay in three different apartments during my week's sojourn here. The first apartment is huge and you can tell it has been decorated by a man. Huge blown up photos that he’s taken of rose thorns, nature turned into hills, mountains, dangerous places with enormous insects. I strangely love the place and settle in for a few days. The daughter comes to join me as she discovered that her room, when she was in Madrid, was being advertised on Air bnb. The owner was always a bit strange, making sure her tenants cleaned everything daily until the place was spotless. The daughter is feeling anxious so she said she’d move out but there’s the issue of the bond and the woman is being pretty nasty.
I spend a few days cooking and the owner of my apartment brings me homemade ricotta from a friend in the mountains. This is what I love about Italy. There are friends everywhere with connections to cows, lambs, olive groves, wineries etc that gift their homemade produce onto others via the familial networks operating. The ricotta is creamy and divine.
The next day, we join a climate change march, Greta Thunberg organised. Half of Modena seems to have turned out, lots of singing and much gelato consumed at the end.
One day we return home to a message from the lady in the apartment next door that is rented out by the same owner. An American lady who invites us for drinks. How civilised! Normally I don’t accept offers like this as what if we don’t like each other and it’s awkward but the daughter is going out with her friends, so I accept. Her apartment is grand as well. Her bedroom is huge with a beautiful ancient looking desk and windows overlooking the main street of Modena. She has a small well loved dog, compact and friendly whom she has brought from America with great difficulty. We sip Lambrusco and talk about life. She’s my age, full of vim and vigour, well dressed, well lived and interesting. We talk for hours. She asks me to come and see a property that she’s looking at the next day.
I breakfast on a pistachio croissant and discover that an antique market has taken over the huge square around the church. The sun is glinting off a veritable array of crystal chandeliers, beautiful haberdashery items, old paintings, vintage doorknobs and paraphernalia from long ago. I wish I could take it all back home with me. I return home to pack as I have to move up the road to a beautiful old building converted to a hotel and then we’re off to see a house in the countryside. We pass by such lush, foliaged countryside to a lovely home which is deluged by a heavy shower upon arrival.
The house is full of art as the couple had a gallery. They show us around and then they have prepared lunch, of course they have, they are Italian. There is no such thing as a refusal. The table is piled up with melon and prosciutto; wine procured via a friend from a vineyard not far away; beautiful cheese and fantastic bread.
A couple of hours later, we’re released but the house isn’t what my new friend was looking for. Later that night we dine at a restaurant down the road. The owners welcome my friend lovingly and we dine on fennel mouse with radicchio sprouts; fried zucchini flowers; asparagus pasta with crumbled quail egg; hazelnut tart with apricot marmalade, little truffle chocolates, fresh cherries from a friend with a tree close by and three different types of bubbly drinks - Lambrusco from Modena, Prosecco and Spumante to end the meal. Oh Italia!
One night at this beautiful hotel and then another night at an Air bnb in the centre. Very modern but in a stunning old building. The daughter is trying to get help from the University in regards to the landlady who refuses to give her back her bond even though she’s been clearly advertising the daughter’s room. The language barrier isn’t helping. The mad landlady rings every now and then to harass the daughter by saying she can have her deported. We go for Spritz and then a Negroni to help soothe the nerves.
My anxiety has come back, if I’m not walking myself through the days, it returns with a vengeance. I don’t know that the antidepressants are doing their job but maybe I have to give them more time. The Italian contingent of our drinking group, says it’s going to flood tonight and that they have to get home. We google the weather advice, it mentions rain. The daughter said Italians have a day off from University if it rains heavily. She has doubts as to whether flooding will occur. She’s right. It doesn’t and the next day we travel back up to our mountain home. It takes us nine hours to get there.
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