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Rodloga Sweden

Are some places cursed?

We had to ask ourselves this question about a bucolic, beautiful, tiny island in the Stockholm archipelago, Rödlöga, four hours by ferry from the capital. The reason we’d even asked ourselves this question is because a friend, the inimitable Meg Ray, baker extraordinaire, author, and founder of Miette bakeries in the San Francisco area, loves this island and she’s run a small cafe on it for a few weeks every summer for five years. In a cafe with no running water, indoor plumbing, or electricity she is able to work magic with a generator to power a clunky oven and convert Baltic sea water for kitchen use. She loves this place so much that last summer during the uncertainty of Covid travel restrictions she rode her electric bike from Paris, where she lives half the year, to Stockholm as to not miss a summer at the cafe.

So we had to find out more and planned a trip with a couple of friends to visit and film in June. Even in the planning stages odd things began to happen. One of the crew that our director friend had booked stopped returning phone calls and never surfaced again—a first for all of us with years of production experience. Another crew member pulled out at the last minute; a friend who was going to come found out her Italian visa had expired, and if that wasn’t enough, fell off a rock wall onto a rock staircase and had to go to the hospital for stitches on her face. A friend’s child had a school crisis that almost derailed the June trip, and ultimately we had a health emergency that precluded any travel for John and me.

Despite all of this a brave skeleton crew persevered with the June trip, including Donella, and they had a complete immersion into the Swedish island summer lifestyle. Donella ended up loving it so much that she stayed for the rest of the summer to bake in the cafe with Meg, so in late August we were quite confident that the curse had lifted and it was safe to proceed with a trip. We ignored that one of the chefs had just been thrown off the island, almost literally, for outhouse misuse—”You and your stuff will be on the 4:30 ferry or all with be thrown into the sea.” And that Balthazar, the commercial oven, broke down and needed a hard-to-get part, leaving the crew to bake in the few private ovens around the island. And that a staff member had a mental health crisis and needed to leave the island.

But still believing in rationality over curses John and I landed in Stockholm, a city of water, bridges, islands, inlets, ferries, and boats. We checked into the lovely Hotel Lydmar, directly across the street from the ferry to Rödlöga. The next morning we boarded the Sjogull, or Seagull, which was the cutest ferry I’ve ever been on, complete with potted plants on the tables. Islands unfolded as far as the eye can see, reflected in the calm Baltic, with larger and more formal Swedish summer homes giving way to smaller cabins the further we got from Stockholm. Two colors dominated, the now-protected shade of Swedish red, which originally was a stain created from the remnants of iron mining, and a golden shade of yellow, which was a color used by the wealthier families who had gold mines and could use the runoff as a paint stain. Common to all were the small, individually-built sauna buildings located to make the jump into the cold Baltic a short step away from the sauna—tiny, doll-house like echoes of the larger houses they were paired with. Here the Baltic is so far inland and distant from the ocean that it’s half salt and half fresh water and there are no tides, so buildings are only a foot or so above water level, making for an intimate relationship between the buildings and the sea.

The archipelago numbers somewhere around 25,000 islands. I asked a few Swedes what counted as an island—when we were on the ferry we saw rocks barely breaking the surface with only room for a couple of seagulls to large inhabitable islands—but no one I asked was certain of the definition. Although undefinable in number the islands are undeniable in beauty. The rock formations are smooth and undulous. The glaciers shaped this landscape, which is still rebounding from the weight of the ice; the elevation raises by three millimeters every year. Something about the newness of the landscape, which only emerged in today’s recognizable form during the time of the Vikings, feels otherworldly and distinct to this part of the world, like the glaciers have only recently retreated.

The ferry pulled into Rödlöga and our suitcases were loaded in a wheelbarrow, the only way to move things around the island. Rödlöga is inhabited for six to eight weeks during the summer months by Swedish families, many of whom have been coming here to family houses for generations. There are about a hundred houses scattered across the island, some located on nearby small islands accessible only by private boat. The tiny harbor with its circle of red wooden houses and buildings and large boulders was gorgeous.

Rodloga Sweden

It had been misting and we were instructed about how to walk across the glistening, perfectly smooth large granite formations which were as slippery as ice. Our red wooden guest house was the size of a shed, with twin beds head-to-head. Water for washing and drinking was pumped from a green hand pump in the yard. The lengthy instructions for the outhouse were intimidating. Let’s just say that liquids and solids go in different places and must never meet. Not taking this seriously is what had caused the chef to be cast off the island. Any bathing during our visit would need to happen in the Baltic. Poisonous snakes and ticks were rumored to outnumber the people and were taken seriously as Lyme disease was prevalent.

Meg was drawn to the island because she relishes a challenge. She wanted to take this rough gem and with the help of the locals—including a long history of the island teens working at the cafe—marry traditional Swedish cuisine and baking with her experience and creativity. When on the island Meg lives in a tiny cabin about a ten-minute walk from the café and when she walks to work at 4 a.m., in broad daylight, through the trees and along the water she tries to get a sense for the weather to determine if the ferry will be crowded and how many people will be arriving on sailboats for lunch to plan for how much bread and food they need to make.

Swedish cabin Rodloga

Donella’s cabin next to the sea

Watching Meg and Donella at work was like seeing a dance unfold. The two of them working almost wordlessly with Edith Piaf’s “Je Ne Regrette Rien” blasting on the speakers, simultaneously making multiple delicious things based on their drawers full of sourdough starters: Doughrien Greg, the rye starter; Tillsbury Doughgirl, or Tilly, for walnut and raisin bread; Hank The Farmer, used for a simple milk bread; and Love for the cardamom buns. The baking was fueled by strong coffee, seemingly the national drink of Sweden. On Meg’s first year on the island the coffee machine broke and she had to figure out how to rig up a new one using gravity and water heated by the sun.

Some of Meg and Donella’s creations

Meg has fallen in love with fermentation and Sweden is a good place to explore it. She’s been experimenting in new types of sourdough as well as pickled vegetables, kombucha coffee, and fermented ginger beer. With such a short growing season the Swedes had to master food storage to survive the long winters, going back to ancient times. Remains of fermented fish stored in an early Mesolithic settlement in eastern Sweden that date from 9200 years ago were recently found, according to the Journal of Archaeological Science—the oldest fermented food yet discovered. Today, Sweden offers sourdough hotels for bread-baking travelers to drop off their sourdough starters to be fed while they are out of town. One is conveniently located in Stockholm’s Arlanda airport.

We got invited to go out on a 1930s wooden boat with the photographer shooting Meg’s cookbook, Tomas Södergren, which revealed the island to be even more beautiful by water.

Settled into our red cabin and watching our daughter work while we idled we assumed all was good, but before we were able to eat our first cinnamon bun the curse continued. Meg revealed that she’d been having nerve pain in both arms and that her fingers were getting numb. The nurse on the island insisted that the medical helicopter come and take her to the hospital to be checked out, and as she’d recently had a tick bite and had had Covid in the winter, there were a lot of possibilities for what could be causing her symptoms. She arrived at a small local hospital by helicopter in the evening and at 2 a.m., after they determined she wasn’t dying immediately, the doctor told her she had to leave despite the fact there were no hotels open and she knew no one. She successfully pleaded for a morning release, we went to work finding her somewhere to stay on the mainland as she was in excruciating pain, and we set to work trying to pack things up on the island as it was clear she wasn’t going to be able to come back to finish up the remaining week that the cafe was scheduled to be open.

This is where I wish I could say the island banded together to help and support Meg but sometimes things in tiny towns get complicated. Usually when someone wants to improve somethings there’s a group that prefers the old ways, and they came out in force, voicing in equal parts that store-bought bread had always been just fine and frustration that Meg wouldn’t be there for the final week or so of the season to continue to bake fresh bread and pastries. It got uncomfortable enough that we were all delighted to board the ferry back to Stockholm, complete with all Meg’s bags.

Meg is now back in the California working on finishing her cookbook about her experiences in Sweden and trying to solve her medical mystery.

A few finds from Stockholm that were a highlight of our trip—two nursery and garden centers with lovely restaurants featuring produce grown on site, Rosendals Trädgård and Ulriksdal Trädgårdscafé. We stayed at the Hotel Nofo which was lovely.

And we now believe in curses.

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Hotal Al Ponte Antico Venice

Venice discoveries

I love Venice but I’ve always hated the area around the Rialto Bridge. It’s too crowded, usually hot, and lined with the kind of restaurants where they try to lure you in as you walk by waving menus in English coated with plastic. My preferred neighborhood, Dorsoduro, feels more local and I’ve shared my favorite haunts here. But when we decided to go to Venice recently for John’s birthday to take advantage of the lack of crowds, we booked a hotel a friend had recommended that was smack dab in the middle of the Rialto Bridge area and we discovered a couple of gems.

The Hotel al Ponte Antico is a restored palazzo right on the Grand Canal next to Rialto Bridge. We went a little nuts for John’s birthday and booked their Junior Suite with Patio with glass doors that opened onto a private quai on the Grand Canal. No railings, no separation, just the traffic and trade of the canal passing by at eye level. The main photo above is the table outside our room. They also have a memorable porch for breakfast and aperitivi. No long lens in this shot—Rialto really is that close. The hotel has less than 10 rooms so it is lovely and intimate. We were lucky enough to have had the whole place to ourselves.

al Ponte Antico venice

The restoration from a nearly empty shell took years and unleashed all the monkeys in the zoo at the Venetian Planning Department. The two brothers who own the hotel were completely hands-on during the restoration and were joined daily by at least one Venetian official who watched over everything. One day they were painting the exterior wood trim of a multi-paned glass door overlooking the Grand Canal a certain city-approved shade of brown with a hint of red. On the inside the owner asked the painter to mix in a touch more of the red which they applied as a test to a small section of the door. The planning official then stopped work because the color had too much red. They offered to paint it over immediately with the approved color they were applying outside but the damage had already been done. All work on site was halted for two weeks and they had to pay a penalty. He recently received a certified letter saying that he must report to jail for the offense. This he shrugged off saying that the jail sentence would be reversed with yet another fee.

Good food in Venice is hard to find as so many restaurants are geared to tourists. We found Ai Mercanti in a tiny, nearly impossible to find square that offers innovative, local, and delicious food. And we discovered that even a stone’s throw away from the main tourist thoroughfares this area of Venice has its share of locals, quiet streets, and hauntingly beautiful canals.

The islands are always fun to explore and easy to access via the Vaporetto line 1. We headed out to Burano, nestled next to Torcello. Burano is a fishing village famous for its brightly painted houses and lace. The houses were even more vibrant in color than what I was expecting and a visual delight.

But what really made the trip special was a destination lunch at Venissa, which is on a tiny adjoining island accessible by footbridge. Venissa has a Michelin star and a large garden where they grow their own grapes for an acclaimed white wine. We ate next door to the one-star at their more casual Osteria Contemporanea.

Venissa Burano Venice

The tasting menu was diverse and delicious but most interesting were the paired wines—all whites— which were unusual and lovely. We’ve ended up tracking several down to have at home. Two of the four were from a small winery near Padova, Maeli, who takes advantage of their highly volcanic soil to produce some interesting sparkling wines featuring yellow Muscat grapes. We had their Dila Sparkling Wine and their Diloro Fior D’Arancio dessert wine—both fabulous—and I saw that they are available at a couple of US retailers. Maeli is headed by a woman winemaker, Elisa Dilavanzo, as is one of the other whites we loved, Arianna Occhipinti’s SP68 Bianco, from Sicily. Venissa has a small hotel and offers cooking and wine courses.

Venissa Burano Venice

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The Venice I love

When we first moved to Italy several years ago we lived in Venice for six weeks in August and ended up loving it more than ever. Several of you have asked for Venice advice so I thought it warranted a story. We love Venice, and feel protective of it, and want friends to experience the things that make it so special for us.

John rigged up a camera obscura in our rental apartment in Venice which projected our small view of the Grand Canal on our wall.

No umbrellas:

Groups of tourists following umbrella-equipped guides has to be a feature of the inner circle of Hell. One of the keys to enjoying Venice is never to be where these groups are. That means sticking to neighborhoods during the day and exploring anywhere near the Piazza San Marco only at night. Once you leave the Stazione-Rialto Bridge-Piazza San Marco superstrada of humanity you can get into neighborhoods and experience a whole different Venice. Piazza San Marco is ravishing at night, and it’s even worth it to splurge on the most expensive coffee you will ever have and sit at Caffè Florian at least once. The only time I’d recommend breaking the Piazza San Marco only-at-night rule is for the Secret Itineraries Tour at the Doge’s Palace, where you go into some special places in the Palace—including where Casanova was held prisoner, and inside the Bridge of Sighs. (If you book through the museum it’s half the price of doing it through a private tour, but places fill up fast.)

Our hood:

We love the Dorsoduro area near the Accademia museum. With quiet streets, interesting stores, and cafes and restaurants that have more locals it was an easy place for us to feel at home and we’ve returned many times. We lived near Campo San Barnabas and Campo Santa Margherita, both of which are lovely places to linger. There’s a university right by Campo Santa Margherita so it has a nice student vibe in addition to the local families with kids playing soccer.

Campo Santa Margherita:

Caffè Rosso (photo above) on Campo Santa Margherita—no formal name, just a red painted facade with white “Caffe” painted over the door. It’s my favorite place to have a Spritz (the classic Venetian cocktail with Aperol, soda water, and prosecco) in the afternoon.

—As you face Caffe Rosso, several doors to the left, there is a place with a floor lamp placed outside, and a little white dog, called Osteria alla Bifora. The space is beautiful with ancient beams and it has a nice selection of simple things to eat. The tagliere (literally “cutting board”) of prosciutto, salumi, and cheese was our dinner many a night.

—Pizza Volo is great, and take out only, if you are in the mood to get a slice and sit in the piazza.

Campo San Barnaba:

— In Campo San Barnaba, there’s a little street that leads off the square called Calle Lunga San Barnaba which has several of our favorite restaurants. A famous one, 4 Feri just went out of business due to Covid and a rent dispute, but fortunately the next door restaurant, La Bitta, another of our favorites, is still going strong. A dessert that we make often—an amazing spice cake with hints of pepper, red wine, paprika, and cumin—is from this restaurant and the owner gave us the recipe.

Ai Casin dei Nobili is good for pizza. They have a retractable roof over one of their dining rooms that is lovely on a hot evening. There’s also a branch on the Zattere.

— GROM ice cream on Campo Santa Barnaba is a chain, but really, really good.

—Between Campo Santa Margherita and Campo San Barnaba you pass over a canal on the Ponte dei Pugni, or ”Bridge of Fists.” They used to have fist fights between the youths of the two islands, outlawed in 1705, because of the injuries and fatalities.

—Here’s an extra credit, super great spot, if you can find it. If you cross the bridge slightly down from the entrance to Ai Casin dei Nobili, find the Calle dei Cherieri, and take it all the way to the end you’ll be on a dock on the Grand Canal, right at water level. I think it’s the most intimate view of the Grand Canal in Venice and a great place for a picnic.

Accademia:

—As you head back toward Accademia you need to find Ponte San Trovaso and Cantinone Gia Schiavi. It is one of the most famous places for bacari, also known as cicchetti, which are small, seasonal, freshly-made bar snacks and a large selection of wines by the glass, and grappa. Go around dusk when everybody gets a drink and cicchetti and hangs around outside. Alessandra, the mom, runs the place with her four sons. (This place just headlined a recent New York Times article. The other suggestions for cicchetti in the article look promising to investigate on my next trip.) There’s a boat yard opposite which is one of the last remaining gondola repair yards in Venice, which will be the topic of a future Itch.

Markets:

—I hate the crowds right by the Rialto bridge, but the outdoor market is invaluable for cooking in an apartment kitchen or provisioning a picnic. There are some high-end food stores in the area. Also, the produce boat parked at Ponte dei Pugni has a great selection.

I loved this lunch straight from the Rialto market.

Other parts of Venice, and islands:

—To go far off the tourist path take a vaporetto (line 12) to Torcello, the first of the inhabited islands of the Venetian lagoon. (Founded in 452—after Attila the Hun razed mainland villages. Most people left for other islands in the 1300s after malaria got too bad on Torcello.) There’s an inn and restaurant called Locanda Cipriani that is a fabulous destination for lunch. It was started by the founder of Harry’s Bar in 1935 and has been run by the family ever since. Ernest Hemingway lived there for a season while he wrote Across the River and Into the Trees. It’s a haunting, gorgeous, nearly deserted island with a beautiful “cathedral” from 639 with some lovely mosaics.

—The Jewish ghetto is interesting and there’s a famous Jewish restaurant Gam Gam. You can even get a table outside and eat right on the Canal Cannaregio. The streets in back of it are a quiet and haunting place to get lost.

— The Lido. Late one summer afternoon we decided to go for a swim and headed to the Lido. Very Italian scene—the beach is totally occupied by beach clubs with small bathing huts and chairs. Groups of families rent the same cabanas year after year, share the cost, and invite dozens of relatives and friends, so the beach was so crowded with towels, chairs, and people that we could hardly make our way to the water. We started swimming and by the time we turned around an hour later we were shocked to discover that the beach was empty. It was after 6pm and there is obviously an unspoken rule not to be on the beach after 6. That’s where we also started to notice that Italians love to do things in packs. Why go anywhere alone when you can go with a crowd?

—The Libreria Acqua Alta bookstore has ended up on a lot of “most beautiful bookstores in the world” lists on social media, but it is worth seeing in person if you love books. Plus, when we were there one of its fabulous cats was standing guard over an honest-to-GodREAD MORE

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The three diviners

Ten years ago our friends needed a new well. Their contractor suggested using a scientific approach to the question of where the well should be placed: have three different diviners come out at different times and if there was a common location that all three selected then that would be the spot to drill. To be as scientifically rigorous as possible the contractor suggested using diviners with different techniques. Although the techniques differed the diviners were remarkably similar: old, very short, Tuscan men.

The first diviner to visit our friends brandished a forked wooden divining rod. I am not sure if this was the same old, very short, Tuscan man who our contractor had brought in for a consultation about our water situation about five years ago. According to our builder he is famous all over the area. He appeared to be such at the top of his profession that he had an assistant carry the divining rod until he needed it. Maybe the assistant dropped the stick, or this was a different famous rod-using-diviner, but our friends’ expert appeared alone. He wandered all over their hilly four acres until he was satisfied that he had found three spots that he was certain contained water. These were subtly marked.

The second diviner came a week later. He was not a fan of the stick method and instead deployed a heavy washer suspended from a string which he proceeded to swing in a circle as he walked. He covered the acres as well and ultimately declared that he had found three spots which were carefully and unobtrusively marked. One of his spots was very near one from the first diviner.

My friends waited impatiently for what the third diviner would discover. He arrived a week later, introduced himself, and then turned away from my friends and appeared from the back to be fiddling with his pants. He turned back around while zipping up his fly and had a meter-long piece of metal wire emerging from the front of his trousers. He walked around the property, swinging the metal wire which preceded him, until he arrived at a spot and declared that he didn’t need to look further. This was the place where the water was. He knew because the wire was connected his “most valuable and sensitive pair” and he pointed to the wire and to the valuable and sensitive pair. Remarkably the spot he identified was very close to the position that the other two diviners had found.

Thus the well placement was scientifically determined and the task of drilling commenced. Water was struck and our friends have never had a problem with supply since.

 

 

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The Signora of the grass

Old men stand in small groups on the street by our house to watch me mow. Being men, I am certain they have strong opinions about what I am doing. As Italian men I am even more certain none of them agree, except that I am doing it wrong. People are often referred to by their eccentricities and I am sure I have earned a nickname like La Signora dell’erbe.

That I’ve started doing the mowing doesn’t sound momentous, but when you have over ten acres and are watched by hundreds of eyes from the village it quickly gets overwhelming, especially in spring when it feels like you can see the grass grow. I pickup up this, eh hobby, because John has been having some problems with his back and the experts all agree that mowing is not helpful. When he was doing it I would often be stopped in the square, sometimes by people I don’t know, who would offer their complimenti to my husband about his mowing which is why I know the state of our grass is of interest in a town where not a lot happens.

I first make straight, careful rows but as I start to navigate around all the trees my mowing paths begin to look like cooked spaghetti. I am sure there are best practices about this—how to mow around a bunch of olive trees without sacrificing one’s precise pattern. If it involves stopping the blade, I’m not interested. I think that’s cheating, like lifting your pencil on one of those puzzles where you are supposed to create a design without lifting your pencil.

My partner in all things mowing is the magnificent Grillo Climber. Grillo means cricket in Italian and my bright green mowing marvel can navigate almost any hill. There are a couple of slopes that need to be mowed parallel that do worry me in case of tipping over, which might mean death.  John tells me that the Grillo doesn’t have a problem with these slopes, except for one dangerous part which I will know when I get there. I think he knows that I have just renewed our life insurance policies.

There are always tall weeds and grass that are too close to each tree to cut and make my end product look sloppy. There is time to daydream while mowing and I think of strapping young men bearing weed wackers showing up to whack my weeds. And I do not mean this metaphorically. (I refuse to go British and use their term, strimmer. Weed whacker has that in your face American directness that I love.)

Before my new side-gig in lawn maintenance I never thought much about decapitation. Rarely comes up when pitching a client. Now, the brim of the hat I choose when I mow becomes important—not too large to block seeing the low tree limbs. I comfort myself in the news that Cate Blanchett recently had a small chainsaw accident (she’s fine…). If Cate can wield a chainsaw Nancy can dominate cutting the grass.

I’ve been at this for six months and so far the tally has been: John’s carefully laid out drip irrigation for the baby trees, ripped up. A family of hare, saved. The battle between a metal stake, the mower, and my finger, finger lost the small fight, but it’s healing well and wasn’t too bad. A field of chest-high wild blackberries (the dreaded rovi), gone.

Maybe next I will try the chainsaw.

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Search and rescue—house hunting in Tuscany

When I saw where the “mad” brother had lived for decades, and died in the 1950s, his battered old clothes still hanging on hooks on the wall next to the bare mattress on the dirty stone floor, shaving cream still over the sink, I realized I wasn’t house hunting in the San Francisco Bay Area anymore.

As you might have guessed from the last Itch, when I shared how we purchased our house in Tuscany, nothing is predictable about real estate in Italy. When we were looking for a house to buy we’d already put down roots in our village—kids in school, good friends, about eight percent of daily life figured out, and we were falling more in love with our village every day. One of our local expat friends who had moved from our village to the next town over regretted making this change and said there’s no recreating the first love of your initial bonding with a town in Italy. This meant that we didn’t throw a wide net over several regions to look at “appropriate” properties but went deep locally, looking at every house that might be available in our immediate area, like the mad brother dwelling above. Before we were able to buy the house we wanted all along we looked at about fifty houses ranging from ruins to completely restored, each one a complete surprise.

When you look at real estate in America there is a certain set of assumptions that from my newly found perspective seem pretty boring and to lack imagination, like presuming there will be a kitchen. Here every viewing was an adventure—is there a foundation here under all the brush? Will the tree growing through the roof be difficult to remove? Is that a dead … rat? pigeon? Don’t step there or you will fall through the floor. Can you give me a leg up so I can break through this window to open the door? How hard would be it to put in a road to reach this place? And the nearly universal question, will this smell ever go away? The latter is usually linked to houses where there are still livestock living on the ground floor, but not exclusively. One house, which we were very tempted by, was particularly malodorous with pigs and geese under one part of the house, a dog kennel under another, and rounds of beautiful handmade cheese ripening all over the dining room table.

The American obsession with staging real estate has grown from the old trick of baking cookies during a showing to Oscar-worthy set design that seeks to erase any possible remnant of the current owners so that prospective buyers can imagine themselves in a neutral space full of possibility. If a cosmic antimatter to staging exists it would be Italian real estate viewings. Even at the nicest properties we looked at the agent arrived at the same time as we did, and as Italian houses have thick wooden shutters on the outside of every window and door, we entered with the agent into a world of perfect blackness. The trick during a tour of a cave when the guide turns out the flashlights to show complete darkness would work perfectly at the first stage of a Tuscan open house. The smell of damp, old belongings, and stone is usually pretty ripe. As you stand in the dark the agent goes from window to window slowly revealing where you are standing. Although a couple of houses we looked at were beautifully furnished and restored, where this reveal was a positive one, most had been left in some sort of suspended animation after someone had died, or a family had left. The close family had removed anything of value and left what remained, usually a rather sad hodge podge of old electronics, furniture no one wants, clothing, and the detritus of personal grooming products. Old tools abound. There is no thought to clearing out the buildings before they are put on the market. And often current owners are there for the viewing, watching every response.

If you are lucky there are still glimpses into lost ways of life embodied in the walls. A hundred years ago Tuscan houses would often have stone sinks placed in the walls that drained directly outside—you can look at grass from the drain. Old stone fireplaces are common, although we saw a number of properties where thieves had gotten there first and hacked them out to sell. The ground floor of almost all dwellings were used to house animals—people lived upstairs—which helped to heat houses in winters. Many still have old feeding troughs and stone and brick corners of walls which have been rubbed smooth and semicircular throughout the centuries by animals scratching against them to give themselves massages. And yes, the smell of centuries of animals does come out after much sandblasting.

Some houses come with mysteries. We looked at one where Thomas Becket is said to have stayed when he came through town in the 1150s, commemorated by an ancient fresco. But even more mysterious, and easier to prove, is in the house next door to us that our friends just purchased—I will be writing about the restoration—that has three bedrooms, complete with beds with nasty mattresses, a small kitchen (so far all of this makes sense) and a bathroom with a tiny sink and toilet. There is not a shower or bathtub anywhere on the premises.

There’s an adventure and magic to the hunt here that I will always treasure, and even miss a tiny bit, leading me to drag visiting friends to view especially good deserted houses—with the side effect of increasing the Anghiari population by a couple of families who will be joining us when the properties are done. I love the unselfconsciousness and lack of preciousness of the process and, to me, it reveals more than just an abundance of deserted properties but also as a reflection of the Italian spirit. This is who I am, I am comfortable about the state I am in, and you can choose to be intrigued and go forward, or not. No presentation of perfection to tempt the slightly out of reach more perfect and evolved you that can exist if only you could acquire this house. Just don’t step on the goat poop on the way out.

 

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How to buy a dream

Well, maybe not all dreams, but if buying and restoring a house in Tuscany is a desire of yours, here’s how it worked for us.

We knew from the start the house we wanted to buy, but it seemed impossible. The previous owner had lived there her entire life and died a decade earlier when she was in her 90s. She’d never married or had kids and it had passed on to thirteen heirs, some of whom we heard weren’t on speaking terms with others.

The house loomed just outside the walls of a beautiful village and on a quiet lane. It had been deserted for nine years, affectionately known by locals as the casa abbandonata, and the site of many a dare involving terrified kids trying to find a way inside. It was dark, shrouded by trees, and broken into occasionally, but we (and at least half the town) wanted it badly as it is in a terrific position looking up to the village and down to the valley, surrounded by a few acres, and a ten-minute walk from the piazza.

For years, whenever friends came to visit, we’d inevitably stand on the village walls which overlook the house and the land to “take in the view” but really to show them our dream house. We always added the caveat of “don’t point at it because if the village knows that the Americans are interested word will go out fast,” reflecting our American paranoia of potential bidding wars. Meanwhile the heirs, who seemingly agreed on little, were united that the best way to value the property was to add up what they all wanted to receive and use the total as the asking price, rather than getting a professional appraisal of what the place was worth and dividing by 13. The result was that you could buy a prime vineyard and restored villa in Montepulciano for what they wanted for the house. They hadn’t budged for nine years despite almost no viewings or offers. The house had been in their family since 1777, so a certain amount of irrational attachment was understandable. The villagers who had their eyes on the house had long given up and we had realtors tell us not to even bother trying to buy it because it was impossible.

In Italy the buying process can take years, if not decades (the family of one place we looked had thought about selling it since the 1940s but they still weren’t sure they were ready to part with it). Property taxes are very low, the houses are usually owned outright, and maintenance can be nothing as stone buildings take a long time to fall into ruin. It took us about three years to buy the house from when we first looked at it. We sent out some carrier pigeons about what we’d be willing to pay for the house and they sent out some return birds saying that would be acceptable. So we wrote up an offer with a two week response time excited to move ahead. Seven months later there was no answer and then fate intervened. Someone, or someones, to whom I will be eternally grateful, decided to break into the house and used a tree-trunk battering ram to break down one of the solid chestnut doors. (A villager later mentioned that she’d been driving by, recognized the intruders, and told them off. Can you imagine how embarrassing that would be from the villain’s perspective?) Suddenly, as there was a whopping 700€ of actual hard cost involved with the property to replace the door, the heirs were ready to do the deal. Yesterday. December was upon us and they were in a hurry to close before Christmas because they worried that one of their family, a woman in nearing 100, would die, passing her shares along to her two daughters who hadn’t apparently agreed on anything since 1940. Then the whole deal would have to be renegotiated. The heat was on and the closing date set for December 23, 2014.

John and I had bought and sold a few properties in the U.S. between the two of us so we thought we had an idea of what to expect. As always, Italy is full of surprises. A notaio, or notary, reigns supreme over the sale. As Americans we had to get over our image of the guy at Kinkos with the book and stamp authorizing a signature. In Italy the role dates back to the Romans where they were the legal clerks for the Emperor. Their role evolved in the 1000s when a deed issued by a notary was given a privileged “public faith”, a particular strength. Today they must have a law degree to start, then specialized training to become one of a limited number of public officers of the State, guaranteeing that all parties to a signing are who they say they are and have legal authority to sell what they are selling. They also issue and hold the official deeds. Title company, registrar, and more, all rolled into one.

On the big day we all met at the notaio’s office. Very different from the U.S. where a closing often involves a trip into a sterile conference room at a title company to sign reams of paper, completely separate from the other party in the transaction, who you may never meet, an Italian closing is a spectacle. The office was large, lined with books, and had an enormous table in the middle. We were there along with the thirteen heirs, all seated in large blue velvet chairs. After everyone was assembled the notaio entered, formally dressed, with an air of gravitas. He took a chair, set apart of the others, at the center of the table. Then he started to read the document of sale. This long document contains the name, birthdate and place, fiscal codes, relationships, and percentages of the property of all the sellers. It details how much money each person gets, complete with the check numbers of the issuing bank. It then spells out in great detail exactly what parcels of land you are buying, with whom they are registered, and the relevant contents of the house, among other details.

As you can imagine, this document is long and tedious. Italian notaries have an ingenious solution. There is a particular rapid-fire reading style that they use, akin to an auctioneer, to get through the material. The blazing speed of this blitz of information did nothing to dull the interest of the sellers, however. They leaned forward listening to every detail of who got what, eyeing each recipients in turn. We finally got to the end and everyone signed every page wherever they want with the end document resembling a birthday card that a group has signed.

Then a special moment arrives when the notaio excuses himself. Traditionally this is when any applicable bags of cash are handed over to cover any gap between the recorded and actual sales price. We know people who have lugged significant numbers of paper bags full of money to finalize the deal, which fortunately we did not have to do. The notaio re-entered after a safe amount of time had passed, the keys were handed over, in our case a big wad of them including several antique keys, and big smiles, handshakes, and greetings were exchanged. The sellers, for all their initial reluctance, were warm and pleased that a new history with a family was to begin in their ancestral family house. The deal was done, and the adventure began.

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The pediatrician

A sweet memory of early days here and Sebastian, back when he was twelve.

One of the tricky things about moving anywhere, but especially changing cultures and languages, is finding  good doctors. Friends had recommended a pediatrician for Sebastian and we went to his first appointment having no idea what to expect.

The doctor was a vivacious woman dressed in street clothes. She started the appointment raving about Justin Bieber and a recent concert of his that she and her daughter had attended, sharing long takes of video on her phone before she started in on the medical stuff. Midway through the exam she had an idea that Sebastian needed to meet her daughter. She immediately dialed her and put Sebastian on the phone. Somewhere between flattered and embarrassed Sebastian had a short conversation.

An invitation to the local pool followed. Sebastian had a lovely time with the doctor and her daughter even though it was a bit awkward to run into his “girlfriend” of the moment poolside. After that an invitation to go on vacation in Calabria followed (the doctor was Calabrian and so are John’s grandparents, hence our Italian citizenship). At this point John and I had a bit of a collision-of-cultures reckoning. There’s a surprising lack of formality and distancing of medical professionals in Italy compared to the US — the veil of professionalism doesn’t seem to be a thing with most doctors here. They meet you as people and equals, which is refreshing, although sometimes the specifics can be rather surprising. We had to decide whether this vacation invitation was simply the natural exuberance of this woman and normal in the more equal rapport between doctors and patients or if we should be a bit wary. By our old standards there’s no way we’d agree to this. It’s always a balancing act between my natural caution from the states, where it wasn’t safe for the kids to go alone to the convenience store a couple blocks away, with the norm of much more freedom and adventure here in Italy. Sebastian was a bit reluctant too so in the end caution won this round and we declined.

I was talking about it with Sebastian yesterday and he said that he and the daughter became quite close for a couple of years and texted often. The doctor and her daughter have returned to Calabria.

 

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Live to be 100

The Beast From The East II weather front just roared through bringing some real cold to the valley — on a couple of nights temperatures were down to -7°C (19°F). John was up early one morning and noticed one of our elderly neighbors walking up the hill to town, despite the ice and strong wind. John mentioned it to me and said that he was surprised to see him out, braving the cold, but I wasn’t puzzled. A more important need was calling, something that weather and a pandemic can’t suppress — coffee with friends.

Groups gather throughout the day at the cafes. Current restrictions dictate that cafes are only open for takeout so people stand outside, holding tiny paper cups with a shot of espresso, and try to drink while pulling aside their masks the minimal amount possible. But mainly they talk and laugh, exchanging gossip, news, and complaints. When my favorite cafe is allowed to serve inside a group of older men gather in a back room to smoke, play cards, and bet. It’s a room stained dark with smoke, but also mystery and intrigue. I hesitate to enter it even when they aren’t present as it feels like I am trespassing.

Teens hang less at the cafes and more in the pedestrian tunnel that runs through the foundations of the tower on the wall, complete with the town’s ancient water well. They are often smoking, mostly tobacco but sometimes pot, and seem unable to keep their tough teen personas intact faced with a “buon giorno”, answering with a smile. If I squint I can easily see them in sixty years, still together.

If not outside a cafe, the old men gather under the portico near the ATM. This spot is most crowded on market day, every Wednesday morning, and on Sunday morning when they get kicked out of the house so that Sunday lunch can be prepared. Most have known each other since school days and still have much to say to each other.

To socialize this much you have to get to where the gang is. Our neighbor is not alone in his frequent walking trips to the village, which although only a couple of hundred meters, is breath-catchingly steep. Our house is between town and the cemetery so we see the steady parade of older people going down the hill and back up for their daily visits to the graves. The elderly who live in the historic center navigate cobblestones, tiny staircases in the houses, and steep streets. They walk to stores and the pharmacy; most of their needs are met within meters. I marvel at their mobility after growing up in the states where there seems to be a universal acceptance that after a certain age one needs to move to, as Mom’s retirement community euphemistically called it, a “level-in”.

After being here nearly ten years I credit these two things, the insatiable desire to socialize and frequent walking that requires stamina and balance, with the vitality and spark that I see in the older people. Not to mention that only Japan’s population lives longer. I aspire to age like this and will try to follow their graceful lead.

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Anghiari in snow

Would you just look at that

Almost ten years ago, when we moved here, I wondered if my sense of being gobsmacked by beauty several times a day would last or if I would just grow used to it. If anything, it has grown stronger.

I’ve been surprised that our appreciation is matched or even bested by the Italians bred, born, and raised surrounded by such beauty. I’m in a couple members-only Facebook groups for the village where the main topic of conversation is how beautiful it all is, accompanied by lovingly taken photos. These will be followed by a few dozen comments laden with beating heart gifs and responses like “Spettacolo!”. The mayor often chimes in. (The community gets most of its news from the mayor’s personal Facebook posts — you have to be friends — usually leading with a Covid update for the town, and followed by cheery reports about a new sidewalk going in or improvements to the basketball court. He’s the first non-Communist mayor since The War so he has a lot of suspicion to overcome.)

This love of place all came to an exciting head over the last few weeks when the village found itself in a social media competition for the Most Beautiful Village in Tuscany. We are far off the tourist map, unlike places like Cortona, Montepulciano, or San Gimignano which, in the humble opinion of the village, have ceased to exist in any meaningful way except as tourist destinations. Despite our lack of fame we somehow ended up in the semi-finals against Volterra, a shocking turn of events. All stops were pulled out as pleas went out to everyone in the village to flood the competition with their favorite village photos. We won that round and were in the final competition against Massa Marittima. They have just a few things to their advantage — a cathedral, prehistoric artifacts, a castle from the 9th century, a church founded by St. Francis himself, and a vantage point on the Mediterranean, but the villagers fought a strong social media war of images and vote coercion of friends and family and WE WON!! It even made the national papers. Now we can get back to the real work at hand deciding with the mayor how high the basketball hoop should be on the newly repaved courts.

Not that there aren’t the fair share of box stores and car lots around here, but it matters that we live in the shadow of a thousand-year-old village in a beautiful valley. Untouched nature is breathtaking but there’s something about the long interplay between people and the land that floats my soul. That the village is constructed of stones that were sitting right here so that the color is perfectly matched to the surroundings. The tiny cobblestone streets worn down in the middle by centuries of foot traffic. The patterns that the plows make in the rolling fields. This all matters deeply to me. 

There’s also beauty in sound. I love falling asleep to the noises of owls, foxes, deer, and wolves, and waking up to the sound of roosters and church bells. I know many would fight me on the last two but I am adamant that roosters and church bells are lovely sounds at just the right distance — so they don’t wake you up but you can appreciate them when you are awake.

It’s not just me. John, of course being the epically visual guy he is, is constantly touched. But it does surprise me a little that the kids notice and comment so frequently. Those moments when we’d be driving an angsty teen to high school and they’d point out the window and say “would you just look at that.” I was driving Sebastian to the airport to return to school in the UK last September and I stopped the car so that an old man could cross the street, pushing his bicycle. After he crossed in front of the car he stood in front of an old stone building in his oversized puffer jacket, gave us a huge smile and a wave, and then pushed off on his ancient, bright pink bicycle. Sebastian’s comment, “That was beautiful.”

In this odd moment we find ourselves in let’s never forget how important it is to appreciate the beauty around us, be it the steam from a cup of coffee, fog over a valley, or a smile from a stranger on a bicycle.

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