When I was just a new, wide eyed traveler, innocent in the ways of the world of woofing and workaway, I had my first long term experience at a beautiful little villa just outside of Turin, Italy.
The host, Fay (she later just became known to me as my “Italian mum’, perhaps this was a bit of a misnomer as she is Welsh…) had had amazing reviews from the people that volunteered with her so seemed like a great option for my first placement. Although I specified I had no marketable skills to speak (of bar a small amount of building experience), she nonetheless decided to take me on.
I had been trundling around Southern France, which was spectacularly beautiful (not only due to it’s nude beaches), but I had begun to feel that kind of wistful purposeless melancholy that can build up with extended periods of aimless travel. I figured that a workaway experience would provide that sense of purpose and allow me to be productive in an active way, hopefully dispelling the listlessness I was feeling.
Taking several trains towards Italy and killing a day in Turin to get a feel for the place, it was finally time to go and meet my host. Stepping off the train I saw a short, somewhat brusque figure walking my way with short cropped and violently blond hair, and a huge smile spread across a face that, I imagined, was used to smiling and wanted to stay that way for as long as it could.
Fay, on first impression, is direct and about as subtle as a blunt axe to the forehead- needless to say I liked her at once, and as time progressed I was able to discern much deeper aspects to her character that I found both surprised, and then supported me when I needed a word of wisdom or encouragement.
She informed me happily that there was already a Kiwi boy staying at her place (she loved New Zealand as, if I’m honest, most Europeans do, and we shared a few inside jokes about rugby and marmite and feijoas- banter that I had been sorely deprived of while living in Germany).
Getting situated in the villa consisted of dumping my bags unceremoniously on a random bed and wandering back out to see what I could do, as the other volunteers were all hard at work. I have never been comfortable sitting back while others are busy, and wanted to dig in as quickly as possible. Fay was aware of this I think, but also wanted to suss me out a little before giving me free reign of power tools and other implements (considering how my eyes light up whenever I see anything large and ‘cutty’, this may have been a sensible choice), so asked me to gather raspberries from a lovely little garden she had been working on that was situated just outside the kitchen.
As I gathered the plump little red berries, I cast my eyes over the gorgeous outlook of the villa, which typified what one might expect from a stereotypical Italian countryside. The Dolomites were visible stretching out in the distance, and the rolling hills dotted about with the expected Cyprus and olive trees wove an atmosphere of tranquility and Italianess that lifted my heart immensely. I knew immediately I was going to like it here.
I also immediately felt comfortable with the other volunteers as well. The first I was introduced to was a quiet, unassuming young Italian girl, Sally, who didn’t say much but was watching everything with dark, keen eyes that seemed to search your own like spotlights, seeking deeper meanings hidden within. After enduring her intense scrutiny for a moment, I noticed that she brought with her a huge, foolish and completely loveable white dog called Toby. He was very nervous around me initially, giving me a slight warning growl and hiding behind his mum if I came close. As you may have guessed from reading some of my posts, I feel I have an affinity with animals and knew that to push him now wouldn’t achieve anything, so I calmly ignored him, smiled at Sally, and went on to meet the other two blokes.
The first was a young guy called Tim, a builder by trade (well there goes the one skill I had to offer this place) and was shy, quiet, but you could tell he had a good heart. He was the sort you could just imagine sitting on an upturned bucket enjoying his builders tea in workman's overalls, having completed a hard day's yakka. He mumbled a few things about himself in an indefinable UK accent (which I pretended to understand) and withdrew, happily content to watch.
My final introduction was to a fierce and really rather large Maori boy named Tredegar. Now if you want to know more about this incredible bloke, read my post about Switzerland. For now, suffice to say we shared a love of exercise, kiwi humour and philosophical conversation, and during my time at the villa, we formed a friendship I knew would last far beyond whatever distance our wayward travelling natures might lead us.
My first role, it seemed, was going to be helping Tim to grout the paving slabs by the pool, which were laid and levelled but still had about a 2cm gap between them. Tim had uncovered some old cement that looked to me as though it had passed its use by date, but nonetheless, we mixed up a batch of grout and began the painstaking process of shoving it delicately into the gap and prodding it with sticks to get the air bubbles out. We were at this all day, a good 5-ish hour stretch, and with sore bums and backs we wandered back to see what was cooking for dinner. I know any tradie worth his salt would have found a more efficient way to do this but I’m a school teacher for crying out loud- you get what you pay for!
Meals really were an Italian affair at the villa- we would all gather in the kitchen, taking direction carefully from the matron herself, and then just as carefully cock it all up. But the fresh produce and gallons of Italian red wine (and a few large birra as well) made it a jolly time, and dinner would often be drawn out long into the evening as the light stretched out and took on that soft, pinkish glow of the setting Italian sun. I have never understood how eating in Italy works- somehow, they take 2 or 3 ingredients, sprinkle a little oil and salt on it, and magically you have the best tasting food you’ve ever eaten. Attempt to replicate this, using the same ingredients anywhere else in the world, and I guarantee you will be disappointed.
Now being slightly more advanced in years than the other volunteers (I was now in my early (and dirty) 30’s) I began to naturally take a leadership role. When we realised the cement we’d used was useless Fay and I spent a day digging up the hard work Tim and I had done and I decided to take over the project, content and happy to while away my days with a bucket of grout, the beautiful Italian sun, and a few midges to keep me company (these little buggers would fly about 2 inches in front of your face, never quite touching you, and it was weeks until I stopped trying to swat the damn things, who would always buzz away impossibly fast).
We fell into a comfortable routine, and Toby soon became a best friend, happily greeting me in the mornings with a wagging tongue and tail. However, he never quite got used to Tredegar, always scuttling away if the big man showed up or tried to talk to him. I think maybe the dog was a closet racist…
When dinner was done, we would retreat inside to get lost in our own pastimes, though would often sing to whatever was playing on the stereo, uproariously belching out tunes with little to no care what particular notes we were supposed to be singing. Sometimes, as if in response to our singing, a huge cacophony of thunder would roll over the landscape. Here in Italy, the peals of thunder and lighting would be loud enough to shake the house, and could be terrifying if you weren’t used to them. You could feel the shock running through your body and a kind of static charged the air. I revelled when the nights were like these- you could often see a storm captured on the other side of the mountains, roaring and flashing away, but not a drop of rain would fall on us.
On one particular evening, I was so enraptured watching the display of weather above me that I sat outside in the courtyard, glass of wine in hand, and one by one the others wandered out to join me. I was so engrossed I didn’t notice them until I saw Sally drawing close, a little unnerved by the violence of the storm. As my protective side emerged, I took a second look at the scene and realised we were all sitting underneath a metal scaffolding that was once a pagoda style thing, and realising the implications of this, I very gently and calmly suggested to my friends that we move the party indoors, and they reluctantly complied. It wasn’t until everyone was back indoors and safe that I explained that sitting outside in a lightning storm beneath an exposed metal cage was probably not the height of health and safety.
Perhaps due to my manly display of protection and leadership (he says very humbly) Sally started to draw closer to me, and before long we were spending time together as a couple. It was not the first nor the last semi-romance I was to experience during my travels, and we both knew it was only short lived, but were content to enjoy one another's company for however long circumstances permitted.
Occasionally, this meant a little wander into the nearby village of Aglie, which boasted its own castle, and genuinely could have been pulled right out of a medieval scrapbook. There was the occasional horse or donkey drawn cart on the cobbled streets, high rock walls surrounding narrow streets, and ancient buildings that housed little supermercados and lottery shops. It was absolutely magical, and Sally and I would take the loyal Toby out for a wander to smile and wave at the local Italians, who would always be loudly and boisterously doing whatever it was they might be doing. I asked her once if the hand gestures Italians use were purposeful or simply a cultural habit, and she immediately began explaining each gesture to me in detail. After about 20 I told her to stop, as I was beginning to forget them. I was a little dubious, feeling she might be having me on, but when I saw a large Italian mafioso slapping his inner forearm with two fingers with a look of derision on his face, I recognised the gesture Sally told me meant “you are so boring I need Heroine to stay awake!”
The reason I love doing workaway is that you essentially become part of the local scene, and it would often encroach into all aspects of life as a volunteer. Many afternoons or evenings, our neighbours from the farms nearby would wander over unbidden simply to have a decent chat, often having a go at our host in an obviously long-running joke about her poor espresso making. One time as one of my favourite neighbours wandered up, I glanced at the shirt he was wearing and involuntarily coughed the wine I was drinking out of my nostrils. Ignoring the odd sensation of red wine running down my nose, I tried valiantly to snuffle the giggles that burst out- his shirt had a huge slogan emblazoned proudly across it, reading “my STI”.
Seeing Fay chuckling at my reaction, she explained to me that STI was a popular clothing brand in Italy, and she had tried to explain to her neighbour about wearing different shirts when he visited her and her foreign volunteers, apparently to no avail.
If the neighbours weren’t visiting, we would often take a wander, led by the deceptively fit mother hen Fay, around the surrounding parkland and forests. I dearly loved to do this, as the hill we climbed to access this land gave you an incredible view of the surrounding country, and the views were filled with things so very different from my normal NZ scenery. I had always been attracted to the ‘differences’ that existed in other countries, and never, ever grew bored of experiencing it. I lived in one city in Germany for more than 2 years, and not once did I grow bored of the building, the architecture, the trees, the parks- all of them filled with many and varied differences that I simply craved as a traveller.
As we walked Fay and I would reminisce about our time in the education sector, sharing experiences, ideas and laughter about the kids we had been fortunate enough to interact with over the years. We would often go very deep in the conversations, and I drew on her wisdom about life and love, as we found we very much shared our core values, but also never took ourselves too seriously.
The one challenge that accompanied living in this stunning villa were the seasonal mosquitoes. These were ubiquitous, and almost silent assassins, sent to drain the sanity from your mind just as they sucked the fluid from your body. After my first walk left me as bumpy as a newly plucked goose, I got into the habit of drenching myself liberally with deet until I smelled vaguely like a decontamination centre. I would also grab a bushy branch to swipe at the horrible little beggars periodically as we walked along. I was lucky I had little reaction to these little tormentors, as the others would often swell up like they were afflicted with the plague, and antihistamines made the rounds frequently after we had returned from these beautiful but nerve-wracking walks.
Fay and I both loved the outdoors, and she had promised me a decent walk up into the nearby mountains to see a wonderful waterfall. We saw, as we wound up the single lane roads that dropped off to sheer drops, that it had been raining the night before, and everything was glistening in the misty sunlight with dew droplets and puddles of rainwater.
We began our trek, and soon I fell into the regular habit of being surprised by Fay without trying to show it (this might seem petulant but she had spent the previous evening gleefully destroying me in a game of scrabble and I felt I deserved a little of my own back). Determined not to outdone again, I surged ahead along the path, Tredegar and I stretching out legs and lungs as we hiked up the picturesque but slippery path.
Suddenly, we heard a shout, a swear (if I’m honest, more than a few swears but this was Fay so it wasn’t particularly surprising) and then something along the lines of “Bollix, I’ve broken my arm” and then another grunt of pain. Now being a teacher I have spent years training my ears to discern and filter real and fake sounds of pain and injury (a necessary skill to maintain your sanity and your hearing when within 500m of a playground) and knowing this was the real deal Tredegar and I shared a look and barrelled back down the path towards Fay.
Arriving on the scene we saw her cradling her arm, and her pale countenance told me she was in some serious discomfort. I did a brief check to make sure the rest of her was in good shape (i.e. hadn’t banged her head, busted an ankle etc) and then in true first aid fashion set about looking for a stick we could use to brace the arm against. Tredegar, quick thinker that he was, proposed that the strap he used for his damaged knee would suit perfectly, and with this rudimentary support we began the laborious journey back towards the car.
Arriving eventually back at the car, Tredegar's strong arms supporting Fay so that she did not slip on the muddy path down, we faced a challenge- who was going to drive in this mad situation? Now an oddity of my personality is that when there is a crisis, my teacher voice and mannerisms come out- I talk slowly and calmly, giving clear instructions when others might allow the panic to overtake them (while this sounds rather self-aggrandising, I promise it is simply a by-product of having 30 children dependent on you and being absolutely desperate to avoid wide scale panic!).
Therefore I calmly cycled through our options, offering to drive but explaining I had never driven on this side of the road, let alone in a manual and on insane Italian roads, so if anyone had more experience was prepared to do it they were welcome to take the lead. They, however, were all smart enough to avoid meeting my eyes and unwittingly volunteering, so swallowing my panic and trying desperately to look confident (and not like I was going to throw up), we got Fay settled into the shotgun position, and I breathed a huge, steadying breath for my first go at driving in 2 years, on the wrong side of the road, in a manual car, on hazardous mountain roads, with insane Italian drivers and an injured passenger near me who would feel and pay for every little mistake I made… no pressure.
However, never one to balk at a challenge, I did what teachers have done since the beginning of time- I decided to fake it until I made it.
I tried desperately to keep the shift changes smooth and avoid the bumps, but on these roads it was impossible to do it entirely, and Fay, trooper that she was, would only let a sharp intake of breath escape her when she was bumped (I don’t count the swears as these are as normal for her as breathing). Each and every time she let out a gasp of pain, huge, strong hands would reach over from the back seat to grip and rub her shoulders for comfort, as Tredegar did all he could to impart support to Fay and not fall asleep (this sounds crazy but I promise I am not being callous about his attitude here, he really was quite amazing- not 2 minutes into a drive in any vehicle and he would be sleeping like a babe. It was like a super power- but he managed to fight it off and stifle the yawns for the sake of Fay).
We eventually made it to the hospital, on Fays directions, and as we waited for her to be seen the cramps in my stomach and legs, built up from unbelievable tension, began to dissipate. We were determined to wait for her and drive her back to the villa, but she wouldn’t hear of it (surprise surprise) sending us back and insisting she would spend the night with a friend who lived close by and could help her out.
As a side note, she later told us the doctors didn’t believe her that she had broken her arm, and basically scoffed at the idea that she had then reset the bones herself (this was the second grunt of pain we heard). However, after the first x ray was returned, their expressions changed and became almost reverential towards this absolutely staunch Welsh woman as they saw the extent of the breaks in her forearm she so casually held, not a single tear betraying the obvious amount of pain she must have been in.
Once Fay got back home, life returned to some normalcy, as I did my best to shoulder a little more of the day to day while she went loopy on pain meds (thats a huge exaggeration but I couldn’t resist) and Sally stepped up, helping Fay with changing and other activities that had become so much more difficult with only one functioning arm.
Now this villa was actually a holiday/ BNB business for Fay, and she actually lived most of the year back in Wales. It came to a point where she needed to disappear for a couple of weeks, and asked me if I wouldn’t mind keeping an eye on the place. As I was about ¾ of the way through the pool project (and I am absolutely loath to leave any job uncompleted) and I would have the run of a beautiful villa in the Italian countryside, I humbly decided (out of the goodness of my heart) to help her out.
Thus it was that 2 idyllic weeks passed, I finished the pool work and even celebrated my birthday there (Sally had graciously surprised me with homemade pancakes and a bike tour of the countryside for it). During this time I must admit to adopting a slightly mafioso attitude and appearance myself, letting my beard go full dwarf and indulging in my penchant for good cigars and red wine.
We had drawn close over this time, and one evening I could tell she had something on her mind she wanted to share with me. Patiently I waited until she had relaxed a little, and with a little wine to help lubricate the talk, she shared that she sometimes moonlighted as a dominatrix. This surprised me for a few reasons- firstly, because she was at heart a gentle and caring soul, and I couldn’t imagine her with leather and whips abounding (though having been on the receiving end of her glares when I had done something stupid involving self-endangerment I suppose I could see potential there), but also because she told me it involved no sexual aspects at all, and was rather the play acting that served the desires of Italian men who wanted to be used and abused by an attractive woman who treated them like horse shit. I like to believe I am fairly open minded and so certainly didn’t begrudge her this choice (or the men- whatever floats your boat you weirdos ;-p) as it could be incredibly lucrative for her. However, I could tell she didn’t enjoy taking on this role, contrary as it was to her comparatively shy and gentle nature, and could understand her hesitancy in sharing with me and also her conundrum of whether to pursue it- she could find work elsewhere, though the pay would be paltry in comparison. She had to decide if the drop in income could be offset by the fulfilment and happiness that would accompany her other dream of working in a florist.
We talked for a long time, and I tried to do nothing more than help her understand her own feelings and thoughts towards the situation, in the hopes that active listening would encourage her to make the best choices for herself. The situation didn’t bother me in the slightest- we would both be on our way on different paths soon, and I was nothing but thankful for the opportunity to get to know someone of her depth and complexity.
Interestingly, I was far more vocal and vociferous in wanting to help her quit smoking- even finding an Italian language “Helping you quit” book, and am very pleased to say that she did indeed reduce and even stop the smoking, at least in the time we were at the villa.
While many adventures pop happy memories into my mind from that time, the last I will share is one of my favourites. Sally and I were looking for one last hurrah to celebrate our time at the villa, and she came up with the idea of inviting me, Tredegar and his mate Shane (who had joined us for a short time at the villa volunteering and basically creating havoc with his quick wit and mischief) to a home cooked dinner, made by her Grandma.
Now I’m not sure if you have picked up on this yet but I adore any chance to interact with and act like the locals, and this was exactly the kind of activity that would allow me to do this.
We turned up to a small, cozy apartment in the heart of Turin, all trying to be on our best behaviour around Grandma. Seeing my two enormous Maori friends ducking around the small apartment and hunching deferentially to this tiny (but robust) Italian granny was hilarious, though I knew how seriously the Maori culture respects its elders, and expected nothing less from them.
When we finally sat down to dinner, it was an absolute feast laid out before us. The main dish however, was nothing but that simplest of pasta dishes- marinara. Simple spaghetti accompanied the tomato sauce she had made (everything from scratch) and, in some indefinable way that defied understanding, it turned out to be the best pasta dish I had ever, and would ever, have in my life. After perhaps an hour of wonderful togetherness, the large carafe of red wine on the table was demolished, as was every single scrap of food on the table, all of it exceeding our expectations. When the feeding frenzy was finally over and we paused, checking to make sure we still had all of our fingers (it got pretty rough there for a while) we realised we had eaten this wonderful little granny out of house and home. She seemed speechless, and though we tried to explain how grateful we were and how very much we had enjoyed the meal and her company, we couldn’t help but feel guilty for acting so greedily.
Leaving a little shamefaced, we found an Italian pub and proceeded to (I kid you not) drink it dry of red wine. After gently encouraging Big T that he didn’t need to go ‘deal with’ the Italian youth who were ‘giving him the eye’ (he loved his red wine but it didn’t love him back) we happily shuffled and stumbled back home, drunk as skunks, full to the brim, and overflowing with happy memories of a wonderful night out.
Sally told me later, before I finally left this magical place, that her grandma had called her parents the next day in absolute tears. I felt incredibly guilty, and offered to go back immediately and apologise. Sally stopped me, laughing her head off, and explained that what we had done in demolishing the meal with such gusto was actually the highest compliment we could have given to Granny, and it was with tears of joy that she had explained to her children that we had finished every last morsel of food she had cooked!
I will never forget the time I had at this magical villa, and I hope beyond hope that one day I will be able to make it back there. Thinking about the memories I, and those I loved, shared there, brings tears to my eyes even now. Fig tree villa you little beaut, I will see you again one day, I promise.
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