Trials and Tribulations

This is a little entry meant to tide you (or me) over until I gather my thoughts and actually write about the past few weeks.



Thanks to everyone who wrote birthday wishes up here. Meglio che lo scrivo in italiano: grazie a tutti che mi hanno fatto auguri! (Considerando che eravate quasi tutti italiani.) I actually spent my birthday in Sicily, on the first leg of a Wine Tour (sponsored by work) for which I was the translator/guide. In this case, obviously, I was a co-guide - because what do I know about the indigenous grapes of Southern Italy? But I learned an incredible amount of information. Simultaneous interpreting will do that to your brain - you're forced to absorb the info so that you can regurgitate it properly.



The tour was a massive challenge for me personally, emotionally, mentally - in every which way. I've only been back home for about 18 hours, so I haven't really processed it yet. However, I wanted to list a couple things I learned. Did you know that . . .

- A certain kind of grape native to Puglia grows in heat resistant soil?
- That in Calabria you can drink wine made from the same grapes that Ancient Greeks used for the celebratory wine at the Olympics?
- That the pressure created by fermenting wine can break a sheet of glass three inches thick?
- That you can put a train on a ferry boat? (Between Sicily and the mainland.)
- That there are cities in Southern Italy where you can see old cave dwellings that are 10,000 years old?

And most importantly . . . that in the south, you can find a level of warmth and hospitality that, in my cynical American brain, I had never even imagined? The people I met on this tour, especially in the vineyards we visited, made me grateful to live in Italy, and even a little bit proud.



I also learned that I'm stronger than I thought. I hope that I can hold on to that.

Pause in Action

I'm currently traveling for work, and I have lots of photos of my birthday that I wanted to put up here, but instead I'm using the resources I have at hand.

The photos below were taken by the amazing camera of Robert Marnika, who has recently been visiting our choir and possibly thinking of joining. (We need more baritones!) Robert is Croatian, and runs an amazing-sounding photo workshop in Croatia in August. Worth drooling over.

He lent the camera to my friend Michele, who then took these photos (which I love). There are quite a few crazy-looking ones of me, which will not go into this entry, but I liked many others. We had a party last Friday, with lots of wine and music, and these were the results. (The above photo was taken by me, in the hills outside Bologna. I think it's some of the most beautiful countryside I've ever seen in Italy, but I might just be biased.)

Dancing!


Critiquing photos.


Sarah, sei bellissima e abbronzattissima. Colpa del giardino! (E vedi che ti ho scritto un messaggio in italiano?)


This is me being Korean. Jean, do you appreciate the peace sign?


Also, the poetry reading that I mentioned below went off without a hitch. I actually managed to speak in Italian in front of 50 people and I wasn't too much of an idiot. I spoke in sentences, didn't sweat too much or turn neon red (as I am wont to do), and I read my poem from start to finish. How amazing is that?

Traveling to New Places

I'm about to go to a poetry reading organized by my friend Carla, in which foreigners will read poems from their native countries, accompanied by an Italian translation. I chose an E.E. Cummings poem, which I've pasted below in English and in Italian. I originally chose it by instinct - I read it and I loved it immediately. But later I realized that it's really perfect for the event. The idea of opening one's heart, for me, is very closely related to the experience I've had as a foreigner in Italy. For all that it's been difficult or exhausting, it's also been an incredible rewarding 20 months. So, while I harness my stage fright, enjoy. (The photo above is a classic Bologna skyline, taken from my friend's rooftop terrace. Bologna is so beautiful!)


[somewhere i have never travelled]


somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skillfully,mysteriously) her first rose

or if your wish be to close me,i and
my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens; only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain, has such small hands



In un luogo dove non ho mai viaggiato


Da qualche parte ove non ho mai viaggiato, gioiosamente aldilà
D’ogni esperienza, gli occhi tuoi hanno il loro silenzio:
Nel tuo gesto più lieve è un qualcosa che mi cattura
O che non posso toccare, perché mi è troppo vicino.

Uno sguardo tuo, il più rapido dei tuoi sguardi mi dischiuderà
Sebbene mi sia chiuso in me come si chiudono le dita nella mano
Tu poi sempre mi schiudi, petalo dopo petalo, come la Primavera apre
(con tocco esperto, nel mistero) la sua prima rosa.

O se vorresti chiudermi, la mia vita e
me stesso ci chiuderemo a riccio, all’improvviso, splendidamente
Come quando il cuore di questo fiore si raffigura
La neve che scende piena di cura, in ogni dove.

Non sentiremo nulla, nulla in questo mondo
Che il potere eguagli della tua fragilità intensa
Le cui forme mi stringono nei colori delle sue terre
Donando morte ed eternità ad ogni suo respiro.

(Non so cosa in te abbia il potere di chiudere e aprire
Soltanto, in me qualcosa mi dice
Che la voce dei tuoi occhi è più profonda di ogni rosa)
Nessuno, neanche la pioggia, ha mani più minute.