Getting There

This is a series of posts about Italy, Malta, and Spain that starts here.

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I was on a train traveling from Naples to Sorrento, or to Campania. I won’t keep you in suspense; the train eventually arrived in Sorrento, which is in the region of Campania. It was a mystery to me why the train a region as the final destination instead of the city.

I spent almost two hours on a train whose destination I was unsure of. I refused to ask anyone for help because I didn’t want to embarrass myself. I thought about getting off, going back to Naples, and trying again. I told myself that the worst case scenario would be if I had to take yet another train from “Campania” to Sorrento. In the midst of my fretting, we approached Pompeii. It had started to rain, hard. Should I still get off there? Where there any covered areas or was it all outside? Maybe if I got off I could make sure I got on a train to Sorrento this time. It was already 3:00 pm and darkness would fall at 5:30. Was it possible to “do” Pompeii in two hours? At the stop, inertia won and I stayed on the train to take my chances on where I would end up. Who knew? Maybe Campania was a nice city.

It’s not a very exciting ending, I know. The point of this little story is that I learned some things about myself and traveling:

1) Despite what the travel guides say, European train travel is not “as easy as 1, 2, 3!”

2) I would rather end up in the wrong city than ask strangers for help.

3) Given a choice between taking a warm, dry train to the wrong city or spending a rainy afternoon in a muddy archaeological site, I will stay on the train.

—

The Hotel Rivoli had emailed to ask if I wanted a pick me up at the train station. “Oh sure,” I thought, “You want to send your brother in law, who will over charge me.” I didn’t reply.

I’m not usually that suspicious or rude but it appeared the hotel was only a 10-minute walk. I had written down the route: From Via Marziale, left on Corso Italia past Piazza Tasso and Piazza S Antonino, right on Largo Padre Reginaldo Giuliani, right on Via Santa Maria delle Grazie just in front of S Antonino Church. How hard could that be?

Except that it was still raining when I arrived, so I hailed a cab. I did what you’re supposed to do—ask how much the fare is before getting in—and the answer was €15.

I don’t know if this is true for you, but it’s interesting how I had spent hours looking at Google maps to sketch out how I would get from one place to another, and it all looked completely different once I was actually there. While technically it would have been a short walk, given my track record of getting lost I would probably have ended up in the next town. Five minutes later, the driver dropped me at the entrance of an alley that was too narrow for motor vehicles and pointed to the hotel. I had to squeeze through a crowd in front of the Church of San Antonino to get to my hotel.

“You took a taxi?” asked the young woman at the desk. “Fifteen euros!?” she exclaimed. “We only charge five.”

—

My room was on the top floor—the third floor—and after that cramped little place in Rome I loved its spaciousness. It was also decorated with clean, modern furnishings instead of 1950s polyester cabbage roses.

Unfortunately, the lock didn’t work and the door kept popping open. The rain had stopped and I was dying to explore. I flagged down a blonde, blue-eyed young woman whose name tag said Ugne.

“Oh, it works fine!” she smiled as she slowly demonstrated how to lock a door. I smiled and waited until the door popped open. “Oh no! I will get help!” She trotted off, and after waiting 15 minutes I pulled the door shut as tightly as I could, hoped for the best, and went out for a wander.

Naples to Sorrento via Compania

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This is a series about Italy, Malta, and Spain that starts here.

—

The guidebooks and online travel guides all damned Naples. “Noisy, crowded, filthy, smelly, and teeming with pickpockets and con artists,” was typical. This was not alluring, so I intended to spend just enough time in Naples to transfer from one train to another.

The high-speed train to Naples was as advertised: fast, clean and comfortable, and punctual. I was right on schedule! I proceeded to wander around the Naples train station for almost an hour. There had been a bathroom on the train but if you’ve ever used a toilet inside a fast-moving train, you’ll know why I held out for the train station.

There were no signs to indicate where the toilet was. I walked what felt like a city block to one end of the station, then all the way to the opposite end. Finally I spotted an information booth and asked the attendant. The toilet was downstairs and, once I got there, I discovered it cost a Euro. I didn’t have any coins so I walked back up to where the shops were. When I waved my arms to make the toilet exit door open, half a dozen people pushed their way in without paying. What a sucker I was!

I hiked back upstairs, grateful to be suitcase-free, and wandered to and fro trying to find the train to Sorrento. It was called the Circumvesuviana—after Mount Vesuvius, I guess. I found the train signage, such as it was, bewildering. There seemed to be multiple names for the same train. Or maybe it was like the Amtrak Acela, where Amtrak is the name of the company while Acela is a specific train? Regardless, I saw no signs for the Circumvesuviana—which wouldn’t be hard to spot given how long its name was.

I approached the information booth attendant again, who informed me it was … downstairs. It was at the end of a very long tunnel and I arrived to find throngs of people milling about the turnstiles. Why? There was nothing else there except a pastry shop, but they weren’t buying pastries or tickets for the Circumvesuviana. I pushed my way through the crowd, bought my ticket, and slipped through the turnstile.

Here’s the station as we pulled away; other than this I didn’t see any graffiti or dodgy characters.

After the high speed train from Rome, the Circumvesuviana felt kind of old-timey—like a kiddie train at a fun fair. There was lurching, stopping with no explanation in the middle of nowhere, and the occasional alarming metal-on-metal screeching noise.

It slowly wound its way out of the city. Finally! I was on my way to Sorrento. I begun to relax. I had survived the Naples train station without being mugged, and I had gotten on the right train. I could just sit back and enjoy the scenery.

Less than five minutes later, we stopped at a station. Then another station, and another. Little did I know, there were 33 stops between Naples and Sorrento. Basically, the Circumvesuviana is the local bus. All I knew was, this was taking forever, and I had planned to stop in Pompeii on the way to Sorrento.

A recorded voice came on to announce something in Italian, and thankfully it was repeated in English. The announcement was so long that by the time it finished we had stopped at a few more stops. There was the usually stuff about not sticking your head out the window, especially if the train was approaching a tunnel.

The British-accented voice finally reached the end “… and our final destination, Campania.”

Campania! What? I sat up and scanned the car, expecting other travelers to look alarmed, but they were all asleep or staring unconcernedly at their phones. There was no official to ask; did the train even have a driver? There were no route maps in the car. There was no wifi so I couldn’t pull up Google map. (I had opted not to pay for international data.)

Then I caught a glimpse of the sea on my right. Use common sense, Anne. If Mt. Vesuvius appeared on the left—which it did after a few minutes—we were heading south. But to where?

Trains Times Three

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This is a series of posts about Italy, Malta, and Spain that starts here.

—

I spent a day visiting all the sites I could in Rome: Piazza Navona, the Quirinale, Trevi Foundation, the Spanish Steps, and the Coliseum complex. Everything took twice as long as planned because I got lost several times on the way.

I had read a lot about what went on inside the Coliseum—e.g.: the tens of thousands of humans and animals slaughtered there in gruesome entertainments, the clever pulley systems for lifting hippos and lions up from the basement to spring upon the hapless gladiators, the seating system that made it clear which of the 50,000 spectators were vestal virgins, senators, knights, or plebeians.

I ran into this Chinese volleyball team, who I had also seen at the Vatican Museum.

I had not known that the Coliseum was built using “the spoils of the Jewish campaign.”

You probably can’t read this, but I love how this is worded. If you didn’t know better, you might think that the Jews had carried out the campaign, rather than the campaign being carried out against them. This was about the only interpretive signage in the Coliseum, so I was glad I had rented an audio guide.

I have to say that my visit was spoiled by the swarms of self-absorbed selfie takers. I wanted to just stand and take it all in, but they were literally thrusting themselves and their selfie sticks and their cameras in my face at every turn. I gave them lots of withering looks and told them off in my head, but they didn’t pay me any attention.

—

I was most moved by the Pantheon—something about its austerity—and the fact that it was the first of many churches I would see that had been built on top of an earlier Roman, Jewish, or Muslim place of worship.

The hole in the dome is open to the elements, and I was excited to see rain splashing down on the marble floor, since it had been raining since my arrival. Alas, this was the one hour that the rain ceased. I wandered back to the hotel—I can always find my way back— feeling satisfied. Tomorrow I would leave for Sorrento and the Amalfi Coast.

—

This part of my journey had given me the most of what I call “Kindergarten stomach”—that part scared, part excited anxiety I had before the first day of school every year when I was a kid.

My plan was to take a train from Rome to Naples, then another train to Sorrento, stopping halfway to spend the afternoon at Pompeii. I had booked a hotel in Sorrento, which would be my base. From there, I would catch the coastal bus and hop on and hop off in Amalfi, Portofino, and Ravello. The following day I would take a boat from Sorrento to Capri and spend the day there.

The following day at 6am, I would take the train back to Naples, then another train to Rome, then a third train to the airport to catch my 11am flight to Malta. “It’s so easy to zip around Italy by train!” claimed the guidebooks. And so I had planned this precision operation, with no room for train strikes, rain delays, or a leisurely breakfast.

Then I had an epiphany. I cancelled my last night in Sorrento and booked myself back into the Hotel Italia in Rome. I would spend the night before my flight to Malta in Rome so I wouldn’t have a heart-pounding relay race to the airport. As a bonus, this meant the Hotel Italia was more than happy to store my suitcase while I went to the Amalfi coast with just a back pack. So no lugging a case on and off and on and off and on and off of three trains.

I don’t expect you to follow all of this, especially if you’ve never been to Italy. My lesson is just this: plan ahead, but be prepared to change your plans if you realize they’re ridiculous once you arrive.

Happy Christmas, 10 Years On

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This is a reprise post from last year. Merry Christmas, ya’ll!

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In keeping with my gradual transition to writing about unconventional travel and living abroad adventures, I’m looking back on the first Christmas I spent in the UK, 10 years ago.

I had learned a lot since arriving in October. Searching for housing, I had finally figured out that address numbers sometimes went up one side of a block and down the other. Also, many buildings just had names instead of numbers. The Oxfam head office was called John Smith House.

“House” was a misnomer because it was a modern, three-storey building in an industrial park across the motorway from the Mini Cooper factory, and 750 people worked there.

I could usually remember that the first floor was the “ground floor” and the second floor was the first floor. I had figured out that when my coworkers asked, “You awl right?” they weren’t concerned about my health; it was the same as someone in Minnesota asking, “How ya doin?” I was avoiding “creeping Americanisms” in my writing, as cautioned in the Oxfam writing manual, so was careful to write “storey” and “tonne” instead of “story” and “ton.” I was no longer taken aback when introduced to a 20-something coworker named Harriet, Richard, or Jane.

Most important, I had learned to avoid any references to my pants, as in, “I got my pants wet biking to work in the rain.” Trousers were pants, and pants were underwear. I loved the expression, “That’s just pants!” which meant something like “that’s insane!”

Everyone spoke in a low murmur. This was partly due to the open plan office, where six people shared one big desk, but I think it was also the culture. A few weeks after my arrival, a new Canadian employee came through for her induction (orientation), and her braying, Minnesota-like accent filled the whole building. One of those moments when I realized, “Ah, that’s what we sound like.”

At Oxfam, everyone walked fast. It was as if, by striding vigorously, they would personally Save the World. My tall, ginger-haired colleague, Adele, was selling Palestinian olive oil out of her desk drawer. I enjoyed a daily fair-trade, organic chocolate bar from the cafeteria. Oxfam had a Christmas bazaar in the atrium featuring beaded jewelry made by Masai woman who used the proceeds to buy goats. Everyone was very earnest.

To be fair, the “Boxing Day”, or Indian Ocean, Earthquake and Tsunami (caution: upsetting video) had happened one year before, killing 230,000 people and leaving millions more without homes or livelihoods. Then, suicide bombers had struck the London transport system in July, killing 56 people and injuring over 700. The week I arrived in Oxford, an earthquake took 80,000 lives in Pakistan. People were reeling, but responding generously. Oxfam had received a tsunami of donations, internally referred to as the “Cat Fund”—for Catastrophe Fund—and rumour had it that they were struggling to do enough, fast enough, to respond.

But for now, Oxfam was abuzz with Christmas cheer. I look in my diary (date book) from that time, and I was busy meeting colleagues after work at pubs named The Marsh Harrier, the Eagle and Child, The Bear, Angel and Greyhound, and Jude the Obscure.

They called Christmas Crimbo, and presents pressies. There were crimbo crackers for sale, too, which are not a crunchy, salty snack, but shiny cardboard tubs “cracked” open at the festive table and containing a Christmas crown and trinkets.

There was a panto in the Oxfam atrium, so to use all my new words in a sentence: “Are you going to the crimbo panto or shopping for pressies and crackers after work?”

And what is a panto? It’s slang for pantomime, an extravaganza that takes weeks of planning and involves elaborate costumes, jokes, dancing and singing, skits, and slapstick. Apparently it’s also done by families and in theatres but the only one I’ve ever seen was in the Oxfam atrium. Our usually-serious employees were dressed up as fairytale characters and making fun of themselves, our bosses, and our work. Very healthy, I thought. Take life seriously most of the time, then go all-out silly for a week.

The Queen’s Christmas Message that year was beautiful, in my opinion, and more relevant than ever.

Fa la la la felon

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It’s Christmas Eve and I thought I’d share this post my son, Vince, wrote from prison two years ago. If you’re feeling lonely today, write a letter to a prisoner, then contact your local Department of Corrections or a nonprofit prisoner support organization on Tuesday to find out how you can send it. Half of prisoners never get a visitor, and many never get any mail. Vince is doing great now. In fact today he’s on his way to San Diego to spend Christmas with his aunt and uncle and cousins. If you’re interested in following his adventures, he blogs at Fixing Broken.

—

I haven’t written any blog posts in nearly a week. My job keeps me busy, and I’ll say that there is a little more effort involved in the actual writing vs. typing a blog, from my point of view, anyway.

My co-blogger, aka Mom, came to visit me today. Like everybody else, she had a good laugh at my prison-issue glasses. But then we sat down and talked for two hours. We could have talked for two more and time would have flown by just as quickly. It was really nice to see a familiar face. We spoke on topics ranging from family health to sign-language-interpreting gorillas. It will probably be my only visit during my whole tenure as a prisoner, and it was a good one.

—

Last night I started reading Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter. I only made it through 40 pages and I had to get to sleep but so far I’m interested. I’m sure once I leave prison I’ll go back to reading zero books. My mind is impossible to control so I’m easily distracted. Sometimes I can’t get through a page without daydreaming. I’ll catch myself. And do it again minutes later. Brain. Bad brain.

—

I haven’t been sick in years. Years! I am in the middle of a terrible cold, and I don’t like it. I have been told several times over the years that, despite my claims, I am not a doctor. Even if I were, there’s little I can do to suppress the effects of the virus. So I’ll do the standard: rest, drink plenty of fluids, and complain.

—

I’m not at all religious but I went to a Christmas program for something to do, and I had a blast. There were six or seven musicians, all in their 70s or 80s, from some denomination whose name I cannot recall. Each played a different instrument ranging from accordion to piano to guitar. They had 50 grown men, drug dealers, pimps, and armed robbers, singing Twelve Days of Christmas and even doing the chicken dance. That was the best. We were all laughing. And we all needed that.

I think it may have been the first time in a while that some of the guys smiled. Which will usually, unfortunately, later, lead to crying. Quietly, so your cellmate doesn’t hear. We will be thinking of our friends, families, and why we can’t be with them this holiday season. I am one of the lucky ones. I won’t be locked up next year. Some will. Some will be forever. And although they are here permanently for a reason, it will still hurt. They may not show it, but they will surely feel it.

Art and The Avocado

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This is a series of posts about Italy, Malta, and Spain that starts here.

—

As I exited the Borghese Gallery at exactly 2:00 pm I wondered, Why Caravaggio? Why Bernini? Why did they become famous, while hundreds of other artists who had created most of the art in the gallery remained nameless nobodies? How do some artists “break out” from the pack? Is it talent, connections, luck, or what?

I could appreciate how difficult it must have been to carve fingers out of marble. Were no other sculptors able to do that—is that why Bernini stands out? I could see how Caravaggio’s paintings were darker than his peers. Is that why he’s considered so much greater than other painters? Was “darker” a breakthrough in the 16^th Century, like cubism would be in the 20th? Even the worst artist in the gallery—if there was one—was infinitely better than I could ever be. I felt like a philistine and resolved, as usual, to read up on what I had seen when I returned home.

—

I sat on a bench outside the gallery next to an elderly couple and pulled out my map so I could think about where to go next. The man leaned over to me and asked where I was from. He had never heard of Minnesota and his English was so-so, but that didn’t stop him from talking without interruption for 20 minutes straight.

He commandeered my map so I couldn’t walk away. He was very nice but he made enough suggestions to keep me busy in Rome for a month. “You must walk over to the other side of the river and see the Church of St. Celestine of the Bloody Hand,” he said enthusiastically. “It’s like no other church you’ve ever seen! It will only take you about a half hour to get there by taxi.” I made up that church name, of course.

He paused, then sighed, “Ah, that’s-a-Roma.”

His wife leaned forward to peer around him at me with a look that said, “He always does this.” She must have been 80 but she didn’t have a hair out of place and she was wearing a skirt and high heels. He was wearing a black trench coat, open so I could see his tweed suit and silk tie. They were both wearing boxy, trendy eyeglasses.

He said something that sounded like “I am an avocado.” What? “A lawyer—retired,” he said in English. Ah, an avvocato—as in legal advocate— I nodded.

“You must see the Caravaggios in the Church of the Holy Martyrs of the Flagellation,” came next. “Ah, that’s-a-Roma.”

“You are by yourself?” he asked. “Alone?” When I nodded he looked back at his wife and I couldn’t see their faces but I imagined they exchanged pitying glances.

Finally, I maintained eye contact and smiled while gently extracting my map from his hands, then walked off down the tree-lined lane. They were such a sweet couple. Why wasn’t I part of a sweet couple? Why? What had I done wrong? Would I ever meet Mr. Right? Why was I the Only One in the World who was alone? Blah, blah, blah went my thoughts. A few tears escaped, and I thought this would be a good time to sit on a bench, rest a bit, and gather my thoughts. But counterintuitively, it’s often when I’m over tired that I have the urge to Press On No Matter What. I was determined to find one of the things the old man had recommended—a church in the Piazza del Popolo which had two Caravaggios.

Despite it being close by, I got lost. I consulted the map, then got lost again. It was hot, I was hungry and tired. The thoughts started again: What’s wrong with you? You’re such an idiot. No one else gets lost this much. Finally I stumbled into the church and gazed at the Caravaggios. Meh. I think I had OD’d on art. After three days of nonstop touring, I told myself I had nothing to prove. I walked back to my hotel, polished off my complimentary prosecco, and slept for 12 hours.

Stories as Old as Time

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This is a series of posts about Italy, Malta, and Spain that starts here.

—

The Borghese, pronounced borrrr-geh’-see-ah, was once a private estate originally owned by a cardinal who was the nephew of a pope. There was a lot of money to be made in the Catholic Church 500 years ago, which is partly what sparked the Reformation.

The gallery is one building in a sprawling complex. There was the villa itself, where successive owners lived before the last ones bequeathed it to the state. There were parks filled with statuary and fountains, and then there was the gallery. I didn’t see the villa, but I imagine it isn’t too shabby. So if you were lucky enough to live here in the 17^th Century, the gallery was your own private art museum.

My group of a dozen New Yorkers, Floridians, Hoosiers, Ottowans, and one Dutch couple were led around efficiently by our guide, Mario, who said he was an art student. He was around 35, so I think he may have meant he was a lifelong student of art.

The first room featured a sculpture by Bernini, the Rape of Persephone (by Hades, the king of hell). According to Mario, they “lived happily ever after.” Really.

Despite the repulsive subject, I couldn’t help but marvel at the lifelike bodies carved out of a block of solid marble. Look at Hades’ fingers sinking into Persephone’s flesh.

The Rape was the centerpiece in the room, but every inch of the room was covered with art. Even the walls, floors, and doors were works of art because they had been painted to look like marble or other precious materials. I wondered how much just one of the friezes above the door would be worth, and what anonymous artist had produced it.

In a hallway, there were these 3D murals on the ceiling:

The next room featured another guy (Apollo), who couldn’t keep his hands off a woman (Daphne) who had said “No.” She pleaded for help to her father, the river god Ladon; and he turned her into a tree. How did Bernini know where to start? How did he carve the arms and fingers without cracking one off?

We passed through an enormous room that was closed for renovation, but we stopped to appreciate the ceiling; this is one small section:

There was a sculpture of Napolean’s sister Pauline, who was married to a Borghese for the political alliance. Note the wrinkles in the marble “mattress.”

Then there were the paintings by Caravaggio. This one had been banned because it depicted Mary with cleavage and was unflattering of her mother, Anne. Full frontal male nudity, I guess, was not a problem.

Continuing along the rape theme, there was this painting of Susanna being raped by the elders.

The painting below depicts a virtuous vs. sinful woman. It’s not what you think—the naked one is virtuous because she isn’t hiding anything. You know us women–always keeping important secrets from men.

After an hour and a half, Mario said we could walk around by ourselves until our timed ejection at 2pm. I had read about a statue by Bernini called The Hermaphrodite—female from behind, male in front. Mario had led us past it without comment and it was pushed against a wall—for modesty’s sake? Was male nudity deemed unseemly when it was an adult? But there were plenty of other statues of naked men throughout the gallery. Was it because of the gender fluidity of the statue?

—

I had not expected to encounter these themes of rape, of women being objects for barter and use by men, and of the mixed attitudes toward nudity. Aside from The Hermaphrodite, I didn’t go looking for any of these works; they were highlights of the gallery featured on the tour. Mario didn’t interpret or make any sociopolitical commentary.

Open a newspaper anywhere, any day, and there will be stories about rape and human trafficking and women being killed by stalkers. I’m not one to say “nothing ever changes.” The world is safer and saner in many ways than it was four hundred years ago. But art suggests that human nature, emotions, and impulses don’t change.

This Way to the ?

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This is a series of posts about Italy, Malta, and Spain that starts here. I’ll be posting every other day for a while until the travel posts catch up with real time.

—

After five hours in the Vatican Museum, St. Peter’s Square and Basilica were anticlimactic. The square was … well, a square, and it was filled with white plastic stacking chairs. There were also plastic ropes demarcating lines this way and that like you would see at Disneyland. I didn’t bother trying to photograph it because there was no way to capture how big it was without plastic paraphernalia in the way. St. Peter’s Basilica was … huge, of course. Maybe, after the glorious collections of the Vatican Museum, I was just beyond being wowed any further.

I did make tremendous progress on a census of nuns and priests I had started upon my arrival. But it was the Vatican, after all, and I lost track when I reached 12 nuns and nine priests in less than an hour. This was more nuns and priests than I had seen in the previous 30 years of my life. Almost all of them appeared to be from the developing world.

The hotel desk clerk had been right, there did seem to be a lot of Argentinians around, drawn by the Argentinian Pope. I could hear Spanish everywhere. Its cadence was like a relentless rat-a-tat-tat, whereas Italian was more circular.

This may sound cliché and insensitive, but it’s true. I didn’t see one obese person aside from a few Americans, who were clearly distinguishable by their sloppy sweats and athletic shoes. Why are we such slobs? You can’t even go to an orchestra performance anymore without half the people wearing jeans and sweatshirts with sports logos.

By contrast, the Spaniards and Italians were impeccably dressed—the men with flawlessly-shined dress shoes, women in heels and skirts, everyone in black finely-tailored overcoats. The women had clearly made an effort to style their hair and accessorize. Many of the men wore hats. Not baseball caps—real dress hats like real men should wear. Boy do I sound old.

What did I wear? I compromised comfort and style by alternating between two black and grey outfits topped by a silver puffer vest with zip-able pockets, one of which was inside; a secure stash for cash and cards. I switched my Dr. Scholl’s gel inserts between black boots and a pair of black Coach shoes that were really trainers but looked dressier.

—

I took the subway back to my hotel, thinking I would nap but I couldn’t. I boomeranged back out into the streets and wandered around, eventually eating dinner in a tiny ristorante where the first of many waiters asked, “Only one?”

—

I had a ticket for the next day for the Borghese Gallery, which I’d never heard of until I started reading “Top 10 Rome” lists. The ticket purchase required me to choose a seat, as if I were going to a concert. Sometimes just buying a ticket is an adventure in itself.

My emailed ticket listed three different entry times and an exit time, so I wasn’t sure if I had booked a tour, a concert, a museum, or what.

I got to there early which was good because the place was run like a Swiss clock. I waited in line to exchange my emailed ticket for a fancy one:

I never saw this passageway.

I got into another line to check my coat and bag, which was mandatory. Then, being sensible, I waited in line for the bathroom, then got into line for the tour. All of this took place in a cramped underground room with a hundred other people trying to figure out what they were supposed to be doing.

Finally it became clear to me that the tour was mandatory—you couldn’t wander through on your own and you were required to leave at the time indicated on the back of your ticket. We all got radio receivers with headphones so the guide could talk at a normal volume. At precisely 11:10 am, my group—Group 11—followed our guide to a fifth and final line where a guard scanned our tickets and then on into the gallery.

Prison Update

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If I don’t step up my posts about my recent trip, I’ll still be blogging about it by the time I go on my next one, which I just booked—a week of hiking, snorkeling, and kayaking in Belize and Guatemala in February with Wilderness Inquiry. It may sound precious, but I need something to look forward to. We’re in the midst of our second blizzard in a week now, and today’s low will be -11F (-23C). Need I justify myself further? I was able to book with a deposit and somehow I’ll come up with the rest. Somehow it always works out.

—

But it’s time for a post about prison. My son’s imprisonment was the reason I started this blog, in case you are new here. He’s been out for a year and is doing great. I continue to do what I can toward changing the system.

Last Sunday I went to a summit on criminal justice reform organized by Jewish Community Action. About 300 people attended. At my table were two people whose parents or grandparents were holocaust survivors. As we talked about the election and the prospects for meaningful prison reform (or reforms of any kind), they both said they felt afraid for the first time in their lives to live in America. They both said something like, “I remember my father talking about how it happened so gradually that people kept thinking it couldn’t get worse.”

There were a number of passionate speakers. A professor of African American studies at the University of Minnesota talked about how we needed an abolitionist movement to get rid of prisons all together. Others echoed this language.

Coincidentally, the Minneapolis Star Tribune had run a feature story about the abuse of solitary confinement this very day. The last speaker at the summit was the commissioner of the Department of Corrections, and one of the questions posed to him was about completely banning solitary confinement and abolishing prisons in the US. I could sense he was struggling to be diplomatic. “There are people in prison …” he began, “… who have raped five year olds. I have had other prisoners tell me that they would murder again if they could get out of seg.”

Yep. I’m an idealist, but I hope we can focus on issues that stand a chance of delivering meaningful change to prisoners.

—

I wrote a letter in response to the Strib story:

Dear Editors:

Thank you for the feature, “Extreme Isolation Scars Inmates: Minnesota prisons pile on solitary confinement, often for minor offenses ….” Last year my son, who was serving a 50-month sentence for a nonviolent drug offense, was transferred from St. Cloud to Moose Lake, which didn’t have a bed ready for him in general population. So they put him in solitary for no offense. I was not informed, and became concerned after not hearing from him for days, but fortunately he was released after “only” six days in solitary, with no explanation, apology, or even an acknowledgement that something had gone wrong.

We didn’t bother protesting. I had turned to the American Civil Liberties Association after being banned from visiting my son for six months (when I protested a visiting policy). The ACLU told me that corrections officers and facilities have “almost total discretion.” It would be their word against mine, and I didn’t want to risk being punished again.

The terrible experience of having a family member in prison has led me to become active in the movement to reform the correctional system, specifically through Jewish Community Action (JCA), which has made the issue one of its advocacy priorities.

I happen to work for the Center for Victims of Torture (CVT), and I organized an event in September which brought together experts from CVT and JCA—and my now-released son—to explore the physical, psychological, and social effects of solitary confinement. The effects are heartbreaking. My son experienced some of them after only a few days. Imagine spending years in “seg.”

I hope others will be moved to demand prison reforms after reading this series.

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My letter was the featured letter; I really do hope it gets more people involved.

Bits n Bobs n Dogs n Gods

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This is a series of posts about Italy, Malta, and Spain that starts here.

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As you might expect, the Vatican Museum contained hundreds of paintings of the Virgin Mary, crucifixions, and saints being burned at the stake, beheaded, and otherwise martyred. I’ll focus on the non-religious treasures.

It was the off season, but still crowded. Once inside, 99% of the visitors made a beeline to the elevator so they could get to the “main event”—the Sistine Chapel—asap. My friend Lynn had told me that in their rush to get to the chapel, most people miss a splendid collection of art along the way. I couldn’t remember exactly what she had written, so I just stopped and looked around. Voila! There was a massive spiral ramp leading to the same destination as the elevators.

None of my photos turned out, so you’ll just have to imagine a spiral ramp like in a parking ramp, maybe eight stories high, but instead of concrete it was made of marble, brass, and wood. And it was lined with exquisite models of ships and boats. I love maritime art, so I was happy although I was sure this wasn’t what Lynn had meant.

The display was meant to illustrate the world’s seafaring cultures over time, from the Phoenicians to Papua New Guinean headhunters, the Yoruba of Nigeria, Native Americans, the Vikings, the Chinese, the Spanish, the English. The models at the bottom of the ramp were of birch-bark canoes with naked warriors holding spears, and as you walked up the boats became more sophisticated, their occupants wore more clothes, and they were armed with more deadly weapons.

I had it all to myself. I felt lucky but a little sad. Some anonymous team of historians, art curators, and skilled model builders had devoted years of their lives to telling this story, and hardly anyone knew it existed.

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At the top of the ramp I rejoined the crush of visitors pressing on to the Sistine Chapel, but then I diverged when I noticed a room full of statuary. Was this what Lynn had meant? There were no placards describing who they were but they looked really old. I know that sounds dumb—everything in the Vatican is old—but I decided to believe that these were the treasured works of art that everyone misses. Everyone except me, ha ha. There was nothing about them on the map, but I did notice that there were about 30 rooms between me and the Sistine Chapel, and suddenly I didn’t feel so smart. I glanced at each statue for a couple seconds, then scurried on.

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The map room was what its name implies: a room filled with maps of all the Italian regions. My photos won’t do it justice, but you’ll get the idea. This was the room where they plotted empire.

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Next were the rooms I’ll call the “Bits and Bobs Collection,” room after room with cupboards full of ancient glass, pottery, coins, etc. I could imagine some flunky saying to his superior, “Your holiness, what shall I do with this pottery lantern? It’s only from the Roman period.”

“Oh, throw it in a cupboard in the back room with all the other bits and bobs.”

This 1510 map was in the bits and bobs collection. Do you recognize it?

There were rooms crammed with art depicting animals.

After several hours I managed to find the Sistine Chapel. I would love to be one of the guards who stand on a platform and yell over and over, “No photos!” You’ve seen art from the chapel a hundred times, so I won’t write about it.

Next up: the Egyptian collection. My favorite was Anubis, the dog god and perhaps the world’s first palindrome.

Lastly was the Etruscan collection. Not much is known about this civilization that founded Rome, and even less was provided in signage at the museum. I learned that they were the “bridge between the Romans and the Celts,” but what does that mean?

It was 2pm; I took a break to enjoy the views from the windows, ate a protein bar, then exited and walked toward St. Peter’s Square.

Breaking Free

Living Well, Despite what Life Throws at You

Getting There

Naples to Sorrento via Compania

Trains Times Three

Happy Christmas, 10 Years On

Fa la la la felon

Art and The Avocado

Stories as Old as Time

This Way to the ?

Prison Update

Bits n Bobs n Dogs n Gods