Remembering Italy:
Ravello Flakes, Pompeii Erotica

[Regions of Italy]

Ravello

The first seven years I lived in Rome, I worked at the Overseas School of Rome as Admissions Clerk. It was great fun and I still, years later, keep contact with friends there.

One of the best things about OSR were the wonderful school trips offered to the kids as part of their courses. I saw a good deal of Italy by going along on some of these trips; thus, when chaperons were needed for Hiram deWitt's Ancient History class one weekend, I volunteered to go. Itinerary: Rome, Amalfi Coast, Ravello for the night, Paestum, Rome.

It was on an unusually chilly day in May that we met in the schoolyard, fifteen high school seniors, three chaperons and Hiram, whose mouth dropped open in dismay as an enormous bus pulled in to pick us up. The bus was so big he knew it couldn't get around the hairpin turns of the road leading up to Ravello, and he wasn't reassured by the bus driver's repeated "Ci penso io." Loosely translated, this well-worn phrase means, "Just leave everything to me," and it strikes terror in any foreigner who's lived in Italy awhile, for it is the pet of Italians who mean well but who in the very near future are probably going to sink your ship.

Eyes rolling heavenward and ready to kill, Hiram shooed us into the mammoth vehicle and off we went towards sunny Paestum. But the weather turned bad almost immediately and a grim cloud settled over the skyline. By the time we were snaking along the beautiful Amalfi Coast road, it had become uncomfortably cold...and I was wearing only a light sweater over a sleeveless cotton dress!

The nightmare of that mountain climb to our Ravello hotel remains forever etched in my brain. Over and over, Signor Ci Penso Io backed up to the very limit of the narrow road. When his rear tires were half on, half off the cliff, he would lurch as far forward as he could go toward the granite mountain wall--three or four times at each hairpin turn! Time and again, Hiram had to get out and stand on the dark unlit road in the freezing cold, directing the maneuvers, screaming "STOP! STOP!" in horror each time the madman driver was about to back us right off the side of the mountain.

Pompeii

After more than an hour of this, when we had progressed only a third of the way, salvation came in the form of our hotel owner, who drove down to see why his guests hadn't arrived. We went the rest of the way in the warmth of the hotel van, leaving the driver to make good on his ci penso io.

In the morning we awoke to an astonishing sight: the entire town of Ravello was blanketed in six inches of snow! SNOW! It's unheard of in Ravello, and such a rarity even in Rome that most of the kids had never actually seen the stuff before. Shouting and hooting, they were all outside in record time, rolling around in it, flinging snowballs, and just generally flabbergasting the entire population of Ravello.

Hiram grimly informed us that without tire chains we couldn't get down that treacherous road to Amalfi. The hotel people were busy figuring out another route for the driver, but there simply wouldn't be enough time for Paestum. We'd have to go to nearby Pompeii instead. "Star-crossed and double-cursed," our leader mumbled in despair, then went out to round up the kids.

In the end, our gigantic bus lumbered across the top of the mountain, at what was probably the pace of Hannibal's famed elephants. The road down was less steep than the one we'd come up on, but it was much longer.

By the time we reached Pompeii it was warm and sunny, without a hint of a chill, and we happily traipsed around after Hiram listening to the fascinating story of the wonders of the ruined city and its tragic end.

Pompeii

I had already been to Pompeii but our leader took us to an area I hadn't seen before...and here another rather bizarre thing happened. We had entered a series of small marble rooms, with many drawings on the walls and brilliant mosaics in the floors. At a certain point, a guard stopped us and whispered something to Hiram, who then informed us that no girls or women could pass into the next rooms: only males were allowed. Promising he would explain later, Hiram quickly herded the male students through the door. We "females" indignantly demanded that the guard tell us the reason for the discrimination. At first, he refused to speak, but then he averted his eyes and mumbled, "Pornografia." Rather taken aback, we snorted disdainfully, then waited impatiently while throwing killer looks at the poor guard who was, after all, only following orders.

Fifteen minutes later, the "males" filed out, laughing and red-faced and elbowing each other in the ribs. Hiram explained. This ancient place had once been a brothel and the walls were painted with male genitalia of every size and shape, doing, well...whatever male genitalia do.

We "females" sniffed, threw haughty, icy glares at the "men," turned on our heels and stalked away, noses in the air. Not surprisingly, Hiram suddenly felt it was time to bring the Pompeii visit to an end.

The rest of the time went by uneventfully, and before we knew it, we were back in Rome and the kids were starting their Ancient History papers on the subject of Pompeii. I never did ask Hiram, but I always wondered if any of the boys had written about the last site they'd visited.

This was, of course, years ago. Women no longer are barred from entering those "hallowed" halls of Pompeii. We've made progress, ladies, but let's be honest: present-day male shenanigans haven't changed all that much from those of 79 A.D., have they?

[Regions of Italy]