Will Work for Pay

After spending the best part of a week recovering from the journey, getting onto European time and generally acclimatising to being back in Italy it was time to get down to the all important job of finding a job.  On arrival all I had told about my plan to find employment gave me dire warnings of how hard it is to find work Italy.  But there is nothing like the prospect of being penniless in a strange country to spur you on. 

So making the effort to look presentable and with copies of my resume in hand I began the schlep around language schools.  I had planned my hunt with military precision.  Each day I would hit a different location and visit every language school in the place.  Day one was Treviso, day two Padua, day three Mestre.  My search did not manage to get much further as after three days I had managed to secure three interviews. 

The first interview was with a school in Mestre.  Being new to the world of English teaching and new to the planet of working in Italy I wasn’t sure what to expect.  Arriving my customary five minutes early (I always contrive to arrive to an interview five minutes early anything more and you seem desperate and any less blasé) I was greeted by the director of the school.  What followed was perhaps the strangest job interview I’ve ever attended.  The first thing the director of this English language school told me was that he didn’t speak any English so we would have to speak Italian.  OK I said my Italian is basic but let’s go, for the next forty five minutes he proceeded to tell me about the troubles he was having filing his taxes online and how he used to pay an accountant to do his taxes but didn’t see the point of paying someone to do his taxes and still having to pay taxes.  Every now and then he would break off to tap furiously on his keyboard and mutter at the computer screen.   When I got back to Treviso GM asked me how the interview went.  For once being lost for words all I could say was; “I think I just had a quintessentially Italian experience.”

The next interview was yet another curious event where the interviewer proceeded to list all the bad points of the job and then up front tell me that the company didn’t want to worry about taxes etc so if I was to work with them I would not be able to declare residency in Italy.  There was also a bit of haziness as to when wages would be paid but I wasn’t to worry about that. 

After a week and a half of searching I had been offered two jobs and learnt a lot about the employment culture in Italy.  Employers call the shots here and they know it.  Wages and conditions are not great but there are so many people looking for work that they can get away with it.  As for me, I accepted a teaching post with a school here in Treviso.  Everyone is amazed at the speed in which I have found myself employed.  When I tell people of my new working status the response is usually a congratulations, well done or we can hardly believe it.  It has all been a bit of a whirlwind and part of me wanted to enjoy a little more idle time but, as much as I don’t want to, I need to face up to the economic realities of life.  After three months without earning a cent it’s good to be back in the land of the employed.

Asolo and the Road

By way of being GM’s long term, he doesn’t know how long and showing signs of being worried it’ll be a while, house guest I have become a bit of a de facto sidekick to my friend.  You know the kind that share events, adventures and often impart wisdom disguised as light entertainment only to be killed off two thirds into a movie thus providing the hero with the revenge motive for the third act – I hope we don’t go that far.  So when GM heads out for an evening I end up tagging along for the ride.

Many of these nights have occurred in the mountain town of Asolo.  Known as the city of a hundred horizons for its mountain settings (uncle Wiki) and a world leader in the production of mountaineering shoes, Asolo is about an hours drive from Treviso.  I couldn’t comment on its beauty as I’ve only seen it at night and as for significant sights well I’ve seen bars and restaurants.   Being without a car (and a little afeard of driving on the other side) my journeys around the Veneto have largely been public transport affairs but when driving through the bits between I get a glimpse into the side of Italy that never gets written about in the under the Tuscan sun genre.  I begin to wonder if like Frances Mayes and Marianne Di Blasi if I too have over romanticised Italy?   Yes within this peninsular is packed a seemingly inexhaustible supply of beautiful medieval towns and cities, rolling countryside filled with poplar trees and vineyards but driving around the Veneto there really are an awful lot of out of town megastores and industrial centres.  I know, I know Italy is a modern country yadda, yadda, yadda but I never did think about the scourge of the out of town shopping centre and the scary family restaurant (which if your reading I still want to go to) being here.  On the bright side I suppose it keeps all those medieval towns' picture postcard friendly. 

Arriving in Asolo for the first time GM introduced me to one of his regular haunts and his friends.  How would I describe the bar called Rock Affair?  Well it’s quite big (by the local standards,) has a red interior, comfy sofas, lamps and a bunch of lovely locals.  For those of you familiar with the North Fitzroy Pinnacle – there’s no Ted, nor any other annoying, socially inept dregular.  While GM saw to DJing duties I was looked after by his friends.  By the end of the evening there were many offers of – if you need any help just let me know and an invitation/insistence that I return with GM on Saturday.       

So it was just a few days later we were back on the road to Asolo.  This time we stopped off in the town of Montebelluna for an art “happening.”  The theme of the night was made in China and while I assume there was a commentary on the global as opposed to the local as ever with such events I wondered if it was just me not getting it or the event not really having anything to say beyond a slogan.  Perhaps it was just me as no one else seemed to have a confused expression and a continual desire to say but.   At least (as with most art events) there was a well stocked bar.   So with our (hic) art fix over and clutching our gift of cheese (long story) we continued on our way to Asolo.  We stopped at Zweibar not for a drink but to undergo the curious car swapping procedure.  Waiting for us was F and his car to which we quickly decamped and then made are way up into the hills for dinner.  After a feed we were off again to the Rock Affair for a few hours with GM taking another turn at the DJ booth before heading back to Zweibar to pick up the car we arrived in. 

This scenario played out a number of times over the next few weeks and I quickly realised what a car culture this is.  I’ve had the luxury of being chauffeured everywhere but once out on my own life suddenly becomes trying.  So many wonderful places I have visited here have been in a little village somewhere at the end of a long lane, up a mountain or just plainly out in the middle of nowhere.  In 09 when I wanted to visit the museum of children’s illustration in a little heard of town called Sarmede a quick look at the public transport options had me realise that unless I wanted to commit two years to the enterprise I would have to get me someone with a set of wheels (two guesses as to who was press ganged.)   Living in Melbourne I have been spoilt with having everything either a walk or tram ride away.  Last week GM, L, F and I headed down to Bologna for a gig.  While it’s relatively easy to get to Bologna there was no way we could have got to the venue on public transport  – suddenly whingeing about having to go south of the river to catch a gig at the Espy seems somewhat pathetic.  All in all I must realise that I’m not living in a city anymore – despite its city status Treviso is really a town and things are just done differently here.  Whether I can live with the concomitant frustrations remains to be seen but here’s hoping people don’t get sick of me tagging along for the adventure.     

                                          On the road to Bologna.

Return to Italy or call me Francesca

In the cold light of reason I should not be here..... really, truly.  I like order, efficiency, things being done with the minimum of fuss and bureaucracy.  I like honesty and I have too many feminist principles to be in a country that would have an aging permatanned, sex obsessed and let’s face it obviously corrupt old man whose only contribution to the world is the addition of bunga bunga to the lexicon as its president.    

And yet on a Melbourne day that required the first post summer wearing of a coat I said my goodbyes and headed to the airport for yet another epic flight.  After thirty six hours in transit, little or no sleep, four airports and regret for the declined Valium, I was deposited at Venice Marco Polo airport on a blisteringly cold March morn.  Low spirits were lifted by the appearance of GM in the arrivals hall.  The friend of a friend GM had naively offered to look out for me when I arrived in 09 little knowing that  year and a half later he would be collecting me and putting me up while I sort myself out (NB GM is the kind of friend everyone should have.)  Back at his apartment in Treviso I quickly passed out on his sofa – GM was polite enough not to point out that if you are putting  up a homeless traveller they should at least provide entertainment rather than just taking up couch space.   

The next day it was straight on the train to Venice.  I have been in Venice three times none of which have been high season.  Stepping out of ferrovia I was horrified to be confronted with my beautiful city packed to the rafters.  In all the rush to pack up my life and get a plane I had completely failed to realise that carnival would be in full swing.  What should have been a twenty minute walk to San Marco took well over an hour.  Tourists filled every calle sporting cheap masks that, no doubt, had a made in china sticker discreetly removed before purchase.  With all its fascinating history I have always been surprised that Venice chooses to celebrate the symbol of its decline and decadence – carnival has always left me cold and now as it invaded the city I regard as my own I hated it but a step inside the cathedral reminded me of why I love this place.  At once so unbelievably beautiful and at the same time you have to remind yourself that much of the glorious interiors are the result of thievery (mainly from the sack of Constantinople.)  Even the patron saint himself whose church I was now standing in was pilfered from Alexandria.  Venetians have always had an eye on the hard economic realities and I can’t help but imagine that as well as religious sanctity and political advantage the body of an apostle would have commanded a fair profit in pilgrim tourism (call me cynical, you wouldn’t be the first.) 

First evening and GM wanted to introduce me to his friend L.  So jetlagged. surreally tired and running on far too much coffee I found myself in a trendy Trevisan bar listening to tunes DJ’d via ipod amongst the lights of Trevisan society who it seems consisted of wealthy older women in ten in inch heels sporting children as fashion accessories.  L recently spent a year in Wangaratta teaching Italian to the locals and despite this still pines for Australia, especially Melbourne.  So much so that she cannot believe that I would leave the delights of Melbourne with its endless laneway bars, endless ethnic foods and endless music for the Veneto.  In fact over the next few weeks whenever I expressed an incredulity for aspects of the Italian experience she would point out with the same sense of the bizarre “You moved from Melbourne to Treviso,” the barely disguised subtext being – you idiot.   

On Sunday GM and L took me for a day out.  I have always loved riffling through the things people no longer want and the flea market at Padua was the perfect place for me.  First stop was breakfast in a pasticceria.  Italians not being a great breakfast culture (certainly not a Sunday morning hung over plate of poached eggs, toast, beans, bacon, spinach, mushrooms and three flat whites kind of culture) it was cappuccino and local Venetian pastry fritello.  Despite it being early the place was filled with the kind of woman for whom the spending of three hours fixing hair and applying six inches of make up on a Sunday morning was a basic necessity.  There’s no nipping out in your trackie daks it seems.   One such overly coffered woman accosted GM and asked about the two ladies he was with – where are they from?  When she asked “what is your name”   I mentally took a breath and ran through my usual dialogue in these situations.  Do I say my name and go through the whole rigmarole of repeating it three times, pointing out that it is Indian but I was brought up in the UK and now live in Australia or do I make life easier and just say a western name? 

Western name,

oh fuck, the only one that comes to mind is Sharon, that's not going to work.

Oh fuck it, here goes –

Raji. 

Francesca?

No,

Raji.....

.... it’s Indian. 

By early evening it was time for the first spritz since my return that aperitif that is so synonymous with the Veneto.  Not sure if it was the alcohol warming my belly, the cosy dark bar or being amongst friends but it seemed only logical to be back.  Still only three days in I still had it all to do, there is a job to find, a place to live, the seemingly Kafkaesque bureaucracy to deal with and a language to learn but for now all seemed right.