Chapter 4 The Streets of Cattolica.
Part of my novel The Road to Ancona.
Day three. By the time the boys and their northern roommates had got up, most of the other guests had finished their breakfast and left the hotel. The boys managed to find some coffee in a large steel urn in the dining hall; it was very black and tasted of burnt rubber. They ate the last of the rolls on the table, spreading them with runny butter, that was about to turn rancid, and red jam.
The sky was overcast as the boys made their way to the beach. As they changed into their swimming costumes, it began to rain. They left their clothes beneath one of the parasols and went into the shallow waters of the Adriatic. The sea was as warm as the air and crystal clear; the rain splashing on their bodies was pleasantly cool. Richard was perfectly at home on the beach; he was like an animal in its natural habitat. Michael was slightly uncomfortable, being surrounded by strangers who were practically naked. He could smell the air; it had the aroma of wet sand and rotting seaweed. As a teenager his senses were sharp and acute and his mind reacted to what his ears and nose fed him, layering his experience of the world with his own individual significances.
The rain soon disappeared and, as the morning went on, the sky returned to its usual shade of azure blue and the sun just got hotter and hotter. Michael returned to the beach parasol, seeking relief from the burning sun. Over the course of the holiday, Richard’s skin would turn a rich nutty brown; Michael would end up looking like a freshly boiled lobster. By midday, the sand had become too hot to walk on in bare feet. Richard had been into town and had come back with an inflatable plastic airbed and was sunbathing on it, while Michael was writing notes in the shade. He wrote:
I have paid all this money and come all this way for some sun. Now I am here, I am hiding from it under a beach umbrella. There are people here on this beach who are basting themselves with oil, roasting in the sun like sides of meat in an oven.
The girls arrived and insisted that Richard let them take his airbed into the sea. ‘Richard, lend us your Li-lo. We want to have a go on it,’ Kate said. After some good-natured argument, Richard reluctantly handed it to the two girls. They walked into the sea and were soon taking turns to float on it. The flimsy device was not easy to handle but as one girl lay on it the other pulled it along. Fortunately, the sea in that area was surrounded by a breakwater of rocks and there were no currents or waves. The line of rocks that encircled the beach was a favourite place for sunbathers; they would lay themselves on the largest of the stones, rubbing oil into their skin. Such oils were for tanning; people had not yet learned about blocking ultraviolet rays. For sunseekers it was all about going home with a tan – so they looked like they had been somewhere.
Practical jokers
The teenagers played practical jokes on each other. Most of the lads in the group never got out of bed much before midday. This was particularly inconvenient for the girls who got up early and missed their company in the mornings. One day, two of the girls went to the boys’ room at 8 am. They knocked on the door. A sleepy male voice asked, ‘What’s the matter?’ One of the girls said, ‘It’s two o’clock. You had better hurry or you will miss the coach.’ A couple of minutes later two lads tumbled out of the room only to be greeted by the girls who were falling about with laughter.
Michael walked through the streets of the small town on his first morning in the resort. For him, the experience came as something of a culture shock. The streets disturbed him – the absence of made-up pavements at the side of the road, the presence of beggars, youths riding crazily on scooters and mopeds, dressed only in shorts and T-shirts (without crash helmets), the absence of traffic signs, people walking in the middle of the road. The little town was just one big holiday camp; everything in it was devoted to the holiday-makers and to squeezing from them every cent, every last lira. Corpulent women with massive breasts sold huge slices of watermelon, kept on big blocks of ice, at the roadside. Men stalked the beaches carrying cans of cola in buckets of ice. It seemed that the entire population was eking a living, in whatever way they could, by selling anything that the holiday-makers might buy. Food and drink were being consumed in copious quantities. Michael stopped at a small café and decided to write a few notes. He always carried a notebook and pen with him.
Life in the Mediterranean resort is very different from what it is like back home in the Midlands. I keep seeing these differences. I have only rarely been outside my home town and in fact I know little of English seaside destinations, other than what I have seen on the television. I see the people of Cattolica as being simple peasants. I do however realise that they have a culture of their own. I love their songs and music, for me, this conveys something of the real life of Italy, and much of what they seem to be singing about is youth and the vitality of being young. I saw the singer Gianni Morandi on the television in the Britannia’s lounge. My favourite song was Nel Blu Dipinto Di Blue, sometimes referred to as Volare. The local songs, sung by the lads at the bars and nightclubs, we never hear in England. This is a wonderful discovery. The more we soak up the lifestyle and culture of Italy, the more we come to the conclusion about what life in England is really like. It is not until you go abroad that you begin to understand what your life at home is about.
Michael paused to light a cigarette. In Cattolica, he could buy cigarettes for a fraction of what they cost at home. He sat back in his chair and watched the crowds of tourists walking by. Around him were small shops and stalls, on the roadside, selling souvenirs and slices of watermelon. The whole town was engaged in selling and there were plenty of people willing to buy. He returned to this notebook
European countries seem to have jumped on the bandwagon of commercialism. Everywhere I go I see people trying to sell things to the tourists. Hundreds of local people spend all day trying to get the holidaymakers to part with their money. But then I suppose the same thing happens back home. When we went to Blackpool for the day it was just the same. The whole of the seafront was little shops selling things, bars, cafés, fish and chip shops. I can’t blame the Italians for wanting to make a living. It’s probably no different back home.
Later that afternoon, Michael and Carol were drinking coffee in Mario’s café. Mario’s had a spacious outdoor eating area where round tables were set, each with its coloured parasol held aloft by a pole going through a hole in the middle of the table. White plastic chairs were placed around each of the tables. The kitchen where Mario prepared the food and drinks was on the ground floor of a low building above which were two small apartments; one in which Mario lived with his wife and another which he rented out to Chico during the summer months. Before Cattolica became a tourist resort, the building had been the residency of a smallholding belonging to Mario’s father; he grew vegetables for the local market. When the town became commercialised for the new tourist trade, the father gave the land to his son and Mario decided he would make a lot more money by turning it into a café. Michael learned all this from Mario during his many visits there.
Being young
Michael and Carol talked about being young and what this meant for them. Ever in a philosophical vein, Michael said, ‘The thing about adolescence is that we have no responsibilities. All we have to worry about is how we look; whether we are wearing the right clothes; whether our hair is right … when we go on holiday we have nothing to do. We fill our time with activities – things we want to do or that someone says we should do. Life just happens. We don’t have a programme to follow until there is an excursion to go on. We can sit around all day and do nothing if we like. The only thing we have to do is turn up for meals at the hotel.’
Carol agreed, ‘Yes, meals break up the day. It’s the same at home. In our house, we always eat at the same time. Breakfast, tea, supper. It’s the same old routine day in and day out. Without meal times, life would be difficult. It would be chaos if Mum had to plan every day differently. She wouldn’t know when to start cooking or even what food to buy.’
Michael said, ‘Adults have to worry about things all the time. They are always thinking about things such as when to have meals when to go shopping, how much money they have.’
Carol replied, ‘The adults are always worrying about things. Where people are, what they are doing, what time it is, where they have to go next. They might be on holiday from work but they are not on holiday from being adults.’
‘The grown-ups get on with each other but it’s in a very civilised way. They never really get to know each other because they don’t want to tell complete strangers things about themselves that they shouldn’t know about. Once they get settled into the holiday they choose which people they want to stick with. They find out pretty quickly who they like and who they don’t like and it stays the same until they leave,’ Michael said.
‘With us younguns,’ Carol replied, ‘we form groups but the groups change constantly. Some of the girls are the dominant ones – they are the ones who start things. They have their followers; other girls join their entourage.’
‘Have you noticed that the pool table at the hotel is a very important place? It’s like … a game where people act out their relationships. It’s not so much about playing the game as the way they play it,’ Michael explained, sipping at his coffee.
‘It’s different for us girls though,’ Carol said. ‘We don’t play pool – well not very often. We tend to talk about things in the toilets where we can be away from the boys and usually the adults too. Girls say things to each other in toilets that they wouldn’t say anywhere else.’
‘It’s an odd thing isn’t it?’, Michael said, as he took a bite from his piece of cake, ‘All these people have been thrown together on this holiday. Me and you – we would never have met outside of this holiday. Dave and Nick – those lads from Manchester – we would never have met them in a million years. We get thrown together in this place simply because we booked a holiday. There’s no way any of these people would have ever met each other in any other way. Wouldn’t it be funny if packaged holidays were only for people who already knew each other?’
‘It looks like the adults stick together,’ Carol remarked, ‘as a sort of protection – against the foreigners. The English people have come here for the sun and the sea but they have to put up with the place being full of Italians – and the Germans, of course. Have you noticed how many Germans there are here? It seems they too have travel agents that sell them packaged holidays, just as we do.’
‘Ah yes, the Germans!,’ Michael exclaimed, ‘The only thing I like about them is their custom of having coffee and cake in the mornings. I see all these signs outside the cafés, written in German, offering Kaffee und Kuchen but what I don’t like about them is the way they hog all the sunbeds. By the time we get to the beach all the sunbeds have the German’s towels on them. They must get up at the crack of dawn and put their towels on the sunbeds, so when we get there, there are none left for us.’
Carol nodded in agreement. ‘Isn’t it funny that we pay all this money to come to a resort that will guarantee sunshine and then, when we get here, we pay even more money to sit in the shade?’
‘Oh yes,’ Michael said. ‘And in this hot climate, that we have spent so much getting to, we spend lots of money on drinks to cool us down,’ he said and took another dip from his coffee.
‘So, you two are sharing a room with other boys?’, Carol asked.
‘We booked a twin room,’ Michael replied, ‘and then Chico said we had to share with Nick and Dave because the hotel was overbooked.’
‘You said they are from Manchester?’, Carol asked.
‘Yes. I am sure that’s where they are from,’ Michael replied. ‘It’s their accents; they sound like they are from Manchester. I have heard people talking like that on the telly. They are a bit odd though. You know, they both sleep in the same bed together.’
‘Really!’ Carol said in surprise. ‘Why is that?’
‘I don’t really know. I thought they might be brothers but I haven’t asked them yet. They didn’t give us their surnames when he first met them. I assume they are used to sleeping in the same bed when they are home. It’s what northerners do, isn’t it?’
‘Perhaps they do,’ Carol replied, ‘but you never know, they could be … well, you know, together-like.’
Michael was not sure what she meant by this but he had a hunch. ‘One night they were in bed, after we had put the lights out, and there was definitely something going on between them. They kept sniggering and moving about and rustling the duvet. It kept me awake. I don’t know what they were up to but they were obviously enjoying themselves, whatever it was.’
Carol replied, ‘It sounds to me like you are reading too much into little things. After all, you don’t really know them that well. Anyway … does it matter? Even if there is something going on between them, it’s not really any of our business.’ Carol looked very wise, Michael thought. He saw her as being old for her age. An old head on young shoulders, he thought.
Michael looked at Carol drinking her coffee and said, ‘This holiday feels like it has changed me in some way. I know it sounds funny but now I feel grown up; I don’t feel so much like a child any more.’
Carol gave him a look of surprise; she said, ‘In what way? How do you feel more grown up? Why should coming on holiday have made you feel like that?’
‘Well, for one thing, I have never been on a proper holiday before. My parents never went anywhere; they never took holidays. Your parents have taken you on holiday with them many times before?’
‘Yes. We always went away somewhere, every year, as far back as I can remember. It was usually somewhere in England but then, as cheap package holidays came in, we started to go to European resorts each summer. This holiday has not been out of the ordinary for me. I can see that it might have affected you though if you have never been abroad before.’
Michael continued, ‘It’s being here without my parents. That’s mainly what makes me feel grown up. I am responsible for myself. When I was little, my parents were always there to look after me. Now, I have to look after myself. Back home, if anything went wrong, you always felt you had people around you to go to if you needed help. Everyone speaks the same language so there would never be any problem with explaining things to people. If anything happened to me over here, I have no idea what I would do. I can’t speak their language.’
‘Well, it’s good we have Chico to take care of us,’ Carol replied.
‘Ah yes. Chico,’ Michael responded. ‘God help us if we ever get into any kind of trouble and need his help. So far, all Chico has done has caused problems for me.’
‘Like what?’
‘Like making us share a room with two strangers.’
‘That wasn’t his fault though, surely. It was the tour operators in England who overbooked the Hotel.’
The two friends spent a couple of hours talking, drinking coffee and ordering cakes and various items of food they wanted to try. They were happy, under the shade of the café’s parasol, chatting about their experiences and watching the people walking by, commenting about them. It was something that neither of them would have done at home, especially outside.
Michael said, ‘All the cafés at home are indoors only. Do you think that we will ever get tables and chairs outside, over in England, Carol?’
‘It would be nice if it happened but I think we get too much rain; I don’t see it happening unless there is a really big change in our climate.’
Their conversation paused as they studied the people passing by in the street.
‘Oh Michael, just look at that fat woman over there. Doesn’t she look a sight? How can she have the nerve to walk around in that tight dress with nearly everything hanging out like that.’
‘And look at her husband. He’s so small and that hat he’s wearing looks ridiculous.’
The two teenagers laughed a lot as they commented on the passers-by.
Food played a prominent part in the life of the holiday-makers. For them, eating was all part of the fun. At breakfast, in the Britannia, it was a time when people discussed what they might do that day and whether they should take advantage of the excursions that were always on offer. Chico was always around at breakfast; trying to persuade people to sign up for the trips that were offered on a daily basis. His commission depended on him being able to get customers to book for these optional extras. Dinner in the hotel was a social occasion both for the young people and for the adults. They would tell each other about what they had been doing, who had done what and what people had said to each other during the day.
Cafe society
The nearby cafés were where the English holiday-makers spent a lot of their time. Most of them were keen to sample the unfamiliar continental menus; they liked pizza and spaghetti and several resolved to look for these things in the supermarkets when they returned home. Not all of the English people were so keen on Italian food and stuck to their familiar diet of fish and chips. The local café owners had learned to cook what the English were asking for and began offering the staple diet of the English, as they saw it. Various Cattolican stall-holders offered slices of pizza to take away; others had baskets of apples and plums for sale, which they knew were popular with the tourists. Eating was a form of entertainment, just as much as drinking and dancing. Michael wondered if the local people ate for entertainment. Many of those he saw in the streets seemed to be poor people who were struggling to eke an existence and barely had enough food to keep them alive. It was those who had latched onto the tourist trade, he thought, who were prosperous and well-fed. Michael noticed that very few local people were to be seen in the cafés; most of them, he thought, were working during the day but even at night the cafés were populated mainly by the English and Germans.
It was very rare to see a black face in Cattolica. When a family from Africa walked through the streets, there were a lot of comments about them, both from the tourists and from the locals. In those days, people from Africa or India stuck mainly to the urban centres like Rome or Milan. Michael did however notice some Chinese-looking people; he assumed that they were Japanese. Japan was a prosperous country, he thought, and they could afford to take European holidays as much as the British and Germans. The holiday resorts were populated mainly by white people and seeing a black face was rare, so Michael noted in his book:
I do not often see black people in Cattolica. I suppose most of them come from poor countries and cannot afford to take holidays abroad. The odd few I have seen must be wealthy businessmen from Africa. So, why do people peer at them and make comments? Surely they are spending money the same as everyone else. People from Japan are spending the same money as we are and they do not get stared at. Why should people find black skin something that should be commented on?
That afternoon Richard kept his promise of taking Michael to the shops to buy shorts. The unwilling customer grumbled about the cost of everything. There were arguments over what style of the garment should be purchased but eventually, Richard’s dominant personality prevailed. Michael ended up with a pair of bright yellow shorts and Richard bought a blue cap for himself, a cap that he wore continuously until they went back to England. Richard usually wore an open-neck beach shirt or his T-shirt with broad blue stripes. Michael had brought very little clothing with him and none of it was at all suitable for a continental seaside holiday. As he had never been by the sea before, he had never had any need for shorts or T-shirts and England was not a place where he would walk around in skimpy clothing, even in summer.