Italy Day 0/1: Singapore — Rome — Santo Stefano di Sessanio
It’s hard to believe I was walking through the Roman Forum not three days ago, but there you have it: going on holiday frequently feels like stepping through a portal where here and there don’t seem like they could possibly belong to the same space-time continuum. I am writing now, as quickly and unthinkingly as I can, to document my memories even as they exponentially decay, like light fading as it leaves a source of illumination. My hope is to capture some of the fleeting sensations I experienced on this trip, before they dissolve into shadow.
I am sick before I get on the plane.
In the back of my mind I know I am done for as soon as I feel the telltale throat tickle in the morning, the second morning I have woken up at 6.00 am, ill-rested from a few hectic days of trying to squeeze out as many emails as possible before going on leave. With today’s work culture, taking a vacation is much like dropping a stone into a large cowpat; you might displace the muck to either side, but you don’t actually get rid of it. Or, to misquote Lavoisier — such is the law of conservation of fecal mass.
Anyway, I hate flying even on the best of days, and there is nothing like flying with a cough to send my self-pity-o-meter shooting to new heights. By the final three-hour leg of the journey from Helsinki to Rome, pain is needling its way through my shoulders, up my neck and into my brain with nauseating intensity. My mouth tastes like a week-old garbage can. I had popped a paracetamol in the departure hall earlier; it hadn’t helped a jot.
J, meanwhile, is limping along, having sprained his ankle while holidaying in Japan the week before. He nevertheless gamely drags both our luggages to the rental car, looking like the world’s most put-upon porter. This spurt of chivalry will take its toll in three hours, when we pull up in the town of Santo Stefano di Sessanio. As it is, neither of us are in the mood to celebrate the free upgrade to a fancy BMW bestowed upon us by the customer service officer at Sixt (“Remember to give me a five-star review when they send you the survey,” he had winked. And we did, if only because he had the tenacity to send us a reminder email about it).
If I asked you to close your eyes and picture a medieval town nestled in the rolling hills of Italy, you would probably be imagining something very close to Santo Stefano di Sessanio. The tiny village, which was once ruled by the Medici, is all rustic stone buildings and narrow cobbled streets — perfect for tourists looking for a romantic getaway, terrible for someone with a right foot that has ballooned to the size of a meatloaf.
The first thing I notice as we approach by car is the crane that thrusts out from amidst the sloping rooftops, its latticed boom suspended high above the ancient watchtower — the Torre Medicea — that must have been the tallest structure in town for hundreds of years. That crane doesn’t belong in this place, I think irritably — and then I shake my head and realise that it is Santo Stefano, and not this phallic piece of machinery, that is the anachronism here. Without the crane, or more accurately the extensive interventions of modern engineering that the crane represents, this village might be little more than a pile of forgotten rubble on a hillside.
We are staying at the Sextantio Albergo Diffuso — literally a hotel that is diffused across the entire town, its guest rooms tucked away in a maze of carefully restored buildings that we navigate with the help of the concierge. J is moving at the pace of an arthritic snail, but she graciously slows down so that he can keep up on the uneven terrain. We duck through a low arch, edge by some steel scaffolding, and finally arrive at L’Alchimista, a two-storey outfit that apparently used to belong to an alchemist. The lower floor has a stone fireplace stocked with wood; the upper is accessed by a set of steep wooden steps that open onto a landing with a double bed and a gracefully curved white bathtub (if you are a person who needs privacy, this is the wrong suite for you). In lieu of a shower, the hotel has generously provided an enamel jug for you to scoop up water from the tub and pour it over your head. Just like the old times, the concierge says, and indeed the room is a feat of preservation, luxury and history woven into the cosy wool mattress, embedded in the spotless hardwood floor.
As soon as our host departs, my facade of composure crumbles. I have a bath, collapse into bed and sleep fitfully while the sliver of sunlight in front of the window lengthens and then disappears. J joins me in this venture, but wakes up at some point to cancel our dinner reservation at the albergo’s restaurant, which is an unbearable five-minute hobble away. In a surprising and touching gesture of kindness, the hotel sends a meal to us instead (and doesn’t even charge us a room service fee after). When I finally drag myself downstairs, there is a veritable feast laid out on the table — some kind of deep fried lamb or beef; a leafy salad strewn with slices of plum; grilled vegetables that aren’t so much glistening with oil as swimming in a golden puddle of it. I have no appetite, which is never the case when I am well, but force down as many mouthfuls as I can before returning to bed.
Sometime in the early hours of the morning, I wake up on damp bedsheets, glazed in sweat but blessed with that glorious feeling of a fever breaking. I’m sure you know it — it feels like cool fingers against your forehead, lifting a sickly miasma from your mind. My illness isn’t over, but for the first time since I touched down on Italian soil, I feel a flicker of hope that the holiday might be salvaged yet.
To be continued…
