Two Worlds

This was the turkey when Roberto and Tony celebrated their first Thanksgiving - and got compared to turkeys themselves. © Photo by Francesca Di Meglio

Get the truth about one of Italy’s most popular islands – and its people – by reading my new weekly blog installments (every Monday right here on this site)

Chapter Seventeen – “Italian Men Are Turkeys”

The next day was Thanksgiving, and we were all heading to Long Island. My grandfather and Roberto’s late grandfather were brothers. And we’d be celebrating the most American of holidays with my grandfather, his children (my mom’s brothers and their wives), and grandchildren (my cousins). Some of them would be meeting Roberto for the first time; all of them would be meeting Tony – who had locked lips with me the day before – for the first time. As everyone was getting ready to leave, Tony came into my room for another kiss. He held my hand as we sat on the floor and took in the Thanksgiving Day parade, which was also new to Tony.

As Snoopy floated past Macy’s Herald Square, Tony squeezed my hand and said, “I think I’m going to like Thanksgiving.” Indeed, he did. Roberto and he devoured antipasto, marinated vegetables, lasagna, sausage and peppers, stuffing, salad, and of course turkey. Their Italian palette failed to appreciate sweet potatoes or cranberry sauce, but they were keen on meat and gravy.

We took photos of all us cousins with Roberto and Tony as we introduced them to the American foods on my uncle’s harvest table. There was a lot of laughter. Addy, my sister’s all-American friend, who was joining us was getting some attention from the young men in the room. But Roberto still seemed to have eyes for her. He rarely left her side during the festivities, even though he did play a round of cards with my grandfather (his great uncle), and smoked some cigars with the others in the backyard.

Carrying a shot of grappa in his hand, he returned inside to Addy. He was whispering something in her ear, which made me nervous. After all, Roberto had a steady girlfriend, Lisa, back in Ischia. Sure, they had a fight, but they were not broken up. And this seemed like a bomb waiting to go off on his relationship. It got me wondering what Tony would do, if we were to pursue this kiss into full-fledged coupledom. We couldn’t possibly be together all the time; my life was in the United States and his was in Italy, so would I be able to trust him? Roberto was a stand-up guy, who I never thought of as being a two-timer. Were the stereotypes about Italian men true? Do they all cheat?

Moments later, my sister pulled me aside and told me that Roberto tried to kiss Addy last night. Addy, knowing all about his girlfriend, pulled back and sent him to his room to go to bed. She did the same in the living room’s pullout couch. Still, he was trying to convince her to finish that kiss. When my sister questioned Roberto, he said that he and Lisa had flirted with other people before, and that since she was back in Italy she would never find out. They were young, and their relationship was still experimental. They hadn’t really committed yet. In other words, he added, no one was getting married just yet. My sister and I both felt disappointment in our cousin – and men everywhere. “Italian men are obviously turkeys,” my sister said to me. “Obviously turkeys.” I glanced at Tony and wondered if she was right.

My faith in Italian men lifted a bit later in the day when Tony brought me a slice of the apple pie he watched me make from scratch the night before. Even though he hates cinnamon, he brought a big slice for himself, too. That’s when I taught him the wonders of a la mode, and he squeezed my hand under the table (so my cousins, who were sitting next to me, wouldn’t see us) and said, “You did an amazing job. I don’t like cinnamon, but I love your apple pie.”

Some names and identifying characteristics of the real people involved have been changed.

Tune into this Web site, Two Worlds, every Monday for the latest installment in my blog about my experiences in Ischia, and every other Monday to ItaliansRus.com for the latest Our Paesani column about all things Italian. Di Meglio is also the Guide to Newlyweds for About.com.

After my trip to Ischia in 2004, the Statue of Liberty waved me back home, but one kiss might change all that. © Photo courtesy of Di Costanzo and Gerenini

Get the truth about one of Italy’s most popular islands – and its people – by reading my new weekly blog installments (every Monday right here on this site)

Chapter Sixteen – Already, a Complicated Life

My question for Tony was simple and direct. “Are you sure this is a good idea because I’m from the United States and you’re from Italy?” His answer was the same, “Don’t worry. Keep kissing me. We’ll find a way to make it all work.” We kissed for another moment and then I returned to my office to work. He smiled for the rest of the day, but the kiss had me trembling both for its passion and the complications it would undoubtedly bring to my life.

While I wanted to believe Tony and focus on the glory of this blossoming love story, I couldn’t help but hear my gut churning. After all, months earlier a trip to Ischia’s hospital with that dang knee injury that was still plaguing me had me wishing I had never seen the place. Now, I was going to get embroiled in a romance with one of its natives? Aaaaah, but he was so cute and charming, and he seemed to genuinely like me, which was my favorite characteristic in a man back then. He did travel all the way from Italy to see me. And did I mention how cute and charming he was?

In the meantime, Roberto and my mom returned from the grocery store just in time for the boys to start preparing lunch and for my parents to head to the airport to pick up my sister Rosaria and her friend Addy. The phone rang and when I answered, there was a familiar Italian voice on the other end. It was Lisa. She was not at all happy. Roberto had not been in touch since he arrived in the States, and she wanted to know what he was doing – and with whom. I quickly had him pick up the phone. Although Tony and I couldn’t hear what was happening on the other end of the line, Roberto’s face told the story of a boyfriend in trouble with his love. If he had been back in Ischia, he’d be sleeping outside with his dog Diego (named for soccer player Maradona, of course) tonight. For much of the afternoon, he looked as if Diego had died.

Singing while cooking (still with a genuine smile stretched across his handsome face), Tony insisted that American salt had no taste and kept adding it to the pot of boiling water, ready to dump the pasta into the pot. As I finished up my work ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday, I was distracted by the kiss and thoughts of being forced to live in Ischia, an island without even an MRI machine, where my kids would lack opportunities, and the people work only six months per year, a place where people really believe that a glass of ice water on a hot day will kill you. At least, I had family like Roberto there. And I made a few friends on my recent trips. Truly, I earned a college degree in the States and vowed to stay in the New York metropolitan area because it was where I belonged and where my real family – replete with parents, siblings, and cousins – either lived or often gathered. We left Ischia with good reason; Ischia made us poor, and America made us rich in more ways than just in our wallets. And I sang to myself, too: “God bless America, land that I love…”

A little while later, Rosaria and Addy, who met my sister while the two studied abroad in Italy last summer, walked into the house. After brief introductions, we sat down to eat. Suddenly, the sullen Roberto, who had just argued with his Italian girlfriend Lisa, was coming back to life. He pushed my sister aside to sit between her and all-American Addy. A dancer, Addy was long and lean and had the face of a supermodel. Blond and blue-eyed, she was the epitome of what Italian boys thought of when they dreamed of American girls. Certainly, Roberto had forgotten his earlier tiff, but I think he also had forgotten Lisa’s name…

Some names and identifying characteristics of the real people involved have been changed.

Tune into this Web site, Two Worlds, every Monday for the latest installment in my blog about my experiences in Ischia, and every other Monday to ItaliansRus.com for the latest Our Paesani column about all things Italian. Di Meglio is also the Guide to Newlyweds for About.com.

This thermal spa is typical of the places the new generation of Ischitani go to get tan and meet people. © Photo by Francesca Di Meglio

Get the truth about one of Italy’s most popular islands – and its people – by reading my new weekly blog installments (every Monday morning right here on this site)

Chapter Three – Italian Men Past and Present

This [2003] vacation in Ischia – a return to my roots – was as much about taking a break from that crazy job as it was about questioning my life’s choices and finding myself again. In addition to finding myself, I was hoping to find an Italian man, even if but for a distraction.

From the moment I put my feet on the plane that would take us from Rome to Naples, there were men surrounding me. First, there was Enzo, who was returning home from his engineering job for the Easter break. He was a typical Neapolitan with broad shoulders, bronzed skin, and wavy black hair. He chatted me up on the plane from the start. First, he asked about my work and life in America. Then, he moved onto how pretty he thought my eyes were. I had never met such a forward man before (besides the ones with whom I was related, who I witnessed picking up other ladies). It was like I had just landed on Mars, and this was a whole new species before me.

In college, I barely dated. In fact, I didn’t even share a kiss with anyone. I had many male friends, who came to me with the problems they were having with other girls. I’d nurse their broken hearts but witnessed few opportunities for love for myself. The few boys who showed the slightest bit of romantic interest in me either scared the hell out of me or had a back-up girlfriend on the side. Since I’d never be the other woman – that’s just not my style – they fell into the “friends” department, too. In those few years out of college, I lived at home with my parents and worked hard to launch my career at women’s publications. I had forgotten what men looked like all together.

Of course, my Italian relatives in the States were concerned I’d never marry. They’d say, “You miss-a the boat-a.” So, in their glorious wisdom, they’d try to fix me up. One of my cousins chose a guy whose family hailed from Naples because she thought he’d fit in great with the family. She would go on and on about how his parents had a house in Italy, and he was such a great nurse, and he was so cute, and he seemed like a real catch – until he was always unavailable for a date and my cousin ran into him and his boyfriend doing wheelies on a carriage at IKEA, where they were shopping for furniture for their apartment. Another cousin tried to set me up with a banker from China, who was cute and wealthy – and in love with my cousin’s sister-in-law. Another cousin brought me out to eat with the mushiest kid you’ve ever met; he might have cried more than I do. When my cousin’s mothers tried to get in on the act, I drew the line and headed to the homeland.

Italian men reminded me of masculinity, and I associated them with strength and dependability. Even though I knew there were good and bad people in every culture, I just assumed most of them, especially the ones from Ischia, would be like my papa’ and uncles and cousins and grandfathers. They would live for family and work harder than anyone I know. They’d be serious and committed. If one of them chose me for a wife, he would make me his number one priority.

Later on, I learned that life is not as simple as I made it out to be. Ischia had changed since my Italian men had left the island. This was a new breed of men in Ischia. They wore a mask that made them look and sound similar to my people, but there were subtle distinctions. It would take a few years for me to realize it, but there was something different and disturbing about this new generation of men in Ischia.

My peasant people in Ischia are all but gone. Replacing them are overgrown teenagers who work in the hotels, restaurants, bars, nightclubs, and travel agencies. While my father and his siblings made due with hand-me-downs and shoes that had leaves for soles, today’s islanders are decked out in Armani and Prada whether or not they can afford designer labels. If you want to do something special for them, you will bring them a Ralph Lauren Polo shirt from America. They zip around the island on their vintage Vespas in a rainbow of colors or Smart cars that carry with them a certain prestige but can’t transport more than two people at a time. They worship the sun and look like bronzed statues with not even a hair out of place. They’re often so pretty that it is painful to look at them.

Take Roberto*. From top to bottom, he is delicious. Despite his salt-and-pepper hair and being nearly 40, he seems forever 17. His wavy hair reaches the nape of his neck, and falls in front of his eye as he talks. It’s the kind of hair that has him always looking like he just got out of bed. It perfectly frames his tan face and that crooked smile. When he looks at a woman – any woman – with those crystal blue eyes, he has her convinced she is the only person in the room with him. On the beach when he takes off his shirt, he reveals just enough muscle to prove he is not trying too hard to look this good. In the winter, he wears a button-down shirt, American blue jeans, a scarf around his neck that drapes and dips into his chest, and a pea coat.

Roberto lives at home with his parents, brother, and sister, and their families. He works as a doorman at one of the hotels near his house. With little responsibility even during the high season, he manages to get one day off work per week to bum on the beach by day and dance and drink with his friends by night. His girlfriend of seven years is in no rush to get married because she’s younger and still going to university (many don’t graduate until they are 30 years old in Italy). Roberto is in even less of a hurry to settle down. Why should he? Mammina does his laundry and cooks his meals. And he comes and goes as he pleases.

While Roberto remains pretty faithful to his longtime girlfriend (barring a drunken kiss with an old classmate three years ago), flirting comes as naturally to him as making meatballs comes to Mammina. He knows not to cross the line despite the many, many temptations. What he doesn’t know is that his well-educated girlfriend with the parents who own three of the most popular restaurants on the island and who never seems to flirt, is about to get him embroiled in a love triangle with a carabiniere (considered to be like the fake, moronic police) that will have repercussions that no one in his right mind could imagine beforehand. By the time all is said and done, families will be split apart, seeds of doubt will seep into numerous relationships, and friendships will be over and done. And I myself won’t even want to return to Ischia, the island I once loved like home.

Meanwhile, we all should have been paying more attention to the gossip about the carabinieri on the island. It was like an alarm warning us of the dangers to come. The police officers sure do get around on Ischia, and they’re not fighting crime. Roberto’s friend Fernando has had two girlfriends who cheated on him with different carabinieri. Another carabiniere broke up his own marriage and ran off to Miami with his lover, who had been married to someone else, too. They both left behind their teenage children.

Frankly, however, no islander is a saint. For every Adam who bites into the apple, there is an Eve who helps convince him it’s a good idea. Women in Ischia are almost as beautiful as the men. What they lack in physical perfection, they make up for with…

*Some names and identifying characteristics of the real people involved have been changed.

Tune into this Web site, Two Worlds, every Monday for the latest installment in my blog about my experiences in Ischia, and every other Monday to ItaliansRus.com for the latest Our Paesani column about all things Italian. Di Meglio is also the Guide to Newlyweds for About.com.