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* photo by micora
There are a plethora of small regional Italian Banks, but only a certain number of clearing banks, thus international transactions can result in astronomical bank charges. Consequently Italians generally prefer to do lots of their transactions in cash. In fact they don’t trust banks at all, and often prefer to keep their savings hidden under the mattress. In the end we tore up the cheque book in disgust and closed this euro account, as it was basically useless.
So we had to organise setting up an Italian bank account, to enable us to transfer some of our funds over to Italy. Guido’s cousin worked as a cashier in one of the bigger Italian banks and he said he would try to help us by organising for us to meet the Bank Manager. In due course the meeting went ahead, but we were advised that we could not open a “normal” bank account, as we were not registered as “Residents” in Italy, yet we couldn’t be “Residents” because we didn’t have a normal bank account ??? Therefore we had to open a “Stranieri” account, which of course was subject to significantly higher charges.
The staff in the bank turned out to be very helpful, and it was just as well, as it took a full hour and a half to complete the procedure of opening the account, which meant Paul had to leave to feed the parking meter on several occasions. There was a long list of questions and a series of screens on the computer that the clerk had to fill in using a complicated system of codes. The staff didn’t seem to have created a “Stranieri” account before, clearly they were unsure of the procedures, as they had to phone up Head Office several times for advice. Then reams of documentation were printed off in triplicate, at least half a tree’s worth!!! Eventually after much sorting and stapling we were given pages and pages of documentation to sign, before we were finally despatched with two enormous bulging folders of paperwork. We left the bank totally exhausted by this experience.
We soon learned that free personal banking does not exist in Italy, because an account holder has to pay a three monthly fee just for the privilege of having an account. We opted not to have a cheque book as every cheque you write also comes with an additional cost.
Subsequent visits to the bank also proved to be very time consuming. Firstly simply getting in and out of the bank can be quite an ordeal, as most Italian banks are, for security reasons, equipped with a metal detecting device. (There are said to be more bank robberies in Italy than any other country in the European Union !!!)
Firstly you are told to leave your personal belongings such as: keys; coins; watches; jewellery and mobile phones in a small locker, a system somewhat similar to that of a swimming pool changing room. Then you have to push a button to open the door of a small, claustrophobic “airlock”, and automatically the door closes behind you, imprisoning you inside. Then inevitably the machine picks up on something metallic on your person, and a grating voice instructs you to go back outside and put all your metallic objects in the locker provided. Paul found, to his great annoyance, that many seemingly innocuous objects can fall foul of this wonder of modern technology, such as a buckle on a belt, zips and in particular safety shoes with protective steel toe-caps. Paul was often stared at by other customers whilst approaching to the counter, in his socks, holding up his trousers with one hand, whilst trying to get a cashpoint card out of his wallet with the other.
So, having eventually gained entry to the bank, you now have to start the process of “waiting to be served”. First you must make a mental note of exactly your place in the queue, as this can be confusing. There are sometimes chairs for elderly customers to sit on whilst waiting their turn. On one occasion an old dear entered just before us, gnarled and bent double, hobbling on a stick, complaining of her artriti. We smiled sympathetically as she took a pew, and noted that she was before us in the queue. I watched her shrewdly observing how the transactions at the counter were proceeding. When she concluded that it was her turn, she jumped up and made a sudden sprint to the counter, we’d never seen someone be so quickly energised, despite their dreadful artriti !!!
Basically, Italians just don’t comprehend queuing, and customers tend to stand around in a rebelliously disorderly fashion, huffing and puffing, generally grumbling loudly about the excruciatingly slow speed of service. Meanwhile, they take advantage of the situation to size each other up and listen in to other people’s conversations.
Customers are, on the whole, served in turn, but inevitably there is somebody who just wants to sneak in to “ask a simple question”, and “it will only take a moment”, and “You don’t mind do you?”. Consequently you end up waiting forever and a day, because nothing in Italy is simple, so inevitably the matter in question turns out to be far more complicated than it should be. Meanwhile you are left thinking of all the other things you could usefully be doing with the precious wasted time.
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The road up to the rented villa was steep and winding, not at all straightforward for a touring caravan to negotiate, however our friend Guido kindly allowed us to park our caravan on his piece of land overlooking a delightful, hidden little cove. The grounds were overgrown with waist high weeds, so in exchange for his kindness we offered to help him begin to tame the wilderness with a temperamental decispugliatore (strimmer) which proved to be more trouble than it was worth. Guido showed us the way down the steep, rustic, wooden stairway that lead to the beautiful white, sandy beach.
* photo by paul ellson
At that time Guido had three dogs. The first, named “Fausta”, stood waist high, when on all fours, and was a Pastore Maremmano, a breed of large, powerful herding dog from the Maremma area of Tuscany. “Fausta” would come boisterously lolloping up, drooling profusely, her tail alone could give you a nasty lashing and if she jumped up she could easily knock me flying. The second was a sizeable swanky male, by the name “Geronimo”, who was a cross between a Husky and a German Shepherd. The third named “Mona” was smaller and more timid, with a sweet temperament.
Most of the time the dogs were kept in ramshackle kennel in a rickety enclosure, only being let loose to run off steam and play before their afternoon feeding time. They were generally fed on bones, scraps and pasta that had been boiled up in a large smelly pot.
One day we drove up to Guido’s terrain as usual, with our two dogs panting in the back of the car, feeling safe in the knowledge that the other three hounds would be safely contained in their pen. Paul released our dogs from the car, intending to tether them nearby, when in a flash Fausta and Geronimo came bounding across, bearing their teeth and growling ferociously. A terrible fight broke out, and they savagely attacked our two dogs who were screaming and yelping in terror. Paul scrambled about on the floor, wrestling with Guido’s hounds in an effort to curtail the attack. Fortunately reinforcements were soon at hand, in the form of Guido and his brother, who finally succeeded in separating the dogs, and we speedily locked our two safely back into the car. Paul was left looking pale and in a veritable state of shock, not to mention badly grazed and scratched. It took quite some time for him to catch his breath and stop trembling.
We checked our dogs over, and at first believed they had escaped without any injuries. It was only later that evening that we found that Barney had in fact received a nasty bite in a rather delicate region. The next morning we found a local vet, who pronounced that the bite was infected and needed stitches. Having paid the expensive vet’s bill we resolved never to take our hounds up to Guido’s again for it had proved to be a very costly mistake.
Barney soon made a full recovery, so much so that one day whilst I was playing ball with him he managed to leap up and head butt me under the chin, making me the proud owner of a fat split lip. That’s gratitude for you!
** photo by rogilde
Later, we heard that Guido’s dogs had twice broken out of their enclosure, and had gone “AWOL”. In their break for freedom they galloped off down the wooden stairway towards the sea, where no doubt they wreaked havoc among the poor, unsuspecting sun bathers. It was not long before it became evident that both the female dogs were pregnant.
Some weeks later Guido proudly announced that both the bitches had given birth to their cucciolini. The smaller Mona had produced a lovely litter of ten, and Fausta excelled herself in delivering another fifteen pups. Thus Guido’s patch was rapidly transformed into a “puppy farm” with the copious new arrivals !!!
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It became clear that very soon we would have to consider moving from Salvatore’s campsite, as the summer season was fast approaching.
Dear Salvatore had allowed us to remain with our two hounds as a special favour, although his campsite had an official policy of “no dogs”. He had been so concerned for us and had tried his best to prolong our stay, but before long another family from Rome would be arriving, expecting to park their caravan on our pitch. Already at weekends several families had begun turning up, busily organising themselves for the summer months. They arrived with their cars packed to the gunnels with crates, plastic tables, chairs, sun loungers, umbrellas, fridges, cooking stoves, plastic cupboards, shelving, fans, TV’s …… even canaries in cages and pet cats. This was an almost “home from home” relocation – Just how much could more could they manage to cram into a small caravan and awning, we wondered?
All the little local campsites, shops and restaurants dotted along the coast road had started springing into life, preparing for the onslaught of summer visitors. Boards were prepared advertising the local cuisine and delicacies such as zuppa di pesce, tiella and fresh mozzarella di buffala. Stalls appeared setting out a colourful array of holiday goods. Over-grown verges were cleared for parking so that in August hundreds of cars could squeeze into every little nook and cranny of space available.
At one stage we considered purchasing a second-hand mobile-home to accommodate us all on the building site, while the necessary renovation work was being undertaken on the farmhouse.
However in due course we abandoned this notion and decided that the quickest solution was to find a suitable rental property in the Itri vicinity. We had not taken into account that rental prices were significantly inflated during the profitable summer months, thus we were greatly relieved when Giampiero, the estate agent, came up trumps by locating a more reasonably priced property, which could solve our accommodation problem, at least in the short term.
This was merely a small, simple country villa, but to us it felt perfectly luxurious and spacious, compared to our compact little caravan quarters, and best of all it had a bath and lots of hot and cold running water.
Yet we were particularly sad to conclude our stay at the campsite, as we had very much enjoyed our spell there, under Salvatore’s watchful eye. We promised to drive down to visit him and his family regularly.
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