The Francigena Road

The Francienga Road (Via Francigena in Italian) is a road of pilgrimage that extends from Spain to Jerusalem. In the middle ages, the Via Francigena was integral in bringing new cultural influences and wealth to Siena, which led to Siena’s growth into a well-established city and cultural center. And of course, because it is so important, the Via Francigena is all our Sienese Art and Architecture teacher can ever talk about. Us CET Siena students, then, have come to loathe and adore the Via Francigena in equal parts, integrating the Via Francigena into conversation as often (or as little) as possible.

In fact, when my roommate Andra was about to meet an Italian boy in the city center, my other roommate Sam and I decided to give her a teasing “talk.” “One,” we said, “you are only allowed to kiss.” “Two,” we said, “you can occasionally hold his hand.” “And three,” we said, “you are, under NO circumstances, allowed to talk about the Francigena Road.” Of course we later amended the last rule to say that Andra is either not allowed to talk about the Francigena Road or is allowed to talk about the Francigena Road, meaning she is either silent about the topic or cannot stop talking about the subject even for a second.

The Francigena Road also came up when Kristina, Marcella and I—the only three people in our Italian language class—were asked to write an in-class, collaborative essay about a “discopub.” Of course, we named the discopub “Via Francigena.” And just as pilgrims stopped into churches along the Via Francigena during the Middle Ages for food and shelter, so was our discopub designed to provide a haven for those wanting to eat and party. We also wrote that Piergacamo, our art history teacher, would be the celebrity at the discopub’s fabulous opening, all the while learning important Italian words like “le pellegrine,” pilgrims, and “un buttafuori,” a bouncer.

Not to make our obsession with the Francigena too absurd, one of the highlights of a bike tour we took through the Tuscan countryside also had to do with the Francigena. First off, the bike tour was cool all on it’s own. We got to bike beneath one of the gates to the city, marked by a traditional Sienese “balzana” crest; we got to bike on roads lined by beautiful, golden rolling hills; and we got to look back from the top of a hill to see the walled-city of Siena, snuggled into the hills at a distance. However, as we approached the top of one of the hills on our bikes, we experienced a particularly spectacular moment: we’d found the Francigena Road. On the left of the dirt road was a modern day sign with a small logo of a pilgrim and, in bold white letters, the words VIA FRANCIGENA. “Take a photo of me hanging off the sign!” my roommate Samanthat exulted, climbing up the sign like a monkey and initiating a whole round of photos we took with this celebrated sign.

We didn’t get to bike all the way from Siena to Jerusalem on the Francigena, unfortunately; but it’s always extraordinary to me that, as silly as we make the Francigena, in Siena, there’s always a good chance that you’ll stumble across history and an older time.

Beautifully unbeautiful: Chiesa San Niccolò, Catania

I stepped inside and felt, at once, a little disappointed. The church was undergoing serious construction, so I could not really walk around. I was reading a sign about San Nicolò’s significance when I was startled by a loud snort. The source of the noise appeared to be an older gentleman dressed in a checkered fleece, despite the heat, who was sitting asleep on a wooden bench nearby. Every so often, he would let a strident snore escape as he sat slumbering on his throne. Eventually, he woke up and noticed us. He said a few introductory words about the church in Italian, walked to the door where two other men stood and then sat behind a desk where he clasped his hands into a ball on its surface and began humming peacefully.

I was struck by the serene manner in which this man carried himself. With his calm movements in mind, the church assumed a new atmosphere for me. It became a beautifully walled city of white marble, whose interior was punctured by shafts of bright light. The construction scaffolding, though quite expansive, only carried the weight of one or two workmen, whose silhouettes were foggy in the dusty light and whose panging hammers were like dripping water on stone. The church had transformed from a decrepit monument into a heavenly sanctuary, draped in an atmosphere of sleepy luminosity. And yet, it is this very luminosity that lends such an environment a certain vibrancy, infusing it with an unquenchable vitality. Despite the church’s incompleteness, all of its various elements – the man, the sound of hammering, the shafts of light – form their own harmonious ecosystem and I, a casual tourist, felt close to God in its presence.

Lo sciopero

A couple of weeks ago, my friends and I decided to take a trip to Cinque Terre for the weekend. We were thrilled to go, both because we had heard such wonderful things about this place, and because it had taken so much effort to plan the trip. After we finally found and put a payment down for a hostel and settled accounts, our Resident Director took us to the ticket office in Piazza Gramsci so we could buy our biglietti for the trip. As she was in the midst of conversing with an employee about expenses, we could see her facial expression become worried. I, who had only taken a couple weeks of Italian at that point, had not the slightest idea about what was going on. When she finished her conversation, she explained to us that there would be a railway strike (uno sciopero) for that Sunday and she didn’t know whether trains would even be running to Siena that day. We were distraught. After much discussion about our options, we finally decided that we would go on our excursion anyway and deal with the strike on Sunday. Worst come to worse, we would take a 5 am train on Monday morning and arrive a half an hour late for class.

The trip to Cinque Terre went smoothly. When we arrived, we, like all of the other English-speaking tourists we encountered, were enchanted with the beautiful coastline, picturesque villages, and clear blue water. We swam, hiked most of the paths between the villages, took a sunset boat ride back to the town we were staying in, and enjoyed some well-earned food. The next morning, a friend and I woke up early to check the strike situation at the train station, and our day full of adventure and confusion began.

To give away the ending, we made it home safe to Siena on Sunday with time to spare. I thought I might provide you with a step-by-step summary of our travels so that you will have some idea of what to do if you should encounter one of the many inevitable strikes that the Italian bus and train systems are so fond of. So. If you should find yourself in Riomaggiore on the Sunday of a strike and need to get to Siena the very same day, just follow these simple instructions and you’re sure to conquer lo sciopero. Here we go:

1. Wake up extremely early in order to scope out your situation. What if the only train running through your station leaves at 6 in the morning? Then you’ll be waiting at the train station all day having no idea that the only train has already left you behind.

2. Since your hostel’s office won’t be open for a couple of hours, leave your room keys in the suspicious wooden box propped up against the outside of the building. There was a cat in a shoebox nearby yesterday. The cat is gone. Where did it go?

3. Arrive at the train station to find other weary Americans studying abroad who have been there since 6, but all of the trains since that time have been cancelled. Learn that if “SOP” appears next to a specific train’s information on the departures board, you’re out of luck. Apparently that means that your train has been cancelled.

4. Wait at the tracks in vain for any train at all to pass by. It is randomly really cold (why, it was so nice yesterday?). Change into pants in public at the tracks (don’t worry, literally no one is there but you because it’s so early). You don’t want to miss the one train that passes through because you’re in the bathroom. Remember that Spongebob episode, “Rock Bottom?” No. You’re determined to have better luck than Spongebob. You’ll change at the platform.

5. As the day progresses, ask other random early-risers stranded in Riomaggiore what their plans are and if there is possibly a way to get back to La Spezia train station if no trains come through. After being hustled by an old lady trying to advertise her hostel to you, figure out that there are taxis, but the taxies charge 50 euros and are all booked for the day. How can it cost 50 euros when your train ride from La Spezia to Riomaggiore on the way to Cinque Terre was only 7 minutes long? Your other options are embarking on a 4-5 hour walk uphill with all of your luggage or hitchhiking.

6. Decide that you’re going to haul up to the top of the town by climbing a formidable hill and discover when you arrive at the tourist center at the top that there is, in fact, negative hope of catching a taxi and pretty much no other options.

7. You see a lady getting into a car. Ask her if there is room for five. Nope, she can only take two to La Spezia, but she was awfully nice to offer the ride at all. It looks like it’s going to rain. Sit aimlessly at the top of the hill until you see a taxi driving away. A taxi? Have the friend in your party who speaks the most fluent Italian chase the taxi up the street and pretty much grovel at the driver for a ride. He is a driver for La Spezia so is technically not working for Riomaggiore, but he is a sympathetic soul and agrees to take you along on his way back. When your friend asks how much it will cost, he hesitates and she takes his moment’s silence to suggest 30 euros. He accepts! Looks like your luck is changing.

8. The second you get into the taxi it begins to rain. During your drive to La Spezia, you begin to understand that if you had decided to walk you would have surely died within moments of your departure. The mountain you are driving up is treacherously steep and curving, and there is legitimately no space on the side of the highway for walking. Plus, even if you had made it you would have definitely died of hypothermia from the rain and wind when you arrived at the station.

9. When you arrive at La Spezia station, send your Italian-speaking friend to the information desk to ask about trains to Siena. When she comes back, you learn that there are no trains to Siena but one to Pisa that leaves in about two minutes. Run to the platform, not bothering to buy the new appropriate tickets or stamp them, and hop on the train and hope for the best.

10. When you get on the train, you immediately realize that it looks like the Hogwarts Express. There is even a man pushing a food trolley. You could swear Harry Potter is in your compartment underneath his invisibility cloak, and you caught a train that will bring you closer to home. What could be better? Your bubble is burst when a man comes through to check tickets. Your friends and you explain that you bought round-trip tickets and didn’t really know you needed new ones, and then the nice man lets you buy your tickets on the train.

11. When you arrive in Pisa, you quickly realize that there is little to no hope of getting to Siena by train and that the last four trains to Florence have been cancelled. You bum around, eat one of those Caffé Zero slushes, and buy marshmallows.

12. Rest in the waiting room that is inexplicably lit by fluorescent pink-purple lights (Why? Why does the room have to be that putrid color?) and try to read for a couple hours while the TV in the corner replays the same commercials over and over. After reading two pages in two hours, you are in the midst of debating with your friends about whether you have time to go to the leaning tower when you notice a departure on the screen for Florence with no “SOP” displayed next to it. It looks like your luck has turned for a second time and you spend the next fifty minutes with your fingers crossed.

13. After a fairly painless train ride, you arrive at Santa Maria Novella station in Florence. You go across the street to see if you can catch the next bus on the Siena Rapida, but the bus is already full and has been having mechanical problems that eventually force all of the passengers to get off. Cool. You buy tickets for the bus that leaves the following hour.

14. You and your friends haul all of your luggage all the way to the Duomo to have a look before you head back. At this point, your feet and back hurt so much (and you are so regretting not showering for two days) that you can barely appreciate the beauty of the Duomo. You decide that next time you visit you’ll be in a better mood and you head back to the bus station to wait for the bus.

15. When you’re finally on the bus, you feel relieved (the end is in sight!), but wish people wouldn’t speak so loudly. You drift off to sleep with a vague sense of exasperation, but when you wake up you find yourself in Piazza Gramsci.

There you have it. Perhaps now you’ll know exactly what to do when you inevitably encounter lo sciopero. My parting advice is this: be creative – at the very least, you’ll have an adventure you won’t forget. From here, all I can do is wish you luck.