I was introduced to my first glass of grappa last night, Nardini grappa from the town of Bassano. “The best grappa your money can buy,” they told me. It felt like someone hit me in the head with a large mallet. Fortunately, after the day’s adventures, I was drinking safely in my room or I might be stumbling yet through the poorly-lit alleys of Venice muttering, “ Ey... dove sono?”
I had taken a day trip to the small medieval town of Bassano del Grappa – the town whose name I bear. It was a sort of pilgrimage, about one hour north of Venice. I found my name displayed on the banks there, on the museum, on the shop signs and buses – even on the sewer lids. It felt like the town was mine.
I had been wandering for a while nosing about busy little shopping streets and arcades, and had stopped to take advantage of a little green bench to rest my feet. Two floors above, in a building across the street, a pleasantly plump older woman was cleaning her windows. Suddenly she turned around and the tiny balcony became her stage. She began to sing in a rich, booming contralto to the pedestrians below. She waved her cleaning rag as delicately as a lace handkerchief as she sang, swaying from side to side, clutching the cloth to her more-than-ample breast for emphasis. When her aria came to a dramatic and lustful end, she was rewarded with sincere applause and whistles from the small crowd gathered on the street below. She bowed with great solemnity, turned, and continued polishing the window.
I love Italy.
As many other northern Italian towns, Bassano was badly damaged during World War ll, and has been restored with much care. I stood on the charming Ponte degli Alpine, a beautiful covered wooden bridge spanning the Brenta. It is the iconic symbol of the city. It has been destroyed and faithfully rebuilt many times since the 13th century. From my vantage point, with the rumble of the waters rushing beneath, I saw homes on both sides of the river that still bear the scars of artillery fire in their plaster walls, left that way all these many years on purpose, I would imagine, as a reminder of their resilience.
Though Bassano has several war memorials, I found one to be particularly touching. In 1944, there was a rastrellamento or a round-up of the partisans in the area, which culminated in the hanging of thirty-one young Bassano men on what is now the Viale dei Martiri, a circular esplanade with a view out toward Monte Grappa. It is a small park encircled by 31 identical trees. Each tree has a pot attached to its trunk filled with blooms, and on each pot is an engraved plaque bearing the name and photograph of one of these martyred young men. As I stepped from tree to tree looking at the young faces, reading their names – Fabio, Lorenzo, Angelo, Gianni, tears clouded my eyes to think of the pain this town still feels and to see how lovingly they have remembered their lost ones for more than seventy years with this personal tribute.
I put my book down early tonight. By ten o’clock, I’d read the same page three times and still wasn’t taking it in, and, let’s face it, Chekov is not that much of a challenge. Could it have been the second dram of grappa? Or perhaps the lone 40-watt lightbulb dangling at the end of a cord from the ceiling was just no match for the full moon illuminating the dome of Santa Maria Formosa outside my window. Maybe it was the enticing fragrance of the stewing cioppino coming from a kitchen across the canal that stalled my concentration. Whatever the cause, Chekov slipped behind the bed, forgotten, and I fell asleep again, with a little smile on my lips.
Such memories of your travels, always feel like we're right there with you....
Amazing post, Sharron - I LOVE that you visited Bassano!
There are a couple of far-flung places across the other side of the globe bearing my own family name - neither of which is really feasible for me to reach!