Palio di Siena
Only one Italian in the whole of Italy was angry while we were there. “NO!” She practically yelled across the desk. Her eye’s rolled in their sockets as she turned to her co-worker to gossip about us while we stood and watched.
There was nothing I could do about it. My entire Italian vocabulary consisted of “la donna mangia la mela” which in a transit station, is terribly inadequate. There was something immensely mundane happening out on the bus line today - but to me in that little station, it seemed like the entire Italian bus empire was quaking. If I had been able to understand the rapid fire vocabulary, I’m sure it was the mind boggling task of walking out to the bus stop, looking for the bus with “San Rocco a Pilli” on the front of it, and climbing aboard… Something my little brain couldn’t process, especially with the syntactic onslaught from this small Italian lady in the dungeon of a bus stop in Siena.
“la donna mangia la mela”
Let me be perfectly clear - statistically it is unlikely that this portly lady was the only unhappy Italian at the time. I’m sure some tourist was causing equal amounts of stress in some other unfortunate Italian’s day, but when insults sound like the scripts of poets, it’s hard to discern real malice. Someone could have looked me dead in the eye and said “sei senza valore” and I would have thought to myself, “Oh wow… they think I am valorous and heroic”… “thank you so much!” As you can imagine, the fact that this woman’s words didn’t sound so virtuous caused me even more confusion. The rolled R’s lost their luster, the “ayyy” endings felt more like “ehh” endings as she spewed forth her hardened words.
“sei senza valore”
I turned to my wife with a bewildered look of despair. She stared back through equally helpless eyes. We both turned back to face the woman as she pointed and shook her head in the dimly lit booth. It quickly became apparent that any further investigation into the matter of bus scheduling would yield poor and unreliable results. The co-worker in the back was on their mid afternoon siesta and was clearly enjoying the debacle far more than rendering any assistance. I couldn’t tell if it was just dusty or if smoke was actually coming out of the ears of our poor, angry, Italian assistant, and fearing the worst, I politely excused our stressful presence and started back for the stairs that lead up to the light outside.
Midway up the stairs, I paused for a moment to stand up a bit straighter and adjust my now slightly disheveled linen shirt. A trip to Italy means that you at least need to try to look the part. Italians are a beautiful people. It would be so sad to visit the charming country and waste the time away with a wrinkled shirt. I had to put the bad juju of the dungeon behind me, and re-invigorate my ego. Well dressed and lightly tanned, strong Italian men sat at the cafe across the street passing the time behind a romantic newspaper holding a cappuccino and laughing at the printed pages. I didn’t want my wife getting any ideas.
In the end, this chance encounter with that particularly unfriendly transit official, COULD be explained. There is only one explanation which could have reconciled this uncharacteristic outburst. The Palio.
Palio is unlike any event you have ever been to or are likely to attend. The event turns the romantic walled hill town of Siena from the rustic, charismatic landscape that Tuscany is known for, to a bustling and energetic medieval city. Entire mobs of locals from one Contrada can be heard singing their age old tunes blocks away. The sound carries down the cobblestone streets, bouncing off of the tall stone buildings, in and out of cafes, and under the arches that welcome you to the city on the hill.
The preliminary qualifiers and demonstrations had begun earlier that day, and clearly, the middle-aged, bus attendant working her days underground in the unforgiving and dark transit terminal was part of a Contrada who’s horse had been outperformed.
When we arrived at the main square the next day, we stopped to take it all in. The city center had been transformed into a magnificent spectacle. Large sets of bleachers ringed the plaza, blocking the entrances to the shops. People ducked under them anyway, intent on grabbing a cup of their favorite gelato, or to pick up an extra flag in fear that people might mistake them for the enemy Contrada. The midday sun pierced the soil that had been trucked in, turning it into a dry powder. A lone official with a water hose went about his duty trying desperately to keep the soil moist against the odds. Without concern, he happily splashed sunburned tourists who wandered too close in their white sandals and cream colored capris.
A splash of dark watery ooze jumped up from the ground, causing a stir in the overweight family trying to cross the race track in the clearly roped off area. A police official with a smart brimmed cap and polished boots whistled at them and waved his hands. The father played his part, acting as if the ropes they had just climbed under weren’t there seconds ago. He yelled unhappily at his kids to cross more stealthy and they pushed their way into the crowd on the other side.
“Is that a WOLF?” My wife asked, a tone of disbelief mixed with a tinge of concern in her voice. I turned to look where she was pointing. “I’ll be darned” I thought to myself. I searched my memory banks for any piece of European history that might hint at some medieval practice of serving the loosing team to ferocious beasts. I drew a blank, but even still, I turned back to my wife and tried to sound confident while I explained that if we were on the loosing team, I would make sure to get her out of the square before we became the evening snack for a hungry wolf.
Let me pause for a minute to describe what exactly the Palio is. Some might describe it as a horse race. They wouldn’t be wrong, although they would poorly and quite inadequately describe the intensity and pure mayhem of the event. The Palio pits all 17 Local townships (called “Contrade”) against each other in an all out duel of bravery and strength. Riders race bareback around the small city square without regard to rules or regulations. Fall off your horse? That’s okay, your horse can still win. Can’t make the turn? Slam into the sharp corner of a stone building erected during the middle ages, loosely padded with someone’s old holed mattress. The race is every bit Italian as Cappuccino and Pizza. Married couples from different Contrade separate for the week of Palio. It is the sporting event of the year for the small city.
We made our way to the right side of the square and found a comfortable set of unoccupied seats in the bleachers. They were nice seats. Too nice. We were quickly approached by the local SWAT team who informed us in very eloquent Italian that we either had to pay the bounty in pure gold, silver, and emeralds, or be kin to the king. I have to be honest, there was no mention of women or apples, so my translation is loosely based on known visual cues like pointing and other gestures.
We made our way to the center of the ring, where the peasants could stand and watch. Time passed rather slowly as the final preparations were put in place. Police officers, race officials, horse owners, school teachers, children, parents, tourists, old grandmothers and grandfathers, people from all walks of life started filling the stands and cramming into the fenced off center portion. School children proudly displaying their Contrada’s colors filed into the stands directly across from where we were standing and began chanting and singing.
At last, official business began with the clearing of the race track and a good sweep of the lightly dampened soil. Old soda bottles, paper fliers, and random other ownerless articles were pushed to the side. When the horses came out of the stables the crowd went wild. The cheering and chatting reached a new decibel - each voice motivating their riders with absolute urgency. The options were to either win, or put your Contrada to shame for the next several months.
I had to keep both eyes open to take the picture. The sun was intense, beating down on me with every bit of its immense strength, but I had to endure. They would be rounding the corner any moment now, and to loose sight of the long fence before me could me a complete reset of camera and the potential of missing the action. I was jammed up against the fence on the inside, people pushing against me, craning to see. The sound of the cannon was still ringing in my ears - everything about that moment was raw and untamed.
I felt a small sliver of wood press stiffly into the exposed skin on my elbow as I held my place at the edge of the ring. The rough planking had been brought into the small Italian square and erected solely for this event. The mixture of sand and gravel under my feet shifted under my weight, making me shift my footing slightly to maintain my posture.
Only a second had passed since the cannon had released its deep boom - reverberations still echoed off the high walls of the buildings that surrounded the plaza. The crowd was wild. Cheering of the young children across the track drowned out the noise of the thousands of other spectators.
I could see the excitement as they drew nearer to the corner. I could only see down the straight-away and had to gauge the timing based on the response of the crowd. The time was now. I squinted through the lens and held my breath.
The first horse rounded the corner. It was magnificent. I’m not a betting man, but if I was, I’d have bet everything on that horse, and won. The next one was just as glorious. They nearly flew by kicking up the mucky sand with each hoof beat. I was completely caught up in the excitement. I was breathing heavily even though I was completely stationary. My fingers were moving quickly trying to get my settings correct for the perfect shot. Funny… I never put the camera in sport mode so at best I got only 2 or 3 images each time the group or horses ran past. I had three laps to click off the pictures - three chances to see it all up close.
The race ended much faster than it started. The three laps were over. The blue and white of the Dolphin Contrada took victory! Incidentally, this was also the Contrada in which we were staying, and the colors we had dawned. Should’ve bet big.
