Overseas Briefing Choosing Trenitalia

Author: Beth Connolly

I spent thirteen hours aboard Trenitalia. In English, this is called learning things the hard way; in Italian one would say, essere una stupidona. It all started well enough. The train departed from the ancient Greek city of Siracusa and traveled up the Sicilian coast. Outside my window I saw the Sicily I'd imagined: rows of lemon and orange trees, the blue sea peeking out from behind laundry hung on terraces, Mount Etna looming in the distance. I was on my way to Rome to visit family after a sunny week backpacking through Sicily with friends.

At 11 a.m., my train pulled into Messina, a city on the northern coast of the island. It started to rain. Everything went dark. The smell of gasoline permeated the six-person compartment where I had spread out by myself. With concern I stuck my head out the door of my compartment into the hall to ask someone what was going on. This being Italy, various men loitering immediately looked over to size me up. I spoke to the nearest one.

"Scusi, ma dove siamo?"

"We are in a boat, crossing the strait," he told me. "Come up, you can see the most beautiful part of Italy." He suggested that I leave all my luggage with the people in the next compartment. Umm ... is that safe? Diciamo di si. We'll say it is.

Turns out our train had boarded a ship, and my new friend Giovanni, a naval officer, escorted me to the top level. On the right side the pastel-colored buildings of Messina lay spread out against the Sicilian hills. On the left was Calabria, the southernmost part of the Italian mainland: the tip of the boot.

Getting to know Giovanni better as I did over the next five hours, after he declared that he would move himself into my compartment because his was full of anziani (old people), I discovered that he was on his way home to Napoli for a oneweek vacation with his family, that he loves to travel and that he wants to learn more English. Every time that our train slowed to an inexplicable halt in an overgrown field, Giovanni told me, "Thirty minutes more delay." Apparently everyone knows that trains from Sicily will run late.

Okay, so maybe I will always forget to allow a few extra hours for travel in Italy. And I don't think I'll ever get used to 24-hour time. But there are a sacco of things that I will never forget from these five months. Like the delight of having the language explained to me by an eight-year-old, my host parents' granddaughter. Like the pleasure of mangiare bene, eating well. Like Chianti wine, called the blood of the earth. Like watching an episode of an American TV show from the 70s dubbed in Italian, and for the first time tonight being able to understand everything.

Rolling into Roma Termini at 9 p.m., the voice crackled over the intercom, "Signori e signore passaggeri, benvenuti a Roma Termini. Ci scusate per il ritardo di cento quaranta minuti. Grazie per aver scelto Trenitalia. 'Welcome to Roma Termini. Please excuse us for the one hundred and forty minute delay.'" Thank you for choosing Trenitalia. And I am so grateful that I did.