17-21 August 2019
We spent a few days in Serra before heading to Pesaro and Fano with our cousin Luciana for three days of eating, music, and bureaucracy.
Serra Wanderings
Serra—Mercato
Every Thursday there is a small mercato in Serra with great fruit and vegetables and sometimes shoes. (Lots of shoes are manufactured in this region.) There was a bigger mercato 18 August for the summer fiera.
(The vans must squeeze through the town gate.)
Fano e Pesaro
We went to Pesaro for three days for Bonnie’s Permesso di Soggiorno appointment, for the Rossini Opera Festival (ROF), and to see our friends Adriana Molarolli and husband Guiliano Giampaoli in Fano. Pesaro and Fano are about 12 kilometers apart, both on the Adriatic coast. They are beach towns with a large fishing industry.
Cibo e bevande con i nostri cugini
We landed at our Airbnb in Pesaro and, first, we agreed to have lunch before we headed to Fano. Second, we decided to eat near the beach instead of in the city center. Third, we found a restaurant on Google. And fourth, while looking for parking, Luciana spotted cousin Guiliano from Rome in a restaurant with his daughter Michaela and her husband Maurizio! What a coincidence. We joined them for a leisurely lunch, and they graciously picked up the tab. Small world indeed! Great fish restaurant by the way.
Pesaro Wanderings
The Airbnb for Luciana, Robert, and Bonnie was the top floor of a condo on the outskirts of Pesaro. Bonnie found Pesaro booked up because of the opera festival, and our “two-bedroom” flat turned out to be one big room with a curtain separating our beds. Oh well. It worked. In the morning Luciana and Robert found a nearby cafe for their caffeine and pastry.
Fano Wanderings
We spent much of Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday with Adriana Molarolli and her husband Guiliano Giampaoli wandering and eating our way through Fano. (Adriana and Luciana are childhood pals from Serra. Robert met them when he was 12.)
Our first dinner was on the main square of Fano, Piazza 20 Settembre. Adriana’s sister Mirella and her daughter Silvia from London and English son-in-law Jonny, joined us. After dinner we all strolled and stopped at Maki gelateria.
The next day we met at Ristorante Laterna for an elegant fish lunch. And on Wednesday, after a late night at the opera and then an 8:30 am appointment for Bonnie in Pesaro, we strolled the morning mercato in Fano (while Bonnie caught up on sleep). Then we had a great lunch prepared by Adriana, followed by naps for everyone and more Maki gelato.
Dinner on Piazza 20 Settembre, Fano
Ristorante Lanterna, Fano
Robert saw Adriana Molarolli’s Facebook post about this restaurant several months before our trip and decided we must go. Lanterna specializes in fish. It did not disappoint. Fano is known as one of the fish centers of Italy. Turns out the owner has a friend in Los Angeles who runs the restaurant Angelini Osteria on Beverly Boulevard.
Rossini Opera Festival, Pesaro
Bonnie has long wanted to go to the annual Rossini Festival in Pesaro, and this year our timing was right. We saw Semiramide, a four-and-a-half-hour tragic opera premiered in 1823 set in ancient Assyria with florid belcanto singing over a full orchestra in front of an edgy Freudian set. Wow. It was a fabulous spectacle. One of the props was a 12-foot stuffed teddy bear. The Assyrian queen wore a sassy black business suit and spike heels.
The 1,500 seat theater was sold out, with large contingents from Japan (some in kimonos), Germany, and other countries. This old-fashioned decorative style of singing is seldom heard currently in the US, but it was done fabulously by this cast. In fact, Rossini seems to be popular at operas all over Italy. Robert, Bonnie, and Luciana napped much of the next day.
Permesso di Soggiorno
The morning after the opera Bonnie had an 8:30 am (gasp) appointment at the Questura in Pesaro, the provincial capital, to request permission to stay in Italy for more than three months. Robert is an Italian citizen, so he can stay forever. (Not that Bonnie is hoping he will. At least not yet.) And let’s ignore the fact that Bonnie has already been in Italy for four months. This was the earliest appointment available.
Bonnie had done extensive research online and found conflicting lists of what she needed to bring. These included an official translation of her marriage certificate, evidence of medical insurance, evidence of household income, an Italian fiscal code, form B, Robert’s multiple documents confirming his residence in Serra, four photographs, a photo copy of every page of her passport, a stamp issued by a tobacconist for 16 euros, and on and on. It was a daunting list of things to assemble, but she was thorough. She took her squad, Robert and Luciana, to translate the Italian bureaucratese and lobby for her. These government transactions are not straightforward, even when you come fully prepared.
When we arrived at the questura, the police said, No, no, no. This is not the right office. They sent us to another bland government office a half mile away where we waited with others, many young men from Senegal. In the end we walked two miles in the heat to three different offices, some twice, to get everything, including fingerprints, in the correct order. But Bonnie was approved!
Her final Permesso document will be ready in two to three months (we have to check online), and it cannot be mailed to us but must be collected in person in Pesaro. (The chief clerk in this ordeal delighted in saying to us, This is not like in America.) By the time the Permesso is ready we may be on our way home to San Francisco, but Bonnie is clutching a receipt that should be fine for now.
It was a four-month slap-in-the-face experience in Italian bureaucracy. Actually it was somewhat streamlined because Bonnie is married to an Italian citizen. Cousin Luciana did the heavy work of debating, questioning, explaining, and disagreeing, while Bonnie stood in late-night-opera-stunned silence holding a big folder of documents. We’ve noticed that frequently in the middle of acquiring documents, the government computer system breaks down, a software expert is called to assist, data is reentered, and everyone waits. In addition, the controversial politician Salvini has made everything more difficult for foreigners. He shares Trump’s view on immigrants.
Pranzo (and a nap) at Adriana and Guiliano’s in Fano
Another great lunch by Adriana (and Guiliano). Fish, of course. Mussels followed by a pasta with clams. All fresh. All good. All better with friends and cousin.
Gelateria, Fano
Crypt of San Biago
Buried in the ground below Serra’s cemetery is a crypt that dates from the 7th and 8th centuries when Christianity was introduced into the Cesano Valley where Serra is located. The columns are of different shapes and were probably from a pagan site elsewhere, if not this one. The crypt may have been underground to hide the fact that Christians were worshipping and to prevent thieves from finding it.
The crypt was recently restored, and you can pick up the key at the city hall. The remarkable part of this visit is that we went with Claudio, Natasha, and their family. We met by chance in the cemetery a few days earlier while Luciana was cleaning the family plots. Claudio recognized Robert from 1972! Robert’s grandfather asked Claudio, then 12 years old, to take Robert to the crypt. It was Claudio’s first time there. They had to dig through a pile of dirt to get into the crypt. Claudio clearly remembers Robert, the American, with long hair, big beard, and large Nikon 35mm SLR camera (Nikon F?).
At the unexpected cemetery meeting Robert showed Claudio photos he made on an even earlier trip to Serra in 1962. When Claudio saw both his grandparents in one photo, he felt this was profound because this was 15 August, the day Italian families reunite.
Now Claudio lives in France, teaches religion in Luxembourg, and has started a foundation promoting peace. His current focus is Ukraine, his wife Natasha’s homeland. The foundation sponsors a student to study outside of Ukraine.
Luciana’s turn to make pasta
Luciana channeled her mom’s expertise.
Steak the Marchigiana way
Cibo e bibite a Casa
