Upstate Update #1 - 15 days to go

It doesn't take that long for me to process data.. yeah right. It's just 10 months I'm putting off this post, not that much. Just 10 months since I won the competition and there are 15 days to go 'til I leave, but I have no freaking clue where the days in between flew.

TR # 5 - Going out

As usual, once a leg of my journey is finished, I stop for a moment, pick up my notebook of "things to do and see before I die" and delete as appropriate: New York+Stephen King, New Jersey+Perth Amboy, BJ at the Giants Stadium. Only three?! There's a lot left. My impressions about the States? Contradictory. I saw the land of the TV stereotypes: yellow cabs, MacDonald's, splatter and gossip TV programs, skyscrapers, air conditioning at full blast, the super sizes of everything, the houses with the American flag in the patio and the backyard. I found some peculiarities, not to mention the oddities: people handcuffed on the street because they were drinking alcohol in public, the smoking ban 20 feet from the entrance of the buildings, preachers at every street corner and in the subways.

I found a diverse population, overall friendly and open, I was awarded the honorary citizenship of the Garden State (New Jersey) by one of his drivers, and I was given way almost anywhere, in the subway as well as on the plane.

But I also found a very frightened nation, whose perseverance in the assimilation now doesn't hold water anymore. The belief that foreigners should be grateful for being welcomed and therefore deny their origins and become deeply Americans has no rhyme nor reason anymore. And Americans have come to realize all that, though still the astonishment resists in those who can not explain the hatred and attacks perpetrated by inhabitants of this country, but whose origins generate today fear and suspicion. And clumsy attempts at reconciliation between cultures crop up, such as the final draft of a mosque near Ground Zero: the controversy raged, and there is no way of knowing if the politicians know what direction to take, or just run with the hare and hunt with the hounds: a monument to the Americans and a place of worship for Muslims -who are Americans as well. It 's time to cross the border to find out if the Canadian culture is different from that of their neighbors.

But all in all, God bless America ... whatever your God is.

TR # 4 - Caterpilling

Of course it's boiling hot in New York as well. And I'm actually worse than the typical Japanese tourist: New York in less than two days, is it even doable?! My first experience on New York trains puts me in a '60s atmosphere: wooden interiors, the controller wearing a peaked cap, seats with moveable backrest (to seat in the right direction!). As soon as I come out from the Penn Station I feel like I'm in the middle of a bunch of stereotypes: skyscrapers, crazy traffic -but only because there are thousands of yellow taxis- behind me the Madison Square Garden of many famous concerts (Bon Jovi, just to name one ...). While I proceed in the excruciating heat I see Macy's, the Empire State Building of which I willingly ignore the hour-and-a-half queue to climb to the top, and the Grand Central Station which competes with certain scenarios from Harry Potter. Contrary to what people say, the subway is not complicated -even if, in fact, you can easily walk your way around New York- and it accepts the Italian ATM card to buy the tickets as well... wonderful! My plan includes a wide detour to go see a skyscraper unknown to most people, but for those who have read The Dark Tower by Stephen King, it's a must: at 2 Hammarskjold Plaza there's the Dark Tower of our world, aye Roland. Once I paid my respect to this milestone, I dive back into another stereotype: the hotdog stand on the street, and what a street! The fifth, or rather the famous 5th avenue. A job to be taken into account, that of the stand in Manhattan, a bit like the "bar on a tropical beach". My trip continues at the Rockefeller Center -the one with the famous ice-rink- and the nearby Starbucks to refresh myself in the heat of the City. This brings me to the well-known Times Square, and I wonder if the Americans are copying Piccadilly Circus or vice versa. After a due stop at the toy store, where there is also a ferris wheel ... and even here, who copied whom? Hamleys or Toysrus? - I relax in the dining area -basically, a series of tables and chairs in the middle of Times Square. Next to me sits an elderly Japanese lady knitting, then a boy approaches our table to lay down the oiliest McDonald's bag I've ever seen and eat his Big Mac on the spot. I end the first day in Central Park, just one look and then I'm off to some well-deserved rest. All in all, I have debunked many of my prejudices about the City: you can breathe a beautiful air of life, enthusiasm and not -as I thought- of hustle and hurry.

The second day is dedicated to Lower Manhattan, and I naively buy a ticket to the Statue of Liberty: the queue to board the ferry practically starts in Brooklyn, but it's enlivened by performances of various street artists. Fortunately the heat is tempered by the air, yet my shoulders are colored with a lobster-amaranth shade that's all but reassuring. The security controls are just like those at the airport, with the metal detector ... and of course try and guess who makes the alarm go off four times?! Italians. From the ferry I admire New York's skyline, and there are already hints at the chasm left by the Twin Towers. We arrived at Liberty Island, where I discover that the statue is not as small as they describe it, indeed! Maybe it's because the base is extremely high, but the whole monument is impressive to say the least. I continue to Ellis Island, where I fall in and out of sleep while Gene Hackman's voice tells us about the incomparable generosity of this country which has received millions of dirty stinking sick poor immigrants, long live America! And I couldn't describe the disgusted look on the guide's face while answering "Italians" to the question of which people had brought the largest number of immigrants to New York.

Coming back, a nice summer shower catches me by surprise and makes me regret the umbrella, safely inside the suitcase. Taken cover at Starbucks, I then go to Wall Street, which is nothing but a very busy street, and to Ground Zero. I very strongly looked forward to and feared the meeting with this place, because my 9/11 was the watershed date between the naivety and innocence of my 17s and the rude awakening to discover that no, America was not perfect, the American dream was a hoax, there were those who hated America and those whom in turn America hated. It was the moment when we lost all the serenity, the neutral look on anyone with a beard and a turban, the serenity of going out alone at night, the relaxed feeling of traveling without wondering what everybody carried in their bags. These days in the U.S., oddly enough, gave me back a bit of that lightness: the peace of mind of "come what may, it'll be a success," the open-mindedness that made me sit on a guard-rail in the middle of nowhere, at night, and chat with strangers without fear. Ground Zero takes your breath away. That's right, you're looking around and then suddenly you're in apnea. A void that can not be explained, because if I watch the images from 9 years ago and compare them with what I see now, I cannot explain how all the other buildings can still be standing. The conspiracy theories are gaining more and more appeal. There are two cranes, nobody knows to build what, it's not clear and it will be revealed only on the day of the tenth anniversary. But there are two American flags draped in mourning hanging from the cranes, for eternal memory... As if the void was not enough, to take your breath away.

TR # 3 - New Jersey (finding Jon)

My adventure in New Jersey begins under a dreadful hot weather, hopping on and off three different trains and waiting endlessly for a cab to deign to come to the station -why in god's name am I doing this?! Oh yeah, it's because of Jon Bon Jovi. Finally the cab arrives, so I can chat a little: what are you doing here? All the way from Italy FOR A CONCERT?! And what's your job? Who do you teach Italian to, in Italy? Don't they speak it already? Your English is perfect, by the way! Don't forget to come and see me too, one of these days I'll be playing in the stadiums too! Yeaaahh, sure... whatever. Finally I get to my apartment hotel, in a suite with stadium view and the highway all around, which means I can't leave this place other than in a cab. Perfect. Therefore I shut myself in the room, try to hand-wash my t-shirts -and successfully manage to!- and I make a sandwich. The sandwiches are already cut, awesome. Then I cook a pasta for dinner, and I realize that here they don't use normal burners, but hotplates which turn fire-red when hot... it took a while, before I realized I wasn't supposed to wait for a flame.

My first night goes by in a dreadful cold, thanks to the crazy thermostat. The day before the concert is dedicated to visit Perth Amboy, Jon's hometown, where I take for granted I will meet him, since he will be certainly there to rest. And indeed... my breakfast at the station is made of a traditional local Donut and an also traditional local watery coffee, after which I buy a newspaper to read on the train. Perth Amboy is very nice, it looks just like Wisteria Lane: cute houses with their gardens, the wooden stairs, the porch and the American flag in the patio garden; the beach on the... well, the canal, smell of saltiness in the air. My iPod plays Bon Jovi's songs, which in some way gain a whole new meaning, in this context. After walking along the canal, I resign myself to not meeting Jon while he's walking his dog and I take a seat at local restaurant to eat something. Which means, for just $10: icy cold water, blue cheese salad, crab cakes with lobster sauce, baked potatoes, dessert that I don't have, choosing an espresso instead... full of cinnamon, what the hell. Right when I was enjoying the cakes, the unforeseeable happened: a black sedan approaches from the road next to the restaurant, signals and turns... Jon is driving, with his headphones on, beautiful as ever. In the end, I was right. I can hardly eat anymore, of course, so the waiter asks me if he has to pack what's left for me to bring home... oh no, God forbid! I go back to the station, take the chance to go down to the beach and wash my feet in the water -icy cold, it's always an ocean after all- and I walk past through the worst neighborhoods. I'm ready for the concert.

The first thing to hit you is the absence of any fee meter on the cabs, because the fee is negotiable. Or rather, it's fixed. Whether you go to the station or across the street (the highway in my case) in just about 5 minutes, you still pay the same. It's boiling hot, what was I thinking when I bought a long-sleeves Bon Jovi shirt??! The stadium is huge even from the outside, and for those who have followed this band for a while, it's a dream come true: the old Giants Stadium, next to it and already half demolished, is a memorabilia in BJ's history. I arrive while they're still rehearsing, therefore I hear some hints of the songs they're going to play. Finally they open the gates, I take my seat and stare at the 3 rings of this "home of the Giants and the Jets!" which will host the Super Bowl too. I can count about 100 thousands seats, and some of them are way TOO high. As they usually do here, the seats on the field are numbered as well, which is good to prevent crowding and illnesses, and also to give to the people the opportunity to sit down. The seats are provided with drink-holders, and they're also very slippery. Those sitting next to me are an alcoholics' family with bottles of wine everywhere, and on the other side two typical extra fat American ladies. Unlike what I was told, the Americans are all but cold at concerts, on the contrary. After the opening act OneRepublic (the ones playing "Apologize"), the concert begins, with a jingle "this is our house" followed by two of my favorite songs, "Who says you can't go home" e "We weren't born to follow". The concert lasts three and a half hours, and when Jon thanks us for our loyalty, because he wouldn't be there if it wasn't for us, I think that I should thank him instead, because I wouldn't be here if I hadn't had those tickets for months. Now I know that a new phase of my life is beginning, without regrets and no more "I wish I was there", because I'm here now and I want to live every second to the best. For all the BJ lovers, here is the setlist: Who Says You Can't Go Home, We Weren't Born To Follow, You Give Love a Bad Name, In These Arms, Born To Be My Baby, Just Older, We Got It Goin' On, Raise Your Hands, When We Were Beautiful, Superman Tonight, Captain Crash and the Beauty Queen from Mars, Bad Medicine, It's My Life, Love's The Only Rule, Lay Your Hands On Me (Richie Vox), Livin' in Sin / Chapel of Love, I'll Be There For You, Something For The Pain, Diamond Ring, Sleep When I'm Dead/Jumpin' Jack Flash, I'd Die For You, Work for the Working Man, Someday I'll Be Saturday Night, Keep The Faith, Dry County, Wanted Dead or Alive, Livin' on a Prayer.

Once outside the stadium, I try to call for a cab but it's too late to get one. So I resign myself to sit on the crash barrier together with other unlucky guys, to wait. There's a guard in the middle of the street, trying to stop the approaching cars with a flashlight, to warn them to do a U-turn because there's a traffic jam and it would take more than one hour to go through, but nobody gives a shit about him: "I hate my fuckin' job!" Finally a cab arrives, after almost an hour, and I share it with father and son from Indianapolis. It's time to go to sleep, and to begin a new phase of my journey.

TR # 2 - First impressions

My notebook's first page says “my dream is....”: not enough dots, I leave it blank. I leave my home persuading Ma' that, altough the suitcase is half empty, Klappar the hyppo wouldn't fit in it. At the airport, after saying goodbye to Pa' and Gogo, I head for the check-in desk with a blasé attitude. After the first passport check, I find out that the beauty case counts as suitcase, so please pay the extra fee thaaaanxx. There's the huge novelty in Venice, the body scanner, ooohh yes. Nice. Shut down. Unused. Nicely spent. The plane is on time, we're served lunch -cheese maccaroni, not so bad as I tought- and I realize how much people overstates. When they say there's a lot of room for your legs, or no room at all -the room is always the same-, that you're given lots of stuff -a pillow and a dressing gown, which I assumed to be a cover-, that you must walk or your blood will not flow and you run the risk of a paralysis -I stood up only once and never suffered any consequences. I enjoy two movies, the Christmas time kind, and observe that a trans-continental flight is no more silent than the others, on the contrary. When the pilot says that we're going to land one hour earlier, the old man sitting next to me can hardly contain himself and starts telling me about his 15 days in Italy. After descending and finding the exit among a thousand labyrinths, I line up on the "visitors" line, and I'm told I must fill in a green form. Exactly the same as the ESTA form, which I already filled in, asking me once more if I'm a relative to Bin Laden. NO, WHAT THE FUCK. After which I line up for the security checks, which make you feel SO welcome in this country. There's a sign describing the procedure: right hand's fingerprints, then left hand's, digital picture, and in the end it says “welcome to the USA”... woah, what if I wasn't welcome?! The hour of advance is already wasted, while I'm explaining to the cop that I'm a turist... "and you're staying in Bensalem??! To visit what?!" I'm staying at a friend's, HOLY GOD!!! I rescue my suitcases, hurled off the conveyor belt, and go outside. Until I'm on the street I can't believe I don't have any more checks to go through.

After a quick call home, I drag myself to the first available cab, giving the driver Mel's address. The energetic driver, while busy setting the GPS, ends up on the sidewalk, but the situation is under control. Then I meet the very first local tradition: the air conditioning at full blast. My neck cervicals are grateful. Along the way I see the skyscrapers, typical of Philadelphia's skyline, and the bridge: these are the first images I record. In the end, the nice driver can't find the right street "I cant see numbers, I cant see!" so I decide to call Mel to give me a ride. The weather today is what we would call "suffocating" in Venice, so hot and humid that you would rather stay at the Equator. After leaving my suitcases at Mel's cats' mercy, we drive -of course- to the local supermarket. The car are huge here, on the other hand streets are immense too. At the supermarket I meet my friend Air Conditioning of course, and in the fruit and vegetables department a storm breaks out: you can hear the thunder, then a light rain waters the produce -choreographies made in USA. Every product -fruit, vegetables, bread, delis- lasts up to a month, open in the fridge. Gulp. And in facts you don't buy hundred grams of delis, but a pound... half a kilo, who cares, since they last?! Luckily it's Mel who prepares dinner, meat pizza, and then it's time to go to sleep... or to play with Ninì the female cat, in my case, thanks to the jet-lag.

The next day I'm numb to say the least, because of the sleepless night, therefore I spend my time on the Internet. When my Macbook's battery runs down, I realize to my chagrin that the expensive transformer I was sold in Italy and said to be absolutely necessary, is useless, and all I need is plain adapters. Hmmmmmmm. In the afternoon we go for a stroll at the Mall, the shopping centre, with Mel and the faithful Air Conditioning. At the Mall you can find all kind of brands on sale, not necessarily in "sales weeks" as in Italy. Thus the Guess store sells bags at 25 dollars, while the Levi's store hauls jeans at 30. On the other hand, unlikely sweaters by D&G and Missoni reach $500-$600, but they used to cost $2,000-$3,000! While you walk through the mall's hallways, you can find any kind of stuff: candies machines, masseurs, estheticians who depilate your eyebrows USING SEWING THREAD, make-up stands where you can ask for a free trial to see how the make-up looks on you. Many dummies here have a 42 bra size... local beauty model; the Nike store sells a purse that you can fasten to your sneakers; the Lindt store is shutting down, therefore they're selling 4 pounds of Lindor at $7... that's too much even for me, the local super sizes are giving a hard time even to my undeniable voracity. Every shop assistant is smiling, and even if I know they're posing, I love to hear their greeting "Hi, how're you doing?", 'cause it sounds as if they gave a damn. After dropping by Victoria's Secret -which actually exists, I couldn't believe my eyes!- we head back home, and finally tonight I manage to sleep!

The third day couldn't start any better, with the skype-call home, and it goes on even better, with the trip to Philadelphia. It's boiling hot, and the temperature range between outside and inside must be around 20 degrees. An inspector validates the tickets, then puts them on your seat, and takes them when you're supposed to get off. The first stop we make in Philly is the Liberty Bell, which is the symbol of the American Independence. It has a whole museum of its own, where they stored souvenirs dating back to 1960... memorabilia indeed!!! The rangers won't allow us to sit on the very valuable outside little wall -it could date back to 1980, show some respect!- and finally we're admitted to the guided tour to the Congress Hall, where others valuable memorabilia are stored... 1700's stuff... the guide gets excited while talking about the best Constitution ever written and represented in those very halls... yeah, we must be in the middle of the world. After a tasty Mexican lunch, we take a stroll in the skyscrapers' area, which couldn't exist until a short time ago, because no building could be higher than Penn's statue's hat -Penn is the founding father of Pennsylvania. It's still boiling hot, but at least we have some shade from the skyscrapers. We seek shelter at our friend Air's, in one of the most recent skyscrapers, and after drinking a smoothie we head for the station, which is conveniently connected to the skyscraper, underground. Our train is canceled, therefore we squeeze ourselves into the next one and then we go shopping: tomorrow it's time for me to leave, New Jersey is waiting for me.