Back to the Future – Rocca di Castagnoli

We are staying in a castle, a fortress that dates back to the 11th century.  I am sitting in a window to access the wireless across the 800 year old courtyard.  Time and space are different here.  Historic takes on new meaning.  It is wonderful.  The people are great.  Communication is beyond language because everyone speaks two or three or four. And occasionally you hear the misplaced word or misused phrase, reminents of another language that have been dragged in a less than successful way to anglaise. I love watching and sometimes forget to participate and help when I can, when my comprehension is greater than that of my fellow travellers and I could be of assistance.  The Latin I studied in Halifax West High School with Mrs. Orlick has come back to help me here.

I love Italy.  No I love Europe.  The people are closer physically and socially.  There is little space between you and the next person or the next vehicle.  The language is bigger, more demonstrative.  It is easier to read body language, although I may be misinterpreting some of it.  It seems more aggressive and yet I think the lack of agression might be seen as a sign of disrespect.   I am having so much fun just watching and learning.

This afternoon we toured the winery that is here in the castle.  Hundreds of years of history, back to the never ending war between Sienna and Florence which continues in Soccer matches. So although the societies were closer geographically, they found reasons to distance themselves from each other, reasons to fight, to differentiate themselves from each other.  I can’t help but think that Italy is a 4 country.  Italians are different and they get their energy from being different.  They are creative and talented and reject sameness.  It is interesting to witness a whole nation reflect a type.

We also had an incident today where one of the rental cars was hit in a parking lot, hard enough to move it about one foot.  No one in the area heard the crash although it had to have been loud. Otherwise it has been another great day although the rain continues in Tuscany, great wine and great company.  The company has decided that I should do a mini lesson Enneagram for them this week.  That will be fun.  I would love to use this as a mini research project to test my theory that when you don’t have one member of each of the nine enneatypes in a group, someone steps up to fill the galp on the circle.  I am watching my fellow travelers to see what evidence I can find to support my theory.  I will let you know.

Thanks to Marjorie for putting the disjointed messages together for me.