SOLITARY CONFINEMENT

SOLITARY CONFINEMENT.                                                             VGow  20/04/12

Catch the train from Florence to Certaldo. In just under an hour this pleasant ride meanders through the pencil pined countryside of Italy. The symbol of the town is the onion. Onion shields present themselves on the walls of all the major buildings of the town. There is a handsome onion symbol at the entrance of the station. Out from that bleak station where morbidity hangs in the air, walk on and find a funicular. This cable car will take you up to the hilltop where the old, walled, medieval Tuscany town stands testimony to the vicissitudes of time.  Take care to search for a story.

Famous for growing the best purple onions in Italy this town was the home of Giovanni Boccaccio, the 14^th Century author of the Decameron. This is an epic story of 100 tales told in the vernacular to amuse the Florentines of the Renaissance period. The Decameron tells of ten people staying in a villa to escape the plague. Over ten days they tell ten stories based on certain themes, love lost, trickery, intrigue, some are the retelling of oral traditions. Most read like some back street gossip to stir up trouble or to give rise to scandal. The many layers of story are like peeling the onion.

Long ago Etruscans hid coins from ancient Lydia in the folds of the stone foundations of this place. The land between the Arno and the Tiber River held their stone temples and statues. Here they practised irrigation and their kings were perhaps the first Kings of Rome.700 years Before the Common Era. They also held storytelling sessions around campfires. Their seers read the future in dismembered entrails of sacrificial animals. The entrails were a powerful source of omens. Seers could tell a story of good fortune or bring down a curse that would smother the land and its people for years to come. It all depended on the rings that formed when the entrails were swished around and let settle in shape of sliced onion rings.

Romans mixed marriage with those of the elder race, languages blurred and time layered the land with a Common Era.  Florence became a Princely state and man decreed a Baron to rule over the onion lands. Hunts took place in the hills surrounding the hilltop town A great castle overlooked the forests. Barons grew rich on copper and iron trade. Agriculture was ample and the people well fed. The mighty purple onion spread its rings over the general population. Stories were told in praise of its magnificent onion soup.

Some say that Boccaccio danced with ancient seers on moonlit nights in the woods. Some say this is where he found his muse. Certainly, Boccaccio made fun of nobles and church in his tales, but he was protected by high birth from despoilment. However, his cohorts would be punished instead. Boccaccio would lose his muse. He could be made solitary by taking away the people who reveled in his playmaking and he would be confined to his own company. Humble seers were rounded up and deposited underground in dank dungeons in the castle on top of the hill town.  They were placed in solitary confinement, where they could not alter the success of the town.

Imprisoned by the Baron, who was the butt of one of Boccaccio’s tales, was a beautiful girl of fifteen. Her father was an onion grower of a quiet nature. The Baron desired her but she was promised to another.  She was of the elder race, and her eyes had a seer quality. The Baron did not stand for any refusal. Summonsing her father and mother, he drew his sword and quickly dispatched them.  The Baron then made short work of the promised youth, too. He threw the girl into solitary confinement.

Being below ground she crawled around in her cell, until her hand found a chink in the crumbling stonewall. Something was embedded into the wall. It was an old coin from Lydia. Often the story had been told around the fires at night of the power of a wish one would have on the finding of such a coin.  She rubbed the coin and it glowed.

Catch the train from Florence to Certaldo, ride the funicular up to the hilltop castle. Slip a lira into the hands of the caretaker. He will undo the lock, allow you to go down, under the ground where the cells for solitary confinement stand mute in their walled misery. There find the old storyteller fingering an ancient coin attached to a dulled gold chain around her throat.  Ask her to reveal the aonions grow over these hillsides of Tuscany.

LAUGHTER

LAUGHTER                                          Virginia Gow 10/04/12

Sydney, Australia, is blessed with a temperate climate all year round. This allows its citizens to work and play in wonderful weather. In the winter month of June the city hosts a Vivid Festival of urban light design, music and drama. Amazing light shows of moving visions shimmer across the city’s iconic buildings. All of these treats play out along the foreshores of a harbour of sparkling beauty. They beckon the traveler from near and far to come and enjoy this feast of colour.

Opera House sails soar with multi-coloured transparent draperies of artistic patterns beamed from laser projectiles. Stately churches light moving film frescos of waterfalls whilst people skate on a man made rink below. The Sydney Town Hall is endowed with moving creations of angels whilst office blocks at Circular Quay play host to paisley prints.  

Amid the programs of interest is a workshop on Laughter. A cosmic comic musician, Laaragi, offers two hours of “Meditation and Laughter”. He is reported to be a global musician of ambient music and as such a welcomed addition to the Vivid Festival.  Traveling around the world, this Afro American spends his life laughing.

Ginny receives a gift in the mail from her friend, Ulli. It is a ticket to attend the Laughter workshop by Laaragi. Ulli informs her that she met up with Laaragi at Venice Beach, California, years ago. Ulli requested that Ginny introduce herself to him after the workshop. With a lightness of heart, Ginny embarks on her laughter journey.

Nearly 40 years ago Jorn Utzon’s schematic design was chosen over 200 other international designs as the concept for the building of the Sydney Opera House. The geometrics for its curved sails caused great worry, not laughter, when this building was constructed. Utzon was dismissed as architect and left Australia’s shores vowing never to return. This was no laughing matter. Years later he was honoured with an architectural award for his design of the Sydney Opera House.

The Utzon Room is the venue for the Laughter and Meditation workshop. Massive concrete structural beams reflect the window light from floor to ceiling. An easterly view of Sydney Harbour allows for wonder. Natural timbers warm to the sounds of laughter as around one hundred people sit or stand around a figure on a raised platform.

Laaragi is dressed in bright orange corduroy trousers. His feet are encased in orange sneakers with lime green laces. Over an orange shirt he wears a waistcoat of sequenced purple satin. The golden sequences reflect and dazzle the eyes as they catch the light beaming in from outside. He rings a bell, strikes a gong, and plays on a jaw harp. He dances and twirls for his audience. Throwing his head back, he roars with laughter.

Different sounds of laughter are presented to the group. From the soft chuckle, the silly giggle, the madman lilt, the joyful sound, the polite ‘time to laugh in chorus’, the hunter’s sneering cackle, the knowing HA HA, the smiling laugh, the spontaneous rattle, to the full belly roll thunder, Laaragi gives each type of laugh a name and a number. He calls upon his converts to answer when a number is called and the room is alive with laughter sounds until tears run from eyes and some people run for the door. A litany of sound assails the ears and all reason is reduced to tatters. Time is immaterial. Faces display clown features, the plain is made beautiful and the room echoes to a cacophony of voices. People light up from within; hug the stranger next to them and laughter rolls on and ripples out to titivate harbour waves.

As black is to white, laughter is to tears, and through all the joy there is sorrow. Conjure up a laugh and awaken the tears, positive to negative and back again. There is pain in laughter for it triggers the memory and thoughts sneak in when the guard is down. Always there is a price to pay for happiness.

Laaagi is please to meet a friend of Ulli. He wishes her well and tells her he is off to Israel to teach laughter to the conscripts in the Army. Giggling his way through to Germany, Spain will next be open to silliness.

On he travels in his gypsy clothes, to laugh around the world. In his wake, laughter clubs are springing up. If there is one near you, lift your spirits, have a laugh.