Seasons in Basilicata (34 page)

And that was what Aliano offered in abundance. We felt ourselves fortunate and indeed honored to be able to participate in such a rich and spirit-nurturing stew of human sentiment, conviviality, and love. “The good life” was indeed alive and well here in abundance, despite all the modest trappings.

And for the moment, we had no plans to live anywhere else.

An Afternoon with Angelo

Especially when good old serendipity kept rolling in, offering unexpected diversions and delights. This was merely one little example, but a most memorable one…It all began with a picture I just couldn't resist. Normally I was very careful about the way I used my cameras. After all, I wasn't a snap-happy tourist on a point-shoot-and-run package-trip schedule. I lived here, and, while admittedly I was prying into the affairs and activities of the locals, I did my best not to make that too obvious. I put up a front of polite but casual indifference, used my smallest camera where a shot was vital, or ask
permesso
if I felt I had to be a little more blatant about the whole thing.

Which it wasn't hard to be if I happened to be lugging around my huge Canon, with its embarrassingly phallic telescopic lens. But that's all I had with me in the car that afternoon as I spiraled down the
tornanti
through Alianello, on my way to the supermarket at Sant' Arcangelo and to make a few phone calls. The public phone in Aliano was, as usual, nonoperative.

I was overdoing the Monte Carlo rally bit on some of the bends, convinced that I had the road to myself, and that's how I almost ended up bumper-to-backside with the rear end of a very old and bedraggled mule—complete with dual wicker panniers, three huge, yellow-plastic
cassette
used for the grape harvest—and the rather alarmed elderly gentleman in an earth-splattered flat
coppola
cap and old leather vest, perched atop his faithful steed.

I suppose I could have just carried on as would most other “why the hell are you on my road?” Italian drivers, but something about the look of disgruntled alarm in the old man's face made me pull
over, turn off the engine, and walk over to offer my apologies. (And while you're at it, suggested my little avid photographer, you might just as well take your camera along.)

And that's how I came to meet Angelo Guarino. We shook hands—his as rough, twisted and gnarled as an olive tree trunk, mine white and sponge-soft as usual. His forehead was furrowed like dark, lumpy rows of newly ploughed earth. I made my apologies and he gracefully dismissed them with a shrug and a smile. I admired his mule and the strong wicker weave of his ancient panniers. Angelo asked me if I had a cigarette. I said no, I don't use them, but if he'd like a cigar instead…He nodded enthusiastically, so I pulled one out of my vest pocket. (Yes, like my beloved grandfather, I'm an unapologetic cigar smoker, one who staunchly supports Mark Twain's maxim that “Smoking a cigar provides the best of all inspiration.” But, of course, I carefully limit my consumption, as did the renowned Mr. Twain: “I smoke in moderation—only one cigar at a time.”) Angelo's deep-set eagle-eyes, hooded, wary, and darkly shaded by his
coppola,
seemed to glow with irrepressed surprise and delight. He accepted the cigar tentatively, as if afraid his hard
contadino
hands might break such a delicate creation. The Cuban seed (Dominican-produced) wrapper, encased in the six-inch-long, glossy cellophane tube, glowed a deep bronze in the bright sun. Angelo fumbled to open it and then eventually extracted the cigar slowly, lifting it to his nose to smell its rich, toasty aroma. I asked if he'd like to smoke it now, and it was perfectly obvious by his toothless grin that he would. So I pulled out my lighter and, as he sucked vigorously, I lit the tip as gently as I could, despite the fact it was wobbling backward and forward in his saliva-dripping mouth. His eyes crossed slightly as he tried to focus on the tip of this obviously unfamiliar object and keep it still.

Finally it was done, and he began to draw the smoke deeply into his mouth as tradition decreed, and then onward straight into his lungs, as if he were smoking one of those tiny and very mild Basilicatan cigarettes. I was about to discourage him from doing this—there's an awful lot of smoke in one puff from a cigar, and most
people, myself definitely included, could no more inhale on one of these fine creations than eat a plate of boiled ox eyeballs. But apparently it didn't seem to faze Angelo in the least. Either he had lungs of steel or had endured a lifetime of breathing in the rich, winter smoke of burning oak and olive logs in a house whose chimney was, more than likely, either a loose tile in the roof or even something designed to
discourage
evacuation of smoke and heat. (As one
contadino
put it to me concisely, “Why have a chimney? I'm the one that needs the heat, not the sky!”) And so Angelo puffed and inhaled and puffed again, and I thought that it was the ideal moment to ask if he minded my taking a photograph of him on his donkey enjoying the fruits of some tobacco farm in the remote Dominican Republic. He seemed delighted by the idea, and so I clicked away as he sat, upright and kingly, in his ancient saddle, which consisted primarily of a squashed pile of old olive-harvest burlap sacks.

When I paused to put a new roll of film in the camera, he asked if I enjoyed the wine of Alianello. I replied that I didn't know, having never sampled any.

“Oh,
Santa patata!
” (Holy potato! a wacky local expression) he exclaimed, with a widening grin revealing his pink gums and large purple tongue. “Maybe then you would like to sample some of mine.”

Hazy recollections of the rest of that afternoon include my first introduction to the delights of wining and dining in a
Sassi-
like cave (
grotta
or
cantina
) hacked out from the soft tufa rock beneath the prominent crag on which the partially abandoned village of Alianello Vecchio somehow still perches. Antonio called the ghostly remnants a
paese sperduto
(a god-forsaken place), and there was certainly something Craco-like and sinister in its broken walls and weed-clogged alleys.

The approach to Angelo's cave was precarious, even in a totally sober state. At least it was for me. Angelo tied his donkey to a tree by the road and then scurried off along a narrow rock ledge littered with loose stones, exhibiting the agility of a sure-footed goat, and pausing once in a while to look back at me as I followed with the pace
and timidity of a turtle. If I stared hard at the rock face of the cliff I felt reasonably safe, but once my eyes strayed—as of course they did—to the edge of the three-foot wide path and the vertical drop of more than two hundred feet that lay beyond its eroded and very fragile-looking edge, my legs immediately developed the shakes and my pace slowed to a geriatric shuffle.

T
ERRONI
COUPLE

“Very old path. A real
sentiero,
” Angelo called out, I think by way of encouragement, to assure me that for generations the path had
withstood the ravages of time and the torrid climate and provided safe access to all the numerous caves scattered along its length. I nodded, but couldn't quite seem to share his nonchalance. A rock suddenly shot out from under my right foot and sent me skidding toward the drop. The rock tumbled over the edge, and it was a long time before I heard it hit the earth far below. I backed up even closer to the cliff, using its occasional protrusions as handholds. I knew Angelo was smiling—maybe even sneering at my overcautiousness—but I decided not to look at him and kept my eyes fixed firmly on the path and the cliff. I wanted no more loose rocks. All I wanted, needed, was a glass of that wine of his to steady my nerves. Which it must have done, as I seem to remember, after our pleasant interlude together, strolling back along the same path with a confidence and braggadocio that were altogether lacking on my outward journey.

Eventually we arrived at an overhang in the cliff face and an ancient wooden door set tightly in the rock. The door was padlocked with the kind of enormous contraption they doubtless once used to lock up castle dungeons. Angelo's key was equally enormous—more than six inches long, very thick, and very rusted. Lock and key were joined, but for a while it appeared neither would submit to the other. Angelo spat, cursed, waggled the key, and thumped the lock with his fist.

“Very old lock,” he explained unnecessarily. “Very strong.”

Finally, with a series of deep rasps and grinds, something gave and the lock opened. Angelo pushed the thick, weather-gouged door inward.

Daylight dappled the ancient walls of the hand-hollowed cave. As my eyes grew accustomed to the half-gloom, I spotted the marks of whatever chipping instrument—something like an adze perhaps—had been used to gouge out the interior. Although the space was not particularly large compared with the
Sassi
in Matera—a little over six feet high and maybe nine feet deep—it must have required enormous effort to complete the task. Whoever had undertaken the work had obviously been a methodical, practical, and even artistic man.
The chiseled marks in the tufa were even and regular, and they caught the light in a rather pleasing manner. Depending on the angle of the cut, some facets were bathed in the full golden sheen of the sun while others glowed in various hues of bronze, amber, and ochre. There were shelves, too, cut right out of the rock, and hollowed areas for storage, which Angelo had used to good effect. On some rested small tools and boxes of nails and screws; on others sat various household items—plates, cups, and glasses—that suggested that he occasionally used the cave as a kind of vacation apartment. It seemed to be the ideal place, like one of those local shepherds'
baracche
(huts)—a place to escape the intensity of the tight-knit village high above at the top of the cliff and enjoy a little solitary peace on a shelf of land boasting splendid vistas across the Sant' Arcangelo Valley and the vast purple-blue Calabrian ranges beyond.

Other objects made the cave feel distinctly domesticated—a metal-frame bed covered with a thin mattress and an old raglike blanket; a couple of rough-hewn stools; flurries of red peppers hanging to dry on strings attached to hooks pounded into the rock ceiling; half a dozen very moldy salamis dangling alongside strings of garlic, onions, and even tomatoes, which had wizened themselves into tiny, leathery, burgundy-red skeletons of their once-ripe plumpness; and four fat, golden globes of homemade pecorino cheese. And then the wine: Four, three-foot-high wooden barrels and six fifty-five-liter glass demijohns, each with its small tap at the base for pouring.

 

I
T WASN'T LONG
before our sampling began. Angelo pulled the two stools into the doorway by the path so we could enjoy the breezes and views while we sipped his brews.

The oldest was a three-year vintage Montepulciano—dark, rich, and thick, with a strong bouquet and an enduring taste that moved from tart to a coy sweetness at the end. The youngest was this year's production of a Sangiovese—more modest in flavor but with a bright fruitiness that made it seem effervescent as it bounced along the tongue.

Between glasses he served slices of one of his salamis, which, once the mold and skin had been removed, had a deliciously pungent, salt-and–hot pepper flavor that seemed to grow deeper the longer you chewed, especially if you added pinches of the chili pepper and dried tomato that Angelo had crumbled onto a plate from the strings of them dangling from the ceiling. Oh, and some of his olives, too. Beautiful dark green creatures he'd marinated for weeks in an olive oil, vinegar, wine, garlic, and a hot pepper mix and served in an old cracked bowl with such panache and pride that you'd have thought he was offering the finest Beluga caviar. And around the edge of the bowl, he placed chunks of aged
pecorino stagionato
, gamey with its rich aroma of sheep's milk, but creamy sweet when it melted in your mouth.

Fortunately, and coincidentally, Angelo had spent a few years working in England, not far from Nottingham, where Rosa and Giuliano once had their shop. While his memory of the language had faded somewhat, as the afternoon eased along, we still managed to chat in wispy strands of English about his life and his family.

The cave had been carved out of the rock by his great-grandfather, and although Angelo insisted that it had been used as a wine and curing
cantina
for a long time, I wondered if it had once also been a dwelling, as was the case with many places like this around Basilicata. I was tempted to ask but was unwilling to risk our new companionship by prying into things that might be embarrassing to him or, worse still, might make him suffer any
brutta figura
(loss of face)—a real no-no in these parts if you valued an enduring friendship.

Under the convoluted, and often corrupt, land reforms of the sixties, Angelo's father had been able to convert his
mezzadro
(sharecropper) status into that of a landowner of seven hectares of arable earth, olive trees, and a small vineyard, now defunct. (Angelo purchased the grapes to make his wine from other larger local vintners.)