Lisbon, now.

Invaders used to speak lots of languages, and most of them came from Europe. Spain, France, Germany. There were plenty of fellow Italians on honeymoon, too.

People poured in by sea and gorged on the local fish delicacies, even if the fish was anything but local. They consumed. Sixteen thousand people every day, spending between ten and twenty contos in Lisbon. That was at the height of the cruise ship era, in the late ’90s.

Now it’s mostly the British. Some of them visit fleetingly, hopping off and on the ship like everyone else; others come back every couple of years. They show Nella online pictures of flats they daydream to buy, one day. Two-bedroom apartments in Areeiro and Bairro São Miguel, for a price that could get you a small block of flats in Vicaria, central Naples. Well, the last time she checked. That must have been 2005, 2006.

In Nella’s group, today, there’s a lady from Nottingham who’s been on the same cruise twice. She’s been showing off her knowledge of the place all morning to an Australian young woman who’s kind enough to indulge her. Now she points at a bakery across the road and says, “Rita has the best ball-ou dee arrou-se.”

“The best what?” Nella asks.

“Oh, you know, those round muffins, sugary on top.”

Nella’s still playing dumb. She’s understood perfectly well. It’s just a little game she plays with herself, messing tourists around like that. Punishing them for their wrong words and their wrong r’s – not the fricative kind that’s taken her years to master.

The heat and the crowd should be enough punishment for the few passengers who’ve ignored their cruise director’s advice to skip the guided tour in Alfama and go shopping in Chiado instead. If Alfama’s ordinarily unbearable, today it’s sheer madness.

It’s the Festa de Santo António. Lisbon’s favourite saint; Nella’s – Antonella’s – favourite holiday. She grew up in Naples, where people make a big deal of name days, dishing out fancy pastries for the relatives who show up uninvited to deliver their wishes in person. That treat-producing ritual takes the name of cacciata. If people still call it that.

Nella gets paid by visit, not person, so she enjoys having smaller groups. It gives her a break from all the questions.

Not the relevant questions, like “What is the difference between fado and fado vadío?” or “Why are there two crows on Lisbon’s coat of arms?”

The uninvited ones. “How did you learn Portuguese?”, “Is it easier because you speak Italian?”, “Where in Italy are you from, exactly?” and “What does an Italian tour guide do in Lisbon?”

She manages, same as what she did in Naples.

It seems that no one else is going to join, so she waits for the Australian woman to hurry back from the bakery. She’s holding a couple of small, tall cakes wrapped in paper. Sugary on top.

“I see, you meant the bolos de arroz,” says Nella to the British lady, shamelessly. Her face just like her ass, she’d say in Italian.

The lady nods and says nothing.

Only when she thinks that Nella’s not listening, the British lady whispers to her husband: “Must be so much easier if you speak Italian in the first place.”
 

---

 
Lisbon, then.

When Nella first moved in with her landlady, she didn’t speak Portuguese. And she didn’t need to, because Adalina did all the talking anyway.

Her landlady had the habit of ambushing Nella in the kitchen or in the laundry room to tell her about her day, or about that week’s homily, or a conversation she’d had with her neighbours. Whatever it was, she somehow managed to intertwine it with memories of the past. She’d start a conversation by quoting the Gospel of Matthew and end up with her eyes all welled up talking about Muamba chicken and funge, and how it was impossible to find cassava in Lisbon, unless you went to one of those “ethnic” stores.

As one of the many well-off Portuguese expatriates sent back to their homeland after Angola’s independence, Adalina mourned the loss of her former self more than that of her husband. In Angola, she was a landowner’s wife and a librarian, a pillar of her community. In Lisbon, a widow with a two-bedroom flat that she had to share with a tenant to be able to afford it. One of her ways to cope was to bombard said tenant with endless speeches, so, soon enough, Nella got the hang of Portuguese by repeated exposure.

A few weeks after she’d moved in, she and Adalina were watching the news, and Nella was surprised to realise how much she could understand.

There was a segment about Portuguese migrants in Luxembourg and racism. Some right-wing politician was campaigning to kick them out of the country, because they didn’t integrate and didn’t speak the language.

“Things were different, when we had Angola,” Adalina commented.

Nella usually let that sort of remarks slide. Long before then, she had learned not to challenge her own grandma’s “It was better when it was worse” routine, which featured the elderly people’s favourite: “… Mussolini built us roads, though.”

“We didn’t need to learn the language to live there,” her landlady continued. “Pretty much like you don’t need to speak Portuguese to live in Lisbon these days. You can get by with English, and what’s wrong with that?”

Nella could feel her blood gaining territory across her cheeks. Everything was wrong with that.

Adalina went on, gesturing towards the screen. “Besides, those people”, she said, “go there to work the land or in mines or in factories, canning chicken. In my time, we left our country to be better off, not to fall out of the frying pan into the hot coals.”

Sometimes Nella had wondered if she too had fallen into the brasas, or rather dived into them voluntarily. Moving to a foreign country like that. Surrendering to English to work and get by, again.

The next day, she bought a Portuguese grammar and workbook and put them on her bedside table. She read one unit every morning and did the exercises before going to bed. She’d done it twice before, she could do it a third time.
 

---

 
Naples, then.

“If I had known you were coming …”

Nella stopped to think. She hated if-clauses with a passion. Too many rules. She’d done types zero to two with a little effort; but it was type three that confused her above anything else, because she also sucked at remembering paradigms. “… I would have baken you a cake?”

“Baked,” Sofia corrected her. “It’s regular. Bake, baked, baked.”

“Right,” said Nella. “I would have baked you a cake.”

Nella’s sister was spending her Christmas holidays helping Nella revise, instead of catching up with friends. Ever since Sofia had moved to Brescia to work as a nurse, Nella barely saw her. She wished the two of them were doing something fun instead of studying, like playing briscola while listening to those dreadful neomelodico Christmas songs, but hey ho.

Nella needed that English certificate, now that tourist groups were more and more international. French, the language she’d chosen at the time of her tour guide qualification exam, was not enough to secure her a permanent contract, or even a temporary one. And she was tired of getting gigs in nero, under the table, with agencies taking a forty-percent commission and sending her wherever she was needed.

Nella specialised in outdoor walks around the city centre, but most of the time she temped in museums, like the Certosa or Cappella Sansevero, if she was lucky, because at least they were still in town. When she was sent to Capodimonte, she had to catch a bus that made all the stops, taking more than one hour to get there.

Sometimes, she accompanied groups down to Pompeii on a coach driven always by the same guy who didn’t have insurance or even the right driving licence. Almost certainly, he was getting paid under the table, too.

Nella’s daily pay amounted to seven thousand lire, give or take, the price of an average pizza menu in Spaccanapoli. At that rate, she could not afford buying her own clothes or books, let alone move out of her parents’ place.

“Enough grammar,” Sofia told Nella, shutting the workbook close. “Let’s do speaking.”

“Fine,” Nella said. At least she could forget about conditionals and idioms and false friends for five minutes.

“So, Miss Pozzoli, tell me about your dream job,” Sofia said.

From the window came the noise of firecrackers, followed by children’s laughter.

Nella felt a ticklish sensation in her stomach. “I … want to be an astronaut.”

Sofia faked a scowl. “Come on, stop playing games.”

She had lost a lot of weight since the last holidays. It was showing, particularly on her face. After all, she helped doctors save lives for a living. What she did was Serious and Important. Nella, on the other hand, had no real reason for taking herself so seriously all the time.

“Ma quando mai?” she objected.

When had she ever.
 

---

 
Lisbon, now.

Twenty-five years ago, Lisbon was hard to conquer. Locals had rough edges, blind to what could have attracted someone like Nella to move there, when so many young people were desperate to leave.

But it had “spots”, as locals called them. One nice café on the fourth floor of a residential building, with a terrace overlooking the river. A public library with frescoed ceilings and walls covered in azulejos, and a quiet garden at the back. The hidden tascas where fadistas sold their cassettes at the end of their performances. And that British cemetery where Nella liked to walk in search of strange, unlikely names, like “Stella Constance Atkinson Lopes Coelho”.

All those places, all of the spots, still exist. But over the years they have been found by the visitors. Word has spread. They feature in Lonely Planet tour guides and blogs. They have been elevated to “local gems” and they have multiplied. New cafes, new terraces, new tascas with live fado. They have guided tours of the British cemetery, now.

Inevitably, Santo António also attracts lots of tourists. Italian ones, especially, who still call him “Santo Antonio da Padova”, despite him having lived in Padua only the last four years of his short life.

Of course, the cruise passengers only happen to be there by chance, so the two Italian ladies in Nella’s small group, Rosamaria and Giusy, are visibly overwhelmed by the unexpected scene: the brides, the basil plants, the carnations, the paper garlands. When they see the statue arrive, they hold on to each other’s arms and look like they’re on the verge of tears.

The figure has seen better days: the gold paint on his aureole is scratched off and the expression on his face, one that should inspire infinite compassion, seems more bored than anything else. He could also do with a good foundation cream for a matte effect on those shiny, scrawny cheeks.

Nella keeps her silly jokes to herself, as Rosamaria and Giusy have picked up a prayer card and are reading the antiphony in Portuguese making up the pronunciation of most of the words. When she first hears them, it’s hard to resist the impulse to laugh. But they are so focused on what they are doing, Nella almost finds it touching. She asks the rest of the group to give them a few minutes before moving along.

In the prayer, there’s a part that gets repeated, a stanza about the miracles Saint Anthony can do. The lost getting found, a prison being broken, and a stormy sea suddenly calming. By the time the antiphony is over, Giusy and Rosamaria have mastered the refrain, reading it fluently out loud. And Nella has learned it by heart, so that at the last one, she too whispers along:

             Recupera-se o perdido,
             Rompe-se a dura prisão
             E no auge do furacão
             Cede o mar embravecido.

Nearby, the Australian lady is snacking on her bolo de arroz, leaving a trail of crumbs on the pavement. A sparrow hops out of nowhere, pecks at them, and flies away.
 

---

 
Naples, then.

Two more years of agency work after Nella got her English certificate, and then she was hired at Capodimonte with an internship contract starting at five thousand lire per day. The average price of a pizza menu if the pizza was a Margherita, and you had water, instead of beer.

Some of her colleagues insisted that she didn’t know how lucky she was. So much art was still in storage at Capodimonte. Some people estimated between one and two thousand pieces: paintings, sculptures, tapestries … Nella had access to all that beauty regularly: on previews for touring exhibitions, special events for professionals only, or even private visits, if she wanted. A kind word to the underpaid staff at the storehouse would be enough to let her in.

However, the one time that she visited the storerooms on her own, she lasted less than one hour.

She couldn’t breathe for all the dust. There was barely any natural light. She felt dizzy and, inexplicably, angry, very angry.

In the afternoon, she gave her notice and went back to agency work, only accepting outdoor walks, until she was offered a temporary placement at Pompeii on the same salary scale as the Capodimonte job, so almost for free. Per amore dell’arte, for the love of art, quite literally.

At Pompeii, archaeologists regularly discovered some new artefacts or mosaics. And every day some area closed for maintenance and restoration. That meant that guides never knew what their tour would be like until they were given a hand-drawn map, half an hour before they were due to start. It was challenging and exciting. And it was outdoor. Nella could breathe.

Then, the cruise ships arrived. And on them, hordes of British people and Americans anxious to be photographed with the Vesuvius in the background and ask questions about the Romans. What did they eat? How did they dress? Did the women vote? Did they have slaves? Were their slaves black or white? What did their slaves eat?

Nella was able to answer those questions in English now, but that was little consolation to her. If anything, it felt more like a defeat.

On 13th June 1998, on her thirtieth name day, Nella brought a tray of sfogliatelle to share with some of her colleagues after work. One of them, Matteo, casually mentioned that a cruise director had dropped by to chat about some new jobs coming up in several Mediterranean cities and even in the Canary Islands and Brazil, if anyone was interested. Better pay, but on a freelance basis.

“And you can’t choose where they relocate you. Imagine you end up in Corsica …” said Matteo.

“Or Genoa,” said Cecilia, another colleague. “Maronn’, where did you buy these?” Her chin was covered in icing sugar, and she was licking the sweet ricotta cream filling off her fingertips.

“Where is he now?” Nella asked.

“You’ve just missed him, I’m sure he’s still in the carpark doing the headcount.”

Nella grabbed the tray with the two remaining sfogliatelle and ran towards the exit of the archaeological park for the most important cacciata of her life.
 

---

 
Lisbon, now.

As Nella is making lunch plans with her group, a man approaches her.

He looks as if his eyes are adjusting after looking directly into the sun. Dazed, almost scared. A little bit curved, making himself look shorter or smaller or invisible. That’s a shame. Tall, slender, olive-green eyes … The same man with a different posture and expression would look handsome, as only Italian men who know they are handsome do.

It’s the smart short-sleeved shirt and Armani jeans that give him away. Of course he’s Italian, and Nella finds her confirmation the minute he opens his mouth and says “Sorry” instead of “Excuse me.”

“Sorry, do you know what’s happening?”

His voice is velvety and opaque, with no contour, like an Impressionist painting with a limited palette. Olive green, like his eyes; and something cold, like Monet’s light purples and blues. His English is limp, flustered, just as Nella’s English used to be.

“Se vuole, parliamo in italiano.”

His eyes light up.

He asks her about the sixteen couples of brides and grooms parading in front of them at this very moment.

She tells him about Lisbon’s city council sponsoring weddings for couples in need on Saint Anthony’s Day.

He seems confused about its relevance.

She tells him about Saint Anthony’s fame for matchmaking.

He makes a joke about him needing his services then, and another joke about Saint Anthony’s being the patron saint of lost causes.

“Già,” says Nella.

“Che pianta è?” he asks, pointing to one of the many windows decorated with Greek basil.

“Manjerico. Una specie di basilico. È tradizione metterlo alla gianella.”

He seems a little perplexed, again, but happy enough to say thanks and leave.

Nella’s still hearing her own words in her head.

She’s said gianella instead of finestra. From janela, fado’s signature word. People were always doing something at the window in fado songs. Opening the curtains to let the moonlight in. Hang carnations. Look longingly towards the sea. If you didn’t know any better, you’d think that Portuguese people have invented windows, so proud they are of them.

Maybe it’s just a word that sounds nice. Like farfalla. But Nella didn’t know that many Italian songs with butterflies in them. Shame, as you could have those two words in the same verse, farfalla and gianella, as they almost rhymed. Only, one of them was not a real word, though, or was it?
 

---

 
Naples, then.

One of Nella’s two English examiners was a young man who could have been a poster boy for life after punk and heroine. Skinny, with bulging blue eyes, big ears, pointy nose. Tidy hair, layered cut, middle part. Smoking jacket over a cashmere cardigan, cornflower blue. To match his eyes, surely.

He seemed agitated, discussing something with the other examiner, a much more poised lady. Middle age, foreign outfit: an oversize brown jumper over a long black skirt and wedge moccasins. Her jewellery – bigiotteria, rather, stuff you’d get at a craft fair on Maiori’s promenade in August – tingled while her foot tapped idly in the air. She nodded absent-mindedly in response to the young man’s rant.

Nella sat down in front of them, and he finally acknowledged her presence. He introduced himself, Michael, and asked her to do the same and talk about her job.

She talked about her time as a volunteer at the National Archaeological Museum when she was a History and Fine Arts student, and what she did now at all the venues she rotated through the temp agency. More responsibilities, lone work, etcetera.

That was her sister’s idea (“Show them you can talk about the past, then switch to the present”). The lady – Claire was the name on her badge – maintained eye contact with a warm expression. She even looked impressed when Nella mentioned her occasional gigs at Ercolano and Pompeii.

“Is there anything you don’t like very much about your job?” she asked.

Nella didn’t expect that question. She understood it was just to keep the conversation going, but she wished they had asked her something else.

“Not a single thing?” Claire prompted, addressing Nella’s awkward silence.

It was the works of art abandoned, imprisoned, in those dusty, lightless storerooms. Who had decided that they belonged there? Who wielded the power to release them, for a few months at a time, only to then return them underground for another two, five, ten years? Nella didn’t like the rules of the tour guide game. She had the feeling that it was rigged, somehow. Why couldn’t they build more museums, employ more people, encourage Italians to do something different on weekends, for once, other than grocery shopping or going to church or watching football or daytime TV? Italians didn’t appreciate the treasures at their doorstep. So it had to be foreign people. So it had to be English, the language that would make those works of art come to the surface, come to life.

“We get paid breadcrumbs,” Nella said, finally, keeping it simple.

“Do you mean that you get paid ‘peanuts’?” said Michael, raising one eyebrow and straining his lips into a smug smile.

“I wish it was peanuts.”

When the written exam came back, Nella found out that she scored as average as she did in the oral, 166. She achieved a “Pass at Grade C”, sufficiente, in Italian terms, “just enough”.

The assessment centre didn’t release completed exam papers, but she could imagine where she fell short.

She still had a marked mock essay that she had done in preparation for the exam at a very expensive school once Sofia had gone back to Brescia, just after the Epiphany.

The essay was about what Nella did in her spare time. The word “yellow”, next to “yellow books”, had been circled, with three question marks on the side. “Footing” had also been circled, and “smooth” in “smooth dance” had the side note: “What’s this supposed to mean?”

Finally, next to “conversate”, the examiner had added a comment underlined twice: “Not a word!”

Nella didn’t like doing any of those things anyway. She didn’t have any spare time, as she was too busy taking as many tour guide gigs as she could or teaching herself English, with “just enough” results. And even if she did, she wouldn’t have spent it reading crime novels, jogging, ballroom dancing, or conversing with her sister, who didn’t even live with her anymore.

She’d migrated to a different city just so that she could do the job for which she’d studied, and even enjoy it, imagine that.
 

---

 
Lisbon, now.

Gianella. Già, Nella.

She loves a good gioco di parole. A game of/play on words.

Nella walks the group uphill, past the former jailhouse, the Aljube, now the Museum of Resistance and Freedom. As she peaks into the impressive wrought-iron gate, she imagines sounds of shackles breaking.

The party makes an obligatory stop at the overcrowded miradouro Santa Luzia, for selfies with the view and the more extravagant tuk-tuks, like the one with azulejos patterns, or the hippie caravan.

The tour ends at the Fado Museum, just behind the pick-up point for cruise ship passengers. The tourists tell her, “Thank you very much,” “That was fun,” and “I can’t wait to be back.” Giusy gives her her phone number. “Chiamami, quando torni a Napoli.”

Nella is barely listening. As she returns to the mayhem of Saint Anthony’s celebration, she looks around for more windows, thresholds between the languages she speaks, not-words. All her senses, now, feeding into her new little game.

                barulho
             Il baruglio della gente.
                                 baccano
                (people's noise)
‎
              cheiro        manjerico              alecrim
             Scerro di mangerico e alecrimo.
                         profumo          basilico greco      rosmarino
                (smell of Greek basil and rosemary)
‎
                         andorinhas
             Nidi di andorinne.
                                                rondini
                (swallows' nests)
‎
            crianças              brincam
             Crianze che brincano per strada.
                          bambini                giocano
                (children playing in the street)
‎
            migalhas                             pardais
             Migaglie di pane ai pardali.
                              briciole                             passeri
                (breadcrumbs for sparrows)

Is it párdali or pardáli? Don’t bird names in Italian tend to have their stress on the penultimate syllable? Like fringuello, usignolo … not passero, though. Passero’s sdrucciola. Párdali it is then.

                                                                                                                                                 estremecer
It doesn’t matter, as the bang of a firecracker makes the sparrows stremiss and fly away.
                                                                                                                                                                     (startle)

There, it is getting to her English, too.

“Stremiss, stremissed, stremissed,” Nella says out loud.

“Can I help you?” says a tuk-tuk driver walking in her opposite direction, stopping abruptly. “What did you just say?”

             brincando
“I’m just brinking,” she says. Her lost things found, her waters placid.
                              (playing)