We had met the year before in Pergamum in Turkey by visiting the Acropolis. Obviously we had made the usual stupid joke (for them) because they were residents in Bergamo Alta (Italy), they wanted to emphasize. He, let's call him Alberto, claimed to be an accountant who then moved on to the profession of psychologist who clearly made him much more judging by his motorhome which must have cost a lot of millions of lire.
An exuberant type, a cascade of words, passionate about weapons. He immediately showed us his P 38 which in those years in Turkey traveling in a camper according to him was more than necessary and he was surprised that we in our midst did not have any defense weapons. We told him that our defense was Anastasia, the German shepherd who traveled with us in the camper and was the object of desire from a lot of Turks, even though they are said to hate dogs following the dictates of their religion.
After about ten days of visiting the Turkish archaeological sites we left each other because they had to return to Bergamo and we instead had to continue to Cappadocia. Kisses and hugs with the intention of meeting again the following year to spend the holidays together this time in Spain bringing our children with us again if we could compete with the protestant attitudes of their golden adolescence.
Alberto and his flimsy half named Maria had a fourteen-year-old girl, Sonia, rather ugly and schooled against her will in a strict Catholic institution.
Why the camper? To tell the truth, we started earlier with the caravan, a misnomer because the word "caravan" should be used. However, spending your free time and summer holidays on a trip by camper had many advantages, including that of being able to stop wherever we wanted without time limits. In a nutshell, the sense of great freedom even if there were contraindications and there were many starting from the effort of driving a vehicle of considerable proportions compared to a normal car.
But above all there was also the advantage of making children, especially boys, understand the great significance of knowing, approaching people who are different from us, respect for cultural traditions and differences in skin, the daily challenge of measuring themselves with the need to be a little less Italian trying to understand others.
In Norway, just as Italians had invited us to leave a supermarket because we talked loudly. If you travel in organized groups then, the hard experience of living with people who have problems and taking them on to the other members of the caravan. For example, it happened to us on a trip to Egypt organized by Plein Air magazine where a self-described high school teacher (later it became known that he was just a janitor), did nothing but cover himself up with his camper. When all together we blocked our vehicles, getting off to push his vehicle out of the sand, this fellow also found a way to get violently angry at those who were helping him by accusing us of dirtying the white body of his motor caravan. In the end we were forced to drop him in the sand, all of us continuing our journey as scheduled.
"Giulia is really beautiful, isn't she?", Alberto observed with not exactly paternal attention the friend of his daughter Sonia who had been entrusted to him by her parents, a couple who had broken out and were going straight to divorce. We were sitting outside our motor homes at a Valencia campsite where we met as promised we had made the previous year in Turkey.
Giulia was really beautiful and looked something more than her 15 years, maybe 17 maybe 18 but compared to Sonia, the daughter of Alberto and Maria, Giulia radiated femininity from all pores. She loved wearing tank tops that obviously showed large portions of her small but already well formed breasts. And it was dangerous to speak to her because she found every excuse to lean with her elbows on something, leaving full visibility of her pectoral jewel.
Giulia was a disturbing presence for grown men as the writer and as the accountant turned psychologist. Without bothering Vladimir Nabokov.
"Since we left Giulia has shown that she is much more mature than her age. This pleased me because it can be useful to wean my daughter Sonia who has many problems, let me tell you that I am a psychologist. It must be said that it is not easy to live with an already very distracted and independent teenager like Giulia. ", Alberto added.
"Okay, but she is still a little girl, albeit a little special ..", I countered.
"Do you know that now the two, when we go to a restaurant, want to eat at a table separate from us? I saw that Giulia enjoys provoking the males she crosses with her eyes and has even gone so far as to cheer with a glass of wine in response to killer looks. Then there are those who get up and go to their table and then I have to take the situation in hand by getting up and approaching the girls. So far I have managed to keep admirers away .... but it is not easy to be a father and friend of teenage girls ... they are well-trained women but with the brains of little girls, naive, open to every encounter and every disappointment ... if you knew how many girls of this type are my patients. " _________________________________________________
Barcelona, the last leg of our short joint trip to Spain. The last evening of our stay was to be dedicated to a visit to Montjuic where in 1929 a Universal Exposition was organized which left architectural constructions of the highest level because the Spaniards not only know how to do beautiful things, but above all they know how to preserve them.
The purpose of the visit to the MontJuic park was above all to attend the show of the Font Magica, the sound fountain, a major tourist attraction with millions of visitors every year. After walking for a few hours visiting the Olympic stadium, El Poble Espanol, an open-air museum located on the Montjuïc hill and the Joan Miro' Foundation, since in Spain you eat very late in the evening we had bought tickets for the show of the Fonte Magica at 9.30pm. Then we would go to a restaurant.
In the midst of thousands of people we witnessed the splendid show of the Magic Fountain then, now considerably tired from the busy day, we stopped in the first restaurant we found. As usual, the two girls demanded to have dinner at a separate table from ours. And that scene was repeated which had by now become an ominous tradition of our evenings in the company of Alberto, wife, daughter and Giulia.
But this time the situation seemed to have taken on more dangerous contours: Giulia and Sonia's winks at a group of youngsters who were laughing at a nearby table and had evidently already reached a very high alcohol level, had convinced five of these individuals to get up and surround the table of the two girls led by the pack leader who answered the name of Jose ', at least according to what the other boys called him with a hint of submission.
Alberto had tried to show off his talents as a courteous psychologist by inviting the youngsters to let the two girls free. But this time this technique didn't work. "¿Qué diablos quieres, Italian mierda? Estamos aquí en nuestra casa. Estas chicas nos sonrieron y enviaron mensajes. ¿Que quieres de mi?", Jose began to yell.
The situation did not improve when I in turn threatened to call the police. Jose 'came under my face, grabbing my chest: "¿Quieres llamar a la policía, idiot? Llama, llama ... la policía nos defiende, no a los turistas de mierda." The restaurant owner who clearly knew and feared that group of youngsters intervened and convinced them to go back to their table while we hurried to resume the exit after paying a stratospheric bill.
We took our campers back and stopped in a nearby parking area and I did something that should never be done by a prudent camper in such a situation: I lowered the vehicle stabilization feet. I trusted the posted signs saying the area was under police control. _________________________________________________
"Oscar wake up, wake up, wake up. They're trying to get into the camper," my wife was shaking me. A little dazed, I got out of bed and took a large kitchen knife and opened the back door of our vehicle. It was three in the morning on August 15th.
The noise of someone running away convinced me that the situation was not the best. I sat on the retractable step of the camper with the long knife in one hand. I quickly realized that someone, a group of thugs, was crawling to attack us. They were those young men from the restaurant and here they reappear with an arrogant air. It seemed to me that they had at least sticks or knives in their hands. The parking area lights weren't enough to understand.
"Alberto, Alberto - I started yelling at my so-called friend's camper - they are attacking me ...! Come out with the gun, help me ...!"
It is not easy, it is not easy to invent the ability to improvise a rustic duel on the spot. In those moments, the very distant prodromes of your DNA are called upon, dating back hundreds, thousands of years ago to remember how the hell your distant ancestors did. In a situation like that, the instinct of conservation is triggered and there are two ways out: the first is to escape anyway, the second is to try to oppose with a violent reaction, absolutely careless, given the inexperience, the number that overwhelms you, the darkness, the confusion, the lack of help from Alberto.
My stomach had closed and I felt a rage rise inside me, while I was handling that kitchen knife with cuts and thrusts invented there and then, trying to keep the opponents at a distance especially that Jose 'who seemed to be holding a shining blade in the dim light of the street lamps.
After a long time calling Alberto finally decided to get out of the camper. "Let's think, guys, let's think!" he said and took a beating between head and neck which convinced him to immediately take refuge back inside his luxurious motor home.
Franca, my wife, tried to hold back Max my son who despite his twelve years wanted to come to the aid of his father, Anastasia, the German shepherd, did not understand what the hell was happening and he let off steam barking as much as possible, Marco, the little one, was crying attached to mother's legs.
The rustic duel had been going on for a few minutes and strangely enough, Jose's companions had almost gathered in a circle to respect the fight between their gang leader and that middle-aged tourist.
I don't know how, but in a lunge I managed to touch Jose's left arm who started screaming: "Estoy herido estoy herido, este italiano maldito me hirió el brazo ..." Since even in the most dramatic situations there is always a comic twist, Jose' had approached Alberto's motor caravan and rubbed his bleeding arm on the white walls of the powerful vehicle.
Situation for me became unbearable, there was no escape, the other members of the gang jumped on me, how many could there be? four, five but it seemed like hundreds. They hit me with kicks and punches, one had torn up a metal basket and was hitting it on my head. I lost consciousness and lucky for me I rolled under the camper. The advantage of having a motor home with high wheels.
As you know, head injuries are the ones that bleed the most and I think those criminals were scared to see me with my face covered in blood and maybe they thought they had killed me, so they ran away.
After a few minutes I regained consciousness and in the fog I heard Franca crying as she tried to understand how important my injuries were. I slowly got out from under the camper. Franca and Max helped me get back on my feet and full of adrenaline as I was I told them I wanted to drive and escape from that parking area.
They looked at me as you look at a madman in an outburst, but I was the only one who could drive the vehicle and they sketched. Max had found the turntable and had been busy raising the stabilizing feet. Franca had removed a packet of fillet from the refrigerator and placed it on my forehead, my eyeglasses had been lost but luckily I had the sun glasses.
I hooked up to the radio and started sending a message asking for help. Despite the early hour, a taxi driver answered me and arrived after five minutes. I asked to guide us to the nearest emergency room and so we got going. Passing through an alley where there was one of those Spanish bars open all night, I found myself in front of a car belonging to someone who had gone to drink inside the club. I stuck to the horn that I had had some super powerful horns modified. The owner, followed by others, rushed out of the shop and stepped under my window with a menacing air, it seems to me that he was even holding a gun. When he saw my face covered in blood he cursed a couple of curses and rushed to move the car so I could pass.
I drove for about twenty minutes and I can assure you it was not an easy operation. In the end, the taxi driver accompanied us in front of the Surgery Emergency Room in the Paseo Colon. Franca worked hard to get us into the parking lot inside the building with the camper. At that point I was surrounded by nurses and doctors. I had to undergo X-ray tests right away to see if I had a concussion.
"Pero primero, Sr. Bartoli, tenemos que lavarnos", the nurse to whom I had been entrusted told me. He took me to a bathroom where he took off my suit that I had filled with feces because, they explained to me, when one faints, the control of the sphincter loosens. I also believe it was a reaction of my fear when I had to endure the rustic duel. Naked as a bug with a systole he cleaned me and then I was put on a bed in the emergency room.
Two young doctors assisted me, a man and a woman, to whom I tried to tell my story. The young doctor's comment was: "Lo sentimos señor, pero ahora tenemos democracia ..." The x-ray had not given negative results, in short, there had been no concussion, now it was a question of mending the injuries to the head and chest that had been inflicted on me.
While they were working on the other bed a woman was brought, a prostitute with a deep dagger wound in her thigh. She complained quietly and prayed to Our Lady. Later the work of the two doctors to mend me was interrupted by the arrival of an excited guy who yelled and railed at everyone and was blocked by four nurses. They gave him an injection of a mega tranquilizer and the guy fell into a heavy sleep.
The doctors had completed their embroidery work on my head where they had placed forty stitches. "Lamentamos lo sucedido, señor, le deseamos un buen regreso to Italy. But no se preocupe during the menos ocho días", they told me before sitting me in a wheelchair that would take me to a room that they had managed to recover all internal department.
But before getting into the lift I wanted to hug Franca, Max and Marchino. As soon as I saw them I burst into tears: "Sorry, sorry" - I said sobbing because by now the adrenaline was gone - "I made so many mistakes. I should have started immediately and left that place ..."
My room in the surgery emergency room was large and overlooked the courtyard with trees and flower beds where they had allowed RVs to park. In fact, even Alberto, I don't know how, had managed to track us down and he too had arranged his vehicle inside the Institute.
The first day I had a very high fever and was on antibiotics. On the morning of the second day Alberto arrived in the room and told me: "I'm sorry if I didn't help you the other night ..." To which I replied by saying: "Dear Alberto, if you don't have courage, you don't if you can give it ... "Maybe I was a little over the top but in those conditions I didn't feel like I was very good.
On the third day, the fever had now dropped, I decided we had to go back to Italy. My head was completely bandaged as if by a cap, I asked myself where the hospital administration was and once I found the office I asked the officials present for clarification. They told me that I would pay nothing if I presented a declaration from the Italian consulate in Barcelona. I thanked and after documenting where this Italian consulate was, I took a taxi and let myself be taken. Calle Mallorca 270.
In front of me there were at least 10 people, almost all tourists who had been robbed, especially when they were walking on the Ramblas. Try to think in those days of August where the consul general was. In Italy on vacation, of course. The problems of the Italian tourists present in Barcelona were managed by an employee, visibly annoyed at having to spend those days of August in the consulate office. After more than an hour of waiting when it was finally my turn I told the official what had happened to me. And I asked him for the certificate to be issued to the administration of the surgical emergency room in Barcelona that was hosting me.
The official asked me if I had the E 101 form. To which I replied that I did not know what it was. The official told me that the form was used to extend health coverage overseas. He asked me which city I lived in, I told him Rome and then he suggested: "Write to your Local Health Authority in Rome and have form E 101 sent, then you will come here again, we will make this declaration that you can bring to the 'Hospital."
My head felt very heavy and I could not catalog what the consulate official had just told me: write to the Usl of Rome, book a hotel in Barcelona and wait for the E 101 form to be sent, take it to the consulate and receive the required certification by the Spaniards.
"Listen, but do you realize what you are saying to me?" I whispered to the slightly 'consoling' official, "Do you also realize that we are in the mid-August period and that everything is closed in Italy?"
"These are not the problems I have to worry about personally", replies the official, this is the procedure and I cannot change it .. ". I replied that he was paid to help his compatriots present in Barcelona and try to solve their problems without taking sides behind the procedures. I struggled to get up and left, not without first suggesting an improper use of form E 101.
Back at the hospital I went to the administration office where I promptly reported what the consular officer had told me and added that I was ashamed as an Italian. As I spoke the Spanish official smiled with obvious malice. "No hay problem, señor Bartoli, we think that the world is most bureaucratic but we are not equivocal. y no vuelvas a vernos (me refiero a hospital) ..! "
"No problem, Mr. Bartoli, we thought we were the most bureaucratic country in the world but we were wrong. The fault is ours alone that we have caused you these wounds and this shock. Let's solve everything our way in five minutes. and don't come back to see us (I mean as a hospital) ..! "
He put a couple of stamps on some sheets and returned the invoice (room, medicines, x-rays, medical interventions, etc.) with "pagado" written in big letters on it. ___________________________________________________
The next day I drove the camper. 1168 km to reach Marina di Grosseto, Cielo Verde campsite, a beautiful place in the pine forest. As soon as I arrived, I opened the door of the camper, tried to get out and fell to the ground.
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by Oscar Bartoli
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