Day 11--First Italian friends, first Italian pizza...

Pinerolo to Turin

50 kms

Having decided that I should sing for the lovely supper I had enjoyed the night before, I offered to look after two-year-old bambina Sarah, one of the children living at the Casa, whilst her Mum went out for the morning. Apart from the obvious, we turned out to have loads in common and had a grand old time chasing each other around the convent’s stony courtyard overlooking a lovingly-tended kitchen garden with rows of tomatoes running in between the apple and fig trees. I even tried out my none-too extensive Italian song repertoire to comfort Sarah when she fell off her tricycle. She preferred Fabri Fibra to Bella Ciao, but still I could tell she wasn’t impressed.

Sarah with Abz. Besties!

I was happy to have made my first Italian friend. However, the reason Sarah was left at home with me was that she had some sort of throat-ailment which everyone was calling “plache” whilst pointing to their tonsils. I still have no idea what exactly it was but I sure got a walloping of it myself, with runny nose and sore throat following me all the way to Rome.

I left Pinerolo after lunch and set off towards Torino, where I was to meet up with Cristina, one of the girls from the Casa Betania. She had offered to give me a little tour of the city before having my first true Italian pizza at her parents’ house in the suburb of Nicolino.

As I arrived in the outskirts of Torino, I met an old Sicilian cyclist who had caught me poring over my map with an air of bemusement. He proclaimed himself my guide and took me all the way to my youth hostel along the banks of the Po river, a lovely detour which I surely would never have found on my own.

Piazza Castello.

Cristina showed me around the fanfare-some Piazza CAstello and the very imposing Palazzi Madame and Reale which seemed a tad too Germanic in the I-smell-the-Mediterranean balmy atmosphere. We were then joined by her lovely older brother who gave me a tour of the Cathedral and ended up in a café to indulge in the most excellent Northern Italian tradition of aperitivo: if you order a glass of wine in the early evening, it comes to you with an amazing selection of Parma ham, mozzarella and tomato sandwiches. Oh yeah.

Aperitivo, baby!

We caught the bus out to Nicolino and I was welcomed like a princess by Cristina’s wonderful parents, who kindly ignored the fact that I was trying to pass a nightgown off as a casual dress, given that it was the closest thing to street clothes I had brought along. Cristina’s dad served us a succession of delicious homemade pizzas. Then Cristina gave me a skirt to wear so that we could go out for drinks on the town without having stuff thrown at us. Torino has a very pretty, glittery riverfront nightlife, though the cleanliness and the enthusiastic use of recess lighting made the whole place feel very prosperous Mitteleuropa-esque, all the more so when you discover that the flipside of the immaculate pavements of the city centre are some pretty grungy northern neighbourhoods populated by Northern African immigrants, broke students and nasty looking dealers.

After a great evening Cristina and her brother drove me back to my hostel (in the aforementioned grunge-hood). I could not have been more grateful to them and their wonderful parents for this warmest of welcomes.

Cristina and her wonderful Mum, who called me 'bambola' despite the truly offensive state of my hair. I wanted to hug her.