TRIP TO AMSTERDAM () Automatic translation
It was the
summer of 1971. The ears still whistled me for the noise of the last concert of
the Rolling Stones to the Palalido in Milan. Ten good minutes to restart to
feel something, I remember me Mick Jagger that brandishing a belt to mo' of
whip beats the stage singing Midnight rambler: Brian there was not already
more, flies in sky a few times before.
I prepared
me to depart for the service to serve in the military the month of September
and so with Renata and Vanna we decided to depart for a trip around Europe. Objective
Amsterdam to find Arrigo. Settantamila liras to head fifteen days of trip in
hitchhiking, when the hitchhiking was still a sport that united the young
people of all the nations.
We prepare
the baggages: a tactical backpack to head, a water bottle full of tokay and
some scatolettas of meat Exeter and of the good cheese seasoned of mountain.
You departs
from Venice where they live Renata and Vanna. Renata is my girl and from
Campiello fly the morning we go afoot soon toward Rome Plaza: there we meet
Vanna and we take the bus for Mestre, we bring us on the Terraglio and of there
the adventure it starts.
You starts
with an oldie that wants Not to bring us to all costs in Val of. At the end we
succeed to it stuffed to leave on the road and we reach Innsbruck in the first
afternoon
Here we
meet a strange type mountaineer bonnet and pantaloni to the zouave that stops
us and he/she asks us where direct are. He/she takes note of the names, we give
only him the first name and him he/she writes George Renata and Vanna. To us a
girl of the south is added directed to Stoccarda. He says that it has to go
thin to Hamburg to pick up some skiers and to wait for him/it there where we
are that it goes to take the pulmino. We wait A hour passes, then two understand
that you/he/she has taken around us, we send him/it to that country and we take
back the walk up to the outskirts of Innsbruck.
I am by now
you are her in the evening, it starts to do dark it is better to go to look for
to sleep, rather no we still wait for some one passage: if it doesn't arrive we
return in the city.
You stops a
sporting coupée, a registered American stain Nederland. I am a lot of
emozionato,il driver he/she speaks French. Ou allez vous Amsterdam Moi aussi! We salt of run her Vanna before,
Renata and I behind.
The God of
the hitchhikers had taken us under his/her protection!
We reach
the border with Germany and we quickly insert there on the German highway; the
cruising speed is an hour on the two hundred. The gentleman to the guide calls
Gerald Van Lennep and you/he/she is trying the car, a prototype General Motors
for the magazine the automobile. It abdicates the great hotels and he/she
offers us supper and hotel putting all in account to the magazine. To Monk we
stop there to sleep. While we are talking to the owner of the hotel a soldier
it enters American black tall two meters, armed with everything point that
makes us notice that the car is in prohibition of standstill. Renata and I
sleep together Vanna and the Dutch friend in the single rooms. It doesn't look
for any approach a true gentleman. The morning for breakfast I ask a hood with
the brioche: an orangeade arrives to me with a toast. All ok. During the trip
it speaks, he laughs, he sings: Renata and Vanna have an unbelievable
repertoire of very beautiful ancient Venetian songs. Gerald is a pilot of
rallies it is famous in Holland, but we don't know him/it to us we are some
worried for the high speed but then we relax there: it drives the auto as if it
were an airplane but he/she always succeeds in planing in the correct point. The
morning and during the whole day I am stricken from the boundless expanse of
truck, wagons, armed wagons and American military airplanes that coast along
the highway from both the sides and that they proceed along the road clumsily
moving himself/herself/itself. The impression is militarily that of a busy
country how alive under guardianship. The road races fast and we reaches the
border with Holland. There is a long line of hippies with the backpacks to the
feet that wait for the particularly severe controls of the watches. We give
without even not waiting for an instant: they know Gerald they greet him/it
smiling and they make us pass..
And'
evening when we reach Rotterdam and it rains to I hijack. Gerald tells us to
wait and goes looking for his/her fiancée. It doesn't find her/it and so it
brings us thin to Amsterdam. It changes car: he/she leaves in a garage the GM
and he/she takes a big BMW coupée, his. I realize me that on the seat of guide
there is a big rusted nail I pick him/it up and I hand him him. Him firm and it
puts again him/it under smiling: it is his/her mascot.
It needs
it: in the last rally his/her co-pilot had gotten sick and so after two days
and two nights of guide without change pilot has seen an oldie cross the road
and you/he/she is broken with car sick co-pilot and everything. But the nail
the has saved!
Part and
here one start some most beautiful moments of my life. They are with my girl to
which I love a world of and with the friend Vanna to which also under another
form I love. I am about to arrive to Amsterdam craved city and they are in car
with a famous pilots! The music is stupendous the boxes they send current of
air while to insane speed we race toward the Venice of the North under a dense
rain. Every curve is a masterpiece. Before it gives a dry hit and the car it
departs in skidded then controsterzo shotgun, staircase the marches up to the
second and then it accelerates to all gas.danzando on the water. The car
responds docile to its commands and part definite verse where he wants to bring
her/it. We have arrived, it accompanies us to a hostel and then the evening it
comes us to take and it brings us to supper to the Chinese restaurant: it
allows us his/her telephone number if it served us something: this was Europe
of the seventies!
The morning
later we go looking for the hostel that you/they have recommended us
Herengracht 88. Two dormitories one for the males and one for the females. To
the plain earth a cafe with disco that works the whole night. Here The beer is
better and wine costs as the whiskey from us.
We turn for
the city, reached the Vondel Park some boys they ask us if we want hashish and
Renata that it understands badly he/she answers no commodities francais. They
look us incredulous and they go. Here the light drugs are freely in commerce,
but you/they can be smoked only inside his/her own houses and of some public
places.
In the city
he breathes air of liberty, many boys have dressed of all the all colors and
they have everywhere earrings and rings some. The windows of the houses are as
small altars, everything is very clean and clean The newspapers are on sale on
tripods without control where one pick them up and pay without nobody checks
him/it. There is however a lot of police and the cars of the benemerita they
pass more times during the day in front of us.
In the
hostel it is full of boys and American girls that never go out and they chat
then there without stopping a moment you know of here you know of return in
America and they tell around their mythical trips for the world
And'
evening, we wonder aimlessly in the center, they draw near us some boys that
felt that we are Italian they start to curse hog here and hog there.
In fact the
Italian curses are the preferred here by the boys of who knows because!
Then we
discover that it was a joke, they are nice they accompany us toward the hostel.
We still have I set all the money and we are some mistrustful ones. They offer
us to smoke, we thank but we say that it doesn't suit us, that have of better
They want to know what: let's have the water bottle with the Tokaj that is good
indeed!
They
propose then to make an exchange we say this way cultural. We give back, he
does late we are in front of the entry of the hostel, me Renata we are sleepy,
Vanna remains still some to talk to the Dutch that by now they have become
friends
Already,
friends, pass mezz'ora and while I am being about to take sleep it arrives of
run Renata in my dormitory and it tells me that Vanna has disappeared.
Renata has
waited that she arrived for some, then not seeing to arrive her/it has gone
down to check that there pits still and there was not anymore. Anybody, neither
her, neither the Dutch. Possible that Vanna has gone alone at night away with
some strangers without knowing the language neither to know the place? No.
Then the
you/they have abducted, the you/they have brought away with the strength And if
instead if n'
has beautiful beautiful
irresponsible person gone as you/he/she is? Be deficient but when returns I
tell him of it four!
Moral of the
fable I get up me and I go at night around for Amsterdam to look for the Vanna
without estranging too much me from the hostel, full of sleep and of fear
hoping that something ugly doesn't happen. They macaws at night by now the two
when, at the end of to nth turn to empty to the return The see Renata that
waits me to the entry of the hostel and it tells me that the Vanna has
returned, that have asked her to go their home to pass the evening and her
you/he/she has answered no and then one, the tallest and big, has said Ah yes
and then The I give as they make Italians, the has loaded at shoulder and
street laughing for the roads of the city. Vanna some laughed some it argued
but then you/he/she has understood that it was better to be to the game since
they didn't seem bad. L' have brought to see at night their city, around on the
streetcars and then in house to know their world, their girls and their smoke!
Then the
have accompanied again back healthy and saves, but that fear!
This way
our adventure starts to Amsterdam.
We meet
Arrigo that is violent, inebriated of the possibility to live
intensely
that it gives a young city and rock as it is the Amsterdam of that years.
Arrigo is gay and an evening it brings us in a place for homosexuals. They do
us one it enrolls and we enter the club. And' a kind of disco with cafe and
slacker illuminated by beautiful lamps liberty. After some I realize me that
the couples are all formed by boys of the same sex and here Renata and I are
the irregular ones! In fact when risk there to dance in footstep her and I one
in front of the other arrive to us certain shoves! Here many boys of the same
sex are seen to turn hand in the hand. In Italy I had never seen of it,
probably not because there is not but because they are ashamed to make to be
seen. As there are a lot of couples mixed whites and blacks or yellows and
whites. However the stupid are here also there, because an evening in a shop of
meats the little fellow that serves us, seen Renata and Vanna and understands
that we are Italian, you/he/she puts on two meatballs on the breasts and
you/he/she starts to make the fool. We go out very angry giving him some boor
and will want us the whole evening to the rhythm of Sticky finger to digest the
anger.
The song of
the moment is Brown sugar of the Rolling that here is a myth and of which all
the boys know to memory the texts and the music. And' with us a black boy of
color that is admired for as we dance well: two Venetians and a Milanese that
jump as crickets on the dance footsteps in the Venice of the north!
Money is
pochini and then we thinks about earning us some lira going to the Vondel park
to sell necklaces of berries! They are beautiful to see him but they last few,
the clients return back to protest and we have a beautiful give us to do to
calm them and spiegar theirs that the berries are not rubies!.. I draw abstract
postcards and with amazement I see that they immediately buy me her. Close to
us of the workers that work in the excavations of the city sell clay pieces and
of ceramics that to their dir they are ancient!
A thing
that surprises me is the liking that I operated and the people of the place
reserve us, you/he/she Passes a gelataio with his/her bicycle you/he/she looks
us you/he/she smiles and you/he/she tells us - be happy! -.
One day we
go to a desecrated church where there is who prays and who law laid down on
carpets along the altars and who the flute and two very nice girls that offer
tea to the visitors to the entry plays.
An evening
we finally go to see the Heaven that is the most famous place for the young
people. There are out some Chinese with the knives and it throws ugly air so we
quickly get further there and we go to another place the Melkwek, I believe is
written this way. Here we also find a boy all colored in face that plays a
trumpet. Do I ask him in a French padano " Excusez east moi que vous savez
quest east que there ca? " All burst to laugh and I dry up me a lot of,
but meanwhile the tension is ended. We enter. There is a great saloon with a
fountain in mean. Enormous carpets contain about ten smoked young people. It is
one of it that for the whole time that we stay continuous to always do the same
two accords with the guitar; a girl has a big ring to the nose. I feel me to
uneasiness and I regret not to have gone to another place that I have seen
passing along the channel. It
called: « Le bon marriage le vin et le fromage ». Inside the Melkwek there were however various
rooms among which a room for concerts live, a vegetarian cafe and anything else
other than now I don't remember.
The week
passes in hurry and visited the museums imperdibili and sort some buy we leave
again for returning in Italy. I immediately tell you that in this trip back
will pay the whole fortune had in the going and with the affairs!
We depart
soon from Amsterdam in hitchhiking the morning direct toward Belgium, The time
is grey and the passages are boring. Belgium doesn't tell us nothing. I
remember a night passed on truck with the radio turned on that it went down
toward Paris and then the tiredness the evening out of the great city with few
money in pocket and so much desire to return soon to house. Here that it
arrives an Alpine blue coupée, it stops him a kind gentleman and he/she asks us
where we am direct. We explain our destination and him it tells us if you come
I make you see Paris and I can entertain you this evening to my house and then
tomorrow I accompany again you on the road. We decide to accept and we go: the
good continuous star to illuminate our walk. This gentleman of whom I don't
remember the name is a psychologist and you/he/she has been assistant of Piaget
to the Sorbona. You/he/she has traveled even in youth hitchhiking in Russia
when nobody did him/it and for this you/he/she has taken us in liking and
you/he/she has invited us from him. Tired to teach all of a sudden psychology of
his/her life has left the university career and you/he/she has begun to work as
psychologist for the industry making a heap of money: to the moment he/she
worked for the Chrysler France where it directed the office Searches of market.
It was so can allow a fabulous villa to the doors in Paris. A square on an only
plan in mean to a great lawn with four entries one for every as lato,con of
sheep and small shop for the jobs. And a piano close to the fireplace where I
have immediately placed before any what is suitable. And' been very stricken by
my personality and has foretold who knows me great things if they will arrive
and when!
During the
afternoon, made an express turn for the great French capital, it brings us to
make a sauna.
I feel my
glasses that become red-hot and so my chain. . Among cold showers and smoke hot
take there a whole big cold! It arrives evening and we prepare the supper. To
cook the juice of tomato me Renata we use the kitchen of the Trailer: the pot
of glass explodes and throws everywhere tomato
The morning
accompanies us on the road for Lione and there begins the part of the least
pleasant trip. We reach Grenoble and it does dark. You sets the problem whether
to stop us to sleep or to continue. We try to go on. We have not calculated a
small detail: And' on July fourteen French national party: don't even find a
sober French to the Eliseo!
This way
the stop that we serve as Grenoble to bring us toward the Blue Coast brings out
us road, it goes out of the government one and it goes down to a little pond
where a popular party there is. There all are already to d tall gradation
alcoolica and as they see to arrive the friend with two redheads they start to
howl out the girls, out the Italians and to push the auto in here and in there
that it seemed to be to the Moon Park.
I have to
look for of calm tener Renata that threatens of died the driver if it doesn't
bring there immediately away us of while Vanna wants to go to the Police.
I do more
diplomatically present to the pirla that has thrusted us in this pie that its
car is going to pieces and that it suits him to depart as soon as possible. Thing
that does luckily and it brings back us on the Route Napoleon and it allows us
to a cafe. Do we drink a beer there and do we relax there some when they arrive
some Italians emigrants and they tell us Italians? Now you pass with us the
evening to sing the songs of Rita Pavone and Gianni Morandi! I explain him that
we are tired, that go out from situations of tension and it is not the case,
that we are hitchhikers in trip and I do for going out. Then that puts on on
the door of the cafe with the two braccias open and peremptory it tells us you
of here you won't go. Renata that doesn't bear the authoritarianism pushes
him/it, it throws him/it for earth and it goes out. Vanna and I behind. That
raises again him and naturally if he/she picks her/it up with me that I have an
immense backpack and I almost am not able even to be in unstable balance. The
scene is comic not to say tragedian. Luckily the owner of the cafe that doesn't
want problems in the place goes out you/he/she stops him/it and you/he/she
tells us to get further us as soon as possible. We go afoot without more
courage to hitchhike and without knowing whether to look for to sleep. Are we on
the correct road? And we will continue afoot then. Fifteen kilometers afoot at
night with the dogs that you/they barked us against in the night to every
house, with a knife in a hand (of those to make the sandwiches) and a stone in
the other because a car departed by the lake is looking for us and so when we
see them arrive we throw for earth and we are silent and firm until they go. At
the end we arrive to a great lawn., it is dawn, we throw for earth and we sleep
a refreshing sleep.
When we
wake up there we depart afoot again, we arrive in small country we refresh
there and again toward Nice on a Renault.
To Nice we
decide to catch a train and we go to Cables d Blackboard (Liguria), where my
parents are.
The trip is
ended: everything is well that that it ends well.
P:S: Ended
to write the story I am me said: who knows if on internet through a motor of
search I can find news on Van Lennep? This way I have done and I have
discovered that the 24 hours of Her you/he/she has won well twice Mans for. The
first one in 71 really the year of my trip, on Porsche 917 in couple with Marko
and You second in the' 76 on Porsche 936 in couple with Ickx. Has also raced in
formula one on Williams! And me that had understood pits a pilot of rallies! They
were prototypes sport competitions of durata,12 24 hours 1000 kms: The manses,
Daytona Nurburgring, thousand km and street saying
A grappa I/you/they are drunk me and I am me
said: everything is well that that it ends well.
V