“Piano, piano”
“Si può sempre trovare tempo”
(One can always find time)
‘Elastic time’, ‘Pole Pole, Mother City Time and Jam Karet all prepared us for this.
“Piano Piano”.
It’s been quite a journey, over many years, unlearning the ‘rush rush’ of places lived in before, and adapting to a more gentle pace of life.
Years ago, we used to look at each other and say, “wouldn’t it be great to find a place that was halfway?” We yearned for a place, somewhere between the accelerated pace of the ‘developed’ West and the Zambian bush town that we were living in at the time.
We didn’t want to return to the rapid pace of life in concrete jungles. We didn’t want to live in London again, where it’s fast and efficient. We no longer wanted to be in a place like Japan, with a craving for speed and productivity. We remembered the trains in Osaka, and feeling irritated that they always ran on time. And while you waited, uniformly lined up with others on the platform, you would listen to the sound of piped music and birds tweeting.
I don’t want to rush through life. I don’t need to be endlessly productive. And I want to hear real birds tweeting.
Three years ago this blog was launched. The idea was born in Cape Town, the Mother City. Somehow Mother City Time, a slower, laid back way of getting round to things had always appealed to us.
The first piece on the blog talked about exactly that.
I’m fascinated by ideas around time. Ironically I don’t own a watch. I choose not to. And I’m still left wondering, why are so many people, in such a rush?
Three years on we are still thinking about time and celebrating the virtues of ‘slow life’. And we’ve discovered “piano piano”. There is a beautiful balance struck in this part of Bella Italia. You enjoy all the benefits of living in a European country. Things work. But things happen ‘slowly, slowly’ in Central Italy. It’s generally very laid back. There’s always time for a chat. And we never hear anyone complaining that they don’t have time. Time moves differently here. And happily, life is the opposite of hurried, hasty and immediate.
It’s not difficult to know our true selves. We just need to slow down enough in life to be introspective. Ask yourself “what do I truly want?” For many the answer to that question is dished up by society’s conditioning, they run the conventional race and continually “chase the money”. Some are wired that way.
We were always looking for something else.
For us, this journey began almost twenty years ago, with a decision to got to work for an NGO, receiving a small subsistence allowance. The money was not important. We were chasing the experience. That thinking has stayed with us.
All these years later we no longer look at each other and say “what if”. We no longer wonder if there is a place that is halfway between the fast life of big cities and that provincial town where we lived in Zambia.
We like the philosophy towards time here. We like that people will always make time for you. And we like that “Abbiamo mangiato un sacco, facciamo il chilo” (we ate too much, let’s take a post-lunch rest) is very O.K. Because, what’s the rush?
Italy has a unique culture to embrace, as well as the most beautiful language on the planet. And it presents to us so many opportunities to travel, as we plan to meander through all twenty regions across the country. Eventually we will see it all. There’s no rush.
We found our place, in Central Italia. We took our time to get here. Many international moves. But we did it.
Pian pianino siamo arrivati.
Slowly but surely, we got there.
What’s the attitude to time, where you are?
© Maggie M /Mother City Time
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