An Englishman ...

... or simply Marco Criscuolo? We went back to Amalfi this year. Flew out from Liverpool on Friday the 25th of September and back on Monday the 5th of October. Too short? Yes and no. Yes too short by a lifetime. No because I felt more like a foreigner in some ways than ever before.

Whenever we go over, I go out there putting myself under tremendous pressure. I have to stop by and see everyone that I know there - friends, relatives, acquaintances ... each and every one of them. I have to eat in every restaurant whose owner is my friend and that's becoming expensive. Believe me. Especially with the Euro and Sterling practically at one-to-one.

I love the place. I could happily spend the rest of my life wandering through the Lattari Mountains with my camera trying to capture moments of exquisite and immortal beauty with my digital machine.

I could happily spend the rest of my life sat in the square in Pontone with a bottle of Peroni (not Nastro Azzuro) in the blissful peace that envelopes that square.

I could quite happily spend the rest of my life sat at a table in Piazza del Duomo in Amalfi with a glass of wine watching the constant stream of humanity pass me by ... every now and again a person stops, throws his or her arms around me and chats for a few minutes about everything and nothing.

I love it. Love it.

Notwithstanding all of that, until I can master the language I can never truly be a part of it. I wasn't brought up bilingual. I taught myself Italian when I was 13. I bought an internet radio for the kitchen so that I can have Italian radio going constantly in the hope that it would deepen my immersion in the language and, consequently, my fluency. It didn't work. I made stupid mistakes and I hate making stupid mistakes. It's only me that cares about the mistakes of course but that's not the point.

Has the promise possessed me? Have I taken it too much to heart? Don't know the answer to those questions. Who am I? Where am I? I don't know the answer to those questions either. I was chatting to a friend when we were there and I did or said something and he asked me what I was doing. I told him not to worry about it. I'm an Englishman was my excuse. No you're not, he said. You are Marco Criscuolo. You are Italian. The name is enough?

I did learn a few things from this holiday and a few useful things too. The pressure thing is pointless and counterproductive. It's a holiday. It's time to chill. I should behave there just as I would at home. Shall we go out tonight? No, we'll stay at home and watch 'Verso il Millione' (Who wants to be a millionaire) and eat fried pepperoncini in front of the telly. Let's go out for a stroll along the seafront and have a coffee or an ice cream or a beer ... or even a glass of wine. Let's do nothing. Let's not have a holiday there. Let's live there for two weeks.

Why then ...

... do birds suddenly appear, every time I am near ... . No. I know the answer to that one. The question I don't know the answer to - or one of them at least - is why I'm bothered about being one thing or the other.

I dislike people who wrap themselves in their national flag and descend into a nationalist fervour. I hate it particularly, when the Brits and the Yanks do it. They seem to become more obnoxious than almost anybody else when they get themselves into that sort of mood.

That being the case, why is it so important to me to be 'an Italian' rather than 'an Englishman'? Especially given Cecil Rhodes' reassurance - 'remember that you were born an Englishman and have therefore won 1st prize in the lottery of life'. Why should a man who hates nationalism be at all concerned about what national badge is pinned on his lapel?

I have never been comfortable being a member of things and go out of my way to evade classification - when someone remarked on the earrings in my left ear with approval because only 'queers' wear them in their right ear, I went out and got a ring put in my right ear. I'm a civil servant who looks like an aging anarchist - four earrings in my left ear, an earring and a bar in my right ear and several tattoos (all of which are easily hidden, I hasten to add. I'm not that much of an anarchist).

It might reasonably be said that I've gone out of my way to paint myself as being anything but respectable. I'm the one who, in pretentious company, pours his tea into his saucer and drinks it from the saucer. That doesn't answer the question about the badge on my lapel though.

Did the promise have that much of an effect on me? Have I become a slave to the promise? I don't think so. Is it just a desire to be different? Now that's entirely possible.

So what is an Italian?

What a banal question. An inane question even. They're not necessarily banal or inane for the obvious politically correct reasons although that might well be true too. It's questionable whether is such a thing as 'an Italian'. The country was only created about 140 years ago. As a state, it's even younger than the US and the people are fiercely regionalist.

It's true that they love their food and their wine but there's more to it than that. If you've never been out to eat in a restaurant with a group of Italians, you should. Can you imagine going to a good restaurant and arguing with the chef about how this, that or the other should be cooked? The Italians will. Vociferously ... and the chef doesn't take offence. Why would he? Would you drive clear across Rome for a cup of decent coffee? The Italians will. Would you do the same for decent ice cream. Absolutely.

Their curses are real curses. They don't just call you names. When they tell you to go away, they tell you to go and commit sodomy with your mother. One of the worst things you can call a fella is a cuckold. They put curses on your dead ancestors, the fella who rings the bells at your funeral and the fella who saves you on your deathbed. They implore the Gods to kill you or to throw away your blood. These are invoke only rarely though. More often than not they simply curse misery or the saint of nothing - I have to admit that I've only ever heard any of these used in jest and never in anger.

They've got their 'Sun readers' as well. As a generalization, it is fair to say that here is real animosity between the north and the south. So much so that there is a political party (Lega Nord) whose principal policy is cutting the south (below Rome) adrift to fend for themselves. My impression is that these people constitute a vociferous minority but that may be because of the type of people I mix with and could be a totally false impression.

In the UK the scapegoats are the Poles, the Portuguese or the Romanians. In Italy it's the Albanians and the North Africans. Their complaints about immigrants are no different to the complaints we hear among readers of the Mail, the Express and the Sun. Their politicians are as bent as ours are. They have the same love-hate relationship with the yanks (Amerdicani) as the Brits do. The rich are just as filthy and the masses just as unwashed as they are in the UK.

This is a country where they have two police forces - one a militia (carabinieri (the men who carry carbine rifles)) and one civilian (polizia) - and where they fear the tax police (Guardia di Finanze), who carry .38s and sub machine guns, more than they fear the police. When people find out that I'm a 'finanziere' (a tax collector), you can see the blood drain from their faces. I have to reassure them that 'i finanzieri' in the UK are peace loving people. We don't get a .38. The only thing we get given to do our job is a pen and piece of paper.

What does it mean to be Italian? I have absolutely no idea.

A misnomer?

Of course, this all raises the question whether it matters, and if it does, why it matters.

Why should I care whether I am categorized as English or Italian? What difference does it make? Aren't both a gross oversimplification in any event?

I know the answer to the third question and it's 'yes'. Dad's dad's family is from the Sorrento peninsula (Amalfi, Scala and Minori to be exact). Dad's mum's family is from that area where Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire meet with a bit of Wiltshire thrown in. Probably safe to say then that they're Germano-Celtic (on the assumption that the advent of the Angles and the Saxons didn't constitute a population replacement event).

Mum's dad's family come from Lancashire, Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Suffolk. All Scandinavian then (on the basis that the Viking thing was a population replacement event. At least north of Watling Street). Mum's mum's family is from Jersey, Surrey and Wiltshire. A bit of a mix but Scandinavian (the Norman French having started their journey in Scandinavia), and Germano-Celtic in that order.

So ... why do I feel the need to be, or be seen to be, Italian? There's probably more Swedish in me than there is Italian.

One of my brothers had one of those ethnic DNA tests done at http://www.genetree.com/. He got 94% European, 5% East Asian and 1% Sub-Saharan African. Nothing unusual in that. His European broke down to 43% South-Eastern European, 40% Northern European, 12% South Asian and 5% Middle Eastern. I had great hopes that my questions would be answered when he told me he was getting the test done but what sort of answer is that.

Actually, it is an answer (of sorts). The average Italian profile is 46% South-Eastern European, 35% Northern European, 10% South Asian and 9% Middle Eastern. That's a fairly close match. Fairly close. This tells me that my DNA looks pretty much like the DNA of the Average Italian; especially when you compare it with the average Northern European profile (6% South-Eastern European, 82% Northern European, 1% South Asian and 11% Middle Eastern).

Is that my answer?

Quis sum?

For the last 36 years I've expended a good deal of time and energy trying to keep the promise I made to grampa and 10 years ago, when I re-established contact with the family in Pontone, I achieved something that he neither envisaged nor hoped for and something that he would have loved if he'd lived to see it. I still cry when I allow myself to brood on the fact that he never lived to see me married; never lived to see his grandson; never lived to meet Maria, Luigi, Matteo, Orazio and a thousand others.

But after all this time, I sit down sometimes (invariably with a bottle of red wine or two) and think about the promise and me.

Despite all that I have achieved and all that I have tried to achieve, it seems to me that, in a perverse and pedantic way, no matter what I do, I shall never be able to keep it. I promised never to forget that I am Italian. Those were the words. It is a pedantic point but, no matter what way I cut it, I am forced to the conclusion that I am not Italian and never will be.

I am Mark Anthony Criscuolo. I speak Italian. My paternal origins lie in Pontone di Scala. I have family there with whom I am extremely close. I love the place and the people. Despite all that I am not Italian. I have never been properly socialized as an Italian. I am an Englishman ... if someone whose paternal line is foreign can ever be an Englishman. Let me put the question more obviously and simplistically. Could I ever be a Chinaman even if my family had lived there for three generations?

I am sometimes left with the impression that I'm kidding myself but you see I can't bring myself to call myself an Englishman. I used to get the crap kicked out of me in school by Englishmen - because my dad's father was Italian. I have to admit that it wasn't helped by the fact that I was brought up a vegetarian but, in practice, that just meant that they had two excuses rather than just one so I got beat up twice as bad - never in the face; never where it could be seen. Why would I want to call myself an Englishman.

On the other hand, dad's maternal line is English as is mum's paternal line. Her maternal line is Jersiaise ... or, in some cases, Guernesiaise. French. But they don't give me my name. My name is Mark Anthony, son of Anthony Thomas, son of Alfred, son of Nicola, son of Pasquale, son of Luigi ... . I'm working on the rest.

Valediction to a lovely man

The last time I saw him Luigi Matteo Antonio Criscuolo didn't look very well but I couldn't be sure that he was ill. He'd always been very thin. He worked in the forests in the Lattari Mountains that are the spine of the Sorrento Peninsula.

I was thoroughly amused, when I first met him, by this Italian who had an archetypal Englishman's tan - the white T-shirt tan.

He really was a lovely man. Generous to a fault. Didn't say much. Only spoke when it was necessary to do so. When he had something to say or to ask.

He'd married when he was a young man - I don't know how young - but it seems that the marriage never worked out and he shared a house in Amalfi with his wife for no more than a few months before moving back to the family house in Pontone and spending the rest of his life sharing the house with his sister who never married.

He'd spent a few months - probably not much more - in Hastings in the '60s working in his brother's restaurant - Il Saraceno. Now and again he'd remind us with a single word of English spoken with a heavy southern Italian accent and a massive smile.

From him I learned loads of those little things that you normally learn from your nan and grampa but these came from a different world to the ones I learned from mine - always let the spring water run over your hand and wash the sweat off your hand before you use it to scoop the water into your mouth (not the sort of thing you learn in Buckinghamshire ... or Crewe). Don't drink while you're eating; Only drink between courses. He taught me how to make real lemonade with lemons the size of grapefruits. He showed me how to make vino paesano, how to set a pizza oven going, how to carry a crate of grapes without doing myself a mischief and how to get the lemon trees ready for the winter.

My son adored him. He wanted a hat like Luigi; he wanted this, that and the other like Luigi.

He smoked and drank but not in any way that we'd recognize. Half a bottle of Peroni or Moretti with dinner and one fag afterwards.

In the middle of May 2007 - I don't remember the date exactly - I got an email from a friend in Bari to say that Luigi was very ill. I phoned the mother of a cousin in Amalfi. He had liver cancer. That's why he'd looked so ill when we'd seen him the previous summer. I phoned my cousin and asked her to tell me the moment she got any news - good or bad. A few days later, on the 27th of May, she texted me - Stamattina Luigi è volato nel cielo (this morning Luigi flew to heaven). He was 71.

He was buried next day. I didn't even get to fly over to pay my last respects. I was gutted. Gutted almost sounds trivial or flippant but it's the right word. I felt like my guts had been ripped out.

He and his sister accepted me as family, no questions asked on that day in October 1999 when we first met them. They took me into their house, no strings attached and made me one of them. Generosity of spirit like that is rare.

Luigi was one of those people whose whole face lit up when he smiled and he smiled a lot.

it's been a while

This is the first time I've logged on for a good while. Over a month. I'm not sure why but it seems to me that it's because the story was becoming repetitive ... or monotonous. What I wanted to do when I started this was to explain how I went from being a boy born in Buckinghamshire to being an 'Italian' to discovering who I really am.

The story got lost somewhere along the way; or I lost track of the story. I'm not sure which. Since the 'story' (I use the term loosely) in the last post, my wife and I have been to Venice, Verona, Peschiera del Garda, Longarone, Pisa, Lucca, Siena and Pistoia.

I have enjoyed all of them although I have to say that I find the denizens of la Toscana rather strange. I have spent the last ten years wandering around Italy with a red-haired, Irish wife so that - whether I look Italian or not - I am clearly identifiable as a tourist. When we sit down to eat or drink, I open my mouth and I speak Italian with a southern accent and, although there are mistakes in there they are not very frequent. That visual contradiction has the effect that wherever we go, Italians talk to me ... except in Tuscany (Toscana sounds so much better - or is it Etruria?).

In Veneto people talked to me. In Friuli-Venezia-Giulia people talk to me. In Campania people talk to me. Nella Toscana they say nothing. Perfunctory. Brusque. Taciturn. Not Italian? There is a theory that the Toscani consider themselves to be something better than Italian.

In Italy people are loyal first to their 'region' and then to their country - especially where food is concerned. However, the Toscani elevate this to another level.

I wouldn't say that I've 'done' Toscana. I've been to a few places there. What I don't understand is the English love affair with the place.

Have you ever taken the train from Venezia Santa Lucia to Longarone? Have you ever driven across the mountains from the Autostrada del Sole to Vietri sul Mare and along the coast road on the south coast of the Sorrento Peninsula (la Costiera Divina)? Have you ever taken the bus from Caserta into the Apennines to tiny villages like Alife? Have you ever driven up into the Dolomiti? Have you ever been to Lake Garda on an October's day when there isn't a tourist within 100 miles of the place? Have you walked along the banks of the Adige in Verona or the Arno in Pisa? Have you left the Piazza San Marco and the Canale Grande behind in Venice and allowed yourself to get lost in the backstreets? Have you sat in a bar and sipped on a glass of wine or a cup of coffee to the mellow sounds of Pino Daniele? Have you sat down to a meal with a group of Italians and watched them argue with the chef about how he should cook the meal you've just ordered?

Before you tar Italy with Tuscany's brush, do all of those things. Tell me then where you'd rather be.

I've done all these things and thoroughly enjoyed the sublimity of them ... and there's still so much more to do. So much more! It is entirely possible that 'the promise' has become and obsession but ...

Perfection can be addictive

In October 2003, we were back again. Just the three of us and we were staying in a bed & breakfast just outside Amalfi in Castiglione di Ravello. Ravello's up in the mountains but this bit of it is on the coast road and overlooks the bay on which Minori and Maiori sit.

We'd chosen the place because it was run by a friend of ours and he'd given us a very good deal ... I think. Anyway, the place was called (is called) La Rosa dei Venti. It's a ten minute walk from Amalfi and a twenty minute walk from Minori - I should add that I'm 6' 3" (or 1.85m) so average walking times may vary.

As every other time, we spent a great deal of time in Pontone with Maria and Luigi. They'd go to the cemetery every Sunday at 4 o'clock in the afternoon to clean up their parents' graves, lay new flowers and pray and we went up with them on at least one occasion.

In Italy, if someone asks you round for a meal you either take a selection of sweet pastries and cakes or you take flowers. More often than not we'd take flowers though. Maria always took them to the cemetery on a Sunday and used them for her parents' graves. I've problem with that. It's sort of making a practical use out of something that's pretty but not very useful.

This time we didn't get the weather that we'd had every other year. It poured out of the heavens most of the time. I never took a coat with me. Didn't think I needed one. We'd been in October at least twice and the weather had been superb. Maria ended up giving me a Nastro Azzurro jacket that I still have and still wear in preference to any other jacket I own.

I wasn't in the least bit bothered. I wasn't there for the beach. Never had been. I'd set on the beach for five minutes and get bored. "Where d'you wanna go now then?" "D'you wanna do something now then?" I can sit on the beach for ages in the evening, when there's nobody else there, watching the sun go down (which never seems to take long on the Med) and just listening to the sound of the waves. Beaches with people on them have no attraction for me at all though.

Anyway, back to 2003. I'm sure it was 2003. Doesn't matter really I s'pose. Life was good. We wandered around the place. Went to Sorrento where I tried my damn'dest not to look like a tourist nor to sound like a tourist.

But my principal aim, as it was every other time I'd come over, was to socialize myself into this society. To learn the rules. To learn to be one of them. I have to say that it's really difficult when you don't speak their dialect ... or if you can speak a bit of it but get completely lost when they speak it at 90 to the dozen.

When we left after two weeks my Italian was just starting to get back into gear again, I'd met more relatives, made more friends and reaffirmed the friendships that I'd made on our previous visits.

I cried when we said goodbye to Maria. I know. That's no way for a grown man in his forties to behave but I couldn't help it. When I was a kid and we were living in Devon and nan and grampa were still living in Bucks, we used to go up for a couple of weeks to stay with them. I felt just like I used to when we got in the car to go back to Devon. I used to cry then too.

I had to find a way of maintaining my Italian at a decent standard though. You go a year without speaking it at all and then you land in Naples and you have to speak it right off the bat. I could. Of course. But I had to think about it and concentrate on what I was saying. There had to be a way round that. I think I found it years later but I'll come to that when the time comes.

Senatus Populusque Romanus

In August 2002 we were back. Me, the missus and the kid (and one of his mates) was back in Amalfi. This time though we'd decided that we was going to spend a few days in the Città Eterna at the end of the holiday so we booked our return flights to Rome (Fiumicino).

We'd taken an apartment (not a flat mind you) but, if I'm honest, I have to say we didn't do much self-catering. We were still getting €1.50 to the £1 and life in Euroland was good. We went to Pompeii and Herculaneum again for my lad's mate's benefit ... and because I just love them.

Maria loved my lad's mate because he'd eat 'til he burst. No matter how much she put in front of him, he'd eat it. He's not a big lad either. Bit of a belly but nothing particularly worrying. He was only about 15 and full of energy. Not surprising really.

After two weeks in Amalfi, we got the bus to Salerno station and got the train to Roma Termini - sort of like Roma Euston if you like, or Roma Victoria. We arrived at Salerno station with about half an hour to spare and I went up to the little ticket window to buy a ticket. "Two adults and two kids to Roma Termini please." The ticket-man says there's no second class tickets left; only first class tickets. How much are they then? €36 each! £24 for a single first class ticket for a journey that's the equivalent of Liverpool or Manchester to London!! Unreal!

When we got to Rome, we checked into a hotel that had been booked for us by a mate of mine who was a member of the military wing of the Finance Ministry in Italy - the Guardia di Finanze. Nice Hotel and dead central. Can't rememer for the life of me what it was called but it had a name that alluded to ancient Rome.

Having checked in we went out to do the tourist bit. I love Rome. There's something about it that is irresistible. The atmosphere. The people. The city itself. I love it. We went to the Flavian Amphitheatre, the Circus Maximus (the Roman equivalent of Royal Ascot but every day) and, after some discussion, St Peter's Square. My wife, having been permanently psychologically scarred by the nuns, was very reluctant to go at all.

There was a curious thing though. As you approach the Basilica, from whatever direction, there are a legion of souvenir shops selling all sorts of religious artifacts from small statues of the Madonna to massive pictures of the Sacred Heart. The curious thing was they all sold busts of Mussolini! Bizarre. I was tempted but good sense got the better of me.

That evening we met up with my mate from the military wing of the Finance Ministry and he and his wife took us for dinner in a very nice restaurant. After dinner I was taught about the Italian obsession with good coffee and good ice cream. There is no room for compromise in either case.

He asked us whether we wanted a coffee and when we said yes, he put us in the car and drove us half way across Rome. The coffee was stunning of course and the journey had clearly been worth it. After that he asked the two boys if they would like an ice cream. When he got an energetic yes, he herded us all back into the car and drove us back across Rome to another place to the only place where one can enjoy Italian ice cream at its best in Rome.

I did learn the taste of a decent coffee from that though and, to this day, I remain incredibly particular about the standard of my espresso (caffé in God's own language). The only chain that even comes close is Costa and that is bettered by a country mile by a little place on Theobald's Road in London called Sfizio. Brilliant place! I'm told that the Bar Italia in Frith Street in Soho is at least as good.

Marco, Tone and Bob

In the spring of 2001, dad phoned me, said that he, and his cousin Bob, were thinking of going over to Amalfi in September and asked me if I wanted to go with him. It was a no-brainer of course.

We stayed at Bob's place in Slough the night before the flight. The flight was an early one from Heathrow and was to Rome. Not Naples. From Fiumicino, we got the shuttle to Roma Termini and from there we got the Eurostar Italia to Salerno. The buffet car on the train was superb. It had a real bar in it. There was a corner bar with bar stools and the rest of the carriage was filled up with cafe tables and chairs. A proper bar. We'd only just left the 'burbs of Rome when dad fell asleep and me and Bob went up to the bar for a drink and spent the rest of the journey there.

We'd rented an apartment that you had to climb a few steps to get to but once you got used to it, it was alright. It was a nice flat.

Bob was an instant hit with Maria, Luigi and everyone else to whom he was introduced. He's one of those charming characters that lights a place up ... and he looks the part; totally Italian. Like an extra from the set of La Dolce Vita.

We had a cracking time. Three fellas in Amalfi just enjoying the craic. The sun was hot, the food was good and the wine was better. The main occupation was sitting in the Piazza del Duomo with a drink watching the world go by.

There were a couple of things that stick in my memory though. The first was a really strange thing. Me and Bob went out on the boat to Capri - left dad reading on the beach. There was a 'couple' (English) who were all over each other like a rash but everything that they said and did suggested that they were father and daughter. Creepy!

The second was a Scottish couple to whom dad got talking. They were very pleasant and we spent almost an entire evening with them. We were sat at a restaurant in the main square and I was chatting to the chef (Sergio) who said, in passing, that dad had a real amalfitana face. I passed Sergio's comments on and the girl 'accused' me of trying to be an Italian. Told me I was an Englishman and should be happy with that. I was gobsmacked. Speechless. How could she have misunderstood so completely? I spent the rest of the evening speaking to Sergio, his wife and his sister-in-law. No point in talking to her. She didn't understand anything.

The third 'event' was one that shook the world. I was sat with a beer outside the Caffe Royal in the Piazza del Duomo with Bob. It was about half past three when one of the brothers who owns the place turned up for work. "There's been an aircrash". I looked up at him bemused. Confused. "In New York. An aircrash." I thought no more of it. I'll catch it on the news later.

Then, a little while later, one of his brothers came past. "Ue, Criscuolo! You'd better get home and get your gun. There's going to be a war." My face must have been a picture. "Two planes have crashed into a skyscraper in New York." An American couple sat front of us heard the mention of New York and asked me what it was about. I told her what I had been told. "Which skyscraper?" I shook my head. "No idea."

I shouted into the cafe. "Which skyscraper?" "Le torri gemelle." The twin towers. The American woman nearly died. "That's where my office is." I went inside to watch the news on the telly and report back. The Italian newscaster told of the two airliners crashing into the twin towers and a third crashing into the Pentagon. There was another story though that disappeared without a trace after about half an hour without any trace of an explanation - a fourth airliner had been shot down by USAF fighter aircraft.

We spent that evening with one of dad's and Bob's cousins - Matteo. Looking back, it was strange. The disaster that was to become known as 9/11 really didn't intrude into the holiday. It was too remote. Too unreal ... like everything in the 'outside world' when you're on holiday. The holiday seems to insulate you from reality.

There was one other thing. One evening, Bob and I went up to this piano bar looking for a bit of action. We went in and the place was empty apart from the barman. We ordered a drink and asked when we could expect it to liven up a bit. The barman promised us faithfully that it wouldn't take long. We left an hour later and went back to the Piazza del Duomo. There was a lot more life in the square ... and we could hear ourselves think.

On a more mundane level, by the end of this third visit it was getting so that I couldn't walk down the street without someone saying hello; how ya doin'? I was starting to feel at home in the place. To feel at ease; comfortable.

Like a rubber ball ...

Most of the rest of that holiday was spent going to and fro' from Amalfi to Pontone with one trip out to Capri. You can see why Tiberius Claudius Nero, Maxim Gorkiy and Gracie Fields fell in love with the place. It is stunning. Totally overrun by tourists though; and for someone who has an innate allergy to tourists, the only escape was to walk up to one of Tiberius' villas - Villa Iovis (the Villa of Jupiter). Because the only way to get there was to walk ... half way up a mountain, it was gratifyingly quiet.

There was a terrace that overlooked the sea. In fact, it overhung the sea and it is said that it is the point from which he used to have those thrown who had displeased him. It was looking over the edge of the wall that, for the first time in my life, I experienced an overwhelming fear of falling. Nearly wretched my guts up. I spent the rest of the day staying as far away from the edge (any edge) as it was possible to get.

We spent days, or parts of days, out in Positano, Maiori, Minori, Sorrento and, as always, I did my best to blend in; not to be a tourist. It's not easy when your wife's got bright red hair and freckled white skin and you're the only one who speaks Italian.

When I got back to Crewe, I felt a certain sense of satisfaction and achievement. I felt that I'd sort of completed the circle that was broken when Nicola died in 1947. That was never part of the promise although I think it became part of the mission as I got older. Of course, the promise will never have been properly fulfilled until they put me in a hole in the ground; I had promised, after all, never to forget that I am Italian. I'd gone further though ... I think. I'd taken the first step toward putting the family back together again and that felt alright.

We went back in October 2000 only without dad this time. We spent a good deal more time with Maria and Luigi. Maria introduced us to other relatives - dad's second cousins, my third and my son's fourth. Hey. A cousin's a cousin, right? We were introduced to Marisa (and her husband Gennaro), Rosita (her husband Domenico and their kids Mara and Gianluca), Orazio and one hundred and one others.

This time, for the first time, something else happened; on a number of occasions. People would stop me and ask me whether I was from round 'yer. I'd explain that I wasn't but that I had family here. "Who's your family?" I'd reel off a list of names and their relationship to me, dad and grampa and they'd say something like, "ah yes. I know who you are." They didn't of course. Not in the sense we would understand the statement. But they knew where I fit into their world and their community.

I was chuffed to nuts. There was clearly something about my appearance that made them ask the question in the first place which meant that I must look like I belong there. My face fit. Without wanting to get all schmaltzy, I don't think I ever felt that at any other time, with the possible exception of those three years at the polytechnic.

Wonderment and awe

Our trip to Pompeii was an organized trip. We spent the whole day following an ageing gentleman called Lorenzo around the city while he held a garishly coloured, folded umbrella above his head so that we could follow him around like a troop of goslings following their mother goose. For a snob like me who hates being a tourist, it was pure torture - rescued by the fact that I managed to transport myself sufficiently far back in time that 'Renzo's presence didn't bother me any more.

We went on from Pompeii to the workshop of the blacksmiths to the Gods. The bus took us most of the way up and we walked the last twenty minutes or so. There was a fella handing out walking sticks - aparently for free but, of course, they weren't. He needed a tip. We took a stick, handed him a few grand and headed up to the caldera. It was unfortunate that it was quite a hazy sort of day so that you could barely see the bay of Naples and you couldn't see much further south than Salerno, if you could see that far.

Having been to Pompeii and Vesuvius, we started to feel adventurous and decided to take on Herculaneum and Paestum. Herculaneum is, in many ways, better than Pompeii. Apart from the fact that all of the ovine tourists go to Pompeii and none of them go to Herculaneum, through an accident of the eruption and the way it landed on the two cities, the woodwork in Herculaneum survived (albeit carbonized) whereas that in Pompeii simply disappeared.

Ercolano was brilliant although I was almost embarrassed to find that none of the photos I took there were any good. Rubbish. Every single one. I shall have to go back and rectify the matter.

Paestum, like Neapolis, Pompeii and Herculaneum (and a lot of the other cities in southern Italy) were Greek cities. Part of the glorious entity that was Magna Grecia. Even though it was nowhere near as well preserved as either of the two Vesuvian cities, it was good enough to impress ... and some. Seriously heavy Greek temples. The sort of stuff you only expect in Athens.

We were guided around the place by an extremely classily dressed young Italian lady (a history student?) who appeared to know her stuff and was happy to call me family when she discovered that my family came from Scala - the town where she was born and bred. I'd like to think that it was my natural Italian good looks that led her to seek the familial connection so readily but it really doesn't matter. This greying 39 year-0ld spent the rest of the tour around the city chatting to her and feeling very privileged as a result.

Apart from anything else, the fact that I could chat to the guide in her own language and even in her own accent (I can't do the dialect but I can do the accent) separated me from the rest of the ovine tourists.

On the 24th day of August in the year of our Lord 79 ...

Before the first week of our holidays had passed, I had managed to fulfil another of my long-standing ambitions. Since I was in my early teens I had always wanted to be an archaeologist. Unfortunately for me there were a couple of obstacles in my that I was unable to overcome. In order to study archaeology in the olden days, you had to have A levels in 'The Classics' and I was at a comprehensive school that had thrown the baby out with the bathwater and had renounced as the work of the devil anything that smacked of the old grammar school system.

So. I ended up with poor A levels in French and German (Ds) and an O level in Latin (a C) that the head had very graciously allowed a few of us to do. Not enough to get me in to University College London to study archaeology though. No Greek. No qualifications on the works of Marcus Tullius Cicero, Gaius Julius Caesar or Gaius Valerius Catullus. No view on the ideas of Aristotle or Plato or the histories of Herodotus.

Anyway, the dream (if it could be said to be a dream any longer rather than simply an interest) continued and, in that October in 1999, I finally got to Pompeii. Amazing. Haunting. Evocative. Chaotic ... and full to the brim of American and Japanese tourists. Still, I loved it and could have wandered its streets aimlessly for days, trying to imagine the people who had lived, and died, there; imagining talking to them in my imperfect Latin.

We went to the theatres, the arena, the gymnasium, the gladiator barracks, the public baths (loads of them), the posh houses and the hovels, the bakeries, the take-aways and the shops ... and the brothel. The lupanara. Amazing. Stunning. And all in the awesome shadow of that mountain. The workshop of Hephaestus and Vulcan - the blacksmith of the Gods. Vesuvius.

This was where my roots lie. This is what my people came from even if it's not where my people came from. Where was H G Wells when you needed him?

Getting to know you

The next day we got the bus up to Pontone to Maria's for lunch ... and dinner. I think we must have got the quarter past 10 and arrived about twenty or so minutes later. The bus can't actually get into the village so it stops at a point as far up the mountain as it can feasibly get. There's a sort of lay-by built into the side of the mountain that allows the bus to turn round and head on toward Scala and Ravello. From there we walked into Pontone, across the bijou little square and up to Maria's place.

Lunch was a feast - pasta followed by meat followed by vegetables followed by salad followed by fruit followed by cheese, olives, salami, chestnuts and Lord knows what else - and all washed down with vino paesano.

I love vino paesano (peasant wine). It's one of those things that should go on everybody's 'bucket list'. It's your honest-to-God basic wine made the way God intended. They crush the grapes, let the juice do its own thing for about a year and then drink it. It doesn't taste like anything that we would recognize as wine. It tastes of grapes. Now there's a thing. Maria's wine was never particularly strong (although I have drunk stuff that was much stronger) so we would happily get through two or three bottles in a sitting.

We were persuaded to stay for dinner. I have to concede that we didn't take a lot of persuading. You can keep all your fancy chefs with their fancy restaurants and their Michelin stars. I can safely say, without fear of contradiction, that I have never tasted food as good as the stuff that comes out of Maria's kitchen (is that cliché No. 2?).

Dinner was another half-a-dozen courses of ambrosia washed down with more vino paesano and all topped off with a couple of glasses of home made limoncello straight out of the freezer.

What more could any man ask for? To be sat on a roof terrace that looks out over Amalfi, the sea and the mountains eating five or six courses of heaven, drinking vino paesano and finishing with the sublime taste of home-made limoncello.

Perfection? Not quite. Neither Maria nor Luigi (both in their 60s) spoke Italian. Pure dialect. Pure Neapolitan (Neapolitan being the generic term for the dialect that is spoken in Campania, Puglia and Calabria. The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies and all that good stuff). The result was that they could understood every word I spoke but I understood only maybe 60% of what they said.

Let me intoduce myself ...

On the second day in Amalfi (it must have been a Sunday), I plucked up the courage, and we decided to walk up the scalinata to Pontone. It's a hell-of-a-walk. These stone stairways have been there for donkeys' years and they are still well used. They link the coast to the villages in the mountains. The hinterland.

We walked up the the mountain and I have to say that it was a stunning walk. Whether you looked back at where you'd come from (Amalfi) or forward to where you were going (Scala) it was breathtaking. It's one of those places that makes you feel totally insignificant and is all the better for that.

When you get to the top of the stairs, you have to cross a road and then, up a few more stairs, you enter the village square. It's a gorgeous little square. There's the church (of San Giovanni) and a bar. There are also a couple of drinking fountains. The square itself is built on the side of the mountain and protrudes from the mountainside. It's a sort of a terrace.

The four of us chose a table in the square and I went into the bar and ordered the drinks. Ice Cold in Alex for me and the lady. Dad had something non-alcoholic and my son almost certainly joined us in a beer ... or did he have a Coke. I really should have kept a contemporaneous record of all this.

I finally plucked up the courage to appraoch the barman - a gentleman called Gianfranco Criscuolo. I asked him where the local cemetry was - I wanted to see if I could find any of my fathers' graves. It's in Scala, on the top of another mountain and the quickest way there is back into Amalfi to get a bus up to Scala.

So. I got my scroll out. My descendants tree showing all the descendants of Luigi Criscuolo and his wife Brigida - who must have been born in the early decades of the 19th century. I spread it out on the top of a wall and we were quickly joined by an another gentleman called Andrea Criscuolo. I have to say that neither were directly related to me. Poring over the family tree, Gianfranco and Andrea pointed to one name after another - she lives down the road and No. 13. He's her brother and lives with her. He lives in Minuta across the mountain there. He lives down there in Amalfi.

I decided to take the details - such as they were - of the lady who lived at No. 13. We went to the house and rang the bell. No answer. We went back to the bar, had another beer and went back and rang the bell again. Still no answer.

Between visits to No. 13, I talked to Andrea (known locally as 'O Maresciallo because his father was a Marshall of the Police Force). At one point he looked at me, fag in hand, and said "I know your double". I must have looked at him quizzically because he nodded vigorously and repeated his assertion. "Honest. I know your double". That double turned out to be one of my dad's second cousins (Matteo Criscuolo) and there is a definite likeness - bearing in mind that he is twenty years my senior.

Eventually, having written a note, explaining who I was, what I was doing and where I was staying (with address and telephone number - I didn't have a moby at this stage) and left it in the gate at No. 13, we walked back down the stairs to Amalfi.

That evening as we were leaving the hotel to find somewhere to eat, an elderly couple crossed the square towards us. They took one look at dad and said "Siete Criscuolo?" Dad looked at me and I looked at them and nodded. "Si. Siamo Criscuolo." They kissed us - the way that friends and relatives do in civilized societies - and introduced themselves. Maria and Luigi Criscuolo. Brother and sister.

I explained that we were looking for a restaurant to have something to eat and invited them to join us. Not a chance. You don't need to eat in no restaurant. They took us to a house up the road and introduced us to other cousins (dad's second cousins and my third) and we talked and talked and talked about people and times and places.

They had accepted me ... us ... as family. No questions asked. They had known Nicola Criscuolo - zio Nicola - and remembered him coming over to see them. What's more, Maria was incredibly like auntie Marie. The way she looked, moved, talked, fussed. Everything. Dad cried for the family he'd lost and I wasn't far from doing the same if I'm honest.

We were home. No question. We had family there and that was enough to ensure that we belonged there.

My name is Criscuolo. Marco Criscuolo

We were staying in a little family-run hotel called Hotel Lidomare. It was set back from the main square (Piazza del Duomo) on a kind of small square of its own. The real beauty of the place though was that it was two minutes walk from the the Piazza del Duomo and about a minute more from the front.

Criscuolo is a local surname and it gave me immediate cred as someone who belonged there. If you're at all curious, you can go to http://gens.labo.net/, type 'Criscuolo' in the search field in the top left hand corner and hit the red arrow. It'll give you a lovely visual display of the distribution of the Criscuolos in Italy. It'll do the same, of course, for any surname.

On the first day there - it was a Saturday - I seem to recall that we walked up the stone mountain stairway (scalinata) to Pogerola. It was a stunning walk and breathtaking in every sense of the word. Some 800 steps to the top left all except dad pretty much knackered by the time we got to the top.

Much and all as I couldn't wait to go to Pontone, I was scared. Petrified of what I'd find. Scared stiff that I'd be disappointed. Afraid that I'd be rejected. What would I do, I asked myself, if someone I'd never met in my life turned up on my doorstep insisting that he (or she) was my long lost cousin? I didn't know the answer and I wasn't entirely sure that I wanted to know it.

While I was building up my courage, I started to get my bearings around the place. This was heaven. This was, without doubt, a place where I could happily live and die. Like I said, my surname gave me immediate credibility. Criscuolo. It was local. Combined with the fact that I spoke Italian, with a southern accent, and without any trace of an English accent, it was a real asset.

I started making friends. Friends who, many years later would turn out to be real, solid friends. The first of them was a gentleman - a real gentleman - called Alfonso Lucibello. A man of real dignity and serenity. A man of boundless generosity. Over the years he has become a friend for whom I would definitely walk five hundred miles.

Dad looked the part. After one day in the place he looked the part. He only had to walk out into the sun for his skin to suddenly take on that rich Mediterannean bronze colour. He has that rugged southern Italian face too ... and the schnoz. The only thing that picked him out from the locals was the fact that he couldn't speak a word of Italian.

I really enjoyed that first day. It was barmy. Laid back. Italian. I was still petrified about the adventure up to Pontone that I knew had to come but I was starting to feel easier about it. The reception that I was getting from the people to whom I wasn't related was starting to make me feel a little easier about the whole thing.

The time has come the walrus said ...

By 1998, I had decided that I was ready. I had all the information that I needed. It was time to try again. To try again to go back to Amalfi. It wasn't really a going back of course because I'd never been there but that's what it felt like.

I had no idea how to go about organizing it. No idea where to start. What to expect. What to do. It must have been early in 1999 when I went to my local Thompson (or is that Thomson? No. It's definitely Thompson) and booked a package deal ... for me, my wife and my 9-year-old son.

It suddenly occurred to me (or maybe it was to my wife that it occurred) that we had to take dad. We had to ask him at the very least whether he wanted to come along. The name 'Pontone' was as much a part of his identity as it was a part of mine. He said yes. There were going to be three generations of Criscuolo making the journey. It all seemed so right.

On a gorgeous day in October 1999 (I'm ashamed to say that I can't remember what date it was), we took off from Manchester airport bound for Naples. It was late morning when we landed at Capodichino airport and after having been churned through the mill through which arriving tourists are ground when they arrive at any airport anywhere in the world, we got on the coach that was to take us to Amalfi.

Out of the airport, onto the Autostrada del Sole and southwards until we cut west onto the Sorrento peninsula. Through Cava dei Tirreni, Vietri sul Mare, Cetara, Maiori and Minori - mountainscapes of outstanding beauty - with the sun beating down on our coach and my heart leaping out of my chest we wound our way until we reached the last headland - Capo del Orso - and turned the last bend.

Then I saw it. Just like on that old picture postcard. Was this home? Was this real? Had I finally made it? I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Our hotel was just off the main square - Piazza del Duomo - and we were very soon booked. Stood on the balcony dad and I looked out over the marinas ... and cried.

... to the ridiculous?

In October 1989, having left the RAF in 1987, worked as a furniture packer and carrier for a removals firm in West Berlin until December 1988, moved back to C'Martin in Devon, had my first and only son and married a completely mad Irish girl (his mother), I arrived in Crewe. South Cheshire. Cheshire Life? Not really. In fact, not at all.

I'd got a job as a civil servant - in London - in September 1989 and we moved up to Crewe in October. It was an economic imperative that had forced me further north than I'd ever been before. Starting from scratch again, we couldn't afford to stay in the south. So I lived in the north and worked in the south ... and eventually got a transfer up to Liverpool after about 18 months.

Throughout this period the promise had been put very much on the back burner, as it were. There had been too much else to worry about. By '92 or '93 though, things were starting to settle down. I'd got my feet under the desk at work, we were starting to get the house (an 1883 mid-terrace) in some sort of shape and I'd managed to get a computer and I had time to 'play' with it.

Whenever I had to go to meetings in London (which was quite frequently), I'd arrange the meeting for the morning and then take the afternoon off and spend it in the Family Record Centre in Islington. Slowly, I started to pick up the pace and then - probably about '95 or '96 (it may have been earlier than that but I really can't remember) - the best thing since sliced bread happened. I got the internet - with Compuserve. You remember them? Your email address was a series of numbers and I could never remember what my series of numbers was.

It was access to the internet that allowed me to make an enormous leap towards fulfilment of the promise. One day I did a search on an email directory for anyone living in Amalfi. I found a whole list of them and I picked out a few names at random. I made up a descendants report from Family Tree Maker, attached it to my emails, explained what I was doing and fired them off to their unsuspecting recipients.

Only a week or so later I got a response from one of them - a Signor Cantalupo (I wish I could remember his first name) - who said that he was delighted to 'meet' someone who was interested in researching his Italian roots and he promised to do what he could to help.

A couple of weeks later I got an email from him and when I read the attachment I was gobsmacked. He'd traced my family forwards (not backwards) from my great-great-great-grandfather Luigi Criscuolo who was born at the beginning of the 19th century to my dad's second cousins and my third cousins.

When I'd written my exploratory email, I hadn't specified, as far as I can remember, whether I wanted to go back in time or come forward but, looking back, I think I was probably hoping to go further back in time. Signor Cantalupo had done what I only realized I'd always wanted to do when I read his email. He had given me the key to put me in touch with living relatives.

For the moment, of course, they were only names on a computer programme but every name on that newly expanded family tree held the potential to lead me by the hand to the fulfilment of the promise. All I had to do was want it and not be afraid of it.

I tre amici

In the summer of 1985 I went back to Piovene for what turned out to be the last time. I'm not really sure why it turned out that way and have always been sorry that it did but arguably not sorry enough to do anything about it. Idleness? Quite probably.

Anyway. In the summer of 1985 I returned to Piovene with two comrades-in-arms - Mark Townsend and Malcolm Drummond Ashleigh Cooke (I'm sure the Ashleigh was spelt that way but ...). Of the three of us, Mal was the only one who could drive and therefore the only one with a car. He had a lovely bright red XR3i and that was to be our chariot for the journey from Gatow in West Berlin to Piovene Rochette in Italy - 987 km. Actually, that's 987 km now that Germany has been reunited. At the time we had to go down the central corridor from West Berlin to Helmstedt and only then cut south to Italy and that took the journey up to 1,147 km.

It was a cracking holiday. We stayed in a bed & breakfast in Piovene and Paola and Fulvio took us around to all sorts of places ... and to Venice of course.

One day Mal decided that we were going to go to Lido di Iesolo. I wasn't that keen simply 'cos I don't like tourist traps but I went along under protest. We booked rooms in a hotel for two people because we didn't have enough cash on us for three and then went out. Mal and Mark ended up chatting up a couple of German housewives on a girls' holiday while I sat, uninterested, disinterested and bored, watching the pidgin interaction between them. Eventually, they decided that it was time to go back to the hotel. By this time it was lashing down with rain and ... guess what. Nobody could remember where the hotel was. We traipsed the streets of Lido for hours in the pouring rain and finally found it.

I slept on the floor of the room and tried to sneak out early in the morning. I was caught sneaking out but managed to persuade the receptionist that I'd only come in to the hotel to wake the lads up. I'm certain that the fella didn't believe me but after a while he stopped arguing with me.

Tired, wet and hungry, we headed back to Piovene. We came back to a very narked Paola. Narked that we'd disappeared without saying anything. I'd anticipated this and it was one of the reasons I hadn't wanted to simply disappear. Anyway, over dinner that evening all was forgiven as I recounted the daring adventures Mal, Mark and Marco in Lido to uncontrollable fits of laughter of a room full of Italians. The two lads were sat in the middle of it all, not understanding a word that was said and knowing that it was their adventures that had everyone in fits.

I enjoyed that couple of weeks but it had been frustrating. All I had wanted to do was chill with Paola and Fulvio. The lads wanted to get out on the pull and drink. We ended up heading back to Berlin early because they'd got bored. I could have stayed there for months. Nobody's fault of course. Des gouts et des couleurs. That's all.

I never heard from Paola and Fulvio again. I wrote a few times but they never wrote back. Another door shut behind me. Maybe they'd outgrown me. In the seven years since we'd first met, she'd matured; grown up. I very much suspect that I hadn't. Life in the armed forces was never particularly conducive to the maturation of young men. Maybe I still haven't.

... in fair Verona where we lay our scene ...

My first summer in West Berlin - 1983 - wasn't actually spent in West Berlin. That is to say, I spent a few weeks of it in Italy. In Piovene Rocchette again to be precise. In the province of Vicenza - as I think I've already said. By this time Paola had acquired a boyfriend. Fulvio was his name and he was a gentleman. I was delighted for her. They looked good together.

Anyway, enough of the mush. This time I was really shown around. If I ate well last time, I ate twice as well this time. Fulvio took me all over the place - up into the Dolomites, up into the Alps and up into what use to be Austria. He took me to the village where Erwin Rommel was born ... which is now in Italy.

I was taken to a castle outside Verona where one of the families of dignity had resided and from which they dominated the surrounding countryside.

He took me to the top of a mountain where the Italian army had faced the Austrian army during WWI. Both sides had mined the top of the mountain in order to destroy the soldiers on the other side. The result was that entire peak of the mountain was blown off.

He took me to a tiny Romanesque chapel that dated back to the middle-ages. It was small. Seated maybe a dozen people. It was falling apart but the ceiling was exquisite.

They took me eating out. They took me to the local night spots. I spent the whole time eating, drinking and chattering with them or their friends of both.

One of the highlights for me was when Paola took me out shopping (with my own money of course) and picked out a couple of Italian outfits for me. Now I looked the part too. This was living and I felt closer than I had ever felt to the fulfilment of the promise.

Of course, the promise really lay in Campania. In Scala. But this was all part of the journey; all part of the preparation. Even at the tender age of 23 (and I promise you I was very tender) I understood that the journey was more important than the arrival.

L'Amore Mio

It didn't take long for me to find somewhere where I could get a regular fix of Italian. It was an Italian restaurant on a lay-by on the Gatower Straße and it was called L'Amore Mio. It was a nice little place and the food was good.

My name and my Italian was enough to persuade the two fellas who owned the place that I was a friend. Every time I walked into the place they made a fuss of me in the way that Italian restaurateurs do and I was flattered. Delighted with my apparently elevated status in the establishment.

I don't remember the names of the two lads although I must have known them at the time. They told me that if I ever wanted a job all I had to do was ask. So I asked one day in 1987 after I'd left the RAF and moved in with civvy friends in Reinickendorf in the North of West Berlin.

The plan had been that I was going to be a link between the restaurant and their guests from RAF Gatow. They had said that they wanted me behind the bar where I was visible and where I could talk to their British customers. They put me in the kitchen. Washing up. To add insult to injury they paid me DM5 an hour. Not even £2. I picked up my pay - such as it was - and left after a few days.

I did go back once or twice afterwards but the relationship didn't survive the job offer. Lesson? Business always comes before pleasure.

The Queen's shilling

It must have been coming towards the end of summer when I got a letter from the Royal Air Force careers office in Exeter asking me to come down to see them. They thought they probably had a job for me.

I got the train from Barnstaple to Exeter St Davids and made my way to the careers office where I was seen by a very jovial, pleasant sergeant. He took my personal details, qualifications and all that and then we got on to the job that I was being offered. I asked him what the job was and, laughing, he said he had absolutely no idea. It was called Radio Operator -Voice. That was all he knew. That and the fact that they wanted people with foreign language qualifications.

The next thing I knew I was off somewhere else - I can't for the life of me remember where it was. I was there to do the Modern Languages Aptitude Test (MLAT) for which we had to do a number of language learning tests in Kurdish - vocabulary memory, translation into and out of English, formation of basic sentences, etc. I was later to discover that my result in that test was among the top half-dozen ever.

Early in 1982 I was in - Aircraftsman Criscuolo. By early 1983 the treatment that I'd been handed by some of those with whom I was training made me understand why uncle Tony abandoned the name in the early 1940s and by the time I left for West Berlin at the end of my training in April 1983 I was Junior Technician Crisp. The troubles had reached a peak when I was the only one supporting Italy against Brazil in the 1982 World Cup Finals ... when Italy won 3-2. What a game! Blinding.

Those who had earlier found me somehow objectionable suddenly found me perfectly acceptable and I felt the guilt that grampa must have felt when he 'played the game'. The daft thing is that everyone still called me Marco. I was only ever Marco. The Criscuolo revival has lasted all of six years. I had let him down badly. Very badly. Was the 'problem' just a perceived one? Probably. At the time though I believed it was real.

Incidentally, the job that I couldn't be told about and that I couldn't talk about without afterwards killing anyone whom I told is now described in the Royal Air Force careers brochure in the following terms:

"Intelligence Analyst (Voice) - The RAF will train you to a high standard in at least one foreign language so that you can monitor, collect and analyse radio signals from overseas. You'll use this information to produce reports on actual or potential enemies and their movements."

The end of a beautiful relationship

When I got back from Piovene, I started preparing for my expedition into the 2nd year of my studies. I was back and I'd got a full grant for this year. I'd managed to pass the 1st year. Surely that would be the boost that I would need to get me through the rest of the course - 2nd year in London, third year abroad and final year to finish theses (or dissertations) and take the final exams. Easy.

I got dead excited when we had to make arrangements for the two places (one in Italy and one in Germany) where we would spend our year abroad and I finally settled on six months in Siena (Toscana) and six months in Konstanz (Baden-Württemberg). I had decided that I was going to do my Italian thesis on the history of the Mafia and had given no thought to what I would be the subject of my German thesis.

I have to admit that that was a reasonable reflection of my attitude to the whole thing. Idle. Lazy. I can do this without breaking sweat. I hadn't learned a damned thing.

When I turned up to pick up the results of my 2nd year results they were awful. I retired to the bar on the ground floor of the School of Languages behind Euston Tower and got absolutely blind drunk. Polluted. Twisted.

I went back to Deb'n for the summer having promised one of the lady lecturers to give serious thought to repeating the year. "You can do this, Marco, and well", she said, "if you'll only put in the work."

When it came to it, I bottled out. I couldn't face another year without a grant, stealing from people's doorsteps and all that rubbish. I never went back.

Instead I started writing speculative letters to everyone who might conceivably have a job for a lazy git who could speak a few languages (French, German, Italian, Latin and Spanish at that point to varying degrees of fluency).

Life on the dole. Not pretty. It was looking as if my idleness had brought the quest to a grinding halt. What was the promise worth now?

Between the Dolomites and the Alps

My next trip to Italy was in the summer of 1980. I'd passed my first year, as I've already said, at the second time of asking and had managed to scrape together a few bob to get myself over to Italy and to spend a few weeks there.

Where did I go? No. You're right. I didn't go down to Campania at all, let alone to Pontone. I went to the other end of the country. A small town called Piovene Rocchette in the province of Vicenza. It was a pleasant little town that benefited enormously from its proximity to the mountains - the Dolomites to the east and the Alps to the west and both equally impressive; equally beautiful.

I love mountains. Fell in love with them the first time I saw them in 1979 when I went to Alife which lies in the middle of a plain surrounded by mountains. Gorgeous.

I went to say with Paola Panozzo's family in a lovely house on the outskirts of the town. They were lovely people. Couldn't do enough for me and that went for all of them - mother, father, two sisters and brother ... and Paola. Paola took me all over the place to some of the most beautiful landscape I've ever seen.

This was different to life in Alife though. Completely different. This was like Western European but with Italian class. Alife was just pure, raw, stereotypical Italian. Here I was introduced to polenta and a host of other northern ... local specialities that left the taste buds racing. Whenever I was taken to visit anyone, there was always a meal served up in front of me within half an hour of my arrival no matter what time of the day it was. I loved it. I'd never eaten so well, so often and for such a sustained period of time in my life.

These were good people. Good livin' people too and I felt distinctly out of my depth; out of my league. Still, I watched my Ps and Qs and at the end of my stay I was told that I was welcome back any time. I ended up going back twice more.

I have to say that the local dialect here was as opaque as the Campanian dialects I'd struggled with a year earlier. The result was that unless they were talking to me - in which case they spoke standard Italian - I could barely understand a word that was spoken. Some Italian I was turning out to be. Still, I studied every word spoken, every move made, every mouthful of food I ate and every drop I drank. I had to learn to reproduce every tiny detail. It was all part of the learning process. It was all part of the journey towards achievement of the ultimate goal - to release the Italian in me; to fulfil the promise.

What a difference a year makes

I moved into 1980, the end of my 20th year and the beginning of my 21st. Remember this was a repeat of the first year. This was none of your namby-pamby modular stuff. At the end of the 1st year you were tested on everything you were supposed to have learned in that year. At the end of the 2nd year you were tested on everything you were supposed to have learned in the first two years and so on and so forth 'til the end of the 4th year.

I started off the year with a party. It was my 20th and I shared it, almost, with two of the most gorgeous women I have ever had the pleasure of meeting - one an Iranian lady called Firuzeh and the other an Italian lady called Livia. If I remember rightly, Livia's birthday was the day before mine and Firuzeh's the day after. I've almost certainly got it wrong but it was something like that. In any event, we organized a joint party and it rocked. Big style. I even tarted myself up and that was almost unheard of.

Looking back I think I had fallen as much in love with Livia as I had with Angela but, having twice been knocked back, I seem to have gone to all sorts of lengths to deny it. What fools we men are.

She was Hollywood's idea of the typical Italian woman. Dark curly (or wavy) hair. Olive skin. Dark smouldering eyes. Extrovert. Demonstrative. Gesticulative (is that a word?). For the shy boy from Wessex she was fascinating ... like the candle for the moth; except that this moth was doing its damnedest not to look because it was frightened of what might happen if it did. She was Sofia Loren, Gina Lollobrigida and Anna Magnani all rolled up into one.

Unfortunately, I was no Marcello Mastroianni - much and all as I should have like to have been - and if ever there was an opportunity I ignored it. That's not to say of course that there was. It is simply to say that, if it was there, I wasn't man enough to take it.

I went back to popping entire packets of Pro-Plus tablets every couple of weeks in order to get assignments in on time and it paid off. I passed my first year exams at the second time of asking. It was becoming clear that this quest of mine was going to be no walk in the park. If I wanted to walk in Pinocchio's footsteps I was going to have to work at it.

To be a contadino

In the summer of 1979 I went back to Italy. This wasn't a multi-destination holiday though. I was heading down to Alife in the province of Caserta. I was going to find those family friends that I failed to find in '78.

This time I'd done a little preparation though. I seem to recall that I wrote to them and told them I was coming and that I wanted to stay for three weeks. They'd agreed to have me and ... Davy was on the road again.

I got the train down to Naples and then got another train to Caserta. From their I stumbled around until I found the bus station and got the bus to Alife. The bus journey must have been the guts of an hour through pretty mountainous country which inevitably meant narrow, twisty roads. It was wonderful. It was in places like this that I was born to be, I was convinced of it. It must have been July or August and it was hot as hell. So hot, you can't breathe ... especially if you've been born and bred in England.

Having asked directions a couple of times, I found the house and I was welcomed with open arms. Salvatore and Carmela had lived for years in Buckinghamshire and, as far as I was ever aware, had managed to make enough money to go back, buy a bit of land and build a small-holding - a large-ish house in between two fields. One field had wheat in it and the other had maize and vines.

In return for my food and board, I was expected to work and I did. No complaints whatsoever. This was just another lesson in my Italian apprenticeship. We worked hard and in temperatures that I never knew existed. We ate well too. Carmela could cook up a storm and how. They had three kids - Appolonia and Tomasino and, to my eternal shame, I simply cannot remember the name of the other daughter. Those three weeks were idyllic. Perfick.

I was dragged out to Mass one Sunday. I'd protested that I wasn't a Catholic but I was an English guest and it was compulsory for me to go ... even if I couldn't take Communion. I was sat where I was told to sit - at the end of the pew nearest the aisle. I didn't understand why that was; especially as I had to get up to let everyone out to take Communion. It was only after everyone had taken Communion that I understood. Salvatore nudged me. I looked at him. What? He nudged me again. I looked around and saw that all of the men were walking out, leaving the women and kids to see out the end of the service. The men all disappeared into the various bars in the town square. Lesson No. 1. Mass is only for taking Communion.

I returned to England a new man. Pinocchio was possible. I had been initiated into the ways of Italian peasantry. I had feasted on dry bread, salame, cheese and wine in the middle of a field. I had worked that hard that I'd fallen asleep at the table on the patio after dinner. I'd had my first taste of vino paesano; my first taste of grappa. I sincerely regret not ever having gone back, but I didn't; for a number of reasons.

The search for the soul of Italy

It was around this time that I decided that I probably needed to be a Catholic. With hindsight (there's a lot of that in this story), it was an awfully teenage and superficial observation but I made it nonetheless. I didn't see it as being a shallow, teenage decision at the time. In my quest to fulfil my promise it seemed an obviously necessary step to take.

I was living in York Terrace East on the outer circle of Regent's Park and I'd decided I needed religion and not only religion but the Roman religion. When I was born, I'd been named (not christened or baptised or anything like that) in a ceremony in the Ancient Mystical Order of the Rosæ Crucis (AMORC or the Rosicrucian Order). When I started school, I went to St Mary's Church of England Primary School. I didn't have the first idea what it meant to be a Catholic.

Anyway, (shallow decision No. 2), I'd heard that St James' church in Marylebone held a Latin mass. I'd loved my dalliance with Latin at Comprehensive school so I decided that was the one for me. I went religiously for the guts of a year. I never really understood the significance of the whole thing. After all, I'd never had to learn the catechism that way that good Catholic children have to. It wasn't part of my history or my upbringing. It was totally foreign to me ... apart form the language.

I loved the Latin mass. I loved the gravity that the language gave to the ceremony. I loved the choir in the balcony. By the end of a few months I knew the mass off by heart and, what's more, I understood every word of it ... more or less - credo in unum Deum Patrem omnipotentem, factorem cæli et terræ ...

I always came out of the mass feeling somehow uplifted but, even then, it seemed to me that it had more to do with the spectacle than it did with the meaning behind it. After all, I didn't understand the background. The only thing I understood was the language - and I loved the sound of the choir.

It didn't last long of course. Adherence to any religion requires understanding ... or fear. I had neither. Within about a year of my first visit to St James' I had returned to my heathen ways. Even the attraction of the Latin language had gone. After all, they used the same words every week and I knew all of those words now. I wanted to learn new ones.

Anyway. Grampa had never gone to church. It was just that, for a while, it seemed to me, in a terribly, superficial -almost Hollywoodesque - way, that being a Catholic was an integral part of being an Italian.

That's amore

I've only ever proposed marriage twice in my life. The first time was in 1979 and I really, genuinely and sincerely believed that it was the real thing. I was 19 and I was totally, absolutely and madly in love.

Her name was Angela. Her father was Greek and her mother was Italian and she was beautiful; from head to toe and from the inside out ... and she'd been engaged for some time to a 'nice' Italian boy.

I was, and am, painfully shy. Talkative. Very talkative; but painfully shy nonetheless. I know I tried not to make it obvious. She was engaged after all. I don't know whether I succeeded in not making it obvious. Not making my feelings obvious is something that I've never been very good at.

I got to meet her parents a couple of times. Once at a party as I recall. It wasn't a mad 21st century party. It was a very civilized social event and I showed my immaturity by getting stupidly drunk.

Her mother was a lovely lady. Eminently sensible and practical I thought. I spent several very pleasant hours in the kitchen with a coffee and a fag chatting with her about the world in general and Angela in particular. I like to think that she quite liked me. Her father struck me as a very taciturn man. Pleasant but very taciturn.

Then I got my break. At least that's the way I saw it. A friend of Angela's bumped into the fidenzato (in Rome I think it was - he was doing his national service as I recall) and he had a young lady with him. The friend asked the fidenzato who the young lady was and he practically dismissed her as 'just a friend'. The description obviously didn't please the young lady in question because she lost it. Threw a dicky fit. The story got back to London.

I saw that as the ideal opportunity to try to press my suit. With hindsight I can see it was probably the worst time to move but I moved anyway and proposed. I meant it. Every word of it. I wrote to her. I wrote to her because that way I could consider carefully every word whereas I was sure to make a total hash of it if I tried to say it face-to-face.

When she got my letter, she phoned me and was incredibly gentle with me. Generously so when I look back on it. She told me that neither of us were ready for such a massive commitment ... but I was convinced that I was and I was gutted. Again.

I still have a few photos and every now and again they appear on the screen saver and remind me ...

Back to the beginning again

I failed the exams at the end of my first year - Italian, German, Linguistics and Specialized and Technical Translation. I can't remember which I passed and which I failed but that really isn't important. I'd failed and only had two options. Get a job or repeat the year. It was a no-brainer. I repeated the year - without a grant but with a loan from my dad to cover the fees. £300. I had to work for the rest.

In some ways this wasn't a very good year. Nicking milk and bread off people's doorsteps at 5 o'clock in the morning. Raiding the hotdog stands late at night for onions, rolls, odd tins of hotdogs and stuff like that.

In other ways it was a fantastic year. I met two people with whom I have remained firm friends - Pegro and Crow (Domenico or Mimmo and Mike). Pegro is Italian. Born in Naples and lived there 'til he was about five when his family moved to Luton. Crow is a star too. German mum and Cuban dad. The two lads went to school together in Luton and Crow learned Neapolitan from Pegro and the other lads from Naples. It was from them that I started to really learn what the language felt like from the inside.

I also met two Italian girls from a small town near Vicenza - Paola Panozzo and Margherita Spezzapria. I used to help them out when they had questions about how English works. Not simple questions. The subtle stuff. The numerous meanings of 'to put down' or 'to put up'. Stuff like that. They were brilliant girls though and I spent a lot of time with them.

I'd moved from the halls of residence on the corner of Marylebone Road and Baker Street to the grandly named International Students' House on York Terrace East ... on the Outer Circle of Regent's Park.

Downstairs in the cellar was a large common room with a kitchen in it. This was the beginning of the age of the Spaghettata. Loads of the kids (we were still kids) from the Poly would come round - Livia La Camera, Luigi Guarnieri (played the guitar), Nunzio di Dea, Angela Charalambous, Ann Smith (her mum was Italian), Loredana Formaini, Gianni Bruggi (brilliant banjo player), Paola and Margherita, Pegro 'n' Crow ... loads of them; and the girls, armed with ginormous cooking pots, would cook up the most stunning spaghetti and it'd all be washed down with wine.

I was in my element; in the middle of a crowd and loving every minute of it. All those people to talk to; all those people to have a drink and a laugh with. Sweet. The good memories unquestionably drown out the bad ones.