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.
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