Gifts of friendship, to treasure forever

A gift from my lovely friends at Cantina del Granduca.

SITTING at an outdoor table on a balmy night, we're just finishing dinner on my last night in Anghiari when, at some obviously prearranged moment, all of the staff emerge from the restaurant to present me with a gift. I’m fairly gobsmacked, as you might imagine (could possibly have shed a little tear), and very touched. I'm also very sorry now that I don’t have a photo of them all to show you.

It’s not just that I’ve been a regular customer, although I have worked my way through the menu fairly well, bringing several different friends with me. We have a bond because the Cantina is just across the little street from where I’ve been living for three months; I see either Samuele, Matteo, Matteo’s father Domenico, Giulia or all of them most days as I walk by on my way out and back. They always smile, say a warm buongiorno and we have a chat.

This gift is their thanks for a little work I did, just as a favour, correcting the English translation on the restaurant’s proposed new menu. I'm now the happy owner of a numbered print of an Anghiari townscape painting. The scene includes a side view of the tower I have been seeing every day from another angle from my desk, and I will treasure it absolutely.

Giulia, the young owner/manager, came to the restaurant on my last night especially, even though she wasn’t well and had taken the night off. She and her partner, chef Matteo, are dear gems, very good at their jobs, and I wish them all the success they deserve.

What could possibly go wrong on the way home?

• Perhaps it was a sign that I really shouldn't have left. In the air somewhere between Doha and Sydney, I discovered I had left my trusty laptop on a security screening tray at the airport at Doha. Dismayed? You could say that. The airline steward gave me an email address for the lost property department of Qatar Airways and tried to reassure me, saying “The penalty for stealing is so severe in Qatar that it very rarely happens.”

It turned out this wasn’t a false reassurance. I emailed the lost property place the next day and retrieved my precious item at Sydney Airport five days later. How’s that?!

• Worst jetlag ever, but I am aware of what a ‘first-world problem’ this is and won’t complain too much. A week later my sleeping has still not adjusted, but I am working on it.

• Worse is the pinched nerve in my groin, possibly from the experience of lugging 35kg in suitcases up and down stairs several times (sometimes, but not always, with help) and sitting on aeroplanes for a total of 20 hours. The pain comes and goes. Sometimes it’s painful to sit, other times to bend. One leg is definitely not operating as it used to and I’m off to the osteopath tomorrow.

From left: A little painting I bought at the Sunday market; my guardian angel; a painting by Carlo Rossi that I bought last year; Carlo's gift this year, against a statue, providence unknown.

Now I’m in No Woman’s Land again, not sure where I am going to live, and with delightful Anghiari rapidly receding as the fondest of memories.

Sitting in my Bondi apartment, I have displayed my gifts from Anghiari on the living room sideboard: the print from the Cantina del Granduca; my sweet Christmas tree angel – il tuo angelo custode (“your guardian angel”), Giorgio and Vasco told me; a beautiful swallow painting by my friend Carlo Rossi. I am also delighted to be in possession of a Caffe Garibaldi t-shirt given to me by the proprietor Gennaro, who doesn’t want me to share his photo even though he is very handsome (this is a joke we share). Maybe he will change his mind one day.

Thank you, Anghiari. I will return.

Some of the many friendly faces of Anghiari. Signor (dimenticato); Patrizio; Mario.