By Sophie
YELLOW ROSTI – Sophie’s Tour
Thursday – Rosti in the evening
Towards evening, towards the river, pedaling alone, imagining talking to the Inq.
"I have to tell you something, Inq. The truth is that I have always hated artificial fabrics."
"Even 2% elastane in a shirt bothers my skin, makes me nervous."
"I never wear tights, never, and when I want to dress like a woman I wear silk stockings."
«On my own initiative, I would never have bought sportswear made of technical fabric»
«I have always looked down on this obsession with technical clothing for those who go to the mountains, by bike, by boat or on horseback...»
"The motivation for performance? Ridiculous, a pretext. These cyclists in racing livery, or even motorcyclists... fashionistas with a high rate of infantilism, big kids dressed up as superheroes, with the magical suits of their idols"
«Then I came here, you came, you threw me out on the road to pedal, and you told me put these on, see if they fit you...»
"Inq! This stuff works. Now I get it. These suits are truly magical."
"Now I'm a superhero too. Whether it's sunny, rainy, cold or humid, I don't let the elements get me down. I'm a special agent. A special being."
"When you have a noble soul and are inclined to enterprise, you naturally step into the shoes of Achilles, or King Arthur, or even Paperinik"
"A technical uniform, now I know, really makes you special. Like in ancient mythology, like in comics. The magic cloak makes you invincible, gives you superhuman powers"
“Well, Inq, what I wanted to tell you is that you’re right: this isn’t a second skin, it’s your authentic skin, because it corresponds to your soul.”
And if someone says to me: "But how? Weren't you the one for whom nothing surpasses natural fabrics?"
Then I will say: "I was wrong: above the natural fabrics, there are supernatural fabrics"
Thanks Inq, you have opened a new dimension for me, beyond my snobbery. End of the sycophancy.
In the afternoon I took the Bianchi back to the Rosti Bar and took the MB hi-tech back. Today's stage, as expected, turned out to be useless and boring. Demare won the sprint over Laporte and Kristoff, for the rest it was a pure transfer waiting for the last two opportunities before the final parade in Paris: tomorrow's hard mountain stage and Saturday's time trial.
Climbing the hills of Bergamo at sunset this evening I was wearing the uniform of the Rosti “Art for Visibility” line, very yellow, very phosphorous, very flashy, and therefore “passively” very safe. No one will run me over, no one will be able to say: “I didn’t see you!”.
The Tour is coming to an end, and it would take a miracle for Bardet to take the yellow jersey tomorrow, he would have to perform a legendary feat, detaching everyone by 6 or 7 minutes.
My Tour of the Rosti Countries is also almost complete. And I have less and less time to solve the “rebours” mystery of my life, on the trail not of a murderer, but of a procreator. My father.
Friday - at the end of the night
Lourdes, no miracles. Bardet tries, but the one who manages to detach everyone is the Slovenian Roglic. Thomas second, Bardet third. The scientists at Rosti Bar are already doing the anatomy of this Tour. The sprinters are dead (almost all retired, except the stoic-heroic Sagan, who is a comic book character), the climbers are dead (Nibali retired, Quintana aged, Bardet unfinished) the new winners are athletes like Froome, Thomas and Dumoulin, that is, time trialists and track cyclists who work like electronic injection engines, with the control unit programmed according to the route.
This morning, by chance, in a bar in Milan, I was disgusted by the sugary sweetness of the voice of a man who was talking on the phone next to me, saying: "Hi love, I love you so much, darling...". Immediately afterward he became anxious: "Wait! Tell me you'll send me a message tonight...". But she had already hung up, and he, painfully: "Love, love, are you there, ready?"
Shortly after I took the exam on Céline. But I was thinking about the Inq, which is in Paris. The final question was on the masterpiece novel, “Journey to the End of the Night”. Published in 1932, it is the novel that demystifies the frenzy of modern life 50 years in advance. Nights spent wandering around the city in search of scraps of love, freedom reduced to sexual exercise, disgust and boredom until the explosion of madness, the senseless tragedy at the end of the night. Alienating and useless days and weeks to allow even more alienating and useless evenings.
The protagonist-narrator, Céline's alter ego, is called Bardamu, but I see him and hear him with the face and voice of the Inq. and finally I feel him real, and I understand the meaning of these strange, suspended, sleepless hours at the end of the night, when the absurd pushes you to the tragic.
Céline-Bardamu writes: "The worst thing is that every evening we ask ourselves how we will find the strength to continue the next day, where we will find the strength for these stupid attempts, for these thousand projects that come to nothing, for these attempts to escape from the crushing necessity, attempts that always fail, and all to convince ourselves once again that destiny is insurmountable, that we must fall back down, every evening, under the anguish of this increasingly precarious, increasingly sordid tomorrow."
There is a dialogue I would like to read to you, Inq, at the end of the novel (or rather: “at the end” of the novel). We are in a car with two couples adrift, at the end of the night. There is a woman in the throes of a hysterical crisis, she is begging the man, asking him to go with her, to spend the night (what little is left of it) with her, to be with her. He is exhausted, for a while he doesn’t say anything, he tolerates it, he stays quiet. She threatens him, she tells him I’ll report you, she tells him I love you, she insults him, she begs him.
Finally he can't take it anymore, he starts talking, and he gives her a terrible speech: "But yes, you're right, I don't give a damn about anything, even you... Don't take it as an insult... But I don't want to be loved anymore! It disgusts me!".
At the moment she doesn't understand, she's disconcerted, she asks him to explain himself better. And he, Robinson, Bardamu's friend, lets himself go, vents, and tells her everything.
"No, it's not you, it's everything that disgusts me! Love especially! And all the feelings you go looking for to keep me glued to you, they feel like insults to me. You can't even imagine how disgusting you are by repeating what everyone says, that there's nothing better than love! You act sentimental, while you're a bitch... you cover the rotten flesh with sauce of tenderness... But you're too late, it doesn't stick with me anymore... I'm disgusted by love, I spit on it... love, what is love in the end, it's the infinite within the reach of dogs..."
The car stops. We are at the epilogue. For the last time she asks him: "Are you coming with me?"
He replies: "No! Do what you want."
And what does she do? The woman's reaction will leave you speechless!
Find out by reading “Journey to the End of the Night” by Louis Ferdinand Céline.
Saturday - the wind rises
Time trial with a thrilling finale, Dumoulin wins by just 1 second over Froome. Third is Thomas, without ever risking losing the yellow jersey. It's done for the Welshman. Unexpectedly, Bardet also does a feat arriving with a pretty good time in a discipline that is difficult for him, and recovers positions in the standings.
This morning full immersion in the site of the former Caproni, in Brembate di Sopra, not to be confused with Brembate and that's it, home of the Rosti knitwear factory, 20 km further south. Nothing remains of this large factory where my nameless grandfather worked. The area is now occupied by another large multinational factory, Philco. But I know how to regress to feel the memory of places. I help myself by smoking some grass that the mother superior of the convent-hospice where I'm staying gave me last night.
“I know you young people like it,” she told me, explaining that marijuana and hops are medicinal plants from the same family, which nuns have been cultivating for centuries, for various reasons.
And I remember what my brewer friends from Inq. (a Valcamonica river tribe) told me in Crespi, that is, that it was actually a nun who invented hoppy beer, the bitter beer that is very fashionable today (IPA and sorelle), precisely with the aim of making it less sweet and more “medicinal” (we will talk about the tastes of nuns in a specific essay).
Thus I begin my hallucinatory journey into the CAB of Brembate, Caproni Aereonautica Bergamasca, active from 1920 to 1946, with more than 1000 workers (the Caproni group had many other factories in Northern Italy, producing not only airplanes, but also the curious two-seater “pocket” submarines and the famous MAS motorboats-torpedo boats. Overall it employed 50,000 workers, and a leading place in the history of the aeronautical industry).
The two characters I want to evoke in search of my grandfather (and therefore my father) are the engineer Caproni, and the aviator Antonio Locatelli. I have read everything and more about them.
The summary that an old archivist gave me is valid: «Caproni is certainly a genius, Locatelli is certainly a superman, but both condemned to “damnatio memoriae” for their very close ties with the fascist regime, as was the Caproni company».
I lie down on the lawn along the river, where the runway used to be, close my eyes, and smoke the nuns' weed.
I see the first plane built by Caproni, based on Leonardo's drawings, with those wings of a bird of prey. I see the plane used by Locatelli to do the "flight over Vienna" with his friend D'Annunzio, a "bold and futuristic" action: a shower of flying sheets with "WE ARE WAGING WAR ON YOUR GOVERNMENT" printed on them. That day a new word was born, and a new form of communication: the "flyer" (but today even the Italians who invented it prefer to say "flyer", in English. You are ridiculous. Like when you say "junior" thinking that "junior" is an English word, and instead it is Latin, like Juventus).
The joint is starting to take effect.
For nights on end I sifted through list after list of names of Caproni workers in search of a surname to associate with Cesare, the only thing I know about my grandfather, his first name.
I found 7 of them, I chased them through the depths of cross-archival records, but none of them ever emigrated to France. Relax, Sophie. The nuns' weed is delicious.
I take a very slow and long drag, as deep as the first note of Bach's organ music in my earphones. I free my mind, I return to the images of Caproni planes.
I turn up the volume on my MP3 (is that how you say it?), and Bach's fugue picks up speed and adrenaline like a biplane taking off. And in my head, in the sky above me, the sounds chase the images of the flying Goats, those mythological animals with wings of canvas and hearts of steel... I suddenly sit up, eyes wide open. I turn off the music. I'm an idiot.
What did my grandfather's old neighbor in Marseille tell me?
«An Italian comrade, who had worked at Caproni».
And I, like a good little ant, had started looking for a Caproni worker. Now the imaginative regression into the real scenario had made me see what I had always had before my eyes. In almost all the celebratory or group photos, together with the planes, and the engineer, and the pilot, various characters always appeared, with the faces of bullies and martial poses. They were not wearing workers' overalls, but paramilitary uniforms. Squad members, militiamen. Fascists. He was a comrade, at Caproni. He did the security service, the surveillance. The repression of every union or socialist idea or initiative. My grandfather was a thug, a spy, a guard dog. For this reason, when the regime collapsed, he had changed air.
I have to start the research all over again. Look for a Caesar in the militias or other paramilitary organizations of the party or the regime that had relations with Caproni.
I get on my bike, I want to rush back to my cell with the fast connection at the convent-hospice in Bergamo Alta. But in the heat of the moment I stub my feet badly on a dip, I find myself flying over the rocks. I hit my head violently on a stone. I find myself dizzy, in tears. My protective helmet practically smashed.
“I will never put this ridiculous bowl on my head,” I said.
"Instead you will wear it, and one day you will thank me," the Inq. had replied, tying it on my head, with his fierce expression of immediate obedience. Thank you Inq.
A few hours later, around midnight, I find it. In the diaries of engineer Caproni.
My grandfather was called Cesare Rossi, originally from Brembate, he was a fascist from the very beginning, and a freshwater sailor. A diver, a submariner, he had been part of the Decima MAS (Memento Audere Semper, always remember to dare) flotilla raiders, complete madmen who guided torpedoes by riding them! I found a photo where he is very young, 1921, in a diving suit, on Lake Maggiore, involved in the rescue operations of the Trans-Aereo, the most absurd and poetic of Caproni's projects, a sailing ship with wings, a flying ship. A kind of childhood dream, which I recognize immediately, I've seen it before.
“The Wind Rises” is one of the most beautiful animated films ever made. The work of the great Miyazaki, winner of an Oscar in 2013, it is the story of a Japanese boy who dreams of flying and building fantastic planes. This is where I saw the Trans-Aereo. I was sure it was a work of fiction, and instead it is a tribute to the visionary genius of the engineer Caproni.
Finally, there is a sentence that gives meaning to the film.
"First you dream something, and then reality will follow."
Sunday – the land between the two rivers
"As a child, riding my bike home from school, I dreamed of one day taking part in the Tour de France." Geraint Thomas' words on the podium in Paris are simple, beautiful, true.
«Today I'm here in the yellow jersey, and it seems absurd, unreal.»
"I want to tell each and every one of you: don't stop chasing your dreams. You will live exhilarating and terrible moments, you will end up on your knees, I ended up on the ground a lot of times, but if you really believe and work hard, anything is possible, dreams can come true."
The other winners of this Tour are: Sagan (green sprinter jersey), Alaphilippe (polka-dotted climber jersey) and Latour (white young rider jersey).
Latour? Latour rides for AG2R, and wears Rosti!
From the web: «The young Rosti brand wins in the youth category with Pierre Latour...»
«In his first participation in the Tour de France, Rosti climbs onto the podium in Paris wearing the white jersey, and writes his name in the history books...».
I watch the awards ceremony on TV, and at a certain point I see him, just for a moment, but it's him, unmistakable, it's the Inq. who compliments Bardet and Latour, and smiles, he seems happy, moved. A minute later my phone rings.
"Hi Sophie, I have a flight at midnight, I'll be there at 1," he tells me. He asks me if I can go get it, tells me where to get the car, who to ask for the keys.
Before hanging up, he also asks me: “Sophie, did you find what you were looking for?”
I answer him: "Almost, but I'm afraid to turn the last page."
A few hours later we are in the car together, on the highway, at night. The plane left late and arrived late. It is almost three when we leave the airport.
"Yes, I'm happy, very happy, but I don't feel like talking."
He senses my disappointment. And after a moment he adds: "But I'm listening to you."
And then I start talking, indiscriminately, as if I had to tell him everything, tell him about the chaos in my head, the thousand connections of my three crossed tours, the Tour de France, the trip to the Rosti character-territory, the search for my father.
"The word is madness. Madness of those who organize the Tour with only the so-called television needs in mind, and not history, not sport, and so the Tour becomes a television show, but television shows are monsters made of rhetoric, skits, hypocrisy, exhibitionism, they are monsters that feed on controversy, insults, conspiracy theories, conspiracies, scandals, psychodramas, wars of power, of sponsors, of doping, of TV rights... and all to attract more and more spectators, not to make them fall in love or educate them about sport, but to make them stupid, make them gullible TV addicts, and enslave them with bets, their model is football...
"... but what really worries those who hold the fate of the Tour in their hands? That the Tour's TV ratings are constantly declining! So what do they do? By completely distorting the message that comes from the public, instead of recovering the authenticity factors of the race, they drug it even more with spectacular ingredients. Formula One-style starts!"
"So, who really protects and brings to life a sport, a tradition, a culture? Those who practice it. True enthusiasts, of every discipline, level, age, sex and social class. This is the source. Downstream there are the great champions, the great sponsors, the great visibility, the general public, that is, business, and sometimes business, especially when it is global, pollutes, dries up and kills its own source."
"In the middle are you, who come from the source and have now arrived at the Tour, you who dress the true enthusiasts and also the great champions. Now you can make yourself comfortable in the system, or get busy on behalf of the source, and that is, bring the great champions back to the source, and the great races to the true enthusiasts. Not a small challenge."
«And the word is still madness. Not the opaque madness of the system, but the lucid madness of dreamers, rebels, the passionate, geniuses and madmen. Capable of divine madness. A mad idea in your head, and making it happen. I'm talking about my investigation into the Rosti character-territory. There's always the river in between, the land, the water, and the desire to make a leap, to overcome the obstacle. Leonardo da Vinci wants to navigate uphill, and invents locks. Colleoni wants to navigate beyond the mountains, and invents integrated logistics (dismantling, transport, reassembly). Caproni wants to make a ship fly, and transforms the sails into wings»
«And the madness of the great artists who “came out” of this territory, within a 30km radius of the knitwear factory? The madness of Caravaggio, Tasso and Donizetti? In a bar in Bergamo there is a list of cocktails dedicated to these giants. On the first page it says: “If in your city you are mentally ill, and in the rest of the world a genius, you are from Bergamo”»
«Last madness: my grandfather was a madman, a super-fascist, everything I discover scares me, frightens me and attracts me...»
The Inq. listened to my entire verbal orgasm without batting an eyelid.
“What are you afraid of?” he asks me.
“To meet my father,” I reply.
Immediately afterwards I'm already pouring out on him everything I discovered this morning, with the essential help of Claude, my nerdy friend from Marseille (and the fast fibre of the nuns).
«My father Vittorio was born in Marseille in 1974, when his father was already 74 years old!»
«Do you know Marseille? I’ll quote from memory a passage by Claude Izzo, a Marseille writer of Italian origin: “in Marseille anyone, of any color, could get off a boat or a train, with a suitcase in their hand, without a penny in their pocket, and mingle with the flow of others. A city where, as soon as you set foot on land, you could say: I’m here, it’s my home”»
«I'll quote you another one, which would also be good to describe the Rosti territory: "Marseille is not a city for tourists. There is nothing to see. Its beauty cannot be photographed. Here you have to take sides. Be passionate. Only then does what there is to see let itself be seen."
"The old man lived to be 97, he died the year I was born. His son, my father, was a lifeguard and sailing instructor, then he moved on to rafting, then kitesurfing. He takes people on adventure holidays, or works in large tourist villages. He has a half-Algerian ex-wife who owns a chain of nightclubs in Spain with him, and a current Sicilian wife who has transformed the family estate into a luxury resort."
"He goes back and forth between Spain and Sicily. He has a face a bit like that, and he looks a bit like you"
"I don't think he has any children. Other than me, I mean. But who knows?"
We exit the highway, we are almost at the knitwear factory. I take the large roundabout
“Go down to the river,” the Inq. tells me, pointing to the road that goes down to Crespi d'Adda.
It's four o'clock, an almost full moon in the sky. We cross the entire village to the cemetery. Which is closed. The Inq. gets out and starts along the perimeter wall. I follow him in silence.
We take a path in the woods that runs alongside the cemetery. After five minutes we are in a thick undergrowth. There is a perfect silence, that I know. When the night birds stop making their noises, and the diurnal ones have not yet started chirping.
Then I begin to hear a buzz, a background noise coming from the right of the path, louder and louder. Then the foliage opens, another step, and I find myself in paradise, in the moonlight. Beyond the Crespi cemetery, there is paradise.
Before us the spectacle of the two rivers joining together. A thin strip of sandy land.
I look up: to the right, to the left, in front I see only water and woods. Not a trace of the horrible civilization, no house, bell tower, warehouse, no road or lamppost. No boat in the river, no person in sight, nothing, only water and woods. I know very well that around the bend there are obviously towns, factories, highways, shopping malls and unhappy masses of people. But here, now, they are not there. I breathe.
The Inq. sits on his ankles. He reaches into the water, and begins to speak.
"There's a song about friendship, and the fear of growing up. And the river."
"I don't remember the words well, it's in English. It's about these friends who have a secret place in the woods, on the banks of the river, where everyone goes to find themselves. It says: the river is your spirit, your call, your source. You watch the water flow, and at a certain point the river is you."
"The river will always be there. The river is your mother, the river is your father. You are the son of the river."
"You had death in your heart when you reached the river, but now you have light in your eyes"
It's the end of the night. First light of dawn. The Inq. gets up, gives me a sign, we go back. Half an hour later we are at the knitwear factory, he would like to leave me the car to go back to Bergamo, but I want to bike, to pedal at dawn for these 20km. I get on the saddle, but he asks me to wait for him a moment. He comes back and puts a small package in the backpack I have on my shoulders.
When I arrive on the walls of Bergamo the spectacle of the new day is perfect.
I stop on the highest stand, I enjoy the moment. As if the new day brought with it a new desire to live, a new life, in which everything is possible, and happiness is for everyone.
I open the backpack, I open the package. For me, in my size, beautiful, there is the white Rosti jersey of the Tour de France 2018.
There is also a quickly written note.
"Send me the last installment of your diary, before you leave for Spain or Sicily. Don't forget the Rosti knitwear factory, Sophie! And if you're looking for a family, here you've found one that will always welcome you."