FOLLOWING A DREAM
By Nicoletta Chiriatti
[August 1915. A stuffy day in summer. The Peluso Family are going to leave their poor house in Tricase, a small village in the south of Italy, to leave for a long journey to America]
Tetta was packing nervously while Pippi started to swear because he couldn’t find his bowler-hat; Uccio, Pippi’s father who was deaf, was shouting at Oronzo because his grandchild had told him: ”HURRY UP!” since it was late and the train was about to leave, but he couldn’t make himself understood because his grandpa thought he was saying: “LOOK UP” and he couldn’t understand what he had to look at. The poor old man was going mad! Abbondanza and Totò were ready but they were quarrelling. What about? We don’t know...so in the Italian family house, it was simply pandemonium!
Finally, after some unbearable hours of misunderstanding, packing, cursing, tearing out their hair, and running around the house, our Italian family succeeded in leaving for Liverpool.
[ After a long, tiresome journey to Liverpool, the Italian family finally go on board the ship which will take them to the USA]
While Tetta was checking that every members of her family was there, Uccio, the grandpa, because of his incredible loquacity (opposed to his incredible inability to misunderstand), started chatting to an old Swedish woman, called Gridur (if we may call it chatting, because the old woman worked hard to make him understand every single word she pronounced!). That’s how the Icelander and the Italian family met .
So, our Italian “heroes” went on asking the Icelander if they would like some of their food. The ship was total chaos but Tetta was concentrated on getting some biscuits, sandwiches and typical Italian food out of her luggage; she continuously offered it to her shipmates, Abbondanza was really interested in talking to her handsome new friend, Sturlaugur and she also began to call him Sturri, although he wasn’t exactly interested in her, but she didn’t seem to want to give up! She was a tough girl! Pippi was explaining to Gunnar how important and how hard working as a farmer was, and poor grandpa was going on talking about Italy’s beauty but every time Gridur asked him something, he always answered anything but what she had asked him, so that she understood that it was better if she didn’t interrupt him any more!
Suddenly something happened: someone in the sea was shouting and floundering and the ship immediately stopped because a man had fallen in the sea and if someone hadn’t plunged in those rebellious waves he would have died. The water was dark and frightening and the waves were getting bigger and bigger.A poor Turkish man was about to drown in that terrifying abyss, when suddenly a courageous and fearless girl plunged into the sea to rescue him; the boy started to cough and his family was crying and shouting from the ship praying for his salvation but our strong, great heroine was swimming towards him.When the Italian family realized that the saver was Abbondanza, Tetta fainted invoking the Virgin Mary, Abbondanza’s brothers started to cry and Pippi didn’t know what to do: help his wife or stop his father, Uccio, who, in a moment of madness, started to undress (he wanted to plunge in too, to save his grandchild, in his turn; but the worst thing was that he really trusted in that )
The whole crew were watching the incredible scene, terrified, because there would probably be three deaths: the boy, the girl and the crazy grandpa.
Finally our superwoman succeeded in her rescue and to the crew’s great relief , Hasan, the Turkish boy and Abbondanza were saved and brought safely back on board. All the crew started clapping but when Tetta woke up and saw Uccio (completely undressed ) who still intended to plunge and save Abbondanza (he was sure she was still in the sea), she fainted again.
When Tetta came round, all the members of her family had already started a friendship with the Turkish Arpaciogli family, too.
Arpacik, the father and his wife, Hatice (who was pregnant), never stopped thanking Abbondanza for saving Hasan and meanwhile the Italian heroine and the Turkish boy were already in love...
Fatma Ana gave a gift to Abbondanza but when Uccio asked her what it represented (because it was a typical Turkish object ), their problems began again because it was impossible to talk to grandpa without having an attack of nerves! And try to imagine how hard it was to make him understand the Turkish’s family names!
After a three-day-voyage all was calm but on the fifth day, Hatice knew that she was about to give birth to her child. The whole crew was in a state of agitation, because there wasn’t a doctor on the ship.
Meanwhile the Turkish, the Italian and the Icelander families joined another family, the Swedish.
Hasan and Abbondanza were imagining their future. Their parents didn’t know about their engagement yet, but they would soon let them know.
Hatice was in labour and Olof and Ann-Mary (the Swedish husband and wife) were ready to help her.
well, even the Italian and the Icelander families would have liked to help her, but the Icelanders were a bit fussy and the Italians maybe were bunglers! So after 7 hours of labour, Hatice gave birth to her third son, with much help from the Swedish.
Oobviously Uccio now wanted to know what the child would be called! Mr. and Mrs. Arpaciogli decided to call him Tahsin but Uccio couldn’t really understand the name, so he was convinced that the little boy’s name was “Hanging “ and he continuously wondered why they had called him like this “ it’s really a horrible name”- he thought –“Are those people a bit crazy or sadists? But ...never mind!”
The days were passing by and Hasan and Abbondanza were more and more in love and one day when they were looking down to the sea holding each other’s hands, Rolf, the Swedish grandpa, saw them and he told Pippi and Arpacik what he had seen.
Pippi and Arpacik were confused.They didn’t know what to do because Abbondanza was too young to have a relationship to a man, in Pippi’ s opinion, and Hasan was already predestined to a future wife who lived in Turkey. So the day after, Arpacik’s and Pippi’s family had a sort of meeting to discuss this problem; Tetta was the only one who didn’t know anything about, and when she was told this love story, she fainted again. But this time she came round after 2-3 hours...the shock was too much for her! Her young daughter was already engaged! and to a Turkish man! That was an unacceptable thing at that time.
The Turkish and the Italian family told their children that they couldn’t be engaged because of too many reasons, so our two little heroes had a great (and dangerous) idea:Let’s see what happened.
They simply pretended to accept their parents’ decisions and the day after they had organized a good plan!
Their parents were really stubborn, so they needed a strong attack-plan !
It was a stormy, gloomy day, really perfect for the “mise-en-scène”. The night was coming with her dark and cold cloak and the rain was persistent and insidious. The sea was simply mad, the waves were high and imposing and the abyss seemed to be ready to swallow up the whole ship. All the crew were worried about the weather, when suddenly Hasan rushed away from his parents and everything happened in such a way that the crew didn’t have time to realize what was going on. He ran towards the ship’s prow and he climbed onto it, so that he was completely leaning out onto the abyss.
The Turkish, the Swedish, the Icelander and the Italian families, stunned, looked at him and Abbondanza was looking at him too, but she was calm, she knew what he was doing ...Even the rest of the crew was looking at the scene: everybody was petrified because they thought he wanted to throw himself into the sea.
Arpacik and Hatice started to shout: ”get off there! get off ! are you crazy? it’s dangerous!!!”.
The ship was tossed by the waves. Hasan pretended to cry and coming closer to the sea, he started to scream at his parents: ”if you oppose our engagement, I will commit suicide!”.
He was so close to the sea (the ship rolled up and down because of the wind) the waves completely soaked him, even though he was already soaked, because of the rain. Hasan’s mom started to cry. His father shouted: “Don’t force me to come up there and get you off! “
Hasan, like a real melodramatic actor :”Let me be with her or you won’t see me any more!”
The angrier his father got, the more Hasan leaned out and when his father was coming to him, he said with a chocked voice:”don’t do it! the waves are waiting for me! “. Arpacik immediately stopped, terrified, because he believed his son was serious. Everybody was worried and curious at the same time. Suddenly, Abbondanza ran towards him and she climbed the prow too.They embraced each other, now, and while the thunder rumbled she pronounced these words: “ I will die with him ! goodbye everybody! “ and they turned their shoulders pretending to be ready to disappear into the sea.
Pippi ,Tetta, Uccio, Oronzo and Totò became pale and they shouted unanimously :” Nooooooooooo !!!!!!!” someone from the crowd, screamed :”stop it! this is not the time to play Romeo and Juliet! “
Everybody wanted to know how it would end! and the Turkish shouted in desperation: ”come back ! don’t do it ! you will stay together !”
“Yes you can get married even tomorrow if you want! but don’t leave us!” Pippi said with a trembling voice.
Abbondanza and Hasan smiled at each other because they knew that they had done it! They gently came off the prow, satisfied and happy. All the crew started to sing and shout :” long live the bride, the bridegroom!” “long live the bride ,the bridegroom!” in a funny way and everybody was happy and safe. Tetta fainted again.