Leaving on a train (Part I)

When I was very young, my three older siblings would sometimes disappear for months at a time. This was not remarkable in any way, considering our daily lives were already so different from those of anyone else we knew in Rome.

My siblings were off to Milan or Chicago for school. My older sister famously flew home unaccompanied from our grandparents’ house in Chicago at age 6, and as she used to remind us, she was terrified of falling into the ocean. That’s her story to tell, but as a child, it made an impression on me, particularly because of her use of the word ‘ocean’, which sounded so large and American. In Italy, we only had the sea.

My brothers also did stints at Cheder Lubavitch in Chicago, but mostly they all traveled to Milan, which was pretty far in those days.

My sole experience in Northern Italy thus far had been our family trip to a wedding in Milan when I was four or five. Our cousin from Israel, my father’s nephew, was marrying someone from Milan and so we packed our best shabbos clothes and drove all the way up.

A few years later, when I reached the ripe old age of 7, it was my time to join the older crowd and leave home to attend school in Milan. Out came the 𝘣𝘰𝘳𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘪, the duffel bags which would become the bane of my existence for years to come.

As we packed, my mom reminded me which clothes went together as outfits and made sure I had everything I would need until it was time to come home for the next Yom Tov.

I was no stranger to leaving home. I had been going to our beloved Tuscan sleepaway camp since the age of 5. The camp was small and only lasted up to three weeks - furthermore, my sister, only four years older but already well-traveled and independent, was always there to keep an eye on me.

So I did not question my upcoming trip and probably even looked forward to it.

The best way to travel to Milan was on the Intercity, a train that only made a few stops (which we quickly memorized) and required advanced booking.

This was the 80’s and 90s, so in order to book a spot, one had to go to the train station or a travel agency some time in advance. Whoever was the oldest among us Milan travelers at the time was handed the cash and instructed to go purchase the tickets. Later on, we booked them through a youth agency that offered discounts to young Italians below a certain age. The agency was usually full of students buying Eurail passes or discount air tickets to Prague.

We amassed so many tickets over the years that our favorite game to play when we were home was ‘agenzia’, or ‘travel agency’. We had a desk with stacks of old plane and train tickets. For the less adventurous, we had plenty of local bus tickets available.

Yes, we were deemed old enough to travel long distances on our own but we were still just kids who enjoyed the imaginative play.

We would dress up and approach the ‘agency’ in character, inquiring about the best rates and routes. The ‘agent’ would do her or his best impression of the stern Italian travel agents we were familiar with, marking the seat numbers with a red pen and meticulously counting the cash.

(To be continued next week)...