When we were young, many of my compatriots had their sights set on a professional baseball career. Unrealistically, as it turned out. But we didn’t know that then.
In the Midwest, one of the leagues to which we aspired had clubs in Illinois, Indiana and Iowa. And so it became the Three I League. It may have been as much as three or four levels below the major leagues, but anyone who made it as far as the Three I League had a certain celebrity about him. During the off-season, people invited him to sports banquets and introduced him as our next major leaguer. Well, all that was heady stuff but I didn’t know that there was a relation between the Three I League and politics here in the Northeast.
Politics here have their own Three I League. Since 1950, almost every politician from Massachusetts in the north to Pennsylvania on the west and south to Washington, D. C. have paid their respects to Italy, Ireland and Israel, our version of the famous Three I League. Obviously, immigration has much to do with this as they have ties back to the home country. As it is said, we are a nation of immigrants. It is clear that a good many of those descendants of immigrants have married each other. So when the politicians address one group, they often automatically appeal to the rest of the group who may have varying degrees of ties to the Three I League, but they get the message.
ITALY
And so we start with Italy, because that’s where I first landed in the great Three I League. Those are not unusual locations as is the case in Africa. Italy, Ireland and Israel are pretty much the way we are. No big surprises. They go about their business as we go about ours. And so there are no horror or many funny stories about these countries. I feel at home in every on of the I-I-I countries, so we’ll start with a word from my friend down at the toe of Italy, Walter Pippo, who has a spirited Sicilian wife. Being from Reggio Di Calabria makes him know about things in Sicily.
AT&T’s point of contact with the telephone administration in Italy is called Italcable. It is a first class outfit. They recalled that AT&T went out of its way to rehabilitate Italcable and its predecessors after the war. And curiously, they look upon our soldiers from World War II as friends and even mentors. We enjoyed a very warm relationship with that organization.
One of the quirks in Italian business is that many people expect to be called by their professional title. Thus, it is Engineer Spasione or Accountant Muzzalti. I always had some trouble remembering the professional titles in a group where a large number of people were gathered, so like most Americans, we simply addressed our Italcable compatriots by their first names. They seemed to like that as it distinguished us from the more starchy European representatives. And they returned the favor calling us by our given names shortly after meeting us.
Now we come to Dr. Walter Pippo. In formal meetings, even with other Italcable employees, Walter Pippo was often addressed as “Dr.” I never found out what he professed to be a Doctor of and he never explained it. I’m reasonably sure that he assumed the “Dr.” because he had no identifiable academic discipline such as Engineer. I’m sure he was not in the medical field. Walter was just a good and devoted friend who answered to “Walter.”
The given name of Walter is a bit of a story in itself. When American troops landed in Italy it was 1943 and Walter’s mother was pregnant. His father hated the Fascist regime of his government. But even more, he hated the way that Italians were treated by the Germans. He hated everything about the Germans from their forced call-up to perform manual labor to forcing Italians to serve in the German Wehrmacht, the Army. And his father hated the attempts to ship Italian Jews to German concentration camps. He obviously had no love for the Germans on any score.
Walter’s father decided that his child would be named after an American to thwart the Italian and the German authorities. And so there would be no Guido or Bennito or Mario for Walter’s father. No sir! He decided to give his new born son the American name of Walter.
When Walter grew into his sixth or seventh year, he became curious about his name. Naturally, he discovered that it is a German name. He never told his father about his discovery.
His father died happily in the knowledge that he had given his son an American name. Walter always points out that his name reflects the landing of American troops in Italy and has nothing to do with any other influence. Hurrah for Walter’s father and Hurrah for American troops in Italy.
Maybe it is as Pablo Casales said that the United States lends itself to every noble effort of mankind. Maybe so. Maybe so. At least in World War II, I believe that.
We shift scenes to the outskirts of Siracusa, or as it is referred to in English, Syracuse. It is on the southeastern coast of Sicily. It is about as poor as one could imagine. The people lived there in a sort of long range depression. It never seemed to end. And the Italian government gave no help at all. Those people after the war simply could not look for help from Rome. There is not much difference in 1998, I suppose.
Sicily grows a tough bunch of people in that climate, one of whom is married to Walter Pippo, who told this story to me. The people of Siracusa realized that there was no church in their outlying town. If they wanted to attend services, some way had to be found to take them to Syracuse, which could be a burden. And so an appeal was made to the pride of the citizens on the outskirts of Syracuse. And in time, donations were made. The local men performed much of the work in building the framework of the church.
The church was not a major edifice from the outside. It was serviceable. On the other hand, the local people wanted the inside to be a magnificent monument to their pride of having their own church. They wanted to have a tile floor like no other.
As it turns out, Libya is just across the Mediterranean from Sicily. It was a former colony of Italy. Many people there speak Italian. This would have been in the 1970’s and there was still plenty of Italian influence. And there was a depression among Libyan tile setters, considered the best in the Arab world. So it was made to order for the people of Syracuse to find the out-of-work Libyan tile setters and invite them to come to work in Sicily.
The men worked quickly setting their small one inch squares, one after another. The locals were impressed with their work. But most impressive was the beautiful design that appeared in the tile across most of the nave of the church. I think I have that right. It is the section of the church from the front of the first pew up to the alter. In St. Patrick’s, it may be 65 feet or 75 feet. In smaller churches, it may only be 15 to 20 feet in width. From Mrs. Pippo’s story, I’d guess the width of the nave would be maybe 15 to 25 feet. And all the better to see that beautiful design the Libyans had left at the front of the church.
Weddings were held in the church and the bridal party stood on the beautiful design in the nave. I suppose confirmations were held there, as well. And maybe some funerals departed with a last fond look at the tile design in the nave of that Roman Catholic Church.
In the end after three or four years of gracing the nave, a gentleman who spoke Arabic came to the church. He was so sorrowful to announce that the beautiful design actually read, from right to left: “THERE IS NO OTHER GOD BUT ALLAH – AND MOHAMMED IS HIS MESSENGER.”
Maybe the Libyans had evened up for years of Italian occupation. Or maybe it was something that every Libyan church or mosque had as its motto. But in the end, the beautiful design was covered by a carpet. It was too expensive to remove.
And so we take leave of Walter, his wife and all our other friends in Italy.
ISRAEL
Lots of memories come flooding back after all the trips to Israel. If I had to name a best friend in the world, it would be Jake Haberfeld, the Zionist who came to Israel from his native Warsaw. And there was Aryeh Ron, known formerly in Vienna as Leon Ritter, who decided it was time to leave when the Nazi’s made him clean the sidewalk near his home with a toothbrush. And then there was the large presence of Gideon Lev who ate a pair of eggs at breakfast in two bites. One bite for egg number one; one bite for egg number two.
Jake Haberfeld was as tough as Gideon Lev was, but they had different styles. Jake was polite and understanding – as was Aryeh. Gideon made some noise but in the end, he did what was right for the Israeli administration. But in no case did Jake or Gideon or Aryeh ever give anything away. Those fellows stood for something. I believe it is fair to say that I enjoyed dealing with them as much as or more than any other administration in the world. Each of them had seen combat service in the many Arab-Israeli conflicts. I suppose that lent some meaning to their efforts in negotiating with us. Hurrah for Jake, Aryeh and Gideon and their subordinates.
A transient thought jumps out here. We had been in negotiation with the three of them when it became obvious we were running up against the noon Friday deadline when the Israeli’s begin their Sabbath. We had to give the results of the meetings to the Overall Cable Steering Committee in New York, so that they could answer while the Telex operators were still at work. As we got closer to the cutoff time there was no time to summarize the whole set of negotiations. With only a few minutes left before the telex operators left for the weekend, Gideon said, “So — we’ll send a short telex.” I’m sorry that Jackie Mason isn’t here to do his routine on the virtues of short versus long telexes in the style of Gideon Lev.
There are two other thoughts that come to mind about living in Israel where, a few years back, enemies surrounded almost all of the country. To gain admission to Israel, one must pass through the Border Guards on the way in and on the way out. They are not to be fooled with. Those Uzis on their hips are not there for parades. They mean business.
In the beginning, I made a little splash of spreading my name on the entry card as “Ezra,” the scribe of Jerusalem from the Bible. After two or three printings in bold letters, it made no difference. The Border Guards still looked right through me and told me to move along. On the other hand, they were very considerate if we were headed for an Arab country. In most cases, rigorous Arab countries would not admit a person with an Israeli passport stamp. So the Border Guards did not stamp our passports. They simply stamped pieces of paper which showed entry into the country. When we left, we turned in the piece of paper and no stamp ever appeared in any of our passports.
When you leave the country, the Border Guards take you into a booth where you are frisked. Cameras are pointed toward the ceiling and the button is pushed to expose the next print. For many years I carried a ball point pen which required a motion to expose the ball point. That was pointed at the ceiling and the lever was pulled. There was an intense search, a frisk, before we got to our bags. I was glad for that.
When it came to the bags, all of us were asked if we were carrying any package for anyone else. Woe to him who said he was. Start looking for a later plane. I rarely had trouble. If they wanted to look at my bag, I had it ready to open. Rule one is you don’t mess with the Border Guards. I saw that happen when a woman in front of us represented herself as a person of some substance – in short – as a big shot. It only took a minute to call out two female Border Guards who opened her bags and went through all of them. I only stayed until we could move to an unencumbered line for the luggage check, but what I could see out of the corner of my eye, told me that the female Border Guards were going through her lingerie, girdles and everything else, in plain view of other passengers. Rule one and two is don’t mess with the Border Guards.
Maybe it’s time to leave good friends in Israel to go to the last of the Three I Countries. As we leave, I’m always impressed by what the Israeli’s have accomplished for their country. Let’s leave Bibi Netanyahu for another day.
IRELAND
The Irish are like home to many of us, even to friends who have no shamrocks in their blood. Their conversation is easy and they show a respect for others. Now if I could only get them to heat their houses. It doesn’t get much below freezing, but in a brick house with only a small electric heater in a fake fire place, the chill becomes progressively worse. With Alan Corbett and Mick Sheridan and wives, we wound up at the Sheridans. In a circle we sat facing the two watt electric heater. And it took no time for the cold to creep down from the nape of my neck to the small of my back. I’m not giving much to the conversation going on around me as I’m wondering how do these people take baths. They are not alone as in the other two I Countries, but I still think about the bath – shower situation.
Two other thoughts invade my memory right now. In the first case, the Irish rarely ever say “yes” or “no.” They say that it would be a pleasure to do what you are suggesting or they may say that it would be better to do something other than the suggestion you had to offer.
In this case, Judy, our daughter, son-in-law and a 15 month old baby started the trip from Shannon to Killarney after an overnight flight from the United States. We did pretty well until we got to a confusing turnaround some eight to ten miles from Killarney. The hotel was located on the Cork Road, which is how things are designated in this country. After two or three trips around the turnaround, we stopped and I asked a gentleman standing on the corner, “Could you tell me how we would get to Cork?” He told me that “Indeed I can.” And then he walked away. Well, he had answered my question, so he left. I finally figured out what the problem was. I asked another gentleman to tell me where Ryan’s Hotel was on the Cork Road. He almost took us there.
Now a final thought about AT&T’s Miss Mary Margaret Murphy. I suppose no one ever comes closer to a saintly life. She may not think so, but I would nominate her for at least canonization.
In the 1980’s research was a major problem because we didn’t know as much as we would like to know about why people made international phone calls, particularly from their hotel rooms. So under Tom Poretta, we gathered a few stalwarts who could ask the questions and coax some answers. This was no check the multiple choice question. It was much more of a dialogue than that.
So Margaret went to London, Lisbon and Spain. And finally she came to Dublin. She was required to go to the top-flight hotels in the morning, again in the afternoons and quite often in the early evenings. All to ask people about making calls, particularly back to the United States. This meant she had to move from one hotel to another throughout the day. Well, that was her undoing.
It turns out that an elderly cab driver worked these luxury or near-luxury hotels. And he picked up Margaret and drove her to the next hotel FOR RESEARCH. As Margaret tells it, he picked her up for the fifth or sixth time on the second day and could no longer hold his peace. The cab driver told her that he knew exactly what she was up to going from one high priced hotel to the next. She was not fooling him. He thought about calling the police but said he’d think about it and pray. In the meantime, Margaret was consigned to Hell.
I’m sure he would never believe the story about research but that’s all I have to offer in our defense. Ah well, Margaret Murphy is still my candidate for canonization.
There may be much more that we could write, but that will do for now. The friends in the Three I Countries are keepers. They are among life’s joys.
E. Carr
December 30, 1997
Essay #6 (Old Format)
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Pop got into the swing of essay-writing quite quickly, it’d appear. This is probably one of my all-time favorites. Granted, I’m unquestionably a sucker for travel writing, and a three-decade time delay only makes the pieces more interesting to me, but still.
Israel seems like a case of “the more things change, the more they stay the same” — it is still ringed by enemies, and the guards there are likely more vigilant than ever.
The Italy story reminds me of non-Chinese speakers who elect to get tattoos in Chinese characters. I’m at a loss for why people choose to do this, but I do know that people frequently get tattooed with gibberish or worse. http://hanzismatter.blogspot.com/ does a great job of documenting all the different types of failures out there — the lucky people get away with characters that are just upside down or inverted, but tons more wind up with curse words or words that completely distort the intended meaning. Tons more wind up with English words “spelled out” in characters, as if each Chinese character corresponded to an English letter. If you know so little about the language that you’re permanently embedding into your skin that you think “JOE” can be one-for-one translated into Chinese, I guess you get what you deserve. Clearly this level of ignorance didn’t stop the Italian Church either — the “this looks pretty, must be fine” — seems to have carried over to them. I guess it’s possible that they were duped, but even still: the minute you recognize that someone is tiling words into your nave, you should probably get a second opinion on what those words say.
Also one last note about the Chinese tattoo thing, just because I find it infinitely frustrating: on the rare occasions that both tattooee and tattooer manage to translate and ink a phrase properly in a language that neither speaks, the outcome is almost guaranteed to be completely inane. You wouldn’t tattoo “HEART” or “BRAVERY” or “[YOUR NAME]” down your back in huge English letters, so why are those all so popular when written in non-English letters? Writing things in a language you don’t understand doesn’t make those things more deep. Bah.