Shenanigans

Let’s talk about cute old men. Oh but wait, we can’t. Because old men are on longer cute. They are creepy. And they have weird intentions.

So here’s a good story.
Britney, Elaina and I spent our first two afternoons in Cortona in the Carabinieri (the local police station). No, we did not get arrested. Yes, we did go Nancy Drew on this old man in the piazza.

Let’s start at the beginning. During half time of the Italy-USA soccer game, Britney and I leave the pub where we are all watching the game and go for a walk to the city gate. We see Elaina there walking alone and decide to take the long way back together to the dorm, up through the quieter streets of the city. It is beautiful. When we reach the top of one of the big hills (Brit’s calves are looking good) we see this cute 70-year-old man with his dog. Since Cortona is only a town of 1200 people, it is custom to say hello to anyone and everyone on the street. So of course we greet the man with “Buona serra” (good evening) and we stop to talk. He speaks absolutely no English, so Elaina takes over since she knows about 12 words of Italian. He keeps saying “belle”, which means beautiful. So of course we thank him. While Elaina is talking with him she is suddenly startled and looks at me with a strange expression. I ask her what he said and she only looks at me with that same shocked expression. I look to Brit for help on what I missed and that’s when it all goes down. The old man reaches over and grabs Brit’s chest. Yeah. You weren’t expecting that were you? Brit of course steps back and out of shock all three of us lose it. It is a weird mixture of laughter and confusion. During the mayhem Mr. Creeper reaches out towards me. I throw my hands up and he grabs my arm and isn’t letting go. So that is slightly scary for a few seconds. But I pull away and Brit grabs my arm and the three of us book it down the hill. We find out on our way back that did the same thing to Elaina that he did to Brit – thus her shocked expression that I couldn’t decipher.

We mention the incident to one of our teachers later that night, and the next morning sweet old Rick, the program director, tells us we have to go fill out a police report with the Carabinieri. And that is when the real fun begins.

Imagine us three girls, our translator Enza, and six Italian policemen all in one room. They all crowd around the desk because our case is the most exciting thing to hit Cortona since Rome conquered the Etruscans. None of the Carabinieri speak any English. There are many moments when five of them are loudly speaking over each other in rapid Italian, with Enza translating as much as she can, and me cracking up from time to time because the whole situation is just ridiculous.

The police in Italy dress sharp. But don’t be fooled by the fancy leather purse they wear around their chest that looks like it holds ammunition. When I asked the police chief what it was for, he opened his up and pulled out a pack of tissues. Yep. It is only for looks. He then proceeded to show me that the ammunition is kept in the gun.

After a long day of making official statements and signing my name on a sheet of paper typed only in Italian, we have to come back the next day to officially identify the man. Since Cortona is so small, it doesn’t take long for them to find a picture of someone we think is him.

So you are probably imagining the typical criminal identification that is on TV, with the men who stand in a line, and the victim is behind a two-way mirror where the bad guys can’t see them. And the victim looks at all the options and points to the bad guy. Welp, in Cortona it is a little different. Instead of a two-way mirror they give us a bathroom window. Yep. The three of us, along with two officers, cram into a bathroom on the second floor of the Carabinieri building and take turns peering through a crack in the window down into the courtyard below. They bring our little Italian man out into the open and pretend to have a routine conversation with him while we size him up. Who needs all the fancy CSI stuff?

Sadly we still aren’t one hundred percent it is Mr Creeper. It might have to do with the fact that is was 30 feet away from where we stood in the bathroom…but who knows. Enza wants the whole thing over with, so she has us follow him. She leads us out of the station and down the street and we search through the main areas of town to see if he is hanging around. He is— chillin with his old friends having gelato. We get a closer look at him (we pretend to buy gelato and lurk around inside the store, weaving an elaborate tale about how we are waiting on a friend who is meeting us for ice cream but hasn’t shown). The old man catches on. I see it in his eyes as he connects his random meeting at the police station with our awkward lurking around the gelato shop. But it is too late for him. He is done-zo.

We return to the Carabinieri; sign a statement. Make friends with even more officers. There is one lady, Ramona, who is not much older than us and knows English pretty well. We make plans to meet with her for cappuccino later so she can practice her English and we can practice our Italian. One of the officers (who looks shockingly like the weird older brother on Everyone Loves Raymond) makes the whole experience really enjoyable. He jokes around with us and makes funny faces a lot because he knows very little English. He gives me a hard time because I keep laughing when I am supposed to be serious. But they are all glad we are light hearted about the whole situation. They want us to still feel safe in Cortona. And I do.

But we still see the old man everywhere; He usually whistles when we pass by.