👉 Italiano
The tactic of Gab from Cavtat
In July 2021, I spent a few days in Cavtat, a seaside town near Dubrovnik, Croatia. Here I met my new friend Gab, who came to visit me almost every day, usually around lunchtime. Gab is crazy about anything which contains cheese. And since I always had some with me, I was able to have the pleasure of his company. We chatted for a while, sometimes we even fell asleep by the sea. A few days ago Gab asked me to be able to write a Guest Post on my website and I gladly agreed. Ah, I forgot: Gab is a young seagull.
Cavtat from above: everyone tells me it's beautiful. For me it is the everyday landscape, but more and more often I meet entranced guests. They tell me that they have already had a glimpse of it coming from something they call an "airport". Oh yes, even humans in a very clumsy way have found a way to fly. I've been meeting a lot of them lately, but maybe they aren't too many either. Other older seagulls tell me that in past years there were many more. But I wasn't born yet, I can't know. Then, also, some have told me that for a short time humans have thinned out a lot, holed up who knows where. Thus, beyond the luxuriant green of the inner part and before the bright shades of blue of the sea that quickly descends, the multitude of multicolored dots, which today always attract me in my aerial views, suddenly disappeared on the soft gray of the stony beaches.
My older seagull friends then tried to explain to me what had happened. I confess that I've understood, but not entirely. I got the part that for me it would mean staying away from the other seagulls. And that's fine too, because there is enough sky for everyone. But I have some difficulty in understanding the concept of border. I mean, they told me that one of the borders is on that mountain over there. I have no desire to fly there, but I asked: "And what's after the border on the mountain?"
"A little more mountain." This was the answer.
Okay, I give up.
I was saying, among all these colorful returning dots, a couple of weeks ago I met a guy with a weird name. He said his name was Stray Idler. He didn't seem particularly smart, I have to admit, but he always had some great cheese bureks with him, which I love. Sure, he wasn't as good as those humans who give me cheese directly, but still okay. So I stopped several times for lunch with him and I chatted with him. A quiet type, who alternated short baths in the water with long exposures in the shade. In fact, he said his skin is so sensitive that he can't afford to go out in the sun, except for diving. And then he wore the shirt even on the beach and was, therefore, more conspicuously colored than the others. That's how I first noticed him. Now that he's gone, I miss his bureks... Above all, I miss his wife, who is actually the one who passed me food.
I asked him why he came to Cavtat, how he found out about this place. He was very honest with me. He told me that the previous month he had already been in the area. By plane, still that human thing that imitates flight, he had arrived in Dubrovnik and from there he had visited a little bit all of Croatia. They explained to me that the famous "borders" delimit a place with that name. And from there he took a catamaran (humans' crude way of imitating amphibians) to go to Split. Then he kept going around. He had been to Zadar, then to see the Plitvice lakes and finally to the capital, Zagreb. I would like to see Plitvice Lakes, but I don't know if I'll ever want to fly there. Instead, "capital" is another nonsense word for me. Who knows if I will ever get used to the language of humans... Anyway, just as he was on his way to Dubrovnik, Stray Idler had noticed Cavtat from the window of the bus and was struck by it. So much to go back to? Not exactly.
I ate a piece of burek, fluttered around in circles and then asked him: "So why did you come back here, only a month later?" I don't know if I'll be able to explain his answer, because the human world is a little too complex. To say, just last month I saw them cheer, sometimes celebrate, watching other humans running after a ball. They showed me many things about it, but I'm a young seagull and the others say I still need to eat a lot of pasta*. I don't disdain it, but I prefer cheese.
*Italian way of saying that indicates that one is still short of experience in something or in life
I mean, my friend Stray Idler actually was planning to go to the Balkans nearby. But then he realized that for too complicated issues between humans... Borders, rules, limits, that stuff... For a whole series of reasons, which he had not considered well at the beginning, his return would have been pretty complicated. And he might even have had problems with his employer. Now what an employer is... I don't know, but that's what he told me. And so he had retired for a quiet seaside holiday in a place that he had liked from the first glance, having already bought a ticket to get on one of those flying things.
The next day, after another good meal offered by my friend and a consecutive nap, I was intrigued again. "But how many days will you stay here in Cavtat, Stray?"
S: "Another couple of days."
G: "Are you going home then?"
S: "Yes, but just for a day or two."
G: "And then where will you go?"
S: “I don't know. Somewhere I'll go." he said to me, keeping his eyes on the sea.
He blew me away, I admit. Positively at first. I believed that my friend was truly a mentally free person, that he was able to identify the most propitious flow day after day, that he could very well hold the helm of his thoughts. I was wrong. Stray is actually a hesitant type, almost tormented by the decisions to be made, with the desire to escape, but little courage to do so.
S: "You know, I'm considering: I'd like to go to Cyprus, the only country in the European Union that I haven't visited yet."
G: "I heard about Cyprus, but what is the European Union?"
S: "Forget it... Then I discovered that there are two rather distant places, which however count as France and it is possible to go there: Guadeloupe and Martinique."
G: "I'm not understanding that much."
S: "Maybe me neither, but trust me: it's as I say."
G: "Ok, and why don't you go there?"
At that point, Stray began a very boring digression on the current period, on all the rules and risks of traveling to places near and far. I already knew some elements, but I let him speak. In any case, I found that in Cyprus there was a growing moment of something called an "epidemic" and that it wouldn't be unlikely for him to get stuck due to something he called "tracing". Instead, those faraway places he mentioned were even more at risk of something that those called French refer to as "confinement", which sounds even stranger to me than "border".
(Note from Stray Idler: Guadeloupe and Martinique actually put in place additional restrictions about a week later)
G: “You are Italian, Stray. Isn't it?"
S: "Yes, now have you learned about the various countries, Gab?"
G: “I learned something last month, when you were all crowded together to watch some guys behind a ball. And I also learned something about you Italians. "
S: “What, Gab? Tell me."
G: "Am I wrong or are you considered the world masters of defensive play?"
S: "Well, it's a slightly yellowed and reductive view of our way of playing, but in general it's true."
G: “So why don't you do what you should be good at for your culture? Defend yourself. "
S: "What do you mean, Gab?"
G: “I mean, what's the point of trying to visit all these new places if you have to take a too big risk? In the end, it is not necessary to score many goals, but only to concede one less than the opponent."
S: "Are you suggesting that I get defensive, so should I stay close to home or even home?"
G: “I didn't mean that, but tell me... Do you feel threatened here in Cavtat? You came here and you scored your goal. Do you think you are going to concede one now? Are you afraid of getting stuck?"
S: “Actually, not much. The only place where they traced me was the plane. Maybe the apartment, where, however, I don't meet anyone. Otherwise it would be quite difficult to trace back to me. It is also true that I have had very little contact with anyone. Apart from you, Gab. "
G: “Okay, I see you understand. Then try to be Italian: another shy goal and then everyone behind."
S: “I'll think about it, Gab. I'll think about it."
G: You know, this thing about getting stuck sounds very strange to me. I mean, I have wings and I can't use them? You humans are weird, you have your own methods, I accept that. But... It's all very strange, that's it."
S: “It works like this, Gab. That's how it is."
A couple of days later, Stray got on the flying iron cylinder again. And I started wandering in my borderless world. Perhaps precisely because it doesn't have them, I don't feel the need to explore it so much.
But then where did my friend go? I don't know, I just know that a few days later I thought I heard a distant "oh-ohohoh-ohoh-oh".
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