I had expected an intoxicated college student when I arrived at the police station, not a fragile woman in her mid-seventies. Wearing sneakers, green slacks and a white cotton t-shirt that said Lake Michigan Unsalted, she looked like any other American tourist in Italy. She certainly didn’t look like someone who’d write graffiti on walls.
“I’m Anna Carson, your interpreter,” I said to the woman taking the seat next to hers. Her gaze was fixed belligerently on the opposite wall. Had she heard me?
“Ma’am. I’m the interpreter,” I tried again, this time louder. But she still stared unflinchingly straight ahead. Two delicate silver creoles, endless circles, were dancing round and round, dangling between locks that had come loose and I briefly wondered if those really were earrings or her hair.
I looked around: a carabiniere, not much older than me, in his late twenties or younger, sat at his desk, another carabiniere had stepped outside and was smoking a cigarette, then there was only the woman and me. This being Ferragosto, the two weeks in August when everyone in Italy is vacationing at the beach or in the mountains, it was quiet, almost peaceful. After a few minutes of sitting in silence, I realized she was not going to talk, so I rose from my seat to talk to the carabiniere instead. He explained that they had caught the woman red-handed. “Ecco,” he said, pointing at an evidence bag with a black Sharpie in it. She had also resisted arrest, he said, kicking him in the shin and he proceeded to pull up his pants revealing a reddish bruise on his lower leg.
“Wow,” I said and looked at the woman who still hadn’t moved — same position, same expression on her face. My eyes returned to the carabiniere who shrugged the Italian shrug that means I don’t know opening his arms with both palms up.
“Cos’ha scritto?” What did she write? I asked. Instead of an answer, he took out his phone and after scrolling through photos, he handed it to me pointing at the graffiti. The letters were not much taller than a toothpick. I read FUCK (in blue marker); the following word had been written over in black so that I could no longer read it. The new word was ITALY. FUCK ITALY. I looked from the phone to the carabiniere, to the woman, back to the carabiniere who was shaking his head in disbelief.
“Ha bevuto?” Is she drunk? I asked but he shook his head no in reply.
“E adesso? Cosa succede?” What is happening now?
“Eh … non lo sò,” again the I don’t know Italian shrug. He couldn’t keep a signora like this in jail overnight, she reminded him of his nonna, but she had kicked him in the shin and the graffiti… If she paid a fine? I asked. He could, perhaps, let her go, perhaps, forget about the kick? The graffiti had already been there, she’d only overwritten a word, changed it. I pointed at the different colors as he shrugged, then nodded and finally said: “Mah… Sì … Si può fare.” Sure, it’s possible.
I had only worked as an interpreter for a few months, had come to Italy right after graduating from college. So far, I’d accompanied a few Brits to emergency medical appointments and American expats to the questura to help them navigate Italian bureaucracy. This was my first time dealing with a criminal offence, and I congratulated myself for how I’d handled the situation.
I headed back to the woman squatting in front of her, so we were face to face.
“Ok. Good news,” I said. “If you pay a fine, he’ll forget about the incident.”
I expected gratitude or relief, instead, she turned away without a word, clutching her handbag between arms folded across her chest, her mouth turned downwards. She reminded me of Mauro, my friend’s two-year old son, when his mother tried to feed him broccoli. Would she throw the handbag at me?
“Do you want to spend your vacation in jail?” I asked, my voice a little too loud, I couldn’t hide my frustration. “Because this is where you’re headed if you refuse to talk to me and the cop.” Again, no response. I was getting nowhere. I glanced at my phone. Almost eleven pm. If I didn’t want to spend the whole night at the police station, I needed a different approach. Understanding? Something like I can see your anger …? That never worked with Mauro, but I could try.
“You didn’t write FUCK and you overwrote the word that followed, the word upset you. What was it?”
Her eyes met mine. She looked at me intently.
“Ellen!” A man was rushing down the hallway. Her eyes followed the man’s voice, her face softened. Now she looked like someone who had just passed a difficult exam.
I rose to give him some space. He sat down next to her. He was a pudgy man with thick gray hair elegantly combed back.
“Are you ok?” He took her hand. I noticed their wedding rings. “You said you were tired, wanted to get back to the hotel, next thing I know you’re at the police station.” Ellen was gazing at their intertwined hands but didn’t reply.
“Ellen?” He tried again. I was still standing there, unsure of whether I should take a step back or introduce myself when he looked up at me.
“I’m Anna Carson, the interpreter. Your tour guide called my agency,” I said.
“What happened? Why is my wife here?”
“She was caught writing on a wall —” He looked incredulously from me to his wife who looked down at her shoes.
“What! What did she write?”
“FUCK ITALY.”
“What!” He turned to his wife. “I don’t understand. For years, you’ve been learning Italian, talking about visiting Italy, about your grandmother’s food. Amatriciana alla giudia, pizza ebraica … Now we’re finally here everything’s beautiful, then you’re suddenly sullen and quiet. You want to go home early. And now this? FUCK ITALY?”
“Well, technically speaking she only wrote ITALY. FUCK was already there —” I tried to soften the blow, but the husband ignored me. He kept his face turned to his wife whose gaze was on the opposite wall again.
“I’ll give you some space,” I said, retreating into a corner. While husband and wife spoke in low agitated voices, I pulled out my phone, pretending to be busy.
“Where do I pay the fine?” The husband was standing before me. Startled, I almost dropped my phone. I guided him to the carabiniere’s desk.
Half an hour later, I drove the couple back to the hotel. Ellen was sitting behind me, Stephen on the passenger seat. None of us spoke. My eyes were on the road. Through the rolled-up windows echoed the brrt-brrt of a motorino, pop music and laughter. We passed teenagers huddled in a group, a couple arm in arm, illuminated shop windows — Everything was alive on the other side of the glass whereas in our enclosed space, it was as lonely as in a hearse.
“I’m not crazy. What I did was childish and stupid,” Ellen said. I felt something like excitement to finally hear her speak. I still wanted to know why she’d written FUCK ITALY on a wall. “I’m shocked how openly anti-Israel Italy is,” she continued. “Posters are everywhere: Israel commits genocide, Hamas terrorists are freedom fighters. On the wall near the train station, someone wrote Israele criminale, Israel is a criminal. Tonight, walking back to the hotel, I came across FUCK ISRAEL, and I got so angry, I changed it to ITALY —”
That had upset her? I rolled my eyes. I couldn’t understand the American generation that defended Israel at all costs. The war in Gaza, the oppression of the Palestinian people and yes, the genocide were fucked up. She had to agree, how could she not? Besides, this was not Europe in the 1930s. Jews had no reason to be afraid. On my campus since October 7, there’d only been one swastika sprayed onto the Hillel building.
“This morning,” Ellen continued. “I was waiting behind a man at reception to ask for clean towels and I overheard him say something about the religious Jews staying at the Kosher Hotel across the street. My Italian is not good, but I understood puzza, heard the word soldi. I confronted him, asked him in English if he’d said Jews stink and have money because I’m a Jew, too, I said. He avoided my eyes but kept talking. The Jews are estremi, not turning on lights on Saturday, he said, as if I weren’t there. I tried to explain, it’s one of the Shabbat rules. Again, he ignored me, spoke to the receptionist instead. She didn’t even seem embarrassed as if this were a conversation about the weather. I stormed out, it was frustrating and pointless,” she paused. “People don’t care about antisemitism. They don’t care about October 7 or the hostages in Gaza. What’s happening to innocent Palestinians is a tragedy, but there are two sides and only one is seen and heard. We’re not seen and heard. We’re dismissed as overreacting or playing victims. I feel empty and lonely inside. A deep sadness. There’s us, there’s them —”
Stephen shifted in his seat. “We’ll be fine, honey. We’ll be fine,” he said, but that was not what he thought. I perceived doubt in his voice.
Both numbly stared at the window again, a wall separating them from the outside world. I looked into the rearview mirror. Ellen had pulled up her curls in a neat bun — no lock was out of place —, her face was gaunt and pale, and I noticed she had lost one of her silver creoles.
Anna was born in New York City to an ethnic German-Ukrainian father and Italian mother and grew up near Munich, Germany. Whenever she has a spare moment, she reads poetry and prose in English, Italian and German. She also enjoys writing short fiction and translating literature from the German and Italian. She is drawn to topics of identity, (intergenerational) trauma and health issues.