One weekend in October last year, I decided to visit Lucca. I thought I was long over due to visit it, especially since so many of my friends, particularly from the U.S. and the U.K. had said so much about it to me. So on that Saturday afternoon, I drove off to Lucca.
My first objective when I arrived to Lucca was to find my hotel which was inside the remarkable red brick walls of Lucca’s center. All I had when exited off the A11 was the name and street address of my hotel, the Hotel Universo in Piazza del Giglio 1, and an illegible map that I printed off of the Internet of the grid-patterned streets inside the walls. It appeared from the map that the hotel was not deep into the center. All I needed to do was find the closest entrance to the walled part of town and roll on to the front of the hotel. What I did not have was a map that would explain to me from which entrance to enter into the center of town. So I had to guess. My first guess was wrong. Driving through this choice of mine brought me into a labyrinth of small streets. Once or twice, I’d enter into a small piazza that I could not pin-point on my map. Finally, I saw a young traffic police officer as I was driving down a long road and I asked her if she could give me directions. She said she knew the hotel. She took my map and with my pen, she drew the route where I needed to go.
It must have been her first day on the job because she instructed me to go back outside the walls and return to one of the entrances I passed. Her route showed that I was to continue straight for a considerable distance once I was back inside. What she did not warn me was that this particular street, Via Santa Croce was the main promenade of town – and it was around 5 pm on a Saturday evening. Everybody in town seemed to be walking on that narrow street as I crawled through with my car. Eventually, a half-hour later, I made it to Via Beccheria so that I could take a left turn in order to drive past Piazza Napoleone adjacent to my destination, Piazza del Giglio.
Midway onto Via Beccheria which seemed to be turning into my life’s journey, I soon found myself facing a one-way street. I’m a block away from the hotel and it came to this. The hell with it. If a police officer tried to give me a hard time, I would just refer him to his colleague back at the other entrance who gave me these crumby directions. Now I was crossing one side of Piazza Napoleone, which I don’t think is even a street. It was more like a sidewalk. But, luckily I had just enough space for my car to drive between the trees on my right and the startled people having their coffees on my left.
Finally! I made it to Piazza del Giglio unscathed, unticketed, and unarrested. I stepped out of my car, took a well-reserved stretch and looked around the piazza. On one side of it opposite my hotel, was the Teatro del Giglio where Gioacchino Rossini’s opera, William Tell was first performed on September 17, 1831. I walked into the lobby of my hotel.
“I have a reservation.”
“Your name, please,” said Bruno, the receptionist.
“Joe Pascale.”
Bruno reminded me a little of the hotel receptionist that Meg Ryan had to contend with in Paris in the movie “French Kiss.” After Bruno conducted the usual check-in process, he looked outside the front entrance and noticed my car. “We do not have parking. You know this don’t you?”
“No, I do not know this,” I answered.
“Well, you need to move it immediately.”
“Okay. Can you tell me where there is parking?”
“Yes. Go down that block and to the right there will be parking. If no, drive outside the walls, turn right and there will be a parking lot on your left.”
“Okay. May I please leave my bags here.”
“Yes, you can put them behind the desk,” he said without looking up or pointing exactly where. I thought he was referring to the reception desk where we were standing. So I put them behind the desk. He turned around and with a disapproving look on his face, he said, “Sir, you cannot leave your bags there. They are blocking my way to get out.”
This looked somewhat true, but he said put the bags behind the desk. So I said calmly but impatiently, “Well, tell me exactly where you want me to put them. You told me to put them behind the desk.”
“I meant the other desk.”
I turned around to see a concierge’s desk in the corner.
“Oh. That desk.”
I walked out of the hotel relieved to get away from Bruno. This first encounter with Bruno was a foreboding indication of what later I was to have to deal with him that night. In the meantime, I drove to the first parking area he mentioned which turned out to be street meter parking. I was willing to settle for that, but there were no spaces. Back outside the wall, I turned right, and began looking for the parking lot on the left. Eventually, it was there. But I was also realizing what a lengthy walk it was going to be to get back to the hotel. But that was the only option.
Well, I made it back to the hotel, went up to my room to unpack and change for dinner. I went downstairs to ask Bruno if he could recommend a restaurant.
“Well, what would you like? Expensive, moderate, inexpensive?”
“What about Buca di Sant Antonio?” I had just seen a write up about it in one of my guidebooks, The Food Lover’s Companion to Tuscany, by Carla Capalbo. In it, she mentioned that it is Lucca’s most famous restaurant. I had a premonition that it might be already booked since it was a Saturday night and the tourist season was not quite over. After I mentioned this place, Bruno rolled his eyes and said down to me, “Sir. You cannot get a reservation there tonight.”
“Well, fine. What about the restaurant next door?”
“You should be able to get in without a reservation. Just go early around 7:30.”
So I had dinner and went back up to my room to get something. After being in my room for a little while, I was soon ready to go out and explore Lucca on a Saturday night. I walked to the door, turned the deadbolt to open and then turned the continental-styled doorknob. Nothing happened. Calmly, again I turned the deadbolt to open and then turned the continental-styled doorknob. Same result. I thought, “Let’s just analyze this.” I could still see the bolt between the door and the frame. Hysterically, I rapidly rotated the deadbolt back and forth and at the same time jigged the continental-styled doorknob up and down hoping that somehow the trauma I was putting the door through would somehow magically switch the bolt to the open position. I came to the rational conclusion that that wasn’t going to work. Calmly, I thought about what the next course of action should be. Pissed off, I began kicking the door and cursing at it.
“How could you be doing this to me? It’s already 10:30pm on a Saturday night and I should be going down in the elevator by now!”
I then called down to the receptionist’s desk. Bruno was still on duty.
“Hi. This is Joe Pascale in room 365 and the door lock broke so I’m trapped in my room.”
“How can I help you?”
“Well, I want you to get me out of here.”
“Okay. I will do what I can. I will try to call the owner. Please give me a few moments.”
This was a good time for me to calm down. I stretched out on the bed and watched Italian TV. I gave Bruno a good 15 minutes to come up with a solution that I would have thought was part of the hotel’s training program for emergency situations like this. I thought that I should be receiving a call from him updating me on the situation. So I called him.
“Bruno, anything happening yet to get me out of here.”
“Uh yes, I tried to call the owner but he was not available.”
“Is there someone else you can call other than him?”
“Yes, but you have to understand that it’s a Saturday night and it’s difficult to find someone working now. I working here all alone.”
I had two choices either to stay calm and reason with him or start yelling at him to do something now. I didn’t want to yell at him. But for goodness sake. I was a guest in his hotel and I was trapped in my room. I decided to go ballistic.
“Well, what are you going to do about this?” I demanded.
“I don’t know what I can do under the circumstances.”
“You have a guest in your hotel who is trapped in the room! You better figure out what to do.”
“Sirrr, stay calm. If you stay calm you’ll be out within a half hour.”
“Well what are you going to do during that half hour?”
“Well, I —”
“Do you have a locksmith here?”
“No.”
“What about the fire department?”
“The who?”
“Il vigili del fuoco, for crying out loud!”
“Sir, calm —”
“Call them NOW!” and I hung up and stirred in my frustration.
In about ten minutes, I heard sirens. I look out my window into the Piazza del Giglio. From up the street I could see the flashing lights of a two police cars and a fire truck behind them heading through the piazza to the front of the hotel. At the same time, after all it was a Saturday night, I noticed a large crowd of people who were walking over to see what the commotion was all about. “Oh, good grief.”
The phone rang. It was Bruno. “Sir. You need to open your window because that is the only way the firemen will be able to enter your room.” I opened the window and soon two firemen were headed on their way on their hydraulic latter in the direction of my room. While this was happening, more people from the Piazza Napoleone came running over to see the excitement.
The two firemen entered my room. We said hello. They seemed to have a light, but helpful, attitude about the situation. I grinned back and rolled my eyes with an expression that I hoped said, “Whatever. Just get me the hell outta here.” I wonder if they will get medals for this rescue. Hell, I should get a medal for having to deal with Bruno.
They walked over to the door with their tool box. I suppose I thought this was going to be a clean operation of nicely opening the lock and flicking the mechanism that preventing the door from opening. Instead, they used a huge wrench and hammer and started banging on the door in the vicinity of the lock. While they were doing that, I walked back to the window to see how my audience was doing. It appeared to have diminished a little I suppose because nobody jumped out of my window yet. I looked down at the fire truck and there was another fireman on the latter coming toward my room. Three guys were now banging on that damn door.
In about five minutes, they got the door open and I got my bags that I repacked. I was on my way to find another hotel. As the firemen and I walked toward the elevator, Bruno met us in the hallway and he was looking at me.
“You see. I told you to stay calm and you’d get out.”
I laughed. “Yeah, Bruno. You the man.” My rescuers stifled snickers.
Then he asked, “Where are you going?”
“To another hotel. I’m going to check what their emergency procedures are first though.”
“No. Don’t leave. We can give you another room.”
“On a lower floor?”
“Sì. On the first floor.”
“I want to see it first.”
“We go right now.”
We said good night to the firemen and then went to see the room. It was a nicer room. I put down my bags and then walked straight to the window. Opened it and looked down.
“I can jump from here, if I have to. Okay, I’ll stay.”
