In montagna, part 3: the back of your neck

As part of this whole climb-frigging-mountains-in-really-clompy-shoes extravaganza, we are staying overnight in a hostel. This is an exciting experience, because I've never stayed in a hostel with a bunch of strangers before. (Well, okay, my friend is there too... but also a bunch of strangers). Despite concerns over whether or not it will be a disgusting filthy hole where I will be scared to shower, I am game. It will be exciting.

It turns out to be kind of a field study on how Italians operate. First of all, you know those Havaianas flip-flops? I have two pairs, and have happily worn them out to do my grocery shopping and other stuff casual stuff here in Italy... or to do pretty much anything, really, in America. You should know that Italians use them as house shoes. We get into the room, and people start unpacking. I'm in the room with my friend and three other ladies and one man, and five pairs of Havaianas in various colors plop down onto the floor, one after the other. I watch them out of the corner of my eye and carefully unpack a towel to pass the time. I have packed only my (new! sexy!) hiking boots and a pair of decent-looking flip-flops for all other purposes. I have not packed another pair to use as house shoes. Oops.

We go on our hike around the distinclty non-flat island, scrabbling up what seem like kilometers and kilometers up vertically oriented rock, only to rest on another big rock that slopes gently down into nothingness. Okay, full disclosure: it actually slopes gently down into nothingness and then the sea is about three hundred meters below that. But it might as well just be nothingness. With rocks at the bottom.

Then we sit in a piazzetta and eat focaccia and drink lambrusco and listen to one of the group leaders singing in dialect. This is vastly entertaining, and if I could remember all the words to this one song, I'm pretty sure that I could swear quite crudely in Bolognese. Sadly, I can't remember the words to the song, and I'm not sure just humming the tune would have the same effect. Pity.

Next, it is time for bed. I politely let everyone else use the bathroom before me, sitting on the edge of my bed, which creaks but seems clean and contains no bugs (I checked). They all slip on their specially designated pair of flip-flops, and shuffle into the bathroom and run the water for a while and then come back out and climb into bed. I sit and listen to the guy whose singing can still be heard from the piazzetta, floating in through the open window.

Finally, after my turn, we are all ready and in bed. I am about to start wishing people a good night and get on with the business of trying to sleep, but it is a good thing that my words come out slowly because we are not actually ready for sleeping. There is one more problem to resolve.

"Ma, come facciamo per la finestra?" (What are we going to do about the window?) says one of the Italians. We all turn our eyes to the window. I can't quite tell what's wrong with it - it's open about three inches and a nice breeze is coming through it, along with that guy's singing. For a moment, I wonder if they are offended by the singing, and consider saying that he will probably stop soon. I mean, he has to get up tomorrow, too, just like the rest of us.

Again, it is a good thing I keep my mouth shut, because that is not the problem, either.

"You're right. If we leave it like that, the breeze will come in, and then... the back of your neck..." one woman trails off uncertainly and another one picks up where she left off.

"Yes, if it gets the back of your neck in the wrong way...."

"Yes. We're definitely not wearing warm enough pajamas for that," finishes off another. She's wearing long pants that look fleecy, and a sweatshirt.

All five of them look warily at the window, as if it they had caught it conspiring against them on purpose. No, seriously, though. I wish I had videotaped this scene. It's like the facial expression that people do in scary movies for kids when a door creaks open and everyone suspects a ghost or whatever will come through. Except this was an innocent window with the pleasant warmth of Liguria in mid-May on the other side.

In the end, after a few long moments of staring significantly at the window, someone does the brave thing and closes it. Then they comment for a while on how that is a good decision, and can you imagine what state we would have been in the next day if we had left it open?!

Thank goodness we dodged that one.

The next morning, it is a little grey and window out, and threatens rain.

"But will it be safe to hike?" I ask, somewhat intimidated by the big storm clouds rolling determinedly across the sky. I'm picturing those vertical-ish and gently-sloping-into-nothingness rocks from yesterday, except now slippery with rain. It is not a pretty picture. I'm clumsy to start with. I do not want to break an ankle. Or my spine. Or fall off altogether and die in the nothingness.

"Yes, of course!" says one guy heartily. "You just need some good shoes and your sticks!"

I don't have sticks.

In the end, it isn't actually that slippery. So, we climb up and up and up and up and then across those gently-sloping rocks (more of them, and still pretty much into nothingness) and it is as I am holding my breath to get across one, hoping that this will either help me balance and not fall off, or otherwise just avoid nervous breakdown, that I notice the two women in front of me are gamely trotting across the thing while hurriedly pulling their jackets on.

"Yes, now that we're sweating..." says one of them.

"Definitely. If the breeze hits the back of our necks while we're sweating..."

I don't roll my eyes, because then I would probably fall of the rock. But... really?