Taranto, not Toronto

We arrived in Taranto, Italy, in the cover of the night – appropriate for a town that has been invaded at least four times and completely razed at least once in its 2500 year history. A glance out of my freighter window when I awoke gave a most depressing sight of a petroleum refinery spewing tons of pollutants. Taranto is an industrial city and the skyline reflected that fact. To my surprise, the giant cranes here are candy striped. Yes, they looked like giant candy canes.

People here functioned on Italian time and the inefficiencies it caused would plague me for the rest of the day. Even though the ship docked a 4:00AM, the customs agent did not arrive until 9:00. We met and he was kind enough to arrange a taxi for me and told me that I could leave by 11:00 – that was when the immigration officer would arrive and process the paperwork. I was stranded on the vessel until then even though I woke up at sunrise in order to get an early start.

Upon reaching the city at noon, I armed myself with a Gelato and began my explorations, partially to stretch the legs after two weeks of atrophy. Taranto was founded by Greeks and functioned as the capital of the colony. Over time, it was conquered by X, razed by Y and pillaged by the Z’s. In the old city, ancient Grecian columns have survived and still stand next to 200-year old infants. In the new city, Roman ruins and archaeological sites are open to the public. It was quite humbling to walk around the Archaeological Museum and see the ancient history of the local artifacts.

Halfway through the afternoon, it began to thunderstorm and I retired to my hotel. The exhaustion of the day must have caught up with me because I soon fell fast asleep. I considered setting my alarm clock but was asleep before I was able to do so. It did not matter, for Italian Inefficiency interrupted my slumber at 4:00PM. I was woken up by a knock on my door. A loud voice echoed through, “Mr Jia! This is Customs! I have an urgent matter to attend to!” I nearly jumped into my pants. In my head flew dozens of illogical explanations for all possible international crises that could have been caused by my arrival. I opened the door and there stood the customs official I had met earlier in a wet uniform jacket looking apologetic. “I am sorry to disturb you but there has been a misunderstanding. The Immigration official neglected to stamp your passport!”

He was kind enough to drive me back to the immigration building where three officials carefully inspected my passport. Keep in mind, immigration office at the port usually doesn’t have much to do. Every once and awhile there is a crew change and once in a blue moon a passenger disembarks. This was the most excitement they had in years. Eventually, the senior official got up and opened a safe on the other side of the room. He took out a lockbox and set it on the table. He ceremoniously opened the lockbox and set a large stamp on the table. I am sure that it had not been used in many months. He carefully tested it at couple of times on a blank piece of paper to check if it had any ink left and to update the date. Finally, in a regal manner, he gave my passport a long, firm, stamping.

As we left, the customs agent thanked me profusely for my troubles. It turned out that he drove around Taranto for nearly two and a half hours before tracking me down to the hotel. He offered to drop me off anywhere I wanted in the city. I thought carefully for a moment and knew exactly where I wanted to go.

“Take me to your best seafood restaurant!”

I wish every international crisis could be resolved so happily.