February 20, 2020

La Sedia di Marco

If you find yourself in Florence, you should do yourself a favor and visit the Gran Sinagoga de Florencia. It really is a thing of beauty. Once inside, the security guard will likely take your camera and phone, walk seven rows down the middle pathway and then find the seat on the left aisle. Go ahead and sit down. You are allowed. The Sinagoga is a bit dark but if you squint you can make out the ceremonial plaque on the seat right in front of you. Do you see it? Yup. Zevy Marco. I dedicated that seat to my late father. He loved speaking Italian. He loved Italian food. To his dying day he answered the phone with a brusque traditional Italian ‘pronto.’ It is a fitting tribute. I think he would have been happy. I think he would have been proud. Never mind that I was just trying to hide from a woman.

I had been in Tuscany for five days with a group of friends on a bespoke cycling trip. The cycling had been very hard.  A lot of hills. A lot of climbing. There was always the option of taking a break and going into the support van but I kinda had a thing for Carolina, our tour guide, and I didn’t want her to think I was a wimp. Although I suspect she had already figured it out. Anyway, day six was a tour day in Florence. Carolina had planned a very packed day. The Uffizi Gallery, the famed leather market, and the Duomo.

The Uffizi was great. I didn’t really see much of the museum but it had world-class bathrooms and I bought six postcards of the David in the gift shop. I bought a bomber jacket at the leather market. When I tried it on, Carolina said I looked very dashing. Maybe that is why I was the first guy in the history of the leather market to pay asking price. The shopkeeper felt so bad that he threw in a belt. Lunch was going to be homemade pasta al fresco in a small family restaurant overlooking the Arno.

So here’s the thing.

The friends I had been travelling with are all modern Orthodox Jews. They kept kosher.  Which meant we had been eating pasta and fish for five days.

I love pasta.

I don’t hate fish.

But five days in a row.

I needed a piece of meat.

Now, I don’t keep kosher but I figured my friend Elan would come with me. Am not sure how he had lasted this long. So I had looked up kosher restaurants in Florence. There was one near the Sinagoga. It was called Tel Aviv Bene. It served beef kebobs on a bed of rice pilaf.

Beef kabobs.

I turn to Elan and say, “What do you think of going for some kosher beef kabobs? There is a restaurant right next to the synagogue.”

“Beef kabobs?”

I say, “Yeah.”

He thinks about it but then shakes his head. “I would love to but we shouldn’t leave the group.”

I say, “I guess you're right.”

Looked like day six of pasta.

But then a voice piped up. “I’ll go.” I turned around and saw it came from Elan’s wife, Malka.

I said, “You’ll go?”

She said, “Yes.”

Elan was besides himself. “You want to go for beef kebobs?”

Malka said, “No, but I wouldn’t mind going to the Sinagoga.” She turns to me and says, “Deal?”

I smiled and replied, “Deal.”

So Malka and I go to Tel Aviv Bene. I have the beef kabobs. They are delish. Malka has a salad. We walk next door to the Sinagoga. It really is beautiful. A tour is about to start. To tell the truth, am feeling pretty pleased with how it all turned out. I really had no interest in going to the Duomo.

But that feeling is ephemeral.

All of a sudden, I see Heather Lewis.

Of all the kosher-beef-kabob-adjacent Sinagogas in the world… Well, you get the drift.

Heather Lewis and I used to date. It did not end well. There was the whole movie theatre incident.

Malka is busy putting on her headphones for the guided tour. I gently remove the headphone from her head and whisper in her ear.

“That is Heather Lewis.”

Now, Elan and Malka are really good friends of mine.  They know the Heather Lewis movie theatre story.

“What is she doing here?” asks Malka.

I say, “How the hell should I know? People go to Italy. They go to Florence. They go to the Sinagoga.”

Malka gives me a bemused smile.

She says, “It’s pretty funny actually. You just had to have beef kabobs. Are you going to say hello?”

“Of course I’m not going to say hello. I’m going to go and hide.”

She is about to tell me to be a man. Not be such a wimp. But she sees the look of absolute fear in my eyes and takes pity on me. “Okay, I’ll meet you outside later.”

The tour turns right.

I slink off to the left.

I find myself in front of a door which says ufficio. It is the Sinagoga office. I walk in.  Behind the desk sits a portly bald man. He shouts out a very loud, “Buongiarno.” Like he hasn’t seen a human in three weeks. He then says something in Italian which I presume is along the lines of “how can I help you?” I say, “I am just trying to hide from a woman.”  No, I don’t say that. I say, “Scusi, I got separated from my group.” He says, “Ah, very good, very good.” It isn’t entirely clear to me if he speaks any English. Then we just stand in silence for a few seconds. I think to myself, okay, I can do this for a while. And then, it turns out he does speak English, he says, “Do you want to buy a chair?”

A year later, the family is all out for dinner at an Italian restaurant in Thornhill, the Toronto suburb where my brother lives. We run into a friend of Caroline, my sister-in-law. She comes over to say hello. She is very excited.

She says to my mother:

“Mrs. Zevy,” she is gushing with excitement, “We just got back from Italy. We went to Florence. We went to the Sinagoga. We sat on the Marco Zevy chair!” She pulls out her phone. She has taken some pictures.

“Yes,” my mother says proudly, “my son bought him that chair. He is a good boy.”

I nod my head. “It is true. I am a good boy.”

Well, maybe not good.  But as my father used to say:

Non troppo malle.

Not too bad.

The end.