Over the past week, I’ve been writing a lot. There’s an inexplicable alchemy to travel that either dams the literary flow or gets my creative juices flowing. On holiday in Italy with my parents, I’m delighted that the latter has been true.
And so I thought what better way to put 2023 to bed than to share pages from my travel-stained journal. The three entries that follow are sequential and have been slightly edited to make your reading journey easier.
But first, a thank you. December is a month of reflections, and as I reflect on the journey we’ve shared through Infinity Inklings — 20 editions today, of exploring together — I am immensely grateful. Thank you, dear reader, for giving my little newsletter space every Wednesday. It means more to me than I can put into words.
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Italy through my journal
Thursday, 21 December 2023. Roma.
Buongiorno, Roma!
Returning to Italy feels like coming home, although it’s been a while since my last visit, which was to Sicily in 2022. As our taxi makes its way to the vibrant neighbourhood of Monti through the city’s traffic, memories from that Sicilian holiday flood back.
I look through my iPhone album and a once-overlooked photograph stands out and takes on a new meaning. This image, a simple snapshot of the Ionian sea from the bow of a boat I had rented, I now realize, stands as a metaphor for the year ahead.
The photo in question.
The image illustrates tranquility — the near-clear sea is serene, the waves soft, and the sky azure. To me it evokes the sense of a canvas of boundless opportunities, uncrafted memories and unwritten pages. It’s as if 2024 is saying: “The world is your oyster,” and “the open seas are yours to sail.”
Beneath me, the steadfastness of the boat serves as a symbol of the relative privilege that cushions many of us — a privilege that equips us with the means to steer through life’s unpredictable currents. The skewed horizon, meanwhile, reminds me of the adage “through a glass darkly,” which is a nod to the imperfect lens through which we often see our reality. Yet, it entices us, with a promise of discovery, however arduous the travel.
In a way, this photograph, in all its candid glory, will help me sail to 2024. As I look forward to next month, I gaze both backwards and forwards, just like Janus, the deity the month is named after. With one head, I feel gratitude for the year past — thankful for the new relationships formed and old ones sustained, all the experiences had, and the patterns both abandoned and adopted. With the other, I firmly look ahead, eyes set on the unknown horizon of tomorrow.
In the vein of this entry, I am manifesting a 2024 filled with strength to navigate any of life’s challenges — for myself and for you, dear reader.
Friday, 22nd December 2023. Roma.
A quintessentially Roman view.
The first entry of the day starts thus:
“It’s the puzzle of Rome that mesmerizes: its patience, its stratigraphy, Tiber mud gumming up the past, wind carrying dust from Africa, rain pulling down ruins, and the accumulated weight of centuries compacting everything tighter, transubstantiating all stones into one,” writes Anthony Doerr, in the book I’m reading while we sip an aperitivo in Campo de’ Fiori.
Doerr’s writing is mesmerizing, and I catch myself stumbling on passages from his book that I wish I had written myself.
Inspired, I make a list of my observations in my own words on the next page — phrases, that I hope, may eventually find their way in a Roman story:
byzantine streets, dotted with many shades of sepia …
cracking and crumbling facades of storied buildings, covered in graffiti …
sunkissed domes, with bright cloudless skies …
getting lost in the arteries of the Eternal City, amongst its cobblestones and quaint trattorias …
ivy-draped, battling the tides of time …
milky-white marbles from a bygone era …
a city veiled in the smell of espresso …
A view from one of the side alleys from where we were sat in Campo de' Fiori.
I read another five pages and then pause. I write some more:
Same as with food, there are two types of books — on the one hand, we have those compelling page-turners, the unputdownables, and the dishes that sweep us away wanting more. They make us forget where we are, engulfing us in their captivating narratives or tantalizing flavors, and transport us into a magical world.
But then, there’s the other kind — the rarer, more exquisite variety. These are the books that don’t just tell a story, but ignite a fire within you. Every word, every sentence nudges you to pause, to ponder, to explore further, to discover — and maybe write.
I read yesterday about Italy’s Slow Food movement, which took off in the 1980s in response to the first McDonald’s opening its doors in Rome’s Piazza di Spagna. Angry Romans took to the streets to protest what they saw as a fast-food chain taking over their livelihood, culture, and love for savouring food slowly.
I can’t help but draw a parallel between that and reading. In today’s era of a 24-hour news cycle and swift consumption, maybe there is something in it for a slow reading movement in response to a society perennially chasing the next Goodreads badge.
On that note, do I think I can read 52 books in 2024?
Some books demand your full attention, urging you to savor each sentence, to relish the metaphors and the experience. Just as you need to relish every flavour and every texture of the Carciofi alla Giudia — or Roman artichoke — a dish that doesn’t satiate your hunger as much as enriches your soul, carrying with it centuries of history and gallons of extra virgin olive oil.
Anthony Doerr’s Four Seasons in Rome perfectly embodies this rare breed of book. It’s a masterpiece that doesn’t just narrate but inspires — I’ve been reading it for 3 days and I’m only halfway through, and not for want of trying. But because, as I wander through Rome, I often find myself in Doerr’s world; one that was previously a stranger to me. And I find myself stopping and creating my own stories and transcribing my own observations — even some that go so far as to disagree with the author.
That evening, I look into it and realize that someone else has already come up with the concept of slow reading. I add this quote:
“If you want the deep experience of a book, if you want to internalise it, to mix an author’s ideas with your own and make it a more personal experience, you have to read it slowly.”
The final entry of the day is completely unrelated:
Today, on the way back from Campo de’ Fiori, we took a path I hadn’t before and stumbled upon a previously unseen cathedral. Chiesa di Sant’Ignazio di Loyola — dedicated to the founder of theJesuit Order — was breathtaking, and included some of the most beautiful frescoes I’ve ever seen. The illusionistic perspective of Andrea Pozzo’s trompe-l’œil dome, I read there, set the standard for the Late Baroque ceiling frescos for several generations throughout Europe.
The interior of Chiesa di Sant'Ignazio di Loyola, including Andrea Pozzo's famous frescoes.
I am reminded yet again that every corner of Rome is beautiful, even the ones not in a guidebook. My only frustration? For all of the city’s grandeur, it can sometimes be a bit much. Too many cathedrals, too many ruins, … too many tourists. Rome is as overwhelming as the details of its art is intricate.
Tuesday, 26 December 2023. Firenze.
Stepping off the train in Florence today, my first stop was La Feltrinelli, the iconic bookshop in the city’s Santa Maria Novella station. There’s an inexplicable charm to station bookshops, a place where normal rules seem suspended, and even the act of buying a book feels like a whimsical indulgence.
It was here, while waiting for un caffè at their in-house bar, I discovered Diana Athill’s A Florence Diary, a beautifully bound account of her journey to this very city in the August of 1947.
The preface alone was captivating enough to justify the steep price — extortionate anywhere else, but in places like this, the usual constraints of money seems to lose its grip on me. To an extent it’s the concept of sunk cost: if you’ve spent so much money traveling to a place already, another €15 for a travelogue you had previously not known existed isn’t going to have a major impact.
Stations — be they train-, bus-, or plane- ones — are a liminal world of their own. Although the romance between books and travel is well-known, what’s less explored is the physical manifestation of this love: The quintessential and ubiquitous station bookstore. Here, time and reality bends, creating possibilities not found elsewhere. It’s a place that helps materialize the idea that many of us carry — an idea of traveling with a notebook, travelogue, and map in hand, documenting the eccentricities of a foreign land if not for others back home (or online), but for ourselves, as if we are all following in the famed footsteps of Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta.
I’ve always had a soft spot for mid-journey non-fiction travel-reading. There’s nothing more beautiful than visualizing another person’s journey — both practical or metaphorical — in the land you’re stepping.
“Florence didn’t feel like home,” Athill says early on in the preface, “Its great charm lay in its unlikeness to home — in its being so enchantingly ‘elsewhere’.” Time will tell if I agree.
I hope you’ve enjoyed Infinity Inklings in its inaugural year. I’d love to hear your thoughts and suggestions on what you’d like me to write next — feel free to hit reply and share your impressions.
Hope you have a fun-filled last few days of the year, and I’ll see you in 2024!
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