Love Locks on Ponte Milvio - a Rome tradition from popular teen novels?

 

These "love locks" seem to be in many cities these days. We saw them for the first time on Ponte Milvio in Rome (above), and assumed that was the only place they were then, and that the idea had spread. 

Above, Moccia with his first book translated
into English.

This year, while reading the first book in Federico Moccia's exceedingly popular contemporary Roman teen trilogy, I learned that Moccia's novels (specifically the 2006 "Ho Voglia di Te") are considered the source of the love locks (or are they?).

In an interview for the New York Times last March, Moccia said the idea came to him when he was in the army. "We had these locks for our bags, and when their service was over, people would attach them to the barracks fence....I thought it would be nice to turn a military thing into its opposite - make love, not war." He takes credit, the article says, for placing the first lock on Ponte Milvio. 

"Dianne, Jerry, Bill, Judy"

We put our own locks on (with good friends visiting from the US) in 2008, not too much later from that first act by Moccia. The locks were already exceedingly popular, with lock salesmen set up on the bridge, as the photos here show.

Bill and Jerry discuss with Judy, right,
which lock to buy - On Ponte Milvio.

Doing a bit of digging, I discovered the "love locks" originated not in Rome but 100 years earlier in Serbia during World War I. Nada and Relja, engaged lovers separated by the war, were separated for good when the young man did not return from the fighting because he had fallen in love with a woman from Corfu. Nada died of a broken heart. The women of the town, Vrnjačka Banja, bought padlocks, wrote their names on them, attached them to the bridge where Nada and Relja used to meet, and threw the keys in the river - all to protect their love. The name of the bridge always had been "The Bridge of Love" (Most ljubavi). The whole story is here. 

Cutting off locks on Ponte Milvio (likely
there goes ours).

Since the fad started in the 2000s, bridges all over the world have become burdened with locks, so much so that some bridges developed structural problems and locks are routinely cut off (see photo right). In some places special frames are set up for the locks. Somehow this seems too civilized for me, taking the raciness and perhaps love out of it. Below, a lock frame set in Toronto's Distillery District (October 2021).

Lock frame (I recall it spells out "LOVE")
in Toronto this year.

Moccia's novels continue to be popular as well, something of a mystery to us, though admittedly we're not the target demographic. The author's effort to get published is the best story here. He started writing the first novel, "One Step to You" (in Italian, "Tre metri sopra il cielo") in the 1980s. Failing at finding a decent publisher, he paid a small publisher to release it. The 3,000 copies sold out quickly but then the publisher closed before any reprints were made. Photocopies of the novel circulated and it gained cult status (reminds me of "Peyton Place" circulating in my day), apparently especially among Roma Nord teenagers, where it's set. It's now 2 film versions and multiple translations later. With the large Feltrinelli publishing house behind him, Moccia's books sold over a million copies when released in a 2004 edition. The English language edition of the first book was published just this year; the next two are slated for next year.

Set in northern Rome, which has wealthy enclaves as well as some substandard housing, the trilogy highlights many aspects of that end of the city, including Ponte Milvio itself and cafes and hangouts in the Flaminio district south across the river. To that extent, we enjoyed the novel. 

Ponte Milvio, locks restrained.

The story is a classic: rich girl/poor boy, good family/unstable family, diligent student/truant. It's so outlandish and caricatured that we found it close to laughable. But, could 1 million readers be wrong? Are we missing empathy with teenage culture of the 1980s and 1990s?  

Almost laughable, but this was the closest I
could find to a photo of a woman sitting
backwards - here she appears to be calmly
 going to market on the back of a scooter -
 hardly a racing motorcycle in the dark nights of Rome.

Several incidents involve racing motorcycles at night on city streets, with the girl riding backwards behind the guy, tied to him via a belt. Based on the brand of fashionable belts, Chamomile, the young women are called "chamomile." So Step, the truant who has put at least one person in a coma with his fighting, talks Babi, the studious young woman, into being his chamomile. There are other, fairly uncivil acts that take place in the novel (like running out of country restaurants without paying), making us question the source of its popularity. Still, if this sort of teen activity interests you, and many claim it's all based on true incidents, go for it.  We're stopping at the first book.

Dianne

Genazzano: The Art and Science of Fried Dough

Not long ago we found ourselves among thousands (literally) of others, wandering the streets of Genazzano, a hilltown to Rome's east, just beyond Palestrina.  The sun had set, and the teens were off by themselves at the end of town, some (of the boys) engaging in mock combat, others sitting on the ground in groups in a dark piazza framed on one side by ancient aqueducts and on the other by a sensational view of the valley and the Lepini mountains beyond.  They knew what they were doing.

We spent most of our time on the town's main streets, people watching, at once entertained and bored by an improvisational dance troup of limited talent and a New Orleans-style jazz band doing their version of Dixieland.

Eating was the order of the evening--several of the piazzas had been strung with wire that was then draped with cut branches, creating arbor-like open-air restaurants. 

We had already dined at our 3-star Hotel Cremona, but Dianne's sweet tooth beckoned, and she lined up for that festival staple, fried dough with sugar, sensibly rejecting the alternatives: fried dough with salt or smeared with Nutella, a commercial product made of chocolate and hazel nuts.  The sign at the booth labeled these concoctions "Pizze Fritte [literally, fried pizzas] Da Sora Cesira [by Sister/Nun Cesira]."  Probably the best translation would be "Sister Cesira's Fried Dough."  1 Euro. 

It took about 10 minutes for Dianne to be served--for a reason that will soon become clear--enough time for Bill to study and photograph the "assembly line," consisting entirely of older women.  One woman mixed the dough.  Another shaped it into right-sized balls.  A third flattened it into a rounded form and, using her thumb, put a small hole in the center.  



The last on the line placed the dough into a tub of boiling oil--one after the other--turning each one to assure uniform cooking and browning, then removing them for sugaring (or salting or Nutella-ing), at the other end of the line.

Dianne's wait was predictable; there was only one tub of boiling oil, the tub held only 10-12 pieces of dough, and the cooking took about ten minutes (maybe 8).  Delicious, even if not so nutritious. 
Bill

Teens Gather: Park of the Aqueducts

Teenagers get together everywhere.  But in Rome they often do so in remarkable places and settings that give these meetings a grace they wouldn't have if they were to take place outside, say, a Wilson Farms store.

We recently published a photo of one such gathering, at the Museo della Civilta', amid the enormous columns of Mussolini's EUR.  In this one, we're at Parco degli Aquedotti  (Park of the Aqueducts), with our teens displayed along one of the park's aqueducts, low here because it's going to ground at this point (toward right), soon to be fully underground. 

The name of this aqueduct is Acqua Felice.  Though not of ancient origin, it's old enough (Hillary), constructed in the late 16th century under Pope Sixtus V.  The Parco is fully described in Itinerary 1 in Rome the Second Time, along with a good story about Sixtus (not the nicest man) and Acqua Felice, which didn't work right when it was turned on.  Those teens in the photo probably don't know the story, but they're making good use of the structure, which still carries water to Rome.
Bill

And here's a link to a Google Maps version of Itinerary 1's map: 

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Rome,+Lazio,+Italy&msa=0&msid=115234173574934358486.00048bfd318d41d8b7cb1&z=15  Google Maps versions of all 16  maps in the Book (accessible by hyperlinks in the ebook versions) are in a document at right (under the Book Updates document), also available by this link:  http://www.scribd.com/doc/56172132/Google-Maps-Versions-to-Rome-the-Second-Time-book-maps

Dianne

Teens Gather





We figured these Roman teens were on a field trip to the Museo della Civilta' Romana, located in EUR in one of those massive, 1940-ish buildings beloved by Mussolini and the Fascists.  The huge entrance door (also characteristic of monumental Fascist architecture) is at right, and an enormous column, signifying the building's--and the regime's--link to the ancients, is at left.  We liked the gendered way in which the teens had arranged themselves.   Bill