Gated

The Villa San Michele is surely one of the most beautiful places on earth, particularly if you like spectacular views.

It's definitely not the place to catch a cold, which I did the other day (possibly when getting up at 4 am to catch the first ferry to Naples).

We stay at la Foresteria, a secluded area of this complex on Capodimonte, at the foot of Monte Solaro.

Our house is right next to the former home of Axel Munthe, i e the Villa San Michele, parts of which you can see on the image above and which is the museum and the major reason why the alley below us, il Viale Axel Munthe, is cramped with herds of tourists all day, all heading for a tour of the house and the park, dramatically located overlooking Capri town halfway down to the sea level. The Tyrrhenian Sea level.

At la Foresteria guests like us, who have applied to profit from the generosity of Axel Munthe and the San Michele Foundation during three weeks, are housed in several small buildings forming a cluster of groups of different kinds of people from Sweden; mostly scientists, researchers, journalists, artists.

A few guests each year receive the special honorary scholarship and don't pay for their stay. The rest of us pay 250 kronor/person/night.

Everybody is working on something, quite a few on projects connected to either the villa or Italy.

And everybody is enjoying the silence, the walks, the food, the views.

Not many of us know Italian, J being one excellent exception.

Staying here is an exclusive experience no doubt and I can't help but feeling like I'm inside a gated community, the walls in this case however not protecting us from thieves and burglars but from nosy and confused tourists.

Linguistici

I sometimes think Italian sounds like the ee-language.

Let me try to explain, however I'm not sure this translates.

In Swedish, ”the ee-language” (i-språket, link in Swedish only), is a sort of language game, a play with words. Every vowel in every word is replaced by the letter i, in Swedish always pronounced ”ee”.

If Eey treeyd tee eempleey this reele in English it widd be keempletely inceempreheensible.

?

It's hard, maybe not possible to do this in a language like English with lots of diphthongs. I believe most languages have diphthongs, Swedish has none (almost).

I saw a sign today in Capri town, it said ”Intimissimi” (a boutique for underwear, ”the most intimate”).

Also the headline above, Linguistici (=”linguistically” in plural) sound like the ee-language (even though, ok all linguists reading this, there is a diphthong in gui).

Another example, instructions on our toiletseat: ”non gettare gli absorbenti igienici nei W.C.”.

I love that word, igienici. It's completely ee-language.

The other night we were invited, like all guests at the Villa San Michele, to join the director Peter Cottino to the regular Wednesday meeting, where new guests are introduced to the ways of this impressive institution, the San Michele Foundation.

If you're a newcomer, you are to present yourself in a few words.

At situations like this, when you're new and uncertain how things work, who isn't a little bit nervous? I couldn't help but toy with the idea of introducing myself in the ee-language.

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Sorry, in Swedish only:

Hij, jig hitir Lirs Fihri ich jig ir grifisk firmgiviri ich liriri pi Bickmins Disignhigskili. Jig irbitir mid in idig ginski birtglimd firfittiri, Illi Bjirni sim livdi millin 1890 ich 1969.”

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It may not surprise you that I didn't. (I think that had I done it, it would possibly have amused Ulla Bjerne, who was a bit of a prankster.)

Every Wednesday one guest has offered to present his or her work. This time, Anders Fahlbeck, a former assistent to Josef Oliv's, a legendary director of the institution, talked about his research on guests at the villa during the 1950's and 60's.

It was a very interesting talk and afterwards some of us had dinner at da Gemma, an institution in itself in Capri town.

Beautiful detail, Anders met his wife Åsa, also present, on Capri 1960, when she was working at the Swedish solar station then run by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

The Villa San Michele is on top of the island of Capri, just outside Anacapri, at the end of the impossibly vertiginous 777-step Phoenician stairs, the ancient walk from the Marina grande.

We are here now, enjoying the views and the hospitality of the San Michele Foundation.

One of us suffers from vertigo.