Glow

It's hard to pick what will linger in your mind about a place. We spent a short day in possibly the most recognisable city in the world - if you take the right picture. This is not the right picture, nor is the extra. The leaning tower is striking not just because it is obviously askew but because it is startlingly white, and accompanied by an equally white cathedral and an associated baptistry. All this in a sweeping area of vibrant spring-green grass that resembles nothing more than an English park, complete with picnickers and sun bathers. For a split-second, I had the circular, domed baptistry down as a band-stand! 

On a bright day, the whiteness carries an initial shock like a blast of noise, but in all that space, the overall effect - even with crowds of sight-seers taking joke-trick pictures - is quiet and calm. As luck would have it, we also co-incided with a rally of hundreds of classic Vespa scooter-riders; they assembled in a nearby square, but many of them took the chance to visit the tower on two wheels (I've sobered up from yesterday's wine, I promise). Despite all that, echoing walls and flag-stone plazzas are absent, and it gives the place much more serenity than you might suppose. I expected to hate it, but came away with pleasant memories

The tower leans less than it used to. Engineers grew increasingly alarmed in the 1980s, as the lean got closer and closer to the point of no return. An elaborate scheme of metal ties, metal guy-ropes, lead weights, and an archimedes screw to move earth below the tower were rigged up to pull the structure back from the brink and consolidate the earth beneath it. Only the fixing points for the guy ropes now remain (extra) - just in case, I supppse

What will linger? I think most likely scenes like this picture: tall buildings flanking, even enclosing, narrow streets. Bicycles, shutters, balconies, life lived at high level - and the colours; above all the colours