Robyn Bateman's blog

If you go right back to the early days of this blog, you might remember a tale about Ken, a man I met while walking in the mountains of southern Spain who, with a miniscule income - something like £3 per day - lived on his own terms on beaches and in caves. I've always been interested in people who live their lives differently, away from the mainstream, and even better if it has an element of cycling in it. When he was in the UK, Ken's only mode of transport was his bike.

This week, on the country roads between Perugia and Rome, I met Shane, a cycling Irishman. Like Ken, he was living what many might call an 'alternative lifestyle', although it's a lifestyle that's also being lived by thousands of others. He's a WWOOFer, that is, someone who helps out on a small, organic farm for no pay but for food and lodgings.

Shane works the land in the mornings and then the rest of the day is his, and off he goes on his bike to discover wherever he happens to be living. He has moved around Italy from farm to farm, saying for a few months in each. He has seen Italy from the inside, by working with Italians and living with them as part of a family.

Shane's life has always been bikes. He was a cycle courier in London for years, darting in between cars, annoying taxi drivers and getting parcels to places more quickly than engines could manage. Wasn't there a high mortality rate, I asked. "Ah, no," he replied. "Only two or three of my friends died." He thought about this for a second. "So actually, that's quite high, isn't it?"

Yes, that's certainly more fatalities than I encountered as a software engineer, unless we count those who died of boredom. After years of cycling the streets of the capital, he'd had enough. "I was earning lots of money but I felt that I was just giving it all away." Life in London is expensive. So he changed things around. Now he earns nothing, but also spends nothing, and he has plenty of free time to indulge his love of two wheels.

Shane finds the Italians, or maybe the rural Italians, very conservative. One of the ways this manifests itself is their belief that only certain sauces go with certain shapes of pasta and it is sacrilege to mix the wrong pasta with the wrong sauce. It does seem odd that, even in a tiny village supermarket here in Italy, there are shelves devoted to pasta and it is all essentially the same stuff, flour and water, and maybe egg. Maybe you have to be Italian to understand the Pasta Laws.

If you want to experience another country by living and working with the locals, if you want to learn a foreign language by using it every day, if you want an outdoor life, eating healthily - a lot of the farms are vegetarian - WWOOFing sounds like a great idea. There are participating farms on five continents but each operates its own system. You need to negotiate your own terms with the landowner. I've no idea if Shane's deal - of working till lunchtime and then getting the rest of the day off - is typical. Have a look at www.wwoof.org.

The next day I was at a campsite not far from Rome. I popped into its shop to buy something for dinner. "This pasta is nice," said the young Italian shop assistant. "It goes really well with tomato and bacon." I laughed to myself. "Do you have any bacon?" she asked. I have salami, I replied. She tutted. "Ah, but that's not bacon." Yes, I'm sure the pasta would be an absolute abomination with salami. I bought the pasta and, over my little camping stove, I made a sauce. Not only did I use salami instead of bacon, I even added some bloody sardines. It was lovely. Sod you, Pasta Laws!
 

Dear Caz,

Hi, how’s it going? So, you’re 23 eh. I remember those days, if only vaguely. In nine years’ time you’ll be me. I haven’t turned out to be quite the person you expected but don’t worry, I’m someone completely different and I’m remarkably happy about it.

You’re about to take a big leap of faith in yourself and do something you always wanted to do but never got the chance – you’re about to go to university. How do you feel about it? So much has happened since I was you I’ve completely forgotten what it felt like to take those first tentative steps into the abyssal unknown.  Please take assurance from me that you’ll be fine.

In fact you’ll be more than fine – for the first time in your life you’ll see something through to the end. In fact you’ll do more than see it through to the end – you’ll see it to the end and go even further. In fact you’ll do more than see it to the end and go even further – you’ll see it to the end, go even further and decide to go back to the start and do it all over again! Oh my, what an eventful nine years lie ahead of you.

There will be times during your studies, especially at weekends, when you want to be out mountain biking with the boys, that you wonder why you’re doing this. You’ll get your head in a tangle trying to fathom out what Descartes was on when he came up with some of his theories and you’ll be a whisker away from RSI from some very late-night typing to get TMAs finished and submitted on time. Enjoy it. Please. Appreciate what you’re doing and why you’re doing it.

If I were you, and I could do it all over again with the wisdom I have now I would do it so differently. I wouldn’t drop out when things got a bit tough. I wouldn’t be so blasé about my abilities and I’d get more involved with the university from the very start. It’s easy for me to look back retrospectively and say what I’d do differently, but in truth I did actually enjoy it all just the way it was. I’d like to be a cliché and say I grew up a lot during my time at the OU but in reality I just got a bit older and wiser. You’re such a mature 23-year-old and took those leaps into adulthood long ago so there isn’t any more growing up to do.

In the nine years that follow you’ll find love, lose love, and then find forever love. You’ll become and aunt then have that title heartbreakingly stripped from you, but then you’ll be blessed with the honour a second time. You’ll hear your parents tell you how proud they are of you more times than you’ll be able to remember but you’ll never tire of hearing it. You’ll discover that despite how you felt in school, you do actually enjoy learning. Most importantly, you’ll realise that your greatest ally and motivator is a green-eyed monster but don’t be afraid, he’s really friendly; you’ll grow to love him.

Your life in nine years’ time is not a bit like you expected it to be. You’re not married, you don’t have kids, you don’t have plans to either, and you’re actually really relieved about it. You realise that the destination you wanted to get to when you were your age doesn’t actually exist – because it’s not about destinations, it’s about journeys. Finally, you’ll realise that all along your mother was right about everything – knowledge is very different from wisdom and as you get older you become wise to the fact that when you’re 23 you know everything, but it ultimately counts for nothing.

As you sit reading this you probably don’t believe a word I say. I know, I get it, I was you once, remember. I don’t expect you to understand how much what you’re about to do will change your life and I smile at how beautifully oblivious you are about what’s to come. I’d give anything to be you again and have it all to experience again for the first time, but alas I’ve had my chance and am about to do it all over again for a second time. I wonder where I’ll be in nine years’ time? I dare to imagine.

Enjoy your life, Caz. See you in nine years.
 

There are times in life when it has its ups and downs. And then there are the times when you get trapped in a lift and you have neither. I was taking my left pannier, and my heavier right pannier, and my bar bag, and my tent, and my rucksack down from the third floor of a rickety hotel in Piacenza.

The lift doors closed but then the bugger wouldn't budge. But then, after stabbing the buttons repeatedly, it eerily began to slowly sink, seemingly without power. I quickly remembered my How To Survive Anything book's advice of spreading yourself on the floor if the lift started to plummet. I got close to the second floor and, because the buttons weren't doing their job, I prised open the door, jumped the last bit and escaped.

The rest of the day, however, consisted only of ups: a morning tour of beautifully serene Piacenza's cobbled centre, a pleasant ride in gorgeous sunshine to Parma and then, in the evening, a meeting with brand new Italian OU student and teacher of music to disabled children, Silvia. She'd told me that she wanted me to try some of the food that Parma and its surrounding area is famous for. In true Italian style, that was an offer I couldn't refuse.

I met Silvia and her daughter, Valentina, in Parma's Garibaldi Piazza. I asked her if Garibaldi had any special connection to Parma but apparently he doesn't. But, she said, every town in Italy has a square or street named after him because of how he united Italy. Yes, and because of his biscuits, I offered. I drew a blank look. It's official, folks, Garibaldi biscuits are unknown in the one country that you'd expect them to be eaten on a daily basis.

'I love the OU. I love the fact that I can study with this great university, learning about the English language, philosophy, maths, physics and astronomy, as I have done. And I love that I can get on my bike and cycle halfway across the continent of Europe, still continuing to study, and meet up with fascinating people - fellow OU students and their family and friends'

We went for a prosecco aperitif and then wandered to the classy Antica Cereria restaurant, over an old Roman bridge, on the other side of the river. Along the way we were joined by Valentina's younger sister, Zoe, who had borrowed her elder sibling's bicycle to reach us in time. Silvia may be studying English and French with the OU, but her daughters are both firmly on the science side. Zoe is in her last year of a physics degree at Parma University while Valentina has just completed the Italian equivalent of an MA in astrophysics and is in the process of applying for PhD research opportunities. She's hoping to be accepted by a university in Paris and wants to study the vibrations of black holes.

Time for me to go off on one. Y'know something? I love the OU. I love the fact that I can study with this great university, learning about the English language, philosophy, maths, physics and astronomy, as I have done. And I love that I can get on my bike and cycle halfway across the continent of Europe, still continuing to study, and meet up with fascinating people - fellow OU students and their family and friends.

None of this would be possible without the people behind the OU and, in Italy, to one lovely OU Co-ordinator, Jane Pollard, who sent my details out to all the OU students in this remarkable country. How else could I be sat around a restaurant table with three amazing women who were all strangers only a few hours before and be able to talk about, amongst other things, the vibrations of black holes? Sorry, ignore me. It's the science geek coming out.

Ah, and then there was the food. An Italian meal starts with antipasto, in our case with a pile of prosciutto, pancetta and the most wonderfully rich salami I've ever tasted. The next course was two types of pasta, herb and ricotta stuffed ravioli and an utterly delicious tagliatelle covered with crispy little bacony bits (I'm sure there's a more technical term for these). The main course was the softest parmesan-stuffed brisket with fried potatoes and rosemary. All this was lubricated by a rich and creamy Lambrusco. Finally, there was a perfect chocolate mousse. Much better than my usual camping stove noodles.

The conversation was wide ranging, from the Italian language, Parma's role in fighting fascism, imprisoned parmesan cows, Zoe's ambition to see Edinburgh purely as it's the birthplace of J.K. Rowling (although, now that I've checked this, she appears to have been born in Gloucestershire), the joys of Blackburn, Italian food, and the best cities to visit while I'm here. I had a thoroughly wonderful evening. And I think Silvia, Valentina and Zoe did too.

And then we finished, went outside and Valentina's bike had been stolen. There are times in life when it has its ups and downs.

Pictured in Palma are Italian OU student Silvia with her daughters Zoe and Valentina.