A Class Act

A shimmering mass of whitewashed buildings sits on a mountaintop overlooking the Adriatic, the chalky brilliance punctuated by the reds, blues and yellows of laundry flapping in the breeze. Men congregate on the square, and elderly women watch from their balconies. Steep staircases and supporting arches intersect cobblestone streets so narrow that pedestrians flatten themselves against the walls so cars can pass. This is the old Italy of picture books.

The Liceo Scientifico (Scientific High School) on the other side of Ostuni will never make the picture books. Four stories of glass and steel, this sleekly modern building, with 600 students, could be any place. But here I was, volunteering as a teacher for two weeks last April, helping students with English and teaching them a few things about America and Americans.

I wish I could say my only motivation was to help students in southern Italy learn about the United States and to improve their language skills. But I also wanted to learn about life in a place totally different from my home, New York City. I wanted to meet the people of Ostuni and--however briefly--become part of their community.

For that, I turned to Global Volunteers, a nonprofit organization based in St. Paul, Minn., devoted to achieving world peace by strengthening international relationships. The agency works with community groups in more than 20 countries.

Volunteers work in teams, and most team members, like me, have no teaching experience. Because the volunteer work is tied to the school day, participants have sufficient time to relax or to explore the area.

This was my second trip with Global Volunteers. In October and November 1998, I spent three weeks in Xi’an, China. Farther from home, further from my own experiences, China was more exotic, more exhilarating--and more exhausting. The teaching was exceptionally challenging because I had a class of 50 college freshmen to myself, but there was enough time to explore Xi’an and the surrounding area.

A teaching vacation is a balance. You have time for personal exploration, but you must plan schedules around classroom responsibilities. The camaraderie that builds within the group is warm and wonderful, but unless you rent your own car, you depend on group decisions for excursions beyond the immediate vicinity. Still, my experience in China was so fulfilling that upon my return home, I immediately began planning another Global Volunteers trip.

Before arriving in Ostuni, I spent 10 fast-paced, self-indulgent days in Florence immersed in Renaissance art and contemporary cooking. Two weeks teaching in a small city, population 33,500, at the other end of Italy seemed like an ideal way to slow down and focus, to meet people, to enjoy the pleasures of familiarity and to have time to wander aimlessly.

My volunteer group of seven had little in common other than a sense of adventure and a desire to serve. Some married, some single, we ranged in age from late 30s to early 70s and came from across the United States.

A retired college librarian, I came on this adventure alone and was assigned a roommate, Gloria, a retiree from Pennsylvania. Only one woman in our group was an experienced educator. Assigned to assist teachers in two middle schools and two high schools in Ostuni, we volunteers shared feelings--apprehension in facing our task and exhilaration at attempting it.

On my first morning at the Liceo Scientifico, I hesitantly walked into a room seemingly in chaos, with the noise of 30 students, ages 16 to 18. The boys were all legs and mouths. Dressed much like American teenagers, they lounged and laughed and lunged at one another, appearing too large and too loud for the confines of a schoolroom. The girls were not much quieter.

Antoinette Papa, the English teacher for this class, appeared unfazed. Antoinette speaks English like an American (she spent her early years in Brooklyn), but her gestures are pure Italian. She has an air of rushing even when standing still and speaks so fast she seems to interrupt herself. With fist pounding the desk and voice louder than her boisterous students, she brought the class to order and introduced three of us volunteers. She assigned 10 students to each of us and instructed the students to ask questions about America.

I gulped and tried to wing an answer to the first question: How is Italy different from the United States? I showed maps to establish relative size and drew a time line to show how long a history Italy has compared with the United States. I also talked about our ancestors and where they came from.

I was better prepared for the second question: How do young people in America spend their time? Broad grins and snickers greeted my description of time spent hanging out with friends, watching TV, shopping and going to the movies. That first day of class turned out to be surprisingly enjoyable.

In China, I had to develop my own lesson plans and to teach students by myself. But in Ostuni, I worked with local faculty. Sometimes I led small group discussions where the objective was for each student to speak English. Other times, I talked about American education and our political systems--separation of powers, federalism, judicial review. The retired teacher in our group lectured on Shakespeare and the history of theater.

Our students were eager to learn about life in the United States, and we volunteers were eager to learn about Ostuni. Between classes, we discussed educational theory and pedagogical tricks with the faculty. Later, over coffee and pastry in local cafes, we talked about children and spouses, careers, travel and everyday life in Ostuni.

Our schedule left us time for other adventures. Mornings were spent teaching; afternoons were for resting, lesson planning and sightseeing. We explored the tangled web of lanes and paths of the old town, and stood in front of its 15th century cathedral looking out across the Adriatic.

With other volunteers, I shopped for leather goods and olive oil in newer parts of town, where we often ran into our students and their parents.

At a large dinner party one night at Antoinette’s house, we talked with her family and friends about the war in nearby Kosovo and the universal challenges of raising teenagers.

The Hotel Novecento, a luxurious country home converted into a 16-room, four-star hotel, was our headquarters. About a half-mile from town, the hotel is surrounded by gardens and palm trees. Our rooms, each with a private bath, were small but comfortable.

The Global Volunteers package included three meals a day. Each morning we feasted on a continental breakfast in the hotel dining room, with rolls and croissants still hot from the oven. Lunch was pedestrian--soup and sandwiches at one of the few cafes in town open in the afternoon.

Dinners, always back at the hotel, were ample and well-prepared, if not spectacular. We had a choice of two pastas, followed by a meat or fish dish and salad. Dessert was a simple fruit plate, often supplemented with cookies, pastries or candy we bought in town.

Long, leisurely dinners provided time to share our life experiences and our Ostuni adventures. We gave one another moral support as we talked about our students, the local sights and friends we were making. These conversations helped make the two weeks special.

Weekends, as in all Global Volunteers programs, were free for more sightseeing. This part of southern Italy, although less traveled than other regions, still has much to see, including two UNESCO-designated World Heritage Sites: the trulli houses of Alberobello and the sassi of Matera.

Undulating lines of stone fences set off fields and bordered narrow dirt roads as we started on our first full-day jaunt out of Ostuni. In a comfortable van with an English-speaking driver-guide, we looked out at groves of olive trees, gnarled and twisted, some reputed to be 600 years old. Fields of yellow daisies, punctuated by dazzling orange poppies, surrounded the ancient trees, making their gray-green leaves and branches appear more somber and venerable. As we drove farther inland, the olive trees gave way to small farming plots of vegetables and grains. Every distant hilltop seemed crowned by a picture-book town embellished with turrets, steeples and high stone walls.

About an hour’s drive from Ostuni are the trulli of Alberobello. Trullo means “silly” or “strange”; the trulli houses are little beehive-shaped buildings, with pointed gray stone roofs hanging over cylindrical whitewashed walls.

The earliest trulli, experts believe, date from the 14th century. They are constructed without cement or mortar, using only local limestone--boulders for walls, thin slabs for roofs.

The sassi (the word means “stones”) of Matera are about 35 miles west. Here, thousands of dark, mostly abandoned dwellings cling to the side of a gorge. Although the area has been inhabited since Neolithic times, what we saw dated from Christian settlements of the 8th century. Carved from porous rock by early Christians, they are a tangled jumble of caves, churches and houses linked by narrow, twisted staircases and foot-wide lanes. Buildings and caves tumble into and onto one another in a chaotic mass of walls, doors, niches and arches.

For centuries the sassi were the site of monastic settlements and modest homes. There were underground cisterns, storage areas and drainage systems. But gradually the area deteriorated as more people moved in and medieval water systems were displaced. By the end of World War II, more than 15,000 people were crowded into the area, living in poverty without electricity or adequate plumbing. In 1952 the government condemned the sassi, the population was resettled and the area was abandoned.

But the age of the settlement, the uniqueness of the site and the medieval cave churches with frescoes intact led the sassi to be declared a World Heritage Site in 1993. They have become a tourist attraction, and many dwellings are being reclaimed as living and working space by the people of Matera.

On our second full-day expedition, we went southeast about 70 miles and were reminded of the world we had left behind. The harbor of Otranto, population 5,100, rivals the best in the world in terms of how picturesque it is: charming whitewashed buildings, clear blue waters, white sand beaches, medieval castle, quaint fishing boats.

Where it differs is in the stories of illegal immigrants coming ashore in rowboats from Albania, visible on a clear day across the Adriatic. And on this day, in the middle of the Kosovo war, we heard U.S. Army helicopters flying overhead.

A different century engulfed us after a brief ride inland to the city of Lecce. Called the Baroque City, Lecce was a thriving metropolis in the 17th and 18th centuries, and architecture remains its biggest charm. After visiting the remains of a Roman amphitheater (the city dates to the ancient Greeks), we immersed ourselves in the guardian angels, grotesque beasties and exuberant floral designs of the churches and palazzi of Baroque Lecce. Lunch was alfresco, in the sun and amid the sounds of children playing in the city park.

This was a trip of emotions. I was surprised and amused by the quaint trulli, awed by the sassi dwellings and embarrassed that I had not known about the proximity of Otranto to Albania. Equally embarrassing was the number of years since I had thought about such things as the Declaration of Independence. But there I was, learning Italy’s history and being asked to explain America’s.

Volunteer teaching is a constant swing between feeling awkward, unprepared and out of place, and feeling loved and appreciated beyond any reasonable expectation. Learning about southern Italy, experiencing the warmth and hospitality of the teachers of Ostuni, and visiting the area’s scenic wonders with a small group of congenial people were a delight.

One Monday I was attempting to explain “self-evident” truths and “unalienable rights” to students. For this exercise and for the rest of the trip, I reached deep into my memory--and even deeper into my belief systems. And I emerged unexpectedly enriched.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

GUIDEBOOK

Volunteer Teaching in Ostuni

How it works: Global Volunteers is a private, nonprofit, nonsectarian group that organizes teams of volunteer teachers. Participants may be involved in construction, small-business development, health care, or teaching or tutoring English. Overseas programs last one to three weeks.

Screening process: Applicants fill out a health and skills questionnaire and provide the names of three references. References are checked, and some health questions may require a doctor’s letter, but few people are turned down.

Getting there: Alitalia offers service from L.A. to Bari, Italy, with one change of planes. Round-trip fares start at $766.

Where to stay: Volunteers stay at the Hotel Novecento in Ostuni, included in the package. Hotel Novecento’s regular rates for a double room with two meals are about $125 per night in July and August and $94 in the off-season.

Prices: The trip, including lodging, meals and transportation to and from airports and work sites, is $1,995 for one week, $2,295 for two weeks. Air fare, alcoholic beverages and sightseeing excursions are extra. Global Volunteers officials say all costs are tax deductible.

For more information: Global Volunteers, 375 E. Little Canada Road, St. Paul, MN 55117; telephone (800) 487-1074, Internet https://www.globalvolunteers.org.