The European Scene

Storytelling at 2000 Meters
by Sam Yada Cannarozzi

Prolog: It is rightly said that storytellers tell by refering to images and pictures. And on my way to telling at a wedding anniversary I carried within me images, especially from New York, seared into my memory. But I was also bearing words of sympathy, to soothe those scorched images, from family members in Sicily and Denmark, and outpourings of sympathy from friends here in France where I live, but also from England, and a Serbian friend as well as acquaintances from parts around.

Dominique and Claudie first asked me to tell at their wedding ten years ago, and there began our own private tradition. On their wedding day, on their fifth anniversary and now ten years later, forty family and friends gathered around 'le Gros Caillou' the Big stone, our rallying and rendezvous point. Local legend says that the big stone started out as a small pebble; in fact, the hard heart that a banker was obliged to roll along like some modern day Sisyphus, until he found someone even more hard-hearted than he. That dubious honor came to a 'regis-seur' or Lyonese real estate agent notorious in the last century for throwing poor families of silk workers out into the street. And so the stone came to rest at the end of the Croix Rousse Boulevard, where I was telling the story.

Each year we boarded a bus that took us the first time south of Lyon to a number of country stops, five years ago to the Mediteranean and this year to the Alps. And they asked me to choose from my repertory, appropriate stories to accompagny us on the journey.

La Flegere is a alpine center that can accomodate a few dozen climbers in a rustic chalet setting, set at an altitude of over 2000 meters above the famous ski resort at Chamonix in Savoy, France. We arrived just in time to get the last cable car up, and after a short walk we were lifting glasses at the aperitif and I was into my first story, from Africa, to warm us up a bit.

But the main part of the evening was to take place after Dauphinoise au gratin and cheese, after Dominique and a friend, opened with some foot stomping pieces for accordian and fiddle. And then with Mont Blanc as a background, I launched into a piece on the theme of the Traveler. There were stories from the Touareg of the Sahara and Timbouctou, a blind door keeper, a six fingered ogre and of course a love story of 7 brothers who had married 7 sisters. After which we turned in early, because we were on mountain time. One of the gifts was a beautiful hand-woven Kilim, Persian rug. And we kept our thoughts on that warm thought as we climbed the stairs to our unheated dormitory, the ambient temperature was about 35 degrees F...

We were, however, disappointed the next day when our hike was curtailed because of snow and fog (and it was only September 16!!) but some hardy souls, the happy couple in the lead, did brave the elements on the trail to the 2300 meter high White Lake. Yours truly stayed snuggly at the chalet bar with a few of the less enthusiastic climbers where I taught string figures and scopa, a card game from Italy. One adapts to the situation n'est-ce pas?

After lunch I told a penultimate story about a young Chinese boy called Feng (Wind) and his quest in the mountains for the Dragon Master (kites are called dragons in China, AND in Denmark for that matter) and then we cabled again down to Chamonix for a last glass of the delicious Savoy chilled white wine. Just to show my gumption I also ordered...ice cream. Yes, one must learn to adapt!

The last story I told in the bus about fifty kilometers from the Big Stone, in fact a ballad we sung together about Kenyan women fetching wood in Zinjanja. Where is Zinjanja? It's your next destination I told them, no matter what or where it was. Well I'm already booked for Dominique and Claudie's fifteenth and I've already chosen the program: Nordic creation myths. The only mystery will be, after the country, sea and mountains where will we next depart for from the Big Stone, a speleological destination or perhaps, if the international space station is completedÉ

—posted February 2002

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