A Moment in Time, Italian
7am and the ferry terminal at Genoa was near empty, except for a lone gunman standing at the customs' checkpoint. With thumbs hitched on his belt, the carabinieri sized me up through his cylindrically-shaped sunglasses as I marched towards him. "Bongiorno Bastia?" I enquired. The Sylvester Stallone look-alike momentarily moved his hand atop his pistol. Realising my incendiary words might have aggravated him, I quickly followed it up with some fluent English, "the ferry to Bastia you bastard, this way?", or words to that effect. "Si, terminale cinque" he replied. "No, terminala nove" (four) I said whilst pointing to the digital screen on the other side of the building that displayed the departure time and terminal number. Peeved for having questioned his authority, there was a momentary halt to proceedings. He was either going to shoot me or wave me through. After studying the board at length, he chose the latter option. I breezed...