Gore Vidal, Los Angeles - Sent

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Gore Vidal
L o s A ngel e s – S en t
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als 27 gün 2006
Impressum
©2006, [email protected]
redacziun Claudia Knapp, Not Vital
fotografias
Florio Puenter, Patty Dryden, Daren Simkin i oters
graficaErik Süsskind
ediziun
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500
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Palimpsest
Eu nun ha mai cugnuschü inchün chi d’eira usché vag sco Gene Vidal cur chi’s trattaiva da seis agen passà o da sia famiglia . El vivaiva adüna sco in ün sömmi d’ uffant, sco ün pirat in tschercha dad or. El vaiva adüna alch plan co ch’el pudess
trar our dal mar a Florida alch barcha spagnöla o investir in ün secret chi nu fess ingün viers e guadagnar milliuns. Cur ch’el
ha gnü da registrar mia naschentscha a Orange County, NY, sco “junior”, nu savaiva’l plü, scha seis seguond nom füss
Luther o Louis. Ed uschea esa scrit aint il certificat “Eugene Louis Vidal”: plü tard lura müdà in Eugene Luther Vidal, junior.
E lura n’haja agiunt Gore pro la confirmaziun e cur ch’eu vaiva quattordesch ons, n’haja strichà ils prüms duos noms.
Gene d’eira eir usché vag cur chi’s trattaiva da seis bap, ch’el nu vaiva jent. El crajaiva cha seis bazegner patern
derivaiva d’inclur in Svizra. Invezza d’eira quai sia nona Emma da Traxler von Hartmann, oriunda da Lucerna. Eugene
Fidel Vidal d’eira da Feldkirch in Austria, d’origin rumantscha. Avant ün pêr ons suna i a Feldkirch a verer la chasa Vidal,
construida intuorn il 1300. Plü tard, tanter il 1580 e 1799, es la famiglia ida vers il süd, illas alps dal Friaul. Gene es rivà da
mantgnair ün medagliun da vaider chi’d es gnü dat da figl a figl. Là as vezza ün vegl apoteker davo il banc butia e suotvart
esa scrit: “Caspar Vidal, 1589”.
La persuna ch’eu n’ha tramiss a Forni a Voltra par far retscherchas, il lö in Friaul ingio cha meis antenats vaivan vivü
dürant duos tschientiners suot ils Venezians, ha stübgià quels documaints da baselgia ch’el ha amo chattà ed ha
imprais a cugnuoscher ad ün pader chi’s vaiva interessà per noss’istorgia da famiglia. “Quels d’eiran, sco chi’s crajaiva” manaja il pader, “da derivanza güdeua.” Meis hom da retschercha d’eira ün talian intellectual chi vaiva paschiun
per documaints vegls. Eu laiva savair, co be mâ chi füss pussibel cha, scha la famiglia d’eira catolica daspö il 1300,
sch’inchün vess pudü savair che chi vessan pudü esser stats avant?
“Tü stoust savair”, ha’l dit cun fatscha riainta “cha bajarias sun eternas aint ils cumüns in Italia.” Quist cas ha cumanzà
a m’ interessar ed eu n’ha dumandà a Gene sch’el savess forsa alch dal oriund güdeu. I til paraiva ün pa da rier ed el
m’ha dit: “I d’eira be üna famiglia güdeua a Madison e a no vaivna dit dad esser gentils cun lur figlia, perché ch’ella as
sentiva ün pa missa a chantun.” Ma e che diavel esa cun nossa famiglia? El crajaiva cha quai nu sia pussibel. L’unic
misteri cha’ls Vidals sun adüna stats obliats da mantegner, d’eira il fat, ch’els d’eiran da derivanza catolica taliana, e
dals Talians faivna schnöss in America da quel temp. Aint il cudesch d’annada da West Point d’eira Gene cugnuschü sco
“Tony the Wop”, e Eisenhower sco’l güdeu svedais. Quels mats da West Point vaivan ögls sco sajettas.
A Feldkirch n’haja stübgià l’unic documaint ch’eu n’ha chattà, quel da nozzas. Las naschentschas ed ils mortroris
d’eiran svanits. Duos jadas vaina maridà a Romanins; üna Maria della Valle e tschella Maria della Sopra, duonnas simplas
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Gene, il bap da Gore Vidal, a West Point
Gene Vidal (mità) cun president Franklin D. Rooswelt (schnestra)
e cu’l minister d’agricultura Henry A. Wallace
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sainza noms da famiglia. Maria da la val e Maria da casü. No vain maridà a Meyer von Baldegg, a Ludwig von Hart­mann, a Herzog... Tuot quist noms sun ün pa ambivalents – volu dir noms cha güdeus convertits vessan pudü tscherner.
Eu n’ha dumandà a meis agent da Venezia davart dals Romanins. “Quels sun da Padua, üna famiglia richa güdeua,
sco’ls Rothschilds.”
Alain Vidal-Nacquet, ün neiv dal filosof frances, ha dit: “Cler cha no eschan güdeus.”
“La vart dals Naquets?”
“Na, da la vart dals Vidals.”
Vidal es ün nom cumün in tuot ils pajais latins, chi deriva da “vitalis”, la fuorma genitiva dal pled per vita. I fa sen ch’ün
güdeu converti tscherna ün nom neutral, cumün, invezza d’ün nom chi attress massa l’attenziun.
Dals ons 70 ha publichà üna scoula a Feldkirch üna lavur sur da la chasa Vidal e la famiglia. Quist ha fat gnir amo
pü confus l’istorgia. I d’eiran duos famiglias Vidal. Üna es mort’oura e tschella es ida davent. Üna güdeua e tschella
rumantscha. Da chenüna derivaina no? Eu n’ha adüna cret cha no d’eiran rumantschs, üna razza alpina dapersai cun
üna lingua plain diftongs. Ma che capita cun tuot quella glieud cha no vain maridà? Cun quels, ..., ma, noms suggestivs?
Cur ch’eu n’ha fat il film documentari “Vidal a Venezia” suna stat ün pa aint il ghetto a discuorrer cun ün vegl rabbiner. La
republica veneziana es pel solit statta amiaivla culs güdeus ed ha artschvü ils güdeus convertits cun bratscha averta. Ma
scha mâ ch’ün güdeu converti tuornaiva aint il ghetto per tour part ad ün ritual güdeu gniva’l executà per avair tut pel chül
il cristianissem.
“Quels staivan vaira attents da nö gnir tschüfs” ha dit il vegl rabbiner.
“Ma tü crajast cha quels continuaivan zoppadamaing ad esser güdeus aint il ghetto?” “Be schi deiran suicidals. Na. Ma
quai ch’els faivan d’eira da maridar tanter dad els.”
“Damaja, I tschernivan noms cristians, pratichaivan la religiun, ma maridaivan ad oters güdeus convertits?”
“Precis” Quai explicha tuot, Romanins e Herzogs. Sco in ün mond da strias a’s perpetuevna quists jüdeus convertits,
cuntschaints sco marranos , mascrats sco cristians.
“D’eira Vidal ün dals noms chi tschernivan?” “Eu nu sun expert. Ma i ha dat gronds rabbiners cun quel nom. Da tschella
vart daja cristians cun listess nom. Cugnuoschast il pled ebraic per vita?”
Eu n’ha dit da nöa.
“Chaim. Vita. Vitalis. Vidal.”
- tradüt da l’inglais da Not Vital
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Gore Vidal (mità) cun president John F. Kennedy e Jackie
1948, ad üna party cun Marlon Brabdo e sia amia Celia Webb
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Vital – Vidal
Ils Vidals appartegnan a las plü veglias schlattas da Sent. Il möd da scriver il nom variescha tenor ils documaints chi
vegnan in consideraziun vaira ferm: Vitalius, Vitalis, Witalis, Wital, Widal, Vidal e Vital. La fuorma Vital vain in general
dovrada per segnar il nom, intant cha dal pövel vain amo hoz adüna dovrà il nom Vidal.
Aint il archiv da cumün es il nom da famiglia Vidal per la prüma jada da chattar sülla pergiamina d’Uina dals 28 october
1475. Bler pü bod manzuna però il cronist, pader Goswin in seis urbari da la clostra da Maria Munt la famiglia da Sent.
Quist urbari chi deriva our da l’on 1392 cuntegna üna glista dad abitants da Sent chi sun in oblig da pajar la deschma a
sia clostra, chi sun damaja servs da Maria da Munt.
ViDal – ViTal
The Vitals are one of the oldest families in Sent. The spelling differs considerably depending on the document: Vitalius,
Vitalis, Witalis, Wital, Vidal and Vital. The written form is usually Vital, but it is pronounced Vidal to this day.
The name Vidal was first mentioned in the village archives of Sent in a document from Uina, dated 28 October 1457.
Chronicler Pader Goswin mentioned the family from Sent much earlier in his Urbari of Mariamunt monastery. This
document from the year 1392 contains a list of inhabitants of Sent who were under the obligation to pay a tithe to the
monastery, i.e. burghers of Sent who were in the service of the monastery.
our da: Famiglias veglias vaschinas da Sent, Töna Schmidt, 1998
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Gore Vidal e Not Vital, Los Angeles, 20 avrigl 2006
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Alesch D’UINA
Once upon a time, a certain barba Buolf, son of barba (uncle) Alesch the Old, lived in Uina. He always stayed at home
in Uina. He went to Sent only on the main holidays, to attend communion. When he was 35 years old, he married his
neighbor and cousin Barbla. He would have rather had someone else from Sent, but she did not want to move to Uina,
and so he left her where she was. Some 5 years later, they had a son, around Christmas time. They should have had the
boy christened, but the dangerous path was not yet paved and it was so icy cold at the time. “The boy has everything
he needs” barba Buolf said to his wife, “and so there is no rush in having him christened. We know what he is called and
it should not concern other people too much!” Donna Barbla thought so too. She nursed her boy Alesch with passion
and diligently cooked nourishing porridge for him that she oozed with butter.
And eating this kind of food, the boy blossomed. Christmas, January, February and almost all of March went by. Alesch had
become strong, a few teeth began to show, and he ate bread with cheese and chewed on tough meat dried in the open air.
On the first Sunday of April, sar Buolf decided to travel to Sent to sar ravarenda (the Reverend) and have his Alesch
christened. He put his boy on his back in a carrying basket and left Uina at dawn to arrive in Sent before noon. He
arrived in Sent and headed straight for the vicarage, for that is where the child was going to be christened; it was too
late for a church christening. He put his basket on a trunk in the piertan (hallway) and went to the living room. “Good
morning sar ravarenda” he said, “I have come here to have my Alesch christened.” “That’s good, that’s good, my dear
sar Buolf. Welcome out here in the valley!” said the sar ravarenda. “But where is the boy, we want to christen him before lunch.” “Well, I left the boy outside in a basket.” “But, dear sar Buolf, he is surely cold and hungry, the poor child!”
“No, no, he is neither cold nor hungry, I packed a piece of flatbread, a large piece of cheese and a knife for him.” “Fine,
fine, then he must be doing well!” said the sar ravarenda laughing, “so go and fetch the godparents and bring the boy
inside.” Sar Buolf went off, fetched the godparents and then came back into sar ravarenda’s chambers with the back
pack basket. When he picked up the boy, the pastor was more than a little surprised; for the child about to be christened was rather chunky, he seemed to be almost a year old. Sar Buolf put the boy on the table and christened him
without picking him up. Alesch did not say a peep as the cold water trickled down his forehead, but he stared the pastor straight into the eyes. As soon as the ceremony was over, Buolf said good-bye, put the boy back into the back pack
basket and hiked back to Uina to be in time to feed the farm animals.
Alesch goes to Sent for the sermon
Alesch developed wonderfully, and always had a good appetite. When he was only one year old, he was able to walk
well and every morning and every evening he accompanied his father to the stable, where he drank his milk from the
teats of a cow or a goat. For the warm milk straight from the udder tasted much better that from the kettle or from the
cup. Of course, his mother still nursed him, and she did that until he was three years old. That was the custom in Uina,
to feed the children on mother’s milk, so that they would become big and strong. He also ate “fänz” (parched flour
cooked in cream) and nourishing porridge. He ate chunks of butter as large as a fist and of course quite a lot of pork.
And so he became tough and strong and when he was only four years old he went to the pasture with the goats without
worrying about the bears.
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Foto Florio Puenter
He must have been about ten years old when one day he said: “Father, I want to go to Sent to the sermon; Mamma
says there is a sermon there every week. And I also want to see the church there.” “Good, then go there”, said barba
Buolf. “What kind of a thing is it, the church, Father?” “Hm, it is a big and white thing with a hole in it and you can enter
through the hole,” the father explained. That was enough for Alesch, for he was not used to asking many questions.
And so on Sunday, early in the morning, Alesch got dressed, put on his father’s hat (he had never worn a hat before)
and went off to Sur-En and up to Sent from there. Just as he arrived at the village square, sar Steven was there by the
well with his white horse, a magnificent big horse. Alesch, who had never before seen a horse, was amazed at this
unfamiliar, white, large something. – And there was a hole there for entering, too. That must be the church, he thought
and he went over there to slip through the white horse’s back legs in the belief that that was the church door! Sar
Steven’s white horse, however, did not see the joke. It lashed out with its hind legs so that Alesch flew halfway across
the square. It did not hurt though, because Alesch was very tough. But on that Sunday, he did not want to go on looking
for the church door and went back to Uina straight away. “And, how was it?” asked his father upon his return. “Not very
good, father,” replied Alesch. “When I came to Sent there was something big and white with a hole for entering by a water
hole. When I wanted to go in, the whole thing went up into the air and flung me off.” “Oh, dear lad, that was probably a
horse. The next time you go, watch where all the people go and follow them.”
The very next Sunday, Alesch went to Sent again, for he wanted to see the church at last, even if that meant making
the pilgrimage ten times. A true Ruinas-ch does not give up so easily. But this time, he did what his father advised him
to do. He watched what the other people did, followed them and easily arrived at the church. “Well, how did it go this
time?” his parents asked when he arrived back in Uina in the evening. “Hmm, not bad” he replied. “Well then, tell us
something, and don’t just stand there like a stick,” his mother urged. “Well, when I arrived in Sent, I saw many welldressed people standing around, and so I stood there too and waited to see what they would do. A short while later, a
little bell began to ring and then two and three and finally all four together. And all of a sudden, all the people walked
over to a large, white cave, and I went after them. And then they all began to howl very loudly, and so did I. And then
a man in a black frock and with two white shaggy tresses, the same as our goat, went up to the rock ledge and began
to loudly rant und rant and rant. And all the people were quiet as a mouse and so was I. Then the man with the white
shaggy tresses got off the rock and all the people straight away began to howl, and so did I. Then they all left the cave,
and I followed them. And then everybody went to a water hole and drank water from an iron pipe, and so I drank too
because I was also thirsty. And then I made my way back. On my way towards Sur-En I heard the four bells ringing”.
Alesch is supposed to become a pastor
This description of the Sunday sermon convinced sar Buolf that his Alesch was chosen for better things than just being a
peasant in Uina. And so he racked his brains and thought about what could become of him. When Alesch, during the first
year of his confirmation classes, was able to recite the Lord’s Prayer after only two months just by listening, the proud
father had made up his mind: my Alesch, he must become a pastor, even if it costs a whole goat!
And so one day he took Alesch by the hand and went with him to Sent to the pastor to see if he could teach him to be a pastor. Alesch was very happy with the idea. He thought that he would like very much to take part in weddings and wakes.
When they arrived in Sent, they went straight to the minister and sar Buolf told him what he wanted. The minister, a shy
and rather delicate man, was quite stunned at this aspiration. What was to be done with this blockhead who took two
months to learn the Lord’s Prayer and who still did not know the confession of faith by heart. What was he to say to sar
Buolf and how to explain to him that this was impossible? He might even rough him up. “Hm, do you think your Alesch
is suited to study for the ministry? It requires a good head, you should know.” Oh, his head is surely good enough,”
assured sar Buolf. “Only a few days ago he fell down the flight of stairs and hit his head against the wall at the bottom.
And nothing happened to him, nothing at all! That’s why I say that his head is more than good enough, sar ravarenda!”
And the pastor replied: “It all depends whether he is capable of learning Latin, sar Buolf.” At last he had found a way to
master this embarrassing situation. “Without Latin there is nothing to be done, if he can learn Latin, then we will try it.”
“Hmm, that should be fine”, remarked sar Buolf, “he is big and strong, and so he should be able to learn Latin. He can
certainly carry wood, just as well as a strong man and load the carts and pull them shut so well that they can hardly be
opened again!” “ Well, let’s try it” said the pastor and left the room. Although the following scheme is unworthy of a pastor, sar ravarenda saw no other way of ridding himself of the problem. He decided to give the poor boy a jigger of caster
oil in a cup of coffee. And that is what he did! The pastor came back into the lounge with a cup of coffee with the castor
oil in it, which he now gave to the boy to drink from. He turned to sar Buolf and explained:” if your Alesch can keep this
drink inside him until you arrive at home in Uina, then he will be able to learn Latin; if not, then forget about your Alesch
becoming a pastor.” Alesch emptied the cup in one go and he and his father immediately set off on their way home.
Even on the way to Sur-En the boy could hardly hide the pain. But he did not say a word. Inside, at Val Glatschera, sar
Buolf heard how the boy quietly cried: “Father, it hurts!” “Oh dear, son, keep it down. You heard what sar ravarenda
said.” And they continued on their way home. Poor Alesch was grinding his teeth. But suddenly he cried: “Bap, I cannot
go on!” and that was that, Alesch’s hope of becoming a pastor was over. There was nothing else to do but be a farmer
and hunter in Uina like his ancestors. And that was just as well, because this is what happened a short while afterwards: Alesch was out with the goats. In the evening when it was time to go home, one of the goats remained standing
on a cliff alone. Rain was pouring down and Alesch did not feel like climbing up and getting the goat. And so he called
out: “Oh dear God, please make the goat come down from the rock, because it is too much effort for me.” To no avail.
The goat stayed on top of the rock and looked down on Alesch. Now he lost his patience and shouted: “ Dear God, if you
cannot even do that, then you do not know much more than me!” And so he went storming up to the rock and chased
down the goat. Sar Buolf, who had been standing nearby and had heard everything, reproached the boy and said: “You
really would have been no good as a pastor, you do not have the enough faith to be a clergyman. And as for the goat, if
you had gone ahead with the entire herd, the one that stayed behind would have followed anyway after a short while.”
Alesch the hunter
And so, as mentioned earlier on, since Alesch became a farmer in Uina, like his ancestors. Of course, he also began to hunt
bears and chamois. Because in a place where chamois graze with goats in the summer and in winter drink from the well in the
courtyard and where you can see bears in the scrub who scratch at the stable doors in winter, in this kind of a place, farmers
are of course also hunters. The stories they tell say nothing much about his hunting prowess. Perhaps they just left this out.
Whether someone shot 100 or 200 chamois more or less was not that important, this was forgotten after a while. On the other
hand, Alesch had more talent for telling cock-and-bull stories than for Latin, it seems! One day he came home from hunting
without any prey. Barba Buolf asked him whether he had been successful. “Hmm, not really, dear father. But today I could really have caught a lot of game. I saw 100 bears.” “But, “ barba Buolf cried, “that’s impossible! A hundred bears together in one
group, I‘ve never seen that, and I’ve never heard that anybody else saw such a thing, dear son, that is simply not possible!”
“OK then “, replied Alesch, “but there were surely 50 of them!” “No, no, it is not even possible to see 50 bears together in one
place.” “Well then, there were 12!” No, not 12 either. I am now 50 years old and I have never seen so many bears in one place.”
“Good, you know father, it was definitely either a bear or a tree stump,” replied Alesch and they left it at that.
Alesch does not return home until late in the evening
As time went by, Alesch became an ardent hunter and it sometimes happened that when he had hunting fever he stayed on
the mountain until late, and only returned home at nighttime. Barba Buolf and his wife Barbla were not too worried about it
because they had gotten used to it, and because Buolf had also been a hunter when he was young. One night, the clock struck
nine, then ten and then eleven and their son had still not returned from hunting. Now Barbla, who was sitting at the table spinning wool, was beginning to worry and said: “I hope nothing happened to him, our Alesch, since he is still not back.” “Hmm, he
is big and strong and old enough, at 25 he will be able to take care of himself”, Buolf’s voice replied from the bench near the
stove. That is where he was lying on the cotscha smoking his pipe, which he did not take out of his mouth even while speaking.
After a little while, Barbla started talking again: “Now I’m really worried, I’m afraid that the bear ate our Alesch.” “I don’t believe
that”, a sleepy voice drifted from the bench next to the stove and added after a while: “That would be a shame, since he put on
his good shoes this morning!” All the care and worry was for nothing, and around midnight Alesch came back from Sur-En and
not from hunting.
Alesch wants to marry
Alesch was now almost 30 years old and still unmarried. His parents had been advising him for some to get married but he did
not want to “tie the knot”, as they say. He was happy enough with his parents. But when barba Buolf and soon after Barbla his
mother, finally died, both almost 80, he did feel a little lonely. He was almost 46 years old. And so he wandered over to Sur-En
to get his cousin Uorschla who was also already 42 years old. He got himself a young bear for the wedding feast, which he
killed inside in Curtinatsch. He nearly lost his life at the time, because the mother of the bear, furious about the death of her
child, chased Alesch right up to the houses in Uina. The wedding was celebrated in Sur-En. The very same day, the newlyweds
returned to Uina to their little house, which Alesch had painted white a few days before.
Quarrels at home and division of their possessions
To begin with, the two of them, Alesch and Uorschla, got on very well. They had both entered the marriage with a roughly equal
number of possessions. But as time went by, they quarreled more and more often. One day, they fought bitterly and Uorschla
wanted to divide up their possessions because she maintained that Alesch broke everything. He had broken a jug that her
dear father had brought back for her from Venice. And so poor Alesch gave in, and they decided to divide up all the goods that
were inside the house. First, they divided the dishes, namely the plates, cups, bowls, wooden boards, jars, jugs and so on.
They divided up everything nicely and fairly, and made two piles, one on the table and the other on the bench. In order for the
division to be fair, Uorschla prepared two pieces of paper, one had ‘table’ written on it and the other ‘bench’. Alesch had to
leave the room and Uorschla put one piece of paper into the Book of the Holy Martyrs and the other into the Book of Charity.
Then she called Alesch, and he came in and picked up the Book of Charity. It contained the piece of paper for the first half, the
one that was on the table. To be absolutely certain Alesch asked his Uorschla: “Is that my half now?” “Yes, that belongs to you
now.” “And so I can do what I like with it.” And so he first of all picked up the pretty soup bowl made from burnt clay by potter
Barnard from the pottery in Martina. It was a bowl with red and yellow dots on it, which Uorschla always took very good care
of, and only used for festive occasions. Alesch looked at the bowl from every angle, turned it around in his hands, went over
to the door, opened it and threw the bowl as hard as he could against the stack of wood so that it shattered into a thousand
pieces.
“Oh God, oh God, you squanderer, breaking such a nice thing”, Uorschla cried and broke down in tears, she was so disappointed. “What is it to you” Alesch said sternly, “these are my things, we have divided them up.” Uorschla was silent
and did not say a word. After all, she had wanted to divide it all up. Alesch sat back down and picked up a brown jug with
a golden edge which his father and mother had been given by a well-off aunt whose husband had worked in the German
Café in Venice years ago. He looked at the jug and mumbled to himself but for his wife to hear: “I no longer need this
one either”, and so he got up, walked towards the door and moved as if to open it in order to smash this jug against the
stack of wood as well. Now Uorschla could no longer contain herself. As soon as she saw the way Alesch picked up the
jug she bit her lips until they bled. “He would be silly enough to smash this jug against the stack of wood.” She jumped
over to him, took the jug away from him and, crying with anger, she said: “You’re nothing but a fool! Do you really want
to break everything, even the pretty jug from aunt Nesa? Answer me! Give it here and we’ll put everything together
again, otherwise you will not even have a cup for drinking milk, and then I would have to give you one of mine!” And she
put all the dishes back into the kitchen and hall cupboards. Alesch only said: “If you want to put everything together
again, then let’s do that. I just thought you wanted your own separate household.” From that day onwards, Uorschla
never wanted to separate their possessions again.
Serious fight. 7 years without speaking to each other. The sneeze and peace
After this fight, Alesch and his Uorschla never really lived in peace again. He was quite dry and hard and she was made
out of the same stuff, so to speak. It happened that they quarreled and 2-3 weeks passed without the two of them
saying a word. “We have no children and so there is little distraction in the house” Uorschla once said to her sister in
Sur-En. One day, the two had a great quarrel like a thunderstorm. It was about mowing the fertilized meadows. Alesch
wanted to get his own way and Uorschla refused to talk to him. She did not make the bed on Alesch’s side; she even put
up a board in the middle of the bed. That is how things were for seven years. For seven years they did not speak a word
to each other. They both went their own way. Uorschla only cooked meals and did the most basic kitchen work for both
of them. Then one evening, when they had just gone to bed, Alesch sneezed, such a truly loud sneeze that the bed and
the entire room trembled! He had caught a cold while gathering wood. Now Uorschla could no longer contain herself and
cried: “May God bless you!” “Did you really say this from the bottom of your heart?” asked Alesch. “Yes, I did”, Uorschla
answered. “Then take away this board!” And so they made peace for good. They lived for many more years, they grew
very old, almost as old as the Stones d’Uina! Barba Alesch and his wife left everything they had to their nephew Plasch
of Uina-dadaint, under the condition that he moved to Uina-dadora and marry the daughter of the sister, Zia Uorschla.
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Barba Buolf e barb’Alesch d’Uina
Ils giatschins nell’avna
Üna saira vain Alesch darcheu tard aint pella not da chatscha. El avaiva fam, ed appaina cha’l riva in stüva, schi clama’l
a sa duonna, chi eira fingià a dormir: “Uorschla, angiò asch alch da tschaina?” “Mo, uarda ch’ê n’ha miss l’avna sün
pigna, par ch’i stetta chod”, respuonda ella giò d’chambra. Alesch va in davopigna be sainza far glüm, palpüglia intuorn
e chatta l’avna sün pigna. Lura va’l per ün sdun ed üna furchetta our da chaista d’maisa e comainza a mangiar be our
da l’avna, il prüm la schoppa da “jotta” e lura la charn e charnpüerch e’ls plains. Davo üna pezza, schi clama’l darcheu:
“Uorschla! Uorschla!” Tuot strasönada respuond’la: “Mo che vosch darchè? I pareva, cha no vessan brüjà e jerbà’l porch
bigl e bain. Mo questa champorch ha pès lungs dal diavel!” “Mo, schi na sai’ê nö perche. Ê veva miss aint üna vaira bella
spola champorch!” Basta, nos Alesch manget inavant, fin cha’l füt saduol e get lura a dormir. La daman, cur cha Uorschla sta sü e guarda nell’avna, schi che esi: La giatta avaiva fat quatter giatschins aint nell’avna, e nos Alesch avaiva
mangià trais fin al cheu e bundant la mittà del quart.
Da quella vouta davent hane adüna miss sü il vierchel dell’avna, cur ch’els la mettaivan sün pigna, ed Alesch vüdaiva
üna tioula, avant co mangiar.
Da: Gaudenz Barblan; “parablas, mitos religius, mitos eroics, legendas e da tuotta sort requints populars in Engiadina
bassa, Annalas”, XXIV. annada
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------From left, standing: Uorschla, nada Zonder (1844 – 75); Not Vidal (1846 – 1921)
From left, sitting: Not Vidal Senior (1820 – 99); Onnatina, nada Valentin (1807 – 79)
The house of Not Vidal Jr. and of Buolf Valentin (middle) and the house of Not Vidal
Sr. (right)
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The donkeys from Sent
One evening at the “Plaz della Nuscheglia” Michel said to his friends, all of them enthusiastic hare hunters: “Come on!
Let’s all go to “Costa dalla Jocca” in the morning to shoot a few hares and then have a nice meal with the girls.” They all
agreed and the next morning the seven hunters and four dogs set off towards “Costa della Jocca”. They got into position, one here, one there, the best spot was by the road to Scuol. The poor dogs searched and searched but they did not
manage to chase anything out. Finally, it must have been about noon, a misshapen and slow-moving hare came up the
hill, as fast as he could, ears pulled back, jumping and hopping. One of the dogs had lured it out from under some shrubbery and chased it like the devil himself. Michel saw the large hare coming towards him and got ready. Bang! And the
hare tumbled and fell over. “Dead!” he cried, and repeated it two, three times, and his friends hurried over. “Wow, what
a shot. This is the mother of all hares. Bravo Michel!
Four of them carried the huge hare on their shoulders and walked towards the village and, in a triumphal procession,
accompanied by all the children, arrived at “Plaz della Nuscheglia”. There, they gave “Duonna Ursina” orders to cook the
huge hare. They invited all the girls from the village to a feast and there was dance music.
In the evening, they all came to eat. The roast hare was delicious, there was good wine, everything was merry and
everybody was happy. Suddenly, Michel cried out; as he gnawed on the hare’s foot, he broke off two of his teeth. The
damned animal had been wearing horseshoes.
Poor Michel and all of his mates had mistaken a donkey for a hare. Convinced that there had been a mistake, everybody was stunned; they all went home quiet as mice, and the dance music also stopped.
Only duonn’Ursina, the cook, laughed her head off.
From that time on, they said: The donkeys from Sent, “Ils Asens da Sent”
Gaudenz Barblan, in: Annalas dalla società retoromantscha, XXIV. annada
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fundaziun
Not Vital
7546 Ardez