Batistuta: Life without football
Date: Dec 14th, 1997
By: Daniel Arcucci
Source: Revista La Nacion
Translated by: Humbird
[click on thumbnails for full size image]
Di notte or di giorno, con sole o con luna, tocca questo ferro e ti portera fortuna. (It is originally in Italian. Means "By day or by night, with sun or with moon, touch this iron and it will bring you luck.") At the end of the staircase, at the last of the twelve steps, that take one to the door of the Gabriel Batistuta's home, in Florence. Bati -- the Italian legend is around an iron horseshoe, that is an inevitable point of attraction. "Touch this iron and it will bring you luck" says the inscription but very few arrive to read. Because few know from the inside the mansion at Viale Allesandro Volta. Surrounded
by a high wall of rustic stone merging its typical yellow among the green of a lush garden, and all in
the city knows who has lived here for the last three years. Because of this, someone has left the
message near the bronze electric door under the number 58: "Bati is great."
Nobody bothers him, however, when he lights the yellow alarm light, opens one of the garage doors, and leaves in his silver Mercedes Benz 320SL. The heavy traffic stops for a few seconds to let him pass, and he incorporates himself into the slow drive only 400 meters further to the Stadium Comunale, where Fiorentina trains.
It takes some time to understand that there is more shyness than division in the posture of
Batistuta. "Some day I want to be anonymous," he says. But Gabriel is an idol in spite of himself.
Batistuta is not only a Fiorentina player. He is more. A patron of Florence, one of the messengers
of the city to the world. This, from a local magazine, lets one understand what this man, born 28
years (in 1969) ago in Avellaneda, a small town near Reconquista, in Santa Fe, means for Florence,
the city of art, David, Michelangelo, with historic culture in every street.
"When I arrived here and saw everything so old, I thought, where did I get myself?" After seven years, I learned to know Florence and value it.
A few days after he first arrived, he walked from the hotel Savoy to the Ponte Vecchio. When he saw
the Arno River from above and the movement of fish near the surface, the first that he thought was, "What are those? Trout, surely¡when my father visits, we will get our fishing poles and go fishing here."
Fishing, hunting, Reconquista. He misses these things in Argentina.
Sitting at the table at la Osteria Mastrobuletta, over the Via delle Cento Stelle, obliged meeting place after training, Gabriel has lunch with his wife, Irina Fernandez, his younger son, Lucas, and some of the players from the team. He recommends the food: "For you, penne rigate al ragu (penne pasta with meat sauce). For us, al pommodoro (tomato sauce)."
"It's not that I'm on the defensive, it's the photos, it's something that I've yet to learn to do¡to pose. Besides, they come out ugly."
But you give the impression that you are a bit more closed now.
This place is small, like almost all in Florence, and it is attended by its owners. It is la Fiaschetteria Da
Latini, one of the preferred sites to eat in all the city. He arrived in a taxi together with Rui Costa, the best friend that he has in the team. "Because I came late to training," he says, "I have to pay for dinner for everyone... and you know how they eat here! Really, there's no food here that I like more than another. I prefer pasta every day. What happens is that the Italians play with food, it is an art. You give them a bit of meat and they make ten recipes, it's incredible."
It must have been expensive to pay for the whole team to eat here?
"You didn't pay anything," says Irina.
"It's true," he says, "Really, there are few places where I have to pay."
The elder son Thiago is in school at this hour, la Scuola Americana, where, besides the Spanish of the land of his parents and the Italian of his adopted land, now incorporates English into his repertoire of languages. Irina speaks Italian easily, like Gabriel. For her, adapting to this new life was not too hard. "I wake up every day at 7:15 to prepare Thiago for school, while Gabriel sleeps. If we went out the night before, after I return from taking Thiago to school I will rest a bit more, until 9:30 or 10. If not, I organize things for the day, pay bills etc. At mid-day I prepare lunch for Gabriel and in the afternoon, two times a week I go to the gym. And now I am engaged with decorating the new
house."
The new house in the hills of Fiesole, from where all the city can be seen with the cupola of the
Duomo as the central reference. For Batistuta it does not mean a great change of customs. He
continues being a pantofolato, a definition in Italian that means one that prefers to spend time at
home in slippers.
Without fishing and hunting, what do you do to pass time?
Do you spend much time with it?
"Yeah, sure, a few days... every day!"-clarifies Irina again.
Alone?
And how are you doing?
And why are you studying English?
Are you also thinking of a professional use? Do you imagine a future in
English football?
Why do you like English football?
He changes the topic from football: "I know that you journalists say that I am antisocial."
Are there some journalists with whom you like to speak?
Do you speak of this with your Italian friends?
What do you mean?
"But Gabriel," interrupts Irina, "it depends on the city, they can go to a club, or go swimming."
So this is not his principal problem, says his wife. Without malice, she says that he is jealous, messy and very forgetful. They met on her 15th birthday party. In those times he didn't have long hair that now identifies him in all places, she remembers. But she also has a "defect"-- jealousy. Thousands of cards and letters from women, but she has learned to accept this as something normal.
When you tell it, Gabriel, your life doesn't seem so boring.
"We don't go very often," says Irina.
"Well, speaking of going, it's time to go back to training. I don't want to be late. I am the captain and have to set an example. We are going to have to take the photos tomorrow. Look, we didn't talk about football, and everything went faster."
[ This article taken from www.ac-fiorentina.com ]
"What do you want to know about my life?" is his first question after greeting the journalists without much enthusiasm. "It's boring: from my house to practice and from practice to my house," he continues as if not to allow anyone to spy on him. "You know why I am always on the defense with the press? Because it's my life in some way. I want to live it like any person. I don't want to be shown as a rich type, that gives me an incredible irritation. I try to say things the way I feel. I don't consider myself a good diplomat. Should I say that I am happy because he is here? (Batistuta points at the photographer unhappily.) Because it's not so. I am happy to meet another person, yes, but it would be better without the camera."
But clearly, he couldn't do this. Fishing and hunting are his two passions and are reserved for his
twice yearly visits to Argentina. "Over here," he says, "I can't do either." "You go fishing and you
have to throw back what you catch because the water is polluted, and to go to the sea I have to go
100 kilometers to Viareggio, which I don't like to do. They invite me to go hunting but it is boring. To hunt pheasants, for example, if they are wild you can only hunt two, and if at a game reserve, you have to arrange with the owner. Tomorrow let's go, they say, and they flush the pheasants from the trees. The creatures are so tame that when they see us they come to us looking for something to eat and instead of escaping. They come around. You have to push them to get them to fly. I am accustomed to other things, this is strange."
"No more than ever with respect to the club. Before, I participated more, the directors
consulted me and I answered. Now, no: I do mine and nothing more. In this I feel, yes, I am
closed."
"Yes, I paid, but I won't tell you how much."
Lucas interrupts the conversation when a piece of bread gets stuck in his throat. Gabriel says, "He is a beast, eats everything, and now he chokes."
"The computer."
"No, a few days a week, because it's bad to my eyes."
And what do you do?
"I love it. I play Formula 1 racing games and study English."
"Yes, I have a program that gives me lessons and all."
(In English) "Good, very good. I have learned a lot."
"I like the idea of learning other languages. I think it is important. I can be informed of everything.
I turn on the TV and watch the news on CNN."
"Well, yes."
"For everything. I think it would be ideal for me and my game."
"No, well, yes... with those who don't want to speak solely about football, with those that make
me feel comfortable. Although, I don't know much about politics, I like to talk about life."
"Yes, of some things. Some don't believe I know how to ride a horse. Some don't know anything
about Argentina, and others get things confused. One time, in a press conference, journalists made me mad and I said that in Reconquista we didn't have time to rest because we had to prepare for raids by Indians. To my friends I like to talk of my childhood and to learn about theirs. Although in a city, there's not much to do."
"It's clear. What's there for a child to do in a big city apart from school? Go to play videogame... and then what?"
Gabriel, you grew up on a farm, right?
"Yes, and in a very small town. There were more possibilities to invent. That's how to live. Now I am worried about the children. Thiago has a mountain of toys in his room but if there is a problem, he doesn't know how to solve it. If a wheel falls off a toy truck, he doesn't know how to fix it. We, in my childhood home, finished eating a can of sardines, and immediately that can would become a toy car, you understand?"
"No. I also play tennis, always with someone I can beat. And we also go to the movies."