Olivio

My room-mate at the hostel, Olivio, is an interesting character and after a long conversation with him last night I want to write down some details of his life before I forget them and I may already have mixed them up or embellished them. I think he is the first really interesting character I’ve met so far and I hope there will be more to come.
Olivio has a mixed background and holds multiple passports – Australian, Canadian, US and Croatian. His mother was Croatian, his father Italian but he was raised in Canada and lived for most of his adult life in America. Needless to say, a person blessed with quadruple citizenship and gifted in many tongues is born to travel but at first this was not the case. He told me about his marriage to a ‘typical Jewish Princess’( I’ve never really understood this term to be honest and I take it to mean a spoiled, rich young Jewish girl since there is no royalty in the Hebrew nation as far as I am aware). He told me about a life of luxury, a small business empire of software companies, a 200K salary, weekends at the country club and houses all over the place. But as he was building this life he constantly vowed that when he turned forty he would give it all up to travel the world. His family, friends and colleagues mocked him and took it to be a joke but just after his fortieth birthday he did exactly that. He signed over the houses and the wealth to his wife and son packed a bag and left.
He’s been travelling now for six years and shows no sign of wanting to give it up. Every summer he returns to Miami and works as a casting agent for commercials. I didn’t find out the exact nature of his present finances but I guess, I hope, that he’s kept hold of at least some of that money, at least enough to allow him to continue his travels. He’s recently been in the Ukraine and has fallen in love with a young girl on a train and has gotten engaged after only a few days. They communicate with a dictionary and despite the language barrier he assures me he’s very much in love and he adds with a shrug, “but if it doesn’t work out…”
Two lines have stuck in my mind from my conversation with Livio. The first is a little obvious but nevertheless true, he says that: “everyone I meet is a character in a book” and I really understood what he means by this. It’s a way of looking at people you meet and appreciating their qualities in a more objective way. I’ll try to keep it in mind.
The other quote I want to remember is this, it was a casual remark but it’s gotten stuck in my mind: “I would change any plans for a pretty girl”. I admit I listened in awe to Olivio’s travel stories most of which feature a beautiful leading lady. At first I found myself recoiling a little at his mildly predatory nature but more and more as I listened, it awakened my own little predator that has lain dormant for so long and like a small worm it has lifted its head and tentatively, sleepily peered out from inside its hole.