My cheek was stuck to the seat, my brothers were sleeping and I could smell smoke. Other than being stuck-by-jowl to the vinyl back seat of my father’s car, I had no idea where I was. Could be France.

This was back in the early seventies, not quite sure when, maybe ’71. The car seat that I was stuck to belonged to my Father’s Alfa Romeo Giulia and I’d actually woken up in the car park of a small bar high in the Italian Alps, just outside Aosta. I was seven.

Mum and Dad were outside having a smoke and stretching their legs, she was kissing him and making sure he was okay – stroking his face. The drive down through France was a non-stop blur of vineyards, strange road signs and Citroens. The Alfa had some dirty fuel problems as we set off from home in England and it was a nervous start as we barely limped into Dover’s hovercraft port in the middle of the night. But once we’d disembarked in Calais it was as though our beautiful little Alfa had sensed it was going home. It just took off, all Dad had to do was sit back and point it south.

I know from experience that if I time the trip correctly for a night run through France, I can leave my home near Salisbury and drive door-to-door to my cousin’s house in Milan in 17 hours, including the channel crossing and with stops for fuel and coffee only, maybe a a croissant if they’re warm. Done it many times, pre-speed cameras of course and occasionally In a Maserati. But anyway, back in the seventies before glass-smooth autoroutes and warp-drive, my poor father must have taken close to 24 hours just to make it to the Italian border in the Alfa. Mum told me sometime afterwards that at one point she woke up in the passenger seat half way through the Mont Blanc tunnel to see my Father dozing off at the wheel, the tunnel had two-way traffic back then!

Alfa Romeo Giulia

As I gently stirred into life and began absorbing the unfamiliarity of the moment, my Mother had instinctively opened the door and let me out of the car making sure not to disturb my younger brothers. The alpine air was icy fresh and needle sharp like I’d never felt before, it was way past midnight, I was seven, and we were in Italy. I didn’t know exactly what it was that I was feeling, but I liked it. Dad finished another cigarette while Mum got us all together and we went in to the warmth of the bar to rest a while – and then comes the moment that I will remember for the rest of my life.

Talk about being a kid in a candy store! All around was a sea of cakes and sweets and colours and sounds and smells that overwhelmed and saturated every one of my senses. I didn’t know what any of it was or what you were supposed to do with it. Mum called me to the table where she’d laid out some pastries and drinks, I sat myself down, looked across at her and then met my true Italian mother for the very first time.

She lovingly caressed that cup with both hands and raised it to her mouth, with closed eyes she paused just before she sipped and drifted away for a moment, she was back home and I could see memories flooding back to her. She’d been away from Italy for such a long time. She drifted back from her thoughts of family and sunshine, raised her cup and delicately tasted home once again, then turned to me with foamy lips and handed me her cup. All I could see was a milky froth with a dusting of chocolate powder that had been disturbed only by her lips. “What is it?” I asked. “Cappuccino” she said, and smiled. She knew.

Mum is Italian, she came to England in the fifties with her parents and three of her four brothers and had probably only been back home once since. We were about to see where and who she came from, and although we’d already been on the road for close to 40 hours, our journey really only started with that cappuccino. I was a very young boy but I could feel what it meant to her.

I’ve carried that feeling with me all my life, I’ll never forget my first ever cappuccino. Every single thing that I was ever going to learn about Italy was waiting for me there at that border, and item number one on the list had just been ticked off. We walk back to the car holding hands and I asked my mother if everything was going to be that nice?

She said yes.