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An Interview with our neighbour Andreas Prantl (AP) and his partner Regina (R),
by Andrew Milne-Skinner (AMS).
AMS: tell me about your Vespa, Andreas!
AP: She’s a 1962 150cc Vespa, original except for the saddle, and re-sprayed pistachio-green. I’ve owned her for 12 years. From the age of 16 I always wanted a Vespa. Now I’m 61 and have one!
AMS: How often do you take her out?
AP: On average 5 to 10 times a summer, only in fine weather. Usually about 500 kms a season. Often to ice-cream parlours. Once we were on Lake Garda together….having taken her in our mini-bus. Every Vespa needs to return at least once to its native land, its Heimat!
AMS: The first Vespas are now 78 years old. Is your Vespa reliable?
AP: 100%. She starts first time in spring…
R: But I’m there with a back-up car, just in case.
AMS: But you’re not a member of any Vespa Club?
AP: No. I’m very much my own man! But I have a good Vespa colleague here in Inzing.
AMS: Why are these Piaggio machines called ‘Vespas’?
AP: Because of their sound….they buzz like wasps, and they’re so agile and manoeuvrable…
R: You can use them in narrow streets and alley-ways in Italian towns, where cars can’t go.
AMS: Like in Naples? Where thieves on Vespas would rip women’s handbags from them! Why do people respond to Vespas with a sympathetic smile?
AP: Vespas remind them of that Italian summer feeling….a feeling of youthful enjoyment, of easy living, of summer memories, with that Mediterranean flair.
AMS: So nostalgia is a factor here. In the 1950s and 60s advertising for the Vespa often showed a long-legged Italian woman sitting on a Vespa, with a flowing dress, showing a stocking: exotic.
R: Erotic! That doesn’t disturb me. These are striking images, as in Italian love-films of the period. I can’t ride the Vespa yet….no licence for it!
AMS: In the film Roman Holiday we see Audrey Hepburn enjoying her newly found freedom on a Vespa. And for you, Andreas?
AP: Yes, it’s the immediate, spontaneous freedom and pleasure of jumping on the Vespa in a ‘T’-shirt and flip flops!
AMS: Thank you both, Regina and Andreas, and for this interview. Have fun this summer!
