Chapter 1 Dino
20 April was Dino Bracco’s twenty-first birthday. He worked. Giovanni, his boss at the Hotel Grand, brought him a cake from the hotel kitchen. ‘Just twenty-one!’ said Giovanni, and he put his hand on Dino’s back. ‘Ah, Dino, Dino...when I was twenty-one...!’
Dino ate some cake and smiled. He was only twenty-one years old, but he was a young man who knew what he wanted. He had a plan.
‘You must know what you want, Dino,’ his mother said to him when he was a child. And he did. He had a plan. Dino came from a very small town called Roccella, in the south of Italy. His mother and father were farmers. Roccella was beautiful but no-one had any money. Dino was born there, but now he lived and worked in Venice. He worked at the reception of the Hotel Grand.
‘Wow!’ said Dino’s friends in Roccella. ‘You’re at a big hotel on the Venice Lido. How did you get that job?’
Dino smiled. ‘Because I work hard,’ he thought, ‘and I have a plan.’
Dino liked his work at the reception. When guests came in, he said hello to them and he asked, ‘Sir, madam, would you like a glass of Soave, one of Venice’s famous wines?’ He took their credit cards. When they weren’t from Italy, he took their passports. Then he asked the boy to take their bags to their room. He helped the guests. ‘Yes, madam, of course, madam.’ Dino’s boss, Giovanni Tardelli, thought he was a good boy.
He knew a girl at the hotel who also came from Roccella. Her name was Maria Luca and she worked as a waitress. Maria was nice and he liked to talk to her, but she was just a friend. On his birthday, she gave him a small picture of Roccella, their town.
‘I did it,’ she smiled at him. ‘You can look at the picture and think about home. ’
‘Thank you, Maria!’ Dino smiled and put the picture in his little room. The picture was nice, but he didn’t think about Roccella much. He liked to think about his plans.
Women liked Dino. Well, why not? He was good-looking, with dark curly hair and beautiful brown eyes. And he was nice. The women who came to the hotel liked to talk to him. Dino was kind to them. But women were not in Dino’s plans. Not for the moment. ‘When I’m twenty-six,’ he thought, ‘I’m going to meet a woman, the woman I want to marry.’
Dino knew that it was important to look good. It was his job. He always wore good clothes: beautiful shirts, nice jackets and trousers. His hair always looked good and he was always elegante. He knew that Italy was famous for nice clothes and beautiful things. That’s why people came to Italy, to Venice.
Dino worked very long hours and he didn’t make much money. His room at the back of the hotel was very small. It just had a small bed, a table and light, and somewhere for his clothes.
But Dino didn’t think about the long hours, the little money and the small room. He liked his job at the Hotel Grand. And it was only the start. He knew what he wanted. Every night he wrote about the day in his little black book. Then he looked at his plans. He liked to read them every day.
The night of 20 April, his twenty-first birthday, Dino sat in his little room and looked at his little black book. He looked at his plans. ‘Everything is good,’ he thought. But on 21 April, something changed his plans. The woman with the long dark hair came and stayed at the Hotel Grand, and everything changed.
第1 章　迪諾
4月20日是迪諾博萊克的21歲生日。他在上班。他在格蘭德酒店的老板喬維尼從酒店的廚房給他拿來一個蛋糕�！安�21！”喬維尼說著把手放在迪諾的后背上。“啊，迪諾，迪諾……我21的時候……！”
迪諾笑著吃了一些蛋糕。他只有21歲，但他是一個知道自己想要什么的年輕人。他有個規(guī)劃。
“你必須知道自己想要什么，迪諾，”他還是小孩子的時候母親就對他說。他也是這么做的，他有個規(guī)劃。迪諾來自意大利南部一個叫羅切拉的小鎮(zhèn)。他的父母都是農民。羅切拉很美，但是那里沒人有錢。迪諾生在那里，但是現在他在威尼斯生活和工作。他在格蘭德酒店的前臺工作。
“哇！”迪諾在羅切拉的朋友說�！澳阍谕�尼斯利多的大酒店工作。你是怎么得到那份工作的？”
迪諾只是笑笑�！耙驗槲夜ぷ髋�力，”他想，“而且我有規(guī)劃�！�
迪諾喜歡自己的前臺工作�？腿诉M來時，他向客人問好并詢問：“先生，女士，想來杯蘇瓦韋白葡萄酒嗎？這是一種威尼斯的名酒。”他接過客人的信用卡。如果客人不是來自意大利，他就接過他們的護照。然后他讓門童把他們的行李送到房間。他為客人提供幫助。“是的，女士，當然，女士。”迪諾的老板喬維尼塔德利認為他是個好小伙兒。
他在酒店認識了一個同鄉(xiāng)女孩兒。她的名字叫瑪麗亞盧卡，是一名服務員�，旣悂喓芎蜕�，他喜歡和她聊天，但她只是個朋友而已。他生日那天，她送了他一幅家鄉(xiāng)小鎮(zhèn)羅切拉的小畫。
“我畫的，”她朝他笑笑。“你看到畫就可以想起家鄉(xiāng)�！�
“謝謝你，瑪麗亞！”迪諾笑著說。他把畫放到了自己的小房間里。畫很美，但是他沒多想羅切拉。他喜歡想自己的規(guī)劃。
女士們喜歡迪諾。是啊，為什么不呢？他長得英俊，有著烏黑的卷發(fā)和漂亮的棕色眼睛。而且他人好。來酒店的女士們喜歡和他說話。迪諾對她們很和藹。但是女人不在迪諾的規(guī)劃內，當下不在�！暗鹊搅�26時，”他想，“我會遇見一位女士，一位我想和她結婚的女士�！�
迪諾知道外在形象好很重要。這是他的工作。因此他著裝總是很講究：漂亮的襯衣，帥氣的上衣和褲子。他的頭發(fā)看起來總是很有型，而且他總是很優(yōu)雅。他知道意大利以好看的服裝和漂亮的東西著稱。這就是為什么人們來意大利，來威尼斯。
迪諾上班時間很長，掙錢不多。他的房間在酒店的后面，很小。里面只有一張小床、一張桌子和一盞臺燈，還有點兒放衣服的地方。
但是迪諾沒有去想上班時間的漫長、為數不多的工資和狹小的房間。他喜歡格蘭德酒店的這份工作。而且這只是個開始。他知道自己想要什么。每天晚上他都在黑色小本子里寫下自己的一天。然后他會看看自己的規(guī)劃。他喜歡每天讀讀自己的規(guī)劃。
4月20日的晚上，他21歲生日那天，迪諾坐在自己的小房間里看著他的黑色小本子。他看著自己的規(guī)劃�！耙磺卸己芎茫�”他想。但是4月21日，有件事改變了他的規(guī)劃。一位留著黑色長發(fā)的女士來入住了格蘭德酒店，一切都改變了。