For Gianfranco Verde, the road from opening for The Beatles to closing the door on a 39-year career on cruise ships has been, well, long and winding.
He’s heading into his final contract with Princess, as Hotel General Manager on the Coral Princess. You might have made the (lucky) guess that he’s from Italy, but when he walks off a Princess ship for the last time, he’ll be going home to…Australia.
Confusing?
Not to Gianfranco.
As a teenager in Italy, he loved music, especially playing instruments. His instrument of choice was the drums and that eventually led to being in a band. A pretty good band, 
evidently, good enough to be the opening act for The Beatles when they toured his homeland in 1965. (That’s Gianfranco on the right, standing behind George Harrison.)
“They were the idols in those days,” he says. “I have pictures at home. I introduced myself to Ringo and he said the best thing about being popular is you never have to introduce yourself. That’s my highlight.”
The leader of the band, Augusto Righetti, went on to own an entertainment agency. Gianfranco went on to sea.
“I had to [quit music] because I wanted to continue to go to school,” he says. “My objective was to complete the studies. I would do the same today. I studied economy and finance for eight years, in Milan. That’s part of how I learned English.”
One of six children, Verde’s father was a builder and his mother a cook. His thoughts of working on a ship were as far away as the sea.
“I had no thoughts of coming to sea,” Gianfranco explains. “I’m from Piedmont, about 60 or 70 miles northwest of Milan, or Turin. It’s an area which is industrial. Turin is the Detroit of Italy, and the sea is very far away. After university I had a friend who said to me: ‘Let’s 
go for an adventure.’ He’d found jobs on a ship, from Genoa. He left after a year, and I’m still here.”
All his 39 years have been with Princess, or with a company that owned Princess. He climbed the ladder on ships. Front desk. Back office. Crew office. In 1995, he spent a year and a half participating in preparing the Sun Princess for launch, and a month later he was promoted to hotel manager.
He remembers the Sun Princess with affection:
“There are many big ships now but the Sun Princess revolutionized the industry, with all the balconies. No one had balconies then. And 24-hour dining when no one had that. And electronics, and the new system of the cards in the stateroom door. So many innovations. It was a pleasure and an honor to have been intimately involved in something that has revolutionized the cruising industry. I was there [Fincantieri Shipyards] for one and a half years, and I was really involved.”
His best day at sea was on land. This was before he became Hotel Manager and he met a young woman who was a youth activity co-ordinator on the ship. Her name was Jacinta.
“We were friends on board, then we bumped into each other — literally — in Venice,” he laughs. “That was the luckiest day of my life and, after that, we stayed together. Now it’s 20 years.”
Australia?
That’s where Jacinta’s from, and they live 100 miles north of Sydney with their 18-year-old son. It is a long and winding way from Piedmont.
“Australia is paradise, but it was a big change,” Verde says. “We had to make a house become a home. Having a child actually made it a home.”
When he goes home early in 2012, it will be as a near-pensioner who still loves music, who still plays drums, who still he a home workshop and who still visits Italy.
“You can’t turn the years back to be young again, but I love where I am from,” he adds, allowing himself a self-deprecating joke about his countrymen. “When God created the earth, he rested on the seventh day…and then he saw Italy and thought it was heaven. In order to balance that, he put Italians there!”
DAILY DEAL:
Oceania Insignia
12 nights
December 10, 2011
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil to Buenos Aires, Argentina
Oceanview $3,999
www.oceaniacruises.com
