VG's in Italia

ER - Italian style

2009-12-20T15:24:00.000-08:00

Right after our return from the Netherlands, I was having coffee with some new American girlfriends in Pavia. Afterwards, my new friend Rene and I, with Asher, headed out to lunch at a Lebanese restaurant, yum! We walked down Strata Nuova, which is mainly a pedestrian street with lots of shops and limited traffic, only buses. It’s time to cross the street, Rene and I head out first, I turn back to Asher and tell him to come. He starts towards me and a high speed cyclist runs Asher over, first knocking him down, then literally running over his entire body with the bike falling on Asher’s head. I ran to him, throwing the bike off, to hold my silently screaming Asher.

This is one of those moments where you hear about mothers who lift cars or have amazing feats of strength. I know it was only a bike, but as I threw if off him, I felt like I could have lifted a boulder off of him. Asher was hurt pretty badly, I have never seen him in such pain or so discombobulated. We had a huge crowd around us, as there were many pedestrians already walking on the street, everyone concerned over the little bambino that just got hit. The police were on the scene and called an ambulance before I could even call Doug. Doug got to the scene just as the ambulance was ready to take us to the hospital. I was so thankful for my new friend Rene who translated everything and even rode to the hospital in the ambulance and stayed there translating for me for several hours.

In the hospital, after an xray and an additional CT scan, we found out Asher had a small skull fracture. In my mind, I kept thinking how could this have been avoided, thoughts/regrets swirled around in my head. I should have held Asher’s hand across the street, even though it’s a pedestrian area…How did I not see that bike…I should have been more attentive and not so chatty with my friend. Nothing could bring that moment back, and so I have to live within the present reality. Learning from the past and not dwelling in it.

After the discovery of the skull fracture, the doctors wanted to keep us in the hospital for 24-48 hours. This turned into 3-4 days which turned into 9 days. As Asher is admitted, I am also “admitted” and a patient/prisoner with him. Normally, I would not sweat this, but in this case, the timing was terrible. We were having Lucas’ birthday party that Sat, and on Sun, Grace, Taylor, Sophia and Sherry were arriving for a visit from the US.

So here we are hospitalized in Italy’s state run health care system. I had some wariness in the back of my head, but as a foreigner that barely spoke the language, I was forced to trust the care we received from the doctors. And I have to say that we received excellent care. You would think that a state run system, wouldn’t want to shorten the hospital stay or not have thorough testing, but I felt the doctors did not leave a stone unturned. We had a private room with a bed for me as well. I was given meals along with Asher. It seemed they were without a care for the costs, and did all that they could. With my brother and Doug’s sister Jody giving us advice/thoughts that confirmed what our Italian doctors were doing, we appreciated the care we received.

While we felt we had quality doctors here in a state run system, I did see the evidence of a state run system in the facility. It wasn’t shiny and new like some American hospitals with flat screen TV’s and private bathrooms. We did have a sink in our room, but had a shared toilet and bath down the hall. Our balcony door was kept shut with a table in front of it. The second night, I asked for a towel, I didn’t know the word for it and did a round of charades to get them to figure it out. In the end they gave me a sheet. I managed, but made sure I learned the word for towel the next time. I asked for an asciugamano and I got…a sheet. Apparently, they don’t provide towels. Asher’s rolling IV bottle holder had two bum wheels on it (later on we got a better one with only one bum wheel), which meant I had to half carry it down the hall for bathroom breaks. And the hospital food-I won’t even mention it for fear of gagging. Although, I blame this on another new American friend of mine, Cindy, who told me just the day before that she had the best food at an, albeit different, Italian hospital after she gave birth. So I was ready and excited for my gourmet Italian hospital food. Needless to say, I’m setting the bar low, really low, for future Pavia hospitalization.

I know that the US is currently in a heated debate over health care reform. My experience gave me some new insight on how complicated it all is. I won’t comment on the American health care system/crisis mainly because it’s complicated and I am ignorant of all the issues involved on both sides. But I will say this: We walked out of the hospital after 9 days of hospitalization, xray, CTscan, EEG, ear scoping and exams, hearing tests, neurological examination, and a slew of other things I am probably forgetting, without a bill or any money out of our pocket. For this, I will be forever grateful.

Going to the Motherland

2009-12-20T15:13:00.000-08:00

A girlfriend of mine, Julia and her husband Mike, moved to Groningen, Holland earlier this year. So we booked a cheap flight on Ryan Air to visit them in the beginning of November. I was a little wary of Ryan Air, notorious for its charge-you-for-everything policies (ie €40 to pay with a credit card, when our tickets cost only €60). Also, Ryan Air operates out of Bergamo, outside of Milan, so we took a bus, a train, another train, then another bus, to finally get to the airport to board our plane. After arriving in Bremen, we rode a 3 hour bus and then a taxi to arrive at Julia’s. Totaling 12 hours of Trains, Planes, and Automobiles. Despite the length, we had a good day of travel with the boys and to our surprise, our experience with Ryan Air was very positive.

So we arrived in the Motherland. And it was cloudy. cold. rainy. A reason to Groan, again and again in Groanagain, oops Groningen. Yes, I was a little grumpy during the first part of our trip. To leave sunny, warm Italy for this was a little tough for me. But as the days past, I really came to love Holland.

First of all, it felt like a homecoming for me. Yes, this is Doug’s motherland, not mine, but it’s a part of me due to our many years in Grand Rapids, which holds a lot of the culture and feel of the Netherlands. We stayed on Diephuis Straat (so we thought of Doug’s good friend Greg often). We saw so many friends’ names on store fronts, businesses, and streets (Winkel, Ruiter, VerBeek, VanderMeyden to name a few). We had Ollie Bollen at the market - several times. We loved the fried fish, the cheeses, and the cosmopolitan nature of Groningen and Amsterdam. There were all different ethnic cuisines you could choose from. The markets held goods from all over the world. (I bought a jangle scarf for belly dancing there, and there were 3+ booths selling them- I think GR can follow suit here. More belly dancing in GR!)

Anther thing I loved about Holland is that everyone spoke English. It’s amazing that bus drivers, grocery cashiers, and street vendors, practically everyone on the street, spoke English. Not only this, what amazed me further was that many people would first talk to me in Dutch then after my blank stare and request for English, they spoke to me in English. Even in the USA, there are still people who will first try to talk to me in Chinese or Japanese. We only encountered a handful of people who did not speak English. One was a happy drunkard who adored our children. Which leads me to recount a serendipitous highlight of our trip.

On Monday night our whole family went for a night walk to throw away garbage and recycle. This kind drunk man sees us, says hello to the children, and says “lantaarn” to us, pointing at the kids. We smile, but shrug our shoulders and shake our heads, having no idea what he’s talking about. Well on Wed afternoon, I am heading back from the market with Julia on our bikes (of course!) and I see a family with children carrying lanterns. So I accost one of the families and find out that the kids make lanterns, hang them on a lit up fishing pole. They go around to others homes and businesses, sing a song, and get a treat. Trick or treating with a twist! So I run bike to the store, buy some of these lit poles and lanterns, ride home, grab the boys and off we go. The first place we go to was a bike store. The owner had these huge marshmallow treats in a container that were not individually wrapped. Well, Lucas grabs one promptly turns to me bright eyed and innocent and says, “Mommy, it's not covered, so we have to eat it right away, right?” Throw out any candy poisoning anxiety, how can I say no? We went around singing Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star, which got rousing cheers. Many had never heard it before. At a few homes they sang Jesus Loves Me, which got more odd looks, maybe because Lucas forgot some of the lyrics in the middle (we’ve been missing Sunday school- reminded me to do more at home!) So we stuck to Twinkle, Twinkle. Lucas sang this quite slowly and carefully in the beginning, but by the end, he was whipping it out in double time. Even Asher started to get it and was a little echo with Lucas by the end. Twinkle. Star. You Are. High. Sky. It was great spontaneous fun for our whole family, and the kids (we) got huge bags of yummy candy.

One’s loss another’s gain: Florence

2009-10-29T18:18:00.000-07:00

Returning from Oktoberfest, we got the opportunity to visit Florence. Doug’s cousin Janelle and family moved to Italy just a week before us. However, because they were traveling in Europe for 3 months prior, they encountered some visa problems and had to return to the US to resolve them. They generously offered us their apartment while they were gone. Thus, their loss became our gain. After our rough hotel stays in Austria & Germany (and this was at a nice 4star hotel where we all had our own beds!), we jumped at the chance to stay in an apartment, to be able to cook healthier (and cheaper) meals, have the space to move around, and sleep/relax in separate rooms. And the icing on the cake: their apartment was bellisimo! It had a huge master suite with space for sleeping, an office, and a master bath, a nice spacious kitchen with eating area & dishwasher(oh how I miss my dishwasher!), high ceilings, huge windows, satellite TV in English, and it was right in the city center amidst all the top attractions of Florence. I had some serious Italian apartment envy.

Once we got situated, we did a Renaissance walking tour and got our bearings around the center of Florence. Visiting some of the major sites, the Duomo/Baptistry, Santa Croce, Bargello, San Lorenzo Market, Ponte Vecchio, Piazza Repubblica, Piazza Signoria, Piazzale Michelangelo, Palazzo Pitti, Palazzo Vecchio, Boboli Gardens, Uffizi… we appreciated the architecture, the sculptures, the art, the markets, the views, and the gelato (of course). There is so much there, you can see some of it in our pics.

When you travel, there are always unexpected blessings and curses. One day, we visited Palazzo Vecchio, which has a children’s program in English. So, we roamed through this palace with some other English speaking families, the boys searching for turtles in various parts of the palace art. At the end of the tour, we were talking to a few of the families, and it turned out a group of them were Renaissance professors on fellowships doing research in Florence, an American family, an English family, and a Canadian family. Well, it was Canadian Thanksgiving and they generously invited us celebrate it with them. We love those Canadians! So we got to enjoy some Tuscan delights, wild boar stew, pappardelle, sausages, cheeses, croquettes and of course good Tuscan wine & grappa. The kids all entertained themselves in the spacious apartment(I had apartment envy once again). It was such a great afternoon, listening to fun stories and meeting a new set of families (who are actually very familiar with Italia, the language, culture, and of course, the Renaissance).

And then there are the curses. We loved James & Janelle’s apartment, but there was one pesky problem. Mosquitoes. These mosquitoes didn’t bother us during the day, but it was in our sleep that they would buzz in our ear and bite us all over our face, arms, and hands. We would lay out traps before we slept, trying to lure them in and kill them. But whenever we killed one (which was not an easy feat as the Italian mosquito is quite elusive), there was always another one around. Poor Doug got the worst of it. Usually, I work well as Doug’s mosquito repellent, apparently in the States, they favor my blood. Here, in Florence, Doug got double the number of bites I did. Ouch!

Denn alles fleisch es ist wie gras (Oktoberfest)

2009-10-28T11:21:00.000-07:00

So here we are in northern Italy, and we realize that the real deal Oktoberfest is taking place in not so far off Germany, so off we go with our 2 young boys. We stop for a night in Innsbruck, Austria where we had a yummy dinner of starchy salty delicacies – Susie had the best mac and cheese she’s ever had. Doug washed it down by a surprisingly sweet tasting beer (more on that later). That night we tried to get the whole family asleep in an 8 by 12 foot room with 2 single beds. So the boys are first. We put them down, and we hunker outside the door watching Planet Earth. We probably had to stop the show at least 8 times to try and curtail their giggling, talking, and otherwise not sleeping. Needless to say, none of us got a lot of sleep that night. Ah, the joys of staying in a hotel with kids.

The next morning we head to Monk-town (Munich), only an hour away. It is during this leg of our journey that we face the fact that neither Susie nor Doug knows German. This turns out to be 100% true for Susie, but Doug is oddly able to recall a smattering of phrases from a former life: das is nicht zo goot; ich ben ine Berliner; spreckenzee Deutsch? Nine. On top of this, shreds of Brahmsian phrases from choir days return as well, but we think ‘Then all flesh is as the grass’ will not be easy to work into everyday conversations.

Parking by our hotel, we took the train into Thereseweiss, the place of Oktoberfest. At every stop the number of people on the train doubled. Young and old alike garbed in leiderhosen, leather trousers for men, and dirndls (can I buy a vowel here?) busty calico dresses for women. The climb out of the subway station is truly climactic as it summits right in front of the main gate to the festival – which started some 199 years ago when Crown Prince Ludwig gave his new bride Therese a field and they used that location for a wedding party.

We have arrived, and it is now our duty to try and convey the wonder that is Oktoberfest. So it is I, Doug, authoring this entry, as I was the one viewing the event through the appropriate lager-colored glasses. This is not just a metaphor, as the glasses are so big that when you drink, you cannot see over it and must look right into your glass and out the bottom. I enjoyed a pair of these over the course of the day, enough to wash down the roasted chicken and sausages, but not enough to do anything embarrassing.

So it turns out when you center a festival on Beer, it becomes the biggest one in the world. It was packed with people, all in various stages of debauchery and tomfoolery. Not just young people either. Kids, older adults, it seemed every German, and those wishing to be German, showed up. In the Hacker-Pschorr tent, where we got in first, we sat down next to 2 Austrians, dressed in their leiderhosen, who just drove in for the day. One was a cop and had been up the whole night before. He could barely keep from falling asleep. It was the awake one that clued us in to the existence of the radler. Some of you know that I enjoy creating ‘beer-coolers’ with juice and beer. Well, that’s what a radler is. It turns out I had ordered one in Austria, and now discovered that it was invented by bikers in Bavaria, who upon nearly running out of beer, starting mixing it with lemonade. The radler (german for rider) has been a Bavarian staple ever since.

The truly shocking part about the fest, though was the rides. Yes, carnival rides. Enough to outdo Cedar point. Loopers, swingers, whizzers, every combination of swervy motion you can imagine. Now rides are a lot of fun, but remember this is a beer festival. A beer festival where the beer is served in large litre size mugs – all Andre the Giant size. And people were drinking a lot of beer (typically 7 million liters total). The festival has an entire operation dedicated to picking up passed-out-drunks and discretely covering them with a box, before carting them away to a rather large recovery tent. The festive cacophony is punctuated surprisingly regularly by the sounds of ambulance sirens entering and leaving the grounds. Never was chunder more inevitable. I include a picture for those of you who dare to look.

Our day wound down as we sat in a park near the entrance, surrounded by happy playing children, and the numerous men lying in the fetal position. Notice the level of the glass in these pictures taken just minutes apart. I tried to tell him “Denn alles fleisch es ist wie gras”, but I don’t think he heard me.

(By the way, Brahms wrote his requiem between 1865 and 1868, almost 60 years after the first Oktoberfest. I like to imagine he attended himself in 1864.)

Our next day in Munich, we did a walking tour of the city. We learned about the history of Munich and Bavarian culture. It is amazing that after all the bombings during WWII, the buildings are as beautiful as they were prewar. Apparently, the Nazi’s took a lot of photos of the buildings, which were used to rebuild them to their previous glory. As we walked around, we could see the foundation of the buildings had bullet marks in them showing the evidence of the bombings, some buildings had cannonballs lodged in them. Another interesting thing we learned is that the leiderhosen, the leather trousers, are passed down from generation to generation. So you know a true Bavarian by the condition/age of their leiderhosen. Now, are the leiderhosen cleaned before being passed on to the next generation is another question. We also visited a pub, where you have your own beer mug, and your own booth. If you get to the restaurant, anyone sitting in your booth must move and they will serve you beer in your very own personalized beer stein. Now that is VIP service!

A Random fun thing we encountered in Munich: We ran into the LEGO roadshow 2009 and had fun playing with legos, jumping in a giant lego blow up, riding a lego ride, watching them build an 80 ft tower...

I am going to end this blog with an age old adage from Homer Simpson; "Bacon that sausage, boy."

Milan Mums and Tots

2009-09-28T16:06:00.000-07:00

So this past week I found out about a mums and tots play group in Milan. It was such a blessing to meet with some English speaking women/moms. Thursday was also their monthly mums night out, so I got to try out a charming little Italian restaurant (Casa Tua). The dinner out started at 830pm. So after making dinner for our family (we eat at 7pm, early for Italians) I took the commuter train into Milan (20 min) then hopped on the metro for a few stops to get to the restaurant. My love for city life has returned being so close to a large city. When I got to the restaurant, it was nearly empty, but with reservations full they were turning people away. Then by 930pm, the restaurant was packed out. There were even a few models sitting at the table next to us (fashion week starts soon). Service was slow, so we had a very long meal, but it was good. I even got to try rabbit, and it was surprisingly delicious and tender. I had to leave by 1130 to catch the train, so I missed dessert. A few interesting things about eating out in Italy: complimentary mini appetizers, multiple courses with meat 2nd after pasta/rice, no tipping, no doggy bags(except pizza), specify water-naturale or frizzante, and some slower service (longer paced meal).

As you might have noticed, instead of mom, it is mum due to the overwhelming large number of British mums over American moms. I am partly surprised by the great number of Brits over Americans in Europe, and also all over the world, considering our population difference (England 61mil-USA 304mil). Of course in Europe, you would expect to find more English expats because it is so close. In addition, I think there is a greater openness to moving to a foreign country. As Americans it’s common to move to another state or another city, but uncommon to move overseas. Maybe it is because we are blessed to live in such a large country with varied landscapes, demographics, and subcultures. Maybe it is because we are a bit isolated and insulated from the rest of the world. Regardless, I am thankful we had the opportunity to live abroad. And as charming it is to hear some kids say mum, I love to hear my kids call me their mom(my).

To Bidet or Not to Bidet

2009-09-25T05:20:00.000-07:00

There has been a lot of talk in our house regarding our new bathroom accessory. While I am usually not one to engage in bathroom talk, the Bidet cannot be missed in our blog. The boys have been very intrigued, with Asher asking, at times demanding, to use it as a second toilet. While they pay less attention to it after 3 weeks, he asked again if he could pee in it just yesterday. Doug and I have been discussing bidets, their use, the frequency, the ubiquity. In the past, we’ve seen some with little fountains in the middle, but ours, including most Italian bidets, is a shallow sink shaped like a toilet with a faucet. So we’ve been debating how to use ours. Do you splash from the faucet or fill & dip. What is your vote?

With many of our Italian questions, we went to our friend Dario got the low down. Bidets are still used by many to wash after the #2. Most from our generation do not use it, but it is still in every home, including new construction. His parent’s generation probably still uses it regularly. And how do they use it? Drum roll…fill and dip!

We had this lovely bidet conversation with Dario on our way to Brescia this past weekend. Dario’s parents invited us to lunch at their house. We made a day trip of it and Dario took us to see his home town and a lake close by. It was a fun day, seeing some sights in another Italian city. The old Duomo there is circular and a newer (centuries ago) Duomo was built next to it. Both beautiful buildings inside and out with a wonderful green piazza in front. There was even a children’s bush maze. In Brescia, there were even some old Roman ruins that we got to see. What is amazing is that as the city is built around these ruins, in the last 2000 years, the ground level around the ruins steadily risen, some by natural sediment deposits and some man built roads/construction, but there is nearly a 12 feet of ground level difference from the ruins and modern day. It is wild seeing things that are so old!

At 1pm, we went on to the home of Dario’s parents, Luciano & Adele. Dario’s newly married brother, Sergio, and sister in law, Teresa, joined us as well. The meal started with wonderful antipasti, there were 8 different varieties, including: roasted red peppers and garlic, pepperchinis with parm cheese, octopus (even Lucas tried this, now he’s proud to say he’s eaten octopus), and marinated mushrooms. This was followed by some wonderful risotto with saffron and mushrooms. I had to work hard at not eating too much because I knew there was more to come. It was a relaxing meal with wine and good conversation about Italy and life in the Pasini household. The whole family loved on our children, giving them candies and letting them run around. They knew what it was like to have two boys as Dario and Sergio did the same thing many years ago. Back to the meal, the main dish was some stewed beefsteak served with a delicious polenta and mashed potatoes. After that we had salad. It’s different having the salad toward the end of the meal, but there’s something nice about having the greens to wash down the heavier foods from earlier in the meal. Then we had two courses of dessert. First some fruit salad sweetened in syrup with gelato (of course!). After that an apple torta. I saved a little bit of my torta to have with my espresso at the end of the meal, which Italians typically have by itself.
Four hours later, we were full of food, wine and Italian company. Because the meal is over a large period of time, it was nice to have breaks here and there, especially towards the end of the meal, a few people, including Doug, lounged in the couches nearby as we talked.

From there we headed to a lake nearby, Lago di Iseo. There is another lake nearby, the largest lake in Italy, Lake Garda. This lake is a bit touristy so we headed over to Iseo which is picturesque and has a large island in the middle of the lake, which you can take a ferry to. We had planned to take a ferry to visit the island, but dark clouds moved in and so we shortened our visit at Iseo. Of course we made time to have some gelato and walked through a large open market for antique furniture.

It was a great day away thanks to our friend Dario and his family.

Rain, rain go away…

2009-09-19T14:50:00.001-07:00

The weather was beautiful our first two weeks here, and then its rained for the past three days. So when the sun peeked out today, we tried to take advantage of it. We went to a big outdoor kids play area in Pavia that had inflatables, trampolines, mazes, ball pits, playground equipment, play riders and more, for only E3! We were the first ones there and the last ones to leave. Stopping only because it closed for reposo (aka siesta). Leaving there, in passing, Doug noticed a guy with a Cal sweatshirt. Soon after, we ducked into a bakery (about to close, luckily we got in) to buy some bread. I saw the Cal sweatshirt guy and asked him if he went to Berkeley. It turned out he was Italian and did not go to Berkeley, but his friends were three American boys, all Berkeley grads. Go Bears!

With the respite from rain, we finally got the chance to check out a new park I had seen while biking around. The boys enjoyed it, but I realized I was starting to get bug bites, then they started to swarm around us, I must have swatted 6 mosquitos in 10 seconds, two of them on Asher's forehead. I quickly got Asher in the bike seat and we headed out. When we stopped, I noticed Lucas was all bit up. So much so that I counted his bites. (I wanted to tell Doug who was not with us) There were 42 of them! The bugs have been an issue. We (even Doug) get bug bites throughout the entire day. Typically in the US, the bugs come out at night, but here, it's an all day deal. Fresh American blood, something new and exciting for the little buggers?

Our final fun activity was a mini festival/open market in our town. We headed there after dinner. It was an interesting market of goods, from jewelry, hand puppets, cars, kids clothes, sausages, jellies, sauces, cheeses, wines, and (random) products from Madagascar. Restaurants were open with seating outdoors and of course gelato stands. They had stages set up for bands in different areas. We can hear them play right now. We caught a fire eating show in the kids area, where they had balloons and face painting. We were just enjoying the show, when we felt the drops of rain. We headed back home in a drizzle. Lucas asked why we didn't bring an umbrella. Which started a series of "why" questions on reading the sky and weather patterns.

All in all, we made up for the days it rained with lots of fun activities for the whole family.

Hitchhiking through Pavia

2009-09-14T12:10:00.001-07:00

Yes. I did it. For the first time in my life, I tried to hitchhike.

Our family took our first trip into Milan, we heard of an English speaking church in the city that had a service at 530pm, so we decided to make a day of it. First stop was a Korean restaurant for lunch. The first one was closed, but we were able to find another one not too far away. And as we were heading there, we came across a fun park for the boys to play at. Second stop, the Duomo, the main cathedral in the center of town. Milan is set up like a wheel with the Duomo at the center, roads go out from there and there are multiple concentric circles within the wheel. The Duomo was beautiful, but our boys made it difficult to linger especially with the Silence, Please signs all over. Next we ate at Odeon Gelateria, a fun shop that had lots of flavors. Doug noted that gelato isn’t as creamy as he thought it was going to be. And contrary to what we’ve been told, we found out that ice cream does have more calories than gelato! Bring on the gelato! Fourth stop, the Ferrari store, we got a little mixed up finding the Ferrari store, so Asher fell asleep and missed most of our time in the 5 level Ferrari store. Level 1: Kids, Level 5:Luxury. Due to time, we skipped most of the levels, and headed to our Fifth stop, St. Augusine’s square, Piazza Sant’ Agostino. St. Augustine had his conversion experience in a small garden in Milan, which we thought we’d find in the Piazza. Unfortunately, all we found was a concrete wasteland. Some ugly buildings and a subway entry - quite disappointing. Finally we went to church, Milan Bible Church. They had child care. Yeah! So we were able to enjoy the service and message.
Here is where the day got hairy. We heard that near the church, which was in the southern part of the city, there was a station that had buses to Pavia. Great, maybe we’ll save time& money since we have to head south to Pavia. At the bus station, we could not find anyone that could help us. I asked several people in broken Italian how, but got very few answers. At this point we were cutting close for our train to Pavia. So we ran down to catch the metro and then the commuter train to Pavia. Panting and sweaty, we got on without a minute to lose. Whew, we made it!

We got to Pavia and went to the bus stop to catch our bus, only to find that the buses stopped running on Sunday at 830pm. It was 845pm. No problem, we’ll grab a cab. No cabs at the taxi stop. No numbers to call one. Finally, a taxi comes, but another group is ahead of us and they take it. 30 minutes later, the boys are getting tired and antsy. So we head out to the main road to try to hail a cab. There is a ton of traffic, cars, motorcycles, bikes. There is a festival in Pavia, so a lot of people are out. We talk to a police man that tries to call a cab, several times, on my phone, his phone, and another police woman tries to call on the radio. The lines are busy, we are on hold, and at one point we get through, but they say to call back in 5 minutes because there are no cabs available. At this point it is 945pm. So we decide to try to walk the 2+ miles home.
Our wonderful day in Milan is becoming a distant memory to the cramps and blisters we face now. Lucas tells us that he thinks it was a bad idea to go to Milan. My heart is breaking for the boys. We keep calling the taxi company, and finally get through, but we are in the middle of nowhere with too little Italian to explain where we are. I bust out my Spanish and try that. Doesn’t work. I stop a stranger and ask him to explain where we are to the cab driver. After he hangs up, I ask how long will it take the cab to get here? He doesn’t know, but it will come he says. We decide to continue walking.

And this is when it happened, in complete desperation, I pull out my thumb and hope that it is an international sign for hitching a ride. Dozens of cars drive by, but no one stops. We get to about 1/3 of a mile from home and a taxi is driving in the opposite direction. We flag it down, hop in and look forward to being home. We get home in a minute or two, only to haggle with the taxi driver who tries to charge us 9 Euros, $13, for all the traffic he had to drive through. Will this day ever end? I fight him and give him $4 and safely duck in to our apartment building. It is 1030pm.

So I didn’t actually hitchhike. But I never thought I would ever even try. Desperate times call for desperate measures. And this mama had to get her babies home.

PS Pictures to come. My computer is not allowing me to download pictures from my camera.

The world of Piazzas

2009-09-10T09:20:00.000-07:00

I love Piazzas - not to be confused with Pizzas, while I love them too. In Italy (and many other European cities), there are many piazzas. Each city has a main one that is large (or multiple ones in larger cities). It is an open space fully enclosed by beautiful old buildings on each side and cars typically do not travel in the piazza. Within the piazza you may have several restaurants that have their outdoor seating under tents. You may find an artist working on a painting, people sitting on benches, children playing a game,… Today as we explored the city center, we took a break, bought some gelato and sat at one of the tables. Basking in the sun and people watching, I thought, here I am in Italy. How crazy is this?!

The other crazy thing is European fashion. I’ve seen more than a few men wearing orange, yellow, green pants. I first saw it on one of the men helping us with our Internet connection. And I named him Orange Pants while talking to Doug. “Orange Pants is the new guy” & “Orange Pants told me this”. But now I’ve seen multiple people, in other colors too. Some who look like they are fashionable otherwise with these colored pants. Maybe the new fashion trend, coming soon to your nearest Gap?

An American in Italy

2009-09-08T14:27:00.000-07:00

A few nights ago we had a wonderful Italian meal at Dario’s, Doug’s colleague. It was a typical Italian meal. After some antipasti, for our piatti primi, we had a bowl of pasta in a wonderfully fresh tomato sauce and foccacia bread. Next we had melon wrapped in prosciutto, then a nice salad and some grilled fish, then cheese and fruit, then the dolci, some gelato, finally a cup of caffe, served in a tiny espresso cup. I tried to force myself to take little sips while tempted to down it like a shot. We put a video in for the boys so we could enjoy our nice long meal with vino and good conversation with new friends.

I titled this blog entry an American in Italy, because as I get acclimated to life in Italy, my mind is comparing it to our life in the US. Not as a yearning, but more in an analytical process. Being in Italy, a developed, civilized, western nation in Europe, I would expect the way of life to be different but the standards and conveniences of life to be very similar to the USA. While most of it is, there is a level of luxury we have in the US. I say luxury because there are so many things that we take for granted, that we don’t even think of them as luxuries, but they go above the level of comfort needed. For example, the apartment we are staying in has a hair dryer. It’s a more basic model than mine, but I thought, its Italian, I should use it. Within the first minute, my hair gets tangled up and burned because there are no mesh guards covering the air intake. Ouch. No problem, I’ll plug mine in. Well, my blow dryer is on steroids, blowing air like a commercial fan and getting very hot. Do I heed the sign that the converter does not seem to be working and thus turn off the dryer? Of course not, I am a woman with limp wet hair in Milano! So then my blow dryer gives one bright glorious glow and shuts down. It’s gone. And what am I left with? A complaining heart that can’t believe I have to go back to that hair-eating Italian dryer. Instead of feeling grateful that there is a blow dryer, that little piece of lost luxury that I had with my American appliance is mourned and missed.

The blow dryer is a small and insignificant incident, mainly a fun story that I wanted to share. But we’ve noticed that as Americans, we enjoy a high quality of life with a low cost. Here we are finding higher prices and lower quality of goods. From electronics to food products like meat, Americans seem to have the best of what’s out there at affordable prices. What a blessing! But is there a hidden cost? A cost to the rest of the world? And do we ourselves lose something in the process? Definitely some things to think about for me. Doug and I are gaining a greater global perspective here that we hope will return with us to the States.

Internal Clocks

2009-09-08T08:55:00.000-07:00

We have been amazed at how our bodies take a while to transition to our new life that is six hours ahead of MI. Sleep is of course the main concern, especially trying to get the boys in a good sleep pattern. The first two nights they slept close to their normal bedtimes 8-9pm, we thought this was a good sign, they are adjusting well. Much to our dismay, that second night, they woke up at midnight and were wide awake. It was over an hour later, with much effort on our part, to get them back to sleep. Last night was a battle from 9-11pm, with the boys in and out of their beds. Although, I have to say, it’s tough to go to bed at 9pm, when you woke up at 11am. We’ve all been sleeping until 1030-11am each morning. Sounds nice, except for me, because I couldn’t fall asleep until 4am.

The other interesting thing we’ve noticed is not only do we have an internal clock for sleep patterns, our bodies are also adjusting to eating in Italian time. We’ve tried to have meal time be normal mealtimes, breakfast when we wake up, lunch around 1pm (since we had breakfast two hours ago, this is a light meal), dinner around 7pm (on the early side for Italians). Then, between 9-11pm, Lucas keeps asking for more food right before we put him to bed. At first I dismissed it as a stall tactic. But I think his body is still waiting for the big dinner to come (even though he’s had a big dinner already). We as adults also find ourselves with little or no appetite during the day and ravenous during the later hours of the night. Our bodies are truly creatures of habit that cling to old patterns.

Benvenuti in Italia

2009-09-05T06:52:00.000-07:00

We have arrived in Italia and are getting situated here. Weve settled into our apartment which is very nice. We are official residents with social security numbers and everything. Armed with our new status, we were able to get a cell phone and hope to get Internet soon. While we may not like to admit it, we realize that the Internet is a huge part of our lives. It helps us get connected with friends and family through email and skype, and it also provides so much information; maps, where to go for this, how to do that, translate this. In a desperate search to get connected, we found a secured network in our building by the name of SQUEEZIE. We have been trying to find squeezie. We went to every floor trying to see where the signal gets stronger, we even wrote him a note, but to our dismay, there has been no contact. We have someone coming on Monday to see if we can get an Internet key. Once I get this, we'll post pictures and share more.

People have been very nice here. Doug's colleague Dario, has been an immense help, driving us everywhere, translating, even loaning us a bike. I can't imagine how we could have done it without him.

We are still figuring out the food situation. We've gone out to eat sandwiches and pizza, ham (with many versions, pancetta, prosciutto, chudo?, and a few other versions) seems to be the main meat in sandwiches. I had a type of ham today that was dark red and very salty.

I asked Lucas what he thought of Italy and he said it's good. Asher probably would not agree. Yesterday Asher said he wanted to go home. When we got to our apartment he said,"no not this home, go HOME!" It's been a bit of a sleep deprived adjustment for Asher.

Arrivederci for now, we will write more later!

Dash to the Finish

2009-08-31T09:33:00.001-07:00

We are in the final days before our adventure in Italy. In typical Susie style, we are in a flurry to get ready. Procrastination has it's up side and down side, maybe Doug would say only a down side. Regardless, I enjoyed my summer and now, of course, I wish we had a few more days. Many people have asked us if we are stressed getting ready. We are both fairly at peace about it all and will go as ready as we are. We are looking forward to our adventure and if we've forgotten something here in America, we hope that there will be something better in Italy to make up for it. We will embrace our Italian life with gusto.

If you have any last minute thoughts or advice, feel free to let us know!