Persi Nella Pioggia

It has been raining so much for the past couple of days. Actually it has been flooding everywhere it is raining so much. Apparently, this is really strange for this time of year. Everyone seems to hate the weather, but I coming from the desert, love it! At least I love it most of the time...

I had plans to meet up with Nicole for lunch. I decided I would go into the city early to drink coffee and read at my new favorite place, Chocolat. It was raining SO much, but I decieded I would go out anyway. I had to take a bus and a metro to get to Chocolate.  The first problem I had was that I got on the bus going the wrong direction. I didn’t even think of this! So I ended up in the middle of now where, but I got back to where I needed to be…eventually. Once on the metro I got to my stop fine. I had to pee (I really need to stop drinking so much coffee) but the bathroom in the metro was charging a euro. I, being the extremely stubborn person that I am, decided paying a euro to pee in a dirty metro bathroom was ridiculous!  I knew I was close to Chocolat so I decided to wait. I really should realize how truly, truly horrible I am with directions.  I am pretty sure that that part of my brain never formed and never will. Of course I got lost. I was wandering around the city in the pouring rain having no idea where to go. It was raining so much that my umbrella was almost blown out of hands 5 times, and I couldn’t look up to see the street signs because rain was falling in my eyes everytime I tried to glance up. Plus, the streets change ever time there is the smallest curve in the road. You can walk 20 feet and be on four different streets without evening realizing it! I was getting SO frustrated because I didn’t understand how I could have gotten so lost, I really had to pee AND I was mad at myself for not paying the damn euro to use the dirty metro bathroom. When I finally found it, I felt like I had conquered the world!  

Later I met up with Nicole for lunch and went shoping. Makeup and pretty underwear! Things I could probably never have to buy again for the rest of my life I have so much…but oh well! I found the best makeup store ever! It is basically the Milan version of Mac but so much better AND  it is really, really cheap!  I love being a girl!

Americans in Italy

Nicole invited me to an All American Breakfast Party her neighbors were having. She lives above an American family who has lived in Milan for 5 years. The parents are journalists who have lived all over the world for their jobs. One of their sons goes to school in Manchester and the other goes to school in Milan, but he is still in high school. I met of bunch of his/ Nicole’s friends who also go the International School of Milan. These kids have lived all over the world, literally. I enjoyed learning about their heritages and their lives so much; they were all so unique. For example, one girl’s father is Italian and her mother is Chinese, they have lived in Africa, America, and Italy. Another girl’s dad is American and her mother is Australian and he has lived in Italy, America, and Australia. Every person I met that night had a different and diverse story, and they were all fluent in about ten languages. It is strange that these people were still in high school because they seemed so much older. It is true that age is truly just a number. I am pretty sure these individuals have had more life experiences than the typical 60 year old American. For dinner/breakfast we made pancakes, chocolate chip banana muffins, bacon, eggs, and mimosas. I didn’t realize how much I missed greasy, fattening, and delicious American breakfast foods! After dinner we went out to get gelato followed by bar hopping in downtown Milan. Truly a great night!

Non Capisco

Last weekend I went out with the Italian nobleman.  I had only know him for about an hour when he asked me if I wanted to go out. He then proceeded to send me NUMEROUS text messages and facebook messages asking me to go out, which needless to say was overwhelming. I should have realized he was a bit over the top but I thought I should go out and explore Milan.  Also I could tell it would have offended Rita if I didn’t go with him.  I had asked him if we would be meeting up with some of his other friends and I told him I would like to meet people. He told me a bunch of friends would be at the bar we would be going to. Well, this turned out not to be true…at all. You know when you have the feeling someone already really like you? Well I had this feeling…and it was so very awkward because the feeling was not mutual. Once we got to the bar, I realized he thought the night was more of a date than anything else. Especially since none of his friends were there, even though he told me we would be meeting up with them. I kept trying to go with flow of things, but it was so weird. Honestly I have never been on such an awkward “date”, especially when I didn’t want a date in the first place! When we first got to the bar he offered to by me a drink. I was thinking, “yes PLEASE… because I am about ready to run out of this bar…” So what does he get? NON alcoholic drinks! Also the drinks were ten dollars each... so I do not understand why he spent 20 dollars on juice that didn’t even taste good. I asked him if he drank and he said yes. I was so confused by why he ordered non alcoholic drinks for both of us, but I couldn’t find the right Italian words to ask . So I just drank my non-alcoholic-strawberry-medicine flavored drink and smiled. The night only preceded to get more awkward and uncomfortable as I realized more and more how much he thought this was a date and how much I wanted then the night to be over. I didn’t want to be rude and I felt so bad that I decided to stick it out. But after a few hours I asked if he could take me home. As we were walking the car, we passed another bar and asked if I wanted another drink. I am thinking no, I just want to go home but I said yes. At this point it 2 in the morning, and he asks if I want a bottle of wine. NO I don’t want a bottle of wine, its 2 in the morning and I want to go home! I agreed to one glass. Finally our drinks were done and we left. At this point I really had to pee, but it I thought to myself I can wait the 20 minutes until I am home. Big mistake. He had a GPS but it took him OVER an hour to get me home. How do you get lost with a GPS? !! Especially In a city you have lived in your ENTIRE life? By the time I finally got home I had to pee more than I have ever had to pee in my whole life, no exaggeration. Long story short, I certainly will not be the next Italian Princess.

First Week: Take Two

This was week filled with new experiences. I am finally getting adjusted to Milan. The small town of Sestriere and the mountain villages are so different the bustling city of Milan and for this reason I feel like I am starting all over again in a brand new city. This brings both excitement and new obstacles. I think the hardest part of moving to a new city is not knowing my way around and not knowing anyone other than my Italian family; whom I love yet it is not the same.  However the difficulties of feeling alone and lonely, as difficult as they are, are in a sense good for me. I think the most personal growth comes from being in uncomfortable situations, which force us to overcome our insecurities, doubts, and fears. It does not always feel that these experiences are promoting my well being, but I am choosing to look at this way.

On Tuesday, I spent the day in the center of Milan shopping, visiting the Duomo, and lazily sipping coffees. It was truly a fantastic day, yet I wish I would have had someone to share it with.  Regardless of that small fact, it was a truly a perfect day. This was the first day I rode the metro and it really is not bad at all! I think visiting New York last year really helped- as the metro here is about a 10^th of the New York Metro. The bus transportation on the other hand is a nightmare! There are something like a hundred buses, and I don’t think I will ever master this…

Wednesday I spent the day with Rita. She had a dog training in the morning and then we went to lunch, grocery shopping, picked up Bruno, and then the rest of my day was spent doing homework and watching Bruno. When I picked up Bruno I overheard a girl speaking and she was speaking in English- the first person   have heard yet to speak in English! So naturally she caught my attention, especially since she had an American accent. Our accent sticks out here so very much… I went up to her and we started talking- she is also an Au Pair who just graduated and also live in Milan.

My new friend and I spent meet up on Thursday after we dropped “our children” off at school. Nicole has been here since August so she was personal tour guide as she took me around the city. First we bought amazing breakfast “brioches,” which by the way is what Italians call ANY type of pastry, no matter how different they may be from one another. Then we went to my new favorite bar/coffeeshop-Chocolat. Too bad I will never be able to find it again with my poor sense of direction :) We spent the rest of the day visiting the Castle of Milan and shopping. My favorite store, which I have decided to call One Size Fits All, literally only sold clothes of ONE size. \ I don’t understand how they stay in business…. I really don’t. I loved all the clothes and nothing fit right. There was the dress I loved and remember thinking, “Oh I just need a smaller size, oh wait that does not exist…”  After shopping had lunch a great panini place and for desert I had a candied rose. I have had never heard of this before but is an actual rose covered in sugar! So weird, but delicious.

Friday was  a fairly uneventful day. I went to a dog lesson with Rita in the morning and then I created a video of her training the dog. We then proceeded to spend the next 3 hours trying to get the video to work on her computer and send it as a file so that it can be published to a website. That damn video still has not been sent. I am not sure what the problem is. The first problem was that the file size was too big, so then I zipped the file. However, her program that zips the files does not tell you where the file is going to be saved…I also spent about two hours on my own laptop trying to convert files, compress files, zip files, etc, etc. And mind you today was the first time I even zipped a file.  If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know! It was an on-going process of frustration that still has yet to be solved. On a more exciting note Rita and I met a friend of Bruno’s swim teacher who also offered to be my personal tour guide around the city. Apparently, he is a noble from a royal family, that existed before World War II. Italy become democratic after the war…Angello and Rita was trying to give me a history lesson but we got distracted and it was never finished. Anyways, he is very nice and Rita has already decided I should marry him because he is a royal and rich and I could become “the would have been Italian princess” or something like that. I just find this amusing. However, I just want to be friends. I wish I could be attracted to this person but I am really, really not.

More updates coming soon! I am getting behind on my blog and I will try to be better! 

Baci e abbracci

Snow, Skiing, and Italian Dogs

We left again for Sestriere late Thursday night. It was so snowing so much! I have never driven in so much snow before! The sky was pitch black besides for the car lights, which illuminated the pieces of snow. The speed of the car combined with the speed of the snow falling created a truly, amazing effect. When you looked out the front window it looked like a scene from a movie.. some sort of vortex -whirlwind made of streams of light.  All day on Friday it snowed and snowed and snowed. Everything was completely covered! I thought that the previous weekend had been cold, but this day was definitely the coldest.  However, with two tanktops, a long sleeve shirt, sweater, down vest, tights, 3 pairs of socks, jeans, and my coat I kept pretty warm. I think I have Finally figured out how to stay warm in cold weather.

With my new winter wear I certainly was warm outside in the freezing snow. Inside though was a whole new problem… We meet the family’s friends for dinner at a restaurant called Al Mulino. Inside the restaurant it was nice and toasty and for most people who were not wearing 11 layers of clothes quite nice. I took off as many layers as I could and I was still sweating. I even contemplated going to the bathroom to take of my tights, but I didn’t have a purse and I didn’t think it would look too good if I came back to the table holding only my tights….ah mamma mia. I was about ready to pass out I was so hot. Other than feeling like I was standing in the Tucson sun wearing a parka, dinner was great. A lot of the waiters have become my friends as we eat at the restaurant at least once a day while we are in Sestriere. Too bad this place is two hours from Milan. Anyways the family friends were really nice. However, they brought both their dogs to the restaurant- one is a giant dobberman who caused a huge scene the entire night- barking, scaring children, etc! There aren’t any rules about dogs in restaurants in Italy so people bring them everywhere and feed them whatever the rest of the table is having. The dogs might as well have had their own seats at the table with everyone else….

The best part of the weekend was that I learned to SKI!!!!! I love skiing and apparently I am really good at it. At least that is what everyone told me. Once I am skiing I am fine, it getting on and off the ski lift where I have problems. I only fell down twice though- the first time I got off the ski left and another time trying to walk up this hill to get to the ski left. I still have no idea how one walks up a hill in skis! It seems impossible to me! I think there must be a magic way to do it because every time I tried I started skiing backwards and I could not stop. . . needless to say this is terrifying.  I also had a few problems with the ski lift itself… My lesson went well except for the fact that it was in Italian..I didn’t really think about this as a problem but it was much more difficult to learn to ski in Italian than it would have been if I learned in English… overall fantastic, fantastic experience! I can’t wait to go skiing again!

Troppo Cibo

I Watched Bruno this morning and I showed him to watch movies on the internet. I am pretty sure he thinks this is the most incredible thing to ever exist. He absolutely loves Pokemon, I mean LOVES IT. He loves to watch it on TV, play it on the Wii and of course he has the cards and little figurines. We also worked on reading comprehension in English. He really is an extremely bright boy and teaching him is so easy and enjoyable. Later in the day Rita returned home and we drove him to basketball. Watching little Italian kids play basketball is certainly entertaining.

The best part of my day was dinner out with Rita. We meet Andrea, who is one of Armani’s assistants. Andrea speaks faster than any person I have met in my life. Of course, our entire conversation at dinner was in Italian so I got lots of practice! Mamma Mia! Andrea told me his life story after knowimg me for 5 minutes. Basically, he is gay, but he was formally married until he realized he was gay, and has a son of 8 years old. This man has so much passion for life, merely having a conversation with him was inspiring.  Andrea is a hilarious person but also a bit critical. He had something to say about the outfits of everyone in the restaurant, but this only made for an incredibly fun time. I assume most of this has to do with the fact that a) he is gay, b) he is Italian and c) he works for Armani. Everything that come out of his mouth made both Rita and I burst into laughter.

We ate at a restaurant called Il Vento di Sardegnia- The Wind of Sardegnia. After eating about two pounds of bread, we had had a huge plate calamari and an even larger plate of french fries. Italians eat French fries all the time at nice restaurants! I find this both odd and assuming. To me, french fries and Italian food do not go together at all, but here they certainly do. I actually have not seen the family order salad at a restaurant once, instead we get a giant plate of French fries. After our “antipasti” of French fries and calamari I had risotto and shrimp covered a wonderful cream sauce. I was so full…but then Andrea decides we need to have cheese. So I think to myself that I am so full but I could probably eat some cheese, I mean how much could we be ordering? Then the waiter brings out A GIANT wheel of cheese. It was a the size of a pizza, I am NOT exaggerating a bit… I have never been served so much cheese in my entire life. Apparently this giant cheese wheel is very common in the south of Italy. I estimate it was at least 5 pounds of cheese… and only Andrea and I were eating it.  You spoon out pieces of the cheese and eat and eat and eat. Thank god we didn’t have to eat the whole thing…I think I would have thrown up if the waiter had not taken what was left over when he did…. Many times I wanted to stop eating, but I have noticed Italians will get offended and think something is wrong with you if you don’t eat an excessive amount and completely finish your plate. So many times Rita and Agnello have said to me “are you sure you are alright , you hardly ate anything!” Mind you they will tell me this when I have ONLY one bite of food remaining on my plate and after I have eaten so much bread, French fries, pizza and pasta. I honestly have no idea how all Italians are not 500 pounds, I am not kidding. I am pretty sure I am going to gain ten pounds…by tomorrow. I really don't understand it...I have not seen one overweight person since I have been here- instead everyone just looks like a model. Even the kids here look like models for Baby Gap. I suppose the Italian genes are just fantastic and I should be thankful that I am part Italian :)

My first week

I have always wanted to start a blog and I figured my adventure to Italy would be the perfect time to start!

I arrived in Italy 6 days ago. I cant believe it has already been that long! I flew from Tucson to Dallas, Dallas to London and London to Milan. I almost missed my flight from London to Milan because security took so long! Everyone involved in the security department in London moved so slowly! They were all standing around talking, and every once in a while one of them would remember to do their job. Finally I got to Milan. By this point I realized my  "great" international phone did not work internationally...thanks verizon. I was so worried that I would not be able to find Rita and would have no way to find her without a phone.... luckily we happened to run into each other and I did not even need to call her. I spent the rest of they day unpacking and getting settled. The next day we left for Sesteriere which is very close to Turin. It is where the 2006 Olympics were! This for sure is the coldest place I have ever been in my life, but it was beautiful. We spent the weekend there in the family's cabin. I was doing to learn to ski on Monday, but I got sick...so I spent the day reading in the cabin while it snowed and snowed and snowed. I have never seen so much snow in my life. We will return to the cabin on Thursday and hopefully I will learn to ski this weekend! This week Bruno does not have school and we are going to the mountains because it is a holiday in Italy called La Settimana Bianca- literally The White Week. This is a week break from school when many going skiing- thus the name.

So far I absolutely love the family. Rita, the mom, is a professional dog trainer and she is famous in Milan. Tomorrow she going to have dinner with Armani's assistant because she works Armani's dogs...yes THE Armani! She invited me to go to dinner with her if would like...yes please :). Angello is a laywer and is one of the funniest people. I am greatly enjoying the company of the family. Bruno is seven and one of the cutest kids I have ever met. He speaks English very well and is often my translator..I am teaching him English and he is teaching me Italian. I think we are great team. The house I am living in is about 20 minutes by car from the center of Milan. It is a very small two story house, but it is beautiful.There is a living room, a kitchen, three rooms up stairs, and a backyard.

Ok I am going to go to bed now as I am still a bit sick.

Baci e abbracci