La Macchina and Mongolfiera

Much like in the States, Italians appreciate a fair or festival; complete with booths peddling over priced homemade/homegrown goods and some fried treats, cheeses and sweets as well as. Over the past week the Ferrara Balloon Fest was going on brining in a healthy crowd of tourists, and several dozen hot air balloons from all over the world of all shapes and sizes could been seen flying low over the city and surrounding countryside. Although our first attempt to watch the balloons launch last Saturday, was foiled by breezy conditions but this Saturday the boys and I took our breakfast perched on the wall, watching the balloons launch into the bright blue, cool September morning…I would even call it picturesque.
Also like the States, Italians have an appreciation for cars that would slightly border on obsession. Almost every time we drive by a carwash, and certainly on the weekends and at the big “do-it-yourself” places, people are meticulously scrubbing or having someone scrub their cars. As things are more expensive here, and the need for driving usually less, most families only have one car and having more than one is usually a sign of solid financial security. To that end Italians generally look at their cars less as tools of utility as we might, but an expense of honor. At any rate, this weekend also brought a classic car show in the city center. But in typical Italian fashion instead of parking all the cars in one central spot, the classic autos were stylishly arranged by maker in strategically selected places to highlight both the cars and the city. As a result a casual ride through town would find classic Masserati or Jaguar race cars parked in a beautiful fountained courtyard or a line of 1930’s Fiats along a shop lined walk. As a result the pictures snapped were made effortlessly beautiful, even with our inexpensive point and shoot and had the people been dressed differently you would have been whisked back in time.
Despite my earnest searching, I unfortunately didn’t find any funnel cakes.

Matt playing American flag football in Italy

Sept 14-18: Easy there Sparky

For all of you calling to leave birthday messages this week I’d like to apologize for our lack of phone response. We have received your messages and wanted everyone to know we had great birthdays. Lauren and I got to enjoy a real night out with adult conversations and a nice dinner and everything; thanks to our friend Shannon who volunteered to babysit.
The reason behind our missed calls is this, we were short on electricity. It seems there is a short in a wire somewhere in the house and at times just looking at a plug funny was enough to trip the breaker. I say the breaker because there is only one…for the whole house. So instead of being able to isolate the problem I spent a few days plugging and unplugging things trying to figure where the problem was. Only thing was it seemed randomly activated and it progressively got worse. So we decided to unplug almost everything in the house in order to run essential items, because once the power tripped it took about 20 mins, turning off all the lights and unplugging every single thing. We informed our landlord, who dispatched the electrician with amazing speed.
The electrician was on time…for an Italian and worked diligently from 930-1230 and then from 5-630. There is the interim break for lunch and reposo, which is the Italian version of siesta. So the work is still in progress, for the fourth day. Watching him work was entertaining because our 400 year old house is not conducive to easy work, especially considering the jumbled electrical spaghetti inside our walls. At one point I watch the guy shock himself 3 times, decide it was best to trip the breaker off, come back only to shock himself again on a “cold” wire. Fortunately he has isolated the problem to the “boys” bathroom, as Braxton calls it, and has disconnected all the power from the hall and guest bathroom. This weekend is a trial period to test his hypothesis and Monday he should return to fix the problem for good.
Oh yea, the electrician speaks no English at all and our knowledge of construction and electrical terms in Italian is lacking (but significantly improved now) so there is a minor communication problem. Fortunately our landlord’s son who is also a neighbor has lived in the States and he serves as translator. Unfortunately he is an artist so the technical aspects are totally lost on him…which makes for some funny translations.

Strike a pose

This is the first rainy school day and remember no one drives here. It is all walking and bicycles. There is not even parking at the school. I don't know how the Italians do it, but they are still put together and looking fabulous. All the moms were in front of the school looking like a page out of a magazine and I show up with hair that is half dry and half wet. Literally half my head. Our power went out after I dried the left side and I couldn't get it back on. Looked a bit like a clown. So then I went to the bakery to get Matt's birthday cake. Very interesting pushing a stroller, holding an umbrella and a cake. I ended up giving up on the umbrella so when I got home, my whole head looked like a drowned rat instead of just half of it. THEN our neighbor and his wife showed up with the electrician and ended up staying for a while. The whole time, I'm looking like I've been swimming and I realized later my makeup is also a mess because I put in on in the dark. Ugh! I need some of this Italian "put-togetherness" to rub off on me!

Where in Hellas am I, because it’s all Greek to me.

I had to take a trip to Larissa, Greece for work, but unfortunately would have little time for sightseeing. It dawned on me only hours before departure however, they don’t speak Italian in Greece they speak Greek, this would become a problem later. I also decided that in honor of all the great cultural contributions made by the Greek civilization, this blog is kind of a quiz…see if you can find some of the more famous contributions to Western Civilization by the Greeks.
Since we have the philosophy of saving money as often as possible I was forced to choose between traveling by 12 hour plains/trains and automobiles to get to my destination or driving my own car to the ferry and taking an overnight ferry to Greece before completing my journey by car, about 18 hours. The ferry seemed like a much more leisurely course, and that turned out to be correct. Although uncomfortable in my airline style seat on the ferry, I arrived in port early on Tuesday morning after an overnight crossing and set out on my odyssey. Always prepared I had a GPS, a map and Google map directions to guide me along the three hour trip across the Greek countryside. A breathtaking sunrise and a new, uncharted highway met me as I pressed eastward, and confounded my GPS and map for the next 2 hours. No worries, I could see that I was clearly following the same track as intended, until I hit the real mountains.
The Greek countryside is most similar to Northern California or perhaps Southern Colorado in its rugged beauty, but the winding mountain roads and mile long tunnels are not conducive to GPS signals. As a result, I missed my exit and was steered sharply north, towards Alexandria. This was troublesome but there we no more exits for another 25 miles and I was forced to follow the GPS when it recovered; as I had no idea what the signs said (my best understanding of Greek is that PI is 3.14….) or even which way might be best to go. I exited onto what might best be described as a goat path and pressed on towards my destination.
Now here an explanation about Greek driving and roads is in order…it makes Italy look like a Sunday drive in Mayberry. The roads are bad, poorly marked, the drivers are INSANE and will pass you or the oncoming traffic at any random spot despite the “no passing” signs, there are few guardrails to prevent a 400 ft plummet to your death and you have no idea if the geometry of the approaching curve is a gentle bender or a 180 degree descending hairpin of death; they all have the same non-threatening “curve ahead” sign before them. Fortunately our Cadillac has active stability and traction control as well as “manu-matic” shifting; all of which saved my bacon on more than one occasion. Fortunately my drama turned into more of a comedy than a tragedy and I arrived safely at my hotel.
My hotel was a very nice and modern affair, and I had a large balcony room on the 5th floor which provided me an excellent view of the city and the ancient Greek amphitheater below. Larissa is a good sized city, about the size of Ferrara, with many modern conveniences such as coffee shops, chain retail stores, and the like but there is also an indescribable third world feel to the city as well. I very nearly was run down by cars…on the sidewalk, on more than one occasion. In fact one guy had his toe run over by a moped when he stepped out of a restaurant after dinner. Fortunately no trip to the doctor was necessary.
The food was excellent and we even enjoyed a dinner put on by our Greek military hosts or traditional Greek food. I will not dispel the myth put forth by the movie “My Big Fat Greek Wedding”; I had 3 separate conversations on the fact that every English word has a Greek root. After three short days of mostly work I head back toward the ferry, this time better prepared for the journey ahead.
The trip back was uneventful, until I was about 5km from the Ferry port where I was passed by a pink and blue Ferrari. I’m sure Enzo Ferrari turn over in his grave when that one received its paint. As I pulled into the parking lot, I noticed the car again…along with 4 other Ferraris, 3 Lamborghinis, 3 Porches, 2 Rolls Royce, 2 Lotus, 1 Aston Martin and 1 V12 powered Mercedes. All of the cars were painted in crazy schemes, including Lightning McQueen from the movie Cars and the Mercedes bore a camo pain scheme with the words “Il Presidente” down the side. The drivers and passengers were similarly adorned in crazy costumes including a “shiek”, in a tux a la James Bond and the “Il Presidente” looking like a South American dictator complete with medals and a sash. Needles to say they gathered quite a large crowd, all gawking at both the cars and the people. It turns out, I found out later that evening, they were having a race from Austria to Serbia, Macedonia, Athens, Rome, Milan and finally to Munich for October Fest. I’m sure the parties at each stop lasted far longer than the driving legs between them.
At last back in Italy I made the 2 hour drive home, glad to see my family again but happy I had experienced such an adventure.

August 29- Venice

We decided that we are now prepared to start truly enjoying all that Italy has to offer and with that in mind decided to head up to Venice for the day. We originally thought we would catch the 830 am train, but that didn’t happen. Instead we punched our tickets at 929, just in time to make the 930 train. The hour-ish long ride kept the boys mostly entertained and we stepped out at St. Lucia station.
On the advice from some friends we decided to make a leisurely stroll through the city, stopping along the way to sightsee, shop and have lunch; towards St. Marks square. Despite the heat and crowds, Venice does not disappoint. I am not really into architecture, but it is truly amazing and seeing the gondolas gliding through the canals is stereotypically wonderful. After about three hours of sightseeing we emerged onto the breathtaking grandeur of Piazza St. Marco. Bypassing the throng pressing to be admitted to the cathedral, we enjoyed the view and some gelato as an approaching storm provided some relief from the heat. We realized that despite our growing comfort to the old world beauty we see every day, Venice is truly special and should be witnessed to be truly appreciated.
The one low point of the trip was our choice in transport back to the train station. We decided on the Vaporetto, or waterbus, and that was a mistake. The sweaty crowd pressed the boats to Cuban refugee levels of misery as tourists attempted to escape the oncoming storm. We choose poorly on the route and I’m sure we hit every stop on the 3 mile ride back. The stop and go and press of the crowd and the heat made a few passengers sea sick, which only added to discomfort of others. Despite this, the boys rode uncomplaining and chattering about all the things they had seen and mostly about how excited they were to be boarding the train again. We boarded the 330pm train home, and enjoyed a nearly empty 1st class car (it was only 3 Euros more) with excellent air conditioner.
I expect that we will venture to Venice again, as we only saw a small portion of what the city has to offer, but maybe during the low tourist season and this time we will take a water taxi instead of the bus.