OK, well, here goes. I mean, I've been following my sisters all my life, so why shouldn't I follow them with the next installment(s) of "Beatys do Bolzano"? Anyway, in keeping with the general family theme, this will be a G or PG rated series; those who want the more risqué version will have to accompany us on the next trip.
It's around 9:30 AM on Friday. We got in yesterday, and after a struggle to get the luggage into the car (oh yeah, we remember, SMALL cars!) we headed off to Rome. As we drove in from the airport, I thought about the difference between US (particularly NY) and Italian drivers: both aggressive, but somehow here it's very impersonal: in NY they're mad at YOU; here, you're just an obstruction until you decide differently.
We're staying in an apt. overlooking the Piazza Farnese, near the Campo Dei Fiori. Once we get here, we meet Prudence (our contact for the apt.) and she lets us in. A wonderful transplanted Brit, who, as she says, messed up in NY and had to flee to Rome 5 years ago, she takes us through our close-to-palatial space. We're on the first floor (above ground level), and the main room is about 18x 25, with 3 couches, a huge stone coffee table, a narrow wood dining table with 10(!) chairs, art all over the walls and a 16th Century throne chair that Aliana tries to sit in (it's roped off, as it is in not-so-wonderful shape.) There are 3 bedrooms, 2 full baths and, oops, the hot water doesn't work! Quick, call Helen (Prudence's partner.) She can't fix it, but she'll call Dino (her husband). Mi dispiace (I'm sorry), but he can't fix it either, so we'll call the plumber. When he comes, it will only take a minute, but when will he come? (Puffing out cheeks) Beh (well), you know, you can never tell with the plumbers. Today, for certain, but when? At this point I'm having laughing fits; it seems all too perfectly Italian.
Anyway, Alysia and Joy decide on a nap while they wait for The Plumber, and Ana and I head out to get my phone fixed. Who would have thought that the minutes I bought 15 months ago would have expired? But they have, so we get some new ones, wake Joy up from her nap and go for lunch (Rip Van Alysia stays in bed.) After a stroll around the area, we settle on a likely place and after lunch,head back to the apt. Still no plumber. OK, then, a nap it is. During the afternoon, I wake to hear voices, and in the twilight of jet-lag, decide that they can have anything they want if they will just let us SLEEP! They do, and when we wake we will find the hot water chugging along, and all our stuff still intact. Thanks, Prudence!
I open my eyes and peer at the window. Boy, it's dark! I shoot out of bed, thinking that we've slept until dinner, wrecking our carefully laid sleep plans. But it's only 4PM and the dark is a storm brewing. And here it comes! Thunder, lightning, wind and rain. Alysia and Aliana sleep through the excitement while Joy and I watch the rains sweep the Piazza. We turn on the BBC to try to get some idea of the weather, but end up watching the Asia report. Who knew there were so many interesting things happening in the rest of the world?
Some shopping, then dinner at a Prudence-recommended place called Ditirambo (which I translate as "dithyramb". Anyone want to tell me what a dithyramb is?) which is delicious and unusual. I nearly fall asleep waiting for the check (not that it takes very long, but I'm beat.) Then a small gelato and off to bed. Surprise! Alysia and Ana aren't tired! Too bad for them, Joy and I tell them to tuck themselves in and head to bed.
This morning, I wake to the sounds of the Piazza getting ready for a new day. Deliveries, construction, discussions outside our window add content to the view of the freshly washed space. I unearth a coffee machine, italian style, and make the first expresso if the trip, bring it to the coffee table, open the windows and relax.
Ci siamo (Here we are!).
More later or tomorrow.
Later Friday.
We wake late, go to see if Gianni Scolari (an old friend of the family) is around at the antiques shop, but no luck, so off we go to start shopping, this being the primary reason Alysia wanted to come to Italy (Joke. Sort of.) As we go along, I find myself becoming somewhat irritable and it takes until after lunch and more shopping for me to figure out what's up. The problem is that I feel in the middle, the only one who speaks the language and has some knowledge of where things are. BUT I'm not the only one who wants to do things. So I lead AND I follow, but I have to 1) pry out of the others what they want to do, making suggestions but being oh-so-willing to change when they reject my suggestions and 2) Also make sure that I get some of what I want.
The point is that I don't want to end up where I did the other trip, feeling that I was a shopping guide who took abuse whenever we stopped to see a church. So I go to the others and ask that we all put in input when we are deciding what to do each day, rather than waiting until we've already started and then having challenges with it. OK, so we'll try this for a while and see what happens.
So this evening, as a compromise, we'll take a cab up to the Ara Pacis, and have a look around, then do some local shopping (via Condotti, via della Croce etc.) and then walk a relatively short time to dinner, and see afterwards whether we want to walk home or ride. (The original idea had been to walk up and shop on the way, eat and bus/cab back.)
Now that THAT'S settled, we spend the afternoon reading and writing. Before we left, Fran found and gave to me an old school book of mine called "In Rome, They Say That...." (in Italian, from St. George's School, which marks it at 1970, latest) and I spend the afternoon with an Italian-English dictionary in hand, reading urban legends.
Later still.
While getting to dinner turns into a chore, the time leading up to it isn't. We spend a happy 90 minutes walking via della Croce, popping into stores on a whim, and Alysia finds several that have great clothes (her words) at reasonable prices. Then it's time to head to dinner, which is unexpectedly hard to find and when we do, we are seated in the farthest recesses of the grotto, and largely ignored. The food is mediocre but the conversation between Joy, Alysia and I takes an unexpectedly personal turn and becomes more intimate than I could have hoped for. After dessert (which, while mostly forgettable, includes a novel idea: Lemon sherbet with vodka!), we catch a short cab ride back to the apt. Alysia has made friends with the 23-year-old son of the owner of the restaurant below us, who asks her for a late date! So she's in heaven and we're locking the doors.
It's around 9:30 AM on Friday. We got in yesterday, and after a struggle to get the luggage into the car (oh yeah, we remember, SMALL cars!) we headed off to Rome. As we drove in from the airport, I thought about the difference between US (particularly NY) and Italian drivers: both aggressive, but somehow here it's very impersonal: in NY they're mad at YOU; here, you're just an obstruction until you decide differently.
We're staying in an apt. overlooking the Piazza Farnese, near the Campo Dei Fiori. Once we get here, we meet Prudence (our contact for the apt.) and she lets us in. A wonderful transplanted Brit, who, as she says, messed up in NY and had to flee to Rome 5 years ago, she takes us through our close-to-palatial space. We're on the first floor (above ground level), and the main room is about 18x 25, with 3 couches, a huge stone coffee table, a narrow wood dining table with 10(!) chairs, art all over the walls and a 16th Century throne chair that Aliana tries to sit in (it's roped off, as it is in not-so-wonderful shape.) There are 3 bedrooms, 2 full baths and, oops, the hot water doesn't work! Quick, call Helen (Prudence's partner.) She can't fix it, but she'll call Dino (her husband). Mi dispiace (I'm sorry), but he can't fix it either, so we'll call the plumber. When he comes, it will only take a minute, but when will he come? (Puffing out cheeks) Beh (well), you know, you can never tell with the plumbers. Today, for certain, but when? At this point I'm having laughing fits; it seems all too perfectly Italian.
Anyway, Alysia and Joy decide on a nap while they wait for The Plumber, and Ana and I head out to get my phone fixed. Who would have thought that the minutes I bought 15 months ago would have expired? But they have, so we get some new ones, wake Joy up from her nap and go for lunch (Rip Van Alysia stays in bed.) After a stroll around the area, we settle on a likely place and after lunch,head back to the apt. Still no plumber. OK, then, a nap it is. During the afternoon, I wake to hear voices, and in the twilight of jet-lag, decide that they can have anything they want if they will just let us SLEEP! They do, and when we wake we will find the hot water chugging along, and all our stuff still intact. Thanks, Prudence!
I open my eyes and peer at the window. Boy, it's dark! I shoot out of bed, thinking that we've slept until dinner, wrecking our carefully laid sleep plans. But it's only 4PM and the dark is a storm brewing. And here it comes! Thunder, lightning, wind and rain. Alysia and Aliana sleep through the excitement while Joy and I watch the rains sweep the Piazza. We turn on the BBC to try to get some idea of the weather, but end up watching the Asia report. Who knew there were so many interesting things happening in the rest of the world?
Some shopping, then dinner at a Prudence-recommended place called Ditirambo (which I translate as "dithyramb". Anyone want to tell me what a dithyramb is?) which is delicious and unusual. I nearly fall asleep waiting for the check (not that it takes very long, but I'm beat.) Then a small gelato and off to bed. Surprise! Alysia and Ana aren't tired! Too bad for them, Joy and I tell them to tuck themselves in and head to bed.
This morning, I wake to the sounds of the Piazza getting ready for a new day. Deliveries, construction, discussions outside our window add content to the view of the freshly washed space. I unearth a coffee machine, italian style, and make the first expresso if the trip, bring it to the coffee table, open the windows and relax.
Ci siamo (Here we are!).
More later or tomorrow.
Later Friday.
We wake late, go to see if Gianni Scolari (an old friend of the family) is around at the antiques shop, but no luck, so off we go to start shopping, this being the primary reason Alysia wanted to come to Italy (Joke. Sort of.) As we go along, I find myself becoming somewhat irritable and it takes until after lunch and more shopping for me to figure out what's up. The problem is that I feel in the middle, the only one who speaks the language and has some knowledge of where things are. BUT I'm not the only one who wants to do things. So I lead AND I follow, but I have to 1) pry out of the others what they want to do, making suggestions but being oh-so-willing to change when they reject my suggestions and 2) Also make sure that I get some of what I want.
The point is that I don't want to end up where I did the other trip, feeling that I was a shopping guide who took abuse whenever we stopped to see a church. So I go to the others and ask that we all put in input when we are deciding what to do each day, rather than waiting until we've already started and then having challenges with it. OK, so we'll try this for a while and see what happens.
So this evening, as a compromise, we'll take a cab up to the Ara Pacis, and have a look around, then do some local shopping (via Condotti, via della Croce etc.) and then walk a relatively short time to dinner, and see afterwards whether we want to walk home or ride. (The original idea had been to walk up and shop on the way, eat and bus/cab back.)
Now that THAT'S settled, we spend the afternoon reading and writing. Before we left, Fran found and gave to me an old school book of mine called "In Rome, They Say That...." (in Italian, from St. George's School, which marks it at 1970, latest) and I spend the afternoon with an Italian-English dictionary in hand, reading urban legends.
Later still.
While getting to dinner turns into a chore, the time leading up to it isn't. We spend a happy 90 minutes walking via della Croce, popping into stores on a whim, and Alysia finds several that have great clothes (her words) at reasonable prices. Then it's time to head to dinner, which is unexpectedly hard to find and when we do, we are seated in the farthest recesses of the grotto, and largely ignored. The food is mediocre but the conversation between Joy, Alysia and I takes an unexpectedly personal turn and becomes more intimate than I could have hoped for. After dessert (which, while mostly forgettable, includes a novel idea: Lemon sherbet with vodka!), we catch a short cab ride back to the apt. Alysia has made friends with the 23-year-old son of the owner of the restaurant below us, who asks her for a late date! So she's in heaven and we're locking the doors.
posted by Anonymous | 5:52 AM
<< Home