Felce

Another faaaascinating entry from me. This one is going to be about... wait for it... ... ... soap! Yes! (You have my full permission to go do something else, something slightly less excrutiatingly boring.) For the rest of you...

My attention has been snagged by the "Felce Azzurra" soap stuff pretty much every time I have walked past it in a store, the entire time I've been here. First, I was all in the 'omg there is so much exciting stuff in this supermarket and the reason it is all so exciting is because the label is written in Italian' phase. While a good half of the soap here in Italy exists in America, too, (e.g. Dove, Neutrogena), some of it didn't. And so I was fascinated. I am not hard to entertain, sometimes.

Then I started to wonder what it mean. Okay, so azzurra is light blue. Got that. Even if I hadn't learned it in my Italian classes during semesters of yore, my own students endearingly call anything they perceive as being azzurro "blue... light". Even the little ones. (Side note to self: I would probably just call it all "blue" and not differentiate, but they will actually argue with me. Is this because in Italian there are actually two separate words? Language shaping cognitive development? Remember to ponder this some other time.) Anyway, so, azzurra is covered, but what the hell is felce? (For those of you who know the answer, bear with me. I'm not that bright. Evidently.)

First I thought it meant jacket. But that turns out to be felpe. The two are not related. Then I thought it meant felt, for obvious reasons. But why would anyone make a soap called "light blue felt"? Especially since the bottle proclaims that it's an inimitable scent. Last I checked, felt doesn't smell particularly interesting.

Fast-forward seven months, I finally succombed and bought some. It smells kind of vaguely... spicy. Not spicy like hot, but spicy like spices. Like cinnamon or ginger or something. So this morning I word-referenced it and it means fern. Which would pretty much explain why there is a picture of a blue fern on all of the bottles. (Told you I wasn't very bright.)

The only remaining question is this: it smells kind of manly. Not very feminine, anyway. Is it actually men's soap? Because that would be awkward.

Then again, I'm sure my roommates are used to awkward by now.