"Right, so, I'm off," I say, extracting what is meant to be my boarding pass from the World's Slowest Printer, of which we are proud owners here at Local Language School.
My colleague looks up from the computer (World's Most Finicky Laptop) and glances pointedly at the clock. It is 8:30pm and I have just returned from my lesson in Nearby Village.
"What, to America?"
"Yeah." I glance at the papers in my hand. Impossible to print boarding pass, they read. Super. Whatever. Will worry about that later.
"Well... good luck with that," he offers.
"Thanks!"
I rattle my little wheel-y carry-on down the Via Emilia, trying to remember if I've brought both passports. Sometimes having two passports is nice, because it allows you to choose the quickest lines. At other times it is even nicer because it allows you to not be deported. This is, I think, one of those latter type situations and so I kind of really hope that I do have them.
I jump onto the 9:47 train to Bologna, suddenly feeling all 7 of those teaching hours in my knees. (Sore knees? Really? What am I, seventy?) I am happy to note that it is not the train that stops in every station ever, meaning that we will whiz past Samoggia and Anzola and whatever else. Ciao ciao, Samoggia.
"Could I possibly print something?" I ask the clerk of the cheap-ass hotel at which I am spending the night in order to be at the airport at 5am tomorrow morning.
"Certo, vieni pure," the man ushers me behind the reception desk and explains that I can use the computer as soon as his colleague is done. I look over at said colleague, a man with graying hair who seems to be engaged in a struggle to log into his facebook page. I am nice and do not laugh. After his fourth attempt, I wonder whether I should offer to help. Before I can, he opens up notepad and begins to bang out a message. Ten minutes later, he has a nice, solid three lines. He re-opens facebook. It still does not let him log in.
"Cazzo!" he mutters. I don't remember how to say caps lock in Italian, or I would suggest checking that. He prints his message and shoves it in his pocket. Interesting.
His co-worker pokes her head around the partition with the lobby.
"Tutto okay, Mario?" she spots me. "Ma, c'รจ una fanciulla qua, Mario - watch your mouth." (There's a little girl here.) Mario mumbles something in my direction and leaves. I am not sure how to take the "little girl" comment. I elect to go with "flattered".
I sleep for about five minutes and find myself once again in the parking lot.
"15 euro," the hotel employee tells me, standing in front of a van with "navetta gratuita" written in big green letters on the side. It is too early in the morning to appreciate the irony (or take issue).
In the plane, they have plastic cups and you pull a tab and pour hot water in and coffee happens. Amazing.
In the second plane, there is a vegetarian curry option for the meal. Hands down the best airplane meal ever, and I don't even feel sick afterwards.
I attend my medical school interview in the middle of a late-February blizzard, and we are snowed in the day after. I consume some Thai food and some Mexican food. (Italy, the one thing you are missing: food from other countries. You should try it some time. Really. Much like Italian food, it's delicious.)
"You came all the way back from Italy for an interview?" says my interviewer, a kindly old-ish lady with whom I chat amiably about books (I recommend Se una notte d'inverno un viaggatore to her - and I recommend it to you, too - and she recommends The spirit catches you and you fall down to me). Yes I did, and you damn well better accept me after all that, I think to myself.
Whenever I'm away from home for a while and then go back, I forget how quiet it is, sleeping in my bed in my parents' house out in the middle of nowhere. It's good to be home, I think blurrily just before falling asleep.
I fly back to Italy two days later, passing through Paris's biggest windstorm in decades. ("I think we'll just skip Paris and go right on ahead to Brussels because I don't think we can land safely here," says the pilot at one point. Minutes later, "actually, you know what? I'm going to give it a try." The most precarious landing I have ever experienced ensues. I am actually frightened on a plane for the first time in years... possibly ever. The teenaged boy next to me has his iPod on and idly drums his fingers on the armrest.)
After twenty hours of straight travelling, I plop myself back into my bed in Reggio and gaze blearily at the light squeezing in through the slats in the shutters. Every once in a while you can hear a motorino go up the Via Emilia, or a group of people pass by on their way to San Prospero below. Familiar sounds, ormai.
It's good to be home, my brain mumbles silently to itself.
See why things are confusing?
Sunday, February 28
Wednesday, February 24
Day in the life...
"There are three rules you can use to decide between the present perfect and the past simple," I begin. I am in my element - I taught this lesson twice yesterday.
My fancypants important person student takes out a fancypants pen and begins to take notes. I must confess, it still kind of cracks me up that someone might want to take notes on what I have to say.
"I have a good summary of these rules - do you want me to email it to you?"
I take the opportunity to make him dictate his email. We spend ten minutes sorting out our vowels.
"Chiocciola?" he asks sheepishly.
I love it when they ask you something they think they should already know and look all sheepish about it. Even important-people 50-year-olds will do it. Adorable.
"Ancora!" chorus the three-year-olds.
"Again?!" I feign incredulity for their amusement. Well, actually, not feign. More exaggerate. Because why would anyone want to subject themselves voluntarily to the ultra-inane "snowflake song" is indeed beyond me. If that's the standard for amusement, daily life must be hilarious when you're three.
"Si, again!" they shout, beside themselves.
Bingo! Taught them a new word. Feel that the hour of singing at the top of my lungs and making ridiculous faces has been worth it, and launch into another round of the snowflake song with gusto.
"Should we sing fast-fast-fast or sloooowly?" I ask.
"Fast!" they shriek. Wow. We're on a roll here. Good day. One litte guy in the front row can't quite contain himself and jumps onto my lap, clinging like a little barnacle. See the joy you bring to people's lives when you're an English teacher?
"If I saw him, I would tell him..." my 3 o'clock drones on. Apparently my purpose is to sit at his kitchen table and ensure that his homework gets done correctly. A small beam of sunlight falls across the top of his head. (Sun! In Reggio! Alert the press!) He's a good boy, but ye gods, is his homework ever boring. I wonder if I am a horrible lazy teacher for not thinking of a way to make this fascinating and hilarious. Probably. Sigh. Am momentarily depressed.
"If I will go..." I'm jolted out of my stupor by probably one of the top 5 most common Italian-learner mistakes. I launch into my canned explanation about that.
All new English teachers should develop two things (well, probably a lot of things, but these are the two that come to mind at the moment). One, canned explanations for the most common mistakes people make wherever you are (it varies depending on their native language). These should be based on examples that have been proven to work on your other students - seriously, there are some examples that, for whatever reason, make everyone go click! like little lightbulbs. It's great. And two, a sort of automatic alert for mistakes. This allows you to be completely not paying attention and still catch and correct their mistakes. Key. Because I, for one, find it near impossible to keep my full attention focused on "put these twenty inane sentences into the passive voice".
I pour some yogurt with crunchy bits down my throat, standing over the heater in the office. Yogurt with crunchy bits: best thing ever. Can be sucked down in under three minutes if you're focused, and kind of resembles a balanced meal.
"And then he wants to know if he can move up a whole level in a week's time if we do two hours a day, and I'm like 'no'." We all dissolve into laughter. (Yeah, okay, you maybe start to find kind of random things funny after teaching for a while.
"It's when you can see the clouds that the spring, it starts," says my four-thirty. "Because now it's all grey. You cannot see the clouds - just grey sky of winter. When you can see each cloud, round, you know then it is beginning spring. Maybe next week..." he smiles. "I'm live in Reggio 46 years." Huh.
I jump into the car, restored by a ridiculously sugar-laden coffee. I'm not sure which is the more important component - the caffeine, or the 1/2 cup of sugar. (I exaggerate, but not by much.) Either way, purchase of coffee machine for the office? Best idea ever.
"E poi, sai cos'ha detto?" one of the three kids in my last group of the day. I'm supposed to pretend not to understand them, but what unfeeling robot would decline the invitation into their world? This is prime gossip from the seconda media over here.
I yawn driving home, listening to the radio. Apparently there's an accident on the autostrada near Napoli. Must remember to photocopy more exercises about the conditional for that high school kid for next week and maybe make a question-formation activity for that guy tomorrow... I wonder if anyone has confirmed the Modena lesson for tomorrow... really should laminate those photos of Boston for Saturday...
I boil some veggies, call it dinner, and crawl into bed after checking my email. One of my students has sent me a wikipedia article about Disney characters in the '50s. I can't quite recall why. (Did we talk about Disney characters this morning?)
I probably fall asleep kind of smiling.
My fancypants important person student takes out a fancypants pen and begins to take notes. I must confess, it still kind of cracks me up that someone might want to take notes on what I have to say.
"I have a good summary of these rules - do you want me to email it to you?"
I take the opportunity to make him dictate his email. We spend ten minutes sorting out our vowels.
"Chiocciola?" he asks sheepishly.
I love it when they ask you something they think they should already know and look all sheepish about it. Even important-people 50-year-olds will do it. Adorable.
"Ancora!" chorus the three-year-olds.
"Again?!" I feign incredulity for their amusement. Well, actually, not feign. More exaggerate. Because why would anyone want to subject themselves voluntarily to the ultra-inane "snowflake song" is indeed beyond me. If that's the standard for amusement, daily life must be hilarious when you're three.
"Si, again!" they shout, beside themselves.
Bingo! Taught them a new word. Feel that the hour of singing at the top of my lungs and making ridiculous faces has been worth it, and launch into another round of the snowflake song with gusto.
"Should we sing fast-fast-fast or sloooowly?" I ask.
"Fast!" they shriek. Wow. We're on a roll here. Good day. One litte guy in the front row can't quite contain himself and jumps onto my lap, clinging like a little barnacle. See the joy you bring to people's lives when you're an English teacher?
"If I saw him, I would tell him..." my 3 o'clock drones on. Apparently my purpose is to sit at his kitchen table and ensure that his homework gets done correctly. A small beam of sunlight falls across the top of his head. (Sun! In Reggio! Alert the press!) He's a good boy, but ye gods, is his homework ever boring. I wonder if I am a horrible lazy teacher for not thinking of a way to make this fascinating and hilarious. Probably. Sigh. Am momentarily depressed.
"If I will go..." I'm jolted out of my stupor by probably one of the top 5 most common Italian-learner mistakes. I launch into my canned explanation about that.
All new English teachers should develop two things (well, probably a lot of things, but these are the two that come to mind at the moment). One, canned explanations for the most common mistakes people make wherever you are (it varies depending on their native language). These should be based on examples that have been proven to work on your other students - seriously, there are some examples that, for whatever reason, make everyone go click! like little lightbulbs. It's great. And two, a sort of automatic alert for mistakes. This allows you to be completely not paying attention and still catch and correct their mistakes. Key. Because I, for one, find it near impossible to keep my full attention focused on "put these twenty inane sentences into the passive voice".
I pour some yogurt with crunchy bits down my throat, standing over the heater in the office. Yogurt with crunchy bits: best thing ever. Can be sucked down in under three minutes if you're focused, and kind of resembles a balanced meal.
"And then he wants to know if he can move up a whole level in a week's time if we do two hours a day, and I'm like 'no'." We all dissolve into laughter. (Yeah, okay, you maybe start to find kind of random things funny after teaching for a while.
"It's when you can see the clouds that the spring, it starts," says my four-thirty. "Because now it's all grey. You cannot see the clouds - just grey sky of winter. When you can see each cloud, round, you know then it is beginning spring. Maybe next week..." he smiles. "I'm live in Reggio 46 years." Huh.
I jump into the car, restored by a ridiculously sugar-laden coffee. I'm not sure which is the more important component - the caffeine, or the 1/2 cup of sugar. (I exaggerate, but not by much.) Either way, purchase of coffee machine for the office? Best idea ever.
"E poi, sai cos'ha detto?" one of the three kids in my last group of the day. I'm supposed to pretend not to understand them, but what unfeeling robot would decline the invitation into their world? This is prime gossip from the seconda media over here.
I yawn driving home, listening to the radio. Apparently there's an accident on the autostrada near Napoli. Must remember to photocopy more exercises about the conditional for that high school kid for next week and maybe make a question-formation activity for that guy tomorrow... I wonder if anyone has confirmed the Modena lesson for tomorrow... really should laminate those photos of Boston for Saturday...
I boil some veggies, call it dinner, and crawl into bed after checking my email. One of my students has sent me a wikipedia article about Disney characters in the '50s. I can't quite recall why. (Did we talk about Disney characters this morning?)
I probably fall asleep kind of smiling.
Friday, February 19
Womanizer
It's nice that American music makes it over to Europe and is super popular. (Or, anglophone music, I should say.) Really, it is: my students listen to it and hum the tunes and sometimes wander in vaguely singing a line from something or other. It's good practice for them.
Why is it always the stuff that you really don't feel like explaining is the stuff that's the most often repeated, though?
Because there they are, all humming and whatever, and the next thing you know, an earnest-looking twelve-year-old wants to know what "womanizer" means.
Thanks, pop culture.
Why is it always the stuff that you really don't feel like explaining is the stuff that's the most often repeated, though?
Because there they are, all humming and whatever, and the next thing you know, an earnest-looking twelve-year-old wants to know what "womanizer" means.
Thanks, pop culture.
Sunday, January 31
In which I cook chicken
"Well, you pretty much cook it like a bistecca," the secretary tells me, explaining about the chicken breast I am meant to cook for the children (hers and the boss') after I pick them up from school and walk them home.
I stare blankly into space for a moment, contemplating this.
"Well, the thing is... I've never cooked a steak before, either," I finally explain.
"Oh... well... um... so, you take a pan, right?" she makes a pan-shaped sort of gesture with her hands. "And then you put some olive oil in it. You know? Olive oil?"
I do know.
"And then you... cook it. You know?"
I suppose.
She hands me the package of what presumably contains chicken breast. It feels remarkably heavy for being meant for only three small-ish children. I shift it gingerly to my left hand and grab my keys.
"So, when it's done, the meat should be... white on the inside? Not pink?" I turn back to ask - just to double check, you know. The last thing I need to do is poison the boss' kid.
"That's right," she nods encouragingly, "pink if it were steak, but white for the chicken."
Grande.
The children recount the day's adventures to me on the way home (and then, Manu's mom brought their pet dog into our class!), and also sing a traditional African folk song that they have apparently just learned at the top of their lungs, earning us more than one puzzled stare as we walk up the Via Emilia.
When we get home, I turn on the stove (ha! I've got you all figured out, you silly stove, even though you caused me all kinds of grief when I first started having to use you: hold down the button for a while to make the gas stay lit). The children are occupied with torturing the boss' cat. I take a moment to hope it won't scratch them before turning to the package of chicken.
I open it. It is raw. I mean, obviously, but... ew. Raw. It's all slimey and gooey and stuff, but I bravely pick it up and plop it into a pan with some oil. Actually, a lot of oil, because, fact: oil and fried-ness generally makes everything taste delicious, so maybe the olive-y deliciousness will be able to cancel out whatever other horrible flavors I manage to create. (If you're thinking 'it's just chicken - what can possibly go wrong?', you don't know me very well.) The oil splatters. Never mind the children being scratched by the cat: probably the injury of the day is that I'm going to get hot oil in my eye and be blind. Sigh.
For the next five minutes, I alternate between staring intently at the clock on my phone and staring intently at the chicken in the pan. I time the five minutes very precisely. Flip. Another five minutes. Sizzle. Flip to check for doneness. Well, I can't see the meat on the inside, but it looks okay from here. I cut it open to check and it's white. Not much else I can do, right?
Two more pieces later, I am holding my breath as the children eye the chicken (I wonder if they know I am a horrible cook or if they are in the habit of staring down their food before they eat it because they are children or if they are wondering why it is cut in half down the middle - because I didn't want to poison you, kids, that's all!).
"So?" I ask the one who speaks English. I figure I can get one opinion before opening up the polls to the other two. She shrugs noncommittally. I chew nervously on my bottom lip. Okay, self, I think, as long as none of them actually gets sick, it's okay. I mean, I was hired to be a teacher, right? No one said anything about knowing how to cook. I am still pondering my defense in the event of cries of "ew, your chicken sucks" when the littlest one pokes me.
"C'e n'e' ancora?" she asks. (Is there any more?) This takes me a moment to process.
"Does anyone else... want more?" I ask cautiously.
Three little heads nod enthusiastically. I smile as I take their plates and head back to the stove and I don't even mind that raw chicken is icky.
I stare blankly into space for a moment, contemplating this.
"Well, the thing is... I've never cooked a steak before, either," I finally explain.
"Oh... well... um... so, you take a pan, right?" she makes a pan-shaped sort of gesture with her hands. "And then you put some olive oil in it. You know? Olive oil?"
I do know.
"And then you... cook it. You know?"
I suppose.
She hands me the package of what presumably contains chicken breast. It feels remarkably heavy for being meant for only three small-ish children. I shift it gingerly to my left hand and grab my keys.
"So, when it's done, the meat should be... white on the inside? Not pink?" I turn back to ask - just to double check, you know. The last thing I need to do is poison the boss' kid.
"That's right," she nods encouragingly, "pink if it were steak, but white for the chicken."
Grande.
The children recount the day's adventures to me on the way home (and then, Manu's mom brought their pet dog into our class!), and also sing a traditional African folk song that they have apparently just learned at the top of their lungs, earning us more than one puzzled stare as we walk up the Via Emilia.
When we get home, I turn on the stove (ha! I've got you all figured out, you silly stove, even though you caused me all kinds of grief when I first started having to use you: hold down the button for a while to make the gas stay lit). The children are occupied with torturing the boss' cat. I take a moment to hope it won't scratch them before turning to the package of chicken.
I open it. It is raw. I mean, obviously, but... ew. Raw. It's all slimey and gooey and stuff, but I bravely pick it up and plop it into a pan with some oil. Actually, a lot of oil, because, fact: oil and fried-ness generally makes everything taste delicious, so maybe the olive-y deliciousness will be able to cancel out whatever other horrible flavors I manage to create. (If you're thinking 'it's just chicken - what can possibly go wrong?', you don't know me very well.) The oil splatters. Never mind the children being scratched by the cat: probably the injury of the day is that I'm going to get hot oil in my eye and be blind. Sigh.
For the next five minutes, I alternate between staring intently at the clock on my phone and staring intently at the chicken in the pan. I time the five minutes very precisely. Flip. Another five minutes. Sizzle. Flip to check for doneness. Well, I can't see the meat on the inside, but it looks okay from here. I cut it open to check and it's white. Not much else I can do, right?
Two more pieces later, I am holding my breath as the children eye the chicken (I wonder if they know I am a horrible cook or if they are in the habit of staring down their food before they eat it because they are children or if they are wondering why it is cut in half down the middle - because I didn't want to poison you, kids, that's all!).
"So?" I ask the one who speaks English. I figure I can get one opinion before opening up the polls to the other two. She shrugs noncommittally. I chew nervously on my bottom lip. Okay, self, I think, as long as none of them actually gets sick, it's okay. I mean, I was hired to be a teacher, right? No one said anything about knowing how to cook. I am still pondering my defense in the event of cries of "ew, your chicken sucks" when the littlest one pokes me.
"C'e n'e' ancora?" she asks. (Is there any more?) This takes me a moment to process.
"Does anyone else... want more?" I ask cautiously.
Three little heads nod enthusiastically. I smile as I take their plates and head back to the stove and I don't even mind that raw chicken is icky.
Wednesday, January 27
The blue car is back!
And now we are on to bigger and better things together, like finding the Top Secret Headquarters of the Uber-Fancy Local Fashion Thing and conquering the autostrada. Oh, yes. It is going about as well as can be expected, given our history: the former took us about three hours despite being only ten minutes away from our starting point, and the latter probably shaved about three years off the end of my life.
I should preface this by explaining that the Uber-Fancy Top Secret Local Fashion Headquarters is not actually top-secret. In fact, aside from the flag having been invented here, it's probably Reggio's one other claim to fame. I'm pretty sure a significant portion of Reggio's population is employed or somehow otherwise connected to this fashion group and its associated industries and whatever.
Anyway, that said, you'd think someone would know how to get to the headquarters. Or that the address would be available on the internet. Or that the UFLFT HR people who are organizing the English courses might have included it in part of their correspondance with our school. You'd think. And yet...
"Oh, yeah, it's... you know... over there," our receptionist assures us, gesturing vaguely in the direction of the window, from which you can see Ipercoop and the beginning of Reggio's charming industrial district. "You know."
But we don't. Twenty minutes later and a phone call to the aforementioned HR people later, we have the address. Via M--- G----. (Just maintaining the secrecy, you know. Even though anyone who lives in Reggio will probably know exactly what I am talking about. I think there is really only one Uber-Fancy fashion thing with its headquarters here.) We put the address into the GPS. We attach the GPS to the windshield.
"You have to put the car in neutral for it to start," I offer, sharing the wisdom I garnered last year with the new girl. I am helping her to practice driving in Italy. You should take a moment to reflect upon how ludicrous it is to have me helping anyone to practice anything. Particularly driving the blue car. Anyway, we make it out of the parking lot and after a brief panic on the roundabout ("which way do I go? Left or right? Quick!" Me: "um... right. Like the little arrow. Always right. Because here we drive on the right, remember?" "Oh, that's right." Oh, dear. I check my seatbelt.)
The GPS is exceedingly bossy and we follow its directions, checking them against the Google Maps thing we printed out. They agree. Things are going well.
We miss a turn, but it is no big deal, except for the fact that the GPS is not very sympathetic: "turn around as soon as possible. Turn around as soon as possible," she orders crisply. Couldn't it be just a little more tactful? Like "that's okay, dear - it's hard to see the signs in this light. I'm sure you'll get it on the second try."
As it happens, we turn around and promptly miss the turn again. It is a tiny side street with no lighting and little ditches on either side. On the fourth or fifth try, we get it. Huzzah. We begin to inch along the miniscule dirt road, and the ditches on either side widen until they are huge and we have about six inches on either side of the car. We roll along silently for a few minutes. We appear to be deep in the middle of a farm, surrounded on either side by some sort of field and a faint smell of pigs. The GPS has no advice for us. We are so focused on not falling into the ditches that it takes a few minutes before one of us says, "wait... but would the headquarters of the Uber-Fancy Local Fashion Thing really be here in the middle of a field?" "Good point," agrees the other. "Surely they wouldn't want to work in a place that kind of smells like pigs?"
An even smaller side road branches off ahead, barely visible in the fog. It is clearly a sign. We execute a graceful 3 point turn that only takes us the better part of half an hour (as we are not so confident about our abilites to not end up in the ditch) and inch carefully back to the main road. Splendid.
We slink back to the school. What with having made a side trip to the village of Massenzatico (twice), our adventure has taken a little over an hour.
We acquire a third member for our search party and a new set of google directions.
We end up on Via M--- G---, which turns out to be located in a quiet residential area made up cute little apartment buildings. I roll down my window to ask for help from an elderly lady hobbling down the sidewalk.
"Scusi, ma do you know if the Top Secret Headquarters of the UFLFT is located near here?" I ask.
"The what? The fashion thing? Noooo, signorina, not even close." After indulging in a brief cackle of amusement, she gives us lengthy directions mainly in dialect.
"Grazie mille!" I call cheerfully, rolling up the window. I turn back to my cohorts. Their faces are as blank as mine probably is. Right, then.
"You know," ventures one of them, "one of my students works for the local fashion thing and I have her mobile number. I could... call her." It is eight-thirty on a Friday night, but this seems to be our best bet. She dials.
"Hello? Hi, this is [your English teacher]. Um... we're trying to find the Top Secret Headquarters. You know, where you work. Can you help us?"
Pause.
"Well, we're not quite sure... um... we've been looking for Via M--- G---, but we got a little lost and now we're in the middle of nowhere, at a petrol station. Because also we ran out of benzina."
Pause.
"Wait, really? Via M--- F---, not M--- G---?"
Pause.
"Oh. Yeah. I guess that *would* make a difference. Wait, let me see if the GPS can find it."
We type it into the GPS. It does not recognize it as a real place. (See, I told you it was top secret.)
"Wait, Via M--- F---? You're sure? Because the GPS says it doesn't exist."
Pause, during which the student gives detailed and precise directions for ending up on the so-secret-GPS-doesn't-know-about-it Via M--- F---. It turns out to be located practically under the Ponti di Calatrava (google it, they're pretty cool-looking). Also, we can see them from the window of the school. They are literally less than ten minutes away.
We find them. The student calls to check up on us. (We love our students.) The Top Secret Headquarters is huge, eerily covered in fog, and gated shut. We turn around and head home. We go and get a pizza.
I wonder if there will ever be a time when I will just drive the blue car somewhere and it will be simple and not require emergency phone calls and three sets of a directions.
I should preface this by explaining that the Uber-Fancy Top Secret Local Fashion Headquarters is not actually top-secret. In fact, aside from the flag having been invented here, it's probably Reggio's one other claim to fame. I'm pretty sure a significant portion of Reggio's population is employed or somehow otherwise connected to this fashion group and its associated industries and whatever.
Anyway, that said, you'd think someone would know how to get to the headquarters. Or that the address would be available on the internet. Or that the UFLFT HR people who are organizing the English courses might have included it in part of their correspondance with our school. You'd think. And yet...
"Oh, yeah, it's... you know... over there," our receptionist assures us, gesturing vaguely in the direction of the window, from which you can see Ipercoop and the beginning of Reggio's charming industrial district. "You know."
But we don't. Twenty minutes later and a phone call to the aforementioned HR people later, we have the address. Via M--- G----. (Just maintaining the secrecy, you know. Even though anyone who lives in Reggio will probably know exactly what I am talking about. I think there is really only one Uber-Fancy fashion thing with its headquarters here.) We put the address into the GPS. We attach the GPS to the windshield.
"You have to put the car in neutral for it to start," I offer, sharing the wisdom I garnered last year with the new girl. I am helping her to practice driving in Italy. You should take a moment to reflect upon how ludicrous it is to have me helping anyone to practice anything. Particularly driving the blue car. Anyway, we make it out of the parking lot and after a brief panic on the roundabout ("which way do I go? Left or right? Quick!" Me: "um... right. Like the little arrow. Always right. Because here we drive on the right, remember?" "Oh, that's right." Oh, dear. I check my seatbelt.)
The GPS is exceedingly bossy and we follow its directions, checking them against the Google Maps thing we printed out. They agree. Things are going well.
We miss a turn, but it is no big deal, except for the fact that the GPS is not very sympathetic: "turn around as soon as possible. Turn around as soon as possible," she orders crisply. Couldn't it be just a little more tactful? Like "that's okay, dear - it's hard to see the signs in this light. I'm sure you'll get it on the second try."
As it happens, we turn around and promptly miss the turn again. It is a tiny side street with no lighting and little ditches on either side. On the fourth or fifth try, we get it. Huzzah. We begin to inch along the miniscule dirt road, and the ditches on either side widen until they are huge and we have about six inches on either side of the car. We roll along silently for a few minutes. We appear to be deep in the middle of a farm, surrounded on either side by some sort of field and a faint smell of pigs. The GPS has no advice for us. We are so focused on not falling into the ditches that it takes a few minutes before one of us says, "wait... but would the headquarters of the Uber-Fancy Local Fashion Thing really be here in the middle of a field?" "Good point," agrees the other. "Surely they wouldn't want to work in a place that kind of smells like pigs?"
An even smaller side road branches off ahead, barely visible in the fog. It is clearly a sign. We execute a graceful 3 point turn that only takes us the better part of half an hour (as we are not so confident about our abilites to not end up in the ditch) and inch carefully back to the main road. Splendid.
We slink back to the school. What with having made a side trip to the village of Massenzatico (twice), our adventure has taken a little over an hour.
We acquire a third member for our search party and a new set of google directions.
We end up on Via M--- G---, which turns out to be located in a quiet residential area made up cute little apartment buildings. I roll down my window to ask for help from an elderly lady hobbling down the sidewalk.
"Scusi, ma do you know if the Top Secret Headquarters of the UFLFT is located near here?" I ask.
"The what? The fashion thing? Noooo, signorina, not even close." After indulging in a brief cackle of amusement, she gives us lengthy directions mainly in dialect.
"Grazie mille!" I call cheerfully, rolling up the window. I turn back to my cohorts. Their faces are as blank as mine probably is. Right, then.
"You know," ventures one of them, "one of my students works for the local fashion thing and I have her mobile number. I could... call her." It is eight-thirty on a Friday night, but this seems to be our best bet. She dials.
"Hello? Hi, this is [your English teacher]. Um... we're trying to find the Top Secret Headquarters. You know, where you work. Can you help us?"
Pause.
"Well, we're not quite sure... um... we've been looking for Via M--- G---, but we got a little lost and now we're in the middle of nowhere, at a petrol station. Because also we ran out of benzina."
Pause.
"Wait, really? Via M--- F---, not M--- G---?"
Pause.
"Oh. Yeah. I guess that *would* make a difference. Wait, let me see if the GPS can find it."
We type it into the GPS. It does not recognize it as a real place. (See, I told you it was top secret.)
"Wait, Via M--- F---? You're sure? Because the GPS says it doesn't exist."
Pause, during which the student gives detailed and precise directions for ending up on the so-secret-GPS-doesn't-know-about-it Via M--- F---. It turns out to be located practically under the Ponti di Calatrava (google it, they're pretty cool-looking). Also, we can see them from the window of the school. They are literally less than ten minutes away.
We find them. The student calls to check up on us. (We love our students.) The Top Secret Headquarters is huge, eerily covered in fog, and gated shut. We turn around and head home. We go and get a pizza.
I wonder if there will ever be a time when I will just drive the blue car somewhere and it will be simple and not require emergency phone calls and three sets of a directions.
Monday, January 18
School
I love school. Really, I do. Apparently when I was four I declared to my mother that the time had come for me to go to school and that I didn't want to stay with the babysitter and my infant compatriots anymore. I think it was because I'd somehow got wind that preschools had markers and I really wanted to try those things out. Now that I'm grown up, I still love school (lack of Crayola products notwithstanding) and I think I figured out why.
It's all about the ego-boost. I suck at the real world. I couldn't cook you a decent meal to save your life (or mine), and yesterday it took me three hours to find a place that ended up being ten minutes away. (Although, admittedly, I had the wrong address during the first two hours... more on that another day, though.) Oh, and today I could not for the life of me figure out how to operate the coffee-machine at work. (You have to push the button with the cup of coffee depicted on it. Go figure.)
School, though. I'm good at that. Give me a chapter of (preferrably interesting, but I can cope if not) stuff to learn and I will highlight and take notes and rearrange and then spit it back out at you in the form of multiple choice answers or true/false decisions or essay answers. If I'm really doing well, I can just read and remember. I love that. Either way.
At school, I can look at an essay prompt and bang out 1000 words of decently written prose with correct grammar and a few semi-colons thrown in just to show off and feel good about myself. "You write well," the teacher/professor/thesis advisor says. Ten points out of ten. Oh, the affirmation. It's so good.
I think I figured out how it all evens out in the end, though. People who struggled in school, do you remember when there were spelling tests and you worked so hard to sort out the vowels in ridiculous words like 'neighborhood' and 'facetious' (aside: really, English, what were they thinking when they designed you?)? And those little straight-A brats like me were sitting there blithely throwing in words like 'conscientious' and 'liaison' for extra credit? Well, guess what? Now you are out there having successful lives and even if you can't spell 'mischievous', no one will ever know, because yay, spellcheck! Meanwhile, I have to go around a roundabout three or four times before I figure out which way is west, and being able to read a quiche recipe in French doesn't help me with the fact that for some reason the filling of mine always leaks into the crust and makes the crust disgustingly soggy. I can't even reliably turn the stove on, and let's not even get started on telling one's right from one's left under pressure.
I wish I could send a message back in time to say "Little fourth-grade Self and fellow-nerd friends, enjoy this while you're ahead. It won't last long. And the rest of you... don't begrudge us our grade-school glory. You'll have the rest of your lives to make fun of us for everything else."
This post brought to you by the fact that I decided to take a few online courses this semester and so I'm back at school, in a manner of speaking, and... I love it.
It's all about the ego-boost. I suck at the real world. I couldn't cook you a decent meal to save your life (or mine), and yesterday it took me three hours to find a place that ended up being ten minutes away. (Although, admittedly, I had the wrong address during the first two hours... more on that another day, though.) Oh, and today I could not for the life of me figure out how to operate the coffee-machine at work. (You have to push the button with the cup of coffee depicted on it. Go figure.)
School, though. I'm good at that. Give me a chapter of (preferrably interesting, but I can cope if not) stuff to learn and I will highlight and take notes and rearrange and then spit it back out at you in the form of multiple choice answers or true/false decisions or essay answers. If I'm really doing well, I can just read and remember. I love that. Either way.
At school, I can look at an essay prompt and bang out 1000 words of decently written prose with correct grammar and a few semi-colons thrown in just to show off and feel good about myself. "You write well," the teacher/professor/thesis advisor says. Ten points out of ten. Oh, the affirmation. It's so good.
I think I figured out how it all evens out in the end, though. People who struggled in school, do you remember when there were spelling tests and you worked so hard to sort out the vowels in ridiculous words like 'neighborhood' and 'facetious' (aside: really, English, what were they thinking when they designed you?)? And those little straight-A brats like me were sitting there blithely throwing in words like 'conscientious' and 'liaison' for extra credit? Well, guess what? Now you are out there having successful lives and even if you can't spell 'mischievous', no one will ever know, because yay, spellcheck! Meanwhile, I have to go around a roundabout three or four times before I figure out which way is west, and being able to read a quiche recipe in French doesn't help me with the fact that for some reason the filling of mine always leaks into the crust and makes the crust disgustingly soggy. I can't even reliably turn the stove on, and let's not even get started on telling one's right from one's left under pressure.
I wish I could send a message back in time to say "Little fourth-grade Self and fellow-nerd friends, enjoy this while you're ahead. It won't last long. And the rest of you... don't begrudge us our grade-school glory. You'll have the rest of your lives to make fun of us for everything else."
This post brought to you by the fact that I decided to take a few online courses this semester and so I'm back at school, in a manner of speaking, and... I love it.
Sunday, January 17
Contenta
I love that I can hear the bells from this room. In a year (and now another week) of living here, I've never been sure if they were the bells from San Prospero or the Duomo, but either way, I love them. It makes the whole thing so much more European.
I love the view from my room, especially if you stand to the side a bit and look out slightly on an angle. The reddish of the Palazzo Vescovile turns purpleish-grayish and then maroon as dusk falls, and the sky turns such a jewel-like blue sometimes. (Incidentally, the view from my room is what is featured in that little picture on the side of the page. Or, at least, I can see a little picture. My internet prowess is not so great - read: nonexistant - so the likelihood that anyone else can see the little picture is also not so great. But anyway.)
It was nice moving back in here. It feels slightly surreal in a way: wasn't I *just* lugging these suitcases *down* the stairs in the fierce August heat just, like, five minutes ago? And now here I am dragging them back up and I have gloves and a coat on...
Good to be back, though. Like last year, when I first moved in. Such a relief, after creepy man from the Apartment of No Hot Water. I remember lovingly scrubbing the hardwood floor with hardwood-floor-scrubbing stuff and being so delighted when the dust wiped away and it started to shine. Yesterday I did that again, and cleaned the walls a bit (bizarre... I never clean the walls at home... but here they're starkly white and apparently benefit from an occasional spot of dusting). I even sforzata'd myself and took down the spiderwebs from the corners of the ceiling. Well, most of them. There's one left, and that's because there's a spider in it. He is just innocuous-looking enough that I don't mind leaving him there, partially because he is very high up and I don't particularly fancy having him land on my head if I try to get him with the broom.
Anyway, now everything is shiny and clean and I went to Esselunga and got some vegetables which I shall attempt to work up the courage to cook and it feels like this is my home again. It's very soothing.
It's nice sitting here at my newly-built desk with the bells going and the sounds of the market drifting up and over from the piazze. The swivel chair, by the way, is holding up nicely and has been supporting my full weight for at least twenty minutes despite the fact that I left out two screws and another metal-y hexagon thing when I built it yesterday morning.
I think I will go make a sandwich with some fresh mozzarella. I missed fresh mozzarella. It's good to be back.
I love the view from my room, especially if you stand to the side a bit and look out slightly on an angle. The reddish of the Palazzo Vescovile turns purpleish-grayish and then maroon as dusk falls, and the sky turns such a jewel-like blue sometimes. (Incidentally, the view from my room is what is featured in that little picture on the side of the page. Or, at least, I can see a little picture. My internet prowess is not so great - read: nonexistant - so the likelihood that anyone else can see the little picture is also not so great. But anyway.)
It was nice moving back in here. It feels slightly surreal in a way: wasn't I *just* lugging these suitcases *down* the stairs in the fierce August heat just, like, five minutes ago? And now here I am dragging them back up and I have gloves and a coat on...
Good to be back, though. Like last year, when I first moved in. Such a relief, after creepy man from the Apartment of No Hot Water. I remember lovingly scrubbing the hardwood floor with hardwood-floor-scrubbing stuff and being so delighted when the dust wiped away and it started to shine. Yesterday I did that again, and cleaned the walls a bit (bizarre... I never clean the walls at home... but here they're starkly white and apparently benefit from an occasional spot of dusting). I even sforzata'd myself and took down the spiderwebs from the corners of the ceiling. Well, most of them. There's one left, and that's because there's a spider in it. He is just innocuous-looking enough that I don't mind leaving him there, partially because he is very high up and I don't particularly fancy having him land on my head if I try to get him with the broom.
Anyway, now everything is shiny and clean and I went to Esselunga and got some vegetables which I shall attempt to work up the courage to cook and it feels like this is my home again. It's very soothing.
It's nice sitting here at my newly-built desk with the bells going and the sounds of the market drifting up and over from the piazze. The swivel chair, by the way, is holding up nicely and has been supporting my full weight for at least twenty minutes despite the fact that I left out two screws and another metal-y hexagon thing when I built it yesterday morning.
I think I will go make a sandwich with some fresh mozzarella. I missed fresh mozzarella. It's good to be back.
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