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12.08

Camilla's mother is a sort of cleaning fairy. Each day I'd get home and find she'd put my stuff in neat little piles, the bed made -- actually re-made, because I'd already made it, but she'd do it her way -- and Diddle (the stuffed animal I got for one sister) on top of the pillow. You probably know the kind of person. Once after dinner, everyone was busy in the living room for a moment, and I had my dirty dishes, but I was afraid to wash them myself because it might be an affront to the host, like an implication that her guests have to wash their own dishes. Politeness is so bloody complicated.

One problem I have is that, since I only really know one foreign language, I go into "foreign language mode" and start trying to think/speak German when confronted with a foreigner, even an Italian. I'm also still experiencing strange moments where I know perfectly the German term for something, but am not sure of the English one. Like I was trying to use the word "furnished" and could only think of "ausgestattet".

The bathroom has some toilet paper with little brown flowers. The color of the flowers is perfectly calculated to mask shit stains, which certainly seems like a clever idea. But then I wonder who is so prudish that they don't want to see that they've just used the toilet paper they've just used.

Italy has some serious political problems. Case one. Most skilled professions, like doctors and engineers, involve a privately-granted certification. The certification is required for all government work, which in these fields is almost all work. It is provided by an organization (I hesitate to say company) for an annual "membership" fee, with this certification (a piece of paper) being the sole service. The organization has a very powerful lobby which ensures that the government continues to require their certification. In other words, this group takes money, then uses it to pay the government to force people to give them more. The only way to stop it is for all the doctors to go on strike -- but then you'd get a union, and it would probably end up creating some equally attrocious state of affairs. Goes back to what I said about organizations ultimately existing only for and in themselves.

Case two. Most of the highways are built by a private company, who is supposed to use tolls to pay for the construction and make some fixed profit, then give the roads to the government to be maintained by indirect taxes. Except somehow the company neglected to complete the work. But they're still collecting tolls. Where does the money disappear to? Who knows. But Francesca says this is typical for Italy. It makes me sick.

Case three. We were talking about the EU, because I get the strong impression it's not being run very democratically. Fra is sure that she voted somehow for their EU representative, but neither her nor her friends have any idea about the term of office. Then Fra was talking about the problems with the EU. She described a scenario by way of example where some farmers in some countries have to be directed not to grow crops, because they're growing enough in some other country, and of course the first country wants to fight it... but she's already lost me, because my head about exploded at the idea of telling someone they're not allowed to produce. It reminded me too much of Atlas Shrugged.

Italians know something about cooking. After you finish the first course you think you're full. But the second course comes, and it looks so good that you'll have maybe some. And then you want just one bite more. And it's a shame to let that sauce on your plate go to waste, so you have some bread to soak it up. Then the fruit, and, well, you're really getting full, but it's just a bit of fruit. So you eat three slices of watermellon. Then you really couldn't eat another bite, but wow, here comes the icecream. I think the trick is first, it takes you about two hours to eat, so even though you're "full" after the first thirty minutes, you can slowly pack more in. And second is the order of the courses -- somehow the fruit at the end seems just right.

The Italian icecream is really something special. I never believed it before, no matter how much Fra insisted. What I had in Munich just seemed a bit creamier than what I'm used to, but nothing fantastic. But the real Italian icecream is a whole different dessert. The flavor reminds me of egg nog. It's perfectly smooth and rich. Tiramisú is my current favorite, but I had some Malaga just tonight that was unbelievable. Fra tells me Sicily is even better.

Sometimes it's a frustrating feeling being surrounded by people all speaking Italian, and laughing about something you didn't understand, and you have to hope that someone remembers you and explains it, which is tough when everyone's caught up in an interesting conversation. (This is something Camilla was fantastic at, she went out of her way to keep me from feeling linguistically lost.) Other times it's really neat to catch something, or understand a question and be able to answer, and everyone's so impressed, "Oy, hai capito!"

Traveling with a bunch of people who only barely speak your language is tough... but hey, when it means making a bunch of friends, getting fed and housed, and getting to see all the beautiful sights, then you can get used to it pretty easily.

Venice is really strange. It doesn't feel like a real city at all; I'm sure I couldn't live there, though parts of it are really beautiful. Sometimes the sea rises, flooding the sidewalks, and they lay out narrow floating decks to replace them.

I asked how they do the underground utilities. Robby said the canals are not so deep, only a couple meters. Before I could help myself, I wondered out loud, "What would it take to drain them? Why don't they? It'd be more efficient." Boy, I'll never hear the end of that one. Francesca loves to tease me for being American.

In August, nobody in Italy works. Except for maybe the bartenders and soda jerks in the small coastal towns, where everyone who should be working has gone on vacation. In the big cities, it's a challenge just to survive. You go from store to store looking for bread. Chiuso, chiuso, chiuso. Finally you find some place that doesn't have the kind you want, and it's a bit stale, but heck. Then you start looking for a butcher.

It's like living in a ghost town; 90% of the shops you see have the shutters drawn, and there's just a few people on the street even in the middle of the day. For me, it's almost impossible to grasp -- it's even stranger than the idea that the supermarket isn't open 24 hours and you can't buy anything on Sunday.

Italy is out of order. Every train station I've been to, the baggage lockers don't work. Camilla went to buy tickets -- the automat is broken. I went with Francesca to a telecom store where they had an internet kiosk: offline. We were on the train to Venice, and the last car's electricity had gone haywire so we had to wait while it was swapped out. Trying not to remember Atlas Shrugged.

In Italy your train is always late... unless you are.