Baia di Gombero

10:05 AM Thursday, August 7, 2008 – Sicily
A couple of stomach aches and a couple of drinks later, here I am sitting on the patio looking out at the water and writing. This is the point where my computer died. I didn’t get very far.

11:07 AM Saturday, August 9, 2008 – Baia di Gambero

Hello again, I’m back on the patio here at Giuseppe’s house for another try at writing. This morning I got up around 10:00 and made French toast, bacon, and eggs for Beppe, Marco and Beppe’s mom. It didn’t come out very well, the bacon was only OK and I didn’t make enough eggs but in the end it could’ve been worse.

Today we are going to the beach again and then mass around 7. These are basically the goals for today. Come bella è questa vita? I’m excited to go around here because I think it will be a lot different than up north. I’ll get back on that though.

Yesterday Beppe, Simone, Marco, Cristina, and I went to visit Mount Etna, the volcano from earlier. We climbed all over the rocks and took some pictures – hopefully I can get them up ASAP. Again, internet here is hard to find. After Etna the five of us went to a little touristy town called Taormina. It was beautiful with small streets and fancy little shops. It reminded me a lot of a vacation town up north except with 2 thousand year old arenas and a blue sea that can’t possibly be described.

The past two nights we have gone to friends’ houses to eat dinner. The first night (Thursday) we ate over Carmela’s house and we had a barbeque: sausage, steak, bruschetta, and fried pizza. At the end I taught them how to play a couple of refined American drinking games: Beer pong, flip cup and “Never have I ever”. We said goodbye late to Mary (from Napoli) and Carmela who left for Napoli and Messina the following day.

Last night it was over Rita’s house where the girls made a huge pasta (really good) and we hung out in the backyard. We tried to play soccer for a little before dinner but that didn’t end up working out. I’m kind of happy it didn’t because I didn’t have shoes and I am: A. Out of shape and B. Horrible at that sport. It’s times like these where I know someone upstairs loves me. I’ll go thank whoever it is later today.

Beppe and Marco just left to go to the beach. I am going to meet up with them later – I am still pretty burnt from before and I wanted to write a little more and do some laundry (here it’s all done by hand of course). I am excited to have today to do what I want.

Contorni:
As I sit here again and just contemplate how beautiful it is, it’s very easy to see why there are so many cultural differences between Sicily and both the US and the rest of Italy. When there are so many beautiful things to be appreciated and you always have your friends around, what more could you ask for? For other people (myself included) it can become very trying being around people like this so much. For instance, making breakfast this morning there were 4 people around me asking a million questions and wanting me to explain things to them. It was very difficult because I just wanted to make the darn meal and serve it but they were always there asking “Well why did you put the bread in the egg?” or “That egg broke let me get you another one” (No, it doesn’t matter I am going to beat it anyways) or simply commenting “I don’t understand how you can eat such heavy things in the morning”.

Being in a different cultural atmosphere there are things that you are expected to do that you aren’t normally used to. Seeing as I rarely do things like fold my clothes and organize my stuff like normal people, they are always asking me if I want help with that stuff and I’m just like “No, really. It’s fine the way it is”. It’s nice now because I am being asked if I want help. In a couple of years when people stop asking me these questions I am going to want them to. Vabbe. That’s the way it is.

Here I am noticing I am getting older and older. The group of friends that I have been hanging out with are basically all in their twenties from 20-29. But most of them are not in school or in the military or doing something else. A major difference is that they don’t let their work define who they are. I haven’t really had one discussion about what someone does for a living. I have been asked what I studied and what I am going to do with it, but that’s as far as I have gotten. Here it doesn’t really matter just as long as you enjoy yourself it seems. Well shoot, I can do that.

At the same time I feel the need for myself to return to the states and try to plant my foot somewhere I know. There is a saying here Donne e buoi dei paesi tuoi. Basically what it says is “Women and cows from your own town”. Though I have never seen so many naturally beautiful looking people in my entire life and the food here is unbelievably good - it’s becoming more and more apparent to me that things would be much easier if I established myself somewhere and tried to live for a while. By no means am I saying that I want to do this or that I will do this when I get home, but I understand that it would be a heck of a lot easier. Here I am making friends from all over and I know that I want to come back here but the more friends I make the more difficult it is to keep in touch with all of them. As it is now I have a difficult time keeping contact with all my friends from St. Joan, GPN and now even UofM.

I am really excited to be able to go home this fall and hang out with some of the guys from GP. Even though we have all gone and done our separate things (and I know we have all changed a bit) there is a loyalty there that can’t be forgotten. Thinking about who I am, I know I have a tendency to detach myself a little from a group of people before they start to rely on me to be there. I don’t see this as a bad thing, just who I am. I don’t consider myself unreliable I just try to avoid situations where I am counted on in case things don’t work out. Alright, enough of this discourse. I should go wash my clothes.
TWO MORE THINGS: The music here is awesome and I need a haircut.