Ciao Bedda

Ciao a tutti,

I made it to Sicily for my first time and I could not be happier.  Things here are about what I expected – different, but not as much as everyone says.  At least so far.  I do feel a little out of place here because everyone talks a lot faster and in a different dialect (especially when talking to each other) but in the end I feel a lot more welcomed then I did in northern Italy.  Whereas here being an American is still somewhat of a novelty, in the north Americans are sometimes considered a nuisance.  I’m going to try and recount a little of my trip so far.   

Saturday I left the villa around 10 o’clock to go into Florence.  I had sent my big suitcase with my professor (Giorgio) to Le Marche where he lives.  I am eventually going to go there and pick it up – his family owns a restaurant and I am excited to go there and eat some grub!  So I left the villa, said goodbye to Helen and Blake and the rest of the crew and headed to the train station where I had a 12:38 train to Padova with Sarah (from Michigan) and her friend Natasha (from the UK).   Though I was a little tired from the past week, they kept me entertained during the ride telling me about their crazy encounters with the Dutch and Italians in Florence and elsewhere.  Funny stuff. 

Finally we arrived in Padova, they checked their bags and we took the tram to the Piazza del Santo where St. Anthony’s Basilica is.  This was Natasha’s first time seeing the city so we hit the Saint, another church (San Giustina), Prato delle Valle, via Roma, then up to Piazza Signore, and Piazza del Duomo (right next to where I lived last year).  We drank a spritz of course and then went back to the train station to find both Courtney (from the villa program) and Marco who came to pick us up.

When we arrived at Marco’s house there were already his friends there helping to make dinner with his mom and dad.  Meat was on the wood stove grill and wine was to be drunk.  Right about dinner time his parents took off to a dinner themselves and left the house to the ten 20-some year olds that we just sitting down to eat…

About 7 courses and countless bottles of wine, spritz, etc. later his parents came home and we sat around and talked with them for a while – finally the Americans taught the rest of the kids how to play “Never have I ever” and we ended up going to bed around 2:00 –ish.  The following morning I didn’t wake up until around noon because there was absolutely NO light entering my room (I stayed in Marco’s sister’s room because she was in Poland).  We left around 1:30 to go to the beach (Jesolo) where DJ was going to be later.   We were supposed to get there around 2:00, but in the end didn’t get there until 4:30 after stopping here and there for various reasons (the most important getting food and drinks).  Courtney and I picked up material for PB&J’s thinking it was going to be a hit – in actuality it was just us who ended up eating them. 

We spent a beautiful 4 hours on the beach playing card games (I taught Marco’s friends Andrea and Mozzo a.k.a, Wolverine how to play “screw the dealer”) and with the soccer ball.  In the end we had some drinks and headed to the concert around 7:30, 8:00 and waited to hear Tiesto who came on around 8:30.

As soon as we got in Courtney and I lost the group – it was a mess trying to find everyone and so we decided to just go in and look for a place.  We made it comfortably close to the stage and jammed out with the DJs.  I had never been to a trance concert like this before and I absolutely loved it.  Despite the fact that all I could think about was the political and artistic implications of a concert like this (It would take me a whole different post to explain that) I really enjoyed the people and the atmosphere.   I will try to upload a video or some photos as soon as I’m able. 

With about a half hour left for Tiesto to spin, Courtney and I took off to go for a swim and listen to the music (really cool) and then we went and met Checca and Nick (my roommate from last year and her boyfriend) who came from Treviso just for the a little while to see me.   We hung out with them for a little bit and then met up with Sarah, Natasha, Marco and his friends after the show.  We went swimming again then made it to back to the cars and eventually back to Marco’s place around 2 or 3.

We got up around 10 the next morning and the three girls and I went to Padova in the bus while Marco stayed and had a lesson back in his area.  From Padova, Sarah and Natasha took off for Florence while Courtney and I headed to Venice where we met up with Kate and her mom (Sandy) and Janice (the interpreter from the program) for lunch.  We ate at Brek and then walked around for a gelato and I shopped for a Murano watch for my mother (I think you’ll like it, Mom).

Around 3:30 I said goodbye to them all – Courtney was on her way to Greece while the rest of them were sticking around Venice for the night – and I started looking for trains back to Padova.  Marco and his dad picked me up from the train station and we headed directly to Verona where we had an 8:30 flight to Catania, Sicily.  By 10:30 we had touched down in the land of the lost and then Giuseppe and his sister Chiara took us to the city center where we met their friends and walked around for a little.  As soon as we got there to park there was a man that came up to us and offered us “protection” for the car for a small price. It was amazing to me to think that I was in Venice just 6 hours ago.   Completely different world.  Beppe’s place is about an hour away from Catania so we didn’t get home till around 3:00AM.

This morning we woke up rather late (around 11) and went to the beach which you can see from Beppe’s house.  The view here is unbelievable.  Right next to his house outside is a bunker made by the Americans during WWII.  Now its no longer useful but it’s crazy because it overlooks the sea and there are holes in it where fighter plans had shot at it.  I took pictures of that as well. 

We went to the beach and spent a couple of hours in the water and laid out.  I’ve already gotten quite a bit of sun and I’ve barely been out there!  We came back and ate dinner with Beppe’s family who are extremely nice fed us a seafood pasta with a second of Italian Sausage (buonissimo) and vegetables.  We finished it off with fruit and figs which they picked from the trees right here.  The colors you could see where we ate were unbelievable:  The bluest sea contrasted by the white of the terrace with the green palm trees and the dark purple of the wine complimenting it all.  It was awesome.   In the distance you can see the volcano Etna which is actually erupting right now as I type.  It has been erupting for a while and sometimes when it’s clear out Giuseppe said you can see red of the lava at night.  Right now I can see the smoke. 

What I am living right now is something out of a work of art: a poem, a painting, a book, movie, etc.   The vistas and the landscapes like this that the Italians know how to enjoy with their food and wine make it that much easier to understand why this is a country of poets, artists, chefs and family. 

 

 

Contorno (side dish): Some thoughts and observations so far…

 

Here in Sicily it is easy to take the time to think about what is going on around me so I am going to.  Read if you’d like. 

I wanted to hash over a little bit in my head what I had felt about the concert from the other night.  This was no 60’s or 70’s Bob Dylan or Jimi Hendrix Woodstock concert.  This was a new millennium, shirts off, trance party where the music was loud and continuous, while the beats and the atmosphere cycled from high to low.  Despite the fact that we were in Italy and it’s important to comport yourself in a fashionable manner, people danced their own style while they followed the stages of ups and downs.  At the time I found it very interesting the implications of a concert like that – thousands of people dancing to a beat put out by one DJ.  Everyone subscribing to the same channel and wave of music.   Not only that but the visuals of lights and screen behind the DJ made for a very contemporary expression of artistic capacities.  New technologies are embraced and exploited to serve the cause – in this case the concert. 

Don’t worry Mom, despite what this post may portray I didn’t take any drugs.  I guess it’s just what happens after you follow the political science and Italian courses that I did.   It’s a shame though I haven’t written down everything I thought of because I have had some great thoughts the past couple of days and I don’t remember them all. 

Time to go to the beach.