- Food
- Traveling with Kids
- Photo Dump
- Final Impression
But let's just start with Mr. Cool:
1. Food
There's two aspects to this: grocers and restaurants. In the grocery stores or tiny fruit stands, what stood out was the cost (less than home) vs the quality (higher than home). Some of the smaller fruit places had more questionable selections, as in more pieces on the edge of turning and some that had even turned.
While some people would consider this gross, I saw it s a good sign, as in this produce isn't grown from seeds that are spliced with all sorts of crazy animal DNA to extend their shelf life: it was, eh, non-GMO, maybe because Monsanto doesn't own the rights to all Europeans's food.
The restaurants next to the entrances and exits of major tourist attractions were noticeably bad: poor quality and high prices.
If you ask New Yorkers where pizza was invented, they will tell you right there in the City. But most other people will tell you Naples. While we were there we had plenty of examples, and they were all great. Some more great than others, but all serviceable.
In Rome, early on in the trip, we went to a place and ordered pizza. Big deal, right? Only this pizza had been made on large rectangular sheet trays, the lady would cut pieces with scissors, and charge you by weight.
Also in Rome we got to eat nice doner-kabab (fourteen years waiting for that). These guys put french fries inside, and wrapped them up like burritos instead of stuffed pitas. Times have surely changed.
Corrie and Lola found gelato almost everyday for them and for Cass. I had some. It was good. But dairy in the middle of the day isn't my thing. I remember the shocked look on Lola's face when I told her, truthfully, that had I come to the Pynchon conference alone, I would not have had any gelato whatsoever.
2. Traveling with Kids
Lola had a habit of asking us what our favorite (fill in the blank) was so far. Dinners, locations, coffee places, gelato...also high school classes, college classes, educational stuff like that.
We had hoped that having Lola with us would giver her a chance to get to bond with Cass and maybe even help us shoulder the load of kiddo-work.
Eh, that was a miscalculation. Now, I work with over a hundred teenagers every day, so I'm used to the annoying things that they do, being sociopathic narcissists and all. Spoiled princesses I don't get as much, but kids with trauma at home I do get, and Lola was just one teenager, so it was nearly refreshing for me. Less so for Corrie, who doesn't put up with crap like that ever, especially never having been the spoiled princess. Lola's mom having passed a few years back has shaded how the adults in her circle treat her, and she wasn't prepared for Corrie's not suffering princesses.
We were hoping she would have at least been more mature than Cass, and the fact that there were times where she wasn't made our job harder.
Tell me body language means nothing, and I'll show you this picture:
I'm glad she came and shared in our adventure. She had her own adventure as well, and she'll remember it fondly. To be fair to that picture above, this was very early in the trip while she was still adjusting to Auntie Corrie and Uncle Pat, and not being at home anymore, and this might have even been the barfing day. Because she hadn't been eating food and spent Cass's birthday in bed at the Roman apartment watching downloaded episodes of Criminal Minds, the next day she threw up (a lot) outside of the Colosseum (I heard), the foamy vomit of someone not eating. Corrie knew she hadn't been eating, waited for her to finish, and said: "Are you done? Do you need a minute? We got a lot of stuff to do...so..."
Then she asked what had she been eating, and they had a conversation about the need for calories in a bad way, and from that day on, early in the trip, she eased into having us around as her minders.
We knew how Cass was going to be, or at least live with him and could assume to understand how he could react to things, and I think the trip would have been easier with just the three of us, but it was good for Cass to have Lola around, better than her having Cass around.
But, for what its worth, she is a bright and driven young lady, and she'll surely mature in high school; she starts this fall in the 9th grade.
3. More Photos
There are some pictures I liked but didn't use before.
Victor took this after he dropped us off at the airport:
Three year old with the passport picture of a five month old:
Please, pleas, please start using the toilet; this isn't good for either of us (from the airplane):
Day one walkabout, at the wall:
Birthday at the Spanish Steps, non selfie:
"Wedding Cake" Building:
Marcus Aurelius Palazzo:
The remnants of the first brewery in Rome, brought in by the pope, because the Romans drank too much wine and slashed each other too often, and beer has less alcohol than wine. Makes sense to me. From San Lorenzo:
San Lorenzo density:
The main square in San Lorenzo, the site of weddings, funerals, christenings, and now a thriving drug market at night:
A mural on the remnants of a bombing casualty from WWII. The US refrained from bombing Rome because 1) it didn't have a ton of strategic value; and 2) it did have the Pope, and the US had lots of Catholic soldiers and din't want to hurt morale. Eventually they did bomb San Lorenzo:
Driving through a small town in Sicily on the way to Siricusa:
A rusted rail and the ocean, Ortigia Island:
Apollo's Temple, the oldest ruins on Ortigia Island:
Archimedes Square, daytime:
Running...
Largest modern church and symbol of modern Syracuse, not on Ortigia Island:
Cool fountain detail:
Dionysius Cave selfie:
Modern building, ancient island:
Main public square, Pompeii, Vesuvius in the background, Cassius in the foreground:
4. Final Impressions
I love Italy. I could live there, but I would need to seriously take a stab at getting enough Italian to get around.
One of the reasons we moved to a big city from SLO in 2006 was to mentally prepare for a move across the Atlantic, and while our goals and plans have changed in the dozen plus years since then, the drive to really live in a place like that grows with each visit.
And by "live there", I really just mean Rome. I could stay on Ortigia Island for a while, and the same goes for Collesano, but I guess I've got the big city itch.
Is Rome a downgrade from Berlin? Zurich? Prague? Paris?
To answer: no, maybe, no, yes...
In Asia and Central America the smell of burning garbage wafts on the breeze, and we find it somewhat comforting. In the urban areas in Europe, that smell is replaced with Diesel and cigarette smoke, and while it's less comforting, it's a reminder that we're not in the proverbial Kansas anymore.
So grab a Tennent's Super, relax a bit, and just watch the city bustle to its own beat:
You'll only miss the rat race.
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