why?

So, lots of Italy makes perfect sense. The siesta is a fanstatic concept, and so what it every store closes from 2-4 every day. That just means you HAVE to take a nap. And the 2 hour lunch? Fantastic! Lunch should be the big meal of the day, and then you get to sleep it off with the siesta. So, in many ways, Italians have got it right.

However... there are a few things that puzzle me about Italy and Italians.

1. change
Apparently, there is some sort of change (ie coinage) shortage in Italy. When presented with a check for say, 13 euro and you try to pay with a 20, you will get a look. Then, they sigh, and ask if you have 3 euro. If not, they sigh again and then laboriously count out your 7 euro change. This is true EVERYWHERE, including the pharmacy, post office, and all manner of businesses. We've been hoarding change for this purpose.

2. "service"
Italians seem to have a different idea of what a job in the service industry requires. Peter and I went looking for a bus ticket to Lucca from Siena during the train sciopero. Seemingly, not a difficult task. We went to the bus station. As the bus systems are independent companies here, there are separate offices depending on where you are heading and which company runs there. We stopped at the first office. "autobus a Lucca?" "no" the woman scoffed. "office over there" So, we went to the second office. "no" the woman scoffed. "over there." "but but but" we protested that we had already been there and they didn't have the tickets. She sighed, and suggested that we try the travel agent office down the street. We wandered around looking for the travel agent. Found the travel agent. No, they were the airline agent, for the bus, we had to go downstairs. Down we go... only to be told by the downstairs agent that they only sold tickets for the train, that the train was on sciopero, and anyway, their computers were down so they couldn't sell us a ticket anyway.

It turns out that the entire time, we were asking the WRONG question. Instead of "bus to Lucca?" we should have asked "what city do I go to to get a bus to Lucca?" Because, there isn't a bus from Siena to Lucca. You have to take the bus to Florence and then change to go to Lucca. All with the same company, of course, and public info we found later online. But since we didn't ask the right question, we didn't get the answer.

So, this is my list in progress, I'm sure to be updated later. The thing that strikes me about this list is the odd similiarity with my experiences in less developed countries (Mexico, Thailand, Cambodia). Sometimes it feels like Italy isn't part of Europe after all.

Roman Holiday

We've been having a crazy fun time in Italy. The chaos has been manageable and the sights have been good. If only the weather would cool down, it would be perfect.

Our second day in Rome was particularly memorable:

It started off like normal, visiting some museums (the Galleria Borhese), sitting in some piazzas (Piazza Quartinile) and generally wandering. Then we ended up near the Trevi Fountain, which was absolutely mobbed at 5 pm; nothing unusual.

After some internet-ing, then some chinese food dinner, we went back over to the Fountain. No only was it still mobbed, it was worse. But the atmosphere was nice, and the weather not too horrendeous.

Then it happened. A commotion in the middle of the fountain. A guy was standing in the fountain, blatantly in violation of the rules, pulling his wife/girlfriend in. As all the Pakistani Rose Sellers descended on the scene, the couple were in the middle of the fountain, moving towards the middle. Then all of a sudden, the guy got on his knee and pulled out a ring. The place exploded. It was surreal.

The cops eventually came over to pull them out, and were trying to arrest/fine them. But the crowd kept getting louder and laùouder, and booing and yelling at the polizia. From what we could tell, the couple only got a slap on the wrist (I guess thos Italian Polizia do have a heart (or bribed)) as they were laughing with the police. They also got some extra harrasement from the rose sellers, who descended like vultures.

After that excitement, we decided to head home. We were going to walk to the Spanish Steps, about 10 minutes away, to check out the cene and hop on the subway.

Once we got to the Steps, we completely missed the subway stop. I'm not really sure how, but we walked right past it. When we discovered this, half way to the next stop, we decided to circle back through some smaller streets to where we thought the station was.

As we walked down an alley, we heard some singing in the distance. As we got closer, we could see a crowd and lights, and could hear some really good music. Great, a little concert for us.

Then, it was clear. Not a concert, a fashion show, complete with runway down the middle of the street and live DJ. It was pretty cool, so we hung out for a while as Kimberly drooled over the pretty dresses.

Since the fashion show blocked the whole street, we needed to double back again to get to the station. When we finally found it, hidden in plain site, our feet were tired. We were glad to hop on the train.

Except the subway was closed.

We were a little confused. We were pretty certain that the subway stayed open until at least 11, if not later. We even checked the guidebooks (which, in all honestly, have been wrong on more than one occassion).

Our frustration mounting, we went to ask a cop what was going on. BeforeI could even get half the question out in my terrible Italian, he said "CHIUSO" very aggressively. At first, I was stunned, so turned to walk away. But I realized we had no way of getting home, so turned back. Anticipating the question, he pointed in the general behind us and said "Autobus."

We went and looked around a little for a bus, but couldn't find a stop. So we decided to walk. According to the map, it didn't look too far - from the Spanish steps to behind Vatican City.

In reality, it took us 1-1/2 hours, and was probably over 3 miles. We were not happy the next morning.

We looked into a sciopero or any news on the subway, but nothing. Just another day in Italy.

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We, and I, have been reporting a lot on sciopero's and other nuisances of travelling here in Italy. It's not really that bad, you just need to roll with the punches.

But I wanted to let you know about 2 books we bought in Siena regarding the Italian way of life, including the sciopero and other ways they do things 'differently' over here.

The first is That Fine Italian Hand by Paul Hoffman. It's a fact-based book on Italian history and how it has shaped the people and some of their current institutions. I'm currently in the middle, and am enjoying it.

The other is When In Rome by Robert Hutchinon. This guy moved his family to Rome to invetigate the Vatican City, the smallest country in the world. It' a very funny chrinicle of his adverntures, and while principally about the Vatican, it's really about Rome and the Italian people. I really enjoyed this one.

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Finally, I really like this picture I took from inside the Pantheon. The Pantheon may be my favorite thing in Europe - it's absolutely unbelievable to me that such a large, perfectly domed building was built 2,000 years ago. And inside is even cooler. The perfectly spherical dome has a perfectly circular hole in the top, creating some cool lighting and shadows.

This is the shadow that was cast when we were there.

Held Prisoner in an Italian Restaurant

Eating in Italy is one of the better things you can do in life, as we've reported on several occassions in the past. We hear people over here complaining about the food all the time, saying they get better food in San Francisco or New York. These people are idiots and don't know what they're doing. Ordering polenta in Naploli, or Eggplant in Milan probably isn't going to work out well, since most of Italian cuisine in regional. Do some research, eat the local specialties and you'll be fine.


Italian restaurants move at their own pace, often very slow. In this regard, I can understand the frustration with travellers, especially ones with a tight schedule. Fortunately, we have no schedule, so a 2 hour lunch is fine with us.


But there have been 2 notable exceptions.

In our firt go around in Siena, we went to a little hole in the wall place (in Italy, they're all holes in the walls). After getting screwed out an outdoor seat by the hot guy, we got stuck in the back of the restaurant with the other Americans. No big deal. We were hungry and wanted to eat.

So we perused the menu and choose our food. Some rabbit, some pasta, some veal. Then we waited for the waitress to come.

And we waited.

And we waited.

Since Italian service i slow, I didn't want to look like some American who couldn't deal. So we waited some more. It was an on-going discussion as to how long we should wait. We decided 30 minutes was enough.

When I went to talk to the bar, they were shocked, SHOCKED, that we hadn't been helped and he would help us personally. They then proceeded to tell us that half the menu was no longer available.

In the end, the food was good and I got a free glass of Vin Santo (sweet dessert wine) out of it, but it was annoying none the less.

The second instance happened just the other night here in Lucca. We had a great meal, including raviolli, papparadalle, and cutlets milanese.

Once we finished, we asked for the check. And waited.

And waited.

And waited some more.

At this point, we were trying to do everything we could to get the waitress' attention, including staring, waiving money, etc. She obviously thought it was someone else's reponsibility to get us the check, you know, like the fairy godmother.

After 20 minutes (I learned a little bit from the first time), we finally asked for the check again. The waitres acted like it was the first time we asked and promptly brought the check over.

The problem in both these situations is you can't do anything. We could have left the restaurant without ordering, but on a sleepy Sunday evening, we ran the chance of there being no other available retaurants. And we could have walked out on the check, but really, we couldn't.

We're learning the Italian way, but it has its limits. Next time, maybe we'll only wait 15 minutes.