This Everyday Life

Somehow I woke up and realized that we are fast approaching month 10 in Italy.  How the time has flown by.  I remember reading through blog after blog before coming out here to determine what daily life would be like.  One woman in particular, and I can't remember the name of her blog or anything particular about it aside from the fact that she said, basically, living abroad can seem a lot like living in the US most days.  And so it does very often.  We wake up, make our French pressed Dunkin' Donuts coffee with Coffee Mate creamer and drive to work in our little Honda Civic, which at long last has a new driver's side window!  Hooray!  I spend my day doing much of the same type of work that I once did in the States.  My husband wears the same uniform.  We speak English with our American co-workers.  Eat lunch at Subway.  Work out on familiar cardio equipment.  And after getting a subscription to an IP masking company, we can now watch American TV on Hulu and Netflix.  It all feels very familiar, very often.

To help promote the familiar, this weekend we had a brunch party at our house because I have had an intense desire to eat brunch food and there is none available in this entire country.  I bought the food at the commissary (because good luck trying to find Jimmy Dean Sausage in the Italian grocery store.  The one I frequent was also closed down because of a slight health problem associated with the feral cats living in their deli and seafood warehouse.  Even after it reopens, I am skeptical about going back.) and drove it back to the apartment, bags filling the trunk and back seat.  Italians do not buy food on the American scale.  They think we're freaks.  Giant, hungry, obese freaks.  The 4 gas attendants just smiled, leaned against our car and judged as Tom and I drug bag after bag from the car up to our apartment entryway and back.

That's step 1 - drag bags from car, up the little hill to our apartment's atrium.  We lined the atrium wall with bags and wine bottles, cat litter and dry cleaning.  Step 2 involved loading the tiny elevator and taking that to our floor.  Step 2 was repeated 3 times on this instance.  Step 3 requires going from the 5th floor up one more by foot to our apartment.  Step 4 involves moving the bags from the entryway of our apartment to the kitchen.  Step 5 involves putting everything away.  The process generally takes an hour.  It took longer this time because our Italian neighbors wanted to use the elevator and would shove Tom, our cat litter and themselves in as I yelled "Mio marito non parle Italiano.  Lui non capisce italiano."  (My husband doesn't speak Italian.  He does not understand Italian.)  Unphased, they would rattle off questions in Italian like "Do you live here?  What floor do you live on?" as I stood on the ground floor snickering to the sound of Tom saying "uhhhh...."  To help erradicate this problem, we both signed up for Gateway to Italian, Level 1 (essentially an Italian 101 class being offered here on base through the University of Texas).  Fingers crossed, we'll pass through that Gateway and come out on the other side oozing Italian elegance and grace.  Perhaps I'm putting too much pressure on this class, some things may be asking too much....

Our brunch was a smashing success!  Complete with a Mimosa-Bellini combo that was to die for, biscuits and gravy, egg strata, blueberry muffins and more!  10 months into our adventure, I couldn't be happier with the group of friends that we've made and that we are just starting to meet.  It definitely has helped having more friends with whom we can explore and experience this amazing, crazy country.

Cheers!
Lynne