Ravenna 1

the covered market

inside the market

Olives and strawberries, ugh.. who eats that? Ashley, she eats olives with everything, 2 years ago, she ate olives with 1/2 a pound of freshly made nougat in Amsterdam.

The plan was to go to Verona but at the train station in Bologna, I decided on Ravenna because it was closer. Seeing Ravenna today, a nice sleepy town, lots of old people and young families, lots of bikes, it is hard to envision a place, in its heyday, was as important as Rome. When it was dangerous in Rome during the sacking of it by the Barbarians, the Roman emperors did move their administrations to Ravenna, in its heyday, an important part of the Byzantium Empire. It is just like being in Granada, Spain, which today is another pretty town in Spain, it was hard to imagine that that was the seat of the Moorish government and later Isabella and Ferdinand ruled from there. The Alhambra was where it all happened, just like San Vitale in Ravenna which we will visit in the next posting. That's the romance of Europe, one has to dig deeper when one visits, there are so many layers of history piled on top of each other. Will I ever get tired of visiting it? I don't think so.

On a different note, I visited a few blogs last week and found some gorgeous ones. I left a comment on one of them and they reciprocated.

On the way from the train station in Ravenna, we passed by this church. I went in to pray as I often do in churches in Europe. The girls wanted to know what I prayed about, I said, I always pray that I'll be able to continue to travel and see all these marvelous places, that I'll be able to share these experiences with them, take them with me and for loved ones at home who are worried about us. That's Europe, the age of faith has left us many churches, beautiful ones like San Vitale which we will visit in the next posting. For this I'm truly grateful.

Anna Sophia (my avatar)

I wake up, got out from under the linen duvet, into the chill of the house, brrrrrr... when is it going to warm up, I ask. I walk to the kitchen and made some coffee. I feel cold even in my flannel jammies. I run back to the bedroom to get a robe. Now, that feels much better, much warmer. The coffee is ready, I pour out some into a cafe au lait bowl, opened the frigo, found some cream, I think to myself, I need to walk to the fromagerie later to get some more and maybe get some more of those incredible and creamy yogurt (I only have a small pot left, I love the way the French package their yogurt, in little glass jars). I am consuming so much yogurt, it's keeping me very regular. Maybe, I'll get some more fromae blanc. Mmmmm... what a life, living in a country that produces some of my most favorite things. I look out of the kitchen window while clasping the warm coffee bowl with both hands. I looked at the still frozen winter landscape of the backyard. There's a certain beauty to it. I think to myself, I need to get dressed, go out with my camera, capture the beauty of the moment and write a posting in my blog. My blog? I'm still posting on it after 3 years, still faithful to that old and dear friend, except now I have joined the expatriate community. I've become a member of the 'expatblog'.

The virtual life

I was reading about the virtual life and a second life, of having an avatar who lives the life of your dreams in cyberspace, in the internet. Your avatar is whoever you want to be whether it be a celebrity where money is no object, she shops till she drops, or he/she fights crimes, etc, anyone you want to be. I don't know how it works, how to even start or how to even join in to play. Young people are making real money on things like this.
Here am I, sitting in my car, the front seat has turned into a sitting room like everybody else's cars these days. I have to leave the house very early to beat the traffic, I have a mini library/sitting room in the front seat of my car, I read, I pray, I dream and I write for at least 1 & 1/2 hours on the days that I work, in the front seat of my car, till it's time to start work at the pharmacy. I've been doing this for almost 10 years now. After all this time, some days are such a drag. Like all people, I plot and plan my escape from the 'tyranny of the clock'. Some one said, 'that's why it's called work'. Even so, it doesn't have to be such a mind numbing drudgery.
One morning, I was blessed with a brilliant idea, create my own avatar, my altered ego, my second life (except it's not virtual and no one else gets to come in). I am going to live my second life through 'Anna Sophia'. So over time, I'll make up stories about her life, so when 'Anna Sophia' does the postings, you'll have to remember, she's not real. We'll both post, so one is real life, the other is not, we might get both lives mixed up, so we might end up not knowing which is real life and which is not. Does it matter? No! This is going to be fun and exciting.
Why am I doing this? For my sanity or maybe for my insanity, which one? Who cares. I don't. I just need to remember which one is real and which one is not. What is I get mixed up..... let's find out.
Tomorrow will be Anna Sophia's first post. It's going to be fun. I love it already......

a peek into the 'cupboard' of my life

I'm trying to redecorate but I'm so lazy. This coffee table was some one's discarded craft project. I bought it, paid $69.....10 years ago, thinking I'll finish it, well, it almost became my discarded craft project, it almost became firewood. Finally after 10 years I'm working to finish it.

Some years ago, I bought a spray can of KILZ, a quick drying sealer base for wood. So I sprayed the table with it. It didn't quite cover it, I had to look for paint, maybe go to Home Depot to buy some. I hate leaving the house. There must be some old paint around the house. As with all the houses I've bought, there are always cans of paint left behind. I went to the section of the garage where paint cans go to die, found some stuff, it was some interior paint, for drywall, I think. Not for wood, I don't think but I used it anyway. It didn't really work. I searched again and found some wood paint. Et Voila! Here is it, the finished product, not bad, not that good. It'll do for now.

There's a story behind this couch, a $20 purchase at a garage sale. It had these hideous chartreuse covers on it and the foam had all but disintegrated. I bought it thinking I'll work on it and save some money. It sat that way for 4 years till I got fed up. I took it to an upholsterer, paid $340 to have the foam replaced and new covers made. So the $20 couch ended up costing me $360, maybe I should have bought a new couch.

Not that I can't afford anything new. I have so much cash in the bank earning no money, its criminal. I don't like to spend money. Now what am I going to do with the old TV. I have till 2/2009 to decide what to do........

Addio Pizzo

Pizzo, not pizza. What is pizzo? It is the protection money extracted by the mafia or Cosa Nostra. The Cosa Nostra is alive and well in Italy and especially Sicily. While as tourists, we don't come in contact with the mafia, in Sicilian businesses, it is very much a part of the culture- still! These days, mothers and sisters of those affected and the young people have teamed up to form the association, Addio Pizzo (http://www.addiopizzo.org) to say no to the demands of Cosa Nostra. Among the prominent women in this fight are Letizia Battaglia and Rita Borsellino (I read she is a pharmacist), sister of the slain Magistrate, Paolo Borsellino.
Imagine the scenario, ' a group of young entrepreneurs getting together to open a club.... a very good idea, one of them say,''what about pizzo?" Yes, do we pay pizzo and be unmolested or do we not pay and risk the place going up in flames or even the simple annoyance of having glue squirted into the keyhole of your door!'
I remember reading last year about the farms and tractors confiscated from known Cosa Nostra members in Sicily and given to local farmers. They couldn't use the tractors because the Cosa Nostra made them unusable and they threw rocks into the farmlands to prevent them from being cultivated.
Our trip to Sicily last March (2007) placed us in touch with young Sicilians. On Friday, the train was packed with young Sicilians going back to help out in the family farms. On Monday, the reverse took place, the same people were headed for jobs in Palermo. Everywhere, fields were being plowed for agriculture, it was a heartwarming sight.
These young people wants to change the culture in Sicily by saying 'Addio Pizzo' (down with extortion). I hope they succeed.
The story is different in Southern Italy, the mafia of Reggio Calabria are the most ruthless. They control the drug trade, among other things, like the trash business. They have not allowed more dumps and incinerators to be built. So Naples reeks of trash most of the year. The EU is stepping in. The old part of Naples is quite impressive but everywhere there's all kinds of construction going on forever. There are some famous piazzas, when you visit expecting some great photo ops, but instead all you see is a dumpy place. I still like Naples. I like the Neapolitan spirit. My visit to Naples was totally pleasant. I'd visit again.

Pretty Bologna

a pastry shop

all the fixin's for dinner

market street

one of the many beautiful arcades

view from our hotel room

All the buildings have covered arcades, painted with beautiful frescos or just beautifully vaulted. The old city centre is a wonderful place to wander around, peek into shops or have a drink at cafes with seats spilling into the arcades. It is Easter and the special cakes of Pasqua is found in every shop, reminds me of Panetone at Christmas. I went into a shop to get one, there was a long line to pay, you pay first, take your receipt to one of the shop girls who'll then hand you a cake. At 20 euros, it wasn't cheap but we enjoyed it and made a mess in the hotel room because the crumbs fell every where.

It is a long walk from the train station to our hotel. When we first arrived, we did take a taxi but once we were there, we quickly learnt the bus system and took the bus the rest of our stay.

We wandered around the markets of the old centre, it is really pretty. The beautiful produce looked like art, there are hams and sausages hanging from the rafters. We went in a store that sold home cooked food, we picked out dinner- a few veal cutlets, some salad and some vegetables, a few pieces of chicken and we ate in our hotel room, one of the nights we were there.

Another time we sat down for capuccino, I said, 'due capuccino, per favore'. The manager corrected me, he said, 'due capuccini'. So now I say to myself all the time, 'uno capuccino, due capuccini'. He brought us our coffee with a glass of water. You are supposed to chase your coffee with water, a very Arabic thing to do, after all the Arabs discovered coffee, they call it 'arabica'. I saw it done in Sicily but they never brought us water to chase our coffee. I guess you have to ask for it in Sicily.

All day at work, I was thinking, Europe is the only thing worth doing in this life, forget about beaches in Cancun or Hawaii, or the rainforests of South America.

When is my next trip?

Pasta

You know you're not in America anymore when you don't buy your pasta packed in boxes off of supermarket shelves. I've been all over Italy so many times, this is the first time I've seen a pasta shop. This is in Bologna. Throughout Italy, the pasta shapes varies a little. In the South, in the Puglia and Basilicata areas they eat a lot of Orrechiette, a little pasta shaped in the form of an ear, usually served with Rapini, very nice, I loved it. In Sicily, especially in Catania, we eat a lot of Spaghetti alla Norma, a pasta dish named for the opera 'Norma' written by native son, Bellini, it is really just pasta with eggplant. I've made it at home. I've made Orrechiette con rapini at home too, it is very easy. In Bologna, their dish is pasta Bolognese, the dish shown was the worse I've ever eaten, I make a better one, I should open a restaurant in Bologna.

Morning reading

Every year I face the dilemma, to renew or not to renew my Wall Street Journal subscription. The stories are so pithy, I just take 5 minutes to read the whole paper 6 days a week. The habit I've fostered of going out to the front drive way to pick up the paper is more important than the actual contents of the paper. Sad, but true. So every morning, I still flip through the pages of the Journal, read my bible with the help of a commentary, usually one written by my favorite author, William Barclay. Definitely there's more substance in the bible. So just as we eat breakfast, I feast on words of encouragement, faith and hope and I'm ready to face the day. I still have to make the decision of whether to renew or not to renew the Journal.......

New experiences

a mixture of salad greens, you never know what you're going to get with each bite, as I chewed it sends out a different taste and therefor a different sensation, wow, what was that, then again, wow, what was that.... It's an incredible salad mix, 'mesclun' they call it in French.

'Mulberries' they told me, a variety of mulberries, they look like silk worms, I couldn't really see if I actually chomped on worms. The taste is very different, intense and sweet.

Yesterday's breakfast, a slice of Almond pound cake, mulberries and a bowl of very strong coffee. This is the sweet life.

I was peeling purple carrots last week to put into a soup. It stained my hand this beautiful purple color. I could probably use the peel to stain fabric, that's an idea for another time.

They say, variety is the spice of life. Certainly these new food experiences spice up life, just looking at them gives so much pleasure, just when I thought I've seen and tasted everything, they came along. I'm not that jaded, I still get thrilled by little things like little salad greens, strange berries and purple carrots.

The Jewish Ghetto, Rome

a little sustenance for the grueling feat of sight seeing, maybe I'll take a cruise the next time or lie on the beach in Cancun..... NOT!

I, only went, because the kids are Jewish but its a small area with nothing much to see now. In the 16th century, Pope Paul IV ordered the confinement of the Jewish people to this area, marking the beginning of a time of intolerance that continued well into the 19th century.

I've been to the Jewish Ghetto in Seville, Spain. It has been converted into a touristy area and is very pretty, clean and pedestrian friendly, balconies filled with flowers cascading down the walls. That is one thing I remember about Seville besides the Orange trees planted throughout the city and the smell of orange blossoms that Spring day is forever etched in my mind.

Time flies

My new favorite thing to eat, a piece of Almond Pound cake from Le Pain Quotidien in Santa Monica.

Vintage French linens

It's May already and I'm looking forward to Memorial day. Time flies, whether or not you're having fun. I watch the news on BBC just now, they showed pictures of the trash problem in Naples. The trash is still not being picked up. We were in Naples 2 years ago and they didn't have the trash problem when we were there. We had a great time, it very much like Palermo or Catania, unruly and haphazard. The food was great, I prefer the food in Southern Italy and Sicily. There are mom and pop restaurants every where that served great food. I miss it already. I have to contend with just working the next 4 months, it's been really busy, in fact, we won a sales contest, my staff got their bonus check. I have to wait 2 more weeks for mine. I wonder if it's enough to buy a new camera, a DSLR. Maybe not. I'm just musing and dreaming.....

The Spanish steps, Rome

Via Del Corso is a long street and one of its side street is the very fashionable Via Condotti. Via Condotti is a short side street full of designer shops and at the end of it is the Spanish steps or Piazza di Spagna where tourists and locals gather and hang out. Its just a huge staircase but frequented by famous people like Keats and Shelley and seen in movies. It is usually very crowded but we were there early in the morning.

The Pantheon, Rome

Built in 27 BC, the Pantheon was altered in the 2ND century BC and its appearance has changed over subsequent centuries. The colonnaded facade originally stood higher so the the dome (at more than 130 feet in diameter, the widest every vaulted with stonework) was practically invisible from the approach. Once inside the church, this added an element of surprise to the effect of the first view of the dome, stunning in the simplicity of its proportions: it is a perfect sphere, held in a cylinder of equal height and radius. In 1878 it was declared a tomb for Italy's kings and Vittorio Emanuele I and Umberto I are buried here.

Quoted from Knopf Guides.

Practically the oldest intact building in Italy, it was built as a pagan temple. Over the centuries a host of religions worshipped here and today Christian services are being held on a regular basis. It is a gorgeous building, very awe inspiring, a favorite of most visitors. This was my 3rd visit and I don't think I'll ever get tired of visiting the Pantheon.