Ahhh. Home for the holidays. It was so fantastic to be back Stateside for Christmas and New Year's. I was only back for 11 days, but every single moment was perfect. Now that I'm back in Italy I thought I would make a list of all the things I did in 11 days that I haven't done in 4 months.
1. Made copies of keys. I still do not have a copy of my mailbox key (school cannot find a locksmith to make a copy) or a spare set for my apartment (I've tried, but they won't take my money or make the key of course). In the US, I made copies of 2 different keys. On Christmas Eve day!
2. Watched a movie. In a theater. In English. "The Descendents" is fantastic and a real tearjerker just in case you were curious.
3. Walked to an Asian restaurant. That's right. I walked. Not possible in my town for anything except pizza. I also ordered in sushi and walked to a Belgian restaurant, walked to a sandwich shop for lunch, and walked to McDonald's (for the record that is my third trip this fall/winter; 1st was for wifi in France; 2nd was for wifi and lunch in Germany). Guess what I didn't eat. Pizza!
4. Got my hair cut. There was no negotiating or misunderstanding or drastic change. I've been afraid to get a haircut here because they are expensive and I've learned from London and Paris, don't go to a new person without being able to communicate very clearly. I can't do that here yet.
5. Bought a cell phone. Yes, that's right. It turns out you really do need one everywhere these days so I went to Target and bought a pay-as-you-go phone. It worked and I even recharged it. Ahhh! The sweet smell of success. I actually thought that it might work abroad, but it doesn't. Damn US locked phones. It took me all of 10 minutes.
(In any case, in an Italian phone update, I just bought a new cheapo phone for my Italian SIM card, but I still couldn't make calls. I took it down to the electronics station at the grocery store and used my best smile to charm the guy into helping me. It worked. He couldn't figure it out either. He ended up calling headquarters or something and they said I was out of credit. He recharged it for me and when the new balance came up, I wasn't actually out of credit, but, it works now, so I'm not going to question it. Plus, now I have a phone that charges regardless of what angle I put the charger in!)
6. Did a load of laundry the morning I flew back. Yes, that's right I washed and dried an entire load of laundry in under 2 hours! My washer isn't even finished in two hours here. Drying is out of the question.
I did a ton of other really fun stuff and saw tons of people I really miss! Quick highlights were: my parents' holiday party, Christmas day, a road trip with a friend, a massage, homemade dinner and good wine with friends, a night in my old apartment with my old roomies, watching "The Good Wife," discovering "Damages," playing bananagrams on New Year's Eve, dinners with my cousin (at an old favorite) and a friend (at a new favorite), and a 6-mile run with old friends.
Finally, here is a reason to love Italy. They sell this contraption. Searching for shelving on amazon.it, this came up as a kitchen accessory. I prefer to think of it as some sort of contemporary art, but whatever, it had me laughing at long last.
Ok, full disclaimer: I am not an economist. I am a 1st grade teacher. I am living in Italy for two years, teaching at an American school. I am on month 4 here and am still without "real" internet, a cell phone plan, a TV, a landline phone, tapanade, bus tickets, and local tourist books.
I have already explained the internet/landline telephone thing in a previous post and this is still not remedied. I am still using my too-slow-for-skype internet key.
Telefonino- cell phone. Our first week here the school rushed us to a Walmart type store (6 minutes by car; 56 minutes by public transportation) to buy the cheapest phones possible. I brought an old unlocked phone from the US figuring that I would be here long enough to buy a phone plan. For over the past 6 weeks I have been trying to buy a new cell phone.
Try 1- Vodafone is out of iphones, so I settle for the cheapest smart phone (hoping for skype). At the end of the paperwork, the internet at Vodafone (an internet company incidentally) crashes and our contract cannot be completed. I have to leave the phone there and return the next day. It is not easy to get to the store, but I go back and guess what!
Try 2- The internet is still crashed. No phone for me. Since I cannot return on Monday or during the week, I was forced to cancel the first part of my contract.
Try 3- I returned the following weekend. Well, it turns out that because I had to cancel, I also was charged the 100 euro fee. I told them that I understood, but if I had to pay the fee, I would not use Vodafone for my phone company. Funny how they found a way to reimburse me the fee after that. I go through the whole process of getting an iphone, only to have Vodafone tell me that my Italian credit card is not set up for monthly deductions, only one time transactions. I tell our business office at school and they straighten it out.
Try 4- However, after that I return to Vodafone one last time this weekend and they have no more iphones set up for a plan, only sim cards. This has probably taken me over 5 hours and much, much patience. Now I am without a phone, and Vodafone is without my couple thousand Euros over the next couple years. I thought about buying a wireless modem from them but the headaches and stress I imagine it would induce are not worth it to me.
Biglietti- tickets. It is Sunday and I am without bus tickets for the week. It is not that I did not try. First of all, the economy stops on Sundays. Normally nothing can be purchased on Sundays, especially afternoons, when even the tabacci shops close. (The tabacci are the places where one must buy tickets for the bus. Another appallingly confusing process designed to make even natives confused as far as I can tell, but that is for another bah humbug post.) However, it is the Christmas season so our local grocery coop is open. One of the stores there is a tobacco shop, but when I showed up today, he was out of tickets! This could be because there is nowhere else to buy the tickets today, but it leaves me to wonder what if you have a minor emergency and need a bus ticket to get somewhere. I have one emergency ticket that I will use tomorrow, but it is impossible to buy them on the bus and there are no automatic machines anywhere in the area of Milan. To me this seems to discourage the use of buses. Make it easier to buy tickets and people will. (i.e. spend money in your cities/towns) How many people ride without paying because they cannot pay for a ticket anywhere?
TV- my neighbors have been trying to get TV since their shipment arrived 2 months ago. Still not a channel showing up. I'm letting them fight this battle.
Tapenade e libri-- Neither of these two things are such a big deal, but I tried to buy both as Christmas presents. The tapenade was from a Harrod's food hall-type store, but instead of being allowed to just pick up the jar off the shelf and take it to the cashier and buy it, I got to the head of the line and the cashier told me that I needed a ticket to buy it, but I didn't understand where to even get a ticket. It isn't a special product and the only tickets were for lines at meat, bread, sweets, etc. counters. If it were an occasional experience that I had trouble, I would be persistent and use this as a learning opportunity, but due to the absurdity of shopping generally in Italy I have decided I am never shopping there again. So the store only lost 8 euros this one time, but who knows how many times I would have shopped there in the future. But my boycott of Italian things continues; I don't need the stress. As for the books, I have noticed that when I go to museums here there is usually one general book translated into many different languages and all of the specific books are in Italian. I know what you are going to say, Kate, learn Italian. I'm trying, I promise, but while I am in the process I would still like to be able to appreciate the things that I am seeing.
Maybe all these problems are because I am not Italian, but there are many non-Italians here and many of us have money to spend. As for me, I will be spending most of my money on things when I am in the US over Christmas or in any other country during my breaks.
My conclusion is that things in Italy are too hard to buy. If they were easier they may not have a booming economy, but consumer spending would be on the rise. I, for my part, have decided not to buy anything else non-essential (groceries, trips out of here, social life, art museums) here.
