Even phone installation is an adventure

So........the phone guy came....right when he said he would......

The end.

He came....... he asked Bob if he spoke Italian, told him he (the phone guy) didn't speak English. Looked (no touching) the phone lines and left......

...........without another word (except for Bob to open the gate to let him out).

So, Bob is sitting there not know what to do. Stay there and wait? Who knows?

First thing he did was try the phone. Of course it didn't work.....the guy didn't actually DO anything.

Then he called me at the base to go to housing --utililties department--- to see if they could tell us what just happened.

After the man in utilities stopped laughing he called the phone company......laughed as he told them what happened.

The final story was the guy decided they need to either put or pull (can't really understand the accents completely) some wire. He didn't say anything to Bob because he knew Bob didn't speak Italian. So he just left.

From what we're told, they'll email us when they're ready to put the phone in. No timetable. What a bummer.

One final thing, we need a phone line to have internet...........Just a thought.

Here's a note...

to those whom we can't call right now. We're in the new house and love it. Except for the dining room set being in the middle of the living room (literally--middle) all the loaner furniture is in place. It was so quiet last night compared to the hustle-bustle noise of Motta.

Bob went for a walk this morning and Giuseppe (the older man who lives in the other side of our duplex) came out and walked and talked with him. I peeked out and saw them walking toward the gate. They were so cute. Tracy would have taken a beautiful photo.

Take care. We'll call when we can.

Italian roads are an adventure in themselves

If you think we drew this picture.........nope. We travel this road/intersection every day on our way to the base. Two ways go to the Autostrata (interstate), one goes to Catania, another to Motta, one to Caltegirone and who knows what else. (and WE thought the Michigan Left was a challenge ... lol). And .... just to make this a little interesting for the Sicialians ... there are huge flowering bushes blocking the view of crossing traffic at each inter-change. It's like going to the casino with your last dollar........ Oh, yes, at least three of these five (or six or seven) intersecting roads have the right of way, which ones is anyones guess.

It rained for a couple of hours here today. Oh, my goodness.

When it started we were on the road.......a small road leading from our new place toward Motta. The mud just glided (glid?) across the road and it was like driving on.............mud. Not fun. By the time we got back to the TLA (apartment) it was raining pretty hard. Here's what the street in front of our apartment looked like.

The Isle of Lipari...Wow

I don't have a lot to say on this blog but just have to send some pictures. What a beautiful place. Lipari is the largest of the Aeolean Islands just north of Sicily. We took a bus ride up the coast highway, got on an airfoil ferry and rode 45 minutes to the island.

The islands are made from volcanoes which are still active. Here and in all of Sicily, people don't worry about the volcanoes as long as they are active, that means the steam is escaping and there won't be a huge blowup--though occasionally that's not true and there is quite a blow-up---about every thirty years.

The history of Lipari goes back to the Bronze era or further. We were treated to a guided tour by a young woman, Nadia, who shared so much. We saw evidence of the conquering of the island by the Normans, Greeks, Spanish and, of course, Italians. Some excavations and shaped rocks (for walls and buildings) went back to the second century b.c.

We learned about capers: Capers cannot be planted. They are distributed in the rocks and crevices by bugs, lizards, and birds where they grow. They are tiny and can only be picked by hand in the early morning or late evening. The caper is the bud of the flower and, of course, can be eaten after some processing (though not much). Also eaten is the fruit of the caper which the Sicilians call cucunci (coocoonchee).

We went to a restaurant near the top of the mountain for lunch and had a typical Sycilian meal. Antipasto, pasta, and the main course. I was happy with the antipasto and could have been done but they kept bringing this wonderful food and their homemade bread. In fact, everything at the "ristorante" was made and/or grown right there. As we left we saw their cherry tomatoes drying in the sun.

Another wonderful day.

Here's a blog we forgot to post

Last Sunday we were invited to the house of two of our teachers for a pizza dinner. They own a house just up the mountain from a little town called Zafferana and had a new pizza oven built. Our asst. principal, Sonny, was also invited so we rode up with him. I am sure glad we weren't driving because we 1) never would have found it, and 2) would have driven white-knuckled if we had made it....the roads were more twisty-turny than any I had ever seen (though the ones we saw on the big bus yesterday outdid them).

The town of Zafferana was on the first week (of four) of their "Octoberfest" so Joyce said to come early and we'd go down to the town for awhile before starting the pizzas. There are booths all along the street at three levels (it's built on a mountain so there are different levels to the town) and they have crafts from everywhere--local to far away. I met a young man from Senegal (in northern Africa) who had come with some beautiful things.

There are booths of local produce and prepared foods. We got our first tastes of lemon honey, almond honey, and orange honey. Also, pistacchio pesto (yummmmm!) lemon olive oil (unbelievable) and other such tasty treats. There were many, many kinds of local wines we could have tasted, too. They sell all this from their little booths.

Another layer held more crafts and small, inflatable carnival rides and games. (One was the old game of ring the soda bottle but done with wine bottles). At the back of this area was a kind of food court like you see at any fall festival. Mostly local vendors cooking the most wonderful things made of all sorts of local meats and vegetables. Some were cooking fish and meat over an open fire in a kind of long v-shaped "thing" made of wood. Hmmm.

Bob had been looking all over for a sausage sandwich (not at all the kind of sausage we would imagine) and found about six vendors there selling them. He said it was worth the wait. I was waiting for the pizza and passed up all food except for the tasting.

Back at Joyce and Bob's house we fired up the oven the sat around and visited for awhile while it heated up. Each of us made our own favorite pizza then we all shared. I really didn't want to share my "fresh mozzarella, sundried tomato, basil" pizza but some of the others weren't so bad so .....okay.

On the trip back home Sonny drove through a beautiful little resort town called Aci Tressa (pronounced Achee Traytza) where we stopped and walked along the rock beach over to a marina with beautiful boats.

What a wonderful day.

Driving School Apparently didn't work

After getting a feel for the roads and getting a couple of pretty good maps Bob and I set out for Caltegirone today. We drove right to it without getting lost at all. I wanted a special ceramic pot for my African violet and one for a gift. Caltegirone is the "city of ceramics" and is a lovely town. There are walls that are hundreds of years old (and look it) with insets or lovely urns atop made of ceramic. The picture really doesn't do it justice but you might get the idea.

We found a place to park....in front of a car and a motor cycle. Made sure traffic could get through (it was a narrow street) and took off for our day of shopping. After finding a couple of things we liked, we decided to get the car and go on down the street. As we came to the piazza (kind of a wide intersection with shopping) we noticed the police directing traffic away from the street where we were going. We said, "I wonder if there was an accident down there?"

No........not an accident. As we walked down the street some young men sitting at a table said, "Punto? Roma?" (Kind of car---liscense place from Rome, meaning rental). We said yes and they said something with the word problemo in it. Oops. As we came down the road we saw police lights flashing. Double oops.

Well, as explained to us by the police (who didn't do badly speaking English), we had parked in a no parking zone. Gotten a bus caught by not being able to get past our car (or back up the street) and held up traffic in Caltegirone for an hour. We got there just as the tow truck was backing up to take our car. We were so thankful that 1) someone hadn't smashed our car, 2) that we weren't arrested and 3) we got there before they towed the car away, that we gladly paid the 35 euro charge to the tow truck driver---apologized to the policemen again and again and will pay the fine for parking on Monday when the post office is open.

The second picture is just my feeble attempt at "art photography". I'll never be great but this caught my attention. The line and age of the steps, the green of the plants.....

No pictures just some thoughts.......

Bob and I went to driving class today. Required class to get Italian driver's liscenses. Which are required to register our vehicle. (WHICH IS HERE!!) During break times the instructors showed videos made by some of the "guys" on the air carriers out of Sigonella. Very enthusiastic musical videos with a "pump up" theme.

Really cute videos done to familiar rock songs and edited well. Must have taken many, many hours. As I watched, though, I got a lump in my throat thinking how young they all are. They're just babies. (no offense meant to my own children who are close to this age) Why do we send the strong, young men and women. Who ought to be going is us old folks who've lived their lives.

No wonder the United State government spends millions and millions of dollars for bases to make the service men and women feel like they have a little bit of home here in Italy (and other places of course). They deserve it.

San Stefano

Today we went with a group of teachers to San Stefano up on the northern coast of Sicily. Beautiful handpainted pottery. Bob fell in love with the reds. I loved the yellows. So, whenever we get a place I think the Red pottery will be the main focus in our kitchen with a few accents of yellow. I wish we had taken photos of the polished granite-topped tables with handpainted ceramic tops. I don't know how they do it.

(Jessica, did you notice the African violet? I won't be able to bring it home so take good care of the original.)


The drive up, along the coast was really pretty. And not having to drive was great. We took lots of pictures through the window of the bus, but, Tracy, they just don't seem to match your wonderful "bumpy road/car" pictures.

I just had to take a picture of this pottery shop, the lines of the roofs, the display of pottery and the road signs together begged to be captured.