Start Hibernation

It's chilly here. And not much is going on here, but I will sally forth with this new blog entry, as I don't want to leave my few-but-faithful readers out in the cold. So to speak.



The past few weeks have been totalllyyyy consumed by my attempts to navigate the bureaucracy that is the Italian immigration system. It looks like I'm going to be spending some more time here, so it's the season to re-start the process, which is a nightmare. My activities have taken place in three different spots:
The Questura, which is the police headquarters (Italy has a bunch of different types of police, but these are the ones who control immigration). This place is miserable. I'd call it worse names but I'm worried that some Questura spy will find this and refuse to let me stay in Italy, so I'm just going to say that this is a decidedly not-fun place. The Questura can take someone like me - basically smothered in privilege thanks to race and nationality - and make me feel confused, overwhelmed, disrespected, and anxious. Entering the building is like getting a zoomed-in view of real desperation - I may not feel it, but it's written all over the faces of everyone else in there, most of whom are in Italy because of dire economic or political circumstances.
Then there's the Prefettura (Prefecture), which is some kind of official governing body. They should technically have the expertise to answer lots of questions about immigration, and have all sorts of labyrinth-like hallways in which you can have the privilege of a 4 or 5 hour wait before even seeing an official. You go to the Prefettura if you need to figure out what you have to do at the Questura. They used to be connected (like, in the same building) but about a month ago the Questura was moved to a godforsaken spot, basically on an isolated dirt pathway, outside the city. Luckily for us, however, the Prefettura hasn't moved an inch.
The CGIL, or Italian General Confederation of Labor. This is one of Italy's three major unions - it's the Communist one. For various reasons, they have the most detailed, efficient immigrant support system (including free Italian classes). There is an extremely chaotic office that manages work queries for immigrants, including legal stuff, and this is about to become my new home: I have been advised to visit every day until the first week in December, because work quotas will be released without warning, and it's a first-come, first-serve situation. They already know me. The cool thing about this office, which makes me a little homesick, is the fact that the staff members come from all over the world - as they should, because they need to communicate with the workers who come through the door. It's one of the rare places here that employs a diverse staff - people from North Africa, Ethiopia, Eritrea, the Middle East, Asia, South America, Eastern Europe. Yay! (I may not be cheering for them once they start despising me for my constant presence.)



Aside from all of that stuff, which is really stressful, it's nice to know that I want to be here for a little while longer. Or a long while longer? Well, who knows. But when it came to make this decision, about a month ago, it dawned on me that I've been here for a year. And despite all the tough parts, it's been worth it - I really do feel as if I've created a life here, and I'm pretty proud of that. I'm not ready to give it up yet, either! So I'll be back at CGIL tomorrow. And the day after.



If you've actually made it through all of that nonsense, here's an anecdote from my day today. It's become a regular joke at work that I should just marry one of my coworkers to end all of this immigration-related stress. Of course, the big question is WHICH ONE I'd marry. Amid all this joking, Massimo (one of my favorites - hi, Massimo!) decided to give me a lesson about love and relationships. It's called, "La Legge del Cornuto Contento" - the law of the happy betrayed person. It is as follows: Everyone betrays sooner or later, regardless of any discussion of true love or whatnot. The secret is to make sure that your boyfriend/girlfriend/spouse never finds out - making him/her BETRAYED, yet HAPPY, at least in ignorance. And the final secret: deny, deny, deny, even if the evidence is in full view.
Keep in mind that this was related to me at a lunch table full of coworkers, male and female, ranging from about 25 to 60 years old - and everybody agreed. (Except the American, of course, Puritan Emma: "I don't know if it's always that way." Massimo: "It doesn't matter what you know or don't know. Your thoughts are irrelevant in this case. It's a law, and it's always true.")

Oh well. The cultural learning curve is long.

Audrey, Liza, Elizabeth, and more . . .

Another blog entry about a house party at Via Avesella . . .

The date for our much-anticipated Halloween party rolled around, and we were ready. This time around, Francesca (my new-ish roommate) and I decided that it was time to mutiny: we were going to invite whomever we wanted. (At our past party, Massimo assigned us a guest quota of 6 people.) So, we got all dressed up, invited our guests, and waited. As you can see above, Massimo bided his time by pretending to be a bat, or something.

One of the first to arrive was Elisa, the girlfriend of Stefano, who runs our favorite gelateria (now closed for the winter). She wasn't in costume, but Massimo called her Elizabeth (as in, the queen) for the entire night because of her hair. Her hair was pretty amazing - we'd never seen it before, because at work she always had it tied up and covered by a cap. Here you can see Massimo bowing to her.



I dressed up as Audrey Hepburn for the second time, which was sort of a lazy thing to do. But it was relatively easy to assemble, and Halloween is a pretty new holiday here, so I was happy to find something that I could pull off. I found out that cigarette holders are sold in regular tobacco stores all over the city. I wonder who's using them?

Here I am in full regalia.



My friend Irene usually looks taller than that, I think.

And here's my roommate Francesca, who was a prom-acid-witch of some sort, and her friend Itala, a cat. Itala is Peruvian and is currently an underwear designer in Bologna (she studied fashion in Milan). As you can imagine, this makes every man within 100 miles start drooling.



And below is my friend Natasha, who is blessed with almost the EXACT same genetic makeup as Rosa and me. She came as Liza Minelli. And my coworker Tiziano came as some kind of character from a Fellini film. I don't really know what he was.



By the time everyone had had a few glasses of wine, we all got to sing (this always seems to happen at my house). Chris, a Johns Hopkins student who owns the guitar in question, knew a full repertoire of grunge songs from the 1990s (incidentally, he came to the party dressed in a brown sweater with a leopard-print towel draped over his shoulders - we never really figured out what his costume was - but as you can see in this photo, the towel migrated around the party, spending most of its time with Massimo). When he was finished, we got started on Italian songs. We all sang all the songs, regardless of the words.



The party was a grand success until about 3 am, when Massimo finally took out a wet mop and started using it to shoo guests out of the house. He literally pushed peoples' feet with the mop. Then he got down on his knees and scraped stains off the walls with a teaspoon. (He's certifiably insane, I think.)



In other news, my choir had an amazing interactive concert last weekend, I went to a salsa club and drank an amazing mojito (with practically an entire mint plant inside it) while dancing to music that made me homesick, it snowed yesterday morning in Bologna, and my work life has become rather chaotic. Due to Italian drama and economic circumstances, it looks like the entire company is going to be restructured. Over the past three weeks I've lost my two support systems: Andrea and Letizia. (Andrea can be seen peeing below, in another blog entry. Letizia handled my visa and is a font of feminist advice.) I miss them.

I will try to ensure that my next blog entry is about something other than parties.