In with the new ...

I'm home. The flight went fine, the weather is nice, the packing is endless, and I miss Bologna.

Here's the new blog; it may not be in your native language, but there will be photos:
distantemma.wordpress.com
Visit it!

Note the box covered in stamps ... No joke!

Goodbye, for now

Tomorrow is the big day, my departure from Bologna.

I feel heartbroken at the idea of going, even though I know it's the right thing, and the new chapter of my life is going to propel me forward in the right direction. I want to move forward - I just wish that I didn't have to leave so many loved ones behind here. Couldn't the Atlantic Ocean be just a little bit smaller?

Over the next few weeks I will post an update here about the next blog, that is, Emma's Avventure Newyorkesi (ehmm, suggerimenti per il titolo sono benvenuti!). 

Thanks to my teeny group of regular readers (aka family members and close friends).

In Italian, there are various ways of saying goodbye - a dopo, which means "see you later", ciao, which is a casual way of parting, the more formal arrivederci, which is literally "until we meet again", and addio, which is a real, serious goodbye. Yet another point in Italian's favor, with such a rich choice of words for every action.

Anyway, it's time for my last dinner in Bologna, at least for now.
A dopo!

Lessons Learned at the End

As I come to the final countdown in Bologna, which is really not so fun at all; every morning the sense of time passing becomes more stressful. I had made myself a mental list of the things I just had to do before leaving - like, I wanted to go to Venice, I wanted to see an exhibit in Rimini, go to various museums, and the list goes on. Hmm. Not much of that stuff been done.

I have been able to say goodbye to my life in Italy in a few small ways, though, that have been really meaningful to me.

I went back to this special place, with some of the people most beloved to me in Italy. We sunned ourselves on the rocks, hiked up to the abandoned town, and ate at the same amazing restaurant.

I had a wonderful belated-birthday surprise-trip-weekend-with-food. The best present ever, and despite an unfortunate bout with a stomach bug (yes! my stomach always manages to act up at the best times) it was just the right gift.

A friend (who is cooking me dinner tomorrow) told me to name my ideal menu, all the dishes I wanted before I left Bologna. There was nothing, really, that I could think of - not because I've already OD'd on everything - full disclosure, because my favorite meatball meal is already planned for this weekend. But this question did help me realize that there was one thing I really, really wanted: a bombolone (basically, a doughnut without the hole) filled with cream. The best, most decadent, unhealthy, delicious breakfast Italy has to offer.

So I got one this morning, and it was amazing. It wasn't a trip to Venice, or a day spent in a museum ... but it might've been better.

The Next Step

As my time in Bologna is coming to a close, it seems that "Adventures in Baloney" won't make much sense anymore as a blog.

I have received various suggestions about what to do about this, and the best, I think, is the idea that I open a blog about my adventures in New York. This time I'll write in Italian. That way I can keep my Italian somewhat healthy (hopefully) and I can also update my Italian friends on the next phase of my life. But then I think, maybe it would be better to start up the new blog anonymously so that I can really write whatever I want.

Is that a bad idea?

I know that this will be an unfortunate change for my few American readers, but maybe Google translator can help you.

The thing is, I'd also like to try a different blog server. I like Splinder, which I think is only in Italian, but I've been warned that it's not as good as it looks. Wordpress might be the best bet. I already have a close friend who uses it and you can see, by clicking on the link, that her blog looks pretty great.

So that's an option.

I do wish that Adventures in Baloney wasn't nearing its end, but I think that sensation might be more related to real life than to my feelings about the blog itself.

(P.S. What do you think of these last-minute changes?)

To-Do List

There are so many things that I absolutely, must, upon pain-of-death do before leaving Bologna. And I'll probably never do most of them, because there are only two more weeks, and it's August and everything is closed, and I'm tired and sad and overwhelmed by moving.

But I did manage to do one important thing. I went to Grom to get a gelato. Grom is a gelateria in the center of Bologna, known for its super-high-quality, Slow Food ingredients. In this case the hype is pretty much worth it, because they make delicious gelato. Grom is also in New York City, and the New York Times recently called it the most expensive ice cream in the United States (!!) - that's really something. All the more reason to enjoy my cheapy cone in Bologna.



For all of you Americans who want to get a really fancy ice cream, of anyone who is visiting Italy, my favorite Grom flavor is "Crema di Grom". It's basically the best version of cookies-and-cream possible: pastry-cream flavored ice cream, grainy, not-too-sweet cornmeal cookies (according to Grom's website, the corn is stone-ground to make the cookies as grainy as possible), and Colombian dark chocolate shavings. So, so good. Especially with homemade whipped cream.

The above photo is really a photo of Crema di Grom, but I didn't take it. Got it here.

Moving

Of course, one of the most stressful parts of my return to the US is the fact that I have to move. I've been in Italy for almost four years, so this means that I have a lot of stuff - from t-shirts to dishes to the records of my Italian bank account - and I have to somehow move it across the ocean. That is, some of it will move across the ocean, and some of it will end up in a trash can. It's a stressful mess and I don't wish it on anyone!

The only positive part of this moving experience is that I'm enjoying getting to know the post office workers; the best way to transfer my stuff is by ship, which is less exorbitantly priced and customs-officer-harassed than the UPS/airplane method. I've collected various boxes from the supermarket (every time I do my food shopping, the cashiers now ask me how my move is going and if I've managed to deal with all my books), filled them, taped them up and wrapped them in packaging paper, and sent them off. My obsessive taping has garnered many compliments from the postal workers (not one, but ALL of them), that "THIS is how a package is prepared"; here we are talking about truly ugly, masking tape covered boxes, but apparently security trumps neatness. My taping, and my equally anxious compilation of customs forms ("23 pairs of socks, 3 photographs, 2 pairs of jeans, etc") has made me a fast friend of the Italian post office.

Yesterday this burgeoning love affair was further promoted by one of the stranger employees, a woman who resembles a forest elf and has the corresponding voice and slightly antisocial air about her. As we settled my payment for the package (about sixty euros), she peered up at me from under her gray bangs and said that she wanted to attach the full tariff in the form of postage stamps (!!) to the package instead of simply printing out the mailing label. This, she informed me, was the most picturesque way to send a package, and August being a slow month, she could take the time to attach each of the 100 necessary stamps in order to render my box a bit more attractive. As her supervisor glared at her, I nodded my assent (what else could I do?) and headed home to pick up the next box and fill out the next set of forms. When I came back 40 minutes later, there she was, still attaching each stamp individually with a glue stick.

This woman's desire to pay attention to the details and make even the most boring items look pretty is pretty much the most Italian characteristic ever. I will miss this country so much.

Familial Ties

The next few weeks are full of goodbye-dinner engagements before my departure for the States, and these evenings tend to be extremely heart-wrenching. The positive side, though, is the realization that the past four years here have allowed me to create friendships for which I am incredibly grateful.

One of these stems from a blog entry I wrote in April, about my beloved teenage students. My friendship with Frieda, a German woman from choir, created the opportunity for those lessons, and her daughter Matilde took part. Over the past few months my boyfriend and I have grown closer to both Frieda, Mati and the rest of the family, which includes Gian (dad) and Lucia (younger daughter). We even spent two weekends together in the hills outside Bologna; Frieda and Gian lent me their country house for my goodbye party.

On Monday, I said goodbye to the Frieda-Gian-Mati-Luci conglomerate - goodbye, that is, til I visit Bologna again. We showed up with a bowl full of presents, including from balloons (which Lucia likes to fill up with water), an indoor frisbee (which Gian started using immediately), and washable markers for glass (which the girls started using on the windows).

Above is their family portrait, by Lucia. Below is our "couple" portrait, by Mati. Even the shoes are perfectly accurate!



Of course it was also necessary to start writing a list of "People We Love Very Much". Notice Emma and Max in pink under the list of relatives. We aren't underlined, which was initially very offensive because all important friends are underlined, but then we were informed that there are too many important grownups to be able to underline them all. That seems fair.



I think the best way to sum up my feelings about this family, and the other people I'm saying goodbye to right now, is that I don't even know how to express how lucky I feel. And how much I hope, I really do, that these relationships manage to survive notwithstanding the upcoming distance. It's the only way to make these dinners bearable.

Too Short

There was no sign of Napoleon ... But I think that I can safely say that Elba is incredible, and not at all a bad place to be exiled to.



There are amazing beaches and lots of greenery, and we have scientific proof that 9 people can share one bathroom without any dire emergencies or problems. Plus, beaches with pebbles are way way more comfortable than sandy beaches, leaving ears and bathing-suit bottoms free of discomfort.



If you add on some great eating, singing, and relaxation, a weekend is barely enough time to enjoy it all ... I want to start all over again!



On a different note, I think that I've gotten better at roasted pepper-peeling over the past few years. I started out pretty shaky but now I might even be ready to peel some peppers unsupervised!

Taking a Ferry to the Seaside

Today I am leaving for a weekend at the beach. This isn't the first time I've been at the seaside this year ...



And it's not even the first time this year I've been on the Tyrrhenian coast of Italy (that is, the coast where Tuscany is, and where Rome is) ...



But it IS the first time I've been to the Island of Elba, which I'm very curious about. I've heard great things, though - especially about the nature and the clean water.



Can't wait!

Makin' Meatballs

Hi, readers, if there are still any left. I apologize for my bad blogging recently - this is probably due to various stresses/distractions present in my life right now, such as:
- boyfriend
- hot weather
- departure from Italy (it's true, it's terribly sad)
- preparation for a pre-med post-bac (studying calculus!)
- trying to move, which in this case means eliminating my belongings as fast as possible, often by throwing them away.

Anyway, I'm sorry. I thought that I might try to get back into your good graces by writing about a meatball-making lesson that I received a few weeks ago. I have wanted to learn how to make them forever, because I've eaten some really delicious ones in Italy and they're basically the perfect picnic, party, and snack food. The lesson was held by the above-mentioned boyfriend, who is shockingly competent in these things. Unfortunately, like most good cooks (my mom included!), his recipe is based mostly on intuition and memory and not many facts.



Basically, meatballs start out in a dough-like form, then they're made into little rounds or ovals, and then they're sauteed or fried. As I understand, the "dough" recipe depends on the cook and his or her preferences. But you can make good meatballs by including ground beef, chopped garlic, chopped basil, an egg, breadcrumbs, and some grated cheese. You have to mix it all up, ideally using your (clean) hands, and then add more dry or wet ingredients until the consistency is more or less like Play-doh.

At this point you can start rolling your dough into meatballs!





At this point you need to cook them. One of my favorite ways to eat them is in tomato sauce with peas, and that's what we did. Or at least, that's what I witnessed. Get a pot, start sauteeing some onions in a mixture of butter and olive oil, and when it's hot, put in the meatballs. Brown them slightly and then add tomato puree and frozen/fresh peas. Add more basil, salt, pepper, wine, or whatever else you like in your tomato sauce. Let it all cook for about a half hour.



Then eat it. The only crucial part of the equation is bread; the other stuff is optional.

Girls, girls, girls

For the past two months or so, I've been teaching English to a group of 3 thirteen-year-old girls, who are in their last year of middle school. One of them is the daughter of a German woman in my choir, which is how I was put into contact with them. We spend an hour together speaking English, talking about whatever we want, and the idea is that they'll get a chance to practice speaking (they learn only grammar in school).

The cast of characters:
Matty, the half-German, half-Italian daughter of my choir-mate. She has grown up bilingual and is extremely gifted with languages, as I frequently tell her mom (her mom just rolls her eyes; I think she's OD'd on teenage girls). She understands everything I say and is often subjected to bizarre rules ("Matty, you have to be silent for 7 seconds every time you want to say something!") so that her two friends get a chance to speak.
Marta, one of her childhood friends. Marta looks like a fairy-tale character: she's almost as tall as me, super skinny, and has wispy blond hair and massive blue eyes that take up almost all of her face. She is sort of fairy-tale-like as a person, too, with lots of independent nature-related interests and spaced-out moments.
Sofi, the third Musketeer. She's more recognizable to me, as far as teenage girls go, because she wears her insecurities more visibly. She recently created a diet for herself that included the following rules: no pizza, lots of fruit (which she hates), take the stairs (this is an established rule despite the fact that her apartment is a walk-up and she takes the stairs anyway) and she has to drink water for 92 seconds at a time. At our last lesson the girls learned the verb "to pee", because Sofi had to use the bathroom 7 times after her water-drinking session.

The wonderful thing about conversation lessons is that you end up learning tons of stuff about your students - including the most unexpected tidbits of info - because your position as a "listener" means that they tend to open up more readily than they normally would. And I've discovered that 13 year olds, at least Italian ones, are totally adorable - they're slightly vain and insecure, but still young enough to want your approval and enjoy the attention of someone a bit older. And they're utterly bizarre and irrational, which makes them hilarious company.

One highlight stemmed from their frequent descriptions of Omar, a 16 year old high schooler whom they met through mutual friends. Among his shining qualities: he's Moroccan, he plays the guitar, he plays soccer, he's very sweet when they all chat online. And after a few weeks of their giggly descriptions, the girls actually dragged him to Matty's house one afternoon so that I could meet him before their lesson! I have to admit, for a 16 year old he was extremely polite and very handsome. Perhaps most endearingly, though, when it turned out that he actually had a crush on Matty, she became embarrassed and terrified and prayed for it to pass. Many of these boy conversations take place in front of unsuspecting, non-English-speaking parents, which is something that the girls seem to relish.

But it's not all boy talk. We also discuss their ballet competitions, their siblings, and the differences between Italian and American breakfasts. They've given me a little window into Italian life that otherwise I'd never have been able to experience; despite the many cultural and linguistic differences, they come from families not too different from mine (including violin lessons, younger sisters and organic groceries), and this familiarity makes the lessons interesting and poignant for me as well.

Tomorrow we'll be talking about Matty's recent breakup, and the girls' classical dance competition, along with some classmate of theirs who predicts the exact dates in which their high school friends' will be "doing it". I'll keep you posted...

My Trial

I think I've probably written here, in the past, about my feeling that living in Italy sometimes echoes life in a Kafka novel. Actually, it's probably a good thing that I've read The Trial, because it lets me pretend that certain frustrations are taking place in a fictional land, and it is all engineered to make me smile and think about literature. This helps.

The following blog entry is pretty long, but I tried to add as much detail as possible so that I could accurately depict a recent experience. Sorry - if you fall asleep halfway through, I understand!

Italy has never seemed more like a vortex of bureaucracy than it did this morning, when I had to complete a task for one of my various bosses. I have been working recently as an assistant to a woman in my choir who has a business as a naturopath/healer/tour guide/B&B owner. She wanted to insert the name of her business in the city's web directory, which for linguistic purposes we'll call "Bologna Web". (It actually has a different, unpronounceable name.)

To be added to Bologna Web, we were informed that first we had to go to the city's PR office and request an application at the front desk. I did this, and was promptly given an application, which I brought back to my boss. She filled it out and sent me back to the PR office. This is when Kafka stepped in.

I returned to the original front desk, ready to hand in the application. The man there told me that I had to give it to the woman who takes applications for Bologna Web, at a different desk in the back of the room (the PR office, which is open to the public, is a large room with various stations that give tourist info, internet cards, etc). He waved me along. I went to the desk labeled Bologna Web, and the woman there looked blankly at the application. She had no idea what it was. I went back to the original desk. The man there, now oddly furious with me, told me that I hadn't listened to his directions and I needed to go to a different desk that had nothing to do with Bologna Web, but with Free Information.

Feeling slightly discouraged, I went to the Free Information desk and handed the application to the woman there. She flipped through it and immediately informed me that it was missing the Certificate of Association. Indeed, on a page of the application, it was indicated that my boss was supposed to staple the Certificate to her application. So I took back the papers and went to the office, where my boss printed out the the Certificate and we stapled it on.

The next day, I brought the Certificate and application to the Free Information desk. It was accepted and I was given an official receipt with the time and date.

A few weeks passed. Yesterday I received a phone call informing me that the application was being processed, but the company Statute was missing. "But why was it accepted if we need to submit the Statute?" I asked. "When I handed in my application, the woman at the desk told me that all the documents were complete!"
The voice on the phone was stern. "It's not her job to tell you what's missing, it's your job to follow the instructions."
Odd, considering that the woman had been perfectly happy to tell me that the Certificate was missing. But, okay. What now? I was told to go directly to the office of Free Information on the building's second floor, where I could hand in the Statute without re-submitting an application.

This morning I set off in the rain, Statute in hand. I arrived at the city offices and immediately started to worry. The PR office is easy to find, as it opens onto Bologna's main piazza. But the Free Information office on the second floor proved to be quite impossible to find: the city offices are located in a huge building comprised of many wings (including the police department). Each wing has its own entrance and its own second floor, and I did not see the words "Free Information" on any of the various directories.

I went to the main stairs, which have already had a starring role on this blog, as they're connected to the area where city marriages take place. I've photographed various just-married couples as they joyfully descend the steps. Today, though, the stairs were wet and empty. At the top, everything was closed. A door had a "Secretary" sign on it, but peering in, I saw nobody. I headed back down. Nearby, I found the City Archives Office, and asked the two women at the desk if they could help me. Unfortunately, they'd never heard of the Free Information office.
"But you could go to the PR office," one suggested.
"I was told that I could skip that, to hand in the Statute and enter Bologna Web," I answered.
"Well, Bologna Web is located in the PR office," she replied. "Try going back there. Otherwise we just don't know what to tell you."
I went back to the PR office, and headed directly to the Free Information desk.

The woman there, whom I recognized, stared at me blankly. I explained that I had recently applied to be added to Bologna Web, and I needed to hand in a Statute.
"That's impossible," she said. "I don't take Bologna Web applications."
I had a moment of confusion. "Well, I applied with you."
"If you applied with me, you didn't apply to Bologna Web."
"Ah." I'm still confused. "But can you tell me where to hand in the Statute?"
She exchanged a look with her coworker, as if to say, 'What a moron this girl is!'. "Go up the stairs and to the Secretary's office. But don't say a word about Bologna Web - just say that you want to hand in your Statute!"

Now unsure as to what I had applied for, I went back up the marriage-stairs and pushed open the door to the Secretary's office. The long hallway was empty and silent except for the hum of the Xerox machine. However, I was determined to get rid of that damn Statute no matter what. I walked through the main corridor and looked into a few offices. They were all empty. I heard voices from afar, but saw nobody, and there were no signs of life (or even papers on desks).

Luckily, further down the hall, an open door revealed an extremely young-looking girl at a computer. I knocked.
"I am trying to add a Statute to an application here. Can I give it to you?"
Amazingly, I was in the right place. The girl (who seriously appeared to be 18) looked through a mountain of papers and found my old application. She flipped through it.
"Your Statute isn't here," she said.
"No." I showed her that I was holding it in my hand.
"But on the phone, you told me that you'd handed it in."
This was patently untrue. I told her that I hadn't said that; I'd said that I hadn't known that the Statute was even necessary.
"You're right!" she said, laughing. "You did say that. Sorry." [This was probably the only sensible interaction I had in the entire place. Thank you, nameless child.]
She took the Statute and told me that she'll call me if we're missing something else.
Please, please, let that application be complete.

The Importance of Having Friends

Conversation overheard between two friends.

Friend 1: "My coworker told me today that he sleeps with two guns under his bed."

Friend 2: "Whoa. Really?"

Friend 1: "Yeah. He's a really nice guy, though. I didn't really expect him to tell me this thing about sleeping with guns."

Friend 2: "Hmm. If he sleeps with guns maybe he's not so nice all the time."

Friend 1: "He's just a regular, normal guy. Well, it's true, he told me that he had to come to Italy because he killed a guy in Bangladesh."

Friend 2: "Ah."

Friend 1: "But yeah, like I said, he's a really peaceful normal guy."

Customer Service

My favorite pair of boots recently developed a hole in the toe area, where the leather connects to the sole. Considering that the rest of the boot(s) is in great condition, and the leather is good as new, I located a shoe repair shop about 10 minutes from my apartment and went there today on the way to a babysitting job, boots in hand. The sign says something like this: "Shoes and Boots repaired instantaneously: we repair leather canvas all materials blah blah". I felt confident as I entered and approached the desk, where the cobbler (is this term still in use?) was surrounded by piles of mismatched shoes. The air smelled like chemicals.

Me (holding out my boots): Would it be possible to repair these?"
Cobbler (not moving): No. Can't do a thing for them.
Me: In what sense, you can't do a thing for them?
Cobbler (visibly irritated): In the sense that I can't do a thing for them.
Me (gesturing towards the sole of the boot in question): What about replacing this part here?
Cobbler: It doesn't make sense to replace that part. It would be better to just throw them away.
Me: Throw them away?
Cobbler: It's not convenient for you to repair them. It makes more sense to throw them out and buy another pair.
(At this point he's returned to his work and is no longer acknowledging my presence.)
Me (bewildered): Okay. Bye.
Cobbler: (silence)

Can someone please explain to me WHY this always happens in Italy? I would really, really be happy to pay to repair my boots. Willing cobblers, please apply here!

New Tenants

After practically turning into a hotel during the summer, my apartment experienced a low period throughout the fall and early winter. No visitors! However, this sad state was recently turned around upon the arrival of Doreen and May, who stayed with me for about a week in mid-January.



They look really tourist-y and adorable in the above photo. But does your impression of them change if I add that they were marveling at the Fountain of Neptune in Piazza Maggiore, especially the fact that the "fountain" function is represented by water squirting out of mermaids' breasts? (Would a US city ever allow this? In the name of art, maybe.)

While Doreen is a beloved old friend from NYU - literally, from the first day - I had never had the chance to get to know May, and this was a great opportunity. Considering that Do and I haven't had the chance to spend much time together since I moved to Bologna, it was really as if I was exploring new friendships with both girls. And they were sooooooo good to me! See below:

Pancakes (somewhat like crepes) for breakfast with honey, yogurt, apples, bananas and nutella.


Polenta, tuna, baked tomatoes, salad with pears, salmon spread.


This is only a small example of their culinary generosity. Not to mention their cleaning skills. And the fact that Doreen gave us an amazing private yoga lesson. But the real best part was just hanging out with these two terrific women and enjoying a full, warm, sweet-smelling apartment.

Love! (And they have the cutest haircuts.)


I am trying to convince them to come back. I wish the Atlantic were smaller.

New Friends

It's still too strange and sad for me to think about writing a memorial post for our beloved, deceased cat Dinkie. However, it feels much more cheerful to introduce our new kitties to Blogger. These two new entries to the Gilmore-Valenze household probably weigh a collective 10 pounds, but they're already wreaking havoc. Thankfully; we need them!

This is Lulu, who's a female between one and two years old.


And the oddly-named Carrot - who knows why the shelter gave him this name - who is a male around 7 months old. His name is subject to change. (Suggestions?)


HOW CUTE ARE THEY???????? I wish I could import them to Bologna - or visit them in Cambridge. My apartment really, really, really needs a cat.

High Line Hijinks

This is a post that I've wanted to put up here forever and I kept putting it off because it required a search through old photos. Done, finally! I am becoming much more proactive in 2010.



This year I visited the new and amazing High Line, a park in New York City that has been created out of an old stretch of railway line. The line was above-ground on the west side of the city, and it was closed for years. Now it's been refurbished and replanted and there are wild plants, amazing wooden benches for sunbathing, art installations - basically it's the best park ever.



To all Glee fans, PLEASE NOTE THE BILLBOARD! How could I not have taken note of this earlier? I would've started watching much sooner.



I learned on an educational Jet Blue flight (TV watching can teach you things!) that the plants were specifically chosen because they can grow wild there. And many of the railway pieces were added to help with authenticity.



And the traffic observation deck (above) is genius.

One of the reasons I was so excited about this park is that I visited the High Line before it was re-done, while I was still a student. In the company of two creative, adventurous friends, I snuck through a fence and onto the tracks. At that time everything was gray and deserted, and probably pretty hazardous. But it was totally enchanting. We were above some of the city's most busy streets, walking over traffic and pedestrians and stores, peering into apartment windows. We were exposed, but felt totally hidden.


(I took this photo on 1600 ISO film, which is why it's so grainy. Ah, the days of real film!)

It's wonderful to see the new park but I have to admit that there was a tinge of something bittersweet. I'm so glad that I saw it "before" - I think that the experience really enabled me to appreciate the current "after". The place in the photo above doesn't exist anymore - but now it can be appreciated by everyone. I guess I'm just barely unselfish enough to be happy about that, and still pleased that I got to be an explorer there, once upon a time.

(Sorry for the cheesy blog title. Couldn't resist.)