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Published: June 13th 2009
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Final Farewell at Alpina
After the final was over, I offered to treat my students to dolci at Aplina. A few of them took me up on the offer. Here I am with Courtney, a fellow Michigander *and* Boilermaker! I can’t believe the summer is over. My students gave their final presentations this morning. And then they packed up their suitcases and got on busses headed for the train station. It really is sad that it is coming to an end so soon. Campus feels so strange without them here. And with them leaving, it is starting to sink in that I’ll be leaving soon also. Fortunately, Ryan will be here in a couple days and we’ll have some more time in Italy before we really have to leave.
I figured that today was as good a day as any to pack up the suitcase I want to ship home. Ryan and I plan to travel light, so I need to get some of this stuff off my hands. Anything that I felt that I did not absolutely need for the next two weeks I crammed in the big suitcase. I even sent my CIMBA sweatshirt back. It’s just too bulky to take with me. Besides, I can buy more sweatshirts along the way if I end up needing one.
I figured that while I was at it, I might as well go to Mailboxes Etc in Bassano
Mailboxes Etc
Yes, this is a reciept for 240. Talk about putting a dent in a girl's wallet. to mail it. That way I’d have all of Saturday to myself. Well, it’s a good thing I went today. Mailboxes Etc is closed on Saturdays. I would’ve been stuck carrying around an 18 kg suitcase and a big “thing” that was supposed to be shipped to my mom.
This part of the trip was by far the most stressful encounter I’ve had so far. Getting to Bassano was easy. Finding parking near Mailboxes Etc was a nightmare. All I could think about was my €400 deductible if/when my car got crunched by the nutty Bassano drivers. I was at a yield sign trying to merge with two lanes of traffic. It seems relatively straightforward. But not the case when the two lanes contain city busses, cars, mopeds, motorcycles, bicycles, and an old man on a Rascal motorized wheelchair (I kid you not)—and all of them are changing lanes willy-nilly. I think the trick is to just step on it and (1) hope that people brake for you; and (2) if they don’t brake, accept the fact that a dented car is a way of life in Italy.
Twenty minutes after arriving at Mailboxes Etc, I found a parking spot in the parking lot across the street. I’m just saying that you have to see the way the streets and roundabouts and construction barriers are laid out to understand that it really was a difficult feat. I paid for 30 minutes of parking and dragged my bag into the store. There, I was greeted with the nightmare which was about to become the rest of my afternoon.
In a nutshell, I had two things to send: (1) a suitcase to Ryan’s house (because Lory will be there to pick it up and bring it into the house); and (2) a package to my mother. The man handed me a shipping form to fill out. So I started filling out the form for my mom’s package. Then he handed me another “invoice” to fill out for my suitcase. But all the forms were in Italian and I didn’t know what information they were requesting.
Just then, the door swung open and Tim and Julie walked in. My grandma Catherine would have said “it was a miracle.” She would’ve been right. Julie told me that I needed to list the contents of my suitcase (“used personal clothes, used personal books”) and provide a monetary value (“€0. No commercial value”). So that’s what I did. I handed in the form and got yelled at. I was given another form and told (in Italian… Julie translated) that I needed to itemize the contents of my suitcase. So I estimated: 1 used pair of jeans, 7 used shirts, 2 used pairs of shoes… And then I wrote “no commercial value” in the value column. Again, I got in trouble. I was confused because I didn’t want to insure the box for the value of my used clothes. And I certainly don’t want to pay taxes on my belongings OR send up any red flags even though all that’s in there is old clothes and some teaching materials.
In the meantime, I tried to ask for another set of forms so I could fill out an invoice for my mom’s thing and a shipping slip for my suitcase. This really set the guy off. (He was, by the way, fluent in English.) He kept trying to tell me that I had done something wrong or that I was mistaken as to where the boxes were going. But I was telling him that the one box was going to the address on the shipping slip (and needed an invoice filled out) and that the suitcase was going to a different address (and needed a shipping slip filled out). I stuck my ground and he eventually believed me. In a huff, he gave me two more forms and I started filling them out.
By this time, he had calmed down a bit and decided that he wanted to help me fill out the form. We got the paperwork straightened out and then he measured and weighed the packages. Let’s just say that if I come again next year, I’m going to pack for the whole month in one small roller bag. My total bill for the two items was €240. Egads.
I chatted with Tim and Julie for a bit more and then we headed our separate ways. I was relieved to get out of Bassano. I treated myself to a gelato fragole in Crespano and, later, dinner at the Pizzeria down the street from me. My entrée for the night: a big salad.
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