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Published: August 8th 2007
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La Biglietteria
Ticket booth at Santo Stefano Amanda and I leave tomorrow morning for five nights in Rome. We found an apartment on craigslist that will put us in the heart of the city. Rome is my favorite place in all of Europe and I can't wait to return as a seasoned traveler so I can skip whatever mandatory sights/ sites are required of every new tourist and focus on my favorite parts. I'll take hours wandering the Villa Borghese admiring the Bernini sculptures and Caravaggio paintings and I won't for a minute have to worry--like the common daytripper--that I still have to make it to the Colloseum, the Spanish Steps, the Piazza del Popolo, etc, etc, etc. Those places, that history, and the mobs of tourists, stand still, but I cannot. It's not that I try to put myself above all the other tourists (for I still remain one) but this is the opportunity that is afforded by retracing one's footsteps. And should I want to do nothing but watch the people for an entire day, what's to stop me?
But now, I can only count the time. Rain here has been teasing for days. The consistent low rumble of thunder provides promise, but the much-needed
rain won't touch down for at least another hour. Weather moves slow here in the north.
So the servers at travelblog crashed and were down for 5 days and because they didn't back up any of the blogs of the last three months, all was lost! Luckily, I saved most of my entries in a Word file and was able to recover the rest through the Google cache. Advice to fellow bloggers: back it up! And so, an abridged summary of the last week...
Amanda's cousin Riccardo brought us an awesome gift last week: Italian-language Scrabble. In this version, there are way more vowels (nearly every italian word ends in a vowel) and no Js, Ks, Ws, Xs or Ys. I came in dead last (out of three) the first game of which I'm still contesting the scorecard, but had a rousing late-game comeback last night to beat Riccardo by one point.
Sunday, the 31st, we went with a group of Amanda's cousins and friends to
il letto di fume. We drove out of Concordia at 10 am as a train of two cars and picked up two more along the way. 30 kilometers out we entered
into the center of a town, passed a small church on our right and then drove into high cornfields. For the next few winding kilometers we were blinded on nearly all sides by the thick green stalks. We backtracked a kilometer or two but finally found our way down to the river. We set up a tent, some tables and plenty of food and drink. The river coming down off the mountains was ice cold so we quickly buried our beverages and watermelon to chill. For eats we had
panini of prosciutto and salame (a
panino is just a sandwich, not those fancy grilled flatbread things we have in the states) and
tramezzini which is basically a mayonnaise sandwich on white, crustless bread with a couple of flecks of tuna fish or shrimp for texture. Oh, and someone brought two extra tubes of mayonnaise, just in case. Me, I stuck to the
panini, chocolates and watermelon. We spent 10 hours at the river, ate, got sunburned to death, swam, then went home and went to bed, because the next day was...
Festa di Santo Stefano. Santo Stefano is Concordia's patron saint, and every year from August 1 to 6
the town shuts down and sets up for the big carnival celebration. Roads are blocked off, booths are constructed, all the restaurants move out into the streets to serve friends, food and refreshments. Even the scuba diving tent--pining for more visitors (or maybe just thirsty)-- rolled in a few kegs of beer and wine and slapped together some sandwiches by the third night! There's music, rides, games, tractors, vendors selling this and that, and plenty of sweets. People get dressed in their best and pour in from all around for one of the biggest weeks of the year. Think Coney Island meets country fair. I didn't win anything at the ring toss so I tried my arm at the dunk tank but was a miserable failure--20 balls, no dunks. Got on a couple of rides, stuffed myself with gelato and
fretelle and hung out in the primary school yard which is transformed into a large beer garden where everyone congregates until three or four in the morning. Go to bed, work half a day and do it all over again.
And there you have it. I've got some
new pics up on Flickr and
Amanda has more stories about the Festa and the Fume. I will
La scuola
The beer garden in the middle of the primary school yard post a new blog when (if) I return from Roma. And good luck to my people in New York--hope the island stays afloat. It's dry as a bone here.
Nuove Parole: letto di fume: Bed of the river.
Fretelle: a tasty carnival sweet, similar to a funnel cake, only bigger and covered with cinnamon-sugar
sentire: means "to feel" but can be used in a number of ways: to feel (physically, as to touch); to listen; to smell. It's a very versatile word that comes in very handy.
casomai: for sure
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downwithd
Down with Dysentery
postcard
i know i never sent you one, but you were always a thought in mine. i am very upset i have yet to receive one. since rome is my first love i expect one to arrive at 156 west 77, #2a, ny, ny 10024 in the next week.