So Wednesday night was pizza night, the night we’ve all been waiting for. We sat down at the restaurant with the whole Doll family and Alessandro’s wife and two sons and watched as they brought us pizza pie after pizza pie. First plain (my favorite), then one with potato, ham, and bleu cheese on top; next was French fries and hotdog pizza (I’m still deciding if that was a jab at the Americans) and finally black olives. It was incredible, and right as we thought we couldn’t eat any more, they brought us tiramisu. It was amazing, and our first 2+ hour meal.
Fun side note: Tiramisu can be literally translated as “pick me up.”
We’re starting to encounter a few locals as we return from these meals, and I’ve noticed it’s usually the same men standing in the same shop doorways, smoking with their same friends and saying the same things – “hey, HEY!! Ciao! Americani? Americani!! Ciao! Hey, Americani, Ciao! CIAO!!! CIAO AMERICANI! English? Americani! Ciao ciao ciao ciao!!!!!” It’s actually kind of interesting. I think they just like yelling at us, getting attention, something like that. Most of them are very good at letting us have our personal space though, they just lean up again their doorposts, yelling and smirking over their cigarettes. By the way, everybody smokes here. There is not a square foot of the street that doesn’t have at least 2 cigarette butts wedged between the cobblestones, but that is another matter.
On Thursday morning was the market and most of us decided to go since it was our first week here, although we will have plenty of opportunities because the market comes every Thursday and Saturday morning from 7:30 to 1 pm. We went at about 7:45 since we had class at 9 and found most of the people still setting up. There were probably 4 or 5 fresh fruit trucks, 2 or 3 meat trucks, complete with whole salted sides of fish and pork hanging from the awnings, cheese trucks and flower stands and one little old man selling dried fruits and nuts. There were also many trucks of used clothing just piled on to tables with cardboard signs : 3 euro, 5 euro, 2 euro, 9 euro. Used shoes, linens, kitchen goods, purses, etc, etc, etc,. I bought a leather bag and a wallet, many people bought socks and gloves and other warm necessities that we have been dearly missing here. My favorite trucks to walk past were always on the outskirts of the groups, and had mounds and mounds of bras and panties hanging from the awnings. I thought it was hilarious – especially since almost all of them were run by very grumpy looking old men! Except for one truck, which looked almost deserted until I came around the corner and this little, wiry, old Italian woman jumped out from behind the counter and started singing pop songs and dancing. It made my day.
That afternoon, after classes, we learned all about our chores at the monastery. There is a rotation of rooms to be cleaned and each set of roommates does a different room every Thursday. Carly and I were assigned the vestibulo and refectario. Let me just tell you, these stone rooms look a whole lot bigger when you’re carrying a mop. The vestibulo is a room on the end of the first floor that leads to the courtyard, and which we use as a gallery space. Attached to it is the refectario, a long rectangular room that was originally the dining hall for the nuns of San Paolo. The floors are outlined in swirling stone tiles of brown and black, the middles of it a marbled grey and black. Then, when you look up to the end of the room, the whole wall is frescoed with a recreation of the last supper. We learned that it was quite common for this to be the case because then the nuns could eat with the disciples and their Lord – a really neat practice.
That night, we were all lent out in groups of 4 or 5 to various Italian families in the area. They fed us very well and tried to talk to us in Italian as much as possible to help us pick up the language. I went to the home of Lucca and Elicia and their 3 children, (6, 3, 1) who helped lighten the mood and make us all comfortable. We were fed lasagna (J) and red wine for our first course, followed by salad and a mix of peas and chicken. For dessert Elicia had made a chocolate cake, which they served with homemade lemoncello (I don’t know how to spell that). Luckily for us, Elicia is practically fluent in English and was able to help when we stumbled on our Italian verbs. They were very kind, and it was a really helpful experience to be put in a setting where we had to speak the language we came to learn.
Just how old are these Italian men skulking and smoking in doorways? And how was the hotdog and french fry pizza? Not a combo I would have chosen. Were the crusts thin like your Dad described? Love you, choo choo
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