Driving in Italy, Part Due: Italian driving directions, American style

Driving in Italy, as I have mentioned, is a bit of an adventure.  Between the roads themselves, oft potted, narrow, and winding, and the drivers on said roads, oft speeding, honking, or driving the wrong direction in your lane, you have to keep your wits about you and be prepared.  I credit Naples for a 400% increase in my reaction time and a 75 degree increase in my peripheral vision skills.  It's just survival, people.

Getting around can be a challenge.  Roads often have multiple names, and addressing is haphazard at best, more often simply misleading.

Now, I am no Neophyte.  I can read a map.  I can read a map North up. (No spinning the map in the direction I am driving- you know who you are)  I studied Cartography in college and cut my teeth in Corporate-land at a company that makes digital maps. (Shout out to you guys at NT!)  I even have a fabulous full color GPS with European maps standing prominently on my dashboard.  Yet, I never get where I am going without at least two turnarounds, one phone call, one wild gesturing session with a Neopolitan passerby, and a few tears.

Here is an example of a typical driving session to somebody's house: (Actual information has been modified to protect the innocent.  Local peeps will note that if you follow these directions, you are likely to end up in the Bay of Naples about halfway to Ischia.)

Via Facebook:  "I live at 45 vecchia vigna.  The GPS coordinates are N40. 79414 E14.06281 See you there.  Jane"

So I plug the address into the GPS.  Nope.  Doesn't appear to exist.  OK, I plug the GPS coordinates in, and off we go.

30 minutes elapse.

GPS:  (With a grand flourish)  "YOU HAVE ARRIVED AT YOUR DESTINATION!!!"

I look around.  There are sheep.

I pause, regroup, and call over the shepherd.  He is Albanian.  He doesn't speak English OR Italian.  But he does speak "flailing hands".  He indicates that I am nowhere near where I need to be.

I pause, regroup, cry a little, and call Jane.

Jane: "OK, So  get back on the Autostrada going towards the blue bridge.  Get off at the exit by the castle.  When you get to the smoky tunnel,  (the tunnel with exhaust fans...yet they don't work) veer to the left.  No, not the far left, the one that is just sort of to the left.  OK.  Now you will come to the circle of death. (A roundabout with an enormous number of options, and, a really nice rotisserie chicken place known to the US locals conveniently as **Circle of Death Chicken**  I am sure it has a real name, but who cares.  We all know where we are talking about)  Take the third exit.  You will drive for a couple of miles.  When you see Touchdown Jesus (A Jesus statue with arms upraised) you know you are going the right way.  If you get to the bumpy tunnel (a wildly curvy tunnel that the Italians put concrete/asphalt bumps in to slow traffic down and reduce the fatalities from blind curve passes IN the tunnel) you have gone too far.  At the top of the hill, turn left.  It's a hairpin, and one lane, so be sure to honk before you go into the turn.  If you meet someone coming the other way, you will need to back down to the bottom (about a half mile) and pull into the little driveway to wait and let them by.  After the turn you will see a green gate.  The next house on the right hand side is pink.  Go down that driveway to the end.  Honk and I will open the gate for you.  See you soon!"

I have never had a set of directions from anyone that is any simpler that this.   Really.

I heart you Italy. :)

I've mentioned it before...you just can't feel ambivalent about Italy.  Sometimes it's love I feel, sometimes hate...it's a passionate kind of place.
Today, with the red poppies blooming, the breeze blowing and the clear view of the Bay of Naples, I was reminded of some of the things I love about living here.
Let's get a couple of the obvious ones out of the way to start.

The Food:
I have been surprised to discover that not everyone loves Neopolitan cuisine.  Me, I am in the "love it" column.  Fresh mozzarella and ricotta cheese, cured meats, and *sigh* the pizza. It's heaven to me.  They may have to roll me out of here when I go.

The Wine:
They all make it.  It's called "young" because some guy fermented it in his cellar just last week.  It is slightly carbonated and oh-so-delicious.  And if you don't "know a guy" (like everyone does here), then you can buy the stuff that your grocer made in HIS basement for, like, a Euro ($1.25) a bottle.  Va bene.

The Coffee:
They like it strong and sweet and man is it good.

The History:
It's everywhere.  I mean, the Acropolis of Cuma and Sybill's Cavern (still standing ruins from a city settled by the Greeks in 740 BC) can be seen from our balcony.

The Access:
The Amalfi Coast: 1 Hour by car
The Island of Capri:  1 Hour by ferry
Rome: 1 Hour and 8 minutes by high-speed train
My favorite pizza spot for a 4-cheese: 1 minute by car, and they'll deliver.  Really.

And then there are some of the less-obvious things to love....

Small-town living:
Yeah, the Naples metropoltan area is over 3 million people.  But we live in a community.  We shop in local markets and stores.  They know us here. (Probably simply as the crazy Americanos, but that isn't the point)  They greet us, they appreciate that we patronize their stores, they watch out for us, and they fill our kids with candy.

Fashion risk-taking:
It doesn't always work, trust me.  Despite what you hear on the news, not all Italians have perfect bodies.  But they don't care.  I applaud their efforts.  Lavender pencil-leg pants on the men, thigh high stilleto heels on the women (for work at the grocery, no less), scarves, hats, it's just plain fun to watch.

Family-run stores:
Most every store is named after the person or family that owns it.  Pescheria da Nicola e Nunzio (Nicole and Nunzio's Fish Shop), Aldo's Pizza, Ambulatoria da Maria (Maria's Veterinary Hospital)...all on our main street.  Even if you don't know them, you feel like you do.

The Produce:  Gorgeous fat english peas- $1E/Kg.  I'm sorry.  That is over 2 pounds of peas for $1.25.  I pay $6.00 a pound at the farmers market in the shoulder seasons.  1E/kg for ripe tomatoes?  Really?  I bring them home and rot them sometimes because I simply get out of hand at the market.

The Truckers:  I know, kind of random.  But they put their NAMES on little plastic nameplates on the dashboards of their 18-wheelers so as you drive by them, you could shout out, "Hey Alessio, good to see you!   How's it going Ciro?  Alessandro, how's the drive today?"....if you wanted.

And most of all...

The generosity of spirit:  Out from behind the wheel of their automobiles, I have found the Italian people to be incredibly generous in most every way.  We have been invited to share meals and met the entire families of people who speak nary a word of English.  I get doors held open, bags carried, and  items graciously returned to the shelves by perfect strangers when my toddlers go shopping with me and leave complete tornadoes in their wake.  My butchered Italian is nearly ALWAYS received with patience and enthusiasm.

These kinds of things I don't take for granted, and would not even expect back home in the states.  For that Italy, I heart you. :)


 

Open letter to the ants:

Ok, I give.  I have two little crumb-crunchers, plus a husband who doesn't seem to know we have a trash can, so there are always graham cracker and goldfish crumbs on the floor and half empty juice boxes and gatorade on the coffee tables.  It cannot be fixed!  Believe me, I've tried!   And, I know, sue me-- I don't do the dishes EVERY SINGLE NIGHT before I go to bed, so there are sometimes dirty dishes in the sink in the morning.  But really?  EVERYWHERE?  Why in empty reusable grocery bags?  Why inside my kitchen cabinets with the dishes?  Why in the coat closet?  Why under the stinky laundry in the basement? And where, exactly, are you coming from?  I know that the house isn't exactly "sealed", or anything, but you don't leave an obvious trail where you are entering-- it's just open the desk drawer in the office and "Whoa!!- ANTS!"  I don't mean to seem all ugly-American on you or anything, but you have to go.  I haven't actually yet recovered from "children endlessly vomiting" season here in Italy, so I am simply unprepared to enter "Endless ant marches through the dining room" season.  So, go.  Your cooperation is appreciated in advance.  Arrivederci.

Love it or hate it...it's life in Italy.

People who talk to me who are living in the states constantly ask me the same question.  So, you are living in Italy.  Do you just LOVE it?!?


Well, there ARE things I love.  The food, for example.  The access to amazing historical, architectural, and artistic treasures.  I love that too.  And the crazy.  I have really come to love the crazy.
But don't get me wrong.  Living overseas has its' share of complications, frustrations and challenges.  About every fourth day I have my "I hate Italy" day of the week-- where I curse and stamp my feet and cry at the drop of a hat over some tiny little inconvenience which has served to catalyze the recollection of the eight million "tiny little inconveniences" that I had already suffered in the three days prior.  And I have a mini-meltdown.

Here is a tiny sample.

The Parco.  We live in a Parco.  This is what the Italians call a gated subdivision.  Parcos are very common in Naples-- there is a lot of petty crime, and people like to take precautions.  We have fabulous gate guards, Pasquale and Antonio, who let us in and out of the Parco with a smile and who keep an eye out for gypsies and ne'er do wells that might interfere with our bliss. When Pasquale and Antonio get time off on Sundays, however, there is a big automatic steel gate that allows access to the Parco.  It is operated by a remote that we carry on our keychain.  Said remote goes on the fritz (as does EVERY electronic, battery powered, or internet enabled thing in Italy, it seems) a lot.  Access to Parco, denied.

Garden Gates.  We live in a gated yard in a gated Parco.  As I said, there is a lot of petty crime, and people like to take precautions.  The gate to the yard MOSTLY works.  Sometimes it won't open.  Sometimes it won't close.  It can be operated from inside the house with a buzzer style remote opener, or by key. Inevitably it decides to remain stubbornly locked when I am carrying a thirty pound toddler, a purse, two sweatshirts, a diaper bag, a sippy cup, a bag of goldfish crackers, my cellphone, and a bag of fresh vegetables. 

House Keys.  The keys used to open your front door in Italy are ENORMOUS.  The first time I saw our house key I immediately started singing the Addams Family theme song in my head.  They look like old castle skeleton keys and don't fit in ANY pocket in ANY piece of clothing you own.  You end up getting a key ring the size of a dish plate to manage your Parco gate key, garden gate key, and house key.  And then you spend most of your day trying to figure out how to jam this giant key monstrosity in your purse and the other part of the day fishing it back out when it jams in the zippered pocket.

Maneuvering your car.  Every Italian, or at least every Italian I know, drives a glorified rollerskate.  There is a reason for such.  First, the gas prices are REdonculous.  You cannot afford to fill the tank on a good ole american automobile and still eat.  Second, the roads are a terrifying tangle of foliage overgrown, 270 degree turns onto one-way wide but two lane driving, wrought iron gate half-open, and trash filled madness.  There is no room to place a good ole american automobile.  Finally,  all the openings into parking garages seem to have been spec'd for a Fiat.  The first time I drove into my garage I hit the bumper on my Pathfinder going in AND going out.  Now I just park outside.

Staying Warm.  Electricity in Italy is the most expensive in all of Europe.  And the houses have high ceilings and marble floors.  So it takes a lot of heating to heat up the houses.  So, in order to avoid hundreds and hundreds of dollars of heating every month, you have the heat follow you around the house.  Each room in our house has a little heating unit on the wall.  Enter the room, turn on the heat.  Huddle in front of it.  Leave the room, turn off the heat.  Move to next room.  Repeat sequence. 

Cooking.  Darned Kings English.  Fahrenheit--->Celcius and Fluid ounces--->milliliters for EVERY SINGLE RECIPE.  Fortunately "there's an app for that."

Hard water.  Naples itself has a water system that has some issues, one of which is lots and lots and lots of minerals.  You have to use special shampoos to keep your hair and skin from going to heck and need to add vinegar and salt to the dishwasher to get the dishes clean. 

 The Washer and Dryer.  I am convinced that some fiendish woman-hater came up with these contraptions to keep moms downstairs in the basement full time.  The washers are teeny-tiny.  Like 4 shirts, a dish towel, and a pair of socks tiny.  And the wash cycles are looooooooong.  And you have to empty the dryer of the condensed water after every cycle, or sometimes midcycle.  And clean some dirt gathering contraption that fills up with I-don't-know-what and makes the dryer fail to operate every 17th cycle.  I can understand why many Italians resort to the soap it up in the bathtub and hang it out to dry on a line method.  With two dirt-seeking stinky boys-- laundry is 24x7x365 torture.

Italians don't seem to believe in garbage disposals.  I don't know why, but something about scraping day-old peanut butter from the drain strainer gives me the dry heaves.

Taking out the trash.  It actually MEANS that here, because nobody comes to get your trash in a trash truck here.  To get rid of your trash, you put it in a black garbage bag, load it into the back of your car, and drive to the nearest dumpster.  Mind you, this needs to be done between 7pm and 8am in order to avoid a "trash fine".   Hunh, you say?  Yeah.  And I have one in diapers.  It's icky.

Recycling.  The good news:  There IS recycling!  The bad news:  The recycling bins are big dome shaped containers that have an opening about the circumference of a 2-liter bottle for inserting your recycling, which you must insert...one...piece..at.......a.....time. (Between 7pm and 8am, OK?)

In short, next time you feel overwhelmed by life's little household curveballs, think of how many more you could suffer through   enjoy if you only lived overseas! 

:)

Driving in Italy: Part one of many. :)

One of my "Naples Kisses" on my Pathy.  One on each side already!

Learning to drive like a Neopolitan took me much less time than I expected.  Turns out, if you pretend that you are the ONLY person on the road and do exactly what you want to do how and when you want to do it- you are driving like a local.  Here are some common driving rules (I use this term in the loosest sense just like the Italians do) so that YOU TOO can drive like an Italian.

1. Road Lanes:   Use them ALL. Scratch that.  Pretend there are none.  Straddle lanes for miles at a time.  Regardless of the number of lanes of traffic painted on the roadbed, travel willy nilly all over the road.  Make sure there are at least five cars abroad for every three painted lanes.

2.  Freeway Exits:  There are a number of different options

***This is the precise moment when my computer crashed, all of our lights began flickering ominously, EVERY house alarm in the Parco (subdivision for you stateside) began sounding, and every Italian guard dog began howling (due to said house alarms).  Apparently we had some sort of power issue in the area.  Joe and I wandered around the house for an hour attempting to get the wall heaters to stop squealing and keeping the house alarm from going off.  The lights continued to surge and die until we finally gave up and went to bed.  Why, you ask?  Because it is Italy.  That is the only explanation I have.***

And now back to the previously scheduled Blog.

Ahem.

2.  Freeway Exits:  There are a number of different options for approaching Freeway exits.  Here is a sampling of a few I have seen:

The "Fake Right".- Drive as though you are going to exit the freeway.  At the last possible moment, make an abrupt left adjustment, gesture wildly with both hands and curse out the driver to your left.  Return to the freeway. 

The "Fake Left".- Drive as though you plan to continue on the freeway.  At the last possible moment, make an abrupt right adjustment, gesture wildly with both hands and curse out the driver to your right.  Exit the freeway.

The "Va Bene".- (Loosely translated to "It's all good").- Drive past the freeway exit.  Upon realizing you have past the exit, pull over to the side of the road and drive backwards to the exit.  It does not matter in the least how FAR you have travelled beyond the exit.  Exit the freeway.

The "WTF!".  While exiting the freeway, simply stop in the middle of the roadway.

3.  Vespas:  Ride with three or four passengers at a time with no helmet, in your Sunday best, preferably with one rider carrying either a cake or four stacked pizzas or possibly the family dog.

4.  Nature calls:  Pull over, drop 'em.  Doesn't matter your age or gender.  I have seen more bare bottoms on Naples freeways than in a whole lifetime of gym locker rooms.

5.  Passing:  Do it.  Do it around blind curves.  Do it into oncoming traffic.  Do it even if you are a ...holy mother of taco sauce that is a CITY BUS coming right at me!!! (Sorry, flashback.)

6.  Using headlights:  While convenient for travel at night, these are most often used to flash drivers in front of you to indicate you want them out of your way.  If they do not immediately move over, feel free to climb into the back seat of their Fiat or perform a PIT maneuver.

7.  Using signals:  When travelling in the fast lane, turn on your left blinker and leave it on to indicate you have NO intent of EVER moving over for another vehicle. (It is fun to see a #6 and a #7 meet on the freeway)

8.  Right of way:  It's yours.  It's ALWAYS yours.  Just drive.  Don't use your mirrors, don't hesitate, don't let them see the whites of your eyes.

9.  Parking:  Never ask if it is a parking spot, because of course it is.  Double parked?  Fine.  Triple parked?  No Problem.  Put on your hazards in the middle of the street in the middle of town during rush hour and run into the pasticcerie?  Va bene.

10.  Road Rules:  These are pretty simple, really.  Don't hit that which is in front of you.  It is only if you do that the other traffic rules apply.

Man, that's a lot of Cabbage!

One of the more striking things that I have noticed now that we have been in Italy for three months is how much more "in touch" I am (literally and figuratively) with how much cash we go through on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis.  Italy is a cash economy.  You pay the rent in cash.  You pay the gardener in cash.  You pay the veterinarian in cash.  In most markets, they really only want cash.  It is utterly horrifying to watch the constant hemorrhaging of cash!  Now, that is not to say that this same outflow of money didn't occur while we were in the states- because it did.  But we were insulated from it, cozy in our nest of Mastercard, debit card, autopay and checks.  It wasn't like real money.  But this stuff is real.  It is so real that the normal vigilance that I have for keeping an eye on my wallet has become super-vigilance...you just are ALWAYS carrying cash!  There are two things that I ponder when I count out yet another pile of Euro in order to pay for the groceries... #1.  Thank goodness we are in a position that I can count out Euro and buy my groceries.  There are a lot of people that cannot.  #2.  What condition would the American economy be in if the populace could only buy what they could actually afford to buy in cash?  Sets a mind to thinking.  Just saying.
     On an entirely different cabbage related note:  Boy Elder has finally started preschool  I hemmed and hawed and toured different schools and finally committed to a great preschool for him where he is amongst Italian children and NATO forces children and taught in both English and Italian.  I think it is a great experience for him to be immersed in the culture and the language and I am dearly hoping he will learn quickly enough to do all my translation for me. 
Because I am simply NOT getting it. 
     But this is not the point of my story.  The point of my story is that schools in Italy serve your children lunch.  This isn't lunch of the cold microwaved hamburger and day-old tater tots variety.  This is primi piatti (pasta dish of some kind) followed by secondi piatti (meat and vegetables) + bread or dessert.  Boy Elder is not much of an eater, but I am paying for the food and they do pack it up to take home (in little "to go" containers) when he doesn't eat it, so I like to get a preview of what myself and Boy Younger (aka The Garbage Truck) are going to have for lunch the next day.  The menu reads like a darn good date night.  Pasta Fagioli followed by grilled chicken, mashed potatoes and chard.  Pasta with potatoes followed by sauteed steak bites and spinach.  Um, yum!  Can I go back to school?!? 
     So last week I sashayed past the posted menu to check out what I was going to be enjoying for lunch this week, and I see the following dish:  Pasta con Cavolo.  Pasta with HORSE?!?  WHAT?!  Now, I have seen the little baby food jars of horse in the grocery store (and been appropriately disgusted), but I would have expected an international school to understand that HORSE is not "on the menu" in many places.  I stood in trepidation trying to decide whether I would just look the other way and call it part of the cultural experience or skip school that day or ask that Jack be excused for lunch that day or...I went home to contemplate my options.  Thank God for Google Translate.  Turns out Cavalo is Cabbage.  Cavallo is Horse.  Not Horse for lunch, Cabbage for lunch.  "Ugly American" incident avoided at school.
    Turns out pasta with Cabbage is delicious!  The picture above is of a cabbage I purchased at a local market.  I see them all the time and had no idea which variety they are, but figured- Hey, it's a cabbage.  I'll figure something out.  Turns out when you peel back the gloriously green outer leaves- It's a Savoy Cabbage.  I used these all the time (when I could find them) in the states-- but we only ever saw them in their "domesticated" state-- all the outer leaves removed, leaving a paler, smaller version of the same. I see this kind of thing all the time here...vegetables I am completely familiar with in their "produce aisle" format look VERY different when left in their unadulterated form coming from the fields.  And I would have told you that I knew my veggies.

     Just for kicks- here is the recipe I used with my glorious little Savoy.  Enjoy.
A big handful of cubed pancetta (It comes here packaged like that....so awesome)
A good glug of olive oil
1 clove of garlic, finely chopped
A palmful of dried thyme
1 large Savoy cabbage, chopped coarsely
1 handful of grated Parmesan cheese
Pasta of your shape of choice - I used these great mini lasagna shape noodles called Mafalda Corta
salt and black pepper
1/4 cup or so of grated dry provolone ( You could use mozzarella or similar)
2 handfuls of pine nuts, lighly toasted

Saute the pancetta in olive oil.  Add thyme and garlic.  Add cabbage and cover.  When cabbage has softened (add a little chicken broth to get some steam going if you need), then add the cooked pasta and provolone.  Turn off the heat.  Give another generous swirl of olive oil, salt, pepper.  Top with parmesan cheese and pine nuts.  Serve hot. 

The meaning of trash

You may be aware that Naples had a trash problem back in 2008.  It was all over the international news at the time.  The closure of local landfills led to the streets being filled for huge stretches of time with rotting, stinking and sometimes enormously hazardous trash.  What you may not realize is that this same trash problem still exists today.  Naples has a complicated relationship with trash. Years of poor management, mafioso influence, corruption, and apathy has led to a situation in which all existing landfills are full to capacity (often with trash from as far away as Northern Italy, and often with incredibly TOXIC materials.) and "temporary" landfills are opened, filled, and closed before the trucks can deliver their loads.  Any additional trash then has to wait until a new landfill is authorized and opened.  Naples government has looked into building an incinerator to burn the excess trash, but the populace has been highly opposed-- to a great degree because of fears of lack of oversight leading to hazardous material being burned and greatly contributing to what is already a noxious cloud of haze that burdens the city.  As a result, trash struggles continue, and the city and the roads and the skies and the agriculture and the people suffer.

On an entirely different and not nearly so morose a note, Naples also suffers from a trash problem of a different sort.  The music that I have discovered so far is awful.  There are some sappy Italian love songs, yes, but the VAST majority of music on Italian radio in Naples is either A)  Really bad American music, or B) Really bad house mix music with the never ending thrumming base that makes the juice in your eyeballs jiggle and eventually causes a migraine.  OH, and then there is the ONLY SONG IN THE WORLD.  Here it is.

Michel Telo-Ai Se Eu Te Pego

Catchy?  Yes.  BUT IT IS THE ONLY SONG THEY PLAY.  And it has been since I arrived in November.  Sigh. I guess I should figure out what they are saying, but it isn't even Italian.