Category — Travel

“Have you ever walked down to Fornaci from Barga?”  My request for a new adventure would be answered by the unexpected question from Ryo.  “It’s an ancient path just past the hospital.”

Ryo told me that he had tried to bike the path once, but found a large tree blocking the entrance, and had turned back.

I’ve been struggling a little in the last few days, my poor language skills leaving me with a deep feeling of inadequacy.  A walk in the woods was exactly what I needed.  Growing up, I had taken many hikes in the mountains with my family and with my good friend (and chemistry teacher) Mrs. Healy.  Being able to find paths and make my way through the hills always made me feel confident.  There’s nothing like seeing a distant ridge and knowing that you’ve just made your way from there to here with nothing but your legs and eyes.

And so I started the 90 minute trek from the top of the hill.  “Ryo, where’s the hospital?  And the path?”

“Oh just go out and up and then there’s a sign for the Ospedale.  Then you go on the road, and it forks.  Then, I think you bear right.  I think.  And you wind through some houses.”  He was making swervy motions with his hands, like a fish swimming upriver.  He looked up at me and chuckled.  “And then the road ends and you start going down.”  Deb looked uncertain that I would ever find my way down the hill, and I wasn’t feeling super-confident.  But really, if I went the wrong way, I’d just climb back up and find the studio.  Right?

“I’m off.  If I can’t find it, I’ll be back for a ride.”  “Okay, don’t get lost!”  An unsure smile, and I was off.

Finding the hospital was easy, if a bit unsafe.  The narrow, winding roads that define many of the hill towns present a challenge to those walking on them.  Walking on the right is not, generally, a safe thing to do, as the cars can’t see you well.  However, the many blind corners and fast drivers meant that I was crossing the road frequently to put myself on the outside of the curve, or in the cutout formed by a garden gate.

Once past the hospital, the countryside opened up, giving excellent views and picturesque farmhouses.

When I finally hit a fork in the road, I had been walking for about 30 minutes.  I was really wondering if I was on the right path.  But, I had the mountains to guide me, and I could see the great butte that shades Fornaci, standing sentinel on the other side of the valley.

As I walked I saw very few cars, and heard them in enough time to get out of the way.  There were more animals than people along the way.  Dogs barked from distant houses and cats darted across the ever-narrowing road.

After another 15 minutes of walking in silence, I was seriously wondering if the road would ever end, and where it would dump me out if it didn’t.  I was considering loading google earth on the laptop in my bag, and seeing where exactly I was, when the road came to an end.

To the left was a partially-paved lane marked with several signs.  One announced that it was a private drive.  To the right was an unpaved lane that seemed to lead through a gate and into someone’s yard.  The middle path was overgrown.  Leaves and chestnut pods covered it.  And it seemed to wind around the cluster of houses at the end of the private drive.  But it led down – down the valley wall that I had now reached.  And so I looked around, thought about all the friendly people that lived in the houses, and started down.

The ground was positively littered with chestnuts.  Their leaves made the path slippery, but the hairy pods provided a little traction.  The nuts themselves were everywhere, shiny, growing, friendly.

The path led down and the chestnut trees gave way to elm.  I spent most of the time watching my footing, making sure I didn’t slide down to Fornaci.  Every so often, however, something would catch my eye, bringing my focus to the here and now.  It was like little friends waving as I made my way past.

And, after many twists and turns, the path turned uphill, and suddenly I was out of the woods, walking through someone’s yard.  The light was beautiful, filtering dramatically through the clouds.  Everything was beautiful.  Doors, walls, trees.  Everything.

I still wondered if I was on the right path – whether I would emerge in Fornaci, and whether I could find the house, even if I did.  But I wasn’t worried.  There were friends all along the way.  Goats smiled, and gnomes began to appear, pointing the way.

When I emerged from the country lane, I wasn’t sure where I was, precisely, but I knew I was close.  The mountains were in the right place, and the power lines that I use to guide myself to the house were overhead.  I was in Fornaci.  As I entered the main street, I looked back to see where I had come out, thinking that maybe sometime I might try the reverse trek up the hill.  When I snapped a picture to make sure I could find the place, I laughed.

It reminded me of a poem I’d memorized in 6^th grade.  It was the Shel Silverstein poem, “Where the Sidewalk Ends.”  I haven’t thought of it in ages, but it seemed appropriate running through my head as I stepped off of the “ancient path” and onto the streets of an Italian town.  Grateful for my adventure I looked around, all feelings of inadequacy gone.  I remembered that I could speak the language of the mountains and the trees.  And there was beauty everywhere.

Okay all you foodies. This one’s for you.

Yesterday, after accusing Italians of being descendants of Hobbits,I found myself proved temporarily wrong by my friends who decided to skip lunch. I’m pretty sure Hobbits don’t skip lunch. While I headed down the hill to make myself a couple of fantastic little grilled cheese sandwiches, they stayed to work. I told them to call if they wanted me to put the pasta pot on. I’m really glad they didn’t.

When they returned late in the afternoon, I’d had a little lunch and started afternoon tea. The ladies ran in, grabbed a couple of handfuls of bread and two bananas, and we were off to Lucca. We were going for business, but Lucca is home to some friends, so we got to have a bit of fun, too.

Lucca is a beautiful city at night. The shops sparkle as people pass by on bikes and on foot. We found our friends and started our trek through the city. The ladies were pretty hungry, and had missed afternoon tea, so caffeine was high on the list. We popped into a beautiful shop that had chocolate everywhere. Chocolate in the case, chocolate on the walls, and a vat of ciocolata calda stirring itself behind the counter. I noticed this beautiful liquid loveliness as I sipped my macchiato, and thought that I would need to sample some soon.

After trips to a couple of businesses, we made our way to another shop with chocolate lining the walls. A simple sign “chocolat” adorned the front. The little storefront was jammed with people after one thing – ciocolata calda. “Kristin! Con o senza pepperoncini?” With or without spicy pepper. Yummy. Our lovely friend Manuella handed me a plastic cup and spoon of super-dark liquid chocolate sprinkled with flakes of red pepper.

We all stirred our scalding cups, sending great columns of steam up, along with an amazing scent.  We spent the next five minutes standing in the street spooning mouthfuls of chocolate and scraping the bottoms of the little cups.

We crisscrossed the streets of Lucca for a couple of hours, everyone growing increasingly hungry and tired. We had plans to attend a friend’s art exhibition in Bagni di Lucca, but the thought of finding some food and heading home was growing increasingly appealing.

In the end, we made the turn to Bagni di Lucca, hoping that we could eat at the restaurant where the exhibition was happening. The wine and focaccia we were greeted with, and the long table set for dinner, were good signs.

After mixing, mingling and checking out the art, we seated ourselves at the table. There was a fascinating mix of people from Italy, Germany, Monaco, Greece and the US. This made dinner conversation excellent. While my language skills were probably the poorest of anyone at the table, they were all very good sports, and more than willing to let me muddle through in broken Italian while we consulted my little dictionary for vocab lessons. Of course, it helped that my family is from Greece, Germany and Chicago, where a couple of the Italian guys had spent time, and that I shared a special kind of kinship with two of the others. For the first time in this kind of setting, I felt able to be more myself. The barrier of not speaking the language really puts me in a place where I’m the observer, listening attentively, trying to work out the words, missing half of what’s said. Last night, I found myself able to understand quite a lot, and even allowed myself to speak a few butchered sentences, which were lovingly understood and corrected by those around me. It was lovely.

By the end of the night I had a handful of new vocabulary words, an invite to hold Thanksgiving dinner at a home in Barga, an invite to attend a book club, an invite to another dinner, and an invite to stay in the north of Italy. I need to try to speak Italian more often.

While we talked, food began to appear. The owner announced that, per Luccia’s request (she’s the artist and is a fervent vegetarian), the entire meal would be vegetarian. Wow. Deb and Sandra looked at me with wide eyes. How fantastic! I’d be able to eat everything without asking if it had meat. Amazing.

First was a lovely, delicate pastry filled with zucchini, and drizzled with a saffron sauce.

When the owner came by with a dish to see who wanted more, I was very happy to oblige. It should have registered with me that Deb refused, saying she was full. Here’s a tip for non-Italians eating in Italy: If you are out with a group of people, and food that you have not ordered starts arriving, it’s very possible that you have begun what will be a 2 hour foodapalooza. Unless you are a champion food-eater, or are planning to head to a deserted island for the next month, do not accept second helpings from anyone. There will be plenty more. Have no fear.

After the zucchini pastry came polenta balls in some kind of a creamy cheese sauce, topped with black truffle shavings.

There were so many plates of these that I ended up eating 3, and almost had 4 before the plate (which had migrated, with others, to me) was taken away. Thank heavens it was taken away.

Next to arrive were long plates of pear and cheese salad. The slices of pear and pecorino were dressed simply with olive oil and black pepper. I had at least two helpings of this.

I believe I had a piece of bread at this point – or focaccia. Big mistake. While the brown focaccia you can find here is absolutely amazing – salty, nutty, yummy – it seems to be placed strategically to root out the non-locals. There were few of us who actually touched the bread. Fools, all of us.

As the first plate of pasta came out, I started to wonder if I’d make it through all the courses. The pasta, however, was so incredible, that I stopped thinking and started eating in earnest. Fortunately, I accepted only a few of the beautiful ravioli, which were filled with pureed squash (pumpkin, I think) and maybe caramelized onions, and covered in lovely butter, cloves and walnuts.

I was just thinking how I’d like a couple more when Deb turned to me. “Hey, you want mine?” She didn’t like hers. Joy! I shoveled her portion – which was about twice what I’d just eaten – onto my plate. Here’s a tip for Italian folks who are eating at a dinner like this with non-Italians (specifically Americans): We don’t know that there’s more food coming. Please don’t give us more food. It would even be kind to hide the food from us when we’re not looking. Really.

I’d just polished off Deb’s ravioli when the second THE SECOND plate of pasta arrived.

More squash, more butter, more clove. Ancora, ancora, ancora.

At this point, my head was swimming a little. I had consumed roughly 10 times the amount of food that is supposed to fit in my stomach, and I could feel it expanding as I sat at the table, wondering what amazing plate would be set before me next.

Instead of meat, the owner had prepared fennel baked in a béchamel sauce and covered in cheese (people, we don’t use fennel enough in the US. Its’ seriously good), a roasted tomato, braised radicchio, and baked tomino (cheese) with shaved white truffle and a mushroom that reminded me of a morel. All of it was excellent. I turned down seconds.
Then we sat. And we talked about how much we’d eaten. And how much we’d had to drink. And how much we needed a cappuccino. And then dessert arrived.

The cheesecake itself was almost savory. Very little sugar and lots of ricotta. The blueberries on the top gave it its sweetness. Any other night, I would have had three pieces. But, it was the dessert that sent me over the edge. While I was slightly uncomfortable before, I began to wonder if I’d be able to stand up straight when it was time to go.

When we got home, we didn’t have evening tea. It was a short trip to bed, where my distended stomach was comforted by the excellent dinner conversation and the excellent camaraderie of the day.

As I’ve mentioned, I tend toward binary thinking. The black-or-white thought process was helpful in law school – if not in practice. Following rules and constructing rules has long appealed to me. Just tell me what the parameters are and I’ll figure out how to do what I want within them.

I laughed when Clinton said “it depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is.” He was totally right. And totally horrible.

When someone asks to copy a CD, I flinch. And usually only say yes if I haven’t let anyone else do it, and make them agree that they are holding my “backup” copy, in case mine should disappear in a ball of flame (I’m pretty sure that’s legal).

Yesterday brought a conversation about DVD burning and its legality. “I paid for my license. I just want to be able to view it on my ipod!” Sounded fair to me, but (as one law professor used to tell me) I didn’t go to fair school. “You can probably find an illegal copy on youtube,” came the suggestion. True story.

Yesterday, when I climbed on the elliptical for the first time in about a month, it was with high hopes of watching SURVIVOR on Hulu or CBS.com. SURVIVOR is really the motivating factor behind my workouts. I love the show with the kind of fervor usually reserved for religious zealotry. I’ve applied 4 times, attended an open-casting call and brought a replica Buff to Italy with me. I watch recorded SURVIVOR episodes while I work out. During the season, it’s great. I record on Thursday and watch every morning for the next week, rehashing, analyzing, plotting my own takeover of the game.

But I left for Italy in the middle of the season, and haven’t had occasion to catch up on episodes. Until yesterday.

So, I plugged my computer in, set it in front of the elliptical and logged on. And got this message “this program is not authorized for your geographic region.” What? You’re kidding me, right? This is some elaborate scheme cooked up by the same people at CBS who keep denying my application. Must be. Not authorized for my geographic region…

Okay, okay. Not to fear. Next stop: youtube. I was able to find part 1 of episode 7 relatively quickly (AND WITHOUT SPOILERS). Soon I was in workout heaven, cursing Russell and working the puzzles with everyone else. Part 2 was easy to find as well. Part 3, however gave me some troubles.

This is the part of watching bootlegged copies of shows on youtube that isn’t so glamorous. First, you’re watching what someone recorded off their tv, and in some circumstances, what they recorded using a video camera pointed at their tv screen. Insane. Second, the programs are posted in 10ish minute chunks, requiring you to find and load multiple parts of the program. Third, people don’t always post the entire show, or don’t post the parts with any type of naming-convention. So you have to scout around to find the whole program. Yesterday I used at least three different people’s posts to piece together most of the show.

And I’d like to take this opportunity to say that I would have HAPPILY watched the 20 minutes of commercials that usually infiltrate the broadcast program. I find commercials fascinating. I TRIED to watch them on the CBS site, but “this program is unavailable for your geographic region.”

This morning, I was able to find a complete set of the episode, as well as the next episode. I think I’m only one behind now. It’s a beautiful thing. (Did I mention I haven’t spoiled anything? I still don’t know who was voted off in the last two weeks. For the love of all that is holy, don’t spoil it for me by posting in the comments. I’m a forgiving person, but I’m not sure how I would react to this, and I don’t want to find out.)

People have long said to me that I’d eventually move out of my black-or-white thinking in to an understanding that there are grey areas; that there need to be grey areas. Okay you people who said that, listen up. I’ve always said that grey is just black and white when you get close enough to it.

I don’t know copyright law as it applies to SURVIVOR episodes on youtube. No idea. I’m okay with that. What I do know is how to find the complete set of Season 19, Episode 7. Took me two days, but I figured it out. It was in the grey area, just between “willful suspension of disbelief” and “ignorance of the law is no defense”.

People often ask me why I don’t drink. Honestly, I think I was just a really lucky self-aware kid. As I watched most of my high school friends start drinking, going to parties, and into the woods for keggers, I started to plan. Sure I’d like more friends, sure I’d like to socialize more. But in small-town Idaho, those opportunities aren’t had at the mall. Here’s what the plan sounded like:

Plan A: I will begin drinking small amounts daily, gradually increasing until I can drink anyone under the table.

Yes, this was the plan in my 15-year old brain. Build up a tolerance so I could compete. Not so surprising, really. It’s a lot like athletics. Work-out harder and longer each time, preparing your body to do more than your competitors’. I was an athlete, so this was just like any other training routine. Fortunately, I was also already a little Type-A, so I had a Plan B. Here’s what it looked like:

Plan B: I will never drink.

Now, it’s possible that these two scenarios are a bit extreme. I’ve been known to tend toward this type of binary thinking. However, it was the realization that I was thinking in just this way that allwoed me to pause and say to myself, “self, perhaps we should give serious consideration to Plan B”.

And that is why I don’t drink. It’s also why I don’t smoke, do drugs, or engage in very many things that could lead me to that place known as “rock bottom”. Don’t get me wrong, I have my vices. I realized I had a problem with coffee when one of the judges I worked with walked into my office – where the coffee-pool kept its coffee and coffee pot – looked at me, looked at the third pot of the day, and said “you know, the definition of insanity under the DSM-IV includes mania, aggitation and other elements related to consumption of substances.” When I removed myself from the coffee-pool, daily consumption went from 3 pots a day to 1. Yeah, 2 pots a day might be excessive. Just maybe.

I didn’t totally give up coffee until the prilosec I was taking for acid reflux (due to coffee) wouldn’t work anymore. And sugar. Blessed sugar.

You know, it’s entirely possible that the sense of euphoria I felt the first time I was in Italy was due to the fact that I suspended my 2-year coffee embargo and 1-year sugar ban for the duration of the trip. The coffee made my head swim and the sugar induced a little mania. In hindsight, I was probably high for the entire trip.

When I got back, I was able to cut out most of the sugar again, but the cappuccini stuck. And now I’m back in the land of caffe and pastry. For some reason, the coffee hasn’t torn up my stomach yet, so I’m still drinking it. That means I’m pretty much dependent on it if I don’t want to be a raging jerk everyday. As long as I have 3-4 cappu a day, and a pot of tea, I’m good to go.

The sugar, however, is a problem. It started as a cookie every now and again, and a lovely pastry – or two. Then it became a pastry or two, and another snuck in the kitchen. I know it’s getting bad when I start eating sugar alone…

Yesterday, I hit a place that I’m not proud of. Nutella is the devil. I mean, really, I think there are stories in the Bible about the temptations that Nutella poses to the mortal world. I am mortal. It began as a little bit spread on a piece of bread with everyone else, maybe once a week. Yesterday, faced with the stress of the internet I snapped. While Sandra napped on the sofa I tiptoed into the kitchen to find bread and a knife. The Nutella was already purched a foot from my elbow as I typed – and it had been whispering to me. Okay, maybe I sound a little insane, but I’m fairly sure that most anyone reading this who has lived with a jar of Nutella understands what I’m saying. Or I’m projecting. Either way, it wasn’t good.

The scene rapidly devolved from slices of bread, to one giant knifefull shoved into my mouth. When you go to bed thinking about sugar, and wake up thinking about sugar, it’s time to admit you have a problem.

Fortunately, along with the Nutella, I discovered something else yesterday. Deb and Sandra have an elliptical trainer! Yes, it’s true! It’s hidden in the studio in the garden. I had no idea it was there! My daily routine in the states was to wake up, workout on the elliptical (on on the wind trainer), watch recorded SURVIVOR episodes, and then get ready for the day. Waking up in the morning with the prospect of a workout and SURVIVOR was one of the best parts of the day. So, along with sugar plums dancing in my head, the vision of working-out and watching SURVIVOR sustained me through the day and night.

This morning I entered the studio in my ridiculously short running shorts, turned on my computer and loaded SURVIVOR. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to trade my old habits for the new ones. The 45 minutes of bliss that followed left me lighter and more awake than the caffeine and sugar I’ve been relying on. Of course. I know this. But sometimes I need a little reminding. This morning was a good reminder. Don’t get me wrong, I still had my cappuccino this morning, but I left the Nutella completely alone. Baby steps.

It happened today.  Culture shock.  I’ve had a couple of moments where I’ve missed home, wished I spoke the language, or wasn’t sure whether I’d complimented or insulted someone.  Today was different.

I spent the morning largely with Barbara, Deb’s mom, and Andre.  We went for our daily coffee and focaccia at Marino’s shop where we talked about the importance of family and the uncertainty of leaving one’s surroundings.  Barbara had come to Barga as a young woman to be with her husband, Deb’s dad.  We shared our stories of intentional discomfort – her moving to a new country with little knowledge of the language; my decision to take a fundraising job in order to deal with my outright terror of cold calling.

We went shopping, first to a bookstore where I bought another Harry Potter book in Italian, and then to the local grocery store, where I spent a while staring at the shampoo and face soap.  I’ll just say that it’s much less intimidating to buy vegetables and jam, and even order bread from the meat counter, than to figure out what is face soap and what is laundry detergent.  I mean, if I get the wrong bread, Sandra laughs.  If I get the wrong soap, it could be a pretty miserable week.  So, I left with jam and toilet paper, and even dishwashing detergent, but no face soap (I’ll make Deb interpret the bottles later).

When I returned to the studio, I set to work on putting together a website.  I’ve been wrestling with the Italian site for the last week and thought I’d finally worked it out.  I’m very, very close, but not totally there.  After working on my little PC for a couple of hours, I switched to the big, pretty Mac that Ryo had left vacant.  It meant an Ethernet connection instead of the satellite one I’d been using, but it also meant using an unfamiliar operating system – in Italian.

I was able to find the web browser and, after about 15 mins, translate enough of the menu to figure out how to open up additional windows.  Brava!  Unfortunately, however, the internet was not cooperating.  I spent the next couple of hours battling against the computer and the internet, both of which kept giving me error messages in a foreign language.

When Sandra asked me what happened today to put me in such a bad mood, I couldn’t even explain.  “I battled the internet – all day – and it kept winning – in Italian.”  Not surprisingly, it didn’t translate.  So, we ate the fantastic meal that Sandra had prepared, joked about my hair, and, in the end, Tommy and I ended up playing cards.  And I won.  A lot.  In both Italian and English.  And he learned how to shuffle.  And that totally made up for losing to the internet.