once again please excuse my english as i am trying as hard as i can with the small amount of time i have and also once again, as my italian improves my english gets worse. tit for tat! also i am typing on a european keyboard with symbols in odd places so donàt worry about that. see what i mean....
yesterday fabrizio, ilarias roommate took me to necci, the ristorante just down the block and we had cake for breakfast with tea and capuccino. fabrizio is an actor and he is very funny. he is very nice but also worries so much. and hairy too.
he took me on his vespa where again we wore helmets <9everyone in roma does<0 and to meet with mario grasso, my extended family member, for sightseeing. things are a little difficult here because i have to use someone elseàs phone to call ilaria and also fabrizio if i need to get back in the house, and then have transportation to get there, and also make sure they are actually at home and their phone actually works!
so mario and i did some sightseeing and i took photos, which you can see at the link i sent before, which has new photos. i will put it here just in case
http://www.facebook.com/al
last night ilaria and i went to a party of her friend andrea who is an actor and lives elsewhere in italy. she doesnt get to see him much. the house was on the fifth floor and we walked up all the marble stairs. at first i was very shy and said nothing much at all but took photos and didnt speak, because i was very unsure of my italian, what little i do know, but then i met a few who spoke some inglish and we talked at length, with me speaking in a mixture of english, italian and spanish. if i knew spanish perfectly and spoke that to them they would understand much of what i say.
the wine was white and made by andrea and his family in capri. he mashed it with his feet. it was very good. there was lots of food on the table, all made by people at the party. the white olives tasted like sweet butter and i couldnt stop eating them, though my new friend, francesco, a somewhat famous actor in rome, kept trying to make me stop because he said they cause indigestion.
everyone i talked to was either a photographer, filmm maker or actor. there was an american boy there who was a filmmaker and we spoke for a minute though my inglish was terrible compared to four days ago. it is good though and i dont mind it at all. i need to learn italian as quickly as possible!
everyone was very nice and told me my pronunciation was great and that i was learning italian very quickly. ilaria told them all that i know it better than she did. ha ha, and she is italian. she is very sweet.
i was telling francesco about my favorite bands and everyone here knows and loves bjork and radiohead of course but he said he had never heard sufjan stevens and wrote it down to download. ten minutes later two sufjan stevens songs come on and fra had heard them and loved them. they also played animal collective, from the shortbus soundtrack.
they let me put music on and i played hot chip, metric, tv on the radio, and daft punk for them. we all danced and even people sitting down were moving to the music. the boys all dance together and it is very funny. one named pepe was hilarious and kept doing a chicken dance.
my new friend piero is a phtoographer of fashion and is amazing. unfortunately his show is tomorrow night and i will be in siracusa.
everyone was so nice to me and said very beautiful wonderful things upon departure. iàm getting better at the double cheek kiss that happens on exit.
and refuse to use a bidet. that is weird.
i showed them my website and they loved the photos and we took photos all night, and some friends took photos with my camera. everyone was beautiful, and the dessert was too.
today ilaria wanted me to go into town by myself and see the pantheon, etc. i agreed and she left for work but then i was so scared to go because i dont know the language well enouh to speak with an italian who doesnt speak english, and all i had were four euros given to me by the lady in the airport who gave me the phone card, and my phone card only works to call american numbers.
i could just see myself getting deathly lost. i stayed inside as i didnt have a key to the apartment and felt a little sorry for myself.
then francesca came home, the other roommate of ilaria and she let me use her phone to call mario as he had been calling ilaria and fabrizio, so they said when i called them, and he put me together with enrico and sylvanna, other family members who came after my long nap to take me to the pantheon. while waiting on them i walked around a little with my camera in ilarias neighborhood, and successfully questioned a local shop owner about where to find a restaurant, and understood him for the most part.
i ate at necci again because i knew it and thought it wouldnt be too expensive. i tried to speak italian with the waitress but we could not understand the blank stares that passed between us but luckily another waitress did speak italian. here you are charged for table service and also for bread they bring to the table, though you can refuse it, and can also eat standing up.
people were looking at me so i thought. i try to pride myself on ilariaàs comment that i could pass for italian by looks but iàm sure my giant bag, canteen of water <9iàm too cheap to buy water<0 and the way i held my fork gave me away.
i fell asleep and dreamt of the pantheon. i was awoken by ilariaàs thick beautiful accent saying my name and responded in sleep with 'si?' and continued to speak italian with her as i continued to wake up, though she was speaking to me inglish. sylvanna was downstairs and in all the confusion of getting her upstairs i was still speaking italian, as best i knew.
she and enrico are older and neither spoke english well but better than mario and together we went to see the pantheon, colloseum and foro romano, the roman ruins. i did not get to go into the colloseum but it moved me more than anything else simply by driving by it. i became emotional. it is magnificent.
also the roman ruins took my breath away. i could hardly control myself! it reminded me of the time i saw saturn through a telescope. unbelievable and familiar and tear'jerking!
i crossed myself with holy water in the pantheon. and saw the grave of raphael.
also there are ruins in the city covered in graffiti. it is terrible! so sacred and ancient, like the pyramids covered in graffiti. there is a pyramid here, and also an obelisk from egypt that the romans brought here and placed on one of their monuments.
all of the fountain people and gods are vomiting water.
there are beautiful ancient looking fountains coming out of walls around the city that spill cold water into the ground and i fill my canteen of water up there, and if you put your finger over the faucet the water comes out of a little hole in the top and you drink like from a water fountain near a bathroom in america.
enrico told me that romans are 'fools for cats.' he mentioned this as we saw postcards with cats on the feet of giant statues, in the pantheon, and other notable places around rome. he was right. there are ruins there that are surrounded by glass fence and there are tons of cats sleeping and living there. and cats sleeping on benches around the city i bet they eat lots of fat pigeons.
we went into one of the oldest churches in rome where two nuns sat quietly praying the rosary.
i was unable to go to the vatican as the lines are hours and hours long but i did buy two rosaries for my mother and niece as requested. i will bless them myself.
we visited a coffee shop and got little cups of frozen coffee chocolate with chnks of raw sugar and whipped cream on top. inside was an antique machine where they roast their coffee. the profuma, smell around the city was amazing as coffee beans were roasting everywhere.
i am excited about one day instinctively walking up to someone shaking my hands in prayer, as the italians do when excited.
today i had a breakthrough ' sylvanna and enrico and i were talking about something and i said 'io penso che' i think so whereas before i could only use the verb to think in the form pensa which means he or she thinks. and i thought to myself OH HO did i just conjugate a verb correctly on instinct??
it was a long walk back to the car and when i got home we waited for francesca who had ben shopping with her other friend francesca. i came into the apartment and took my notebook that my roommate james gave me and worked in the courtyard on my book for elise, my niece, as the sun set. a man from the apartment came out back and coaxed a kitty out from under the building, picked it up and kissed it many times, and left.
then another black cat came. they hung out with me a bit and were a little curious but mostly ferile and i worked until i could no longer see well enough by the light of the building alone as the stars were out and i could not tell where my colors from my pencils were going.
now i am waiting on ilaria to come back from recording a rap song she is singing to advertise for her play on friday.
i miss and love you.
