Monday, Monday

I'm so glad I'm keeping this blog. Otherwise I'd have to do my homework right away!

I went to Mass Saturday evening. I walked to San Giovanni for what I thought was the 18,30 (6:30) Mass, only to discover that it had started a half hour earlier. No problem, I'm in Italy, there are tons of Masses. So I went to the 19,00 (7:00) Mass at Santa Maria dei Servi, the church right next door to me. What was interesting about both of them was that not only were there only twenty or thirty people there, but only half of them actually received Communion. And there was no music. Boo no music!

Yesterday, Erin, Rodolfo, Alex, Clara, and I went to la spiaggia (the beach). And we learned how the train system in Italy works along the way. We were quite shocked that it showed up on time, and it must be the only thing in Italy that keeps to its schedule. But it was probably just a coincidence that will never be duplicated. Maybe the conductor's infant son woke up crying extra early and the poor man couldn't sleep, and thus had no choice but to go to work on time, causing all the trains along the line to function on schedule. Anyway, in an hour and a half, we arrived at Milano Marittima, the seaside town where all of Emilia-Romagna goes to play.

Now it's time culture shock. The whole beach is covered with these really nice lounge chairs and umbrellas, matching red, all in rows. Geez. The Italians know how to set up a beach, right? So we grab a spot on the front row and get comfortable. We're there for five minutes when this middle-aged Italian guy comes to tell us that these seats belong to the restaurant behind us and that they're for rent, 22 euro per day. That being significantly out of the question, we start down the beach. There are more chairs and umbrellas, and every thirty feet they change color to match the restaurant or similar establishment that owns them. We were beginning to despair of ever finding just a small spot of sand on which we could lay our towels, when we saw an extra large stretch of bright green chairs and umbrellas, all bearing the name of some hotel I never want to remember. Well, we figured that since there were so many of them, and since it was a hotel, no one would really be able to tell that we didn't belong there. So we set up again. I think we may have been there fifteen minutes when this angry old man scuttles up, yelling at us and hitting the chairs behind our heads. "Ragazzi! Questo è maleducato!" We were quite annoyed at his rude manner, as well as stunned that he had found us out. Ok, ok, we shouldn't have been there. But where could we go? And he could have been a little nicer!

A forlorn group we were, straggling down the beach again, passing the rainbow of forbidden paradise. And then, we saw it. A clean patch of sand, an empty lot for all the sensible people in the world, a free space for free spirits. The grass is not always greener on the other side. We were on the other side, and it was green, but we were content to stay on our own plot.

The Adriatic Sea is extremely salty. It was very shallow near the shore, and the lifeguard wouldn't let us go out farther, so where we were, we could sit on the bottom and still look the waves in the eye. That's not true, because we closed our eyes whenever a wave came, lest the salt blind us.

The Italian beach is a place where, "It doesn't matter what you wear, just as long as you are there!" (Although in this case I'd prefer the lyrics to be "just as long as you aren't bare.") Freedom of expression reigns, and I think that covers it, which means they're not covered, if you know what I mean.

We tried to find a place at which to eat on our way back to the station to catch the 19,14 (7:14pm) train, but we were unsuccessful. Sunday. In Italy, things still close on Sunday. Not everything, but many. That, and restaurants open for dinner at the earliest 6:30pm. But we really couldn't blame them, so we junk-fooded it up at the train station café.

The ride back was much more interesting than the one in the morning. The car was pretty full, which meant we were sitting among real Italians. With the most hilarious ticket checker guy ever. Not that we could understand too much of what he was saying, as he was from Venezia (Venice), and they don't speak with good grammar in Venezia (so our neighboring Italian woman told us). Every time he walked by he would stop and chat with us, with the lady, about anything from the Italian language to cooking to libraries. Alex was quite content with her seat choice, as the Italian lady doubled as a grammar book. She also translated horoscopes for Clara and Erin.

Second week of pre-session class has begun, on with the rythym of life!

Signed, the Sengenblogger