Sent September 22, 2009

Gruezi! 20 hours of rain - The 4th Entry

Guten Tag alle,

Well, I’m somewhat alive after surviving what is one hell of a trip from Italy. Italy was very much a culture shock from the overly romanticized view that America likes to make of it. Even though it may sound like I am bashing the country, I am not. Ya’ll know how much I like to travel off the beaten path and as we sat in a small “mom&pop” pizzeria in Armaroni (where Alain’s folks have a house), I told Madeline aka Monster-in-law, that I would not want to have seen the
tourists cities. This is what I love, to see the real people, to experience the real food and be absolutely horrified all at the same time. I feel as if I would not have appreciated Italy if I had gone to Firenza (Florence), Milano (Milan), Sicily, Napoli (Naples), Roma (Rome) etc. As Madeline said, those cities are where it feels like America. She said that when they first came to the village (population barely 1000 persons) of Armaroni, it was a culture shock too but it
grows on you. And I liked Armaroni, it was tiny, up in the mountains and everyone was nice. A lot of Swiss have vacation homes there so the restaurants speak German/Swiss German.

After this trip I have one resolution: I WILL NEVER COMPLAIN ABOUT PAYING TO USE A PUBLIC BATHROOM AGAIN.

Nobody told me that Italy was a 3rd world country. This is honestly one of the poorest countries I think I have ever seen. And as I sat horrified at villages, towns and cities that looks like what we see on CNN of the war ridden zones in Pakistan and Iraq, I am surprised that people live in homes that are missing walls, roofs, filthy looking towns with garbage and trash everywhere, you didn’t dare find me without shoes. The public bathrooms are disgusting and yes, I took pictures.

It was POURING as we left Schaffhausen. We decided to travel at night because the kids go to sleep between 7:00 and 8pm. And we know that they wouldn’t wake until 6-8am. I didn’t see much as we drove through the Italian part of Switzerland and barely anything as we drove into
Italy.

Our first mistake, I should have tried harder to convince Alain that we did not need a GPS unit. That shit device took us all over Italy; we paid nearly 70 Euros worth in tolls. (It’s 1.5 Euro to 1$) so nearly $102.00 in tolls or 106 CHF. You have to pay a toll to drive anywhere in Italy so the device kept taking us off and on the autobond. So Calabria is way in the arch of the boot so we know that we have a 17 hour drive, with the GPS it was nearly 20 hours. On the way back I asked Gustie (Alain’s father) to borrow his map and we didn’t use the device and you know what – we didn’t get lost and it only took us 17 hours!

My introduction as to the backwardness of this country was as we are passing the garbage heaps of Milano and we needed to head in the direction of Bologna, we pay our toll and take the roundabout to head towards Bologna just to be surprised by the entranceway into the autobond blocked off by a wall of fire and two unmarked trucks, in the pouring rain of course.

“What the fuck is that?!” exclaimed Alain.

We had no idea where to go and the GPS keeps telling us that we need to go on that road that was blocked off so lovingly by the mafia of the city. Spooked we drive in circles for a good hour. Just to pay more money and none of us speak Italian. So I tell Alain what to say in Spanish to the teller.

Now I love this scene, the teller is locked up in an airtight booth, no window, just a holes in a tray where you slide your money in. He has a long cigarette in one hand; the booth is grey with soot. Alain asked him how to get to Calabria and he slides in the Euros and the teller, smokes a bit, exhales against the glass and annoyingly says to head towards Parma. Without saying anything else he hits the button that lifts the bar up and we head out.

Eventually, after being pulled over by the cops (thank goodness they were the “good” ones). In Italy there’s two kinds, since we were in the prostitute section (and this is where we started playing, “Count the Prostitutes!”), the bad cops would have had all of us on the ground and probably have to have paid to get our passports back. Gustie (alain’s dad) warned us about them. They drive a different color car too because they are mafia controlled.)

Eventually the sun comes up, so I finally see this country, at first what I thought was abandoned cities lined along the highways. This is where Alain explained that Italy is a very very poor country. Like in Armaroni, every winter, all the men from the village head off to foreign countries, primarily Germany and Switzerland, with a program and they work for half the year. Madeline was saying that if we visited them in the winter, it would be all women and children in the village.

Eventually we make it to Calabria/Corregliano to our camping resort place. Mainly Germans and Italians go there and honestly it was beautiful. We had a great time and the kids go to be introduced to the beach and the pool for the first time. They love the pool and sand but are afraid of the ocean. I guess it’s the loud noises of the wave crashing onto the shore. :)

The people in the camping ground were very nice and Alain and I enjoyed the bar where we chatted with this one bartender who spoke only Italian and German. We had a little trailer, clean, roomy with a nice sized front porch where we spent most of our time and we were not even a minute walk from the ocean.

I unfortunately got sick. Our 20 hour drive in the cold pouring rain made me sleep a lot but I went to the beach and laid in the sun, unfortunately went into the pool (it was cold) and lost my voice for 2 days. The weather was perfect, warm, breezy and sunny.

Calabria is a poor town and as we would drive to the market (which was inside of a mall – how funny) we passed several regular prostitutes whom I lovingly called, “Blondie, Ugly Tan Line Girl, Leopard Skin, and Legs. Now what Libby and didn’t understand was that everything is
EXPENSIVE in Italy. These people don’t have money. Then it was explained to me that since they joined the EU and converted from the Lira to the Euro, it’s gotten poorer. To compare the prices before, as we left and stopped at a market for drinks, you could still see the marking of the old tags. For a bottle of water it’s used to be .30 Lira now its 3.20 Euro.

The one thing I was happy with was that (and this is cruel, I know) the Italians are exactly the way we stereotype them. Exactly! The men look like Casanovas with their darkly tanned skins, tight shirts, leather jackets, tight jeans, sleek glasses and slicked back raven black hair. The women are beautiful with long black straight but mainly curly hair, dark tanned skins, big tits and tight clothes. When they talk they always look like they are fighting, they are loud and the people in general were not very nice to us in this town.

Our trip to a “farmacia” was horrible. I asked the receptionist at the resort in German, “wo ist ein Apoteke in Calabria?”

She pulled out a map and sent us to an ocean side village where there are animals, strays and trash everywhere. I exclaimed, “We’re in Mexico!” It was the 5hour siesta time so people are just standing in the middle of the streets “talking” to each other. The farmacia tech look offended when I told her, “Gratzie” (thank you) as she gave me some stuff and after having to fight my way through the counter, I had to fight my way back out.

After we left Calabria, we headed towards Armaroni to drop the kids off by the parents so we could go to two Oceanside towns that I cannot remember how to spell. After dinner at a great pizzeria, we headed back. Never to be happier to be back in Switzerland.

The boys were awesome throughout this trip and they had a blast. In reality I had a good time too and happy to add Italy to my “places where’ve I been” map.

Other than that, after driving for 17 hours, I still went to class last night, happy for the first time to be able to ask my teacher for help in German. I got better medicine today.

Oh! There was 23 female prostitutes and 1 male prostitute.