Rediscovering my heritage

All my grandparents were Italian, my parents were called the "fist generation" since they were the children of immigrates. My fathers parents came from the north of Italy near Turin and Piacenza and my mothers parents from the same town about an hour south of Naples called Trendenara. As for food, I now realize how lucky I was having an Italian heritage, we ate really well. My grandfather Angelo Acccarino made his own wine from the grapes he grew that he brought from his hometown in Italy. We all drank wine (diluted with club soda or ginger ale) from a really young age. His wife and my grandmother, Christina Paolino Accarino spent her life in the kitchen, she loved to cook mostly from the fresh vegetables from Angelo's garden. I am convinced that Jim married me after he ate my grandmother Christina's cooking, ask him, he'll admit it. Pietro Conti and Florence Zanazzi Conti my fathers parents owned a Italian delicatessen in Bensonhurst Brooklyn so of course I had been exposed to the best that was imported from Italy from cheeses to meats to any speciality item you could imagine. I just found out my father would make the mozzarella for his parents store. Grandma Florence always made fresh pasta for holidays, it was too good to be true. Here in Senigallia there are a ton of restaurants but except for one that serves "kabobs" there is only Italian food. Jim and I have now samples about 6 different restaurants and I seriously do not know why anyone would want anything but Italian food. Anyone who knows me knows that food shopping in a supermarket is the last thing in a long list of domestic chores I do not enjoy. I am finding that going from small speciality shop to a farmers market I can deal with. Even better I love having the time to actually make something only bought hours before it is cooked. I am relearning and rediscovering my heritage, and if your Italian, food is a big part of it.

Always Moving

I think this is the first time since I was 21 that I am without a car. I wondered why I was so tired tonight and it dawned on me that here we are always moving. After breakfast we need to get our food for the day and that means walking to the fish store, farmers market , bread store and sometimes the cheese store, then back to put it away. Today we took a bike ride about 5 miles out of town to check out a rental car place and then back. Made lunch then walked to the beach. I really can't just sit on the beach for too long so Jim and I went for a beach walk for 1.1/2 hrs, between 4-5 miles, then went for a quick swim. I remembered there was a class at the gym I wanted to take at 6 pm so I walked back to the house got dressed and got on the bike to go to the gym. Was too early for the class so just did my normal routine of 1 hour after a 15 minute walk/run warm up. Back on the bike to the house and started dinner. After dinner did work on my computer and now that I think of it, I'm exhausted.

All the women wear bikini's

Jim and I commented tonight on how diverse the population is and how everyone young, old and middle of the road seem to mingle together. Its easy and accepting here, just the way life is, it doesn't seem to matter what part of the spectrum you fall in. Generations are not separate they are all part of the same fabric in each family, neither kids or old people are treated "special" everyone has their place and is expected to do what they can for the family unit. They take care of each other, I think that is the bottom line.

Either the Italians know how to deal with stress or there isn't any. I guess I should qualify, everyone is expressive when they talk, hands flying and melodic voices getting louder and softer but the uptight, rigid and unpleasant looks I am so used to in the US are not here, I know I am not imagining it.

O.K. so this may seem like a small thing but to me it spoke volumes for self acceptance. Women here wear bikini's, or nearly everyone. It does not matter how old you are or how many wrinkles, its just the beach uniform. I must admit I feel a little strange since my bathing suits are one piece and the only women wearing one piece suits are usually at least 70-80 years old and even that is a minority. I'm even considering getting a bikini to be part of the crowd but have not bit the bullet yet. I've said it before but the people are so good looking, the Italians dress up and look incredible all the time. With that note its time for my beauty rest, I have a lot of catching up to do.

Italian Suggestions

I know in the US when you get to a traffic light it means you can stop, proceed with caution or go depending on the color of the light. Italy also has traffic lights but not nearly as many and they are like "suggestions". If there is no traffic at the light well... it makes sense to just keep going, its O.K. The Autostrada which is similar to our NYS thruway also seems to have a "suggestion" of 110 k speed limit, that seems to be just an idea to consider. The trains seem to have a similar Italian bent. Yes, of course there is a timetable and trains fortunately don't jump the tracks but the estimated time of arrival or departure has to be taken with a very large grain of salt. I think if a train was actually on time it would be considered odd. One would also think the person behind the counter who sells you a train ticket might know where to actually get the train, not so..... they have no idea, even though they give you an answer, don't believe them, you have to look at the screen on the platform. I also know that Italy seems to have delays or strikes so often that depending on any public mode of transportation is a calculated risk. Senigallia is a walking town, everything is close enough to walk to or if you really want to get speedy you can bike. So far our feet have not failed us but my bike lost its breaks twice, not to worry, I just kept going and paid no attention to the Italian suggestions.

Finding the translations and cooking

We are getting better at putting our new life in order and one of my goals was to continue my workout schedule at the gym. Yes, we did find a gym only a 15 minute walk or 10 minute bike ride, its not elaborate but the staff is friendly and helpful and will help if you ask, in Italian of course. For three days now Jim and I have muddled around and finally I decided to get serious, I needed to know how to convert kilos to pounds. I was never a math whiz so Jim tried to explained to the trainer that the bar and weights needs to add up to 50 lbs for chest press, when we finally got that figured out and through the first translation everything else fell into place. Now I know what I am doing and this little accomplishment really made my day.

Of course one of the best things about Italy is the food. Senigallia is on the sea so the fish and seafood is exquisite. We can walk to the shrimp boats in the morning and get the days catch right from the net. The other day Jim and I decided to make fresh Mussels (which we have never made) and Pasta with Marinara sauce, we had so much fun and it turned out great. Here in Senigallia I have turned the corner and really learning how to cook Italian, even my mother would be impressed.

Learning La Bella Lingua

We started almost 8 months ago when I bought Rosetta Stone's Italian so Jim and I could start learning some basics together. Jim had more success than me and actually did about 6 lessons, I only did 1. Then we took a short course "Italian for Travelers" two months before we left the US, Jim of course did all the homework and make all the classes. I did not. Jim carries at least 2 dictionaries and a map, I carry my camera and watercolors. I ask how much things cost, Jim has been paying. We really don't have much choice but to try to speak this beautiful language since this is not a tourist town except for Italians. So we stumble and make alot of signs for words we don't know and slowly we are speaking a little. The sounds are getting familiar, we can buy things at the markets, we point if we don't know the name of something, we ask for help and everyone is friendly and really tries to communicate. Today at the beach our neighbouring sun worshipper started to talk to us in English that was as bad as our Italian but for about 45 minutes we got to know each other. Just so happens she is a realtor who works for a company here in Senigallia that sells in Dubai, Lybia and Egypt mostly to investors. What a hoot to be discussing investments in the international market and we could barely speak each others words.

Mission accomplished we now have our bags, I am quite relieved. Got back front he airport and jumped into our bathing suits and headed for the beach. I hate cold water and would rather just look at the water no matter how hot I am if its too cold. The Adriatic is not a bathtub like the turquoise Caribbean but its close, the best is I could see all the way to to bottom, the water is a light green color and so clear I could see my toes even with the water up to my neck. Did a fabulous power walk in the water, it was good. Came home got unpacked (finally) and headed out for some more exploring. An observation that Jim and I have made is that there are a substantial amount of kids here and they act like kids but they don't scream, they are not out of control nor do they act wild or throw tantrums. Jim is convinced its diet, these kids are not loaded with sugar or unnatural hormones or preservatives.

Something very sane about this way of life, everyone rides a bicycle, in fact there are more bikes on the road than cars. No helmets but for some reason it seems O.K. no one is in a race, its just how you get from one place to another. Our hosts left us two bikes, we are doing a long ride tomorrow morning.

There is a spinning class on the beach tomorrow and Jim and I are going to see how we do.

Its a great day, got our luggage now I can go to the beach and swim!

It was an slow day waiting to see if the airport would call about our bags, finally decided we are just going to bite the bullet and go tomorrow. Hopefully Rome has sent our bags to Ancona only 15 minutes away but since there is no one in lost baggage claim until Monday, a visit is our only choice.

So the thing about Italy which is really great is the sleeping thing in the middle of the day and then at about 5 pm everyone starts their day AGAIN and has dinner somewhere between 8-9, after that everyone is outside until midnight! Kids, babies, old people, everyone. There were two concerts tonight, the first which started about 10:30 was a pretty cool kinda Italian Rap mixed in with a little heavy metal, I think I'll call it Ratal. It was packed with the younger set and lots of fun. Then at 12:00 Italy's favorite female vocalist, no I don't know her name but I will find out. There were lots of revolutionary type stuff in some of the booths so I think she is a little like Joan Baez in her early years. It was a live concert that was broadcast and a really big deal. I stood under the sound stage and got a pretty good look at everything. Both concerts took us all of about 3 minutes to walk too since we are in the center of the old city. What a treat to have live entertainment every night for free! Jim and I have been cooking, its easy everything is made with olive oil, lemon and garlic. Did I mention the wine is good and cheep and the cheese awesome.

We are not on the same clock as the Italians, getting up too late in the morning, and not sleeping in the afternoon and going to bed too late. We did walk on the beach last night until 9:00 p.m. had dinner about 10:00 so we got that down pat. There is entertainment every night in the town forum its free, under the stars, last night it sounded like African dancing we didn't see it but its loud enough we can hear it from our apartment. Just can't wait to get our cloths. Hopefully today.

This is our 3rd day and our hosts Elizabeth, Pierpaolo and Chris have left for Rome to fly to the US, we are now officially on our own. We had a great dinner last night outside in the garden with Pierpaolo's mother, aunt and two cousins, the highlight of the meal was fresh egg pasta with tiny little clams sauteed with garlic and olive oil, they came right from the beach yesterday morning. The walled small city is quite now that its the mid afternoon and nothing is open, everyone has had lunch and is napping or relaxing. We managed to go to the market and buy fresh fruit and vegetables and came back to make lunch. The beach is absolutely beautiful, light sand, no seaweed and perfect temperature. They did loose our luggage and until tomorrow we are living in the few things we have, its fine.... we're in Italy.