After a time of their love wrapping halfway around the world, about 7 months ago Jan moved back to the Czech Republic to marry and be with his dear Petula.
Jan had become a much-loved “Burien Boy”, so I gathered mementoes from friends into a “juju bag” of good wishes and hopped a plane from Milano to Praha (Prague) to spend a few days with the two. (July 3 – 6, 2012)
I brought some Italian coffee and Grana Padano cheese for Jan and Petula.
I enjoyed the ultimate hospitality, good friendship and conversation, and a built-in translator, tour guide and driver!
Imagine celebrating the Fourth of July in the former-communist Czech Republic. Jan wore his red-white-and-blue plaid shirt in honor of the day, and we found many stars and stripes along our walking path.
“Thank you, America! On May 6, 1945 the city of Plzen was liberated by the U.S. Army.”
We saw the highlights of their home town, where Jan grew up, Plzen, and drank Pilsener beer. We enjoyed an afternoon looping stroll in Pizek, where they had been living. Drove through country roads and villages. Made a grand tour of Prague, (to my eye, more beautiful than Paris). We fed the ducks, then ducked for cover from a sudden drenching rain.
Jan and Petula saw each other for the first time in person along the John Lennon Wall in Prague. It was only fitting that we shoot a portrait of them there.
What a beautiful backdrop for a photo: the elaborately decorated front doorway of the Italian Consulate in Prague.
Fresh figs are in at the Saturday street market just a couple of blocks away, and they share the display with the magenta-splashed Borlotti bean pods! I bought some of both green figs and black, and enough borlottis to make a pot of something. (I also bought some picadilli tomatoes, slender green beans, pickled onions, dolce “sweet” green olives and cherries.)
As a kid, my only exposure to this fruit was in the form of highly-sugared “Fig Newtons”. Little did I know that the cookie’s core comes from a soft, sweet fruit, that needs no sugar (wonderful when wrapped with prosciutto). I wanted to do a side-by-side taste test of both green and black figs, so I strolled the market to find the best prices, best fruit and best fruit-handler! (Good fruit and pricing is easy to find. A gentle handler is not.) I ended up with enough figs, ultra-ripe and needing to be eaten promptly, that I’ll be eating several a day hoping to keep ahead of their ripeness.
Borlotti beans caught my eye when I was living here a couple of years ago. Now, during each time in Italy, I’ve got to buy at least enough of the pretty beans to sit myself in a chair for half an hour and shuck the soft shells for a meal. I’ll cook up a pot of the speckled beans, with some fresh sage, garlic, fresh tomatoes, red pepper, zucchini and maybe some pancetta.
A bunch of friends and I met up for a lecture at 9:15 pm at the Design Library. I walked almost a mile along the canals and side streets to meet them there.
Afterwards, we all went out for a bite to eat at 11:00, walking to the restaurant. We each ordered our own pizza (I ate half of mine) and some limoncello afterwards. Then we walked part of the way back together; we split up and I continued on home alone, arriving at 1:30 am.
Whether it’s naivete or genuine security, I walk home alone late at night and don’t feel concerned. Especially here by the canals, there are always a lot of people out walking, riding their bikes, talking, gathering in front of the local bars.
It should be no wonder that Italians are, for the most part pretty trim and not fighting the weight issues seen in America. It’s routine to walk 2 or 3 miles to and from dinner, in addition to everywhere else they go on foot and by bike!
Journal Entry: Sunday, June 10 – On the train returning home to Milano after a weekend in Nice, France, on the Côte d’Azur.
My brain hit “overload” sometime yesterday (Saturday) in the language department.
I rode for three and a half hours with Miriam, who I did not know, on Friday, and we spoke Italian all the way to Nice as she drove. We arrived in France at our Bed & Breakfast run by a Scottish woman speaking English. We went to our friend, Glenda’s, house on her prenuptial night where we gathered with friends speaking English, Italian and French.
Miriam and I went back to our room speaking Italian all the while until we turned the lights out. We awoke the next morning, speaking Italian to each other, but English with our lodging host. Miriam and I wandered town, commenting in Italian for a few hours, then returned to our room and prepped for the wedding.
We left, picked up two other wedding guests, one that speaks Italian and French, another that speaks English and French. I speak English and Italian. Miriam had the clear advantage; she speaks Italian, English and French. All three languages flew around the car.
At the church, the verbal mix continued until the nuptial mass of two hours, which was said in Italian. At the small garden reception afterwards, I wasn’t sure which language to use with the servers, though my French is limited to about four sentences, but enough to ask for a glass of champagne.
The four of us left the reception, again with languages mixed and flying. I was responding to the Italian-speaking French woman, Michou, in Italian as she spoke her native French to me. We spent an hour driving and sightseeing, switching languages depending on the speaker and the listener.
Arriving at the wedding dinner, served by French, attended by Italians, with a few other nationalities thrown in as guests, my mind was in a mixed soup of sound until the celebration ended and we returned to our room at 3:00 in the morning.
Somewhere along the line late yesterday, my comprehension and command of Italian started waning. I wasn’t understanding a word that Miriam was saying and asked her more often than not to repeat what she had said.
Today, it became almost funny. She and I switched to English and talked about what I was experiencing. I realized that in the nearly one month that I’ve been here, I’ve occasionally seen a few Italian-speaking friends for an hour or two and have had transactional conversations when shopping, but have been alone for the most part.
This weekend, I jumped into 48 hours of continuous foreign language, adding French to the mix! And switching back-and-forth between the three, hearing and speaking, really pushed my brain to overload.
I also realized that, if I’m tired and/or hungry, my language competence quickly diminishes! Low blood sugar and lack of sleep do not improve my language skills. (Miriam even commented on the increased number of errors in my speaking.) I had “hit the wall”.
Another curious thing I noted was my resistance to speaking English because of being in a foreign country. I didn’t come to Italy or France to practice my English, but I recognize that sometimes my resistance to resort to English hampered communication.
After about lunch time today, we switched to English almost entirely, tossing in Italian only now-and-then. Our long drive home was made even richer by conversation because of Miriam’s greater ease with English than mine with Italian.
Grazie, Miriam, per la tua pazienza con il mio Italiano!
This is real Italian food. They’re not over here just eating pizza and spaghetti. And they’re NOT eating “Fettucine Alfredo”! (If you see it on a menu, it’s only there for the tourists.) The range of Italian food is so vast. It truly does change every hundred kilometers. And most of it is nothing like seen in “Italian Restaurants” in the U.S.
When here, I eat everything that’s regional and typical to an area. I eat what I can’t get in Seattle. As I travel and seek out a meal, I always ask what the local specialties are and then expand my view of “Italian Food”. Here’s a sampling of what I’ve eaten in the last three weeks.
Soprassata Fiorentina • “Head Cheese” from Florence. I had this when living here a couple of years ago. Found it at a street market with no refrigeration, no running water. This is made of all the extra “head parts” that are cooked and congealed together with seasoning. Mmm. Yummy on a slice of bread. Must be 99% fat.
Fragolini • Little, wild strawberries found growing in the weeds in my courtyard. Actually, they had very little flavor, but I have seen them being sold at the market.
Lardo di Colonnata and Gorgonzola Dolce • Aged, seasoned lard (below, with a streak of meat), and creamy, mild “Sweet” Gorgonzola cheese (above). Both fantastic on a good hunk of bread. (Who needs butter?!)
Torta di Mele, con Gelato di Vaniglia • Apple Tart with Vanilla Gelato. A rare, sweet splurge for me.
Insalata di songino, pomodori e burratina con olio e aceto • Salad of “lamb’s lettuce”, cherry tomatoes and “burratina” cheese, drizzled with olive oil and a thick balsamic “cream”. Burratina is a small version of “Burrata”, a fist-sized ball with an outer layer like fresh mozzarella about 1/8″ thick, containing soft, creamy/runny, semi-solid cheese within. Heaven on a bed of greens!
Panzerotto Luini • Deep-fried bread pocket (filled with spinach and ricotta) from Luini’s by the Duomo. Inexpensive, hand-food that the locals all know about. Carry it around and eat it while walking.
Ribollita • Tuscan bread and vegetable soup, eaten in Firenze (Florence). The name means, literally “reboiled”.
Spiedina di carne mista • It WAS a skewer of mixed meats, in this case sausage and pork, eaten in Firenze.
Porcini • Two porcini mushrooms for 12 Euro at the street market (about $15!) All the time that I had lived here I never bought fresh porcini! I had to splurge at least once.
Porcini e Pomodori • Porcini and tomatoes (and brooms), cooking in my 35″ wide kitchen/broom closet. I brought the porcini home and cooked them up; also sauteéd some fresh cherry tomatoes.
Porcini with vegetable ravioli, and sauteéd fresh cherry tomatoes with meat ravioli, fresh from the street market.
Pastries from Spezia Pasticceria. My favorites are the Babá in the upper right: sponge cakes absolutely drenched with sweetened rum, with sweet ricotta filling in the middle. One bite and the rum sauce runs down your arm.
My favorite meats (clockwise from the top): Prosciutto (Crudo, di Parma), Bresaola, Mortadella with pistachios. It’s an art ordering your prosciutto cut! The bresaola is 100% lean (also available in horse meat). Mortadella: think “baloney” from when you were a kid, then multiply by 100. This mortadella has pistachios and peppercorns in it, and yes those are chunks of (white) fat.
Here’s the receipt for the meats above: 50 grams of Bresaola for 1,50 euro; 100 grams (“un etto”) Mortadella for 1,29 euro; 50 grams of Prosciutto di Parma for 1,35 euro. I had also bought “Gorgonzola Dolce”, the gooey, creamy, mild gorgonzola for 1,88 euro, and “Vitello Tonnato”, thin-sliced, roasted veal with a pureed tuna mayonnaise sauce on top for 2,47 euro. This was several days’ food for a girlfriend and me for 8,49 euro, about $10.66. (Makes up for the cost of the porcini.)
Bresaola, my favorite. An air-dried, salted beef that has been aged 2-3 months. Almost completely lean, no fat. Sliced paper thin, and when it’s very good, it is moist and supple, not dry and leathery. Note how translucent it is! I can’t buy Italian Bresaola in the U.S. Too many fears of “mad cow disease”.
Insalata con mozzarella di bufala, pomodori e basilico. Vitello tonnato • A salad with fresh mozarella di bufala (yes, buffalo milk), tomatoes, basil, served with “vitello tonnato”, the thin-sliced veal with pureed tuna/mayonnaise sauce.
Salsiccia e fagioli • Sausage and beans, a very Tuscan meal eaten in Firenze.
Verdure al forno • Tuscan oven-roasted vegetables, in Firenze.
On Saturday, three blocks from my house, is the weekly street market selling fruits, vegetables, meats, fish, cheeses, olives, preserved foods, household sundries and clothing. It’s a hub-bub of people buying their provisions for the week.
You have to know “the system” for shopping there. Decide what you want, then go stand in line at the side, and wait your turn to request your purchase. You do NOT pick out your own produce! And you do not simply ask one of the stall vendors out front for what you want; you will be cutting in line in front of others. (I had to learn this a few years ago through observation.)
My big complaint is that although the produce is displayed so beautifully, and the quality is so high, the handling of it all is so rough! Ask for such tender things as tomatoes and apricots and they will arrive home bruised and punctured from having been roughly pitched into the bag.
It still feels like high-pressure shopping to me after several years. But whether I stock up for the week there or not, the Saturday street market is always an opportunity for gathering beautiful images. In addition to the gorgeous berries, lemons, olives and fish, I enjoy the “Street Market Script” used to write out the quick signs. (Some have begun to use computer-generated signs and they’ve lost all character.)
The Naviglio Grande – The Grand Canal – is between my casa and the metro subway station, Porta Genova. This gives me plenty of opportunity to stroll the canals and see what I can see, to allow my eye to be caught by sight.
Pharmacy and Sweet Shop, with residences above.
This is the door to an artist’s studio. The Naviglio Grande is lined with studios, antique shops, restaurants and gelato sellers. It’s a hot spot in the evening!
Classic look in signage and appearance satisfies the stereotype of “Italian Style”, likely drawing the tourists.
It’s no joke that I’m in the “presidential suite” at the Palace Hotel, in the region of Calabria, the town of Catanzaro Lido. The waves of the Ionian Sea are rolling in just off my private balcony. I could throw a stone (hard) and it would land in the water, on the other side of the Via Lungomare – the road along the sea. I will sleep with the sound of incoming saltwater tonight.
When one “leaves their options open” or “plays it by ear” sometimes there aren’t many options left, thus, the Presidential Suite, with it’s brocade-clad, padded walls. But after the raucous three nights in Cefalu and Taormina Sicilia, I needed some quiet and something unlike Disneyland.
Last night I slept a much-needed, holy sleep. Today I amused myself with exploration. First thing, I went to the little travel agency next to my hotel to buy my ticket for a long train ride tomorrow. At the agency, I met Valentina and Aurelia, and a man they know from Naples. We all laughed and talked for half an hour and it was the kind of personal connection I needed. (When I returned to my room tonight, Aurelia dropped by a beautifully packaged gift of some homemade soppressata. How dear! I happened to have brought some “Seattle Spices” along with me in case I needed a gift, plus some personal note cards, so I wrote out some notes to the two women and stopped over to drop them off.)
Aurelia’s Soppressata is delicious, with a slight smokey flavor:
After the travel agency, I hit the road… and then stood there. I found the newsstand where I could buy a city bus ticket, then I found the bus stop and asked a young guy if I was in the right place to go to the city of Catanzaro (the part up on the hill). I was at the right stop and the bus was “10 minutes away”. Hopeful and anxious passengers started gathering, and waiting, and complaining. Congested traffic on narrow streets in Catanzaro Lido was almost comic. (Imagine two cement mixers passing each other! They did so in the extra width of an intersection, likely well-practiced.)
As I waited with everyone else, I was pleased that I was having a snippet of REAL daily life of a Catanzaro citizen. (There wasn’t a tour group in sight.) An hour after waiting, I got on the bus with just a small, general map of the two Catanzaros, and absolutely NO idea where I was going, what I would see or when I would get off. How lost could I get? I could always get a cab if it came to that.
I marvel at the systematic chaos that is traffic in Italy, and especially here in the south. It all seems to work, but slowly. There are very few stop lights and much bravado, and it took forever for the full-size city bus to make it through Catanzaro Lido. We stopped at the train station, then through little pocket towns like beads on a string that seem to comprise greater Catanzaro.
We kept winding up toward the hill top. What was I looking for? People. Curious sights and signs. Something to catch my eye. History. I could find the duomo – cathedral – on my little map, but couldn’t determine where we were in relation to each other.
I rode until the near-northernmost point of the city and got out at lunchtime. In a little grocery, I bought toothpaste, shampoo, 50 grams of mortadella and a sliver wedge of some lovely blue cheese. At the neighboring baker’s, I bought a square of focaccia with tomato sauce, which they heated for me. I carried my stash through the city amidst 10-story apartment buildings and scrawny, stray cats, and found a little park bench in a windy spot. I lay the meat and cheese onto my focaccia, folded the whole thing in half and had an amazing sandwich, washed down with San Pellegrino.
Since it had taken nearly 2 hours to get UP to the top, by 3:00 I figured I’d better start heading back down to the hotel. It was a quicker journey somehow, and I got off at the west end of town to walk, look, shoot and shop for dinner and my train lunch tomorrow. It’ll be a 7-hour journey tomorrow, with one shuttle ride, three coarse, regional trains and two quick train transfers. There’ll be no time or place to buy food, so this afternoon I stopped at the bakery for a couple of fresh rolls, at the meat shop for fresh buffalo mozzarella, at the produce vendor for fresh peas in-the-shell, datterini tomatoes, two mandarins and a pear, and the pastry shop for a couple of biscotti. That ought to be a lovely train lunch!
How did I pick Catanzaro in the first place? I was in Sicilia and just had to get out of Taormina. I was heading east to Puglia and Catanzaro was in between. It’s also the hometown of my first Italian “professoressa”, Enza. And… quite simply, I was able to find a hotel room available.
Tomorrow, from the ball-of-the-foot here in Calabria, to the heel in Puglia.
Sitting in a hotel lobby using the wifi network. Italian game show on the TV next to me. Don McClean singing “American Pie” on the sound system. I hear more American Pop music here than Italian, both oldies and contemporary. It always amuses me, but doesn’t introduce me to Italy’s sounds.
How can there be any other way to eat? The Saturday market is now just one block away from my apartment and it goes on for blocks. The selection of meats, cheeses, fruits, vegetables, and other delicious things makes the market a must-stop. Apparently everyone local thinks so, too.
Ahh! Grana Padano! Note the pattern on the side of the cheese wheel. When you see that diamond-shaped imprint, you know it’s the real thing.
Why have butter when you can have lard (or olive oil)? Yum! A slice of lard on a good hunk of bread: Yes!
My purchases today included:
Bouquet of anemones for my friend, Ewa
“Sweet” Olives from Puglia – Green and meaty
Cherry Tomatoes from Sicily
Pomodori di Pachino – Green and red skinned, crisp tomatoes
Pickled Artichoke Hearts and Onions
Ravioli stuffed with asparagus and fresh ricotta
Basil – dirt still on the roots
Eggs – handwrapped
Peas – fresh in the shell
Mozzarella – freshly made
Mortadella of Wild Boar with Black Truffles and Pistachios (!!!)
I couldn’t wait to get home and shove it all in my mouth!
Oooo! The Mortadella with truffle!
The pickled onions and sweet olives!
I cooked the ravioli while I cut up the tomatoes, basil and some of the mozzarella. When the pasta was finished, I shelled the fresh peas right onto the hot ravioli, then dumped everything together and drizzled it all with bright green extra virgin olive oil and some crema di balsamico, a reduced balsamic vinegar from Modena.
Oh… Wow. Mmm.
…And this food is not “gourmet”. And it’s not being sold at high-priced, specialty grocery stores. This is daily fare.
