Last night was so great! The De Renzis threw a party for their artist friend who died last year and since I filled out most of the 1,100 invitations to this party, I had no moral qualms with filling out one for myself. The guest list for this party was for the creme of the crop of Italy. Baron this, Duke that. Princes and Princesses. I mingled with the best of them! It was held in a big palace in downtown Florence with all of the artist's pieces on exhibition. There was free wine and pastries and lots of hand-made jewelry and prints of the art for sale. The proceeds went to a foundation for artists. Afterwards was a dinner in a classic italian restaurant with long tables and plenty of vino. My friend Domenico, Fabio, and the richest lady in all of Florence, Marianna, formed our own little table on the side. I spent quite a while talking with Marianna. She was very smart and interesting! I also met this amaaazingly gorgeous woman who was half English and half Italian and she is a teacher of english. We spent quite a while talking. It's too bad that I still don't know if I'm coming back or not. I've asked Caterina several times to please, for the love of god, to just tell me if I should buy a ticket back after Christmas or not. Every time she avoids the question or tells me she'll let me know as soon as possible.
Well, now it's Satuday morning. I have the most harrowing and torturous day(s) of travel ahead of me. Senti: Right now it is 11:41 Saturday morning. First, I will take a bus from Montespertoli to Florence. Then, I will take a train from Florence to Pisa. Then I will take a plane from Pisa to Stansted airport in London. Then I will take a coach bus from Stansted to Heathrow airport in England. Then I take a flight from Heathrow to Shannon airport in Ireland. Then I will take an international flight from Ireland to New York City. Then another flight from NYC to Houston where hopefully Joey will remember to pick me up at 23:50 from the airport. It's going to be horrible, but totally worth it to see my wonderful, wonderful family and friends who I've missed so much. See everyone soon!

Just When I Thought Things Couldn't Get Any Worse..(12/6/06)
...They get better. The last two days have made me completely rethink everything. They've just gone so smoothly and Caterina has been so nice, and everything has been just perfect. I've been having all the time in Florence that I want, and in the evenings Caterina has been helping me with dinner and even a miracle of miracles happened! She made Leone and Virginia help clean up after dinner one night! And then tonight, I made dinner and Caterina actually complimented my cooking! And then after we ate we all sat around watching Fight Club in italian and it was...nice. I don't know what the difference is, but it seems like this is how it should be. I'd like to think that maybe Caterina is realizing that not everything that goes wrong is my fault, that I'm actually competent to do things, etc. but we'll see how long it lasts. I still don't know if I'm invited to come back after Christmas (Although I'm kind of assuming I am, based on the raise and all) or if I even want to come back. What do I do??

I Have No Idea What in the Hell is Going On (12/3/06)-

Exactly one week ago today, I got fired because I couldn't find the cheese. Caterina had told me to grate some parmesan cheese up for dinner and I didn't see the wedge of parmesan nestled in with the other 21343697 kinds of cheese the Sonninos keep in a plastic tupperware container in the fridge. After Caterina successfully found the cheese herself, she says to me “Jimmy, when I tell you to find the cheese, you keep looking until you find the cheese! You know what? I think that after Christmas, you just don't come back.”
And that was that. The ironic part is that literally 10 minutes after this happened, Caterina couldn't find the brand new stick of butter laying in plain sight in the door of the refridgerator, but unlike not being able to find the cheese, not finding butter is a completely understandable mistake that anyone could make. But that is neither here nor there. The point is, she told me to not come back and I am actually pretty OK with that. It's not like this job is the best thing that's ever happened to me. But that was back when things were simple. I formulated a great plan. I was going to buy a one-way ticket home leaving on the 16th of December (Caterina wanted me to stay until the 22nd, but there's no way I'm paying several hundred extra dollars to make her happy...), and I would just search as hard as I could for a new job from now until the day my flight leaves. If I find something else, great, I'll take it and be ecstatic. If not, well then I'll have to go home and think of something else to do.
Tuesday night, after I'd cooked dinner and cleaned up from dinner and put the kids to bed and helped Leone with his homework and cleaned up all the messes they'd made in the living room and computer room, and straightened the cushions on the couch (Caterina has rage blackouts if the cushions aren't straight) and prepared a tray of cereal and biscuits and fresh fruit and bowls and spoons for the next morning so that I could focus all my energy in the morning into dragging Leone from his bed, Caterina casually asks me if I would take the kids to school the next day and then come back to the house to help the cleaning lady do her job. Now, normally, I do this kind of thing all the time. Not because it's my job but because I was foolish enough to think that if I broke my back working for Caterina maybe she'd actually be happy with me. However, having been fired for not finding the cheese, I wasn't much in the mood to work 11 or 12 hour days anymore. My attitude was basically “To hell with this job and this crazy woman.” So... I told her no. I told her that it's not my job to help the cleaning lady clean, which is true. It's only my job to clean up after myself and the kid's immediate messes (I didn't know this until a few days ago when I asked Anna, the lady who found me this job, what exactly was written in my contract about my work. She said I wasn't responsible for cleaning the house everyday or for cleaning/ironing/putting away the children's clothes. I've been helping the cleaning lady clean almost everyday for the past month instead of spending the school hours in Florence like I was promised I'd be able to before I came here). I told her that I had been working 11 and 12 hour days without breaks or thank you's, and that I had the work log I'd created a few weeks ago to prove it. I told her that I felt abused, exploited, and unappreciated. I told her that she never made one single effort to make me feel like a part of the family, that she didn't do anything for my birthday, that she never invited me along on family trips. She didn't even tell me when the family dog died, a dog that I had been caring for, taking to the vet everyday, holding him up so he could use the bathroom and eat (because he was too weak to do on his this on his own) for his last dying weeks. I told her that I hadn't had more than a few scattered, random days in Florence in the past month and a half, and that I needed the day in Florence to find a job before she ruined my life. Finally, after all this she screamed "FINE! Stay in Florence for the day!!" and stomped off like a little girl whose parents wouldn't buy her the lollipop she wanted.
Then things got really weird. I had a nice day in Florence, I saw this amazing church, Santa Maria Novella, and ate at Mesopotamia Kebab, the best kebabs this side of the Euphrates. It was a great day, but I was expecting to come home to find my suitcase on the street in front of the house. Instead, everything was eerily calm. I managed to avoid Caterina for most of the day. Then, that night after I'd made dinner and was cleaning up all the dishes, Alessandro approaches me. He says “Jimmy, you work really hard for this family. How about a raise? How does 700 euro per month instead of 500 sound?” I told him it sounded terrible and he laughed and I was left bewildered, but, for the first time since I've been here, feeling really appreciated. However, I am now too untrusting of this family to just take the interaction for face value. I think that either a) Caterina doesn't remember firing me (rage blackout) and the threat of me finding a new job made them realize that with Frank, Darshani, and me all gone, they would actually have to do things for themselves which is a fate worse than death so they offered me a bribe to stay, b) Alessandro actually meant what he said and they didn't realize how hard I'd been working until I screamed it at Caterina, or c) they wanted to intice me to stick around until they could find a replacement. I think it's some combination of A and C. But at the moment, I didn't care. It's a considerable raise!
Then, on Saturday morning, I woke up at 9 am to help around the house, even though Saturday is supposed to be something of a day off (but really it's like “Jimmy, do this and this and take Leone to his friend's house and then once he's gone you can do whatever you want”), I was feeling helpful and I knew that if Leone and his friend who had spent the night had to make their own cereal there would be hell to pay, day off or not. So I woke up, cleaned my bathroom and bedroom, made breakfast for the boys, helped Leone with his homework, took out the trash, fed Rosa (don't get me started on how ridiculously well the dog eats. Feeding her doesn't consist of pouring dog food into a bowl like it does everywhere else in the world. Let's just say it involves pots, pans, and raw hamburger meat which has to be bought from the butcher every few days), and was in the middle of mopping my bedroom floor when Caterina strolls out of bed about noon. First she asks me if Leone had done his homework, and I said I'd been helping him with it all morning and that he was doing the italian portion right now. Then she asks if I fed Rosa and I said I had. Then she asks if I'd vacuumed the living room floor. What? No, I hadn't vacuumed the living room floor. It's not my job to vacuum the living room floor. “Why doesn't she ask the cleaning lady (who is standing 5 feet from us) if she had vacuumed the floor?” I thought. Caterina begins harassing me about vacuuming the floor when I tell her “Look, what do you expect from me? I've been up since 9 cleaning and tutoring and working nonstop since I woke up. If you want me to vacuum the floor I'll do it but that means I won't help Leone with his homework or scrub my bathroom floor, or do something else that I'm supposed to be doing.” Caterina basically ended the conversation as gracefully as she could right there. Then a few minutes later, she takes me aside to another room and closes the door. The first thing she says is “Jimmy if you ever talk back to me like that again, then five minutes later you're gone.” I don't say anything back because I'm too speechless. Then she says something completely out of nowhere about how whenever she leaves the house she tells everyone where she is going so there's no confusion. “What??” Then she mentions that I've spent the last few days in Florence and how I got a raise and how that means I'm supposed to be working more. I tell her the same thing I told her a few minutes ago that I'd been working constantly since I woke up. Then she randomly asks me when I'm leaving for Christmas. I tell her the 16th and she flips out. I told her that I booked the flight after she told me not to come back after Christmas, and I wasn't going to spend several extra hundred dollars to stay until the 22nd when I wasn't even coming back. Then I asked her if I was coming back or not, because she told me not to, but Alessandro gave me a raise and I was confused. She responded with “Jimmy, I told you I don't want to talk about this anymore!” And I said “What? We haven't talked about anything since last Sunday when you told me to not come back! Just answer the question please, yes or no, am I coming back after Christmas?” and she said “Alessandro gets back tomorrow. You ask him whether or not you're coming back.”
So that was Saturday. Today is now Sunday. Last night I went to Florence and ate another delicious yufka kebab (I'm addicted!) and then met Fabio aand some of his friends at a happenin' night club. One of his friends, a man named Dominico, who is apparently involved with the fashion world somehow, listened as I described my plight to him. He gave me his phone number and told me to call him on Monday because he was sure he had a job for me. Another one of Fabio's friend's, a man named Ori might also have a job for me editing a magazine for tourists. Frank and Darshani said before they left that their friend might have a job for me as well. We'll see if any of these actually pan out though. I'm not holding my breath. I'm not coming back after Christmas though, no matter what Alessandro says. I can't stand living with this woman who screams at me so much. This woman who is never happy no matter what I do. I really want to stay in Italy because I like it here and I've already made some really good friends. Finding a job will be difficult, though. I guess we'll see how it turns out in the next few days.

11/20/06-
Well, what to say? I haven't written anything in quite a while. I'm not sure why the slow down. I guess it's partly because of the feeling of running out of things to say, and partly because I think for a week or so I was pretty miserable. Things with Caterina were downright unbearable. I was seeing some real fundamental problems with the way this household functioned, the way she was raising Leone, and my role in it all. I guess nothing has really changed, except that I am learning how to adapt to get the results I want using the tools I've been given. Since I'm really not allowed to discipline Leone, I've been having to think of other ways to impose on this spoiled rotten boy all the discipline and respect and decency I can, since he is not getting lessons in these areas from anywhere else in this household. A lot of the problem lies in that Leone is simply a product of his mother's example, and she can be terrible if she's in the wrong mood. A good portion of my energy goes into what I call Putting Leone in his Place. He is used to hearing his mother complain about “the help” so he does it as well. His favorite things to say are “Nobody in this family likes you”, “Jimmy, we pay you too much” and things of this nature, meant to generally demoralize me and assert his imagined dominance over me. Luckily, this provides me with lots of opportunities to practice my witty retort, and to mentally outmaneuver him in general. One morning, as I was pouring a bowl of cereal, he says “Jimmy, you eat too much. You're the au pair, you should just watch,” to which I snapped back “Leone, you talk too much, You're the child, you should shut the hell up.” And he did. Another morning he wanted me to pick him up from school and take him to his tennis lesson, which is only 10 minutes by foot from the school and a walk that he usually makes himself. I told him no, that I wasn't going to interrupt my day to drive him to tennis when he can easily walk. His solution to my insolence was to leave his tennis racket in the car when I dropped him off for school, so that I would be forced to come back and give him his racket and a ride. My solution to his solution was to take his racket to the place where the tennis lessons are held and ask them to hold on to it until Leone arrived there after school.
In general though, things are good. At times it seems like things are horrible. Like when Leone is having a day when he absolutely won't sit still, or when Caterina is in one of her moods, but I am doing a good job of taking a step back, remembering that I'm doing all this for the experience of it, and whether that is good or bad, I'm certainly having an experience! Gaia says this is a defense mechanism my brain is using to cope with all this craziness, but that that is a good thing since it is, afterall, proof that my brain works.
Fall is here and the colors are absolutely amazing. I've been taking too many pictures to post them just yet, but once things are cold and grey and colorless, I'll stop taking and start uploading. Many times I find myself reaching for the camera as I'm driving because there is a row of enormous trees lining the street on both sides with leaves of orange, yellow and brown, or something else that I have to take a picture of. Today I took a picture of a completely yellow tree with a car parked underneath it of exactly the same shade of yellow. I don't think it will look as good in the picture as it did in real life, though.
Frank and Darshani are leaving. I'm very sad about this. I've grown to like them very much, but I don't blame them at all for leaving. They are treated like animals. If they make one little mistake, they get chewed out incessantly. If they fail to anticipate what Caterina or Alessandro want, they get chewed out incessantly. They are often brought into the room and have to stand there silently while either Caterina or Alessandro simultaneously shoves food in their mouths while insulting them and telling them in detail how terrible the food is. They are saints to deal with it for as long as they have. Whenever I complain at the way I'm treated in this family, I have to think about how much worse it could be. The really bad part is that I know it's truly a class issue. Frank and Darshani are from Sri Lanka, and they're relatively uneducated (although very smart), and basically they are expected to serve and to not have feelings. However, the worst part is that the people of this family will never know how amazing they are. Frank was telling me how, four years ago, he was working in Sri Lanka, making so little money that he would never be able to save enough to buy a house, despite the fact that he had a really good job, handling the books for a major manufacturing company. So he sold his car and everything he could and paid the 7,000 euro it cost to buy a ticket to Italy and to pay for his visa. He found himself in a strange new land, where he didn't speak or understand a single word of the language, and was literally standing on the corner begging for money or a prospect. Luckily, he found a job somehow and was able to save enough for Darshani to come join him. Now, four years later, he speaks fluent Italian and English and is leaving a job because he's not getting the respect he deserves. It's not quite the rags-to-riches success story we're used to in America, but it's definitely an impressive tale. I'm so proud and happy for them that they're leaving because it hurt me to see such a noble, hardworking and intelligent couple be treated so badly by this “nobility.” I think that the more that life gives you in the way of luck, fortune, and inheritance, the less entitled you are to be petty and cold to the people around you.
Gaia and I decided to just be friends. This makes sense because we get along great but my schedule isn't really reliable enough for a relationship. She's a little bummed, I think, but I'm feeling much better because I always felt so miserable when I told her we could hang out only to have Caterina change her mind at the last minute and call me away to duty. We went to Rome though and that was lots of fun. We basically did everything that was free, which is a lot. All the really good stuff is either a church or just laying around on the ground for anyone and everyone to look at. I'd like to go back of course and visit some museums, but there's time for that. We were only there for one full day because we didn't want to pay the outrageous hotel prices in Rome.
My mastery of the language is coming along nicely but slowly. Of course I'm frustrated with my lack of communication ability and I have to remind myself constantly that I've only been here two months and that's not enough time to learn a language. I'm learning A LOT though! I'm pretty happy. I can almost watch TV in Italian without missing a beat. I'm constantly finding joy in the way things are worded. I also get joy from adding to my list of ways Italian is like a battle of words.

My List of Ways Italian is Like a Battle of Words:
1)They answer the phone with “Pronto!” which literally means “Ready!”
2)When you walk into a store, the person taking your order says “Dimme” which means “Tell me.”
3)The three most common things I hear shouted are “Vai!”, “Dai!” and “Muoveti!” which mean “Go!”, “Come on!” and “Move it!” in that order. I hear these all the time.
4)A good number of sentences begin with “Senti” and often conclude with “Basta” which mean “You listen” and “Enough.”

There's probably more but that's all I can remember right now.

Rome In a Day, By Jimmy and Gaia-

If there is a god, I feel sorry for him/her-
I realized the other night that doing this job is in a small way what it must feel like to be god, for this reason: If I do everything right, nobody notices or says a thing. If something goes wrong everyone is quick to curse me.
In Italy, nobody likes to go to work and italians are quick to think of excuses to skirt their jobs. An example of this is for Halloween. Here, everyone has some vague notion of a generic "saints day" on the first of November, and they use this is an excuse to take off an entire week. Well, I think most italians worked on Monday the 30th and Tuesday the 31st, but then took the rest of the week off. Leone, going to the American school, took Tuesday off as well. Anyway, so the family decided to go to Genova for two days to attend the Festival Della Scienza, leaving me in the house alone. This is fairly normal, and I don't really take it personally because a) I enjoy the time alone and b) Caterina usually says something like "Oh, we would take you with us but Alessandro rarely gets so much alone time with the kids and etc., etc." Anyway, so she said basically to just turn on the alarm when I leave and to make sure the dogs are fed and to enjoy the time off and that they would return sometime Thursday evening. It sounded good to me, so I relaxed, did some reading, hung out with Gaia, studied some Italian and had a nice time. Thursday night, at about 8:30, I was in Florence. I had just given an english lesson to this cool guy I met named Fabio and I called up Gaia to see if she wanted to eat dinner. So I went over to her place and Caterina called me. She asked if I was at the house and I said no, that I was at Gaia's about to eat with her. Caterina said that they were almost home and she wondered if I could be there to help make dinner (Frank and Darshani also got the two days off). I said sure, no problem, and, sadly, left Gaia's house without eating. When I got home, Caterina almost immediately started screaming at me because I wasn't there, making dinner when they arrived! Then she said it was too late to eat and that everybody was going to bed without dinner, that she was furious with me because I hadn't done any work around the house while they were gone (?? What?) and that I should think about these things. I said all the obvious things that someone in my position should say, such as "I'm sorry, you said I had the time off, I didn't know what time you were returning, if you were expecting me to make you dinner you should have told me, I did everything you said to do (setting the alarm when I left and feeding the dogs), etc." But all of these perfectly legitimate responses were treated like attacks towards Caterina. Apparently, I should have called Caterina to ask if they were going to be home in time for dinner and that she can't be burdened with having to think of EVERYTHING (Nevermind the fact that she had 5 hours in the car to think "Hey, maybe I should call Jimmy and tell him we're going to be home at 9 and hungry?"). On top of that, apparently, feeding the dogs was my only concern in addition to my other, never-before-stated duties that I didn't know about but that I'm supposed to be doing, such as straightening a bookshelf that has been sitting untouched in the kid's room since I got here and is only in minimal disarray (at worst), or preparing Leone's new desk for the next week of school, a desk which is nothing except an empty wooden desk with a pencil holder and Leone's backpack sitting on the surface, which cannot be any more organized as far as I can tell, or some other made-up-on-the-spot-by-Caterina-for-the-purposes-of-having-something-to-yell-at-me-for-not-doing duty.
*sigh*
I went to bed hungry, upset, and unappreciated.

The Autobiography of Theodore Roosevelt-
I would highly recommend this book to anyone with an interest in seeing the world from the point of view of probably one of the greatest men in history. I read 20-30 pages every night before I go to bed and although at times it is quite slow-going, it is rarely uninteresting. If I had been more clever I would have attached a holster to the spine of the book for the purpose of keeping a highlighter handy because he consistently saying notable things about life that are not only interesting and useful but also worded concisely. There is a paragraph that I read on Monday that explains his frame of mind regarding internal affairs as he is beginning his position as president after the assassination of President McKinley. He says:

In internal affairs, I cannot say that I intered the Presidency with any deliberately planned and far-reaching scheme of social betterment. I had, however, certain strong convictions; and I was on the lookout for every opportunity of realizing those convictions. I was bent upon making the Goverment the most efficient possible instrument in helping the people of the United States to better themselves in every way, politically, socially, and industrially. I believed with all my heart in real and thoroughgoing democracy, and I wished to make this democracy industrial as well as political, although I had only partially formulated the methods I believed we should follow. I believed in the people's rights, and therefore in National rights and States' rights just exactly to the degree in which they severally secured popular rights. I believed in invoking the National power with absolute freedom for every National need; and I believed that the Constitution should be treated as the greatest document ever devised by the wit of man to aid a people in exercising every power necessary for its own betterment, and not as a straightjacket cunningly fashioned to strangle growth. As for the particular methods of realizing these various beliefs, I was content to wait and see what method might be necessary in each given case as it arose; and I was certain that the cases would arise fast enough.

After I reading this I thought it was a fantastic way to look at things. It seems like in America today the democrats are criticized for not having a plan of action for the future. However, I'm with Teddy on this one. Why is it so important to have a plan of action? What is wrong with a set of convictions, and an eagerness to apply them to situations that arise? I mean, isn't that why people like the democratic party? Because they believe in things like helping out the little guy, people's rights over business' rights, freedom of choice, etc.? The biggest flaw in this logic is that the democrats need a plan to resolve the war in Iraq, which is, afterall, the end result of a stupid man with a stupid plan. After Bush's 6 years of bumbling initiative, any candidate who promises to apologize publicly for Bush, bring the troops home, and just be clever and humanistic about whatever problems arise in the future has my vote.

In Italy, everyone shakes your hand on your birthday-
Kind of a depressing birthday. The best part was making friends with Kelly, the owner of my favorite pub (I've mentioned it before, it was where I ate with Sarah the Scott), who gave me a free pint of beer and is generally a nice person all around. I've found myself in there more and more, usually just buying a beer or a dessert and then sitting at the table and studying my italian. Kelly is from England but has been living in Italy for 13 years so she helps me if I ask her questions about the language. If she doesn't know the answer she asks one of the other patrons and they get all excited and stand up to talk and to engage me and we have a conversation in either broken english or italian, depending on who is speaking. It is a good time all around. There is one couple named Lilith and something I can't remember who come in regularly for lunch. Lilith thinks I'm very brave for being here and she speaks very good english and loves to help me out with my queries. The low point was fighting with Leone constantly (The low point of every day).

Lack of updates-
Sorry everyone that I've been slacking lately, but it just seems like the days are flying by and I'm not having as much “me” time as I would like. But that is okay, that just means that I'm keeping busy which is a very good alternative to having lots of “me” time. The reason for this is threefold. Firstly, I am starting to realize that to do this job entails a lot more than I previously assumed. As far as Leone is concerned, I'm taking a much more pro-active approach to him and his school work. This includes checking his school diary for his assignments, questioning him about his work, looking over it, giving Caterina daily updates and letting her know when Leone has reading in italian to do, and then givng her Leone's textbook so she can give him pop quizzes throughout the evening. In addition to all this I've been trying to help out Frank and Darshani, the Sri Lankan couple that is living here doing the cooking and cleaning (I can't remember if I mentioned that the original couple left because they couldn't stand working in this insane household. Anyway, they did and now there's a new husband and wife living here). They are awesome, I like them so much. Frank speaks fairly well in english and understands my jilted italian, and Darshani understands english if you speak very slowly. It is fun to help them in the kitchen (which Caterina loves it when I do this, by the way) and the whole time we can vent our frustrations together. It's theraputic. They are just the nicest and sweetest people.
The second fold is because I've finally developed some sort of social life, having met Lilith and Kelly and one of Lilitah's friends, a girl named Gaia who is very awesome and nice. She's really smart, speaks english really well, and is very enthusiastic about helping me out learning about Italy and tutoring me in italian. She is also quite foxy. We've hung out a few times, the first being last Sunday, we drove to San Gimignano which is this awesome (yet tourist-filled) town with a bunch of towers and lots of maze-like streets to walk around in. Unfortunately we were originally only meeting for lunch so I didn't think to bring my camera. The second time we hung out at her place and I read to her in italian to help my pronounciation, and then went back sentence-by-sentence to understand everything. It was very helpful! She also taught me some bad words to say to Leone when he's misbehaving.
The third fold was because I was tired of ranting about Leone problems, and for a while there that was all I had to talk about.

More on Leone-

Well, I have been doing some soul searching regarding Leone and this whole mess. I've decided (with the help of conversations with Mom and Matt) that I need to first, sit down with Caterina and find out exactly what my job description is. It might sound weird to say this nearly one month into my stay here, but I believe there is something fundamentally at odds with what I am expected to actually do and what Caterina wishes me to do. For starters, she wants me to change Leone for the better. She told me this on the first day I got here. She says things that make it very clear to me that Leone is a wild hellian with little to no respect for most things. I find myself that he is a boy of absolutely dismal levels of moral character. It has been interesting for me these past few weeks because every night I read a few dozen pages from The Autobiography of Theodore Roosevelt, and one thing which he repeats over and over and over is his belief in appointing, befriending, and generally associating himself with men who possess the characteristics of honesty, responsibility, and who do not skirt their duties. This nightly reading juxtaposed with Leone's daily behavior makes his faults in these areas all the more apparent. He will lie any chance he gets, about stupid and/or inconsequential things without any regard to the obviousness of the lie. He'll also lie about important things. He lies without fear of getting punished for being caught. One good example is Thursday, October 12th. Leone had received 4 progress reports in the mail, saying he was failing 4 of his classes. Since Caterina had been out of town all week, this was something serious that was looming on the horizon but had been temporarily shoved aside while she was gone. On Thursday when I picked up Leone from school we had to immediately go to the airport to pick up Caterina, something Leone was fearing. As soon as he gets in the car he says “JIMMY I have to go home RIGHT NOW I have sooooo much homework to do, I can't go to the airport I need to start RIGHT NOW! If you don't take me straight home and I don't finish my homework it will be YOUR FAULT!!”
Scenario One: I do what Leone requests. This means an hour drive from his school to Montespertoli and then another hour drive back into Firenze to get Caterina (All the while she's waiting at the airport for her ride), then another hour drive back to Montespertoli.
Scenario Two: I go straight to the airport, pick up Caterina and we all drive back to Montespertoli, delaying Leone's homework at max 20 minutes.
Obviously the first scenario is ridiculous. I told Leone this and that it was ridiculous of him to suggest it and that if he really needed time that badly he could start his homework in the car. He got mad at me and refused to talk to me. He also tried to give me incorrect directions to the airport, but I was too clever for him. Anyway, as soon as his mom gets in the car he starts talking about how he's excited that he can finally watch TV again. When I confront him with the fact that he's not watching any TV if he has all this homework to do, he dismissively admits that he hasn't any homework at all. He would have had me drive two additional hours simply to temporarily avoid confrontation with his mom. Which, as it turned out wasn't even bad and as far as I can see, nothing has occurred. As I type this it is Friday night and Leone is at a friend's house spending the night.
It is obvious to me now that any attempt of mine to put my foot down and enforce some sort of regulation or discipline on Leone is treated with contempt by both Leone and Caterina. The rest of the household I think sees this as a laudible attempt but futile in the end. Once or twice I've caught Virginia harboring Leone in the study, remaining silent as I look for him but knowing perfectly well that he is hidden behind a couch or something, so that he could watch TV illigitimately. The point being, if I want to make an attempt to help Leone become someone that is actually able to function in society, I need to first find out if that is what I'm supposed to do, and then I need to make sure I have the family's support. Otherwise, as wise old Wanda Sneller said, this will never work. It is impossible to change Leone's habits if they are not discouraged on every level. Maybe, though, that is not what I am here to do after all. Maybe this is just a nice idea which Caterina pays lip service to but is not actually interested in. Maybe she just wants someone to tell Leone once what he should be doing and then do it for him given the eventuality of his noncompliance. If that is the case, I will be thoroughly disappointed. I want to be able to look back on my time here with some feeling of accomplishment, not simply as some time I spent in Italy catering to a spoiled 13 year old. If I could only have enough influence to turn him into a reasonably honest man, I would consider it a success.

Violence For Love:


Peace:


Awesomely Named Pubs and Cute Girls on Mopeds Everywhere:


Sacred Love Profane Love (Drawn on the street with pastels):


Neato Scaffolding on il Duomo di Botticelli:

To Catch a Thief-
Today right after I was done with the serial killer museum I was standing on the corner of the street and I noticed lots of people were behaving oddly, standing in the middle of the street (A hazardous activity in Firenze) trying to look at something. Of course I got up on my tip-toes trying to see, too. Then I noticed a man running towards me, running as fast as he could. Then I noticed four other men chasing him shouting “LADRO! LADROOO!” The best part is that I learned this word today in my italian lesson. It means thief. So after figuring this out, I stuck out my foot as the man ran right by me, tripping him and sending him toppling to the ground. The men chasing him caught up to him and pounced on him and held him for a few minutes until la polizia arrived to arrest him. Nobody around saw what I did but I don't care, I feel proud of myself.

My Parents Were Good Punishers-
Being consistent is important in this matter, no? So Leone is supposed to be having no TV this week (read down further for why), but when I suggested it Caterina said “We've tried this before, it doesn't work, Leone doesn't care.” As soon as she said this I thought something didn't sound right. Leone LOVES watching TV! So now I've figured out the problem. His parents are a bunch of softies when it comes to enforcing it! The very first night of his punishment I walk into the TV room to see Caterina and Leone “playing chess.” True, there was a chessboard in front of them but the TV was also on! The second day of his punishment I catch Leone hidden away up in his father's study watching TV! Then, that night, we all sit down to eat together with the TV on as usual, nobody even thinking about Leone sitting there watching too! I say something about how I think Leone should sit in another room to eat if the TV is going on but I'm pretty sure they thought I was joking. As I type he's at his grandmother's house, and I'm positive all thoughts of his punishment have left everyone's mind except my own. Frustration!!

Serial Killer Museum-
I went to a really great museum today on serial killers. It documented 8 of history's most notable killers, including Jack the Ripper, Ed Gein, Ted Bundy, Andrei Chikatilo, John Wayne Gacy, Elizabeth Bathory, Gilles de Rais and Charles Manson. Unfortunately I wasn't allowed to take pictures of the amazingly detailed and graphic displays for each of these people. For each serial killer there was a wax representation of him or her, along with a gory setup showing something about them. By far the best was Ed Gein, who was the inspiration for the killer in Silence of the Lambs, the guy from Psycho! and the house/situation from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. He had all the “best” characteristics from these three movies. 1) He lived in a creepy old house in the middle of nowhere, 2) He was obsessed with his mom and went crazy when she died. 3) He made a suit from women's skin that he killed. The display showed his house just as it was when police found it, which was gruesome scene of body parts (including his mom's head), some nailed to the wall and some just hanging from chains. He had a lamp with a spinal cord for its post, and a bowl made from a human skull. Some body parts were obtained via gravedigging, and some were from people he killed.
Another really good display was for John Wayne Gacy, who was this crazy guy who would dress as a clown and do children's parties and then often lure one unsuspecting kid home. The display was of Gacy's house, cross-sectioned so you could see the normal living room above the floorboards, with a couch and pictures and everything looking normal and then below the floorboards which showed skeletons and random body parts partly buried in the dirt. In the corner of the display, with his top half above the floorboards and his bottom half below them, was Gacy in full clown suit looking very real and very disturbing.

So Happy-
The best thing ever has happened. I found a place to park for free within reasonable walking distance to Florence.
Before: Drop Leone off from school, drive around for an hour looking for a place to park and finally giving up and paying 5-8 euro to park (The variation is because of this really mean thing the city of Florence does. To discourage people from parking all day and/or to gouge tourists, the parking meters work thusly: for the first hour of parking, you pay one euro. For the second, third, fourth, etc., you pay 2 euro. This way, you have a choice to either pay twice as much for every hour after the first OR return to your car hourly to pay the decent rate. I HATE it!). The other option is to park somewhere in the very outskirts of town and worry all day that I would get a ticket (It is impossible to tell which parking spots are only allowed for residents of that neighborhood or not). Most days it was okay but one day I got a 35 euro parking ticket.
Now: Drop Leone off from school, drive 2 minutes to this spot, walk 15 minutes to get to Firenze through a scenic trail and spend the rest of the day worry free.

The Filming of a Movie-
Today the house was chaotic! Alessandro agreed to let some people film a movie here in the house, so there were camera crews everywhere, and a huuuge white dinner table set up in the courtyard. I really want to go down there and shmooze but this damn language barrier! I think part of the deal was that Alessandro got to be in the movie, because he was sitting at the head of the table while they were filming. There was also dozens of bottles of wine for some reason. Maybe the movie is about wine? That sounds pretty italian. The best part of the night was when I went downstairs and the camera crew's chef was cooking up a storm in the kitchen. He made this amazing pasta with a meaty orange sauce that was the best thing I've eaten since I got here. He was also making the dinner plates for the movie, and there was an extra one which he gave me. It was also delicious. Apparently it was pigeon that I was eating, which sounded a bit unusual but was oh so tasty. While I was eating, Alessandro came in told me there was wine to be had if I wanted some. I said “Oh really? Wine? I don't see any wine..” Look at the pictures to see why this was funny. The other best part of the night was after they were done shooting and Alessandro came upstairs, obviously wasted. He was talking sarcastically about what a difficult day it had been, and how he had to have a lot of strength and endurance to sit, eat and drink wine all day while keeping up appearances.

The Chefs and (some of) the Wine:


The Courtyard with the Table and Crew and Alessandro (In the group of people by the table, he is the one in a tan jacket who has a full head of white hair and a beard):

Frustration with Leone!
I couldn't sleep last night because I was so mad at Leone. This is what I get for trying to be fair. On Monday, I went to pick Leone up from school and one of his teachers came to me to tell me that she was concerned because he was unprepared for class at least once, and that he had gotten two progress reports in the past week! On the ride home I told Leone that of course I would have to tell his mother about this because it was serious. Leone begged and pleaded for me not to and all I could say was that it was my job to. Then, after thinking it over, I came to the conclusion that in the heart of the issue, the problem was between Leone, Caterina, and the teacher. I, only being the messenger, was not really an active player in this scene aside from my job as his tutor and making sure that he does his homework (As far as this is concerned, I ask him what homework he has when I pick him up from school, I make him turn off the TV and do his homework at some point in the evening, and then I ask him again if he is sure he has done all his homework and that it's in his bag ready to go in the morning. Aside from being there to help him if he has questions and checking over his math and english homework, there is not much else I can do). So, in the spirit of maturity and Leone's hopeful ascent into manhood, I offered him this compromise: He could tell his mom about what the teacher said instead of me telling her, and he must do it at the very next available opportunity he had. No stalling. I felt this was a good compromise for several reasons. Firstly, as long as he included the three main points of the conversation with the teacher, he could word it however he wanted, thus giving him a chance to present his side of the story. Secondly, this news coming from Leone's own mouth conveys responsibility and maturity, which hopefully, would help soften the blow of the news itself. I was quite happy with my solution to this problem. I thought it was the perfect resolution. Leone happily accepted my offer. Well, Caterina had been out of town for two days for her work, and so last night was the night she returned home, and thus, showtime for Leone. I told him that tonight was the night to tell her and I even told him that I was going to follow up with Caterina to make sure that Leone said everything he was supposed to and to discuss it generally. Well, after they had spent a few minutes alone together and Caterina had gone off to do something else, I asked Leone if he had talked to her. He said he had. When I asked what her response was, he couldn't think of anything so he admitted that he hadn't told her. I was slightly angry at this, but shrugged it off and told him to do it immediately. I went back to studying for my italian class. In a few minutes I walked into the center room to see Caterina saying goodnight to Leone. Then she kissed him on the forehead and went upstairs to bed. I of course asked him again if he had had this discussion with her. He said he had. I didn't believe him. Anyway, the main point of all this is that I couldn't sleep because I was racking my brain trying to think of ways to turn him into an honest man. Suggestions? If this was the first thing he had lied about it would be bad, but not so bad. But Leone lies constantly!! I ask him if he's taken his bath yet, he lies. I ask him if he's done his homework and apparently he's been lying to me about that too. I asked him again this morning, “Are you sure you talked to your mom about my conversation with the teacher? Because I'm going to ask her if you did and if you've lied to me there are going to be consequences.” “Yes Jimmy I talked to her, I told her everything” Later that day I see Caterina and the first thing I ask her is if Leone had talked to her. This was the first she'd heard of it! I tell her the whole story about the teacher, the compromise, the lie, and how I think Leone should be punished. She agrees to my suggestion of one week without TV.

Some pictures-

Scenic view of Firenze:


View of the Arno river, running through Firenze:


Cellini's Perseus with the Head of Medusa:


Rape of Lucretia:


Just a nice picture:

Sour Grapes?-
Well it has been exactly one week since I've left and it feels like much longer than that! I think it's because this is completely a new life for me and so this first week feels like an entire lifetime! I am finally getting into what will become my daily routine. The first few days Leone was gone at camp and so I wasn't doing much, and Monday he had to go to the dentist to get braces so he didn't go to school so yesterday and today have been the only two real days where I am doing all the work I must do. Getting Leone ready for school in the morning is quite a task! I wake up at 6:30 to get his breakfast ready, wake him up and make sure he eats and is dressed and ready to leave here by 7:10 for the drive to school. After that it's sweet freedom! Yesterday after I dropped Leone off at school I was so tired that I took a 3 hour nap in the back of the car, then walked around for a bit, got something to eat and then it was time to go pick him up again. Not very exciting. Today was better, though. I dropped him off, then parked and made my way to the Duomo di Botticelli. However, the tourist lines (or “queues” as the British call them) were horrible, so I investigated a school that gives Italian lessons to foreigners. I want to take a week of private one-on-one lessons, for two hours a day. I think that should give me enough of a platform to become conversational enough to learn on my own after that. I also had lunch with Lauren, which was alright. She seems like exactly the same old Lauren she always was. It was kind of awkward, maybe. I was nervous to be around her for some reason. I must admit that at first I was a bit jealous of her situation; living in downtown Firenze in a GIANT and modern apartment with wireless internet and satellite TV. Not to mention the fact that she has all the money and free time to do whatever the hell she wants. She's lying to her mom, telling Betsy (who is buying the plane ticket) that she's going to Spain when in fact she's going to AFRICA! Besides that, she's going to towns all over Italy every weekend and just in general it seems like a carefree lifestyle full of all the good and none of the bad. But, the more I think about it, I don't even think it would be that great for me. I mean it's nice and all for her to be on this extended vacation on her parent's dime, but it seems like in the end she will have not gotten much out of it all. If she spends all of her time hanging out with her 5 blonde, female roomates and partying and having fun she won't really get from Italy what (I assume) she came here to get. She'll have spent her year doing what any American collegiate could do but in a prettier setting. On the other hand, my experience here doesn't seem as outwardly glamorous as hers, but I truly feel that when all is said and done that I will have a richer, more authentic feel of this place. Years from now I can come back here and be able to speak the language, have friends here and know my way around. She will just have this hazy memory in her mind of a different country where she stayed a while.

After driving around all day with Caterina-
I'm pretty sure the phrase “I can't talk on my cell phone right now because I am driving a stick-shift car in a town full of lunatic drivers—myself included—who make up the rules of driving as they go along and I am so focused on this conversation that I have basically stopped adhering to one particular lane and have opted instead to wander aimlessly from lane to lane and sometimes right in the middle of two lanes for extend periods of time (not that anybody is noticing or caring except for the people behind me whose honks fall on deaf ears) so I will have to call you back later” doesn't translate into Italian.

Leone
Leone is absent-minded and forgetful and generally unreliable. He is like a whirlwind coming through the room, dropping clothes, possessions, etc. along the way. He's okay though, I like him. Today I helped him with this homework, which was writing a few sentences in english for a “journal entry.” Of course he at first tried to get me to write it for him and of course I did not do that. I told him to write it and I would underline the mistakes. After doing this, I realized right away that he has most trouble with vowels. He'll often try to spell words like terrible as “terribol” or but as “bat” because, for example, the letter A in italian is always pronounced like the U in but. The good news is that he is very susceptible to harmless bribes and he sets himself up for them easily. Whenever I am trying to get him to do something that he doesn't want to do, he'll immediately look for a distraction. That distraction becomes the new bribe! For example, after I'd talked him through each of his spelling mistakes on his homework, I took the homework in my hand and started asking him how to spell certain words that he had missed. He immediately was agonized and moaned loudly. Then, seeing an opportunity to avoid more homework, became suddenly interested in my iPod sitting on the table. I responded that I would gladly let him look at it if he would play along and spell the words for me. He consented, and I managed to squeeze a few more minutes of learning into the anxious and easily fatigued “school zone” of his head.
The bad news is that I have to bother him constantly to do anything, and he doesn't have hardly any responsibilities of his own. Some of the more ridiculous things that I have to make sure get attended to: Leone must drink water every night before bed (he forgets to drink water, according to Caterina (I say don't remind him and see how long that lasts)), Leone must be properly dressed according to the weather that day, Leone must have his schoolwork done and his backpack and locker at school organized. These are all my responsibilites, for Leone will not do any of these things unless you ask him 4 times and then stand there looking at him until he does them. I keep thinking once when I was about his age, going to middle school, and my alarm didn't go off and nobody in my family even noticed I was still sleeping until I woke up at about noon and walked downstairs. By the time I was his age I was waking up on my own, making breakfast, getting dressed, walking to school, doing all my homework and everything else by myself.

The Old Country-
It dawned on me today while I was walking around in Firenze that I really like the old feeling of this region. Sure, the roads are hectic and the sidewalks are cracked and uneven and other things of this nature, but in the end, I think people are generally more conversational and nicer to each other, more humane, and more grounded. People here take off a few hours in the middle of the day to just relax and enjoy themselves. The air is beautiful and clean and the food is usually homemade. If you don't know something, people are glad to help you find out and are rarely disgruntled or impatient with you, and if they don't know the answer they'll gladly make something up and tell it to you with confidence. It's easy to bike and walk places and there is greenery everywhere you look. It is a way of life that challenges one to think, be creative, to laugh and hug and not get fed up with many of the little things that seem to bother Americans so much. I like it. I feel like I am healthier, more robust, relaxed and able to shrug and smile more often. Viva Italia!

Friday the 22nd and Saturday Sept. 23rd-
Well, things are definitely better. They weren't bad before, but I think that each day I've been happier and more confident than the previous day. I met Leone last night and I think we should get along just fine. He is about 5 feet tall with red hair. He mumbles a bit when he doesn't know the english words. We had a long drive back from picking him up and Alessandro, Leone and I talked the whole way in english. He wants me to teach him how to play chess and I will love to oblige. I talked some about my family and how we play games together often. Alessanndro was trying to convince Leone that if some computer games were bought it would be a good way for him to learn how to use the computer (with my help). That is another interesting difference between Italy and America. Everyone here is almost completely computer illiterate! It is quite a good feeling to have them call me a computer genius and hear them say things like “Jimmy is very clever with computers!” I restored the hard drive of a computer belonging to the vineyard and everybody was very impressed. It was easy to do and I'm glad that I could be so helpful. Alessandro hinted that perhaps I could work for the vineyard doing computer things, which is great because I aim to be as useful as I can. On Saturday I was left alone in the house because the rest of the family went to a birthday party for one of Virginia's friends in Venice. I took the car into Firenze and walked around a bit, found a nice pub where I met and ate with a cute girl from Scotland named Sarah. I tried this scottish beer called Bulldog that was mighty tasty. I could have done more in Firenze but for me this was mostly a trial run to see if I could get into town and park and navigate the city and find my way back to the autostrade and get home safely. I can! I'm happy to say that it all went without incident and I am finally getting used to driving in Italy. It's a bit crazy, but the secret is to avoid looking out your rearview mirror, for this will only frighten you. You should probably just tear it off when you first get into your car if you want that real italian driving experience. No italian has ever looked in his/her rearview mirror for any reason than to look indignantly at whoever is honking at him.

Leone:

My Job-
The first night I arrived, Caterina and I went for a cappucino (They usually only cost one euro and are delicious. In your face, Starbucks) to discuss my job. Basically she says that Alessandro and Leone get along fine and there is plenty of love, but they don't talk much and Leone, she feels, needs a good older male role model to be able to talk to and look up to. That's me. I basically take him to school, pick him up from school, take him to tennis 3 days a week, and help him with homework, things I guess an older brother would do. Caterina said she specifically hired a male au pair for this because Leone's ears perked up when the idea was mentioned. She described him as very intelligent but not very focused. He can play tennis or run for hours but also wants to sit and play xbox for hours. And his school is not very challenging and his grades aren't great. She took him to a doctor to see if it was ADD but the answer was no. I think the job in all sounds like something I will be really good at doing and as long as we get along okay. I told Caterina that I remembered what it was like to be 13, and that it is a difficult time and that I thought I could really help Leone. She might have been ecstatic with this answer but I honestly have no clue. She is like the stereotypical italian matriarch who is never satisfied. The good news is that during the day while Leone's in school, I have several hours and a car in which to explore Firenze (Florence, to you westerners).

The Family-
There are four: the mother Caterina, the father Alessandro, the children Virgina and Leone. I haven't met Leone yet because he has been at first-week-of-school camp. He comes back this evening and I will finally get to meet him. Virginia stays mostly to herself, takes the bus to school and back, and is what I would describe as a typical teenage girl. She is often on the phone, the computer, watching TV or studying. She seems nice but highly irritable. Sometimes I hear her screaming in italian at either her parents or someone on the phone. Alessandro is my favorite. He is funny, interesting to talk to and I feel at ease around him. He has silvery white hair and a beard. Today he let me drive his Audi into town so that Virginia (who went with me) could pick up something from the tailor's. He is very approachable and seems to enjoy answering my questions about his work and his family. There is a hand-drawn family tree in my room that shows the family's beginnings from the 1200's to the 1800's. Caterina is nice, but very intimidating and critical. Alessandro told me she is crazy and I believe it. I have spent the most time with Caterina but I feel like I know her the least. She is constantly in a bad mood, it seems. She also seems stressed out from all the work she does, and is always on her phone. She often makes comments to me that seem offhandedly critical. An example: She says to me that we are driving into Florence because she has errands to do and she wants to see how well I drive. So we leave, and constantly she is saying that I am too close to the car in front of me even though it's at least 15 car lengths in front of me and I'm only going 90 km/h! Not to mention the fact that every other person on the road is zooming in and out of traffic at breakneck speeds, passing in the center “lane” (the term lane here is used loosely, what I really mean is not a lane at all, but simply the area exactly the width of a car in the center of the road that can temporarily turn a two-lane road into a three-way road) while oncoming traffic is plentiful! Then she SCREAMS at me when I take the exit off the freeway because it was “not smooth enough.” I have been taking exits off of freeways for 7 years and I think I have it down by now! But all I can do is apologize and try to be smoother next time. Anyway, I have gotten off track. The inital example of Caterina's stabbing critiques is when we're in Florence. First, though, a distinction to be made: In Italy, a SIM card for your phone is a disposable piece of plastic that means virtually nothing. You can walk into almost any tobacco shop and buy one with a phone number attached to it or you can recharge the one you have. In America, SIM cards are an important piece of plastic with phone numbers and information on it, and it is sent to you by the phone company. I did not know this distinction! So Caterina had mentioned that I need to get a SIM card, I assumed calling the phone company and having one sent to me. When we got to Florence she asked me if I had brought my cell phone and when I said no, she says “Jimmy, you must get organized!” I was shocked and a little hurt. I ended up buying a cell phone since I figured (correctly) that European SIM cards wouldn't work in my American phone and it was very cheap, only about 40 dollars. Also it was a quick remedy to my supposed lack of organization. Anyway, I am beginning to think that possibly that is typical behavior for Caterina because on more than one occasion she has stormed angrily out of the room after an especially aggressive yelling competition with Virginia or Alessandro. Once, after storming out and leaving Alessandro and me alone, I asked “Did you say something wrong?” and he replied “I always say something wrong.”

Living Conditions- My room is small, but it is mine and at any point I can close the door and have all the privacy I want, however along with it (and my private bathroom) comes a very, very high standard of cleanliness. Liz, I take back every bad thing I ever said about your cleaning demands. They were child's play compared to what Caterina wants! I am expected to make my bed (in a very specific way, which I did not know about or do correctly the first morning), vacuum the rug on my floor, and mop the brick floor of my bedroom and bathroom EVERY DAY! The obsession with cleanliness does not stop there, but that is where my contribution ends (for the most part... I help with dishes during meal times and with general tidying up around the house). The family itself does not clean or do any amount of physical work whatsoever. There is a Romanian couple living here that cooks three meals a day and cleans constantly. Another lady works only in the mornings to help clean, but she does not live here. I think that the entire house is vacuumed/mopped/dusted everyday (except for the unused rooms, more on that in a second). There is a window in my room that is usually open that has a spectacular view of the courtyard area of the house. Speaking of the “house,” it is more like a castle! It has been in this family for many years (since 1820's) and is frequented by tourists daily, but they only look from the outside and at the vineyard, they never come in. I estimate the number of rooms to be somewhere between 15 and 20. The tour went something like “Here is another room we don't use. And another. Follow me. And another and another..” for several minutes. One room had many many animal heads on the wall and animal skins everywhere. Later, I asked Alessandro about them and he said that his uncle was the hunter, and that he only shoots annoying birds from the window of his office (he is quite funny). Every room was elaborately decorated and had old and expensive artwork of the de Renzis Sonnino family. The meals so far have been terrific. All meals are brought to us on serving trays using fine crystal and silver. Several plates are used for entrees, sides and fruit, as well as a glass for wine and another for water. Lunch is something like a meat or fish dish and steamed vegetables with fruit and wine for dessert. The dinners so far have been stereotypical italian meals, yet homemade and scrumptious. The first night was pizza and last night was a vegetarian eggplant parmesean. All of it has been excellently prepared, though I am fairly sure that at the end of each meal Alessandro calls the Romanian couple in to tell them exactly what he didn't like about it (I am guessing about this, due to my inability to understand anything anyone is saying unless they are speaking directly to me, in which case they use english. Most of the time they have explosive italian yelling matches against each other while I sit quietly chewing my food and pretending to watch italian TV). Dessert is always fruit, usually fresh peaches and/or grapes from the vineyard, which are very sweet and delicious but have seeds which only seem to bother me. The house is very very old. There are secret rooms and cubby holes everywhere, the paint is peeling in places, and it appears to have three layers of tile roof but I could be wrong. Dad- they definitely could use your services. There is a clock tower which chimes every 30 minutes. The tower is the oldest part of the house, I was told it was built in the middle ages.

The view from my window:


My room:


The clock tower:


View of the front of the house from the courtyard area (Top middle window is mine):


Two pictures of the kitchen:



Downtown Montespertoli:

Italy- First day impressions
I arrived at about 3:30 in the afternoon in Firenze, and nobody was there to pick me up. After a few unsuccesful tries to use the italian telephone, I started roaming about until I saw a white-haired man and a young woman looking around. It was Alessandro and Virgina. We kind of looked at each other as if to say with our eyes “Are you the one I'm looking for?” Turns out we were. We made a quick introduction of ourselves and shook hands. They apologized for being late and we left.
Before I left home, I had told myself that I was going to be bubbly and excited when I first met them but they were immediately talking to each other in italian, which to my unfamiliar ears, sounds like arguing. Italians always sound like they're arguing or yelling about something, but I am beginning to see that this is not always the case. They were both friendly and polite but not showing what I would call much interest in me. Mostly they were talking to themselves and when there was breaks in their conversation they would entertain questions from me. It did not help that I was extremely tired and about ready to crash. Anyway, we made it to the house despite Alessandro's constant attempts to kill us on the road. First impression: Wow! This place is a CASTLE practically. I have my own bedroom and bathroom. The bedroom is small but Caterina (the mom) said that I would move to a bigger room later if the job is working out nicely (making it very clear to me that I have very much yet to prove myself a suitable au pair). Now I will talk about different aspects of my new life here.

Going Away-
I should have written about this right away when it was fresh in my head, just as I would assume most people should write about most things when it's fresh in their heads. Anyway, I remember it being great and to anyone reading this who was there or contributed or both, I am extremely grateful and it was a wonderful way to permanently engrain into my memory a lasting farewell to my friends and family. But now the past is past and I will talk about Italy.