Posts Tagged: Italy
1
Apr 10
Italian Bureaucracy: The biggest “casino*” I’ve encountered to date…
*Italian lesson 1:
casino [ka 'sino]
SM 1. mess, racket…
• Cos’è questo casino? what’s this bloody racket/mess?
The funny thing is that everyone laughs about this “casino” as if it’s a funny joke someone made at some stage in the past and forgot to fix. An april fool’s gag that has lasted decades past the deadline. I think the key for us was to expect the worst, which we did, and so far at least, we’ve been able to laugh a little at the silliness of it all with the locals. Without falling on our knees and breaking down in tears. No…it’s not all that bad really.
So here we are in a limbo of sorts. Everything is floating somewhere above us, just out of reach. At least for a couple of months we have an address again. However there’s still that dreaded question that crops up:
“Country of Residency?”
“Eh… (technically nowhere right now, considering my green card for the states ran out in February and I haven’t lived in Ireland for over 3 years)…eh.. Ireland?”
Hopefully if we can manage to sort out doing A before B at the same time as doing B before A we can organize residency here in the near future. And then we’ll be allowed to buy a car :-) and be officially accurate when we say we live in Italy. Which of course is the only reason we’ve made this whole crazy move, because it just sounds dead cool…
“Eh yeah, we live in Italy now… don’t you know my grandparents were Italian?”
All jokes aside, we are both so glad we went traveling before beginning this adventure in Italy. It has given us enough perspective, and time out of the wonderful Blacksburg bubble, to be able to cope a little better when thrown into orbit. We are also falling deeply in love with Chiavenna, our new home town, and the beautiful mountains that surround it. Our cutsy modern apartment in a gorgeous 500 year old building with a view over the higgledy-piggledy tiled-rooves of old Chiavenna. The fact that there is a panificio (bread shop) 10 metres from our building. And bars with l’aperitivo (a drink and some tasty snacks) every evening before dinner, where the locals gather. And pizzerias like you only find in Italy. The pleasure of buying parmesan cheese by the kilo. Being able to walk 5 minutes from our apartment and find ourselves at the base of a trail that shoots up into the mountains for a vertical km (literally). The wonderful delight in looking up from the main street and seeing snowy mountains surrounding us.
And then there’s the people. The ladies in the Post office who have spent hours with us (and I mean literally hours), trying to help us sort out our lives here. The sweet girl at the tourist office who always has a smile for us. The women at the Comune (townhall) who handed me the name and date of birth of another Irish girl who lives 5 mins walk away, even though I’m sure that’s confidential information. Our landlord who is allowing us stay 2 or 3 months in his rental apartment instead of the 2 weeks we booked, with a slight increase in price from €350 for 2 weeks to €400/month, all inclusive.
But reading about it just doesn’t do it justice…
La nostra casa. We’re open for visitors.
26
Mar 10
A few photos
Just a few photos of where we’ve been for the last few weeks…
Our lovely host Vanessa made this sign for us! The name is spreading… oh dear.
3rd anniversary dinner in “our” little apartment (B & B apartment)
16
Mar 10
Iniziato di Nuovo
My knee feels like it’s on fire, but I know we’re not supposed to move for at least another 40 minutes. My eyes are closed so I can’t see my watch to check. My back is aching from holding me upright and still for so long. And now I’m so busy panicking about the pain (which incidentally is getting worse…) that I can’t concentrate an ounce of my attention on the meditation technique. Eh, whose idea was this??
Matthew, my big brother. He has done a few of these Vipassana meditation courses over the years and recommended it to us. Fortunately, by the end of the course we were thanking him. Ten days: Rising at 4 am, retiring at 9.30pm, with 10.5 hours of meditation each day, sitting still with eyes closed. No talking or communication of any kind allowed, including eye contact. Men and women are kept totally separate. You are to feel alone with your thoughts and sensations. At one of my weaker moments of meditation I was calculating the percentage of the day spent with eyes closed. The number escapes me now…
The idea of this technique of meditation is to learn to become more aware of the sensations in your body as they occur, moment to moment. With an emphasis on the fact that everything in this world is impermanent, everything will change sooner or later, for better or for worse. With this, one can learn to reduce (or ultimately eliminate) their reaction to their sensations. The belief is that it is our exaggerated reactions to our sensations that cause us sadness or distress not the actual stimulus. A simple example: Someone treats you badly causing a negative sensation in your body. You react with anger or sadness, which multiplies and prolongs the negative sensation inside of you. The person who initially hurt you may have gone but you continue to stew and multiply the negative feelings inside. With this technique you can learn to become aware of these sensations as they arise and how to control your response to them. To observe the sensation objectively without reaction. To understand that like everything in the world this sensation too will change, sooner or later. If you let it.
By our last few days we had both learnt to remain still for at least an hour in meditation. In my experience, pain and discomfort still arose but if I succeeded in merely observing it objectively, like a scientist or researcher of sorts, instead of reacting to it, the pain would run it’s course, fade and often disappear. It was amazing to experience, on a very personal level, the mind:body interaction. Concepts which I have been teaching my patients for the past few years, I was now experiencing in real-time high definition. As the days passed I continued my personal science experiment, each day discovering a little more about the power of the mind.
At times I definitely felt like I was going crazy and it seemed like one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done, but I can already notice the sweet haze of retrospection covering over the darker moments in my mind. Ultimately, it was a very special and unique experience for us. One which we each explored alone, as individuals, in our own personal way. A bizarre way to start our move to a new country but I think a necessary one.
And now here we are in Milano trying to put into practise some of what we learnt while we make our way through language school and living through a foreign language. We have been greeted with open arms and real Italian warmth and generosity by many, but especially by our new friend (and host!) Vanessa, the Pradella family and of course Marina and Gianca our old friends from Blacksburg, who are “neighbours” to us again but now on this side of the ocean.
Grazie 
La vita è bella.
21
Feb 10
Up and atom
So tomorrow we move to Italy. Hmm. How does that make me feel? Absolutely terrified.
Reality hit about mid last week and all of a sudden I became aware of a strangely familiar uncomfortable feeling growing in my stomach. Like someone you disliked in school and haven’t seen in a long time. I’d actually forgotten what it feels like to be anxious and stressed. Seriously. Our bodies have this amazing ability to forget negative sensations, like pain. You remember the idea of them of course, but I would venture to say that actually feeling the memory of the sensation is impossible. Enough of this. I’ll stop being a chicken. Up and at them.
We have just had one of those wonderful weeks, filled wih family and friends, that makes you feel warm and fuzzy inside. To all of you who have been a part of it, thank you. We have missed you all dearly, and will do again when we find ourselves suddenly gone from here. Each of you are special and precious to us. With all your warm welcomes this week, we have felt like the luckiest people alive.
We will be keeping this blog up and running while we make the move to Italy. It has been a lovely way to keep those that care in the loop, and for us to pause and think about where we are and what we are doing. But a blog is nothing if nobody ever reads it, so thanks to those who have been following along with our journey. I hope you’ve enjoyed the ride so far.
