Hi! I'm Sue. I moved to Italy in 2013. I started my www.lemarchescape.com blog in 2012 during the "preparation phase" and it covers my transition moving from the hectic rat race life-style of London to the substantially more tranquil Sarnano in the beautiful Le Marche region in Italy. Now I'm here I'm working on my lifetime dream of becoming an artist. Check out my blog: www.apaintingoccasionally.WordPress.com to see pics!
Now, I don’t want to come across as paranoid, but something is out to get me. Let me take you through the evidence:
Exhibit A: Last month in the early hours I woke to find my bathroom ceiling dripping with water where upstairs had sprung a leak. The water was coming down in a sort of power shower fashion. Two terrified upstairs neighbours (I had underestimated how scary I must look without makeup) and £££’s later the issue is fixed.
Exhibit B: Two weeks ago, a rogue candle which I swear I blew out, was still alight, set fire to the surround of the candle which FOR PITY’S SAKE WAS MADE OF CARDBOARD and set fire to the wooden floor in my living room. All the fire alarms were going at 5am, smoke was billowing out of the living room and dining room and there were quite high flames coming from the TV area. Put it out with a wet towel. A full pot of varnish to strengthen a very charcoaled wooden floor, and a moved TV stand later, the issue was “fixed”/seamlessly hidden :-s
Exhibit C: One week ago, a plastic light shade that I’d washed to get rid of some dust in honour of the new tenant, melted, leaving a smouldering lightshade on his floor and a lightbulb covered in burnt plastic bubbling away MINUTES before the new prospective tenants were coming to sign the contract for the flat. And I wasn’t even able to blame him for it <sigh>.
Exhibit D: Today, I get a call from the building managers to say that the flat beneath mine was positively awash with water following what must be a catastrophic flood in my flat (I’ve exaggerated marginally here for effect but it sounded serious). Rushing home, the flat was fine. Downstairs has some staining on the walls of their toilet. My toilet however, looked ok, UNTIL I lifted up the lino and yes, yes there was certainly a leak. Thankfully not from the waste water pipe but from the one from the cistern to the toilet. When you flush it, it looks like a waterfall but alas, outside of the toilet bowl entirely. My plumber, well, he doesn’t like emergencies or anything that would be considered a nasty or awkward job. Or one that involves water. He basically likes gas safety checks. He should call himself a Gas Safety Check Man rather than “plumber”. So his advice was “hmm, yeah, you should work out where that water’s coming from”. Another plumber is coming tomorrow morning. I’ll have to redecorate the toilet – you have to sort of wreck the room in order to get to the cistern.
See?! Irrefutable evidence that I’m being thwarted by bad luck. It’s exactly EXACTLY like that film, Final Destination where a bunch of kids narrowly avoid Death only to have Death getting them by other means. Admittedly, apart from the fire, I’m only being slowly annoyed / stressed to death but still. It’s the same thing. What have I done wrong?! I’m going to find a goat to sacrifice (only that’s somewhat against my vegetarian principles. Perhaps the plumber would be a better option. I’ll make a judgement call based on how he gets on tomorrow and how many kidneys I’ll need to sell).
What else? The contract is signed, packing is ongoing, the DIY was done (up until this afternoon at least), stuff is being cleared, work is being handed over. Generally it’s going to plan. You know the thing I’m looking forward to most when I quit work? I’m going to have a ceremonial burning of my tights <considers recent escapes> or perhaps I’ll just throw them out. Evil, restrictive, ghastly contraptions.
A slight change of plans from last post is that mum and dad are now coming up the Sunday before (24th) to take stuff back home. It means I need to do everything that bit sooner/quicker but there’s less impact of a hangover from my leaving do the day before. Why did I organise it then?! Last day in the flat Thursday 28th!
It’s fair to say that my Day Skipper course is going reasonably badly 🙂 It’s all written in pretentious jargon. Who says “blow” instead of “wind”?! I’m going to attempt to go to a face to face lesson next Tuesday but I must know about tidal somethings beforehand. I shall learn about that this weekend. And I’ve been working on my knots and quite frankly, I’m fully intending to dazzle teachers and students alike. Knotting is something I can do. Sometimes. As long as I’m in exactly the right position in relation to the rope which is also in exactly the right position in relation to the other rope and myself. Yesiree. I’ve nailed the knots.
I have two quite strong reservations about my upcoming sailing though… Firstly: I must buy deckshoes. Have you seen them?! They’re AWFUL. What on earth is wrong with trainers?! My visions of relaxing on a boat haven’t included repulsive footwear to date. Secondly: Well, to be fair, my sailing teacher did give me an alternative to deckshoes. She said I would need to buy deckshoes or willies. Spelling mistake? Who knows! Having seen these deckshoes, I might be tempted to investigate further.
Well it’s fair to say I’m a little stressed! Moving out of my home for 8 years, renting it out, finishing work, committing to do a sailing course with a prerequisite knowledge (100 hours as it turns out) requirement I don’t have and then moving countries within a month probably is a lot to be getting on with.
There’s been some progress: – I’ve found some people for the flat (yay!) but they are 3 independent people (boo!) and they’re actors (yay!) but not regularly employed ones (boo!) who are all very nice and I think they’ll look after the place (yay!) but wanted to move in straight away as at least one of them didn’t have a place to stay (boo!). So as of Monday, I have a new housemate on the understanding the others will move in at the end of March. Myself and Lucy are moving out on Thursday 28th March (the day after my work leaving do! Boo…). Anyway, so far so good. Hoping to tidy up all the contractual bits and pieces this week and next.
– I had an offshoot leaving do with some of the girls from work! March is a bit flakey- people need to use their holiday up (I never had that issue) so they’d worked out this week was best – very sweet. And they kept it a surprise too, cunningly done. Went to All Stars bowling in Bayswater which was great, then for a meal later. I’ll miss them. I work with a good bunch.
– My sailing course has become more hassle. It emerges I was going to be the only one on the intensive theory course so they’re cancelling. Its an online one now but I can pop into lessons occasionally (handily they’re 5 mins walk from work). At the moment my evenings and weekends are less about what I’d like to do and more what the most urgent thing that I can’t delay possibly delay. Still it does mean I can have Easter weekend at my folks rather than in a classroom, albeit probably doing my own intensive theory class!
– Seeing Italian girl on Friday for a chat after work. Currently on the Subjunctive verb form – it’s impossible. Just impossible.
Anyway, I’m procrastinating. Guarantor forms here I come…
– Had a builder come in to sort out the bathroom ceiling which was falling to bits (admittedly, this wasn’t so strenuous on my part)
– Painted the bathroom (I don’t know why but everything I paint requires at least 100000004 coats of paint).
– Painted the toilet (the room the toilet is in as opposed to the actual toilet. That would be unconventional).
– Sanded and varnished the dining room floor.
– Sanded and painted the bedroom window sill.
– Packed yet more stuff in The Room of Chaos (spare bedroom).
– Got rid of some extraneous furniture.
– Cleaned the flat for photo taking.
– Took photos
– Advertised the flat on gumtree. Please someone rent my flat!
– Had a headache the entire time.
AND I saw a friend for a rather luxurious breakfast that included an ice cream sundae. I highly recommend the ice cream sundae at The Exhibit in Balham. It’s delicious. Even for breakfast. I don’t know why I bother with savoury food <looks down at stomach>. Perhaps I do.
AND AND my Italian friend has emailed without further prompting – she had a good excuse for a slow response. She’s given me her phone number. So perhaps I wont have to pay Italians to be my friend after all 🙂
In an attempt to give myself a head start on the people that I’ll be doing the sailing course with (given that they will all have had the slight advantage of having actually sailed whereas I alas, have not), I’ve started reading my “Day Skipper for Sail and Power” book by Alison Noice. It’s a recommended book. However, I’m only on page 5 and I’m finding the whole thing pretentious (honestly, who says “blow” rather than “wind”…) and annoying (“left”, “right”, “behind”, “in front” are perfectly adequate terms – why on earth rename them “port”, “starboard”, “aft” and whatever the other is I can’t remember). I feel I will have to exercise great control not to spend the entire course scoffing every 2 minutes.
In other news this week, I met someone a little like me (I don’t think that’s ever happened before). They showed me their Dream Board. It’s fantastic! It’s simple but lovely – you put a bunch of photo’s representing what you want out of life together on a board. It helps give some focus – it’s very inspiring. Oprah has a free little app for it. I love mine – I’ve got a colour print-out on my wall.
Right, my productivity has run out. I’m off. 46 days to go until I finish work – 34 working days!!!!!
It’s been a busy few days. I’ve had lots of people helping with the Italy Plan so this entry reads a bit like a lengthy thank you letter!
– Packing: I’ve been packing, throwing stuff out and taking bits and pieces to the charity shop for weeks now. Work are certainly benefiting from it! My team should have this year’s Christmas Decoration competition in the bag – they have all my decorations complete with Christmas tree (that was an arduous/odd bus journey). My friends have just moved back around the corner and offered me some of their boxes (thank you Anke & Graham and Leebrizio for helping me lug the boxes back and fixing the kitchen tap!). Mum and dad came up yesterday to take most of the boxes back to their loft (thanks M&D, oh and Lucy for the offer of your loft if I need it!). I think there’s only one more car journey to go which we’ll do when I actually move out. A friend at work’s moving into his own place so I’m managing to get rid of a few other bits & pieces to him and most of my paintings have a home to go to now. I’ve drafted an inventory for leasing the flat and the contract is pretty much ready to roll now too. I’ll advertise on gumtree / moveflat in a couple of weeks. Scary stuff!
– Decorating: My flat feels like the Forth bridge – as soon as you paint a wall, it seems like it needs re-doing! However, I made quite a bit of headway last weekend with a friend’s help (thank you Sean!). I think I’ve done almost all of the emulsion painting I’m willing to do but still a heap of other things to get on with. And, I finally have someone in to sort out my bathroom ceiling – a builder who lives around the corner so on Friday, the most un-rentable feature of the flat should be resolved – hoorah!
– Italian learning: I met Italian Tube Girl in Canada Water last week – she was lovely! Very kind and patient – we spoke Italian most of the time. Speaking Italian makes my brain ache – after an hour I was speaking mainly gibberish but still, good practice! Haven’t heard back from her since so I suspect I might possibly have made her brain ache too!!! I think I might still be at the point where I need to pay someone to talk Italian to me 🙂 I’ve discovered a new (for me) phone app – Italian Verb Trainer – it’s a simple premise – it gives you a verb, the subject (i.e. me, you,we, he, she, they etc.) and the tense (i.e. future, past, subjunctive is the one I’m currently stuck on) and then you need to work out what the congugated verb is and you can tap the screen to confirm the right answer and grade yourself. It’s no Angry Birds, but it’s quite fun, honestly!
– We are sailing….. Well admittedly not sailing at the minute but there’s hope! I told you last time I’d signed up to the Day Skipper course in March/April. I’m supposed to get crewing experience before I go on the course. There’s a guy at work who’s got all the sailing qualifications and lots of experience. We’ve devised / I’ve pressured him into, a cunning plan to charter a boat – just need some crew in order to cut costs. March 16th/17th in the Solent – anyone up for it?!
– What to do: Well, I might have mentioned before how I quite fancy doing a “painting a day” blog similar to Edward B Gordon in Berlin. I had my first foray into oil painting last weekend (Morley College do loads of great reasonably priced courses) and thought it was great YET STILL MY PAINTING IS WET (and covered now in finger prints where I’ve tentatively checked dryness levels). I have a tip for any would be oil painters – don’t put your oil painting on the radiator to “dry”. It sort of seems to melt your painting, perhaps obviously. I’m getting some sketching practice in with the people at work – it seems to be a hit and got a reasonable line up of people wanting sketches 🙂 I was looking at Italian single’s holidays and there were a few “creative break” ones that cropped up – there’s a 7 day painting course in the town I’m hoping to do the language course in interestingly. Almost £1k for daily tuition and accommodation in a shared room – 4 people maximum. I think I’ll work on getting good, start an offshoot “art” type blog and get people coming on holidays if I can get a nice place. Should be a good earner and nice way to meet people. After I’ve got the sailing thing out of my system anyway.
I think that about sums up the last couple of weeks. Not long to go now – I’ve got a couple of countdowns on my phone, one for “days to go until the end of my contract” (that’s 53) and “working days to go” (39). Sometimes I think it seems a long way off (Monday mornings!) and other times it feels ominously close!!!
Anyway, hope you’re all well. Next time I write, hopefully the flat should be advertised and the decorating almost complete, fingers crossed!
Well I think we can establish that having the smart phone is not much facilitating my blog post frequency! If I’m out of the house, I spend the whole time looking furtively around for potential phone stealing thieves. Perhaps the novelty will wear off at some point and I’ll become less panicked about showing it in public. I’m gradually moving ahead, here’s an update:
Work over here: I had been considering that i could do the occasional day contracting to earn a bit of cash. Apparently I’d need to get myself set up on a self employed basis rather than going through my current contracting route which is a bit of a faff.
Tenancy Deposit Protection Scheme: On the flat leasing subject, if you’re leasing a property, the landlord needs to put the tenant’s deposit in an independent account. Alas, it does mean you can’t earn interest on it! I’ll use http://www.mydeposits.co.uk/landlords. You can register online and set it all up remotely. Seems to be pretty immediate so simply a case of finding someone who wants to rent and then setting it up.
Language School: I got in touch with the language school to ask about minimum notice to sign up. You need to give a months notice in order to get some decent accommodation. In the shared apartments, you just share with other students. I can do a month at the course but stay on another month to give me more leeway to find a flat a bit more long term. You can rent bedding if needed. I’ll see how much i can fit in my suitcase!
Giant boats and sailing courses: I went to the London Boat Show last week with a friend (thanks for coming Laura!). Apart from an overwhelming feeling of inadequacy at the end having walked around some of the biggest, most luxurious yachts I never knew existed (and they were just the ones you use to get to the REAL yachts!!), it was fab to get a chance to look around the more reasonably priced boats. Also very good to talk to some of the training course providers. Having initially been attracted to the foreign training courses, we spoke to one guy who said that you just don’t get the same experience in terms of tides as you do over in England so if you want to sail over here, then to do a course over here. Good advice I think! Anyway, I shall be doing my Day Skipper “Intensive” Theory course over the Easter weekend and then a week later, doing my Day Skipper practical. It’s with a small company called Nomad Sailing. They all highly recommended me doing a competent crew course first – which I’m er, not going to do. The beauty of this course is that apparently I can keep doing them until I eventually pass (perhaps this could be a cheap way of sailing?!?!) Anyway, the sailing plan is in full swing.
Italians: I made a friend on the tube! Yes, I know what you’re thinking. I forgot where I was, broke the acceptable “tube” behaviour and responded to a girl who asked if I was learning Italian (she wasn’t psychic, I was doing some Italian homework). Anyway, she helped me with my exercises and then gave me her email address. We’re meeting on Friday – very exciting. And I’m pleased to report that I could understand her emails without referring to the dictionary once! In other news – I’ve been on a graffiti course today and the tutor was Italian. He said my Italian was good (ha!). Perhaps I’m actually getting better. I’m loving graffiti by the way. I’m going to get me a wall. I’ll have to work out how I can make money from it (perhaps I can threaten to graffiti people’s walls unless they pay me?). Here’s the result of 15 minutes with rubbish colours…
Boring bits: To be clear, I’m not implying here that Tenancy Deposit Schemes are interesting… However, as a collection of other administrative type things, I did hear back from the pension people about what I’d need to do in order to ensure I keep my state pension <yawn>. I must read it. I’ll report back. I wonder where I filed it… I also heard back from Lambeth Council about notifying them of my move. I must read that again too.
I think there’s been other bits & pieces but can’t recall off hand! Anyway, ciao for now and sogni d’oro…
I hope you all had a good new year. Thank you for feeding back on the blog! Had some good feedback – 80% preferred the new format, 20% of you didn’t notice. I’ll take that 🙂 I did have one comment that it required “sexing up” (thank you Justin, useful feedback as ever ;-)).
It’s been a busy few days for me. Here’s an update:
– Smart phones. Well, let me tell you. I’m a convert. I’ve always considered them irritating wastes of time (apart from when I’m lost or need train times – admittedly, this happens quite frequently). I’ve come to realise that my opinion was based solely on being around men who use them for incessant football result monitoring and Angry Birds. But I’m pleased to report that there’s SO MUCH MORE! So, here’s my review of good apps to have if you’re moving to Italy:
Any Do: Is a task manager – you can easily add tasks, add categories, allocate your tasks to the categories, set reminders and sync it to your Google task lists if you have a Google account. It’s slightly tiresome in it’s nagging but I think that’s the key to it’s usefulness! With all the other apps I have, when they give you a notification you can clear it with a mere swipe of a finger but with Any Do, if I’ve said I would do something today, then its insistent in its reminding. You have to go in to the app, mark the task as complete or move it to a later date and feel inadequate as a result. It’s a sad day indeed when you feel like your own phone is judging you.
GoalTracker: For those of you who are into your New Years Resolutions – it’s a way of keeping track of what you want to achieve and when. You can mark off your status easily and share your goals with others via a range of means (presumably so it’s more embarrassing to not do them). It’s useful to keep an eye on the bigger picture whereas Any Do is good for the specifics that help you get there.
Evernote: Is an application which enables you to sync your notes so that you can access them from any device that can access the internet. I’ve started using it for Italy research. You can set up a number of notebooks and add specific notes under each one. I write the blog posts on there – there’s a small outside chance that I might update them more frequently now there’s less of an accessibility excuse.
Italian Apps: Well well well – there are LOADS! I’m so impressed – this has been the best thing for me about the smartphone by far. I was beginning to get quite the hunchback from lugging around a bunch of Italian learning books with me everywhere I went “just in case” (god forbid I would be bored for a couple of minutes) but there are apps for everything! No more dictionaries, exercise books, Italian books/magazines for me! It would take too long to review all the ones I have. I might review them in a separate post one day but in summary, get “EN-IT Dict” (dictionary), “Italian Verbs” (has them all nicely conjugated – for anyone that doesn’t know Italian there are roughly 1 squillion ways of saying every single verb depending upon who, when, what and where and a number of other confusing and frustrating factors) and if you want to practice your grammar, “Italian Class” is excellent. There’s a free version of that last one but if you pay the £2 or whatever it is for the full app then you get a lot more exercises of a lot more grammar.
– Currency Conversion: I’ve done a bit more research on that, click here for more info. I think I’ll probably use a currency conversion agency – seems to be a good way of transferring money.
– Language School: I emailed them about notice periods for starting the course and about accommodation. I got a nice response back. I don’t seem to need to give them much notice at all about starting the course but he reckoned they’d need a month or so notice to get a good deal on accommodation. He said that normally a room in a shared self catering apartment (2 max 3 bedrooms, max 4 people) costs 150 euro/week. If I stay for longer than 2 months, I can have it for 100 euro/week. I’m quite keen to see photo’s of it before committing to any length of time though 2 months isn’t too big a deal. He suggested I fill out the application form and send through and then I can pay the deposit later when I’ve firmed up dates. I’ll do that I think.
– Clearing out the flat: I’ve started packing! It feels like it’s actually happening now! How is it possible to accrue so much tat?! So far I’ve donated 4 bin bags (and importantly their contents) to the charity shop, and the same for the tip. I’m selling my exercise bike – currently on ebay with several watchers all asking stupid questions (why don’t people READ the advert before asking where I am – I’ve put it there in bold capital letters!), and will start selling a few other bits & pieces too. Lee/Fabrizio (hmm Leebrizio?) has picked up all his bits and pieces from the flat and has kindly given me some cardboard boxes for my own packing. Thanks Leebrizio. My parents will be assisting in the transportation of the bits & pieces back to storage i.e. Nan’s loft and then hopefully to Italy if I can get it down to a reasonable amount! Thank you parents. And of course I would like to encourage all of my friends and family to please visit regularly (and bring me some of my stuff).
– Flat leasing contract: I’ve pretty much finalised this as much as I can without predicting the names of the people who will be moving in. Next week I’ll print out some other examples so I can compare and make sure the one I’m preparing has everything it needs to. Thanks to Anke & Laura for sending their examples!
– Budgeting & Flats: I was also looking at rental accommodation near Ancona – it seems to vary. The Italians are not big on photo’s but the flats that did have them seem to look ok. It’s going to be a struggle to stay in budget I think. I’ll work on the budget a bit more over the next couple of weeks and perhaps publish what I think it might be. Then in a few months we can all have a good laugh about it.
Anyway, the flat currently resembles a jumble sale so today, I must stop blathering and clear a path to move from room to room without climbing over boxes and bags. Meanwhile, if any of you have any app suggestions that you think might be good, send me a comment!
I hope you’re all having fabulous holidays! For me, it’s been a much needed rest and some time to work on the Italian Job as I’ve come to think of it. I’ve had a re-hash of the blog – there are a few more pages now and I think it’s a more organised structure than I had previously so lends itself better for adding useful pages for anyone else looking to move, rather than my monologue of updates! I’d love some feedback on it – good or bad – comment below or use the poll 🙂
Thanks to those who came back on the last poll about whether Verona’s worthy of a visit! 50% said “go go go”, 33% said “worth a visit” and 16% was for “other” (they hadn’t been before – I must consider my poll answers more carefully ;-))
I’ve put together a more detailed plan of things to do before I go – basically added some timescales to “Sue’s Action Plan”. I’ve given myself a lot to do for December, considering there’s only 5 days left:
Review flat leasing contracts – get a final contract sorted for renting out the flat.
Confirm escrow arrangements for tenant’s deposits– you have to have the tenant’s deposit held outside of your own bank account. I’ve got a recommendation from a friend.
Understand tax situation, what forms I need to complete for the Inland Revenue and ramifications of telling them. National Insurance – can I and is it worth making voluntary contributions? What if I get a job in Italy, will that cover it?
Look at current exchange– I’m still not entirely sure what to do with finances. I’ll get an Italian bank account but what’s the best way of getting access to my savings and rental income? Hoping to find out!
Email language school – find out when I have to sign up by and how I can find accommodation. I’ve done this already, awaiting a response. They’ve a course starting on Monday 8th April.
Enroll on a sailing course – I want to do my Competent Crew & Day Skipper courses before I go.
Buy a “smart phone” – my i-pod has finally gone caput and I’ve taken that, as well as my regular need to phone friends and family for directions and train times, as a sign that I should probably get a smart phone. Smart phones don’t work with my fingers generally so it’s a risk! I’ve gone for the Samsung Galaxy S II – sim free and unlocked to give me a bit of freedom in Italy. I’m going to get a pay as you go kind of thing when I’m over there (and when I’m over here too I think). I know nothing of smart phones – if you have any advice, please send it through 🙂
That’s it for now – hoping to get a new page up in the next couple of days about the finance bits & pieces.
Well it’s about time to update on my trip to Verona last weekend – the girls and myself had a great time. In true, not very “blog” like fashion, I’ve rambled below so apologies – at some point I’ll work out the best way of updating on my Italian adventures that doesn’t require my blog followers to allocate an afternoon to it.
Getting there
Verona airport is fairly small so it’s quick to get out. There’s a bus that leaves from just outside the airport exit (there’s a ticket machine by the bus – tickets are €6) and takes you to Porta Nouva bus/railway station in Verona. From there it’s only a 10 minute walk to the centre. To get to the centre, have the bus station so that it’s behind you – cross over the road (there’s no footpath on the other side) and turn right past the petrol station for 5 minutes or so down that road. You need to cross over a busy-ish road and go straight ahead until you get to a largish roundabout/junction past some ruins on the left hand side. Turn left up Corso Porta Nuova for another 5 minutes or so. When you get to a large amphitheatre, you’re in the centre!
Staying there
We stayed at Hotel Mastino – if you follow the above route, you’ll walk past it on the way – it’s a minute from the Amphitheatre so very well positioned. And particular well positioned if you’re into fast food as it’s next to (and above) a McDonalds. The Hotel was very nice – quite plush inside, marble floors and things. There were 4 of us so we booked a family room which was very cosy/compact!
There’s a spa attached to the main hotel but it’s expensive – the cheapest treatment was €45 for a head, back and leg massage for 30 minutes. Lisa actually had one of these and can confirm that they also do glutes. I think the general feeling was that the massage was very professional, but if you don’t speak much Italian, there’s a risk it can come across as a hostage experience as you’re taken away in a mystery vehicle to what turns out to be the sister hotel, given some paper pants and left to it for a bit. However, the massage should help with any hostage-related tenseness and you should have confidence that you will be delivered back. Your family need never know.
Sites:
Amphitheatre, otherwise known as “The Arena” in Piazza Bra: It’s a fabulous building – very grand. Lovely smooth rose coloured marble on the inside, crumbly on the outside (armadillo!). It costs €6 to get in. They still have concerts and operas here in the summer. I can imagine that being quite a spectacle. It’s quite crumbly in places but on the whole, very well preserved. You can go right to the top and get a good view of Piazza Bra. If you’re going when it’s icy, then be prepared to break a limb or two.
Piazza Bra (it does have a number of lingerie shops just off it up Vicola Tre Marchetti and Via Mazzini but er, otherwise there’s no connection): It’s packed with sweet stalls that open early and close late selling every sweet imaginable. Crepes with nutella are quite the rage here but they also had Fritellas – a sort of bubbly thicker crepe. Alas, because they make it with some kind of rose water it tastes disappointingly like old lady. Carla liked them.
Piazza Erbe: Has a little market in the middle selling clothes and fruit (and in particular, a mysterious orange fruit / vegetable I really wish I’d bought called Cacchi – or Cachio perhaps in the singular). I think there’s a tower here that you can pay to go up for a good view point but we didn’t, we found a free “view point” (keep reading for that).
Il Duomo: The cathedral was only €2.50 to get in. There’s lots of fresco’s inside – very impressive.
Castelvecchio: We didn’t explore in here but the city art museum is inside. We walked through it and across Ponte Scaligero (Ponte is bridge) which is a footbridge across Fiume Adige (Fiume is river) to the northern part of the city. It’s quite a nice building and if we had more time, it might have been good to take a look inside.
Castel San Pietro: This isn’t much of a castle from what I could see but it does have a fabulous viewpoint. It’s just across from Ponte Pietra on the Northern side of the river. I think this might have been my favourite place in Verona – there are spectacular views of the city and the river up here and it’s quiet and relaxing. Go up as far as you can up the steps close to the bridge, they’re a bit hidden away.
Casa di Guiletta (Juliet’s house – of Romeo & Juliet fame): It’s a bit of a mystery this house – Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet was made up so this is not Juliet’s house. It has been randomly selected. The balcony was put in a few decades ago. However, if you want to be crushed by the crowds in a chewing gum encrusted alleyway, then this is your place.
Casa di Romeo – is simply nowhere to be seen. It exists. It’s on the map. But the writing was so big on the map and the roads are so small I think it could have been anywhere within a 100 metre radius and there’s only a small plaque to mark it. I think it’s the Italian real life equivalent of “where’s Wally?” ; “Where’s Romeo?”. Indeed.
Pam Supermarket (on Via Adigetto I think, very close to Piazza Bra): I’ve added this to “sites” because a) I think it might be the only supermarket in Verona and under the auspices of rarity, I think it qualifies as a site for that reason alone and b) I do like a good foreign supermarket. Ours are so mundane in comparison with not nearly as much variety in teeth-rotting sweets and cakes.
Restaurants & Cafes
Firstly, a word of warning on food in Verona: One can never have too much horse/donkey meat here. There are not a lot of places that don’t serve it so if you’re not at one with eating donkeys, then go to the pizzerias.
Loacker Moccaria off Cso. S. Anastasia: On the first morning we found this little cafe for lunch and had some toasties/Paninis and a drink. Not that impressed with the paninis but this was our first experience of the Italian hot chocolate. Unfortunately, indirectly through staring at the hot chocolate of the girl next to us. It’s so thick – you could almost stand your spoon up in it. The general consensus from the group over the couple of days is that the teas were nice too (though I didn’t have any). Having said that, I’m not sure they DO tea in Italy, not the way the English do at least. They generally bring out a little pot of hot milk to put in your tea. Perhaps that’s what makes the tea nice. You get a little biscuit thing with your drinks too – Fondante Dark-Noir. Delicious. By the way, “latte” in Italian is “milk” so if you want an actual latte, ask for “cafe latte” otherwise you’ll just get milk.
Cafe Al’duomo – Via Duomo: Having been consumed with hot chocolate envy at the last cafe, we had hot chocolate here with cream (“panna”, not the squirty bottle kind but the genuine article) and cakes. The hot chocolate was everything we’d hoped and dreamed for (though not for Lucy – I think for her, there is such a thing as too much chocolate). The cakes were lovely and there was a nice young man who spoke Italian to me – woohoo! Admittedly I understood only every 10th word (he was describing the cakes and well, it turns out my lexical knowledge of cake ingredients in Italian requires work) but still, success!
Ristorante Pizzeria in Piazza Dei Signori (Piazza of the people): Is a very good value place to eat. It’s always a bit more comforting going to a restaurant where the Italians themselves go to eat and there were lots of them here. There are 3 floors – if you go to the top – you might get a window seat overlooking the piazza and at Christmas time, the Christmas Market is there. We had a lovely meal watching the snow fall down over the stalls. For 4 pizzas, a litre of Valpolicella wine (Veronese wine) and a bottle of water it came to €61. The wine, well, don’t get me wrong, it was very nice (my wine descriptions are poor I’m afraid – the most I can do is “winey”, “grapey” and “red”) but, it was curiously and unexpectedly a little fizzy. Nice, but if you’re not expecting fizzy red wine, then er, a tad off-putting. I suspect this isn’t the case with all Valpolicella (though a swift look around the other tables at the restaurant confirmed a fizzyish top to their carafes as well).
Cafe Ebrius on Via Ponte Pietra: This was a cute little bar/cafe. The guy behind the bar spoke excellent English (annoying ;-)) and was very friendly. He served a couple of guys there some very interesting whiskey drink with whipped cream on top of it. Alas, the cafe’s/bars don’t really open late in Italy and they were going to be closed at the point where we might have actually wanted to drink whiskey with whipped cream.
Expensive place in Piazza Erbe: Don’t go here. Admittedly you’d find it easier to follow these instructions if I gave you the name but I’m afraid I didn’t make a note of it. There’s a friendly enticing woman outside but don’t be allured in; it’s a trap. The cheapest thing is soup at €9.50 and the food isn’t great.
Bosari, C.SO Cavour: This was a lovely restaurant. However, we selected it based on its tasty looking, donkeyless menu. It turns out this was the lunch menu. The dinner menu was not as tasty looking and could well have been donkeyfull if we’d looked closely. In fact, for a vegetarian like myself, they seemed only to have some kind of olive potato starter. However, the waiter said they’d make some pasta for me and Lucy (claiming fraudulently she was a vegetarian too – meat eaters – do they have ANY morals? ) which was good of them – points to them for that. Those points were subsequently knocked back off as he kept replying to my Italian in English. I added some again because they gave us a little starter as an extra which was nice of them. And then took them away because it was fish eggs… It’s fair to say, we have mixed feelings of the Bosari restaurant.
For anyone visiting Italy and wondering what the mysterious ”Coperto” is, it’s cover charge. They don’t often charge it for drinks/cake but they do with food.
Miscellaneous
The Italians will never, under any circumstances, hand you your change. Ever. I think this is the sole reason for queues in Italy. You hold out your hand for the change, and then they drop it onto a flat surface right next to your still waiting hand so that you have to push your change to an edge somewhere. Perhaps there’s a niche in the market for change collecting magnets in Italy.
Verona does have a slight sewage smell in parts. I wonder whether it gets worse in the summer? It wasn’t overwhelming, just in some places.
There are no “pubs”! It’s odd – people clearly want to have a sociable drink– the mulled wine stalls at the Christmas market were by far the busiest.
Dogs. Well, let me tell you… I had heard that Italians didn’t do pets, that my cunning money making kennels/cattery plan would fall flat because of it. Oh my word – dogs are everywhere in Verona. They’re allowed in shops, they stay in hotel rooms (with people… it’s not THAT extravagant). I’ve never seen so many pampered pooches. They don’t do medium sized dogs either – in Verona, your dog must either be the size of a large rat, or a small horse. And not your general mongrel either – it must be pedigree. And it must be adorned in only the most fashionable of garments. So, I’m definitely still considering the kennel ideal though I’m thinking now to rebrand it as a Hooch Hotel.
On Sunday, women wear fur. Fur coats, fur collars, fur hats. Fur is the thing to do on a Sunday. I think it’s a religious “Sunday best” thing. And what better way to showing your appreciation to God than by wearing the skin of his creations? 🙂 And there are so many people in Verona on a Sunday, or at least, the Sunday we were there. We were walking around easily enough on Friday and Saturday and then on Sunday, it was like trying to wade through an overpopulated mink farm.
So in summary, Verona’s great. It’s not as grand as Rome, and not as romantic as Venice, but it’s got a charm of it’s own – there’s lots to see and do and well worth a visit!
Come stai? This week I’ve been doing a lot of thinking and not so much doing really but here’s a quick summary…
Verona: I’m going to Verona next weekend with some friends. I can’t wait! I flew into Verona earlier in the year and got the coach straight out to start a cruise in Venice, so it’ll be nice to see it at a slightly slower pace. I’ve done a bit of research on things to see and do, or rather, I have printed out some information from Wikipedia, so not “done” as such quite yet.
Italian: My Italian (language…) is coming along nicely – it’s nice to have a holiday in mind to focus the mind a bit. Last week my Italian teacher was trying to explain “prepositions”. Let me tell you about Italian prepositions (for info, our prepositions are things like, “with”, “in”, “a” etc.) – there is little to no logic involved. There are some rules but there are so many exceptions that it’s hardly worth bothering with. I think one must simply “rote” learn them. Anyway, I’m used to a few by now so I didn’t do too badly. A new guy at work speaks Italian. It’s nice when you come across someone else to talk to in a language you’re learning, it makes it feel less like you’re a kid learning a secret code.
Boyfriend: I’ll just sneak this one in here. My boyfriend (also known as Lee / Fabrizio in the blog) and I split up two months ago. The Italian plan remains but tweaked so I don’t end up an old spinster with many cats living in the middle of nowhere. It’s all about being an old spinster with many cats living near a town now…
Camerino vs Camerano: Remember that language school I was talking about last time? Centro Cultur (I would just like to point out that the missing e is deliberate – from my perspective at least)? Well, I was mildly confused when I looked up the area – the town was solidly in the middle of Le Marche. The write up said that it was a 10 minute walk from the coast. I didn’t think too hard about it but on reflection – if the town was where I thought it was, one would have to walk I think 100 miles an hour. That town would be CamerIno. CamerAno is, well, 10 minutes from the Coast. Note to self: look at a map next time. Still, I’m pleased with new actual location!!!
Airports: CamerAno is a pain to get to for anyone that doesn’t live in North London. You have to go on Ryanair <involuntary shudder> from London Stanstead. Or you can go from Heathrow on Alitalia (Alitalia goes from London City Airport too) or Lufthansa but I think they might be more money. Though to be honest, I suspect once you’ve added “going up in the air” tax, “taking up a whole seat” tax, “using the airport terminal” tax etc. the 1p Ryanair flight might actually come to several hundred anyway. So, in summary, for anyone wishing to visit me, I recommend you drive down (with some of my stuff).
Stuff: Oh my there’s a lot. Who knew?! I’m preparing an inventory of things that will stay here when I leave and a separate list of things to come with me and things to get rid of. I’ve also created a “don’t know what to do with this stuff” list which is longer than the others put together.
That about sums up my recent activity on the Italian front. Tune in in a couple of weeks for an epic on Verona.
Well it’s been a quiet few days really with little to report on the Italian Front. I have been thinking of cunning money making schemes and doing a bit more research on language schools.
Air BnB – Now, as far as I can see, there’s not too many of these in Italy so perhaps it’s not a go-er (or perhaps that means it is as there’s hardly any competition!). Anyway, the gist of this is that people can rent out a room through the website. It seems to be very flexible around what the landlord is willing to offer – e.g. just the room, or use of the kitchen/living room etc. too. Assuming I have a spare room, I’d only need to rent it out a few days a month really to give me a bit of extra pocket money and if I bought a place near one of the language schools, that might work quite well. A couple of my friends rent their rooms through the website and seem to be fairly happy with it.
Painting a day – there’s an amazing artist called Edward B Gordon who lives in Berlin. I came across his work whilst staying with some friends last weekend over in Berlin. As the title of this paragraph suggests, he does a painting a day: an “oil painting”, 15cm by 15cm. They’re mostly of everyday life in Berlin and he makes the mundane really quite beautiful. He auctions off the paintings every day for 150 Euros +. A fabulous idea! It’s got me thinking about whether I could start an Italian version…In fact, I think I might be inspired enough to enroll myself on an oil painting course.
Scuola Lingua – There are 4 language schools in Le Marche but I think Centro Cultur @ le Conero looks like the best. It’s 560 Euros for 4 weeks which rates as about second best in terms of rates. There are quite a few testimonials on the website too, lots of pictures of happy looking students having fun in the sun and they’ve even got quite a good little video on the site about the school and location. They’ll help you find accommodation either in the town or close by (either apartments, agriturismo’s and with families) and they’ll pick you up from the airport. They seem to have afternoon activities but I’m a little concerned that there will be nothing to do in the evening. I think I’ll email them and ask them about the cost of accommodation and evening entertainment. Ancona’s close by and will have bars/cinema, but I wasn’t really intending to get a car and you never know how reliable public transport out in the sticks. It’s got some useful links about Le Marche and the area on the website too. So, who’s interested in coming with me?!?!?!?!
Barca vela –I’ve been looking for sailing clubs. It’s a test of my language skills as it’s not the kind of thing that people feel the need to translate into English. I think I’ve found a link to some sailing clubs. The plan is still to join a club, get some experience over a year or so and then buy a boat and sail around the Med for a year. There’s a Club that would be quite close to the language school above, Circolo Nautico S. Massacessi in Numana but the translation would have me believe that I er, need to be “presented” (ta da!!!) by two members of the Club.
I think that about sums up everything on the Italian Job to date… Sogni d’oro for now!
movetoitaly 