11.037.600

18/06/07
This journal entry is being written on a 13-hour train ride from Catanzaro Lido to Bologna Centrale. Yup. But first, let's rewind to cover yesterday.
I sleep in and have a shower in the morning, using shampoo for the first time since leaving Ferrara (my shampoo bottle was too bulky to pack, but there were little packets in the tiny little bathroom in my room - sidenote: to use the toilet, which dripped perpetually, you have to put your feet in the shower). I go downstairs and get breakfast in the lobby, where the television first airs mass, and then some show about art that TLC would probably air. After a glass of orange juice and a croissant, I am given directions to the beach (through the back of the hotel) where I will find an umbrella marked with my room number - 32. Before I make it to the beach, I see there is a little patio/playground that I think would be a perfect spot to sit and write in this journal. A small company of ants disagrees, so I move on to the beach, where I find not only the umbrella, but a single fold-up beach chair as well, in a line of red and yellow Stella Marina umbrellas and chairs. I write until maybe noon, then play in the water for a spell, then lay out my towel to tan. The Irish in me beats out the Italian in me, and I now have tingly, rosy arms and shins.
After my fill of the beach, I go back to my room and figure out how to use the television. I do some channel surfing (or "zapping", as the Italians say) and come to the conclusion that Italian television is weird, although probably no more so than American television. I call home and chat with my parents, wishing Dad a happy Father's day and Mom a happy birthday. Granma hadn't come over yet, so after some more zapping, I get a call, and it's her, wishing me a happy birthday. I tell her that I haven't yet been able to find any connections to Nonnie, but I'll be working on it tomorrow. Oh, how happy she'll be to hear all my stories when I get back home! Anyway, it's back to the boob tube, and I come across Will & Grace, dubbed in Italian! The jokes in Italian weren't really funny, but just the fact that they were all speaking Italian was humorous enough in itself.
This whole time I'm snacking on Sticks & Bretzel and a chocolate brioche that I've had since Rome, so I'm not too hungry when I decide that it's starting to get late so I should go to dinner anyway. I order penne alla calabrese and the local white wine to celebrate my birthday. I'm warned that the food will be spicy, but I say that that's fine. As I wait for my meal and nibble on the bread, I notice that the diners are more or less the same faces from the day before. There was a new couple at the table next to me, but the family across the hall and the old friends two tables down are the same. I get my pasta and quickly learn that they weren't kidding - I'm actually having difficulty eating it. Then, within the span of a couple of minutes of each other, every other table gets up to leave. I continue to stuff pasta in my mouth, but the heat, spiciness, and all the emotions of the moment are too much, and I nearly choke up what I have in my mouth. I swallow with a swig of wine, and leaving dignity and decor aside, I get up, leave the penne and wine half-eaten and half-drunk, and go to pay at the counter. I watch some more tv (the Italian under-21 soccer team won their game, but the wrong team won the other game in their bracket, so the Italians unfortunately didn't get to move on) and set my alarm for an early morning.