Expatriate in a Cold Climate

20 Tuesday Jan 2009

Posted by in Driving in the U.S., Travel, Uncategorized, Weather

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cold-winter-sun

No, this is not a black and white photo… see that brush of brown on the shed, bottom right?  a hint of red in the barn?  This is New England winter, just as I remember it:  life lived many days in black, white and shades of gray.  That little faint ball in the sky?  Yeah, that’s the sun.  Sort of.

We lived in New England for decades and loved it, but having been away for several years it is a shock to place oneself in Vermont in January.  -20 F (-29 C) is very, very cold.  So cold that when you go out to feed the shivering birds your hands become numb almost immediately.  The good thing about -20 F is that it is accompanied by cloudless blue skies – the sort of frigid blue that makes the phrase ‘blue is a cool color’ seem completely inadequate.

Here are some of the superficial differences between winter life in New England and winter life in Rapallo or Arizona:  1) It takes 5-10 minutes to bundle up to go outside, even for a few minutes work or fun; another 5-10 to unbundle when back indoors.  2)  One’s appetite increases geometrically as the temperature plunges – the colder it is, the hungrier we are and the more we eat.  3) Exercise – you can take a crunchy walk in the snow on the verge of the road, but you won’t stay out long.  Or you can ski, skate, or winter hike, each of which may well involve a drive somewhere.  4) And if you decide to take that drive… well, I’ll let the photos below from our trip back to the airport tell the tale:

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and-another-accident

another-accident

In all we saw a total of 10 cars off the road on a 30-mile stretch of  Interstate 89 in New Hampshire.  Fortunately we did not suffer this fate and I reached my plane, thanks to daring driving by M.,  with 15 minutes to spare.

Stepping into the 70 F night air at Sky Harbor Airport was a  shock of another sort, as was smelling the perfume of the blooming  tree off the deck and standing outside, uncoated, to admire the wash of stars in the dark, moonless sky.

Would I go back to New England in the winter?  In a heartbeat.

Wanderers

12 Monday Jan 2009

Posted by in American habits and customs, Customs, Travel, Uncategorized

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Courtesy of touregypt.net

Courtesy of touregypt.net

A December “Briefly Noted” in the New Yorker about Edmund White’s new biography of Rimbaud struck a synchronous note with an essay by Bruce Chatwin entitled “It’s a nomad nomad world,”  which I happened to read a few days later.  Why?  Rimbaud and Chatwin were both inveterate wanderers (and I hope the similarities end there because Rimbaud sounds horrid and I like the restless Chatwin).

Why do we wander? Why would someone with a lovely place to live in Italy want to spend time elsewhere?  Why does anyone want to pick up stakes and move?  It’s not all economics or thinking that ‘the grass is greener over there’.  Chatwin, in his essay, posits that our genetic heritage makes us move: “All our activities are linked to the idea of journeys.  And I like to think that our brains have an information system giving us our orders for the road, and that here lie the mainsprings of our restlessness.”

Man has existed in more or less his present state for perhaps 200,000 years; civilization dates from at least 4,000 BC., or earlier.  Before that people wandered of necessity to find food and/or shelter.  Now, maybe, we wander because of the restless gene that pricks our curiosity and makes us want to see the geography of other parts of the world, hear strange languages and meet people with different frames of reference (and maybe eat some new and interesting food as well).  Maybe, as well, that urge for movement makes 1-hour commutes acceptable to vast numbers of people who are otherwise sane.

There are those who cheerfully wander in their imaginations, and sometimes I think they have the best trips of all.  At the very least they’re home in time for supper.  But others are afflicted with such wanderlust that a month at ‘home’ is painful.   Most of us, I suppose, fall somewhere in between, being happy by our own hearths most of the time, while enjoying an occasional safe journey.

But isn’t it nice when planning the madness of, say, airplane travel or a long stay in a strange place, to know that we really can’t help it?  It’s a biological imperative!

Yesterday I put my visiting sister and her friend on a plane for home and I’m going to leave sunny, warm Arizona to go to grey, wintery Vermont for about a week.  It’s something I just have to do…

Where are you going?  Do you travel frequently or are you a homebody?

Crispy Tortillas with Pork and Beans

07 Wednesday Jan 2009

Posted by in American recipes, Food, Uncategorized

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While he was working on these tasty goodies I asked the Captain if he would call this Tex-Mex food.  He thought for a while and opined that no, these are Arizonican – so here you have it: the first entry in a whole new food category.

Its best to fry up the tortillas yourself, though you can buy them already crisped. After the frying you will put the toppings on and broil.  Garnish with salsa cruda and, if you like it, sour cream.  I’m of the school that believes there is little in the world that is not improved with the addition of sour cream, but there are those who don’t agree, strange as it may seem. The recipe for what you see above can be found here, or by clicking under recipes over on the right. The recipe for the salsa is here, and also on the right.

There are two great things about this dish: 1) It’s really fun to make and 2) It’s infinitely adaptable to what you have around and what you like to eat. It is only coincidental that these look like pizzas, it does not mean that we are pining for our adopted country.  Well, maybe a little…

You can’t get there from here…

03 Saturday Jan 2009

Posted by in American habits and customs, Travel

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Last year when we returned home to Italy after a stay in the U.S. we asked a friend to drive us to the Phoenix Airport (Sky Harbor, what a great name for an airport).  Our trip involved a couple of plane changes before we finally arrived in Pisa (Aeroporto Galileo Galilei – another evocative name).

After claiming our luggage we walked to the shuttle train which, after the briefest of waits, carried us to the main Pisa train station.  Another short wait ensued, and then we hopped on a train that carried us right to Rapallo.

photo by Maurizio Boi

photo by Maurizio Boi

Dragging our bags behind us we crossed the street to the bus station.  We did have to wait close to an hour, but then a bus carried us up the hill to San Maurizio and dropped us off within 20 meters of our house.

Photo from Max Chern Collection

Photo from Max Chern Collection

The Italian part of the journey combined all the bests parts of travel: thrifty independence, timeliness, the joy of riding on a train, and the entertainment of time spent at a bus station.  What more could you ask?

Why can’t we do that in the United States?  Once upon a time American cities were connected by an intricate web of rails and it was quite possible to get from one town to another by train.  Not only was it possible; it was often the most efficient way to travel.

The magic of watching a train chuff into a small-town station is long gone.  American kids don’t have a lot of opportunities to see passenger trains unless they live near large metropolitan areas. What a pity!

And how inconvenient.  All the post-World War II road building in the U.S. was a boon to those with the means to buy, store and feed an automobile; for everyone else it has been a huge disservice, as public transportation has dwindled and train tracks have been pulled up.  It’s an ugly circle: fewer passengers leads to less service which leads to even fewer passengers which leads to….

Some say it is a matter of size.  The U.S. is vast.  Well, so is Europe, and we can get to just about anywhere in Europe from our front door using only public transportation.  Is it as convenient as driving?  Of course not!  But it is less costly, much less tiring and likely to be pretty entertaining. And it’s probably better for Old Mother Earth.  From our front door in Arizona we can take a very nice walk… and end up back at our front door.

(In Elaborations over on the right there are fascinating accounts of ‘house-party girls’ arriving by train for a college weekend in Massachusetts, and of the last passenger train to run through the Hoosac Tunnel.)

2009 Doggerel

01 Thursday Jan 2009

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Put a lentil in your pot,

Make a wish for quite a lot,

Kick the old year out the door.

Let the New Year bring you more

of all you wish for and all you cravery

health and wisdom, joy and bravery.

To all who visit this blog o’ mine ~ I wish you the best possible in 2009. No doubt it will be quite a ride.

I am grateful that you read and comment.  Come back often.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

The Best Thing We Ate – Pumpkin Ice Cream

28 Sunday Dec 2008

Posted by in American recipes, Food, Uncategorized

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It was a few weeks ago that we ate Sherri’s incomparable Pumpkin Ice Cream.  She has been kind enough to share the recipe, which you can find here.

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Don’t skimp on the trimmings!  You can see them above the bowl of ice cream: caramel sauce, candied pecans, and rum-soaked raisin.  All of them add immeasurably to the ice cream experience.  I especially like the pecans, but the others are awfully good too.  And as Sherri has pointed out, if all the raisins aren’t eaten with the ice cream they make a delightful little mid-afternoon nibble in the following days.

The final drop…

22 Monday Dec 2008

Posted by in Italy, Liguria, Rapallo, Uncategorized

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photo-water-dropThe Water Problem, so movingly and eloquently described here, has been resolved.  I don’t imagine anyone’s particularly happy; we certainly aren’t.  But at least it’s over.

Our lawyer looked at all the documents and told us that we must pay the c. E 2,500 that Acqua Potabili demanded.  Our only remaining recourse is to go to the neighbors for help.

The Captain called A.P. and arranged to have all documents e-mailed to us here in the States.  There will be no second shoe dropping.  The bill we received here covered up to September, when we discovered and corrected the problem.  It began in excess of E 6,000, to which Mr. A.P. applied a bewildering series of reductions to arrive at the E 2,500 figure.

It all has a bit of good-cop bad-cop feel to it.  Bad Cop – “You owe us E 6,000!”  Good Cop – “But you only have to give us E 2,500!”  This, I guess, is meant to make us feel better, and to make up in some way for the appalling lapse of time between meter reads and bills.  But in fact, the bill is about 75 times larger than what we would reasonably expect, and somehow even though A.P. has made big concessions, it just doesn’t feel all that good.

Except for the fact that it’s over.  That part feels just fine.

Gee Whiz!

19 Friday Dec 2008

Posted by in Photographs, Uncategorized

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Disclaimer – this is another postal post.  But I can’t resist writing it because I mail-truckam completely amazed.

Those of you living in the States full time are probably accustomed to such miraculous service, but I am left with my mouth agape, saying Gee Whiz over and over again.

I had five Christmas boxes to mail off, and dreaded going to the Post Office.  When I went to the USPO web site to research what it would cost to mail my packages I discovered that I wouldn’t have to go to the Post Office at all; the Post Office would come to me.

That’s not quite true; I had to go to the Post Office to pick up Priority Mail boxes in which to ship the goodies.  But they’re free – which means I didn’t have to stand in the long holiday line to pay for them.  I simply walked in, took what I needed and walked out. I have to admit, I expected bells to ring and policemen to run out to arrest me for stealing.  But no.

AND there is a flat rate for mailing these priority-rate boxes.  A large box costs $12.50 to mail to a US destination, and a smaller box $9.30.  It doesn’t matter how much it weighs, as long as it’s less than 70 pounds (you couldn’t get 70 pounds in those boxes unless you’re mailing gold, which I don’t recommend).

So I packed my boxes, went online, printed mailing labels and postage, paid online with a credit card, attached the labels to the boxes (I used plain paper and clear packing tape), made an online request for pick-up and that was that.  This morning I put the boxes by my front door and when I returned from errands they were gone.  In their place was a receipt from the mail carrier. They will be delivered from California to Vermont and points in between in 2-3 days.  And I can track them.

The only way they could improve the service, I think, would be to do the shopping for me and pay for the presents.  Maybe next year?

n.b. Reader Giovanni sent in a very useful comment which said, in part,

“Shall we tell to ours readers that in Italy we have a PostaCelere? You go to the Post Office buy your standard package and send it for a 10-30 euro. Your package will be delivered in 24-48 hrs in any civilized location worldwide.”

I didn’t want this very helpful information to be buried in comments.  I had no idea this service was available in Italy and am happy to know about it.

Mail Shock PS

16 Tuesday Dec 2008

Posted by in Italian habits and customs, Italian men, Italy, Uncategorized

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postino1The captain was sad that in the earlier mail post I didn’t describe our postino, an unsmiling fellow who refuses to acknowledge us when we meet on the street.  He’s one of those scooter-riders who always has a burning cigarette dangling from the side of his mouth; maybe that’s why he doesn’t smile.

(Um, no.  This is not a photo of our postino. Darn.)

In any event, he, like the other postini, delivers the mail by scooter.  Where a passenger might sit he has a large plastic bin into which the post has been put in delivery order.  While it seems that he doesn’t make the trip all the way up to our house every day, he does come in all kinds of weather.  We’ve seen him picking his careful way along the road, hunkered down against a driving rain.  So if it’s ‘neither sleet nor rain…’ that keeps our postino from his appointed rounds, what is it?  Whim? Lack of mail? Post Office scheduling? A mystery!

The Best Thing We Ate This Week – Louise’s Birthday Cake

13 Saturday Dec 2008

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With luck we each have a birthday every year.  As it happened, this year mine was Major (or so it seemed to me) so the Captain pulled out all the stops on the birthday cake.

I love chocolate, although probably not quite as much as the next person. A chocolate bar in the fridge is likely to be nibbled to death over time, but it will not disappear suddenly. My idea of perfect chocolate is rich, but in small doses, and preferably with something other than chocolate as a foil. This elaborate cake is just right in all regards.

The picture makes it look a little gloppy, and I guess it is – but it’s gloppy in the best sense of the word. It fills your mouth with flavor and your heart with gladness. I didn’t get around to taking the photo until it had been nearly all eaten, so it is not a beautiful picture. But it was a magnificent cake.

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The neighbors were nice enough to come over for a couple of hours and help us out – this is definitely NOT a cake for two people to try to eat: too rich, too much of it. Most of us washed it down with Prosecco, Italy’s answer to champagne. It’s a sweet, but not too sweet, wine with bubbles that keep desserts from being cloying. A sweet dessert wine would not be good with this cake I think – too much sweetness.

It’s not the easiest cake in the world to make, but it’s not complicated. It just takes a while. And it is one of the best cakes you will ever eat. You can find the recipe here, or over on the right under good recipes.

Buon appetito!