Rain, Rain

The last few days seem to have been non stop rain. We’ve had everything from the torrential down pour with lightning to the gentle mist. Until two days ago it had not rained since we arrived here, and then it rains for 30 hours straight followed by intermittent rain. This of course makes it difficult to time going out to the stores and campus for internet.

I’m really tired of the lack of credit card acceptance around here. No one will take it, and my bank card doesn’t seem to work, which is particularly annoying because it is Citibank. There is even a Citibank in the city somewhere I’m told. I ran into a major problem at the grocery store today when I didn’t have enough cash. I had to go find the nearest atm, which was broken. The next closest one was a 20 minute walk away. After getting up at 8am, having 4 hours of language class, 3 hours of internet at the university and nothing but a slice of bread at 8am, this was the last thing that I needed. By time I made it home at 4 I was exhausted. I need an Italian bank card, and the Italians need to take a step into the present.

Speaking of stepping into the present, internet access is scarce to none in the city. Internet points are only in the bad neighborhoods, which does little for you when you are anywhere else. We still don’t have internet here because the people working at the Italian telephone company are retarded. When we signed up the computer wanted just the street name “Fortino” and filled in the rest. Well it filled it in as “Strada Fortino del.” Even the international students know after 2 weeks that the “del” goes between “strada” and “Fortino.” When we went to the Fastweb store the guy called to find out what was going on since he speaks more English than us Italian. Apparently the guys at the telephone company say that “Strada Fortino del” doesn’t exists, so they didn’t know where to come and install the equipment . Hello!!!! Do you even live in Italy? That was Wednesday and we still haven’t heard anything. If they don’t come or call by Tuesday we’ll go back and have the guy at the store yell at them. Ughhh!! I want internet.

The plus side of being here three weeks now is that I can actually help other international students get around the city without a map. And the workers at the little local stores: baker, butcher and newspaper/office supply store recognize me now. The baker woman is paticulary friendly and patient in helping me learn the names of the breads that I buy. To my excitement I noticed tonight that she also sells canoli siciliani, which is my favorite type of canoli. For those in the family, those are the kind that grandpa always buys at the Italian bakery. For everyone else a canola siciliani is a circular waffle cookie, think waffle cone, wrapped to slightly over lap and form a cylinder. They then fill it with a custard with pistachios. The rest of Italy makes canolis from a Pillsbury croissant role style dough in the shape of a cylinder with chocolate or cream inside.

Umm, Italian pastries.