Highlights from week 1: The Lay of The Land

I.

Buongiorno a tutti. Benvenuto a mio blog d’Italia.

 

This first week was about getting on and getting around.  Santa Marinella is a town like Corpus Christi or SPI.  The beach is the reason for most commerce.  Most of the restaurants specialize in seafood which is caught fresh a mile away or less.  There’s lots of al fresco restaurants, cafes, bars, etc.  Pedestrians are as plentiful as the (Formula 1 wannabe) drivers.  You have to go away from the beach to get to restaurants that offer more than pizza. Gelato shops, souvenir/knick-knack shops, and beach gear shops attest to the fact that visitors are just as ubiquitous as natives. Even a couple of bars near the public beach have a gelato section. Gelato is money in the bank!


A Room with A View, A Staircase...and a Pond (Eddie Izzard)

 

There is… a shocking lack of air conditioning.  And what there is, is weak. For example, at our adopted supermercatto, (a cross between 7/11 and Walgreen’s), the a/c is just enough to feel the difference, but not enough to actually cool you down. When one travels abroad, there are stages of adjustment.  At one point, you start complaining about how you can’t get what you’re used to.  For me, it was the air conditioning.  I’m having a rough time.  I’m sweaty all the time, especially when I sleep – which I hate.  Makeup has to be done early in the morning when there’s more breezes coming through the room. The heat is breaking down my privacy barriers.  For example, leaving the door ajar and windows wide open so that a cross breeze can make the room comfortable.  The genius of Italian architecture, however, has a way of mitigating some discomfort.

 

Our hotel, Le Najadi, is an air conditioner in itself – with no noisy compressor.  It’s designed to circulate air and cool it.  An architect would have better words to describe what I’m going to try to describe.  LOBBY: the lobby is tiered which makes air, I think, sink.  Then the core of the building is a staircase made of marble.  As the air sinks, the marble cools the air by absorbing heat.  When you’re coming up the stairwell, you feel cool air coming down.  On the way down, there’s a strong breeze coming from the open doors of the restaurant on the lower floor.  There are high ceilings everywhere in the hotel. (no ceiling fans) Since our windows are at an angle to the beach, we get lovely breezes. If that isn’t enough, there’s always a cold shower.

 

Sta. Marinella is a good town to get used to living Italian.  It’s only been a week and we’re on a first-name basis with the staff.  They help us with our Italian.  I’m learning from them.  They are lovely people – super cool. 

 

  The Public Beach at Sta. Marinella, A Lagoon

 

II.

Class is A-mazing.  We meet for breakfast around 8-ish.  It’s a continental breakfast. Zucco di arancia (orange juice) or mele (apple), croissant, doughnuts! (the chef is American), jam, burro (butter), coffee, tea, water  and fresh fruit. The water is mineral water and can be still water or fizzy.

 

Then at 9:00, we come inside the restaurant proper and have class for three hours.  We read and talk and complain and debate. This week was Greek Week – Plato and Aristotle.