Sono stanca, molto stanca.
It was a beautiful day, but I lost too much time.
We hopped on the plane in Eindhoven Airport on Tuesday. Vacation had already started when we were waiting to board and had a drink in the large hallway, Hubbie, Daughter and me. Hubbie started a conversation with another Belgian couple, sitting next to us. They were traveling with their ten or so year old son to their little getaway in the South of Spain, at the coast of the Mediterranean Sea.
– I know Italy is lovely, but, the weather in Spain is so much better
– Indeed, it froze this winter in Puglia
– We had twenty degrees °C when we were there during the X-mas break
– Wonderful!
– We really feel safe there, so clean and neat. It is like a protected area.
– We actually feel safe too (if we pay the security company enough). But we admit dealing with the rubbish is a problem.
– That is a pity!
– Oh well, Italian food is the best. And culture!
It was already late when we entered Casa Vita. The new kitchen looked lovely, the new cabinets were all installed, and Natalino, the carpenter, had done a great job!
My first task the next morning was to go to the grocery store. Daughter came along. She was looking into the special foods aisle, looking for pasta “senza glutine.” She is on a special diet for her rheumatoid arthritis. The rest of the morning I was busy with cleaning out everything and giving all kitchen stuff a new place. And then I tried chasing the dust out of the house.
This morning started brighter. Yesterday we had some tough rain storms. Hubbie and I visited a big plant store. The guy of the store gave us a tour and explained all about the fruit trees. You’ll never guess his name. Giovanni! Clearly it is the most popular name around here. His father of 80 years old was even more talkative, he chatted endlessly about all possible features of all types of fruits. It was already noon before we got rid of him. Back home, I fixed a quick lunch with fresh small tomatoes – they taste so much better here in the South – arugula, and local mozzarella. Off to the next job, sanding and painting a dark brown rack and two bedside tables. It was almost five pm when I realized I still had to buy dinner. I’ll be in the fish-shop in five minutes, I thought. It is just four kilometers down on the main road. Not today! Two big trucks collided, and traffic was guided to smaller roads in the countryside. A disaster! When confronted with oncoming traffic, I had to rush into a driveway, find refugee in the fields or stop and hope the other one didn’t scrape the side of my car. On my way back I hoped they would have cleaned the crash-area, but no, the same off-road story till I found our house again.
But the evening ended well: Fresh fish, with grilled vegetables and small potatoes flavored with rosemary from our yard!
We bought the house and paid an extra price to keep the furniture (we changed a lot afterwards, but okay, that’s normal), but there was a slight miscommunication on whether the expensive internet-TV was part of the deal. We assumed it was but noticed it wasn’t. A huge empty space on the wall was mocking with us when we entered the house after the notary deed. An extra investment, we thought, and problem solved. We went to a nearby store, bought a huge screen internet TV. A few days later, they sent us Giovanni in his fancy BMW and the TV. We clearly explained that it was important to have many channels available, and certainly British (since most guests are from the UK). He stayed busy on the sofa in front of the TV for at least two hours and when leaving, explained – too quickly – how everything worked. We were in the middle of installing the stuff we brought from Belgium (we managed to have a truck full), so it wasn’t until later that we noticed that most of the channels appeared to be Italian. Well, Giovanni blamed it on the internet, not strong enough because of the thick walls, but he would find a solution. A couple of days later he came back with a huge satellite antenna. The old antenna could be removed and replaced by this one. It wasn’t too visible, placed behind the roof of the trullo, so I agreed. Giovanni proudly announced we could watch over 500 channels now, worldwide! He disappeared, leaving a bill of 300 Euros for the antenna. That evening I took the time to go over the different channels. I didn’t count them, but there must have been a few hundred–broadcasted from the following areas: Japan, China, the Middle-East. I was furious, and believe me, expressing your anger in a different language is not that easy. So I took the dictionary, wrote everything down and called Giovanni. “Ah, Sophia! Come sta?” In my best English I politely told him to get his antenna and put it where ever …. He got the message, came back, gave me a friendly kiss (I thought it was a habit in Italy, but Francesca told me it was not a custom at all), removed the antenna and finally found a satisfactory solution. 
This worked pretty well for a while. As soon as Francesca received a new bill, she would scan it and e-mail it to us. Until December. The contractor was in the middle of building our kitchen when the electricity stopped. Simply stopped. After inquiry Enel answered they blocked us off because we didn’t pay the last two bills. We didn’t receive any! Reply: it is your responsibility when the invoices get lost, you should have guessed there were bills somewhere.
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