A Small Wanderer

Hooray for Italian bookstores.

So, finishing yesterday's post and continuing on with today...

Forgot to put in my post yesterday (hey, I was tired) our trip to this awesome park near school. Our friend Josh from PhilaU had mentioned how he and some of his other friends from his school had found this gorgeous park while looking for somewhere to go running, so yesterday Dana, Josh, and I went to check out this park. Freaking gorgeous. This place has a huge pond with ducks and swans and a series of waterfalls leading into the pond, one of which has a little path where you can walk behind the waterfall. It's just sweet. This park is huge - there are huge open spaces, lots of trees and gardens, multiple fountains and waterfalls, a tiny private chapel, all sorts of cool things. Apparently the whole place is the summer residence of some rich family that lets the city use the grounds as a park when they aren't living there. As soon as I upload the pics from my camera I'll post a couple here.

So funny story from today. As you might know, I have a small obsession with bookstores, and I've been looking for a bookstore that sells books in English and is located vaguely close to my apartment or the school. Well, I was walking home from school today and lo and behold, there's this bookstore on the street that I take at least twice a day that I just never noticed before. I don't think it was open when I've passed before - Italian businesses close for a few hours in the afternoon for a siesta (though I don't think they call it siesta because I believe that's Spanish), and they open and close at odd hours, but anyways. The place was just called "Libreria" ("Bookstore"). I, of course, walked over to check it out. I walked in and heard the three employees (two guys in their 30's, one woman a decade or so older) speaking English to each other, although it was apparent they were joking around and it wasn't their first language. I laugh to myself because I figure if they're speaking English then they must have some English books. Well, they see me smiling and the ensuing conversation goes something like this: (imagine all comments by all parties except with me in Italian accents and it becomes much more amusing)
Bookstore employees: "English?"
Me: "Si, grazie, inglese."
Bookstore employees: "You American?"
Me: "Si, americana."
Bookstore employees: "Where in America you from? Philadelphia, New York, Washington?"
Me: "Uhh (trying to remember how to say "I'm from" in Italian but failing for the moment)...Pittsburgh."
Bookstore employees: "Pittsburgh...Super Bowl!"
Me: "Si, si!"
Bookstore employees: "Come si chiama [what is their name]...what is the name of the Pittsburgh team?"
Me: "The Steelers."
Bookstore employees: "What is the name of the state that Pittsburgh is in?"
Me: "Pennsylvania."
Bookstore employees: "Listen to how the Americans pronounce their names! Pittsburgh! Pennsylvania!"

I start laughing and then just start browsing through the store. It's all Italian books, not a huge selection. They're talking to each other in Italian. I pretend to be browsing while in reality I'm just trying to figure out how to say "Do you have any books in English?" in Italian. Once I get that down...
Me: "Avete di libri in inglese?"
Bookstore employees: "Lei parla italiana! She understood everything we said! Lei capisca!"
Me: "No, no, non capisco italiana. I'm learning."
Bookstore employees: "No, no, you speak Italian very well! Very well!"
Me: "Grazie, but no."
Which was followed by an interesting exchange between me and the two guys that involved one of them speaking to me in Italian, the other telling him he should be speaking to me in English so he can practice, and the first guy responding that he was speaking to me in Italian so I could practice my Italian. They asked how long I was staying in Rome, and where I was studying, and then told me that if I ever came back to Rome I had to come back to their store. I told them that if they ever came to Pittsburgh they had to come visit the bookstore I work at. Then they started asking me about the reading habits of Americans ("The Americans...they read very much? The Italians...they not read very much."). I asked again about English books and one of the guys pointed out their English selection to me - a bunch of Shakespeare's plays, editions that had the English and the Italian on opposite pages, and Dan Brown's Deception Point. Good times. Yay for Shakespeare. I really wish I could read Italian...anyways. I think I've found a group of Italians on whom to practice my Italian skills (I currently speak an Italian/French/American English/Pittsburghese hybrid. I'm a linguistic mutt.).

Tonight Dana and I made dinner for our roommates and Tommy. We made pasta alfredo with chicken and broccolli. Good stuff. I think it would have worked better had I been able to find heavy cream (like the recipe called for) instead of fresh cream (the only cream the grocery store seemed to have), but it was really good nonetheless. Tommy brought some random mushrooms, we cooked them up and they turned out really well. Dana and I are going to be awesome cooks before we leave. We're going to try making ourselves a fancy dessert in the near future.

It's official....we're going to Florence this weekend! Dana and I bought train tickets (thank God we found a guy who spoke English) and booked a hostel today. I love how easy it is to say "Let's travel this weekend!" and then actually make it happen. Hooray for cheap travel in Europe!

On another note, Dana hasn't had class in two days because her classes keep getting cancelled. I'm only slightly jealous...

posted by Stacey @ 10:43 PM