The Arrival :) :)

On January 11, 2011 (1-11-11) I arrived in Italy! My passport was actually stamped in the Paris airport (bummer) but it does say 1-11-11 J  My job is to now take in all of the Italian food, vino and culture I can stand in the next 89 days! My backpack was delayed in arriving to Florence by 3 hours, so I waited patiently…what else did I have to do? J I felt a little like Tom Hanks in “Terminal”, where he is stuck in the airport for a few weeks (or months?) because his passport isn’t valid. I kept seeing new people get their luggage, meet up with tour groups or friends and then exit the airport, while I just stayed there. 


My backpack finally arrived and I was fully loaded with all 65 pounds of my “light travel” essentials. Took the shuttle to Santa Maria Novella train station and bought a ticket to Buonconvento via a transfer in Siena. Before leaving the station I bought a pizza margarita and a split of Tuscan red wine for the road! This is the beautiful thing about Italy and riding the train, you don’t have to drive! And you can drink discretely while on public transportation. 

Safely arrived to Buonconvento where I was to call my host and ask him to pick me up. A seemingly easy task when one has a cell phone with an Italian calling plan or if the pay phone worked.  Key word ... “IF”… the payphone worked. But it did not, so after getting an Italian girl to verify that the phone was broken, she directed me to another pay phone. I ended up in a small grocery store and there were 3 Italian ladies being, well, Italian, complete with large hand gestures, loud talking and very serious looks. I gave them my best “I’m a helpless American girl and don’t speak Italian, but could you please help me” smile and mustered up the best of my “grammatically lazy” Italian to ask if they could help me make the call. One of the ladies took pity on me and offered to call for me on her cell phone! Bingo! 


30 minutes later Pierre-Jean (yes, he’s French) was there to pick me up and away we went, zipping along the dark, NARROW, windy roads back to the house. I was met by Kalyna (Italian-Canadian wife), Eliah (3 yrs) and Noah (1 yr) who had just flown back from 3 weeks in Canada the day before. We were all a jet-lagged bunch! Dinner was a beautifully roasted bone-in rack of pork (pork chops? Not sure how to call this), and roasted potatoes drizzled with house-pressed olive oil and freshly cut rosemary! Seriously. Amazing! I couldn’t get to bed fast enough, and a bed in my own room with my own bathroom no less! I had been up for 33+ hours. SLEEP!