Pizza Evening in Rome

In return for attending Italian lessons and labouring tirelessly for the school I get free pizza and wine every couple of weeks. Such is the hardship of life in Italy, where the youth, unable to find jobs, will work for 6 months unpaid, and the rest are called ‘Bamboccioni’ (or lazy) by the politicians, while the students protest the lack of jobs.

Actually, that’s not the case for those of us from the wealthier northern Europe, where we heat our homes sufficiently, and drive in cars instead of these interminable scooters that Italians are so fond of. I jest (joke), of course.

This evening at the pizzeria everybody decided to speak Italian all the time. Perhaps that’s due to the large encapment of Germans at the moment who have annexed the school, and who, in the name of efficiency, wish to spend every moment advancing their Italian.

It is my mission to promote the spread of English in this most secure bastion of la lingua italiana – . Many students have benefited from my native tongue and masterful grasp of the English language.

Vadolin Player at Campo Dei Fiori

Every Friday and Saturday night this elderly mandolin player graces the restaurants and drinking establishments of Campo di Fiori. In Piazza Navona there’s a 5 piece jazz band that plays alternate weekends, adding to the romantic atmosphere. A mime artist visits centro storico at a predictable time each evening. If you sit on the Spanish Steps, within 2 minutes, like clockwork you will be presented with a bouquet of red flowers by a street trader.

After 6 months of living in central Rome we’ve seen everything before, know everything that’s going to happen – it’s like that movie ‘Groundhog Day’, or ‘The Truman Show’. It’s a slightly surreal experience: in that we know all the places to go, what’s going to happen, it’s passe. Whereas on the other hand everybody around us, all the tourists, the new people at school every two weeks, look at everything with the same wonderment, like when they see the Colloseum for the first time. For those that have just arrived in Rome, everything is new and spontaneous and exciting. It’s like the first time they’ve seen it, because IT IS the first time they’ve seen it. Everyone around us seems like they must be mad, crazy, and every morning I wake up I’m like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, everything is the same and predictable, but to everybody else it’s like the first time it happened, ever!

It was fate, chance, that that band started playing just at the right moment, that the restaurant we happened to pick was so spectacular, that the wine was just perfect….. OH!! I guess it was, uh, ‘meant to be’!

We used to joke that the Italian men, who are extremely forward and aggressive with the ladies, use this knowledge to their advantage to plan the perfect evening for a date, by taking their woman to the same restaurant, the same bar with the same band that just happened to be there, telling the barman to serve her strong drinks, while him non-alcoholic soft drinks, etc, etc.

Learning Italian after hours at "La Vineria"

13 euros for a bottle of vino, Campo di Fiori, oh many a night has been wiled away practicing my Italian here. It brings a tear to my eye, as I am now leaving Rome, and onto pastures new. My work here is now done, my friends, I will miss you all. The last cork has been popped, the last Italian conquest has been fought (JH: in what sense Dunks?), the last week at Torre di Babele has ended, and the last tearful photograph of the Colosseum has been snapped.

If I intended to take one I couldn’t take a more cheesy photograph than the one of the mandolin player at the Vineria. On the left is a Brazilian guy, and on the right is a Spaniard; oh those crazy latinos, they have more fun than anyone; it’s a real contrast between us English, the Germans, and other Anglo-Saxon descendant countries, and the Latinos, that I’ve discovered through being here. Such is the cultural diversity in Rome and at school that you encounter. Meeting all these nationalities and speaking another language also gives you a perspective on your own language and culture.