Since it’s spring in Italy, I just assumed the weather would be warm to hot, and sunny. It is a Mediterranean country after all.
Thought I’d better check out Weather.com to see what I can expect over the next week or two…. And it’s rain, rain and more rain! And temperatures not much different from Joburg.
I’m so depressed… and I just bought blockout sunscreen… Yes, yes, it’ll get warmer and sunnier… by the end of May only!
A miserable Meira…
Since I’m quite busy at the moment (I’m sure you can understand what with 2 days to go before I leave), I thought I’d share with you my friend and colleague Jarred’s email rant to Woolworths which he sent on Monday. I’ve reprinted it below. It had me in chuckles for ages! 
Please check his site for the responses to the letter as well as updates.
Dear Woolies
I have really had enough of your ridiculous stock problems. For a few months now, I have borne with the outrageous range of items which your stores are out of.
I shop at Woolworths often, and at several of your stores in the northern suburbs. I also tend to shop later in the evening, for which you conveniently cater by keeping the stores open till 8 or even 9.
However, by the time I get there at 7:30, the store looks like it’s been the target of a rampaging mob of Somalian looters.
Example of shopping for ingredients from a simple recipe:
Fresh Mint (out of stock)
Marrows (out of stock)
Fresh Ginger (out of stock)
Sweet Potatoes (out of stock)
Hello? I’m not asking for freshly picked truffles or partially scrubbed Betelgeusian sea cucumber. Sweet potatoes??!!
Which is to say nothing about the fact that you have been out of stock of tuna fish, pink salmon and tinned lentils for so long I could have bred five generations of my own tuna in my kitchen sink, feeding them on nothing but freshly picked lentils from my own vegetable garden.
You are a premium supermarket with premium prices. Where else does one have the opportunity to pay R40 for a punnet of strawberries? Or R6 for one avocado pear? There are families of avocado sellers along the road to Mpumalanga that would be able to retire to the comfort of their Camps Bay home, or at least educate their children, if they could persuade passers by to pay them that kind of fee.
Nonetheless, I have cheerfully paid your obscene prices for two reasons: quality and range. Quality, in general, is good. Everything looks like it has been hand polished on the thighs of the finest Saudi Arabian concubines. Range has now become a matter of statistical probability rather than any kind of certainty. I need to leave the house with 5 recipes in hand, along with a worn copy of the Bible, equipping me with both choice and prayer, to stand even a remote chance of being able to cook myself dinner that evening. And being an atheist, this is a LOT of ask.
Your management seem at best bewildered, at worst uninterested. “We have a new stock system, please bear with us”, the one told me. That was about two months ago after the fourth Woolworths in Sandton was out of stock of potatoes. I am tired of bearing with you. I’m tired of seeing up-ended black vegetable containers and dishonest “temporarily” out of stock notices all over your stores.
If you can’t get the plants to bear fruit or play your part in over-fishing the oceans for the benefit of whinging middle-class citizens such as myself, perhaps you should go back to simply selling clothes? Raymond Ackerman has a lovely book called something about Four Legs of the Table which I used to think was useful only as a way to start the braai on which to cook my Woolworths line fish, but I’m beginning to think someone over there should give it a read. Perhaps he knows where you can buy potatoes.
I don’t know. But I expect the situation to improve immediately. If I have to suffer the indignity of changing to my local Pick ‘n Pay or Spar, I’m not going to be in a forgiving mood.
Yours
Jarred Cinman
… in fact, there are some perks for being up really early in the morning. If you poke your head out the front door and take a look at the park opposite you, you may very well discover that there is actually mist in the morning!
Click on the picture to see the large version.
I just received the most wonderful farewell card from my awesome work buddies at Cambrient (big thanks to Tracy, Jarred and Di). Here’s what the little fiendish elves got up to this afternoon while I was working alongside them, headphones on, listening to my favourite radio station XFm, completely oblivious to their machinations (like distracting me and taking my phone in order to look for a photo of Tal):
They also gave me a small present.
What a cool bunch of people I work with! Thanks guys – you rock!
It was bound to happen, what with such a big event coming up… yes, insomnia. Not bad mind you. I fall asleep fine, but then wake up after 5 or 6 hours and that’s it. I’m sure it doesn’t help going to sleep late. But there’s still so much to think about, plan and do in the evenings.
Last night, amongst various other things, I was collecting my tax return stuff together to give to the bookkeeper today. It’s probably a bit early for most of you to start thinking about this, but I’ll only be back at the end of July. If it’s like last year, the first deadline for getting your tax return in is the beginning of July. And I’d really like to get any money due to me back as soon as possible. I am STILL waiting for 2 years’ worth of tax returns dating back to about 2004. I’m actually losing track how long this is outstanding. But I do have faith in my bookkeeper. I did get last year’s back after a few months. Anyway, whenever the money comes through will be a bonus – and it’s a really nice amount for me. In fact, I wouldn’t mind if it came through end of July so that I actually have some money in my bank account when I get back from my trip!
I know going to sleep at 12:45am is rather late, but does that mean I have to wake up at 6am? Monday it was 7am. Sunday it was 8am. What’s with my internal body clock??? In fact, it was 5:50am. I wake up and think, why did I wake up? Do I need the loo? I go to the bathroom just in case. Climb back into bed. I try not to think about the day ahead but rather recall what I was dreaming through the night. Try not to think about all the things I have to do still. (I have been writing up lists.) And then I start to get hungry. Why oh why! I’m hoping the twinges are going to pass, but they start to get a bit painful. I have a theory that we (or maybe it’s just me) get hungry during the night because our stomachs have completely digested the previous day’s food, but since we are fast asleep, we don’t notice. But if you happen to be awake at the wrong time, then you feel the hunger cravings.
So what choice do I have? Do I lie in bed hoping the hunger will go away? (I’ve tried this before on numerous occasions. Sometimes it works, and sometimes I lie there with hunger pains for 45 mins to an hour) Or do I get up and have a small bite to eat, risking waking myself even further? I get up. Have a small piece of cheese. Now I have to brush my teeth because I can’t go to sleep with the taste of food in my mouth. I’m back in bed. And after about 25 minutes, I capitulate. The insomnia has won. I get out of bed and come switch on the computer.
Hence the early morning blog post.
Sorry it’s not very exciting today. I hope to have something to make up for it later!
4 sleeps to go! (well, almost-sleeps 
)
With 5 (yes FIVE) days to go until I leave for Italy…. I still can’t believe it’s happening so soon… this trip has been a year in the planning… I thought I should finish off the story of my Schengen visa application. Don’t expect it to be that riveting, though I feel it’s only fair to end the suspense for you….
So there I was feeling floored after being told I had to provide booked accommodation for my ENTIRE trip, a primarily backpacking trip. And I wasn’t about to point out to those-of-many-words at the Italian Consulate that their website indicated differently.
You don’t have to have only hotel bookings; you can also get friends/family in Italy to fill in a host form whereby they declare that you’ll be staying at them for a certain period of time and that they’ll be responsible for you in some way. At this stage I was planning to stay with 2 friends in Italy: one a “pen-pal” of mine in Sardinia, and one a friend of mine in Bologna.
Allow me to digress for a minute… I made a few great “pen-pals” in Italy through this cool site MyLanguageExchange – “Find a partner at the online community and practice your second language (any language) with a native speaker who is learning your language”. In June last year (see, I really have been planning this trip for a while), I decided that since I’m going to be spending at least a month in Italy, I should learn the language. Yes, I know, the same thought was crossing your mind…
My French is quite good (I learned it at the Alliance Française in Durban from age 11-18, part of the time with my friend Ilan Pillemer – thinking back it must have been quite unusual to have these 2 little 11-year-olds learning French in the evenings in a class full of ADULTS, but we loved it and I think we learned very quickly), and generally I’m good at languages – I ended up doing 4 language subjects for Matric (English, Afrikaans, Hebrew and French – when writing exams, I always could find the right word… in the wrong language ) – so I figured I’d pick up basic Italian quite quickly.
First I phoned my friend (and former graphology teacher) Silvana Grandin. She used to be a teacher of Italian. She now runs Grafex, an academy with courses in handwriting analysis (graphology) and forensic handwriting identification. Silvana apologised and said she was too busy to teach me, but why don’t I join the Società Dante Alighieri? That sounded great – I love learning languages and the Società in Houghton is situated quite close to where I live.
I phoned them up and they said classes start at the end of July. With a month to go til the start of the course, I decided to start learning on my own (yes, I’m one of THOSE). I had this super-cool book to work from, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Learning Italian. And it was fun to start learning something new. Having French as a background is way useful! At the end of July, I attended the first lesson of the beginner’s course and knew that I was going to be bored to death by the slow pace. So I asked and was allowed to join the Intermediate group. I much prefer feeling like I need to work hard to catch up, than be frustrated by the snail’s-pace of a class. The others in the class had spent 4 months before doing the beginners course, but it only took me about a month to get to their level. After 3 months of the 4-month intermediate class, I was once again starting to get frustrated by the pace. But I knew there was nothing I could do. Anyway, I learned a lot – loads of grammar – which will be put into much practice starting in a week!
What really helped me improve my Italian was communicating with the Italian friends I made through MyLearningExchange. We mainly used Skype and MSN to type-chat, but sometimes in the evenings we did voice-chatting. At times I would try out my Italian and they would respond, correcting me where necessary, and at other times they would speak English and I would help them out. It’s a great system whereby everybody learns and you get to know cool people. I hope to be meeting up with some of them in Italy.
Ummm… I’ve been writing this post now for an hour and I’ve kinda noticed that I’ve drifted away from my original topic. Frankly speaking, in my humble opinion (and it is mine to broadcast to the whole world!), I think it’s become a lot more interesting than I originally thought it was going to be . And just to warn you, the way this blog has veered off course is pretty indicative of how my mind works – jumping from thought to thought by sometimes only tenuous associations…
Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately for some of you who need to get back to your exciting lives after this meandering-no-coherent-story diversion) I need to get ready and go to work. So the Schengen saga will have to be continued (let’s hope finished) at some later stage.
Wishing you a groovy week!
Not to rub your nose in my trip or make you jealous or anything ( ), but here’s the Hotel Villa Nettuno we’ll be staying in for 2 nights in Taormina on the east coast of Sicily:
And these will be the views from our hotel room:
In their description of the reception area, they say “The white and black do not oppose but they blend together in a poor but elegant art of another time.” Don’t you just love (mis)translations? I can just see how much I’m going to enjoy noting down examples of these and sharing them with you…
I can’t wait to go! Can you?
Here’s something cool my colleague Tracy just sent me:
1. Go to www.google.co.uk
2. Click on ‘maps,’ above the search bar…
3. Click on ‘get directions’
4. Type ‘New York’ in the first box (the ‘from’ box)
5. Type ‘Paris’ in the second box (the ‘to’ box)
6. Click on ‘get directions’
7. Scroll down to step 23…….
8. Read 24
What a bright gorgeous day in Joburg! Sun beautiful sun!
Since I’ve been completely unable to do any paying work today (I work for myself as well as Cambrient) , what with preparing for my trip, making hotel bookings, etc… I thought I’d share with you the stress I went through applying for a Schengen visa.
In case some of you aren’t aware, for us holders-of-a-South Africa-passport-only it’s a mission travelling around, always needing visas, except for going to the UK, Israel and afew other countries. To go to western Europe, you need to obtain a Schengen visa which is an agreement between the so-called Schengen states. Once you have a Schengen visa, it allows you to enter any of the Schengen countries, such as Italy, France, Germany, Belgium, Holland, etc. So you only have to apply to one country to get the visa and then you can enter any of the other countries.
Because I’m going to spend most of my time in Italy (and also because I enter that country first), I decided to go with the Italian Consulate in Johannesburg. I checked out their website, downloaded their checklist and read through it.
In case any of you are planning a trip and will need a Schengen visa, here are the requirements (I don’t think they vary much from one Schengen country to another):
I still had some questions and tried calling them, to get told by the voice message that you have to email them or make an appointment. I even went to the actual Consulate (in Houghton) to see if I could just come in and ask a few questions. The tall carabiniere there told me politely and firmly to email them, that they’re very good at responding to emails.
Here’s my first email to them (shortened):
Buon Giorno
I’m planning a 3-month trip to Europe leaving 28 April 2007. I plan to spend the first 2 months in Italy, 2 weeks in France, 1 week in Belgium and 1 week in Israel. My plane ticket is booked and I just need to pay for it.
I have downloaded the Visa Application Checklist and Declaration from your website. Please would you be so kind as to answer a few questions:
Their response:
Kindly consult www.italianconsulatejohannesburg.org for requirements and appointment.
At this my blood started to boil. I’ve just told them I’ve been to the website. I mailed them back:
I’ve been to the website, and I still have questions. Please answer them.
Their response:
Kindly consult www.italianconsulatejohannesburg.org for requirements and appointment.
Oh boy! Am I starting to go mad! I was like… what the &$%# am I supposed to do??? I can’t phone them, I can’t visit them, they won’t respond to my emails… But I restrained myself and sent off ANOTHER email (still polite mind you):
I’ve been to the website but I still have questions. Won’t you please answer them for me.
Finally I got a response, but not one that thrilled me, at all:
You will require confirmed accomodation for the entire trip. That way we will be able to ascertain the time you will be spending in Italy.
Great. I’m going away for 3 months. Most of it is backpacking. I don’t know where I’m going to be for most of it. Now what??? Plus the amount of currency I had to show in my bank account was over R21 000.
And so started the stress of my visa application. To be continued…
I think that’s enough for one post, don’t you?
Have a great weekend and a wonderful Shabbos to you all!
P.S. 8 days til I leave!
Thanks to those who have asked me to share with you my travel itinerary – at least I don’t have to rack my brain for things to tell you about (ha ha ).
I leave Joburg on Saturday night 28 April and arrive in Israel on Sunday morning. My flight to Rome only leaves in the late afternoon so I have the day to spend in Tel Aviv with my sister, Tehilah, my aunt and uncle, and some cousins. This stopover will, of course, include a visit to the Azrieli Centre to do some shopping. No, I’m not such a kugel, but I really want to find some Naot shoes – the best health-type shoes – stylish yet oh-so comfortable. Over the past 3 years I have bought 2 pairs which I live in. And they still look great! Plus it’s always nice to check out overseas shopping centres. Because I’ve been saving up for this big trip, I haven’t been clothes shopping for months and months. Yes, I shall be wearing the SAME clothes in and out for the next 3 months. Not that it bothers me. After all, if I’m really sick of them, I’ll just buy some new Italian threads
OKay, back to the itinerary. Sheesh… Sunday night I arrive in Rome at Fiumicino Airport at the same time as Tal (what joy to find a ticket for him which matched mine tho he flies in from London). Lemme go one step back: Tal will be joining me for my first 2 weeks in Italy. How romantic hey! Ahhhhh….. (the sound of all you female readers). Yeah yeah… there’s a WHOLE other story still to be related through this blog – Meira and Tal: A Fairytale Romance. “Our hero and heroine, living half-way across the world from each other, are brought together by the hero’s sister in an epic tale of emails, tears, phone calls and presents. Finally they meet and love is in the air. Next: will they survive 2 weeks of intense travelling together? Stay tuned.”
Ummm…. back to the itinerary…. Let’s try make this brief for you
4 nights, 3-and-a-bit days in Rome. This includes a huge free 1st May (Primomaggio) concert in the main square (bonus!). We’ll be staying at a kosher B&B.
Thurs 3 May: Catch a charter flight down to Sicily. The train takes the whole day to travel down to Italy and it seemed a pity to spend so much time on travelling when we were only going to be 5 days in Sicily. Plus the charter flights are about the same price as the train, but take a fraction of the time.
3-8 May: See the east coast of Sicily – Taormina, Catania and Syracuse.
8 May: Catch a charter flight to Naples. Spend 6 days there, staying at Chabad of Napoli (they have a guest apartment). Visit Pompeii, Sorrento, Capri, Amalfi Coast…
13 May: Tal flies back to London. Boo hoo
I’m not sure where I’ll be for the next 8 days, but I’ll probably return to Rome. Definitely from 22-24 May I’ll be in Rome because I want to spend Shavuot there.
Then I might go up to Florence for a few days.
Now we’re in the beginning of June. I have 3 weeks to see Tuscany, Venice, Bologna, Milan, Pisa, Cinquaterre, etc. This all depends on how far my money stretches. My friend, Ralph, told me about this cool organisation called Willing Workers on Organic Farms (WWOOF). It’s a world-wide organisation dedicated to helping those who would like to volunteer on organic farms. Sounds a lot like kibbutz. Anyway, since I’ll definitely not have enough money for the whole trip (yes, 3 months in Europe is a bit ambitious), I thought this is a great opportunity to meet people, not have to worry about money and food, plus experience a different aspect of Italy. Tuscany sounded like a good place to do some farm work, so I went to check out what was being offered in Italy.
And can you believe I found the perfect place?
“We are looking for people with idealism and lots of enthusiasm to help create a Jewish nature retreat and centre for alternative healing, music, spirituality. DIRA is located in Lunigiana (northern Tuscany) at 850 metres above sea level, far above the clouds. Accommodation is rustic. Tents are provided, bring sleeping bags. We provide lots of good kosher vegetarian food (mostly organic) and we all cook and eat together. We need people from June to September. Work for this summer will include: clearing, terracing, planting perennial herbs, gardening, and building.” Yeah baby yeah! Right up my alley! You can read more about the place here. The only thing which is giving me a slight twinge of concern is the sleeping-in-tents bit…. I probably haven’t done that since camp! And that was a good 13-14 years ago.
So I’ll be there for at least a week, and maybe more. Even before this, I may need to find somewhere else to work depending on my money situation.
In July I start moving north… to Paris. Got a hotel booked for a week (7-14 July). Then up to Antwerp to stay at my friend Nikki for a week. Then fly across to Israel for the last week of my trip. And finally back to the good ol’ Republic of SA on the 27th of July.
So there you have it – my general itinerary. I’d really love to hear from you regarding must-see places and things-to-do. Tips and advice on travelling. That sort of thing. Perhaps you have friends in Italy I could visit. It’s always cool to meet local people and have them show you around, do the non-touristy stuff and go off the beaten track.
Ciao!
