I had a strange day today. Tina bought and made a big American style breakfast for us (eggs, potatoes, coffee cake!) And while she was making it, Maria our landlady came out. Maria is a strange one. She talks way too fast and very brusquely, so I can't understand her at all most of the time. She doesn't understand that this is all new for us, and kind of expects us to instinctively know what to do. She only comes home to sleep, so we don't know each other very well. Anyway, Tina invited her to eat with us, and she was horrified at how much Americans eat for breakfast!!! Something besides a cracker and an espresso! Very bad for your liver to eat breakfast! Especially eggs! So we destroyed our livers while she sipped coffee and interrogated us about school for a few seconds, and then just as we were starting to relax, she started into politics--do we like Obama? We gave noncommittal answers and then she said non mi piace obama perche e nero (don't like him because he's black) at least I think that's what she said!!! But I wasn't sure if that's what she said (surely not!) but that's what Tina heard too! After that the phone rang and she vanished. I broke her favorite mug as I was making tea, and promised to buy her a new one! Then I washed all the breakfast dishes the sink clogged up unbelievably, so I had to go explain the problem to Maria in my broken Italian. She gave me a broken little plastic plunger that didn't work! So she told us the name of the product to buy to unclog the sink.
Man, do I miss walmart on days like today. We had to buy the mug and the italian version of draino, but the supermarket had no draino type stuff, and I couldn't remember which street the discount place was on to buy the mug. We finally found sink declogger with the help of a friendly compassionate fellow shopper (very bottom shelf, pictures let us know it was correct) but no mug. We went home, and I tried to decipher the italian on the back of the bottle (lots of new vocab!) Pretty mich the same as draino really. So we poured it in the sink and left for Tivoli, but not before I discovered my sunglasses completely broke in half!
Tivoli has a beautiful villa an gardens that we very much enjoyed. It was tranquil and restful, just what we needed.
We had a wonderful lunch at a trattoria and got home surprisingly easily. I even got new sunglasses from the bangladeshi man who sells them on the street corner for eight euros.
But when we got home, the water was still standing in the sink! Oh no! Where's a dad when you need one? Or many male who can help you? In such a time as this, there was only one thing to do: get help from our friends at the bar.
The coffee bar next door has three very helpful brothers we have become friends with. We go every morning and they have started calling us bella and mie ragazze (my girls) and are always so sweet. So we went downstairs and I explained that I had a problem that needed a man! "Madonna!" Was the response. I explained the standing water in the sink and learned the italian word for plunger. They loaned us one from their own bar and explained that there is anothe hole in the sink you have to plig for the plunger to work. So I took the plunger upstairs, plunged with the odd extra hole properly covered, and after five minutes the sink was clear, but during those five minutes hair was coming out of the random hole! What on earth! Flushed with success, I took the plunger back to our friends and thanked them profusely.
What a day, and it isn't even over yet!
