Belgium (May 20-23, 2011)

Last weekend I used Ryanair to have a long weekend in Belgium. They fly Brindisi to Charleroi for ridiculously cheap (this round trip ticket was 40 euros with all the taxes included). I believe this is really cheap because it was over the weekend and the weather in May can be great. This is February or March when the weather is miserable in these parts. We were really lucky with the weather because it was not to hot and not too cold which was important because the hotels we stayed in didn’t seem to have AC so any later in the year and the rooms probably would be uncomfortably hot.

The flight arrived early Friday morning and we jumped into a rental car and headed towards Bruges. We had time plenty of time to get there so we stopped and checked out Gent on the way. Gent was supposed to be a less touristy medieval town like Bruges and for the most part it was. It had some charm but we were left a little disappointed. It wasn’t small and quaint like we were expecting.

In Bruges we used my navigator option on the iphone to get us close to the hotel. We couldn’t get to the hotel because the road was closed. And when I say closed really I mean there wasn’t a road, it was gone. They had it stripped down to bare ground about a foot below street level. I guess this was good because it meant there was no street noise. I highly recommend the Hotel Gheestilic Hof (or something similar to that spelling) as it was great. We were within walking distance of all the major attractions and man did we walk. The first night we had dinner near the main piazza and learned something I didn’t expect. In Belgium this time of year it gets dark really late. We were hoping to stroll around the piazza just after dark admiring the lights but that didn’t happen because at 10:00 PM it was still light out. Also a strange thing about Belgium is everything closes early. The main clock tower (the main tourist attraction) closes the stairs to the top at 4:15 PM! The stores close around 6:00 or 7:00 PM and even the place we had desert at on the square was kicking us out at 10:30. We sat down at 10:00 and the waiter announced that we needed to order right away if we wanted anything. Come on man it’s the weekend, live a little and stay open to midnight. Do you need to get home to bed before the sun sets????

One of the highlights was the boat trip on the canals. I was worried that this would be too touristy but the boat driver was great and view from boat was worth the money. My personal favorite was going up in the clock tower. It was over 300 stairs all in a tight spiral. It wasn’t as hard as you expect but I had to stop to keep from getting too dizzy. We were the first ones to go up in the morning after learning the hard way about that early closing time I mentioned earlier.

After 2 nights in Bruges we went to Brussels for the last night so we would be closer to the airport for early flight out Monday morning. The hotel in Brussels (Best Western City Center) was not nearly as good as the one in Bruges. I really would like to know what “City Center” they are talking about. The two hotels had one thing in common and that was that the road was torn up leading to the hotel. The poor navigator in my iphone again wondered what the hell we were doing. The phone was blurting out directions and seemingly getting upset that we went around the long way. We also found out that we were not far from the “Red Light” district of Brussels during this exploration. I hadn’t seen anything like that since Amsterdam! This hotel was sooo close to the city center that we ended up driving from the hotel to main piazza, interesting given our ability to walk all day. In the end this helped as we were dead tired and stuffed after dinner. One of the highlights of Brussels was dinner. One person of our group had a cousin in Brussels and she showed us around but more importantly took us to a rib place that could be the best I have had in Europe. It was near the Brussels Stock Market and for 15 euro you had all you could eat ribs with a sauce that was dam good. I’m convinced they have stolen the recipe from the USA but that’s ok because we have tons of good ribs sauces and they choose a good one to steal. Brussels seemed to stay awake until after dark so we could see the famous Grote Plaz all light up.

Overall I enjoyed the trip a lot. I learned that Belgian beer is dam good. I know I had heard some good things about it but I really didn’t expect it to be that good. I learned that Belgium eats its waffles in the afternoon, only in the afternoon, and there are 2 kinds. I love the heavier dense kind. They throw a ball of dough that’s the consistency of bread dough into the waffle press and out comes waffle perfection. The other kind is crunchier but seems factory made. They also do a pretty good French fries with an interesting mustardish sauce. They close up the country early so go to any museums or monuments first. They need to take the Italian afternoon pause so they can open past 7:00 PM!

Sicily Round 2

I forgot I had the big old Digital SLR so I have these photos too!!!

The ear of Dionysis or something like that. I'll look it up later.

Sunset in Siracusa

The alley our B&B was in on.

Artsy photo of the Duomo in Siracusa

The normal photo of the Duomo

This is a night shot of Castelmola which is actually above Taormina. Very small and quiet town.
Another photo in Castelmola. Not sure how that old FIAT got up the road!

Photos from Sicily

How about some photos from the trip to Taormina and Siracusa?! Remember I only have a iphone now.

Crossing the straits. It was too cold to go out on deck. This was in January!!!

Gnocchi with Pistachios. Very good. I highly recommend it.
Boats in the Siracusa harbor.
This was the most surprising find. The catacombs of San Giovanni under this church are incredible.
It wouldn't be Sicily without Cannoli!!!!

The only view of Mount Etna. The rest of the time it was covered with clouds.

Plastic in 2011

So this year we (Italy and I) are lowering our plastic usage, sort of, let me explain. Italy passed a law way back in 2007 to cut down on the number of plastics in use. The law got pushed back several times but finally came into effect on January 1, 2011. It says that plastic bags are “illegal”. Now I put that illegal in quotes because like everything in Italy it’s all relative. For one thing the stores are allowed to keep giving them out until they run out of the old stock. They are supposed to use only biodegradable after that and charge for them to give people incentive to use reusable bags. They are trying to promote cloth bags. So far this year I haven’t noticed any difference. There were some places that already used biodegradable bags and some that didn’t. It seems to still be that way. But before I knew all this I had already started collecting cloth bags last year in various ways so now I’m making the most of them. For instance last year in India I was in a part of the country that already had a ban like this on plastic bags. In 2 places I bought something and they put the items in a small cloth bag. This worked out great because now I have 2 cloth bags, one small and the other medium sized. Also last year I got 2 bigger bags when I bought cat food. They were part of a promotion and they are very ugly but they work. Two other cloth bags were given to me as promotional items when new stores opened in Brindisi. Sorry mom the cloth bag you gave me I gave toAlberta because it wasn’t manly enough! Anyway I have made it habit this year to always go out with a bag in hand, even if I’m not planning on buying anything. I figure you have to get in the habit or it won’t work. It seems to be working. The number of plastic bags that I had has diminished greatly, so what am I going to use when cleaning the cat litter boxes?!! I’ll have to get some good biodegradable bags myself.

Then other part of my low plastic life is water bottles. At work I can get a half liter bottle of water for 25 euro cents out of the vending machine. This seems like nothing so I didn’t think twice about buying a bottle once in a while. Also there are recycling bins at work so I always put the bottles there so I felt ok about it. This year I’m trying to eliminate it all together by refilling a bottle and bringing it from home. The result so far is I have bought 1 bottle of water from the vending machine at work. I don’t think I have saved much money but I would like to think that I’m doing my part to improve my habits every year. At lunch they give a half liter bottle with your meal so there is nothing I can do about that. I have started bringing in a panino for lunch instead of always eating in the cafeteria.

In a related story I bought a new CD case. This is the book-type of case that holds just the CD. I took all of my CDs out of their stupid individual cheap crap plastic cases and put them into the new book-type case. I saved the CD cover/booklet with the CD because that’s important part of these old CDs. My first reason for this was my CDs were taking up too much space on the shelves of the apartment and I never use them. This change made it so my CD collection takes up A LOT less space, which in turn gave me room for other crap that I’ve been collecting on the shelves. Also I felt good throwing out all cheap plastic. Many were already broken or cracked so feel a little liberated by doing this.

Last year was LED light bulbs and solar panels. This year plastic. Hmmm what else can do to be greener? That reminds me that I’ve seen LED light bulbs on sale lately. I think a new generation of bulbs are about to come out and they need to sell off what they have in stock. I think this year they will come out with bulbs that give off “good light” and by this I mean truly equivalent to incandescent but they will stay be too expensive. I say in 2014 LEDs will replace 90% of the lights we use. I already see more and more styles and types in the store. I saw some being used to light the tunnels on the A3 fromSalerno to Reggio Calabria on my way down to Sicily. That should be a good test of them. If they can take being on all the time and in the conditions of the tunnels then they could prove their worth.

2010 The Year in Review

Back in the good old days when I blogged a lot I could wrap up the year with a highlight from each month. Let’s see if I can do that without the help of continuous blogging to look back on. If I forgot something important then feel free to remind me in the comments.

January

I went to Tunisia and realized a life long dream. I went and saw Luke Skywalker’s house from the original Star Wars. Of course there was a lot more to Tunisia than that but lets not get into the details about how Tunisians are TERRIBLE at giving directions.

February

I saw my beloved Colts get beat by the Saints in the Superbowl. Well I did see some of it live and then I fell asleep. I guess its ok they lost as New Orleans “needed” it more according to the articles. Blah, blah, blah.

March

My soccer team won the work tournament here in Brindisi. Kolletti Bianchi (White Collars) were unstoppable in the semifinals and finals. I have to admit that those two were my best games too. I tried to explain that when the game is important I turn up adrenalin because when you’re over 35 you have ration it!

April

I can’t think of anything that happened in April. That’s unusual because April is Easter and usually I take a trip with that nice long weekend. This year it came and went with no explorations. I can’t remember why. Then April 25th and May 1st both fell on the weekend so a trip using one of these holidays was also out of the question. Italians really need to learn to move vacation days to Mondays and Fridays like we do in the States.

May

In May I made up for April. I went Whitewater rafting in Calabria. I think it’s amazing that this was my first time in real white water. I’m also upset at my slow reactions when someone in my raft fell out. I imagined that in such a situation I would summon superhero strength to pull the fellow out of the dangerous waters. It ended fine but I did nothing heroic and the waters weren't dangerous. I also went home for a week of R&R in Cincinnati. I’ve learned long ago that I need a trip home about every 6 months or I’ll go crazy.

June

This was the start of the World Cup 2010. Highlights for Italy were few so I’ll just relive 2006 in my head. At least the USA made some highlight film material.

July

This month too seemed quiet and without highlights from what I can remember. Maybe this is because like April it’s the month before a lot of traveling. I didn’t have a big 4th of July celebration at my house like in 2009. I guess I need to bring that back in 2011.

August

August is always the big vacation month in Italy and this year was no different. I again went to Asia for the 3rd year in a row. This time it was to Eastern India (Calcutta to Darjeeling) and then Bhutan. Very nice trip and definitely another highlight of my life.

September

I was back in the States but this time for work. I also managed to see a lot of family on the weekend, which is great when it works out like that.

October

This went I really started feeling bad. For those of you who don’t know I was getting a very strange feeling of nausea. It had been bothering me for weeks but in October I really felt bad so much so that I went and saw my Italian doctor for the first time. It was a good experience with the National Healthcare System. Finally I used my tessera di sanita.

November

Continuing my stomach issues I had a gastro-scope done and they found that the valve at the top of my stomach (called the cardias) ain’t doing its job well. So now I’m doing much better with the help of Omeprazolo (I think that’s what it’s called). Also I went to Torino for a long weekend, which was a surprisingly nice town. Then I went home to Cincinnati for Thanksgiving. I’ve learned over the years that traveling at Thanksgiving is way better than Christmas. Anybody seeing the news about Europe right now knows I choose wisely.

December

This month has been quiet. I guess the highlight is looking back at all the crazy stuff that happened in my life this year. I’m happy spending another quiet Christmas in Brindisi. After Christmas I may drive down to Sicily. I love to visit that part of Italy I still haven’t seen Stromboli or Siracusa which would be nice.

There is definite fear in the air for me in 2011. A lot could happen. The most definite thing is that I will turn 40! Uffa, that sounds old. My return to the States seems more definite than all the other times that I said I was moving back. I think 2010 was the only year that there wasn’t a danger of me being moved back to the States. This time it could really happen and as usual I’m undecided as to weather its good thing or not. Sometimes it seems like a great idea when something is pissing me off and at other times I think about ALL the changes that will lead to and I think I should stay. Still Italians have taught me a thing or two about family so if I have to leave at least I will be getting back closer to family. There’s nothing wrong with that.

Regata di Brindisi December 19, 2010

Some photos from today. I was looking for Christmas photos but found this race instead.

Traveling, what joy?

So let’s recap my latest visit to the states from a traveling view point. Going to the US was relatively easy this time. There was a strange procedure in Rome for getting on the plane. They made everyone get out of seated area by the gate and then slowly let everyone back in by checking their ticket and passport. Then of course they checked your ticket and passport again as you went through to get on the plane. I won’t blame the Italians because I’m pretty sure we Americans have required this system to travel to the USA. I didn’t see this for the flights going anywhere else in the world from Italy.

On the plane things were great. The seat next to me was empty! I can’t remember the last time the plane wasn’t packed going across the pond. I wonder, is this Alitalia’s fault or is it the economic crisis? Usually I take Continental to Newark and its packed solid. Anyway I didn’t care. I dumped my backpack in the seat next to me and connected my Ipad to the headphones and my entertainment for the 10.5 hour flight was set. My expensive Bose headphones have paid for themselves if you ask me. You can truly forget you’re on a plane under their noise-cancelling cushions. It’s a good thing I had this stuff too because this old plane has the monitors in the aisle so everyone watches the same crappy movie. The plane left a little over an hour late so I missed my connection in Chicago. This news hits me like water on a duck’s back. I’ve missed so many flights I no longer get upset.

So the flight to the USA was pretty good with only one missed flight and no lost luggage.

Now flying back to Italy sucked and I took a trip into “Bizarro World” for those of you who know Star Trek (for those of you who don’t it’s when things are opposite of what they should be). First inCincinnati I went through the full body scanner with the new rules. After my radiating experience he asked if I had anything in my back pocket. I did. I had one frickin piece of paper, my travel itinerary. That was enough to make me a pat down victim. So a word to the wise, you can’t even have a piece of paper in your pocket with these full body scanners. No wonder people with prosthesis or other medical conditions are getting harassed. I’m all for safety but this was ridiculous.

Then in Chicago I had to go from one terminal to another. To do that you go outside of security zone so I had to go through security again. It was then that I remembered that I didn’t go through a full body scanner at O’Hare coming into the country (going to the internal USA terminal of AA) so O’Hare must not have them I thought. But I was wrong, going into the International Terminal I had my second full body scan for the trip. I learn quickly and had NOTHING in my pockets so I didn’t get a second pat down. I was amazed how quickly the line moved. I mean consider how hard it is for people to remove obvious pieces of metal, like a watch, when going through a metal detector. I guess the threat of pat down gets people to remember the rules much quicker. I think you American men are going to need “manbags” for traveling. That way you won’t have anything in you pockets going through security.

The plane from Chicago to Rome was about 1/3 full. As soon as we were at altitude people spread out like an oil spill. Again I was about as comfortable as you can get on plane and not be in 1^stclass. Again the plane was very late leaving ….

I arrived in Rome and I didn’t even check how much time I had until the flight for Brindisi. I knew I was close but no need to rush because you can’t! As I’m going into the line for security for transferring flights there was an Alitalia person there saying “Qualcuno per Brindisi?” This is strange so I told her I was. She moved a pedestal that let me into a shorter line for security. That has never happened before. In fact the opposite seems to happen. This was now “Bizarro World”. Usually you’re running late and you want to skip ahead so you ask someone and they say sorry because everyone i s running late, which I have to admit is true. Then I knew I was in Bizarro World because after security there was the same lady from Alitalia waiting of me. I felt like a VIP. She told that the plane hasn’t started boarding yet but it will soon so we walked quickly towards the gate. Normal world made a brief appearance as I waited for passport control. A kid cut in front of me and of course it turned into a big problem. He and another student and 2 teachers were coming to Italy from Turkey as part of some exchange program. I learned all this as the 3 other people behind me went up there to talk to the customs agent after the kid couldn’t answer a single question. Bizarro World conquered as another agent came over and escorted them off to an office to talk about their issues. Then I went up customs agent who seemed apologetic. He commented, “I’ve never seen an American with a permesso di soggiorno before.” “I follow ALL the rules”, I commented back in my best Italian. I wanted to add “even in Brindisi” but the less you say the better. My Alitalia friend was waiting for me again after passport control and she explained that they had started boarding but I should be fine now if I knew where the gate was. I confirmed I knew exactly where it was and I promised to go straight there so she went back to whatever she needed to do. I’d never had treatment like this from Alitalia.

I made it to the gate in plenty of time because the plane from Rome to Brindisi was packed. What the hell is going on? Usually the flight to Brindisi is almost empty and I can stretch out and get quick nap on the 45 minute flight. Of course the one time I arrive last was very important because there wasn’t a square inch available in the overhead bins. I had to put my backpack under the seat in front of me leaving just enough room for my feet and that’s it. At least this was a short flight to be packed in like a sardine. My one joy was another person tried to fit one more bag in the overhead and several other people said, “Hey careful, that’s my bag!” as he adjusted things to no avail. I laughed because I know the people complaining would have doing the same exact thing.

In Brindisi all was well. My bag made it fine and it also seemed to have no new damage (still in Bizarro World). I bought the ticket for the bus to the center of town and of course I could see it leaving before I could get out of airport terminal. That was ok because I know how the guy drives and he was back in about 20 minutes. It gave me time to notice that price of the bus ticket has gone up to 90 cents (from 80 cents) at the tabaccaio in the airport, while the price of buying it on the bus is still 1.50. Next time I’ll go straight to the bus!

So what did we all learn here? A lot I think…..