Turibio's House

On Sunday I went to Turibio’s house. And again it was an adventure. I bought some pasticcieria on the way, which was easier than I thought. With so many little pastries to choose from I wasn’t sure what to pick. At the shop I ran into to the famous Nello. Now he’s working in a café and bakery shop. Or maybe this is just another one of his jobs. I know he said he had 3 jobs when he worked at the restaurant “La Locanda degli Angeli”. I must admit I didn’t believe him but now I do. I wish he still worked there because he really did take care of you. I didn’t realize it until he was gone.
When I arrived in town Turibio, Marco, Lorenzo, Stefano, and I went out and played disc golf in a pine forest. It was very tough and short. Turibio won the first round after I got lost (several times). Then I won the second round easily by taking the right turns. When we got back to his house there was a quite a commotion. Turibio’s father was up on the roof and he dumped a big bucket of sand down through the chimney because it was blocked or something and it made an awful mess when it hit the fire in the fireplace sending ash into the house. Later someone showed up with a big brush and they cleaned the chimney and started another fire. While this mess was being sorted out we took Aisha (Turibio’s dog) for a walk. They really don’t realize how strange it is to me to be hanging out in an olive grove. The craggy trees and tumbled down stonewalls that could have looked like this 2,000 years ago. This time I took a few photos of particular trees for me and Aisha retrieving sticks for Turibio, as he doesn’t have any pictures of his dog yet. When we got back to house Mara, Ramona, Naomi, Gigi, and Antonella had all arrived. Antonella had brought her daughter as usual but she (I don’t know her name) was the only toddler this time. You could see her disappointment with only adults around. The young adults (those of use in 20’s and 30’s mentioned above) went on a walk to see one of the oldest olive trees in southern Italy for my benefit. To me it was really cool and I took several pictures of it, to them I was like some sort of Japanese tourist. Lunch was served around 1:30 and we ate well. First there was this piedina, which is a deep fried bread ball. Then we had penne and sauce that was simple and very good. The sauce seemed to be just tomatoes ground beef and cut up green olives but it had to be more than that as it was so damn good. Then grilled meat again like they did last time. They have this little portable electric grill that they set next to the fireplace. So the meat starts sizzling away after we finish up our pasta. After lunch it’s time for dolce and that was my contribution. It was cool because I got to be like the Italians I see every Sunday carrying a covered tray of carefully wrapped pastries. I especially like the ones that looked like swans. Maybe I’ll post the picture I took of them. I also made a mental note to try to see which are eaten first in case I need to bring something again. The younger adults again went for a walk after dinner like back in November. After the walk we came back, talked a bit, then Turibio and I took Lorenzo home. It was funny before we left, Turibio’s father screamed from the other room only because Lecce had tied up the score in their game with Cagliari (in the end Lecce lost 3-1). I left my apartment “for lunch” at 9:00 AM and returned back around 7:30 PM. And I’m still amazed at how everyone seems to disappear on Sunday. It’s so easy to figure out if look at what I just did yesterday.