Last Week of Work

Spaghetti All'Ubriaca

Well it literally feels like I arrived a week ago, yet here I am, three months later, with just 4 days left of my internship! Katie left this morning, so I get to finish out the job on my own. I have a tour this evening (provided it doesn't thunderstorm) and one on Saturday morning, after which I will head to Prato and spend the night at Miranda's, before catching the train on Sunday for my next adventure! 18 more days of excitement lie beyond my job, so I'll be sure to post about my continued Italian adventures.

Besides attempting to pack (ugggghhhhhh), not much is going on this week, except for the big excitement of "the party" tomorrow night. Signor Gori's daughter Patrizia is turning 60 and there's going to be a big bash here with about 80 friends and family. It will be a catered affair with dancing under the stars (provided, again, that it doesn't thunderstorm... If it does, the dancing will take place inside one of the rooms filled with fantastic art). It will also be one last chance for me to get super dressed up, which should be fun.

This past week has been pretty relaxed too. Been flexing my culinary muscles... one day I made Spaghetti all'Ubriaca (Drunkard's Spaghetti... see picture above) which is cooked in red wine and then tossed in butter, olive oil, garlic, and some basil and parsley. I also made 5-cheese pasta. I technically had the ingredients for 8-cheese pasta, but I figured that was a bit excessive.

Last Friday, Katie and I were invited out by Riccardo, the guy who does all the tech/computer/fixing-the-internet stuff around here. We went for drinks and dancing to a place called Torre del Lago which is very close to Pisa. It was a lot of fun, and a really neat place... definitely the gayest neighbourhood I've ever been to in Europe.

Last night after I gave a brief tour to a French mayor, I headed down to meet Katie in Florence for one last evening out. I rediscovered my love of shopping in the station (the train station in Florence has an underground shopping center that is AWESOME... got a great skirt and pair of pants for 15 euros altogether). Then after a great dinner at our favourite restaurant, we headed to the summer festival at the Fortezza (the fortress) which I used to frequent, well, frequently, when I was in Florence a few years ago. It was as fun as I remembered, with tons of vendors selling cool things from around the world (I got some great 5-euro pashminas). We had some cannoli and ricotta cake, and then sat down for a bit to enjoy some beers and shisha. There was also a concert going on that was pretty good.

A dopo :)

PS. On Sunday I read a great book:

Lost in Shangri-La: A True Story of Survival, Adventure, and the Most Incredible Rescue Mission of World War II by Mitchell Zuckoff

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


What an utterly captivating and fascinating quick read!



View all my reviews

Shisha at the Fortezza

At Torre del Lago

At Torre del Lago

Yet Another Lovely Weekend

Out on the town :)

Yesterday after a miserable tour (half of the "very trendy" Italian participants clearly had no interest in being there) the September intern Carolina picked up Katie and I and took us into Pistoia. She showed us this GREAT bar where 5 euros gets you a glass of wine AND a plate which you may then proceed to pile with delicious snacky food from the bar buffet. (The plate itself is super cool.. one of those foam things that's shaped like an artist's palette with a hole on one side that holds your wine glass so you can actually hold both and have a hand free to eat and at the same time). Then at about 11pm we had some sandwiches at a very busy restaurant, sat on the patio, and had an all-around good time. Afterwards Carolina offered to let us stay at her place since it was too late to go back to Celle (the gatehouse people are usually in bed by about 10pm). Carolina has an awesome yellow lab named Wendy.

This morning we came back and have managed to squeeze in a bit of sunbathing. Now I'm heading back into Pistoia for dinner with my cousin David again. Sort of dreading this upcoming week... I'm going to be extremely busy with afternoon Italian tours nearly every day, plus some office work. Wednesday I've got the day off and I'm going to a hairdresser in Florence, so that will be fun, yet also an exhausting day.

Ciao tutti

Notte Due (Night Two)

Yesterday was my second day here, and after I had a much-needed hot shower and a delicious lunch of risotto di carciofi (artichoke risotto), Katie (the other intern) finally arrived from Virginia!

After settling in, Elena (one of the two Romanian housekeepers) drove us to a nearby grocery store where we bought la cioccolata, la pasta, i pomodori (tomatoes), il carne (meat), le patate, la mozzerella, and some other things (oh, and I stocked up on white wine since the fattoria Celle only produces red, which I am gradually learning to like, but am not generally a huge fan of). When we got back, we got to know each other over a few glasses of wine, and I set out to make dinner. Surprisingly, I made a decent spread of pasta & sauce and beef stew, considering I had no sharp knives, no cutting board, and only a hotplate that switched off every 2 minutes because the breaker kept going (or whatever electrical terminology is used in such a case... you all know what I mean though). The electrician is there today and we're hoping to have more reliable electricity now...

This morning we arrived at the office and promptly set out onto the property with Miranda (the manager and overall driving force behind the organization) because her daughter's 2nd grade class was doing a visit of the collection and she had to go say hi. The collection normally only offers entry to adults, but they've recently started a program where school classes are taken around the collection by a mime who presents opportunities for them to interact with the art works. It's pretty awesome, since it allows them to develop their own narrative surrounding the works, rather than simply hearing "this is the title, this is the artist, this is what it is". One morning next week Katie and I are hoping to go along with one of these mime-led tours.

Upon returning to the office, Katie and I learned some of the basics regarding requests for visits, responding to emails, scheduling, etc. We planned out our May schedule, and then broke for lunch. Lunch in Italy is sacred. No one works over lunch. No one. All the electricians and workers working on our apartment are super industrious, but in the late morning if they're asked to do something asap, they'll respond with "well... it's lunch soon. I can start it at 2:30". There are these brothers who recently opened a chocolate shop near the front gate of the property, and they've been talking to Miranda about working something out since morning visitors to the collection are usually famished afterward. But the brothers are reluctant to provide some sort of lunchtime service/snacks since, well, it's lunch! Personally, I thought it was fairly self-evident that if you are in the food service industry, you should probably expect to be working when everyone else is eating...

But anyways, back to OUR lunch. The housekeepers made us a fantastic lunch of homemade pasta (closest to tagliatelle... very wide flat noodles) with tomato sauce, spaghetti with pesto, pork, and potatoes. For the rest of the day we are going to do some reading about the collection, and maybe get out to take some more photos.

Below are a couple more shots I got of the property, just around the area near the villa/fattoria (btw fattoria means farm, not factory).

Ciao a tutti!

Miranda taking a photo of her daughter's class at il spazio teatro (theatre space)

Awesome view

One of the sets of gates

Mago, by Stephen Cox, on the outside of the fattoria

More of the fantastic view

One of the four fish sculptures on a fountain that's being restored. I love the face!