Lust, Perdition and Bicycles

Phone-me-not

2010-04-12T23:37:00.002+02:00

The service Bel-me-niet has the purpose of preventing people from receiving unsolicited phone calls by marketers. Those reap phone numbers from the telephone directory, and use strategies to get a dubious "yes", which then will use to sell services.

I should have registered there. In general, I had fun answering those, because I used them as a way to practise my Dutch. But in some cases, awkward situations ensued.

Not long before leaving the previous house, I got 2 of them on the same day. One was from a telecom company, which promised lower rates than KPN. I don't care because I use the phone very little, and, when I do, it's mostly the cellphone or Skype. Yet, I stupidly fell: the guy at the other end wanted me to "sign a voice contract", asking me to answer "yes" clearly to each question. The second one was much quicker: I soon told them that they could send me informative material to my address.

Soon I got an answer from the first company by snail mail. It was a pile of papers, saying, among others, that my phone would have been removed from KPN and connected to their network, and that I had a few days to cancel everything. Which I promptly did, with a phone call to their call center.

I was angry at the first company, when instead I should have realised the truth. The first company, while being telemarketers offering unsolicited products, was at least transparent. They were clearly stating what they were doing, they sent a paper notice before doing it, they eventually did nothing when I told them to stop. The second company, instead, only sent me a paper notice when it was too late. Without me suspecting anything, they disconnected my KPN line, with no prior notice.

I told them that it was a mistake. They cancelled my contract. But there was a contract. Cancelling it meant creating a new contract with KPN. KPN treated me as if I were a new customer: they gave me the default subscription (I had a cheaper one, with higher rates for calling, because I seldom call: net result, I spent more money) and they wrote that I could only cancel the line after one year. "Oh ****", I thought, "I'm leaving in one month! Why do they do this to me, after being a customer for almost three years?".

Anyway, the landlord told me he intended to sell the house after I left, so I had no other option than ask KPN to cancel the contract.

KPN proved very inefficient. They said they could not cancel the contract, but they seemed not to know why this was impossible. They blamed the ADSL subscription. So I cancelled that (flawlessly: they said it would be closed in one month, and I would have left 1 month and few days later. And that happened: ADSL stopped working at exactly the right time). I tried again cancelling KPN, and this time is seemed successful.

The landlord changed his mind suddenly, and rented the house. The future tenant claimed he needed the KPN line. Therefore I called KPN again, attempting to cancel the request of closing the line. Their answer was negative: the line was being closed.

But then, I got a reminder by KPN, for a bill I hadn't paid. Well, I cancelled the line, why should I pay for a line I'm not going to use? So, apparently, KPN was not closing the line, despite claiming the opposite...

I paid the bill. And, when the new tenant came, we wrote KPN to change the name from mine to his. That worked. The line has not been closed, it is used by the new tenant now.

A happy ending for this story. But the story taught a lot about dishonest telemarketers and KPN not being able to figure what's happening with their own phone line.

In the new house, needless to say, I have a new phone+Internet provider, which has noting to do with the above ones.

Show ownership

2010-04-12T23:23:00.002+02:00

Eventually, it happened. After so much wishing, 3 months ago, I've become the proud owner of a home in Amsterdam.

I only actually moved there on 1st March. There are many reasons. One is that I wanted to give a long prior notice to the landlord. He has always been fair with me, being fair with him is the right thing. Another one is the bad experience of my first house: I got the notice that I should leave it with only 2 weeks advance. So I wanted to take time. Yet another one was the lack of a bed. A new bed was ordered on 16th January, few days after I got the keys. The furniture shop said that the bed would have taken 6 weeks. And they were right. Even too much: the first 2 days I had to sleep on temporary beds because the real one hadn't come yet.

After moving furniture and boxes, and after sleeping on an inappropriate bed on the first day, my back became very painful. Luckily the situation improved in the following days.

But I'm so happy. It is close to my first Amsterdam home: it feels like a comeback after a long exile (almost three years). And it has proper heating. And the neighbourhood is lovely. And the bathroom has a decent size. And there is a locked space for the bike. And it's mine!!!

Know your ledikant from your boxspring

2010-01-10T15:53:00.003+01:00

Yesterday, with -1°C outside, was time for a learning trip in search for a bedroom, involving, but not limited to, Villa Arena. Apparently, beds in this country come in 2 forms, ledikant and boxspring. Dictionaries are unhelpful (Prisma just translates ledikant as bed, and does not list boxspring at all). After analysing over 100 models of beds, I have come up with a theory, which has been supported by all experiments so far. A ledikant has a bed frame under the mattress, while a boxspring has a sort of second mattress there. So, an Italian would only consider a ledikant.

Still some way to go, but I've started making up my mind.

How to become completely Dutch

2010-01-10T15:41:00.003+01:00

Long time ago, I heard that it was possible to get free Dutch language courses from the city. Curious, I went to the stadsdeelkantoor (neighbourhood's governing office building) to ask for information. Not only was it true, I ended up on a waiting list. After a not-so-long wait (about 3 months) and an assessment test, I started the 6-hours-a-week course. It was great, an occasion to train, in a place where there are so few (Dutch know English very well and are eager to show that off, so they start speaking English at the slightest sign the other party does not master Dutch at native levels). And the people at the course became real friends, invaluable mates in our stay in a foreign country.

The purpose of the whole class is to complete the Staatexamen NT2 (state exam for Dutch as a second language). And lately, the school pressed the students to sign up for the exam. So, reluctantly, I did. A few days ago, the result: sufficient in all 4 topics (reading, writing, speaking, listening). A big thank you to the teachers and the fellow students, you've been great. The only regret is that meeting the classmates will become less frequent. But they won't be forgotten.

A hard day's n8

2009-11-08T23:01:00.003+01:00

Yesterday I went to my third consecutive Museumnacht. And, as always, it was frenetic. The hardest part is to decide what's unmissable, and plan a route which allows you to get to them all without wasting too much time moving from one place to another. A valuable trick is to avoid queues. If there are too many people queuing to enter, it's better to move on to somewhere else: there are so many open museums, and life's too short, and the night is even shorter. 7 hours sound a lot, but they run out quicker than you plan, and you have to plan that. So, among others, Foam, Artis and Geelvinck were simply skipped. What was left:
- failed attempt to find the Huis Marseille (nobody noted down the address...)
- Archaeological museum
- Huis Marseille (this time with the help of the brochure with the correct address). Very interesting, if a little shocking, exhibition about refugees around the world
- Nederlands Instituut voor Mediakunst (a letdown)
- City archive (been there 2 years ago, yet always a pleasure)
- Skipped Hermitage because of the queue
- Portuguese synagogue. When candle-lit in the night it's spectacular.
- VOC ship
- since it was 0:45, made a second attempt at the Hermitage, and this time the queue was shorter! 2nd tip: leave the most crowded places for last, so you get there when most people are already sleeping. Hermitage is a beautiful museum: new, light, spacious... the only letdown is the collection: it was mostly a description of the tsar's times, with no "real" art. Time to plan a trip to the real one in St.Petersburg.

Some people visit porn sites

2009-08-09T09:48:00.002+02:00

I, instead, go to Funda. So many objects of desire can be found there. I look at each one, look at the pictures, and dream of what I would to with them if only I had them. And, when looking is not enough, I ring the agent to book an appointment, so I can be by the object of desire, even inside it. And, of course, dreams stay dreams, and I cannot have any of those. For how long?

In memoriam

2009-05-03T21:48:00.002+02:00

My father has died.

Everything happened quickly and suddenly. According to what I heard at the phone, he was riding his usual Sunday morning bike ride, when he fainted for unknown reasons. He had a heart attack several years ago, so some heart problem is one possible cause. When falling, he hit his head on the road. He was transported to the nearest hospital, Lucca's, but he died some hours later.

He was 63. I spoke to him yesterday, and we spoke about normal things. We actually spoke about my mother, not about him. There was nothing to worry about him.

It is hard to think about good things in this moment. One is that he suffered very little. He was perfectly OK in the morning and dead in the evening.

First news came at about 12PM, he was in the hospital, but nothing about his conditions. Then less than reassuring pieces of news throughout the afternoon. Then the horrible news. It was so much news, and so fast, that I was not really realizing anything about what was happening. I only cried 20 minutes after I heard about his death.

When he left home for his ride he left his PC on. On Skype, he is still online.

A piece of heaven for sale

2009-04-05T22:39:00.003+02:00

Forgetting to say that my former piece of heaven is now for sale.

I don't know why I feel bad (just a little) about that.

Privacy in a public blog

2009-04-05T21:41:00.003+02:00

There are several reasons why this blog does not get updated, if not sporadically.

The main one, of course, is the novelty effect (the lack thereof). It is not the newest coolest thing anymore.
Then, writing a blog is ultimately a waste of time. And, lately, there are other wastes of time competing with this. Facebook (it is a waste of time, but I'm spending (too much) time on it these weeks), the old classics Google Earth and Google Maps (Street View is the ultimate violation of privacy. That's why it's so cool)...
But there is another factor. Privacy. So, why does privacy matters in a blog that can be rad by anyone? Well, for some imperscrutable reasons, the process of creating the post is private, even if the completed post itself is not. I feel shy/embarrassed/add your favourite lame excuse here writing a blog post with someone in the same room. That someone obviously couldn't care less, but anyway. Nobody said human beings are simple things.

Incidentally, the latter's one reason why I spent so much of my life in front of a computer (Commodore 64, then Commodore Amiga, but with my faithful 64 on one side, then a 486 which was my introduction to the wonderful world of PC. The rest is history).

Incidentally again, I grew more fond of my fellow human beings with the years. That changed me from a pathologically shy person to a shy/very shy person with occasional moments of extrovertion, and even some friends.

Enough incidents. The long period with no posts has not been uneventful. Job-wise, I did some sort of jump into the dark, by moving departments within the company. So, I stopped being a well-known and respected member of the old department, and started being the new guy in a department I didn't know deeply. Eventually, I slowly discovered that I was not so well-known or well-respected in the old one, and I wasn't so new or unknown in the new one. What happened after simply made me think that the jump in the darkness was actually a good idea.
Still job-wise, the company I work for is less rich than it used to be. There was a downsizing in January. It was incredible to see that the fired people were accepting their fates, while the people who stayed were more emotional. One would have expected the opposite. But everything was so sudden and unexpected, therefore one could expect the unexpected to happen.

About Dutch life: I begon an inburgering language course. The purpose is to turn a foreigner into a burger, that is a citizen integrated into society. A little hard (6 hours a week, all during work days), but great fun. And my Dutch starts to suck a little less. Still a long way before becoming a burger. Also, I got my first fines. Once I went through a red light with my bike, and a police's motorbike was standing there. The second time, my bike lights stopped working shortly before a place where policemen were waiting. And, of course, they resumed working shortly after.

The four seasons in Dutch, with English translation

2009-04-05T18:43:00.003+02:00

lente or voorjaar - autumn
zomer - autumn
herfst or najaar - autumn
winter - autumn

Well, there have been 6 consecutive sunny days! So, that's not too bad.

A sign of life

2008-07-07T19:50:00.002+02:00

The frequency of posts has dropped dramatically lately. This does not mean that nothing happened. It only means that I'm lazy.

Summary of what happened.

1st-5th May: Paris, guest of a friend who lives there. Marvellous city.
18th May: visit to Brugge (or Bruges. In Italy, the French spelling is generally used. Which does not make sense, since it is in Flanders. But French is more familiar, or better less unfamiliar, to Italians). Excuse was that my friend Nicola went there to the TERENA Networking Conference. Fine city, fine company.
31st May: went to Naples, to be present at the marriage of a friend. I had never been to Naples before. It is a city with a bad reputation, considered as one of the unsafest in Italy. Innumerable stories about how drivers disrespect traffic lights are famous. And the waste problem is world-famous. Well, I found it a beautiful city. True, many streets of the centre are not in the best state. But nothing I haven't seen also elsewhere. True, the traffic lights near Beverello pier (where ferries to Capri and Ischia leave) are chaotic. But elsewhere it's OK. True, I saw some people whose look was not reassuring. But I was not harmed nor robbed by anyone. And I even walked around the old center between 4am and 6am (long story. To cut it short, when a hotel says "reception open 24h", it does not mean 24h. Or, maybe, the 24h are not all in the same day). True, there was some rubbish around. But not that much (admittedly, in the outskirts the situation was worse than in the centre). The marriage was fun, everyone was happy, and the bridegroom's speech was not boring! The day after, short visit to Capri. Marvellous island, small but with a savage beauty. The sea is almost as beautiful as Sardinia's (I'm still a proud Sardinian). Only downside: the pizza was not the best I ever eaten, it was only good.
Beginning of June: Elisa came back
Throughout June: European football championship. Italy didn't do too well. But I wasn't too unhappy (the same cannot be said of some other Italians who live here), it deserved what it got, and anyway it beat France. Disappointments: Netherlands (after such a splendid first phase), Portugal (ditto), semi-final Germany-Turkey (Turkey deserved more). I also discovered what happens when Turkey wins a match. The Turkish community is numerous, and the Turks themselves behave in a very Mediterranean way (which is the same as Italians behave). Therefore, thousands of people around, honking cars, flags, fireworks... And the square near my house was the centre of celebrations. Unbelievable, even more chaos than in Italy.
3rd-6th July: Rock Werchter. Loads of big names: Lenny Kravitz, Moby, Neil Young (incredible energy for one who looks like my grandfather), Beck... And of course Radiohead. Sigur Ros were surprisingly good. It was also an experience because of the camping: fun, the tent was waterproof so the rain wasn't too annoying, the mattresses were surprisingly comfortable. Not many people were sleeping, judging from the constant noise.

Amsterdam, Turkey

2008-05-10T22:53:00.001+02:00

I came back home and, in the square next to my house, a group of people were cheering because Galatasaray just won the Turkish football league. This says a lot about the ethnic composition of my neighbourhood.

Povera patria

2008-05-06T21:48:00.002+02:00

Did I ever say that I was proud to be an Italian? Well, I was wrong.

The only thought that the majority of my fellow Italians gave their votes to a liar, a crook, someone who pretends to be a libertarian and actually invokes state intervention everywhere (as long as he is the state), makes me sick. And makes me want to stay abroad forever (why not?).

Causes? Many. The control of the media is a big reason. The fact that the opponents are often old, afraid of real innovation, and costantly quarrelling with each other, is another one. So, all in all, the future of my own country is bleak.

I'm dreaming of a white Easter

2008-03-23T12:28:00.005+01:00

The winter has been rather mild. After a "promising" December with rigid temperatures, the following months have been not so cold, with temperatures seldom below zero.

December

After a Christmas which hasn't been so white, Easter, which this year is also the third day of spring, is unbelievably cold. It's snowing right now!

Snowfall, a few minutes ago

What will happen to the traditional Easter Monday trip?

Seriously, apart being forced in house, I'm rather enjoying this Easter as a single in Amsterdam (Elisa is in Italy with her family). I can't wait for today's dinner, which will be made by an authentic Sicilian mother!

Sun, oh no!

2008-03-01T12:34:00.003+01:00

The company recently moved to a new office. Larger, not cramped, with real meeting rooms. Less central, that's bad. But it could have been much worse.

Windows are large, so there is much light, and being on the top floor also brings a stunning view. I love trains, so it's nice to have the central station so close. Some trainspotting never hurt anyone, did it?

View from my desk

There is something bad, however: the lack of sunscreens at the windows. There is no need for them: Amsterdam's sky is always cloudy, every day of the year, so there's never sun. When there's sun, however, in the afternoon the rays go straight on the PC screens. In order to be able to work, we used a creative solution.

Umbrellas used as sun screen. It's like being at the beach, and you get paid (well, almost like a beach)

This does not happen anymore: now we posted white paper on the windows, so the view is less good, but at least the sun is not so annoying. After a few days, we received a visit from someone at facilities management, saying that said paper could cause windows to explode (!). Now we live in fear that a flood of glass splinters can come to us (not), until facilities management provides proper sunscreens.

Sweet revenge

2008-02-02T12:19:00.000+01:00

Last Tuesday I went to the bike repairer in Westermarkt, and tried to tell, in Dutch, that I had left my bike the day before to have it repaired.

The answer was "Could you speak English, please?"

Roles swapped. Eventually.

This says nothing about the quality of my Dutch, however.

And, yes, I went there because my bike had a flat tyre. Just for a change.

Enjoying freedom

2007-12-22T20:51:00.000+01:00

The period between yesterday evening and today lunch time deserves a post by itself.

A colleague lives in Utrecht. That's because he met a girl, 2 years ago, who studies there. So, when he joined our company and moved to Holland, a few months ago, the choice of the city was natural.

So, he invited some of the few people who haven't left for Christmas holiday. Those were me and 2 more colleagues living in Amsterdam.

The party went to a Greek restaurant (pretty good, not cheap and not expensive).

Then, Stairway To Heaven, a bar where rock music from 60s to 90s was played, and there was also a dance floor. The walls were covered with guitars, that they claimed had been played by famous rockers. There was also a shirt worn by Kurt Cobain, enclosed in a glass box and venerated as a relic.
Unusual things happened when asking for beer. Once, we got 2 bottles of champagne of beer. This means that we got 2 bottles of beer, but they were 75cl each (!), and they looked like bottles of champagne. Then we asked for 1 beer and we got 8. After telling the waiter we needed 1, he told us to pay 1 and keep the others.
The music was good, and it was also funny to look at the drunken people. A girl with no mobile phone started dancing with us, and later she told us that there is no reality and everything is an impression. Or maybe that didn't happen, it was just an impression.

After the closure, we walked towards the station. The train was leaving in 1 minute, and we needed no less than 10 to get to the platform. And the following train was 1:01 hours later. What now? The guy living in Utrecht offered us to sleep at his place. Good!
We walked for a long way in -2°C and got there. He had the Digitenne TV service, so we told him there was a TV channel he didn't know about. What happened next, in a men-only party, can offend older people, moralists and children, so I won't tell.

I will tell what happened after that. He slept on the sofa, while I and the other 2 shared a double bed. 1 of the other 2 didn't realize he was not sleeping under the duvet, and we were...

Time to wake up. We walked to the Wilhelminapark, see previous post. Then we had a nice breakfast at the Park Café Buiten. Even too much: chocolate pie with whipped cream, apple pie with whipped cream (again), croissant, tea, coffee, wrong coffee.

And eventually we got to Amsterdam again. Time to relax. Or not? No. Some Christmas shopping (not enough), and a visit to the Anne Frank house. First time, after more than 2 years here. Why did I wait for so long? (Because the queue was always terrible, and today it was reasonable, that's why) Really moving, chilling. People who only wanted to live a normal life, and tried in all ways possible to do it. Anne Frank wrote that, after the war, she wanted to become a journalist She did not survive the war, but she did become a writer. Or, simply, she didn't realize what a great writer she already was.

Becoming a Northern European

2007-12-22T20:31:00.000+01:00

There are already some symptoms. Maybe they don't mean I'm one yet, but maybe they do.

Summer was dismal, little sun, terrible. September was not too bad. Then, the temperature started decreasing, slowly but steadily. Some days ago, in the night ice was forming.

And, this week, for the first time the city woke up under the snow. It didn't last long, in the afternoon it had disappeared already.

The day after, it snowed again, and it stayed.

And today, I spent an unexpectedly nice morning with three colleagues in Utrecht. Wilhelminapark was covered with snow. Families with children had ice skates at their feet, usual for them (maybe), really weird for me.

And the weirdest thing: I and the colleagues walked on water, like Jesus. Well, in the sense that the pond in Wilhelminapark was frozen, and the ice was thick enough it was possible to walk on it. And skate on it. We walked, Dutch people skated.

Ice was making strange noises, like metal sheets. And we didn't know if that was something to worry about... Dutch people were not worried, and therefore we were not either... We should have been: one of my friends was doing the very last step before reaching the land, when the ice broke. Luckily, he was so close to the shore that he fell on the land.

After that, we were so scared we didn't try again. But children were skating, were playing ice hockey, and one of them was hitting the ice surface with his (her?) hockey club. Those Dutch people are scared by nothing!

Conclusion: I am actually enjoying this chilly weather with no rain! Today was especially good, sun and blue sky. Even though I like snow (maybe because I was born in a place where it never snows), I used to suffer incredibly from cold climate. Now I like it. Is it serious, doctor?

Company pride

2007-12-22T19:07:00.000+01:00

The company I work for does quite a lot to build team spirit. A borrel every month (to be precise, not this month, but I didn't come in December 2005 and 2006, so that's not so bad). A summer party in June, a Christmas party in December.

It works. It is probably cheaper than increase salaries :), and the consequence is that people are, on average, very proud to work for our company. It is good for work and life satisfaction.

This year's Christmas party was better than last year's: the fact that I didn't lose my camera contributes to this. The place was not far from the centre. Food, while not exciting, was better: people were not forced to sit at a table, they could walk around, and at least the meat was not dry. Music was pretty nice, not too much house-techno (I hate it), more commercial music. Not many people went to the relaxed places: that's a pity, since the music became loud and it was difficult to talk to people. And, especially, it was nice to meet people, some after a long time, chat with them, and talk about past, present, and future.

This week, all employees got as a gift one of the latest products. A few hours later, Internet sales sites were flooded by such products being offered for sale.

And, on Friday, move time. The office where I worked for more than two years had become too small, with all the new employees. So, movers came, disassembled desks, packed computers, and made the old office almost empty. In the afternoon, since working was not possible, I and some colleagues visited the new office. It made us proud (again). It's big, spacious, and new. And there's a phone for each employee. We will miss the old office in the very centre of the city, the new one is a little further away from the interesting parts. Yet, it could have been much worse, all those dreary industrial estates that look like ghost cities after 18.00 and in weekends would have been depressing.

Lookalikes

2007-12-09T18:21:00.000+01:00

I've been told by someone, while I was walking away from the office, that I look like Luis Suarez. I wish it was true...

deep-linked from Wikipedia, license GFDL

Not much else. The only thing that makes me happy is to look at the Serie A standings. If looked upside down, of course.

n8

2007-11-11T21:12:00.000+01:00

Saturday last week was n8 day. It was the third onw since I'm here (the first was just 6 days after I arrived), but the first one I took part to.

It is great fun. Many museums are open until 2am, and with one single ticket one can visit them all. Time permitting. Yes, time is the biggest limitation: 7 hours sound like a lot, but, when there are so many museums to visit, they fly. And many people are around, so there can be queues.

My day:

Rijksmuseum
Van Gogh Museum (only the temporary exhibition about Barcelona, I had already seen the rest)
De Appel
failed attempt to get into the Foam, the queue was too long
city archive (formerly a bank. The former vault of the bank has still steel doors)
Stedelijk Museum (only the temporary Warhol exhibition, and not even all of it)
Hortus Botanicus

And there was much more! But I can be satisfied.

Every cloud has a silver lining

2007-11-11T20:21:00.000+01:00

Rain, rain... The more you see it, the more you should get used to it. Instead, all this rain makes me nostalgic of Italy. Not that in Italy it never rains... just not so often. In most years.

There is only one upside of this. There are lots of rainbows, also due to the variability of the weather, meaning that rain can fall and sun can shine in just minutes. Some days ago, a full bow
was visible from my office's window. And today, another rainbow while I was riding my bike (I was riding my bike while it was raining. Am I becoming Dutch?).

Rainbow between ships in Amsterdam harbour

The land of origin

2007-10-08T23:38:00.000+02:00

In less than 2 weeks I'll be in Sardinia, to attend to the marriage of my cousin.

The relationship between each person and his/her land of origin is peculiar. There is a sense of affection and pride, which goes beyond reason and causes.

This relationship is even more difficult to tell for people who left their land of origin early. When I'm in Sardinia, I am a stranger. I left it too early. I know no one. I don't know the places, the habits, the dialect. And, yet, I feel at home. And I ask myself: why shouldn't I stay here? Why did I ever leave? And, at the same time, I would probably be uncomfortable if I came back there to stay.

My cousin and her two brothers have been so important to me. One summer, my mother and my brother were in the hospital, having been run over by a car. I spent that summer with my uncle, my aunt and my cousins. And I always felt part of the family. I never felt any difference between the three siblings and me. Nowadays, I visit my cousins whenever I can. My uncle passed away in April this year. He once said that I was his fourth child.

My friend Massimo gets married the same day. Also in Sardinia. There has been tension between us at times, but he is a real friend. He puts commitment in whatever he does, playing fantasy league and helping homeless people. And he once told me that he first got in touch with HTML because he saw me fiddling with it. I am an HTML rookie and he is the webmaster of several sites.

I can live with you and I can live without you

2007-10-08T23:06:00.000+02:00

Elisa is going back and forth from Italy to here. Now she's in Italy.

So, how do I feel, all alone in my apartment? Well, strange. I don't miss her when she's not here. Yet, it's not bad either when she's here.

Nec tecum nec sine te vivere possum, I can live neither with you nor without you, is a verse about 2000 years old (maybe by Catullus). In my case, it's the opposite.

So, why did that happen? Elisa taught me a lot, including having more self-confidence, and, in general, the importance of relationships with others. Those helped me to be more happy, whatever happens. In short, Elisa taught me not to need her.

Open questions are: is this a good or a bad thing? And how stable is this going to be? The question to the second answer is: not much. Yet, I don't care, because it is stable right now. It's like the initial scene of La Haine: the narrator tells about a guy who, falling from a tall building, repeats to himself, "So far so good... so far so good". By the way, La Haine is one of the first movies I and Elisa saw together.

Being ill sucks

2007-10-08T22:21:00.000+02:00

End of July, I made friends with the Dutch health system. This system is a nice guy, yet I would have preferred not knowing him...

On a Sunday (the day after the first, and so far the last, concert of The Membro's) I go to Zandvoort. Horrible weather, not the day to go to the beach. And I feel a light pain in my back on the left side. Light, but persistent. It's nothing, it's just because I rode a friend on my bike yesterday, yet it doesn't go. I take an aspirin and go to bed.

Monday, I go to work, and the pain is still there, growing stronger as the hours pass. I phone my personal doctor, telling I am strongly considering going to the hospital. She says not to worry and wait. I take an aspirin and go to bed.

At 3.30AM, I wake up. The pain is as strong as ever. I turn in the bed, and it hurts. I turn on the other side, and it hurts more. And, if I lie on my back, it hurts most. Despite being very tired, the pain just does not let me sleep. I cannot stand lying in the bed. So I get dressed, take an umbrella (yes, it's July, but it's raining like hell) and walk. At 4AM I am at the nearest hospital.

They see nothing, even at the X-rays, make me a shot of Diclofenac and send me back home, after prescribing me lots of painkillers and stomach protectors. And they suggest me to have more exams.

The days after, no more pain. The medicines have the side effects to cure the symptoms of the other health problems (cervical arthrosis, excessive stomach acidity), the medical tests say nothing at all.

The only possible explanation the doctor gave is: I had kidney stones, and I successfully expelled them. Yet, there is no certainty.

After a long silence

2007-10-08T22:17:00.000+02:00

Why no posts for such a long time? Because blogs are a fashion, and fashions come and go. Or because I found no time. Or because Elisa was in the same room when I was sitting in front of the PC, and a blog is a personal thing (but, if it is so personal, why can everyone read it?).

Anyway, the silence is broken. Time to resume blogging.

(to the people who will read this blog in 3 years, and find that this is still the most recent post: please, don't laugh too hard)

A mistake everyone makes, at some point

2007-06-20T19:23:00.000+02:00

Last Sunday I made a mistake. I went to Ikea in Haarlem to buy a piece of furniture.

As this was not enough, I went there without a car. I thought: "There is a railway station there, I just have to walk through the parking lot to the station". I did not think that the object weighed 21 or 23 kg (different signs in different parts of the shop said different things), and that's a lot to carry, even for a few metres. I struggled to the train, I was helped by four kind ladies to put the object in the train, and out of it at the arrival, then I was helped by two girls carry it from the platform to the station's main hall (the two girls missed their train because of this). I was helped by a station worker who collected something I lost and gave it back to me. I went to the bus station outside and it started raining. I thought "Not bad, the box will protect it". The box, being made of cardboard, nearly dissolved when wet: every attempt at moving the box caused a hole in it, and consequent falling off of the content. In the bus, I was helped by a boy who happened to have a roll of sticky tape, and donated it to me. With the sticky tape, it was barely possible to keep the box together in the last metres of my way home.

That was the closest thing to a Mr.Bean sketch that happened to me.

On a different story, yesterday I met my neighbour for the first time. After more than three months, that's a record. She's been very kind, anyway.

Awake all night

2007-06-02T20:52:00.000+02:00

Living at a northern latitude has some side effects. In winter, daylight time is shorter. It's something you barely notice: when you stay from 9 to 5 (6, 7...) in an office, you do not really care if it's daylight or not, and, when you come out, the dark sky make you feel you have wasted the entire day in the office. Which is depressing, in Italy and in Holland. Well, you barely notice in the evening, but waking up at 8 am and seeing it's still night is weird, I never experienced such a thing in Italy.

In summer, it's the opposite. These days there is still quite a lot of daylight at 22.00.

So, yesterday a colleague organized a party in a bar in the centre. The occasion was his graduation, his birthday and his new house. Events which happened in different times, but are celebrated only now all at once. He invited quite a lot of friends, who mostly studied in Groningen. Many of them live close to Groningen, that is quite far from Amsterdam, yet they did the journey nevertheless, despite the inconvinient return trip, or the inconvinient night at some friend's home. Dutch people would do anything for some free beer.

The epilogue. I came back home very late, at about 3.30 am, and I ended up going to bed after 4am. And I looked out of the window: there was already some daylight.I stayed awake all night. Well, I slept later (not much, as usual these days), yet it was a really weird experience.

Tolerance?

2007-05-26T23:23:00.000+02:00

Yesterday I found some flyers on the stairs. They said, more or less: "Do you suspect that there is a cultivation of hemp in the neighbourhood? Then call the police". The alleged reasons were that home growing of hemp is illegal, it causes danger of fire and it makes neighbourhoods less safe.

Yes, this is the same country where coffeeshops sell hemp. Where the hell do they get it, then?

By the way, the landlady of my previous house had asked me not to grow plants which require constant illumination. But I suspect she was only worried about the electricity bill.

I kissed a celebrity

2007-05-17T16:34:00.000+02:00

Last Monday I came back from Italy, where I went to celebrate the fact that Elisa has become a national celebrity. She won one of the 5 L'Oreal scholarships for women in science for Italy in 2007, and therefore she (and the other winners) appeared on the 14th May edition of many national newspapers: La Repubblica on page 28, Corriere della Sera on page 20, La Stampa on page 38 and Il Sole 24 Ore on page 8. That day she even appeared on the national TV news programme, TG1, 20.00 edition (and nobody recorded that. And the archive only archives 24 hours. Anybody has a copy?). At the ceremony, Umberto Veronesi, former Minister of Health and scientific director of the European Institute of Oncology, shook her hand.

To prove that I'm not lying, here are two photos for you to compare.

A promising young scientist, as she appeared on all the main newspapers last Monday

The beauty and the beast last summer in Utrecht

Italy is a nice place, but too many people there think that a Middle Age morale is a good thing. So they struggle in order to deny basic rights to many people, and try to oppose the current law proposal about the agreement between unmarried couples, both hetero and gay. They say that this law would destroy families. In Holland, and even in other Catholic countries such as France or Spain, such agreements exist and they don't destroy families. The Church is really becoming too powerful. That's why I feel so comfortable away from Italy. Then, if Italy eventually progresses, I would be happy, and consider about coming back.

OK, time to stop blogging. I have to cook for two colleagues of mine and their partners, who come here tonight for dinner. One of them is a man married to a man.

Spring, again

2007-04-02T23:30:00.000+02:00

It's spring! Since a few days, the weather is far better, there is more light... OK, you can go directly to last year's post, everything is the same.

To celebrate spring, I and some friends went to Keukenhof. The day was wonderful, sunny, and, at certain hours, even warm. And the park had simply gorgeous colours. We left late because I bought one ticket too much, so I had to queue to have it refunded (successfully). The rest was fun. I also took some photos.

Flowers seen from the train

Entrance of the Keukenhof

Cherry trees (maybe)

Windmill inside the park

An Ikea sofa in the middle of the park. Power of sponsorship

An award-winning anthurium (or whatever the name is)

You think I took too many photos? Think that someone else took more than 200!

New home

2007-03-24T12:00:00.000+01:00

Eventually, I moved to the new home. This time, with a regular rental contract, and a landlord who does not plan to phone and tell me to leave in one week.

And I discovered that the home where I lived for more than one year was in a problematic neighbourhood. Funny. Nothing bad happened to me. Well, once I saw a person getting off a taxi and starting fighting with another one who was walking on the street. And someone broke in my friends' motorhome. But I really loved the neighbourhood. I would come back any day. Actually, I would like to come back as soon as possible: I miss the friends, the lovely neighbours, I still go to the old swimming pool despite having to do a long bike ride to get there.

My present neighbourhood is not problematic, according to that list. But it borders with two problematic ones. So I feel less homesick.

I am getting some satisfactions at work. Apparently, my bosses started noticing that I am doing something. They claim that my contract was renewed for one year only because I was not doing well enough (well, they could tell me that before. How can I do better if I don't even know I am not doing well?). But they say that I improved, and one sign of it is that many people come to me and ask me questions, help and consultancy. My take is: people outside my group knew what I did, what I knew and what I was capable to do, so they came to me asking me questions, help and consultancy. Because of this, my bosses got to know what I did, what I knew and what I was capable to do. But I am happy, better late than never.

My piece of heaven

2007-03-05T18:56:00.000+01:00

I had to change house much quicker than expected. My landlady wanted it with no delay, and the fact that I hadn't found a new house yet did nothing to change her mind.

Luckily, my saviour came in the person of my neighbour downstairs. I was looking for some temporary accommodation, and asked her if she could let me stay in the meantime. The other temporary accommodations did not materialise, so my stay, which was supposed at first to last one week, will end up being one month.

Our relationship during this period was, in small scale, the same as in the previous period of neighbourhood. She studies and works, so she is always very busy. Yet, when she does have free time, she is exceptionally kind and friendly. So, her spare room with my computer, her Internet connection, my Ikea foldable bed and many object which did not fit anywhere else in her house are currently my piece of heaven. And I'm thoroughly enjoying it. I really, really don't know how I can be grateful to her, everything seems not enough.

Next week, I will move to my real new house. It is in the opposite side of the city, and smaller than the old one. But it is nice and cheap (for Amsterdam standards). I'm sure I'll love it. As they say, a door closes, a gate opens.

Farewell

2007-01-25T23:22:00.000+01:00

The news has arrived: I will have to leave my present house. My landlady is coming back soon, and to stay.

What a pity. She loved India. Probably, she came of the opinion that India is a place to visit, but not a place to live. And, apparently, the love of one of the greatest body artists in the world was not enough to convince her.

I will stay here at least until mid-February, hopefully I will have found something else by that date. The date of the actual moving will probably not be sad, since I will be happy about the new place. But today, it is. I look around, see the walls, the furniture, the sight from the window. I came here almost 15 months ago, and already on the first day I said "This is my new house. This is my house".
And now, the same walls, the same furniture, mean something different. They are telling to me: "Forget us. In a few days, you won't see us anymore". Why?

In those times, I only think about good things. The space. The light. The neighbours asking me if I liked the place and the country, and always being kind to me. Not everything was good. But I cannot think about what was bad right now. Only good things come to my mind. I will lose everything related to this house forever. And I can only think about the good things I will lose forever.

When I left Italy to come here, I missed nothing. I was just happy. I only thought about how beautiful the future would be. Now, I'm just sad. I only think about how beautiful the past was.

And a particular mention goes to the bike. This is also not mine, but my landlady's. It is old. It is rusty. The saddle has a hole exposing the inner sponge, so, when it rains, the sponge soaks and when I sit my bum gets wet. It makes all sorts of strange noises when pedalling. It forced me to plug leaks 10 times. And, yet, I grew so fond of it. It is freedom of movement. It is rewarding. It gives me power, strength. I can reach faraway places (well, never more than 30 km) with my own legs, thanks to this little old rusty piece of iron.

I am still here, but it is already time for farewell, a few days in advance. Farewell, my beautiful house in Amsterdam East. Farewell, rusty old Gazelle bike. I will miss you, sorely. You entered my life, deeply. And now you are parting, and your place inside me will be empty. And it hurts.

If I feel so much sorrow for such unimportant details, it means that there are no bigger worries.
It's the only positive thing I can think about now.

Weather storm

2007-01-25T23:05:00.000+01:00

It's a beautiful song by Massive Attack. But it's also what everyone in Amsterdam (and in the whole Northern Europe) experienced exactly one week ago, last Thursday.

In the morning it rained, so I left my bike and took the tram. It would turn out to be one of the wisest decisions in my life. I noticed that something was wrong: Dutch people were using umbrellas. Dutch people are waterproof, they normally walk and bike under the rain as if nothing was happening. And my umbrella flipped 5 or 6 times because of the wind in the short time from exiting from home to entering the tram.

But the worst had yet to come. The wind got stronger and stronger, rain didn't stop, the noise coming from the (closed) windows was scarier and scarier. Luckily I brought something for lunch, so I didn't have to go out to get it, and that was also very wise.

Later in the afternoon, we had the first news that some Christmas light decorations fell on the tram's aerial cables, very close to the office. It was dangerous to use that street, and the trams were detoured.

Train traffic was severely disrupted, bad news from commuters. Web sites kept saying that there were some trains running, maybe leaving from stations further away. Then, police ordered that all trains stopped. It was the hell for commuters and travelling people in general. A colleague, desperate because there was no way for him to come home near The Hague, begged me for a place to spend the night. So I ended up letting him sleep in my living room. And he can consider himself lucky: in Amsterdam and Utrecht, exhibition centers were turned into refugee camps, in order to let stranded people sleep under a roof. The media said that about 200.000 people in Holland could not spend the night at their home.

The day after was extraordinarily clear and sunny.

Eat, eat, eat

2007-01-25T22:21:00.000+01:00

I came back from Italy to Holland with a suitcase full of food. Specialties, liquours, cakes... everything lekker that Italy has to offer. I didn't think I was this nationalist before coming here.

So, what does one do with food? You've guessed it!

On the first day at work, panettone and pandoro day again, just like last year.

Then, I invited my Italian colleagues at home, to eat zampone (pig's leg, typical for New Year's Day) and lentils. Only, Elisa told me that she needed all the zamponi, because she invited seventeen people for dinner. The situation was solved by having a zampone sent by mail in a parcel. So I, my colleagues and some friends of friends gathered at my house and enjoyed. Despite being the first time with a lot of messy organization, the zampone turned out to be good.

Last Monday, it was the turn of Elisa's 17 friends, and the neighbour downstairs, who also lent many chairs which made the thing possible. Incredible but true, it worked! Two friends of Elisa's, both Italian, helped a lot (I didn't), and all the Dutch and not Dutch people who were present appreciated. Some even said it was the best dinner of their lives. The menu was staggering: crostini (small pieces of roasted bread) with tomato and garlic, with liver paté, with olives paté; raw ham, mortadella, finocchiona (a special salami aromatized with fennel seeds); bucatini all'amatriciana; linguine al pesto; zampone (again) with lentils; panettone, panforte, mascarpone cream, brutti ma buoni (a meringue candy); Lavazza coffee; liquour as "coffee killer"; lots and lots of wine. It's amazing we survived. I ate left-overs of that dinner for all the following lunches and dinners until today (except yesterday's dinner). And there's still something left.

And yesterday, there was a dinner with a selected group of colleagues, all working on the same product, but on different sides: development, testing, product management. And it was great fun. At work, people often talk about work, because it's the only common ground. During lunch breaks, in front of the coffee machine, on the Fridays at De Heeren Van Aemstel or Coco's, at the company-organized parties, you really make friends, and contact with people is always an enriching experience. And, often, you get to discover hidden sides of people, which is always a surprise. Shy, silent people, who do not look interested to anything else but work, open up and show others their world, their experiences, their life. As they say, If I give you an idea and you give me an idea, we'll both have two ideas. Among the discoveries, the most amazing was that one of the product managers, born in India, lived most of his life in England, was part of the RAF, was in the Falklands during the war, and he lived 2 years at just 10 kilometers from where I was born! The world is really small.

Holidays

2007-01-25T22:00:00.000+01:00

Long time between the end of the Christmas holidays and the relevant post. Nothing special, apart that they were long. Slept a lot. Visited a lot of friends in little time. Including Nicola, who some weeks earlier had come to Amsterdam for a meeting of the Phosphorus project, and, at 19 years, is the longest-time friend I have (relatives not included). New Year's Day celebration was boring, and the way I was convinced to take part to it is better left untold.

Highlights: a visit to Sant'Anna (famous for a very sad event occurred during World War II, and at the same time a very nice and quiet place among woods and mountains) and Colonnata, a small town surrounded by mountains and marble quarries, and famous for its lard.

I also scratched my father's new, big, fast car. But, strangely, he didn't kill me for that.

Funny signs 2

2006-12-18T02:09:00.000+01:00

An example of polderpoëzie (a word coined by my Dutch language teacher) on a traffic light pole in Nassauplein.

When I look into your eyes
something starts burning in my heart
I find you so beautiful
But I don't know how I can say that
So now I have sorrow

An electoral sign of the Party for the Animals. They won 2 seats in the recent elections. It says Shake The Hague awake now!

Dog lover
If you just leave your visiting card in the letter box, our dog is happy to come by you and crap once in front of your door

Read the Bible, the book for you (Jordaan district)

God does not exist (right next to St. Nicholas church, one of the biggest Catholic churches in town, in the heart of the city)

Unknown canal

One way, except for horses (Bovenkerk)

Who I am, who I should be

2006-12-18T01:11:00.000+01:00

A harsh discussion ensued between me and Elisa, triggered by comparisons to other people and the situation described in another post. Her argument was that I could achieve more, but I didn't because I didn't behave optimally, so I should change the way I behave. And I should plan a solid future.

Everything can be viewed from optimistic and pessimistic points of view, just like a half-full half-empty glass. And I am not completely unsatisfied of myself, and I don't completely lack self-esteem. So, if I look back to my life, I see that I achieved something, I can be proud of something, I have enough money to afford to eat every day. And, about planning of lack thereof, I don't see it as disastrous, many friends of mine do even less and are happy, maybe happier than me.

All this leads to a choice.
1. I should not care if Elisa looks at the half-empty glass. I should enjoy my half-full glass. Elisa must not tell that I would be the right person if only... Either I am the right person, or I am the wrong person. Stop. Then you decide.
2. I should re-consider my everyday behaviour, starting from tomorrow.

Looking back to my previous jobs, I actually applied policy 1, with satisfaction. So the natural choice is 1. But there is something which makes me think about 2:
- things to lose. This may sound conservative, but when faced with the choice of breaking up, one is naturally inclined to think about what there is to lose. Only when you have nothing to lose, are you really free to decide. Evaluate what there is to lose is difficult, and so is choosing if losing it is worth it
- many pleasant things that happened in my life (yes, there have been many) happened because at certain points I could break the mould, do something unthinkable one month before
- what Elisa says actually touches me, even if I don't want to show that.

I absolutely need a copy of the book Life: A User's Manual. Why is everything so complicated?

Luck

2006-12-14T22:34:00.000+01:00

The company organized a party last Friday. Nice. Lots of people, that was the best part. Also the band playing 70s and 80s disco music was nice. The dinner was OK. Not better than OK, the food was not much, the meat was dry with little salt.

At the party, I lost my umbrella. Not a big loss: it was very broken. So I had the chance to buy a new one. Since the weather here and now is very rainy and windy, a good and strong umbrella is a must. So I indulged and bought an original Knirps. Hey, a self-admitting geek who buys an incredibly expensive gadget which is not electronic!!! Unbelievable! It is waterproof and very resistant to the wind. Unfortunately, it is not resistant to one thing: absent-minded people who keep forgetting their umbrellas anywhere, just like me.

And I lost my camera. But someone at work came to me and gave it back to me. I don't know who told him I lost it (but the office managers knew, I wrote them the morning after, telling them the model of the camera, maybe they did). I discovered that, in the meantime, someone else took photos with it. I don't know if I am angry, because people used someone else's camera without permission, or happy, because I had my camera back eventually.

Happy. Not completely, but happy

2006-12-14T22:31:00.000+01:00

I will still work for my present company. This is good. I like my job, and this means that they recognized me as a good employee (they also that in the renewal statement). Yet, it is for one more year. I was hoping for a permanent contract.

Anniversary

2006-10-30T22:56:00.000+01:00

Today, I am living in Holland for exactly one year.

Time for reconsidering what happened. Did I regret leaving my job in Italy. No, not at all. Home sickness? Sometimes, especially with bad weather, but not a lot. Feeling like a stranger? Probably a ittle, but, believe it or not, not a lot more than in Italy. Money? Money is never enough, but, in comparison to Italy, I cannot but be satisfied. language? I don't know if I should be satisfied, because I can read it decently, or unsatisfied, because I speak badly and I undertand spoken language even worse. Let's try to see the positive side: I've improved a lot. But the opposite would have been impossible, considering the starting point.

Would I move to Holland again? Yes, definitely.

Regrets? The same I had before: sometimes I feel like I'm not exploiting the opportunity to the maximum. I think I should make more friends, go out more... My eternal shyness stops me. But anyway, looking from the positive side, I'm slowly becoming more social. Or maybe I should eventually become an adult and stop thinking about that.

80s

2006-10-21T19:21:00.000+02:00

A new Italian colleague has come recently to the company. Yesterday he invited me and some friends to his home, for an evening together and a dish of pasta.

His history is different from mine. I always tried not to behave as an Italian abroad, therefore I never sought for Italian friendships, rather I tried to mix with the international atmosphere of the company and the city. He, instead, came two years ago and almost immediately signed up in the site Italians in Olanda. This is where most of the people present yesterday came from. Yes, there was the odd Dutch engaged to an Italian partner, but the absolute majority was made of Italians. So, I could really breathe that air of a community, a set of people who share language and culture, but live surrounded by a different language and a different culture, and find their own identities in the culture. Funny, before now I always try to assimilate and mingle with the surrounding culture (with various degrees of sucess).

We watched Notte prima degli esami, an Italian movie which tries to appeal to two types of people: teenagers (being a movie about teenagers) and people who were young in the 80s
(being set in 1989). Despite having a fair share of stereotypes, and showing young age and high school in a way sometimes too idylliac and unrealistic, it is anyway a funny and interesting comedy. And all the 80s music and fashions (the boys played with a Commdoore 64! Fantastic) made everyone feel nostalgic. Many fashions, fads, singers etc. were common then, and gradually faded out unnoticed afterwards. Now, when reminded, they become something special, triggering surprise and emotion. "Look at how Madonna looked like when she was singing Like A Virgin!", "Look at those telephone tokens!", "look at that Citroën Dyane!".

I realised something about myself: I am an 80s person. It is part of me, of my being, just like my name and the colour of my eyes. I am in 2006, but I realise that 2006 is not my home. I just bought a Transavia ticket to the year 2006, and that's why I am here. I haven't bought the return ticket to the second half of the 80s, yet.

Our host also had a copy of an Italian mag called Max, some glossy-paper mag with lots of half-naked models, something about the trend du jour, and a lot of ads of overpriced luxury goods. But one of the titles on the cover was actually interesting. "Goa, the hippies do not live there anymore". Somebody tell that to my landlady, please.

Fine weekend

2006-09-04T22:54:00.000+02:00

On Friday evening, I didn't go as usual at the Heeren Van Aemstel. Instead, I went to the Open Air Theatre with the neighbour, her close friend and Elisa, to assist to a Bertolt Brecht play. Nice, well acted, nice scenes. No curtain, so you could see everything behind the scenes. Or, in a sense, nothing was behind the scenes, everything was part of the show, including the actors changing clothes and changing the set. The language was Dutch, and that didn't help a lot.

Sunday was the turn of a visit to the NEMO science museum. Although most of it caters for a children's audience, it was great fun. It was possible to put hands on a lot of stuff, and experiment oneself. And there was an interesting :) section about sex, which was aimed at young people. There was a video which was forbidden to people older than 18. Imagine doing that in Italy. Not as good as the Deutsches Museum in Munich, but very good.

And today, after a long pause, back to the swimming pool.

I don't understand myself

2006-09-02T07:12:00.000+02:00

Sometimes I really, sincerely, utterly admire Elisa. She is good at everything, everything she does she does well, it is a pleasure to conversate with her.
Other times I wonder how I can be attracted by someone who cares so little about how she looks and dresses.
Sometimes I would like to tell her that she should take a little more care in how she looks and dresses (only a little. I hate girls who only care about looks).
Other times I feel that, if I told her so, I would be an insensitive sod who does not really love her and forces her to be someone else.
Sometimes I think that I and Elisa go so well together because we are very much like each other.
Other times I think that we are too much alike, we do not complement.
Sometimes I need more freedom.
Other times I think that, if I had more freedom, I would have more freedom to take wrong decisions and ruin my own life.
Sometimes I am very self-confident. I have qualities, I have some interests, I reached some point of maturity.
Sometimes I feel that I am an annoyance to others, everything I say could harm others or simply bore them, and, anyway, the world can go on if I would not be here, and if I would not be here nobody would care. So I stay silent and tend to avoid human relationships.
Sometimes I take life as it comes, and enjoy the moment.
Other times I think that I should find a determined goal, and live for it. Which is what Elisa does.
Sometimes I like to be alone, independent, and in full control of my life.
Other times I feel that my life is empty without others to take care of, and who take care of me.
Sometimes I am unaffected by bad things that happen, I just bear with them and go on.
Other times I whine about how bad things happen.
Sometimes I complain that nobody understands me.
Other times I think that it is normal. I don't understand myself, so why should others do?

Why am I sleeping so little these days?
Amd, most important, why am I blogging at 7AM?
(BTW, 7AM is very early, not very late)

"I hate my life! I hate everything! I wish I was dead! ...Well, no, I don't, not really. I wish everyone else was dead" (from a Calvin and Hobbes strip)

House

2006-09-02T07:05:00.000+02:00

Not so good news about the house.

Some months ago, my landlady, back from India, seemed so enthusiastic about coming back to India, and looking forward to finding some sort of long-term way to live there.

More recently, she expressed the desire to resume her old job in Holland. And she did not want to renew the contract for a whole year. And she told something about coming back to her own home, of course with a sufficient advance notice bla bla. It is not the most reassuring condition I've ever been. Better look for something else. Pity, I love this house (I love her house?).

And, in the meantime, I hope that my employment contract is renewed. Because, despite a crap August with rain virtually every day, I still love this country.

Plans for the future

2006-09-02T07:03:00.000+02:00

Tomorrow I will be alive. And the day after tomorrow too. But I don't like to make such detailed plans such a long time in advance

Something new

2006-09-02T07:01:00.000+02:00

I did something I never did before: I repaired a hole in the front wheel of my bicycle.

What do you mean, it is not new, and you don't write about anything else? The past times it was the rear wheel!

The eternal struggle continues.

A story with a happy ending

2006-09-02T06:44:00.000+02:00

No post in the last weeks. But the last weeks were not so uneventful. (I should have blogged earlier. But I always did something else instead. Much less useful, of course).

Last week I received a visit from two long time Italian friends, and their daughter, who will turn 6 in a few months. They came with their motorhome. Well, they had to take care of theit girl a lot, so probably they didn't have so much spare time to go around and visit the city. But it was fun. And the girl (and her father) appreciated the C64 DTV a lot. I'm such a geek I appreciate those things.

The last day of their visit (Friday past week) they went to my house while I and Elisa were at work, relaxed a little, checked and wrote e-mails etc. When they came back to their motorhome, which was parked in the same street, they didn't find it. They only found a bunch of glass spliners instead. So they phoned me, worried, saying "The motorhome's been stolen!". I was astonished, I would like to help them in any case, but the only thing I could do was to point them to the nearest police office.

Less than one hour after, an SMS gave relief. The motorhome was at the police. Apparently, a petty thief broke the glass and took a bag (which was visible from outside), but then, maybe seen by people who lived aorund, just flew away, neglecting all the valuables inside the motorhome. The police, in order to prevent more thefts from a motorhome with a broken glass, took it away (without posting any signs of doing that). And the bag was found a few meters away in the street. So, after replacing the glass, everything was back to normal.

They left Amsterdam and headed for the Hoge Veluwe .

Chores

2006-08-13T12:54:00.000+02:00

I dared do something very difficult, yet boring, and possibly unrewarding: filling the tax return.

In Italy it was not hard, for two reasons. First, I was (and am) an employee, and taxes are deducted from my salary. Second, in Italy companies employ fiscal consultancy agencies, so employees just talk to a consultant, and (s)he does all the paperwork.

Here, one is on his own. The HR department does not know much about tax forms. And the form is strictly in Dutch. And I didn't find anything in it about the so-called 30% ruling. I would like to have my taxes back, since I didn't have a 30% ruling in 2005 but I have now, but the form says nothing.

On another topic, maybe I'll have to change house. The rent in my current house will increase, and Elisa is not sure she will stay in Holland after January, so this house would become unaffordable for me alone. And that's a real pity, becuse I really like this house.

What you call heatwave, I call summer

2006-08-03T21:27:00.000+02:00

When I came, I thought Holland was different from Italy. Well, it is, in the sense that August in Italy is a summer month, while in Holland it has an autumn-like weather. But there's something in common: people complaining about warm weather. If it were for me, summer should be 9 months longer. 30 degrees is the ideal temperature. Instead, people, TV and newspapers complained the whole July about the heatwave, instead of letting the other people enjoy the wonderful weather.

The heatwave is over, it's cold (that is, you cannot go around in short sleeves), it rains, and I severely need a holiday.

Italy won Football World Cup

2006-07-09T22:59:00.000+02:00

And I am happy. Because Italy won. And because France lost. Euro 2000's final needed a revenge.

Yet, I think that no World Cup final should end with a shoot-out. In 1982 there was a rule: if the match was a draw after extra time, it should have been replayed. The rule was abolished in 1986. It should be restored.

And, in 1982 (yes, I am so old I remember 1982 World Cup final as it was yesterday) I was far, far, far more happy. Maybe I'm getting old.

Holidays are over

2006-07-06T22:24:00.000+02:00

Very short holidays. The nice times of when I was a child and summer holidays lasted three months are over (well, actually I don't think that the times of when I was a child were nice, but there were nice aspects).

First, back to Pisa. Just off the plane, I remember how hot Italy is on summer. I like hot weather, but that humid hot weather was unbearable. Voted for the referendum (luckily, "No" won quite largely, so our great Constitution was not changed for the worse). Then I borrowed my father's motor scooter and I and Elisa went to Sardinia. Even though I am Sardinian, I don't know large parts of it. It was nice, a motor scooter really gives freedom of movement and you can feel the warm weather on your skin.And the natural beauty of some spots was stunning. The island is very little populated (except that the coasts get overcrowded on summer), so there are large stretches of land in which you can walk for tens of kilometers and not see a house.

We arrived to Olbia in the morning, visited the city, then went to some archaeological areas around Arzachena, then to Palau, where we boarded the ferry to la Maddalena. We went around the town and the island, and to Caprera, where we visited Garibaldi's house. It was closed. maybe Mr. Garibaldi was not at home at that time. Jokes apart, it is so stupid to find a monument closed one day a week during the peak season for tourism. Apparently, since museums and monuments are open on Sundays, they are closed on Mondays. Don't those people think that monuments should be open 7 days a week?!? Especially in an island which thrives on tourism!!! After that we visited Luogosanto and Tempio, stopped in a bar in Tempio to see Italy's match, then we hit the road again to visit some churches, and to Sassari. That was our first day. Our holiday was more stressful than our jobs.

We visited Sassari and Alghero (great town, the most beautiful of Sardinia).

Alghero

Then went along the coast to Bosa (almost completely unspoilt coast, great landscape).

Coast between Alghero and Bosa

We shortly visited Bosa, then went further south through nice villages and unbearably hot weather, we reached the archaeological site of Tharros. We spent the second night in an agriturismo with nice Tuscan people.

Tharros

This is not Far West, but the village of San Salvatore near Tharros

The third day we went to Cabras, Oristano, Sanluri, Cagliari and then the final destination by the south coast. And the real holiday started, and lasted a few days.

The return trip was all in one day, along the east coast. There are incredible landscapes. At one point, the road which runs closest to the coast reaches an altitude of over 1000 meters.

Su Gorruppu gorge seen from the road between Baunei and Dorgali

On the ferry back to continental Italy, we watched the semifinal Italy-Germany. At the end people were about as happy for Italy's victory and for Germany's defeat. Apparently not many people in the world love Germans.

Then, I am back to Amsterdam. I shaved for the first time in about 10 days. The weather is much sunnier and warmer than when I left. It was so nice that, last Thursday, I and the downstairs neighbour had dinner in a park, on the grass. Geweldig (as they say here).

I miss Italy

2006-06-18T14:44:00.000+02:00

When I came, I promised I would have never said so. And I maintained the promised for a very long time. But now that time has come. Why? Obvious reason: the weather. Not too bad in winter, in the sense that it's not worse than in Italy. But now, it's definitely colder. First half of May has been great. Second half of may has been dismal. I was afraid autumn was already started, even before spring was over... Luckily, first days of June were great again. Then, again, cold weather came back... Will summer ever come? Well, yesterday and today were not bad, let's hope the weather improves.

In fact, I don't miss Italy. Here one can see all World Cup matches on TV. In Italy, you have to subscribe to a particular pay TV.

A post cannot be a post without mentioning the bike. Now it has new pedals. The rest is old and battered, as ever. No new holes, this anti-leak tyre is working.

And the language: I still suck. As for writing, I never write in Dutch, maybe I should start in order to practice. I am not fluent at all at speaking, and my vocabulary has enormous gaps. I can understand non-Dutch people speaking Dutch (mostly). Well, I understand English better when spoken by non-English, too, and this could be a sort of consolation. But it is not enough. Anyway, who wants to learn a language which includes the word "onafhankelijkheid"?

Time for exams

2006-05-24T22:13:00.000+02:00

Long time with no posts. It's because the bike works too well. Actually, after replacing the rear tyre, the rear wheel needed to be replaced because of a small accident (which cost me a fair amount of Euros). So, with completely new rear part (actually, I don't know if the tube was changed), the bike is going as well as ever. And the blog is more silent.

Time for exams. Next Friday I have the company 's performance appraisal. I am actually a little scared. It's not like a university exam, there is nothing to do in the last days, only what I did in the past almost seven months counts. But did I do what they expected me to do?

And soon, don't know exactly when, my landlady is coming back from her long holiday for a few days (after which she will go back to her holiday place). She will see the house, and maybe judge me for how it is maintained.

I am not really worried, but I am actually a bit uneasy about those two occurrences.

Also, the weather is like it's autumn again. Maybe it will be autumn until December, then winter again. There's something missing somewhere. I should be content to have had some weeks of spring some weeks ago, but somehow it doesn't seem enough.

Bad, then good

2006-05-01T23:14:00.000+02:00

Things started to go really bad.

Yesterday I realised I lost my bag. There was just one valuable thing inside, but there was one. It must have been on Friday night. So I went to the hotel where the company's party was

While going there, the rear tyre of my bike got its sixth hole. The same day as when I repaired the fifth one. Damn glass splinters left on Utrechtsestraat after Queen's Day!

The people at the hotel found nothing.

Before going to sleep I thought I could have left my bag in the place where I and some colleagues had falafel after the party. But it was midnight, too late to ask.

Today is 1st May, but I went to work. It is not a holiday here. This is the only country in the civilised world where you have to work on 1st May (in the United States it is not a holiday either, but, because of death penalty and the war in Iraq, I have doubts about it being a civilised country).

At lunch time, I went to the falafel place. They told me to try on the evening. I lost every hope.

It started raining. It's May! May is in spring, you know! It's supposed to be sunny!

I went home pushing my bike and riding the metro along with it. Just before coming home, I realised the chain I lock it with was not there.

So I brought the bike to the repairer, asking him to change the rear tyre complete with tube, and replace it with an anti-leak tyre. The conversation started in Dutch, but I was unable to understand his second or third sentence, so we switched to English.

Luckily, after 15 minutes and some tenths of euros, the bike was ready. This blog will become much more silent now. Or at least I hope.

Then I took the metro (it was still raining like hell, better not to use the bike) and went to the city center. I found the chain just where my bike was parked. It must have fallen off just after I unchained it.

Then I went to the falafel place again. My bag was there! And all its content!

Let's hope tomorrow is sunny and warm!

Queen's Day

2006-04-30T12:08:00.000+02:00

Yesterday was Queen's Day. It's 30th April every year. What do you say, yesterday was 29th? Well, apparently there's a rule for which, if 30th April is Sunday, Queen's Day is on 29th that year.

Dutch people go mad on that day. People on streets, live music in stages all over the city, orange clothes (Oranje is the royal family. And also the colour of the football's national team).

In many places, including around where I live, there was the free market: everyone could sell thier used objects. It was more of a dump than a market, with old and useless stuff for sale, but it was fun. Also, stands with food, books, children plays...

Then I and Elisa met in Leidseplein with some of her colleagues, nice people. We strolled around the crowded streets, until finally we got to the Jordaan district and stopped in a pub.

People in boats in the canals

The wise man does not piss in the wind (a Latin inscription near Leidseplein)

A guy who charged 1 Euro to have eggs thrown on him. But very few could hit him

It was very hard to find a place to eat, but, after a long wait, we did. And, after that, we went home with the metro (as there were no trams and buses in the centre). A very fun day.

Maybe I will learn this bloody language (eventually) (in 10 years, or more)

2006-04-30T11:52:00.000+02:00

I found an ad from a man wanting to exchange Dutch lessons with Italian lessons. So I answered. We exchanged some e-mails: mine were written in Dutch, and his in Italian, and we corrected each other's mistakes.

On Thursday we met. His name is Gert and he is very keen to learn Italian. He already writes very well, and speaks it slowly but correctly. I also tried to speak, and discovered (as if I didn't know before) that I still speak in a terrible way. Slowly, without knowing the indispensable words, and with completely wrong word order. .

But I found the evening very useful. Practice is definitely what's needed. If he is patient enough to bear with me and my horrible Dutch, we both will benefit.

Five

2006-04-30T11:42:00.000+02:00

Another hole in my bike's rear tyre. The fifth one. My neighbours tell me I should throw away the bike. Maybe they're right. Surely, a visit to a (trustworthy) bike repairer is necessary

Leaks

2006-04-23T16:40:00.000+02:00

Last Thursday I fixed a leak in the rear tyre of my bycicle. It's the fourth time since I'm here. Maybe this blog should be renamed to The eternal struggle of one man against one bike and only report about leaky tyres. There would be enough material to fill a blog, although it would get a little repetitive.

Visits

2006-04-16T23:54:00.000+02:00

After being in Italy for the elections, I'm back to Amsterdam. So I spent Easter in the Netherlands. Many tourists came here for the holidays, so the city is much more crowded than usual.

Among those tourists, two former colleagues of mine, of the time I worked in Turin, with their respective girlfriends (one of which works in the same place). It was a pleasant experience. We first met on Friday evening, they let me and Elisa (who didn't know them) in their hotel room (note: they were not use to Amsterdam's steep stairs), then we had pizza together (real Italians! We dared eat one of those touristy, un-authentic, mozzarella-less pizzas! Not so bad though) and had a little walk. On Saturday we did probably the most touristy thing we could: a boat ride through the canals. It was the first time for them, and for us too.

The six bridges over the Reguliersgracht

A house-boat for sale. Anyone wanna buy?

Then everybody came to my house, including a Dutch friend who studied in Turin for his Erasmus, and now studies in Delft. Italian food galore. Actually, not so much, it was the first time a dinner was prepared for so many people. But everybody seemed satisfied. Overall, they've been two great days. Let's hope my friends could visit the Anne Frank museum (when they tried, the queue for the tickets was just too long) before coming home.

Forza Italia!

2006-04-16T23:44:00.000+02:00

Now I'm proud to be an Italian. Again.

Funny signs

2006-04-05T22:51:00.000+02:00

No alcohol (in the Oosterpark)

No noisy thingies. Also no grilled meat (or whatever is that in the bottom right) (in the Vondelpark)

Danger, birds! (on the road to Marken)

Some years ago, in Eindhoven, I saw a "No pissing" sign, which is even weirder than those.

Het is lente

2006-04-02T14:24:00.000+02:00

It's spring! The weather has suddenly changed (all weather changes are sudden here) for the better, and it's more sunny. But, most important of all, there are more daylight hours. Also, the daylight saving time, although it forces to wake up earlier, means that the sun goes down one hour later, and that's such a pleasure.

I'm getting ready for my return to Italy. On the 9th, there are general elections. And they are very important, because they are a unique chance to pose an end to the Berlusconi premiership. Berlusconi is a great liar: he lies, but in a very convinving way. He points out all the opposition's misdeeds, and he never cares about his, which are exactly the same, only 10 times greater. His government is very much committed in laws that influence him directly, yet he is very good at shifting the focus away from that fact. He loves to choose as government partners some very conservative, when not outright racist, people, which have a great deal of influence in government policy, yet he is the frontman, so those people can act unseen and undisturbed, while he gets all the attention himself. And he simply does not care about the reputation of clown he earned abroad, because those people do not have right to vote in Italy.
I don't think his opposition is the best possible opposition, but i do think that things would improve tenfold if he stops being the prime minister.

Back from CeBIT

2006-03-12T22:23:00.000+01:00

CeBIT was great fun. Lots to see, colourful, huge, yet not too messy.

On Friday, I and my colleagues arrived in Hannover, and most of us went to the hotel, very far away from the fair (about 10 km) and even farther from the central station. Then we went to the fair. Since there was no room at the company's booth for our luggage, we went to the garderobe, which was just outside the fair's turnstiles. After that, the turnstiles simply refused to let us in again. It was a mistake from us: we should have told the security personnel we were temporarily leaving, so the intelligent turnstiles would have let us in. But we didn't know. And the turnstiles were not intelligent enough to figure that. And the security woman was really, really German, and just told us "You used your ticket, so you can't get in again. Stop". Luckily, with some phone calls and help from another security woman, we could get in.

When inside, we just forgot to have lunch. There was so much to see. And I got my indispensable calories from candies many booths were giving away. Strangely enough, many big names were not present or not so visible (Sony, Motorola, Philips). But there was IBM, Siemens (playing home), Microsoft. Not many Linux companies, what a pity. Novell dedicated a very small area of its booth to Linux. And there was even Commodore, which was so important in my teenage, when I used to spend all my free time in front of a C64.
For dinner, we went to a carefully chosen restaurant: it was the first Greek restaurant we saw just before the tram stopped by it. It turned out to be very good, a lot of meat, tasty. And the atmosphere among colleagues was so nice. It is good to have these moments, otherwise the only relationships among us would be work.

The day after, it was a little colder.

My colleagues waiting for the tram at the tram stop (reached through a shortcut) on Saturday morning

I remembered I am a Telecommunciations' engineer, and I stayed pretty long in the telecoms area. It is nice to see all the acronyms studied at school have some practical significance (almost all of them, some are long-forgotten). Since I don't work exactly in the telecoms field, I am behind the latest technology achievements. But it was fun.

The return journey was more exhausting than expected. We knew the train from Hannover would not have reached Holland, and we would have to take a bus from the border to the intermediate station of Almelo. What we didn't know was that that train would have left Hannover with 1h15 delay. I am reconsidering my bad opinion on Trenitalia... Luckily we caught the last train from Almelo. Living in Amsterdam has some advantages, as people living farther away would have to make complicated train changes, and one missed connection would have meant sleeping in a station. But I hope everybody went home safe. Tomorrow we'll discover.

Get lost!

2006-03-09T21:34:00.000+01:00

Last Saturday it was nice weather, so I and Elisa decided to go to Muiden by bicycle. I brought my TomTom One to find the way.

So, a bike route sign told us to turn right. The TomTom told us to go straight, so we went straight. Suddenly we met a road with no bicycle lane, and the TomTom told us that it was the right way. What should we do? Elisa thinks that, this time, we should not follow the TomTom, so we turn right. Guess what? We get lost in a plain with little human presence, and still covered by snow from the previous days.
The plain, fortunately, had lots of signposts, so we eventually found our way. And, when in Muiden, we found that the castle was closed.
We had lunch in a typical Dutch bar, furnished with a lot of wood, and with a rug as tablecloth (yes, a rug! I wonder how hygienic it is...). The lunch was not bad, Dutch cheese and worst (sausage).
On the way back home, it started raining. Clouds must have realised we were by bike.
And on Monday I discovered the rear tube had a hole. Again! This time, remembering the past experience, I didn't take off the wheel, I managed to repair it by just removing the external tyre. No more rip-offs from bike repairers!
On Tuesday I voted for the municipality and district elections. As an EU citizen registered as living in the Netherlands, I have right to vote for local elections (not for national ones) automatically. It was fun. The voting offices are much more relaxed than in Italy, no police outside, and they didn't even ask me for a document!

And tomorrow is CeBIT day! Yippie!

And you thought spring was near

2006-03-02T20:10:00.000+01:00

Yesterday night snow fell on Amsterdam. This morning the city was covered by white. And it was a sunny day, so the sights were so pretty.

My bike is the third from the left. No wonder today I went to work by tram

Will I ever learn this bloody language?

2006-02-26T12:13:00.000+01:00

I am a little behind in posting, so today I am posting about what happened on Wednesday.

The company Dutch lessons have eventually begun. Once a week, every Wednesday after work. The first lesson was fun. We were two classes (beginners 1 and beginners 2) merged together, since one of the teachers couldn't come. Unfortunately this reflected in the fact that some were starting absolutely from scratch, while some others could put some words together. We presented ourselves and interviewed each other. The funniest moment was when one (an English guy) revealed that his Dutch girlfriend is not so happy he cannot speak Dutch after living there for some years (6, I think). He was among the best, however.

They say practice makes perfect. I hope these lessons help do some practice. But 1.5 hours a week are not enough in my opinion. A week earlier, Kees, a colleague of mine who is very fond of Italy and often goes on holiday there, accepted giving me a private lesson of Dutch in exchange for a lesson of Italian. Unfortunately he is leaving for a long holiday. Pity. I need to find some other Dutch willing to learn Italian.

Ajacied

2006-02-23T21:46:00.000+01:00

Last Sunday, my neighbour invited me to the Ajax match. It was a lot of fun.

Despite it was not a particularly important match (the opponent, RBC Roosendaal, is the last one in the standings), the stadium was almost completely full. It is good that many people go there. In Italy the stadiums are almost always half-empty, and in general they are a dangerous place, because of the violent supporters (not enough is done to contrast them. Rumours even say that in some cases they are encouraged by the teams' administrations). Here it is nothing like that. Supporters are noisy, colourful, but not dangerous. Also when I and other Italians went to watch Netherlands-Italy last November, the Netherlands supporters screamed "Pizza" at us, hugged us, let us take photo of them and us together, and never did anything that could hurt us.

And Marco, my neighbour, really becomes someone else during a match. He a wife and two children, yet he screamed and yelled every time Ajax scored. And he kept complaining all the time Ajax was not doing as good as it should. After 70' it was ahead 2-0, but that was not enough. Only in the last 20 minutes, according to Marco, did Ajax played as it should have done for all the match. It must have been so: Ajax won 6-0.

Yesterday, Ajax did not so well against Inter (2-2 home, it is almost like losing).

Maybe I should resign from being a Cagliari supporter. If my favourite team were Ajax, at leasy my team would win some matches.

The two of us

2006-02-09T23:05:00.000+01:00

A few days ago, Elisa joined me in the Dutch adventure. It's the first time we live together: ironic, we had to move so far away from home...

There are many reasons to like her: she knows everything so there's always something to talk about, I like the fact that she, despite being Catholic, can be critical towards the Pope and Church's excessively old ideas about ethics...

We are very similar. That's the main reason why we are together. Sometimes I think that maybe we are too similar, we do not complement each other. And she already plans to come back to her home town (actually, she plans everything about her future), while I do not like to plan forward and tend to take things as they happen. So, if I don't get fed up about Amsterdam (and Amsterdam does not get fed up about me, which is more likely), why come back?

But the thing I am most afraid is myself. Living together can give infinite satisfaction, but it also requires some sacrifices: keeping the house tidier, giving half of the bed space to someone else (three quarters, actually, judging from the first days)... Will I be able to overcome my selfishness and put up with those, and get the rewards?

This is Amsterdam

2006-01-26T21:40:00.000+01:00

Do you know, when you park your car in a busy place, and, when you pick it up, find an ad leaflet under the windscreen wiper? Yesterday, when I came out from work, I found an ad leaflet hung to my bicycle's handle.

Spa baths: they should be required by law

2006-01-25T08:12:00.000+01:00

Belated post about weekend. Last Saturday I went to Aachen, in Germany but just 5 km from the border with the Netherlands, to visit Francesco, a former colleague of mine.

Some background info: I joined Philips Italy, as a "research scientist" (this title really sounds good! My current title is not even close to that), in 2000. Francesco had started doing his internship as a graduate student one week before. Our research group turned out to be very good. We were using Bluetooth about three years before it became a trendy gadget present in all high-range mobile phone. And, most important of all, we were having fun doing what we were doing, with slack deadlines and quite a lot of freedom in choosing what to do. Francesco (who later on graduated and became a full-time employee) was a volcano of ideas, while I was more of a geek, focused on Linux and C programming (I still am, although no more so Linux-oriented. What a pity).
In 2002, Philips Research went under a restructuring, which involved closure of the Italian lab. So we were kindly "invited" to find another job. Motivation in all the lab employees plummeted. Our job became sending CVs, downloading songs from the Internet, watching movies during work hours... And we were paid for that! Not forever :( About one third of the people were moved in the lab next door (which, about two years later, underwent the same fate...). The others found jobs elsewhere, inside or outside Philips. My job was outside Philips, while Francesco joined Aachen's Philips research lab.

The weekend was a lot of fun. In Saturday Francesco introduced me to the Carolus Thermen, which are simply marvellous: hot water, cold water (much better than I expected), open-air pools with spinning water, sauna... Then we went to a pizzeria with some colleagues of him, mostly non-German. Then, one of them was having a party at his home, so we went there, had fun and drank quite a lot. Then, Francesco insisted we go to a bar, but I reached my limit, so I sat on a sofa and fell asleep...

On Sunday, we went to "les Trois Bornes", the point where Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands border. 5 meters from that point, there is the tallest point in the Netherlands (327 metres above sea. Yes, they are flat). A pretty nice spot, woody hills, perfect for a weekend trip. Then we spent the rest of the day around Aachen, jumping from a tourist spot to a bar and back, and drinking spa water (bleuch...let's hope at least it's healthy). Then, back to Heerlen, in the Netherlands, where I caught my train. Actually, I missed my train, so I waited for one hour until the next one.

And no, no photos. I forgot my camera at home

Sense of humour

2006-01-18T22:42:00.000+01:00

Dutch can have a very sharp sense of humour, very different from Italians. An example is this note posted to the window of a ground-floor flat close to my house.

People who do not Dutch need a translation. But I don't know Dutch either... Here is the best I can do (look Mom, no Babelfish!)

Dear burglar,
After 3 burglaries in 18 months
There is really nothing more to be taken.
Otherwise make an appointment in order to come and look
[a mobile phone number follows]

Sad news today

2006-01-18T00:02:00.000+01:00

The father of two of my dearest friends, Chiara and Claudia, has died this morning. Chiara is a friend since the beginning of my university years, and she is also the mother of Tito. Claudia is the one I have to thank for the beautiful house I'm living at this time, she is a world traveller, and she introduced me to people of any race, colour and creed.

I wish I could have spoken to either of them, in order to express them my condolences. In times like this, all the people who are suffering for the loss of a person cannot but stay closer together, in order to support each other and help each other bear the pain. And, ironically, in moments like this, one really sees how beautiful life is.

I'll never learn this bloody language

2006-01-16T23:00:00.000+01:00

I've living in Amsterdam for two and half months now, and still I'm very far behind in knowledge of the language.

At first, I thought "Easy, as I already know a foreign language, just learn a few words and the basics are there". WRONG. Building a large vocabulary is indispensable, and it takes time and patience.

What I am doing is try to read a lot, with a dictionary on one side, in order to build a large vocabulary. This worked for English, so it should work now. Yet, getting to the point when the general sense of one sentence is clear even when some (many) words are unknown took a long time. And, still, my gaps in vocabulary are abysmal.

Reading and writing...well, I never practise these. Theoretically, I have a lesson book for that. Practically, I dedicate too ittle ltime to it. And I never speak Dutch, because most of my colleagues are not Dutch, and the ones who are know English very well. But, most important of all, sometimes I did try to speak Dutch. The problem was, they understood me, so they replied in Dutch. And I couldn't understand one word.

This leads to the lowest point: understanding spoken language. Every morning, Radio 1 wakes me up. The speakers are very good, they have a clear pronumnciation. So, I understand some words and, at times, even what some sentences mean. But not being able to understand most of it is frustrating.
Listening to the radio makes me believe "Hey, now I really understand!". Then, frustration ensues when real-life people actually talk to me. As soon as the conversation becomes more complex than "Goede morgen", "dank u wel" and "alstublieft", my reaction is always a perplexed face and a few words in English, begging the other to repeat in English...

I realise I will never learn Dutch when I think about all the irregularities, and all the words with different meanings. "Waar" means "true" and "where", "weer" means "again" and "weather", "zijn" means "to be" and "his"... But then, I think that Italian uses the same word for "time" and "weather", and suddenly I forgive Dutch people for speaking Dutch.

The truth

2006-01-15T18:16:00.000+01:00

After inspecting thoroughly the house where I live, and considering the furniture, the picture hung at the walls, the Indian spices in the kitchen, the presence of a wok in the kitchen cupboard, and the amount of incense sticks in the closet, I have discovered the truth: my landlady is actually an East Asian, enclosed in the body of a Dutch woman.

P.S.: the bike works great again. Next time I won't lose any hair trying to repair it myself. Also, this has re-established some trust in Dutch bike repairers.

Ripped off

2006-01-14T14:16:00.000+01:00

A stereotype common in Southern Europe (and maybe elsewhere) is that Italians tend not to be trustworthy, and try to rip off others as much as possible, while Northern Europeans tend to be more honest. In the past I was convinced it was true to some extent, now I am not. The responsible for this is a bicycle repairer.

Some days ago, when I took my bicycle to come back home from work (and the Friday night beer with colleagues), I realised the rear tyre was flat. The following weekend was sunny and perfect for going around by bicycle... So, I went to the repairer closest to home, but it was closed (the sign said 18:00, but there was nobody at 17:50). By chance I found another one, open, and I brought my bike there.
One day (and 6,50 €) after, the tyre was inflated, but not at high pressure. I inflated it myself at home. I inflated myself again the morning after, and I went to work. Guess what? After work, the tyre was flat again. There can be an explanation, maybe something in the wheel caused another hole, but I tend to think that the repairer just inflated the wheel without repairing it.
So, after marking that repairer as not worth coming back, I decided to do that myself. It is much more difficult than expected. I even phoned my father in Italy to ask for advice. Eventually I disassembled the wheel and fixed the hole in the inner tube. Then, today, I spent almost the whole morning putting the wheel into place. After lots of swearing, dirty hands, and a kind neighbour who helped me invaluably, the wheel was in place, but not perfectly straight, and one piece of the brake was missing. So I did what I should have done in the first place: go to the repairer closest to home. What will come out? Only time will tell.

Back to Holland

2006-01-09T23:57:00.000+01:00

Christmas holiday time is over, sooner than I was used to. The 6th of January is a bank holiday in Italy, so it is common habit to make holidays last until that date. But in the Netherlands it is not :(

I enjoyed my Italian holidays. I enjoyed much less the Italian weather. Many say Italy is the country of the sun. Obviously those people have never been to Italy in autumn and winter. It was terribly cold, it rained most of the time, and one day (29th December, I think) it snowed. The biggest snowfall in twenty years.

note the snow covering the roofs and the lawn

So, on 1st January I woke up with a cold, cough and fever. But my plane tickets were not refundable, so I travelled back to Amsterdam nevertheless. The day after the fever, cough and cold were even worse, therefore I stayed home all day.

As soon as I recovered, I introduced my neighbours and my colleagues to the joys and delights of panettone and pandoro. They are two typical Italian Christmas cakes, almost impossible to find in other times of the year. Everyone appreciated.

After that, two Italian friends of mine came to Amsterdam at two different times (holidays last longer in Italy, lucky them), and I introduced them to the joys and delights of poffertjes and oliebollen (two Dutch cakes. The amount of sugar, oil and butter in them makes them absolutely unsuitable for people on a diet and those who care about their health. That's why I like them).

Spot the difference

2005-12-28T12:17:00.000+01:00

I'm back to Italy for Christmas holidays. Short after my arrival, some billboards made me want to come back to Holland.

taken from Wikipedia, used under the GNU FDL

Italy, december 2005. Taken by me
Between these two deranged, ego-maniac political leaders there are few, negligible differences. Spot them and...hey, are there any differences?

Apart from that, I'm enjoying my holidays a lot, much more than I expected. In the 24 hours before leaving, I was thinking "Alas, my holiday in Amsterdam is over...", and actually I was not so enthusiast about coming back. But actually, I'm eating a lot of good food (everything is better than Dutch food) and seeing a lots of friends (I'm not a social people, but strangely enough there are friends who are happy to spend some time with me. Or at least not so unhappy).

Dream

2005-12-22T22:02:00.000+01:00

I had a dream. I was in a different world. It was very similar to the one I was used to: there were houses, streets, cars, signs, traffic lights. But when people opened their mouths, they did not speak: rather, they made strange noises, as if listening to an out-of-tune radio. And I was unable to understand what people said to each other, and to me. And I was unable to speak to them, and communicate with them.

Then I realised it was reality.