WTF Montreal?

I woke up this morning and went straight to the internet to check the score of the game last night. Of course, I was thrilled to see we won.

Then I got to work and heard about what happened after the game.

WHAT IS UP with our city and the rioting? Very sad.

For the last few months I've been boasting to all the people here about what a great city I live in.

I'm ashamed.

Éire...

I bought a ticket to Dublin!

It has always been a dream of mine to visit Ireland. So I am taking advantage of living in Europe (and my Irish friend Cat!) and am heading there this week-end. Cat is flying with me from Rome and has agreed to show me around Dublin for a couple of days. We leave Friday and come back Sunday. Cat's sister has graciously loaned us her apartment and Ryanair has graciously provided low cost airfare, so it's all set!

Now, I realize that by seeing Dublin, I will not really be able to say I've seen Ireland, but if I only make it to a Pub in Dublin and the Guinness Storehouse tour, I figure it's a good start.

And for those of you following my Rugby fetish, Team Scotland will be in Dublin to play Ireland in the Six Nations this week-end. The pubs will be alive all week-end with millions of Irish, thousands of visiting Scottish and one lowly Canadian listening to a plethora of musical accents. Stay tuned for pictures...

Bagrock on

While I've been living in Rome, I have become friends with several Irish Expats. Consequently, I have been exposed to the game of Rugby, and frankly, I've grown quite fond of it. Yes, I know. I used to believe that it was a game of brutality, played by brainless savages. Well, I've been converted.

It is a far more exciting game than North American Football as it doesn't have those boring long pauses between plays. It's as fast moving as soccer, but the strategy and formations are much more intricate. And who can't be impressed with what the players put their bodies through without using padding or safety equipment?

Well, the Six Nations tournament is now under way and I find myself planning my week-ends around when each game is being played. Six Nations lasts 5 week-ends. All six teams (Ireland, Scotland, England, Wales, Italy and France) play each other team once. The team who wins the most, wins the whole thing. Simple. And I just can't seem to get enough.

I am even captivated by the pre-game cermonies. All the teams bring kids onto the field with them at the beginning of the game. Those children are the team mascots. No big, orange, unidentifiable creatures with trumpets representing rugby teams, I tell you!

And I was so intrigued by the "Unofficial" Scottish National Anthem (Flower of Scotland) when I heard it that I bought two different versions of it off itunes this week. The song has a special meaning for me, because my late grandfather used to play that very song off his Bagpipe CD early Christmas morning to wake the whole family up. So I'd heard it played on the bagpipes every year, but I had no idea what it was called and, even better, that there were lyrics!!

So I now legally own a "Bagrock" (Yes, that is an official Genre of music on itunes) interpretation of Flower of Scotland. But what really sold me on this particular version of the song was actually the group's name. The song was recorded by none other than: The Red Hot Chili Pipers. Heh.

Best Present Ever

When I was last in Montreal, I was given this ugly, yellow bunny.
Asstard is now my favourite word.
The bunny was a gift from my friend Nat, who got all shitty on me yesterday for not blogging in months.
So here is my comeback to the blogging world. And yes, I am an asstard.

Am I loving Rome? Is the Pope Catholic?

On Sunday I went to St. Peter's and attended Mass. Kind of funny, considering I'm not Catholic and it was all in Latin and Italian, so I really didn't understand much. But somehow, it was still a very moving experience.

I went with 2 co-workers and we arrived a bit early, so we went to visit the tombs of the Popes while we waited for the service to start. They have to let you in in small groups because so many people stop to ponder or pray at John Paul II's tomb. There were about 30 people stopped and many of them were crying as they knelt in prayer in front of his tomb. The ground was covered with flowers and icons that mourners still bring regularly. Whether you agree with his theology or not, he was a man who touched the life of many people and he is still missed. I have asked Italian co-workers here about him and what things were like in Rome when he passed away... Many of them actually went to the Piazza at St-Peter's to mourn his passing even though they admit to not being practising Catholics. One even had tears in her eyes as she spoke with me about JP. Popey was a special man.

The Swiss Guards' uniforms are hilarious. It's easy to forget that the men in the red, orange and blue clown pants are actually trained mercenary soldiers.

Although it's hard to tell, the picture above is me as we entered the Basilica. Can't you just hear a chorus of angels singing in the background?

New Friends

It is so easy to meet people here!

I met my neighbor as I was leaving my apartment yesterday morning on my way to work. Arthur is a retired university professor from Cleveland and he is here with his wife for a month. He's teaching an economics summer class at an American university in Rome. They invited me over for drinks on Friday after work! Heh.

Then, last night I left the office planning to go home, eat a quiet meal, work a bit, and then hit the hay early.

As I was waiting to catch the bus, a co-worker struck up a conversation. It turns out that he and two other engineers are over from our Australia office, working in Rome until the middle of next week. We talked most of the way into town, and he invited me to go to dinner with his co-workers and an American friend of theirs. So, I thought what the heck, went home, dropped off my stuff and met them at the restaurant at 8:30.

It was a tiny mom and pop joint with a set menu. You pay a fixed amount and get:

Antipasto coming out your yang (Bruschetta, grilled eggplant, deep fried zucchini flowers stuffed with cheese, Fresh Mozzarella and more)
2 different pasta courses, one after the other!
Veal with roasted potatoes in gravy.
Dessert and coffee.
All the red wine and sparkling water a girl could want.
And a glass of grappa.

And every bite was scrum-diddly-umptious.

Lynette, the American girl, is here for two years and wants to see Europe on week-ends. We've already started making plans. She's also from Houston, so we spent a good part of the evening trying to explain the wonders of Texas barbecue to the Aussies.

My new friends were a lot of fun and seem to be pretty hard core. I vaguely recall talk of a pub crawl tonight with a bunch of other expats. We'll have to see about that one. I'm not sure I could handle being out late two school nights in a row. I think drinks with Arthur and his wife might be more my pace...

I Shall Not Walk Alone...

My friend Clare is my first official visitor in Rome. AND the first to see my apartment. AND the first to smell the horrible, stale sewer smell that seems to drift out of my bathroom drain everyday. I tried opening the bathroom window, using air freshener, burning matches but nothing seemed to help. BUT on Saturday, we went shopping and I happened to buy about 100g of black-green mint soap from Lush, which I put in my bathroom. Funnily enough, the smell of the soap is so strong that it seems to have overpowered the sewer smell. Nice.

While we were exploring the shopping on Via Del Corso, I had to stop at the Farmacia to buy razors so that I could shave my legs and pits (because there ARE limits to how much I'll assimilate to European culture). The store was pretty small and there was only one other family shopping in the store with us at the time. The woman was a tall, well dressed blonde (Clare noticed her dress right away) and she was at the counter buying something, while her husband and son stood beside her, having a conversation in English:

Son: Why are there butterflies on that package?
Dad: Because that's what the marketing company decided they wanted on the package.
Son: Why would the marketing company want butterflies on their packages?
Dad: Because they thought the people might like the butterflies and want to buy their product…
And so it went...

The father was so patient with his son. He answered the questions at a level the son could understand, but didn't talk down to him either. It was pretty darned cute, I tell ya, and my heart melted right there. I fell in love with a married stranger in a Farmacia in Rome. Then his wife finished her shopping and he walked out of my life.

WELL! When we got outside, a crowd had gathered around the man, asking for his autograph. Turns out the total stranger that I fell in love with was BEN HARPER. He and his wife (who my friend Annie later informed me was LAURA DERN) and their son were shopping on Via Del Corso too! I suck at recognizing celebrities, and never would have realized who they were if it hadn't been for the group of fans and the news camera crew waiting outside the store to follow them down the street.

For the record, Ben Harper is now on my list.