Not Intent on Arriving

I don’t think I ever told my kids that this happened to me.  So as I mentioned before, during the course of the homestay I lived with this lovely family in Castrolibero, a suburb of Cosenza.  It was about a 15 minute drive to get into the main city of Cosenza (depending on traffic).

Now during the day, I tended to stay in the house during the morning while Maria worked.  I would hang out, watch some Murder She Wrote (in italiano), do any work that I needed to do, write in my journal and read.  Often, Sara and Alfredo would both be working, so I was by myself in the house.  Which was normally fine…until…

One day I wanted to simply take out the trash to the dumpster (which was literally ten feet from the house) and do a little walk around the neighborhood.  I had my own set of keys, but they only worked for the side door of the house in the basement.  So, I grab the trash and walk outside.  As I look over, I see the neighbor staring at me.  I wave nervously and prepare to go on.

I hear, “Chi cazzo sei tu?” which basically means “Who the fuck are you?”  I decide to head over and talk with him.  I explain that I’m from the United States and staying with the family for a couple of weeks.  He asks me a bunch of questions, which I respond to, growing increasingly nervous as he fingers his cell phone.  I try to comfort him by explaining that I’ve actually met him once before.  The family had some people over the week before and I met this man at that point.  He had no recollection of me.

Now, gradually I assuaged his fears and convinced him I was just a guest of the family (an “ospite”) but it took a while.   For a moment or two, I thought I was going to meet the carabineri (or police).

An ironic twist was that we had this same man over for dinner that night.  We laughed about the whole incident then.  I learned he worked for the electrciity company, which was under great stress because of the unprecedented high temperatures.  He also told me of the two robberies that occurred at his home over the past four years and my family told me about the robbery at their house as well.

Thank goodness I was home alone for most of the days :)

My host father, Alfredo, chatting with friends

It’s about a week into the homestay. Maria and I have planned a wonderful outing for all the kids, Italians and Americans, on the Mediterranean sea.  The area is gourgeous and we’ve hired a boat that will take us around some of the islands right off the coast.  It’s gonna be amazing.

The boat is late (we’re in Italy after all), but finally it comes.  The captain is loud, obnoxious and hilarious, all in one. He pokes fun of the fact that the Americans cannot understand him, but takes us away to our first stop.  We arrive at a beach, he lets us off and tells us he’ll return in an hour and a half.  Where he goes, I haven’t the faintest idea.  But, we make for this beautiful natural arch in the area called Arcomagno di San Nicolo Arcella. It’s beautiful (see below):

View of Archmagno di San Nicola Arcello

It was in this beautiful spot that we swam for an hour and enjoyed the (cold) water.  There was a large cave accessible from a tiny hole from the ocean that we swam into.  I, along with Lowell and Sam, helped Kelly into the cave since she had never learned how to swim previously.  Back on shore, Bajia and Travis (who didn’t like to swim) stayed behind.  Once we returned (swimming the 1/4 mile back), I snuck up behind Travis and tried to dunk him into the water.  My attempt failed, miserably.

Back on the boat, we waited anxiously for the “abundant” lunch promised to us on the boat.  Instead, we were offered crackers and other little snacks.  Hardly abundant. The kids were bummed out by this development.  The boat captain played obnoxiously loud music and tried to coax the kids to dance.  In the end,  Georgia and Caitlen took the bait.  It was fun.

Finally, we arrived at the blue grotto (“grotta azzurra”).  I was one of the first people who jumped off the back of the boat into the warm water below.  The cyrstal clear water allowed us a beautiful view of the all the fish in the water.  The captain of the boat tossed crackers into the water and all the fish swam around us.

La Grotta Azzurra (sorry it's blurry)

It was really cool.  We rode the boat back after swimming and finished our lovely trip out to the islands by Cosenza!

By the way, we were on a boat.

At the beginning of the homestay, we had agreed to 3 events where the kids would be together, but I pushed our local rep to arrange a 4th because the kids pushed me to do so.  We did it.

The result was a soccer game between the Americans and the Italian host siblings.   We rented a field for an hour and got all the families to bring their kids.  The result was wonderful.  When the idea was being thrown around, some of the Americans told me that they wouldn’t play (I told them it was fine to watch), but when the actual game happened they caved in and joined their friends.

My kids during the game

Before we began, I told the Italian hosts to go easy on the kids.  They did and were incredibly good sports about the whole thing.  Still, the Americans did pretty well and even mounted some attacks.  The second half yielded some really good opportunities and I remember vividly Rob’s score from inside the box.  You would have thought we won the World Cup with the shot! And that was the last goal, so I guess we won!  America! A really memorable moment happened at half time.  The kids wanted to come together and do a chant before the second half.  The result is this.

We got together after the game (again with almost all the families and Americans) and walked around downtown during the night.  We happened on a concert in the downtown area.  As we’re walking up to it, a slightly scary/funny moment happened.  I notice that a midget is passing and let him by us, but Lowell does not notice.  He yells, “Oh sh**” as the guy passes.  Our short friend was pissed (even if Lowell was just startled) and chased the group for a while. Anyways, it was great and yielded some really cool group pictures.  Some of those are below.

Italians and Americans

Lowell and Caitlen

One afternoon, with a little more than a week left in the homestay, I get dropped off in the center of Cosenza with a few hours to wander the streets by myself.  My quasi-homestay mom, Maria, has to work.

I’m dropped off on the main shopping street of the town, Corso Mazzini.  There are a random collection of all sorts of stores—Zara, H&M, Gucci, etc.

Corso Mazzini in Cosenza

So I’m walking down the road with the idea of getting to old Cosenza (Cosenza vecchia, for all you Italian speakers). There is an awesome gelateria, called Gelateria Zorro down there.  It gets its name from an old mafioso (member of the mafia) that was gunned down there in the 1960s.  The area is also very old and beautiful, and I’d never had the chance to explore it alone.

So I’m walking down the road.  First, I pass Piazza Kennedy, where the large group of us would meet to explore downtown during the homestay.

I keep walking down the road.  A bit further down, there is another piazza that has a local courthouse in it, I believe. I’m walking past it when suddenly I hear “Mama Goose!”  I look up and find Travis, Bajia, Rob and Sam, along with their various host siblings sitting down and chilling out.  I decide I’ll stop and chat with them for a bit.  Sam and his host brother leave quickly.

The rest of us hang out for a while.  The Americans express the need to find a bathroom, and I say that I have to go buy something to drink.  Thanks to Antonio (Rob’s host brother) I go to a supermarket and find something, telling everyone I’ll be back in a bit.

I return, having bought some yummy chocolate for everyone.  And…. everyone’s gone. I was gone maybe 10 minutes. No sign of anyone.  Then, I run into the Italian host siblings.  The Americans “are in the bathroom” they tell me.  I figure I’ll just wait and say goodbye.  10, 15 minutes pass.  Then 20, 25.  By this point, one of the host fathers shows up, wondering where the Americans are.  He has to drive the family back out to the ocean and then return for a flight to Brazil later that night.  He’s already pushed for time.

So… I get panicky.  I run up and down the street trying to find Bajia, Travis and Rob.  We call Rob.  He informs us that Bajia and Travis have gone off in search of a bathroom, but he has returned to his family’s apartment in the city (whish is close).  He gives the impression that Bajia and Travis have returned to Travis’ home, which is halfway across the city.  They’d have to take the bus!

40 minutes later and still no sign of them!  I get really freaked out.  I’m thinking of finding a policeman and, unfortunately this would be the best way to describe them in Italy, ask him to put out an APB for two African American Americans in Cosenza.  They would make quite the novelty walking around together.

The other Italians around me start planning. Two of them (the two that want to become a couple) would take a bus home and find them.  Just as the situation starts to get crazy, they come running!  Travis and Bajia.  The day is saved and they are safe.  They just couldn’t find a bathroom all that time.

The lesson:  when in Italy, always use the bathroom when you buy something.  Public bathrooms are very hard to find. Crisis averted.  Lost children found.  Unfortunately, this is a theme we’d have to revisit later in the trip… But more on that later.