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March 24, 2008 Easter Monday (The Italians are sensible and have a national holiday set for Monday, supposedly to go on the first picnic of the season with the leftovers from Sunday’s feast, but more likely to clean the kitchen after the all the cooking the day before….) It’s been awhile since I carved out the time to write. We were very fortunate and were part of an experiment; Telecom hooked up both our phone and internet on the same day, back on March 10th. Hooray! We tried to give them lots of positive feedback. However, the next day, all 13 of our crates of household goods were delivered. Holy cow! What were we thinking! The moving crew unloaded all, some boxes were taken to the correct floor, the wrapped items were undone, a few things were reassembled that we insisted on and hadn’t been stuck behind other boxes, but no boxes were unpacked at all. So far, nothing serious has been broken, so we’re crossing our fingers. I thought that I would try to get unpacked and settled before returning to the computer. What a laugh, only it actually makes me want to cry. So, I’m enjoying the holiday and taking a moment or two to write again. The boxes will all still be there…..

Organization has never been my strength- I always thought it was a gene that was not passed on in my family. In actuality, I have made tremendous progress over the years, but it is still a great challenge for me and it is so much more challenging to be in charge of 3-4 peoples STUFF, not just my own. There are the few obvious things that are easy to put away, but so much of the little stuff requires a lot of thought and creativity, ( or Bill has suggested a very large trash dumpster….) , particularly when there are no closets to hide it all in. A new home and different spaces require such different arrangements of all the crap! I seem to make my way through a few boxes each day in the midst of the rest of family life. I can see that it will obviously be a much longer undertaking than I had imagined, and it often feels rather overwhelming. I obviously should be drinking more wine in the process. On a side note- Bill has lost almost 15 lbs since leaving the boat- I guess I’m happy to have made it through X-mas and a big move without having gained weight- despite chocolate chip cookie dough being a primary coping strategy.

OUR HOUSE: We think the house is total of about 2800 sq. feet, with 3 bedrooms on the second fl, 1 bedroom and 2 “nooks” on the third fl, and the basement is fortunately more useable for kids than that in our house in CT. The house is at the end of a small alley off a “main” street. Our landlord, Franco, has a big garden and tiny “man-pad” to hang out in during the day. He spends his days here, than returns to his home a few towns away- and on his land there is also another very small apt where a single mom and her 9 y/o daughter Claudia live. They are our only neighbors. There are other houses around us, but high walls in between and I have no idea where their entrances are from. The girls seem to have hit if off and despite very limited communication are able to have fun playing for short periods together when they get a chance. The courtyard is all either paved or flagstone on which the girls can ride bikes, and there a quite a number of orange, lemon, and mandarin trees. Yum! It will be quite a change of pace to not have any grass or garden to take care of. I miss escaping outdoors to work.

Like all Italian homes, there is no carpet anywhere, nor closets. Most of our floors are tile, but the stair case is done in granite. Alyssa has already taken a tumble and had her first set of stitches after splitting her chin open. I’m amazed at how rapidly the dust bunnies multiply. If this much dust actually accumulates in all homes, no wonder we’re supposed to vacuum carpets weekly! The Navy provides loaner wardrobes for each person in the family, as well as a stove, fridge, and microwave. The hardest part for me to adjust to is that each of the windows and French doors have metal shutters that must be opened each day to have any sunlight inside, and for safety, must each be closed and locked before leaving the house and before going to bed at night. In addition to the front door, I think there are 9 sets of doors and 8 windows, which makes a lot of opening and closing! The amount of time to get out the door seems to have multiplied exponentially. I’ve quickly decided that it’s too hard to open up in the A.M. before getting the girls to school, but it’s decidedly harder to get going in a cavelike atmosphere. The electricity seems to flicker off for awhile several times a week, so we’re thankful that Franco pops over almost daily to check on the furnace/hot water heater and restart it each time. I now know how to open our automatic iron gates (to drive in and out) when the power has gone out, or if slugs have crawled into the electronic mechanism and it malfunctions! And yes, there were a number of tears of frustration involved in that process of not being able to leave the house in the morning!

THE BASES / GENERAL INFO: Unlike many military bases, things are quite spread out here. If you picture a clock, Bill’s base (the NATO headquarters) is located in Bagnoli, which is positioned just outside of central Naples, at about 6:00. We live in Lago Patria, about 16 miles away, which is positioned between 8 and 9 on the clock. The support site, or base with the commissary, gym, exchange, library, schools, etc. is about 22 miles away near a tiny town called Gricigagno (near Aversa) and located at the top of the clock, at about 1:00. The other base where most of the military people work is near the airport (Capodichino), located at about 4:00. You can drive around the clock, using toll roads, or drive from 9:00 to 3:00 on a rather convoluted highway, but can’t drive from 12:00 to 6:00 without going around the perimeter. So, to drive anywhere takes awhile. I’m sure it’s not that much different than any big metropolitan area,(just crazier driving) but we were used to the 5 minute drive to base and our little town of Gales Ferry/Ledyard with a total of five stoplights in the two towns! Gas for the locals costs roughly $8/gallon. We get to purchase a limited number of gas coupons/month to bring the price down to $4/gallon or so. We’re glad to have the Prius, even though I will really miss our Odyssey if anyone comes to visit. It’s hard to imagine how most of the people make ends meet, as we’re told that the average income/month is about 2,000 euro, and somewhere between 20-40% unemployment. Utilities are expensive as well, hence the adjustment to keeping the thermostat set at about 61-62 during the day. Apples are expensive, but tomatoes are cheap! Miracles have occurred and Bill has actually started to like fresh tomatoes, when eaten with good cheese, bread, and garlic, and the true amazement, he even enjoyed fresh spinach mixed with our pasta!

SCHOOLS: Trying to find a school situation for both of the girls has been tricky and a difficult choice. All of the choices have felt like which is the lesser of evils, vs. actually feeling good about it. Alyssa obviously needed to be in school, and Rachel needed something for a social outlet and to give me the opportunity to take a language class (meets 2 A.M’s/week at Bill’s base) and hopefully even take some of the day trips arranged by the base to explore the area. If we sent Alyssa to the (free) school on base, she’d have to be on the bus somewhere bwteen 6:45 and 7:00 AM and get home around 3:15-3:30 or so. It seemed like an impossibly long day for her, with little opportunity to learn Italian or be around any foreign kids, plus I still had to find something for Rachel. There is a good private nursery school/kg with an American program that’s close by, but Alyssa would have had to do something different next year, and this year Rachel could attend only 3/days, which doesn’t line up with my language class. The local Int’l school and private Italian schools were also both expensive, required costly uniforms, are difficult to get out of financially if you don’t like them, and a number of other parents I talked to had their kids be not very happy. Culturally, it was pretty difficult to deal with the “tougher” attitudes, rough play, shouting, fighting, etc that is either tolerated or encouraged. And I definitely wasn’t wild about the lack of outdoor/playground space.

For now we’ve opted for a Montessori school for both girls that is located on Bill’s NATO base. Also private (i.e.- very $$$) , but more flexible in it’s program, there is at least some opportunity to study some Italian, and the big plus is they provide free daycare to NATO members (that’s us!) before and after school if needed. There’s a nice playground, they try to have some animals and plants for the kids to help take care of, and there are children from a variety of countries. The downside is I am the bus both ways, and it’s still a very long day for both girls. Alyssa has grown up much in the last months and her coping skills are doing much better, but melt downs at home are still frequent. Rachel has been accustomed to three morning/week and still napped several days each week. Now it’s 5 days/week, getting them up at 6:30 to be out of the house hopefully by 7:30 and they don’t get home until almost 4:00. She's cried about just wanting to take a nap. Now Alyssa is the one reading stories in the car to Rachel and I seem to have almost no time with either of them. I feel very torn, especially for Rachel. It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity for me and our family to learn Italian, explore the area here, etc. but it’s also a once in a lifetime of my time with my kids as they are still young, and I miss our time together, and I also value their free time playing, pretending, etc. I definitely miss the jewel of preschools that we enjoyed back home. I know we are still all adjusting, but I’m having a hard time focusing on the half full part of the glass vs. the half empty. Alyssa’s academic skills are also so not in alignment with a kg class that they’re pushing to place her in 1st or second grade, which in the long run I don’t think is in her best interests. Bill’s not so sure….. It reinforces for me that all the time she spent at home with us doing things together was a good thing. It’s hard for me not to feel like putting Rachel somewhere to facilitate my language class is really selfish and not worth it. But as they say in Italian- “piano, piano”- or in other words, take it all a little at a time.