christmas 2008

 I can't believe it's almost Christmas and I haven't written a blog in ages.  LOTS of things have been going on, obviously, otherwise I'd have had two minutes to write! 

TURIN

First, I moved!  I have now officially invaded Tullio's beautiful apartment, and the hunt is on for a new place in lovely Turin. My friends Anja and Serge helped me load all my things into the truck of  a gracious Syrian man named Fanous, who drove me in his big truck through the Swiss Alps to Turin - it took us over 14 hours, I think.   My two turtles were in shoe-boxes in the cab with us, scratching in frustration the entire trip.  At some point, one of them (the one I call A**hole) escaped and was wandering around under the seat.   Exciting trip.  Then, we finally arrived and made our way to the depot where I'm keeping the majority of my boxes.  Tullio was waiting for us there, and we unloaded everything into his car and the depot while Fanous snoozed.  Then Fanous turned around and DROVE BACK TO BELGIUM!  I hope he made it!!   Sweet guy.   

So, our apartment's on via San Donato in Turin, near a beautiful church with a quaint painted tower, with a schoolyard underneath.  The bell rings at every hour and half hour, and the children fill the air with their playing and yelling in the early part of the day.  There's a canary on our floor who sings his heart out every day there is sun, as his cage gets placed outdoors in the courtyard on those occasions.  We have a long balcony onto the courtyard which I have lined with plants and flowers.  (Well, most of the flowers are dead, as it has been quite cold...)  My two turtles (terrapins, to be exact) have taken up somewhat temporary residence in Tullio's lovely whirlpool bathtub.  It's not the perfect set-up yet, but eventually we will find a place for everything.  I HOPE!  On a clear day, you can see the snow-capped Alps which enring Turin.   Beautiful!  (Am I making up  the word "enring" or am I just taking it from Midsummer Night's Dream text?  Talk about waxing poetic!)  I'm trying to settle into life in Turin as much as possible when you're never there.         

Since last writing, I've been a lot of places...