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To Marmite

This came to me while I was eating dinner and musing over expat life. In the style of Dr Seuss. I hope you enjoy!

'Marmite! Marmite? What is that?'

Shriek the girls in my Italian flat.

'How do you eat it? What do you do?

It looks untrustworthy through and through!'

'Well now I'll tell you,' and their heads I pat,

'It's good with eggs, on toast that's flat.

It's good with cheese, and on its own.

Even on a ricecake - one mustn't moan!

It's good with beans for a flavoursome lunch - 

Relax, my dear, that face you scrunch.

It's good in soups, chillies, stews - all kinds of fayre!

In truth wherever love is, you'll find Marmite there.'

Edam and Courgette 'Rustica'

Now this, this was an absolute EXPERIMENT in the dark that turned out VERY WELL, born of a leftover courgette lurking in my fridge and the desire to eat something other than pasta for once in my Italian life.

Serves 2 (with a side salad. Could stretch to four with lots of other bits on the plate too)

Ingredients:

Cheese of some description - the title says Edam because it was what I used the first time due to it being the cheapest available in the supermarket at the time. I generally just have a rummage and try to find whatever medium, fairly flavoursome cheese is on offer on the day though - pretty much anything will do. Haven't tried Cheddar yet, and don't use anything too sloppy or mild.

1 courgette

1 pack ready-roll pastry (because I am a lazy, good-for-nothing CHEAT, people. Actually, Italian ready-made pastry comes already rolled in its own baking parchment wrapper, which is perfect for a short-term foreigner living in student accommodation. Kills approximately four birds with one small and perfectly formed stone.)

Bit of milk for brushing.

Method:

1) Pre-heat oven. I'm afraid I can't give you a temperature, my oven has two heat settings - 'big flame' and 'small flame'. Just make sure it's hot enough to...cook it.

2) Open the pastry and plonk it in a baking dish/tray to suit the size of the pastry itself, so some of it can still be folded over at the edges and ends

3) Chop the courgette into rounds and place into the pastry case

4) Chop (don't grate, chop - it makes it more rustic) the cheese into chunks and scatter over the courgette. Make sure they're evenly spread.

5) Fold over the edges and brush with milk

6) Pop in the oven and remove once the cheese and courgette is a lovely melty goo and the pastry is golden. Can be enjoyed straight away or eaten cold with a picnic!

Ratatouille

After I wrote up the risotto recipe that I went on to describe as 'possibly my best Italian culinary achievement to date' yesterday, I remembered this humble dish, which served me well in five ways:

1) It's dirt cheap

2) It's filling

3) It's warm on a chilly day

4) It's ridiculously easy to make

5) It's super healthy

I'm somewhat ashamed to say that ratatouille is a vegetarian staple that I'd never really given the time of day until I moved to Italy, which is ironic given that it's French. Anyway, here goes:

Serves 4

Ingredients:

2 courgettes

1 aubergine

2 peppers (red, yellow or orange)

12-15 cherry tomatoes, or six normal ones

1 onion

Drop of olive oil

Dried mixed herbs

Bouillon powder/vegetable stock cube

Method

1) Add the oil to a large (and I mean large!) pan. Chop the onion and fry gently for about five minutes, over a low heat.

2) Meanwhile, chop all your other veggies/plant products

3) Bung all the veggies in the pan, including the tomatoes (they're a fruit I know, hence 'plant products', for the pedants out there)

4) Add a small splash of water. Literally just a splash. Like...show it some water. These ingredients will release a lot of water as they cook anyway.

5) Sprinkle over a teaspoon of the Bouillon powder, or crumble over the stock cube. Give the mixed herbs a good generous shake over everything.

6) Mix the whole concoction well.

7) Put a lid on the pan and leave it to cook for about 35-45 minutes, stirring occasionally. It will reduce considerably and release a lot of moisture. Once everything's looking cooked through, dish up and enjoy with crusty bread or rice. It probably goes well with chutneys too!

Spinach and Pesto Risotto with Gorgonzola

It's been a wee while, and I realised that while I've documented some of my philosophical ponderings over the last five months, I have not as yet paid much attention to my culinary adventures!

This recipe was born of an excess of frozen spinach in my freezer and is really quite seriously good (if I say so myself).

Serves: 2

Ingredients:

Knob of butter

3 espresso cups of risotto rice (if you don't have espresso cups, an egg cup or a shot glass will do. Measurements in my Italian kitchen are somewhat haphazard, but this amount makes two good portions on a hungry day. Just do two if you're planning dessert.)

1 onion

3 chunks of frozen spinach (If you're using fresh you just have to look at it and think 'when that's wilted, will it be enough? and go from there...but use a decent sized bag at least)

1 litre Bouillon powder or vegetable stock (if you use less rice you will have to adjust the amount of stock accordingly)

1/2 tub of fresh green pesto

Chunk of soft Gorgonzola (I'm going to say make it a generous...30 grams. Maybe more)

Generous handful of Parmesan

Method:

1) Put the spinach in a small pan with a little water to defrost. If you're using fresh spinach, wilt it in a colander with boiling water and put aside.

2) Chop the onion. Melt the butter in a large pan and soften the onion for around five minutes. 

3) While the onion softens, boil the kettle and make up the stock. (I don't have a kettle so I get my water boiling before I do anything else) Add the rice and stir until glossy with butter.

4) Start adding the stock to the rice little by little and stir constantly until each part of the water is absorbed. Do this on a high heat until all the stock has been absorbed by the rice, then turn the heat right down. Be very careful not to let the rice stick to the bottom of the pan as it will be a pig to scrub clean later! Towards the end of the process you can afford to turn the heat down a bit and leave it to its own devices with just the occasional rigorous stir while you grate the Parmesan. Or if you're really organised you can grate it in advance.

5) Add the spinach and pesto and stir until mixed through. Then add the Parmesan and Gorgonzola and stir thoroughly. If you want, keep back a bit of the Parmesan for sprinkling on top.

Serve up and enjoy!

Can be accompanied with a light white wine if you fancy, and if you're really hungry and misjudged the quantities of stock vs rice (voice of experience) then a nice bit of crusty bread is good for mopping up juices. And if you STILL have space then by God you're most of the way to becoming Italian already and something like strawberries for dessert would follow it well. Perhaps nestled in meringue nests with a hint of cream. Naughty. But less is more, perhaps best just to let the strawberries stand alone. Your call!

The Mistake Room

'If you're not prepared to be wrong, you will never come up with anything original...and we are running national education systems where mistakes are the worst thing you can make.' Ken Robinson

Classrooms. A classroom. The classroom. Classroom.

I've been thinking a lot about this word lately. (Well, you say, you're a teacher. Duh.)

I studied English, and part of the study of English is that you think critically about words. I'm tired of people slagging off English because 'oh yeah, I like reading, but I'm just not interested in all the ANALYSING of EVERY LITTLE DETAIL, you know?' Yes ok I get it, pathetic fallacy isn't all that creative (oh, the pouring rain that makes Marianne Dashwood mortally ill is obviously a symbol of the destructive nature of her love for Willoughby blah blah blahhhhh) but that's not the point I'm making here (and it's also a separate post, I think!) What I'm getting at is that words, in all their glory, are signifiers. Their etymology and their history create in us a complex chain of reactions and connotations when we hear them that we probably don't even realise we're processing, but these processes largely pre-dictate our responses.

So. Let's take a critical look at the word 'classroom'.

Firstly, its word-category. It's a compound noun made up of the words 'class' and 'room'. Good.

Class

Dear readers, please take a moment to notice all of your reactions to the word 'class'. What does it mean for you?

Social structure (lowerclass, middleclass, upperclass)

Ranking (classification; both in terms of creating order and academic achievement. 'Did you get a First Class Honours? Ooh, smartypants. With that level of degree I'm sure you'll soon have a job that will allow you to travel business class too!') This last example also suggests social elitism and separation - you only travel business class if you have the means to buy the ticket (or the looks to get upgraded).

Restriction (sorry, that's classified)

I could go on, but I think you get the picture.

So, when we enter the classroom, we carry with us all of these associations. And indeed they're reflected in the way that classrooms are organised, with learners often separated onto tables reflecting their 'ability', or the creation of separate ability classes entirely. The classroom is a microcosm of the way we have chosen to structure the world outside it. (Well done Charlie, you have so far discovered nothing new.)

Enter my snazzily reformed name for the place of learning: The Mistake Room!

'Ooh,' you say, 'That's interesting...' but you shift uncomfortably at the mention of the word 'mistake'.

Mistake - another compound noun 'mis'-'take', like 'false-start', if you will.

I notice that a lot of my learners, young and old, whatever their ability, believe that their mistakes in the *cough* 'place of learning' are UTTERLY WRONG and mean they are BAD and they MUST BE ELIMINATED.

And yet. Who ever made a mistake that they didn't learn from? It's like in The Lion King, when Rafiki smacks Simba round the head with his stick to prove exactly the same point. It hurts, but what are you going to do about it? Steal the monkey's stick the second time he makes a swing for you. It may be painful and embarrassing at the time, but it may just open the door to great discovery, creativity, self-affirmation and yes, real learning.

I had a great English teacher in the run-up to GCSEs who sat us down just before our mock exams and said, 'Now is the time to make mistakes girls. Now is the time to get it ALL WRONG. The more 'mistakes' you can make now the better, because then the more we'll have to work with. You are absolutely, 100%, completely safe to make mistakes right now.'

That was the first time that I ever considered that mistakes could be a positive thing. Think of the amount of stuff that was discovered by mistake. America. Yogurt. Cheese. I wonder how many dud lightbulbs Thomas Edison made before it finally worked. If he'd never had the courage to risk making a mistake, he'd have joined all the other apes laughing at him for thinking he could create 'fake sunlight' and, well, complex surgery would still be carried out by candlelight. The whole point of making something, be it art or science, is being able to look at a thing and think 'Hmm, if I just have a fiddle with that and a tinkle with this, maybe it'll make something new and cool. But maybe it won't. Maybe the bridge won't hold (that's why we're making a prototype), or maybe I'll end up asking the Italian waiter 'where are you?' instead of 'where can we sit?' But what will I really lose from it if it does go wrong?' When the prototype crumbles, or when the Italian waiter stares at you like you're a loony and asks if English would be better (sigh), instead of running away and kicking ourselves, we can think 'Hmm, ok, that didn't work so well. I wonder why. Let's have another play and find out.'

If I can encourage my students to feel safe making mistakes in our lessons, to stop apologising for the fact that they're experimenting with new grammar and vocabulary and sometimes sound a bit strange (any students reading this, THANK YOU for some of the mistakes you make in your writing, they provide no end of staff-room hilarity), to recognise 'mistakes' as portals of opportunity, I'll feel I've made it as a teacher.

You are safe here. I'll catch you if you stumble.

Mistakes are good

Allow yourself to feel vulnerable to mistakes during the lesson and see where it leads you.

If we created a world in which making mistakes was the aim of being in 'The Mistake Room', where they were celebrated instead of stigmatised, and if we could take perfection off its pedestal, how much happier, more creative and more balanced would society be?

The Road Not Taken

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost

Last time I wrote a blog entry I was sat at my kitchen table overseeing a pot of simmering lentils. Chickpeas this time.

I think this poem speaks very well for itself and  - surprise! - poets in the late nineteenth century experienced exactly the same decision-orientated conundrums we can all empathise with today.

Which part speaks most to you? For me right now it's the feeling of peering down each road, weighing my options, feeling immensely the difficulty of the fact that I cannot 'travel both and be one traveler.'

The tense of this poem did puzzle me a little at first. Frost mixes past, present and future in a way that made me wonder where exactly along their journey his speaker is speaking from. Perhaps that's the point. What I have now surmised however, is that they're in the middle looking back for the first three stanzas, then in the fourth they contemplate the future by imagining how they'll speak of their choice 'ages and ages hence.'

Frost's speaker is certainly very positive and self-assured. They claim to have taken 'the road less traveled,' but the second stanza contradicts this - the chosen path looks less travelled but in reality they've been 'worn...really about the same.' So...does that mean he's taking the piss out of those who claim that the benefits of taking 'the road less travelled' outweigh those of taking the conventional road? This appeals to my snarky cynical side but the non-conformist in me doesn't want to believe it. But you can't ignore the first two lines of stanza three - the leaves of neither path are blackened by footsteps. They're virtually the same when it comes to wear and tear.

So, my philosophical thought for you all today? It's utterly unoriginal, banal and uninspiring, but sometimes we need reminding: whatever path you take, it makes no difference. You'll be fine. 

Daring Greatly

Sat at my kitchen table overseeing a pot of lentils bubbling on the stove and wondering where on earth my Muse has got to. It's been some time.

What a month! Well, a little over a month now. Here I am in Bari, living the dream of the ESL teacher in the Med. (Today, my one full day off each week, along with indulging myself in the purchase of a NEW BOOK from the ENGLISH SECTION of a nearby bookshop that also happened to be OPEN ON SUNDAY, I did my laundry, cleaned the kitchen and swept and mopped the kitchen and hallway floors - yes, expat life is just as glamorous as it is at home) There's been a fair amount of sun and pizza so far, some highs and lows and some moments of soul-engulfing self-doubt. Here we are, doing the 'living abroad thing'!

I watched another awesome Brene Brown talk last night and she settled so much in my mind. If you don't know her look her up - she's a social worker who studies the importance of vulnerability in living a full and meaningful life (whatever that is to you). She wrote the book that gave its name to this post.

Her talk cleared up one pretty big thing I've been chewing over for a couple of weeks now:

No matter what happens in six months' time, whether I stay in Italy, go somewhere else or go home, whether I stick with teaching or try my hand at a different job, the most important thing is that I will have shown up. I will have 'stepped into the arena and allowed myself to be seen.' I will have dared greatly.

Those close to me will know I've got something of a spiritual streak, and over the past couple of years that's manifested itself in a great respect and admiration for the Quaker faith. When I'm at home I attend a Quaker meeting, and there's something about silent worship, about waiting on God, about getting the frick out of the way and letting him get on with whatever it is he needs to do, that really appeals to me. And what doesn't appeal about a life based around the principles of peace, equality, simplicity and truth & integrity?

Anyway, I sense a digression happening and the main reason why I mentioned this is because I was reading Quaker Faith and Practice online last week and came across a lovely quote I wanted to share:

God does not do things for us - he enables us to do them for ourselves.

A full and meaningful life, a life where we allow ourselves to be vulnerable in order to create, to live to our fullest potential, to love, to make mistakes and to risk failure, cannot ever be a passive life. To me, this 'enabling' from God spoke of empowerment, of the voice that tells you 'you are enough' when everything else would have you believe otherwise, a vindication of your vulnerability and the knowledge that the showing up and being seen is the most important part of all. None of the rest of it even matters. It's sawdust. If you don't take action in your own life and do for yourself whatever it is you need to do, no one else - not even God - will.

And it occurred to me that this is what Quakers do in their meetings for worship - they show up and make themselves vulnerable to God. And then they go out and practice their faith with the empowerment that this act of showing up has given them.

This new adventure is teaching me so many lessons and I'm so glad I chose to do this. Who knows what direction the wind will blow in next, but I know one thing - as long as I can show up and dare greatly, there will be no regrets.

A Lesson in Dialect

I can’t speak Italian. Neither could most of my ACLE colleagues. And that’s why my first camp director and her friend liked to get us to repeat various phrases we didn’t understand, falling about laughing when they heard them. One evening, they started teaching us dialect. And so, in the first week of my travels, a mission was born. I was going to learn the same phrase in the dialect of every region I visited.

Speaking of the country as a unified whole, Italy is very young. Its history is complex and confusing and I cannot make any claims to expertise here, but scholars generally agree that the Risorgimento that led to Italian unification began around 1815 with the Congress of Vienna and the end of Napoleonic rule, and ended around 1871, when Rome officially became the capital of what was known as the ‘Kingdom of Italy.’ Before this time, ‘Italy’ was separated into many different ‘city-states’, each with its own ruling family trying to extend their territory and influence, as well as overseas monarchs (such as the Holy Roman Emperor and the King of France) fighting over what part was ‘theirs’.

What does this all mean for Italian as a language? Florentines claim ownership of ‘true Italian’ as we know it; largely because the Tuscan dialect is the closest to classical Latin, because of how large and central Tuscany is, and because of what has been described as the ‘aggressive commerce of its most influential city, Florence.’ Florence also produced Dante, Petrarca and Bocaccio, who arguably did for Italian what Shakespeare, Milton and Tyndale did for English. However, across the rest of Italy, regions had developed their own languages that didn’t just differ from region to region, but from city to city and even town to town. Much like the similarities in the development of Cornish and Breton through their closeness in trade and commerce, you find surprising links and similarities in the dialects of various parts of Italy and its neighbouring countries. The further into the Dolomites you go, the more Germanic the dialect sounds. Likewise, visit Savona or Genoa, and their dialects are very similar to those spoken in the northern coastal regions of Sardinia – largely due to trade and migration. In fact, I remember my Savonese host mother telling me that when her mother, who was from a town just outside of Savona, Liguria, met her future husband (from Sardinia) – she felt she was only able to fully trust him and therefore marry him because they spoke such a similar dialect. Even across many parts of Italy today, dialect is what children grow up speaking at home and ‘true Italian’ is what they speak at school. So, when Italy became unified, there wasn’t necessarily one common language. My Savonese host father told me of accounts of utter chaos in the First World War, because young recruits from all corners of the country would assemble for training miles from home with little or no knowledge of any language apart from their local dialect, and be almost completely unable to understand the commands issued to them by leaders from other regions.

Therefore, dialect is still a stronghold across huge parts of Italy. Along with the Italian reverence for family, this is probably one of the many contributing factors as to why Italians have historically remained within the area in which they grew up. Their cultural identity isn’t just a national one but a regional one. Many of the Italians that I met are immensely proud of their dialect.

Here are the phrases I collected throughout my time:

Notes:

·         In the interests of pronunciation, I have followed each one with a version using British English phonemes where necessary.

·         I have grouped them according to location, with those areas close to each other listed together, so you can see the similarities and differences more easily

·         For any Italian readers, apologies for the expletive in the Sicilian phrase. It couldn’t really be helped!

·         Also for any Italian readers, please correct my spelling where necessary!

 ‘What are you doing?!?!?!’ (In sixteen different dialects, spoken with the necessary angry/confused hand shaking and in an aggressive tone)

Italiano (true Italian): Cosa stai facendo?! (Cozza sty fachendo?!)

***

Padovan: Coxa sito drio fare?! (Coxa seato dreeo fah-reh?)

Cavallino: Cossa sisto drio far?! (Cossa sisto dreeoh far?)

Venetian: Cossa ti si drio far?! (Cossa tee see dreeoh far?)

Vicentino: Cosa fetto?! (Cozza fetto?)

Mantovan: Cosa set dre far?! (Cozza set dreh far?)

Bergamo: Set dre a far?! (Set dreh a far?)

Castel Goffredo: Cosa se de a far?! (Cozza say say a far?)

Gorla Minore: Cousa te set dre fa?! (Coosa ti set dreh fa?)

Milanese: Sa te dre fa cousé?! (Sa teh dreh fa coosé.)

Savonese: Cose ti feh?! (Cousseh ti fé?)

South Piemontese: So cet foi?! (So chet foy?)

Roman: Che stai a fa?! (Keh sty a fa?)

Neapolitan: Ma che stai faschen?! (Ma keh sty faschen? I know there’s a problem with the way I’ve spelled ‘faschen’ in the Italian version – in the absence of knowledge I used the British phoneme to denote a ‘sh’ sound, but included the ‘c’ for stress and emphasis – it’s not an entirely soft sound.)

Pugliese: Ma cesta fa?! (Ma chesta fa?)

 Sicilian: Ma che minchia fa!!? (Ma keh minkia fa?!!!)

You can see from this how similar those ranging from the northern regions of Venice across to Milan are. Many people from these areas can understand one another quite easily when they’re speaking in dialect. However, when you consider how close places like Milan, Gorla, Bergamo, Vicenza, Mantua and Castel Goffredo are (they’re all situated within a roughly 50 kilometre radius), you realise that their dialects are really quite different. Move down south and the snappy shouts of the Romans, the Sicilians and the Pugliese are almost unrecognisable from the rolling syllables of the north. In fact, you would be forgiven for thinking that ‘Che stai a fa?’ and ‘Cosa sito drio fare?’ were completely different questions! Now, put a Roman army captain in charge of a contingent of Venetian soldiers speaking only dialect and you’re asking for trouble!

I love studying words and etymology, particularly with regard to how social and political conditions have affected language, and this task of learning a little about Italian dialect was absolutely fascinating. It has provided me with a bit more of an understanding of Italians and their national identity, what has made them who they are, how they think, their history as a nation and how all of this is reflected in the Italy I experienced when I visited this summer just passed. What started by accident as a laugh with a camp director and my friends, has turned into a fascinating exploration of language, lifestyle and history, and I am by no means finished with it yet. 

'My Trip to London'

Looking back across my childhood, it’s really no surprise that I caught the travel bug. Although there were no sun-soaked holidays in the Med, no middle-class skiing trip in the February half-term, no money for much more than a leaky tent pitched in a half-empty field on the south coast of Cornwall (and what more, frankly, does a child need for a fantastic holiday?), I was always encouraged to be curious, to explore, to interrogate, to discover things for myself and to be open-minded.

I recently started to scrapbook my travels, and I’ve made some amazing finds along the way. I thought my scrapbook material only went back as far as my trip to Cambodia four years ago, but in fact, recent sorting-out of all the paraphernalia in my parents’ garage has unearthed ticket stubbs, brochures and boarding passes from a trip I took to New York aged seventeen, and even thought-provoking souvenirs from a battlefields tour to Belgium I went on with school, aged fourteen. But by far the most satisfying, most nostalgic, most heart-tugging discovery, was the account I wrote of the trip to London I took with my Dad, at the tender age of seven. I remember writing it on the train home, and now I’m a ‘grown-up’, I can see in it the tell-tale little signs of the nomad I would grow up to be. And I’d like to share it with my readers, whoever and wherever you are, if anyone even reads this little offering. I’ve left the spelling mistakes in because, well, it was written by a seven year-old. (And they’re cute)

‘My Trip to London.’

On Thursday morning we had to rush because we got up late. We rushed to the train station and got there just in time. We had Kit Kat Chunkies for breakfast! We got the train at sevon-thirty and got to London at eleven-twenty. We played hangman but the journey was really boring.

We got on the tube-train to Russel Square. We got on the Northern Line and the Piccadilly Line then we found our hotel. It was called ‘The Celtic Hotel’, it was clean and simple with very friendly people.

After a short break we went for a walk around Covent Garden. Dad was disappointed that there were no street entertainers. Then we walked on to Leicester Square where we went to the ticket stall and got three tickets to see Cats. I jumped up and down and was really exited. The girl in the ticket stall wanted to come with us.

Then we walked around London a bit more then maid our way back to the hotel where we waited for our friend Lisa to goin us. She arrived at six-thirty and we went for an indian curry. THEN WE WATCHED THE FONOMINAL FANTASTIC CATS! I got a program witch Old Deuteronomy signed for me. I didn’t want it to finish at all because it was so fabulous.

We walked back to the hotel very happy very exited and very tird after our first day in London, we collapsed down on our beds and fell asleep.

Friday

We got up at sevon thirty and had a bath and went down to breakfast. I had shreddies first with orange juice. Next I had bacon, eggs and beans with hot chocolate. My Dad had suger puffs and an English breakfast. Then we caut the underground to the Millenam Dome. We had to go on the Piccadilly Line then the Northern line then the Jubilee line. We got to the Dome at ten o’clok.

DOME

1. At the senter of the Dome we watched the millenam show with lots of people in the air. It had three acts
2. Sky scape. We didn’t get to do it.
3. Body. I didn’t like it very much the heart was horrid.
4. Play. I really enjoyed playing on a piano where you press a button and roll a ball.

I went on a maze I almost won. On my second go the boy said that I was eavern better than him. It was an interactive computer maze that I had to stand on.

1. Shared ground. We tell the time capsule about our naiborhod and our life.
2. Jorney. Jorney was about how we do and how we might travel in the futer.
3. Living island. Living island is about how we waist water in this contry.
4. Home planet. We travelled through space back to Earth again.
5. Talk. It is important to talk. I found it a little bit boring. Having my photo with E.T was great.
6. Work. We played computer games and answered questions on tel.no’s.
7. Mony. We didn’t get to do it.
8. Lernig. Lernig was a big school corridor with a horrid headmaster.
9. Millenam Jewles. Millenam Jewles was boring but pretty.
10. Our town stage. It was ok but it was in Welsh so I didn’t understand it.
11. Rest. We lied down on a hard stone floor and watched the lights change. I kept sliding down the wavy bits and Dad told me off.
12. Faith. We didn’t get to do it.

When we got back to the hotel we asked if there was anywhere for us to have an indian curry. Then we went back to the hotel and went to bed.

Saturday

We got up at sevon o’clok. We had breakfast then left for the train. ‘I don’t want to go home’ I told my Dad, just as we were about to leev.

The End.

By Charlie Jessica Murrell – Edwards.

I hope you enjoyed it.

Moving On

This wasn't going to be my next entry, but life cropped up and fed me some material so there you go.

A chance remark made by my Dad when we were Skyping one evening while I was in Italy inspired the title of this blog, so it's about time I made reference to it again, and this is something pretty much everyone can relate to:

I'm leaving home. (Actually, at the time of publishing, I have left home)

We all leave home at some point (or at least we're supposed to). I've left home several times already. When I was eighteen I left home to go travelling. When I was nineteen I left home to go to university. When I was twenty-two I left home to go travelling. But this is a different kind of 'leaving home'. This is kind of...it.

Vamoose.

See, the house I grew up in is very little. And my family are very...big. And there are no opportunities in Devon, and it's logical, and, quite simply, I love my boyfriend and I like the thought of living with him. (Again, time-of-publishing update - what is this thing called 'compromise'? And why must I apply it to the piles of his clothes on the bedroom floor? Watch out darling, 'Boots' is about to happen to the shower room). But sitting in my childhood bedroom, sorting my things out and realising that this room will soon belong to my youngest brother, shook me a bit.

I found us the place and Ewan moved in a month ago while I was still in Torbay studying for a CELTA. Both our names are on the contract but I'm so used to being his visitor that I'm still having to make a conscious effort to refer to it as 'our' place. But that'll change as I adjust.

It wasn't the knowledge that I'd be moving my life and my base to a new, comparatively unknown location that gave me the jolt. Not even the suggestion that I could be getting cold feet over the next stage of our relationship or, I'm a little ashamed to say, seeing the realisation dawn on my lovely Mum's face as she stood in the kitchen doorway - 'I just realised... This is kind of it, isn't it Charlie?' No, it was when I remembered that my childhood bedroom is going to be taken over by my youngest brother. The little bit of space I've called my own since the bundle of joy arrived thirteen years ago - yes, changes were made when I left for university and my relationship to it has changed several times over the years but it was still, essentially...mine.

That room saw me through my Busted phase, with posters on the wall and 'surf hair' wax (how??) on my shelf. Then my McFly phase (similar), followed by the Emo phase (Busted posters replaced by Panic! At the Disco and Fall Out Boy ones, hair products replaced by kohl and ALL THINGS BLACK WITH PINK STRIPES, and Green Day lyrics scratched into the desk). Then my Christian phase (let's please not go there), my psycho-bitch A Level revision phase, my 'where is home - London or Devon oh God what IS my identity' phase, my 'well I've finished uni and NOW FREAKING WHAT' phase, and finally, my 'return home temporarily to gain another qualification and then bugger off for good' phase.*

Magnolia walls, floral bedcovers and Penguin Recycled Classics are to be overtaken by...a superheroes theme.

Transience is healthy. Too much permanence leads to rot and stagnation. As ever, it's about balance. 

It's time for me to move on. I made the choice and I'm happy that doing so means that my little brother will have the opportunity to experience having a space to call his own. I'm happy that this little room will be able to do the same for him as it did for me. But the fact that this little sanctuary won't be mine any more is a bit of a tug. Until the new place with Ewan starts to feel more 'mine' than the room that was 'mine' for so long, I suspect I'll probably feel a bit placeless again.** And that's fine.

One door closes, another opens. Transience is always a given. It's time for one chapter to end, and another to begin.

*Because you see, even though I'm 'moving in' with Ewan, my career choice is kind of...roaming 

** What is it with this notion of property anyway? I sense a black hole opening...

Pizzeria 'Formula Uno'

Located a mere 10 minute walk from Termini station and advertised as ‘The Best Pizza in Rome’, this pizzeria comes highly recommended for when you want good grub on the cheap, away from the tourist crowds. Just seconds away from my doorstep and recommended by my Air BnB host Enea, I thought I’d try this place out to see if it really was as good as he said.

Situated just off the Via Tiburtina, (via Degli Equi 13), this unassuming little place serves up an array of pizzas from 7.30pm-midnight, six days a week. This pizzeria is a stronghold of the locals, and you can expect to be the only tourist in sight. You’ll also find yourself practicing your restaurant Italian but don’t let these things put you off; wherever the locals go you can guarantee good quality, and this pizzeria really is worth a visit!

What you see is what you get with Formula Uno. White-washed walls sporting pictures of Formula One cars and racing legends, simple unadorned wooden tables and service that meets the bare minimum to avoid anyone making a complaint; but the pizza comes out fast, hot and REALLY tasty! In my three days I tried Margherita (of course), Melanzane (aubergine) and Peperoni (peppers- not salami!). They were simple, fresh, filling and satisfying. One of these followed by a gelato from any of the several gelaterias on the Via Tiburtina was more than enough to keep me going until breakfast.

The pizza toppings are all described in English (which I found surprising given that I was the only tourist around). With pizzas ranging from €5-8, you can get a decent sized pizza and a drink for under €10, and ¼ litre of house wine costs the same as a small bottle of mineral water, €1.50!  It’s worth noting that Italians generally drink water alongside their alcohol, so if you want to blend in a bit more in this almost entirely local pizzeria then I would recommend doing that; it also doesn’t hurt to make sure you’re fully rehydrated after a day sweating your way around the streets of the Centro Storico!  There is no cover charge, so you don’t have to worry about being shafted for an extra €3-6 when the bill comes out (il conto, per favore). Tips are not included in the bill, but tipping is down to your discretion  - tipping in Italy is generally neither required nor expected.

I really enjoyed my meals at Formula Uno. As I was alone in Rome for the first time and still adjusting to being back in a country I hadn’t visited for over a year, to be able to eat so well and so cheaply was a real comfort, and started what would become a four-month long taste odyssey.

So much Yum in your Tum that you'll get a Big Bum: A Few Simple Italian Recipes

Seasoning for Just About Anything

When I was working in Bergamo, my half Italian half German host mother who grew up in Brazil (she spoke three languages, not one of them English, and I didn’t speak any of hers) made me the most mouth-watering roasted vegetables I’ve ever eaten, and it was all down to the seasoning.

Place rosemary, sage (dried or fresh), garlic and salt (heavy on the salt light on the garlic) into a pestle and mortar and crush into a paste with olive oil. Add to meat, fish or vegetables and roast/fry/grill/barbecue. Quantities depend on the amount of food you wish to season, so it’s largely guesswork I’m afraid. Happy concocting!

Spaghetti agli Olio ‘a la Barbara’.

This is a meal that was cooked for me by my lovely Sicilian host mother, Barbara. It is yet another celebration of the simplicity of Italian cooking and is well worth a try at home.

Serves 2

Ingredients:

150g spaghetti

Olive oil

1 fat clove of garlic

½ red chilli, finely chopped (it depends how much tingle you like, add more if you want more kick)

Handful of fresh parsley, coarsely chopped.

Parmesan to serve

1.    .Place a saucepan of cold water on to boil and add salt.
2.        Cover the bottom of a frying pan with a generous amount of olive oil. Finely chop the garlic and    add to the oil to heat gently. Don’t let it burn!
3.       When the water has reached a rolling boil, add the spaghetti. Don’t snap it in order to get it in, that’s really not the point of spaghetti! Use a bigger pan, or push it gently. The packet will usually give you an indication of how long to cook it for in order for it to be properly al dente.
4.      .As the pasta cooks, add the chopped chilli to the oil and garlic.
5.       Once the spaghetti is cooked, drain and add it to the oil, garlic and chilli, along with the parsley. Toss to combine.
6.       Serve with grated parmesan.

Salmarillio ‘a la Barbara’

Another recipe given to me by the lovely Barbara, this dressing for fish followed the spaghetti agli olio. We had it on swordfish, but it would work very well with any sea food.

Tip: prepare this before you start cooking the rest of the meal, as it will give the flavours the maximum amount of time to infuse.

Again quantities depend on how many you’re cooking for, but allow for a good generous ‘slosh’ per person, plus a bit extra in case anyone goes for seconds. The amount we made served four.

In a small bowl, combine a generous amount of good olive oil (not quite enough to make the garlic float) with chunky chopped garlic (about two or three cloves), a small handful of parsley and the juice of half a Sicilian lemon. Leave to infuse and spoon over fish when eating.

Pasta a la Pomodoro

I know I know, everyone knows how to cook pasta a la pomodoro. But this recipe is, for me, as much a recipe for a good meal as it is an exercise in nostalgia. I was keen to learn more about Italian cooking and my lovely host father Stefano couldn’t be more willing to oblige. Immensely proud of his country’s food heritage, Stefano first pointed out to me that the key to brilliant cooking is simplicity. Pull together three or four perfectly matched ingredients and you’re away, and this is the baseline of all Italian food. He then ploughed through this recipe with me late one evening after work while I struggled to simultaneously follow his instructions and write them down, which resulted in a messy kitchen, a messy Charlie, a messy notebook and a truly gorgeous dinner. Writer’s paradise.

Serves Three.

Ingredients:

200g pasta (any will do, although penne, fusilli or spaghetti are usually used)

Olive Oil

3 cloves of garlic (1 per person)

Fresh tomatoes. Typically they use the ‘dotterino’ variety, but we used three large beef tomatoes. One per person if you’re using large ones. If you’re using Dotterino you’ll have to use a bit of guesswork, but any leftover sauce can always go in the fridge for later!

Chunk of pecorino cheese OR parmigiano reggiano/grana (parmesan)

Note about the cheese: ‘Grana’ is what we know as Parmesan. Stefano was very particular about highlighting the difference between grana and parmigiano reggiano. I understood that they were two names for the same thing – parmesan - but apparently they’re not. I think what he was trying to tell me was that parmigiano reggiano is produced in the area between Modena and Reggio Emilia, and that grana is produced around Bologna, Farrara, Mantova and Rovigo, and that therefore they are different cheeses and must not be confused. He also implied that grana is a lower class of cheese than parmigiano. So for the rest of the trip I had no idea if I was eating grana or parmigiano but surprise surprise, they tasted pretty darn similar to my foreign, amateur tastebuds!

Finally a handful of fresh basil

1.      Add enough oil to cover the bottom of a medium sized pan. Add the garlic cloves whole and unpeeled. Cook over a low heat until they start to go brown.
2.       Meanwhile, boil water in a separate pan for the pasta. (See steps 1 and 3 of the Spaghetti agli olio recipe for the proper Italian way to cook pasta.)
3.       Chop the tomatoes and place in a colander over the sink, to drain the juice. Add the tomatoes to the garlic and oil and add a little salt.
4.       While everything is cooking away nicely, grate your cheese.
5.       When the pasta is cooked, remove the garlic from the tomato sauce, drain the pasta and add it to your sauce, mixing thoroughly.
6.       Roughly chop the basil and scatter it on top of the pasta.
7.      Serve with a generous handful of cheese!

     
Of course I gorged myself on loads of different meals over the course of the four months I was in Italy, but these are four of my top dishes from the summer. They all have different flavours and elements, but there are two things they all share in common, and those are: simplicity and joy. Each recipe is so straightforward but so lovely, and each one is made with the same aim in mind – to provide sustenance and pleasure to loved ones and friends. Watching Stefano explain how to make the perfect tomato sauce, Barbara lovingly prepare her family’s favourite meal and Susie glow with pleasure as I exclaimed over her roasted vegetables, the knowledge that – for Italians – food is about so much more than just eating was reinforced for me again and again, and is something that I have carried into my own cooking since returning home.

Running With Water

I’m sitting on a stone outside the B’n’B’ near one of Mantua’s outlying villages at 7am on a Monday morning, waiting for my camp director to pick me up so I can begin my ninth consecutive week at camp. There is no one else around. Just me, sat on a stone, with an empty b’n’b at my back and a maize field stretching out in front of me.

I’m preparing to move on once again, with the paraphernalia of my identity as an ACLE Tutor scattered around me and my rucksack at my feet. Not just through my time working for ACLE, but throughout my life, I have become comfortable with my identity as something of a nomad. I spent years fighting it but I finally surrendered – catchword of the summer – and the liberation and growth that has happened since then has been immense. Perhaps that’s why I travel.

‘What was it my dad called me the other day? Ah... Transient One.’

We are all transient. Coming to terms with our transience is one of the most difficult life lessons we all have to learn I suppose. And so, sitting on that stone outside that nameless B’n’B’ in rural Lombardy, feeling very smug about having just applied a Very Big Life Concept to a Comparatively Small Occasion, the name of this blog was born.

This entry is dedicated to documenting those glorious, transient memories I made over the summer, because despite thinking we’ve come to terms with the transient nature of everything, we will still try to contain, to quantify and keep hold. This is a re-living, a re-telling, and a re-sharing of moments with those I made these memories with, as well as evidence of the fact that you can never predict what is going to happen when you travel.

#1

Looking out of the coach window on my way from Ciampino airport into the city centre upon my arrival in Rome, I spot a man headering a football right in the middle of two rows of stock-still traffic.

#2

The scent of honeysuckle that coats the walls surrounding the garden at the back of the Vatican Museums.

#3

Selfie sticks are possibly the most irritating things ever invented.

#4

When your amazing Sicilian host family take you to the opening night of a beautiful club on the beach and you dance until 3am and they arrange for the DJ to give you and the friends you’re travelling with a shout-out on your last night in Sicily,and Jellyfish happens on the dancefloor, and lemon vodka is literally a cup of vodka with a slice of lemon in it (well, not literally...), and Giovanni ‘Travolta’ Cilia OWNS the dancefloor with his moves and then you go to bed with your head ringing and knowing you have a six-hour coach journey the next morning but sod it that was amazing and you LOVE ITALY!

#5

Eating pecococca per vino for desert; a variety of peach that is ONLY eaten after being steeped in red wine. My host father said he’d let me know when it was ready to eat, so there I am, patiently contemplating my wine-soaked fruit, when my eight-year-old host sister appears and swipes my host father’s cup from under his nose, scoffs the fruit, drains the glass and smacks her lips in satisfaction.

#6

Singing along to ‘See You Again’ in the car on the way from Rodia to Messina Coach Station, where we took the coach to Puglia, and struggling not to cry.

#7

Flashmobbing Alberobello the night we visited the trulli.

#8

Steaming along the autostrada from Rodia to Messina on the back of Giovanni’s motorbike.

#9

Watching the energy in my class turn from borderline chaotic to totally Zen in the space of one David Gray song.

#10

Host father: Don’t worry Charlie, tomorrow we will stay at home and eat soap.

#11

When your incredibly sweet host mother turns to you and announces, ‘But Charlie, it’s SO DIFFICULT to cook for you because you’ve been all over Italy and tasted so much already!’

#12

Sitting at the table with my host family in Savona while my sweet little host brother recites a poem he wrote in Savonese dialect for me, which his father translates into Italian and then his mother in turn translates it into English.

#13

When your nine Level Threes burst into song in the middle of your lesson, and you realise they’re singing ‘Glad You Came’ just for you.

#14

Falling asleep next to Ewan on a mountain-side, surrounded by surely the most beautiful panorama the Little Dolomites have to offer.

#15

Sitting outside ristorante ‘Algiubagio’ in Venice, twizzling our Spaghetti Primavera, watching the boats going to and from the Fondamente Nove. Ewan chuckles and observes that we’re seated in the romantically lit outdoor area of a posh restaurant overlooking the lagoon...right next to a bus stop.

#16

Sitting in the kitchen with Susie one day after camp, scoffing Sicilian biscuits and discussing the beauty of travelling. I speak no Italian, German or Portuguese. She speaks no English. It doesn’t matter.

#17

Wednesday of my final camp. Our most adorable camper can only come in for the afternoons because his school has started already, and as he enters the canteen at lunchtime, the whole camp erupts into a huge round of applause and cheering.

#18

Lexi commenting on the pizza in da Michele, Naples:

‘I feel more strongly about this pizza than I do about some men that I’ve dated.’

#19

Every time Brigitte tried to speak Italian

#20

Giovanni on the dancefloor in M’ama Club, going crazy for the Black Eyed Peas.

#21

Giovanni modelling his new beach shorts and shuffling around the garden in his six year-old daughter’s shoes, singing his shoe size, because the flip-flops his family got him to match are too small.

#22

The Thursday of our last camp together, Josué and I are ‘hiding’ from the children during a scavenger hunt. He is balancing and bouncing on a row of low bike railings and I’m sat with my back to the school wall. We’re chatting about life, about knowledge, about work. He starts to bounce with a look of intense concentration and then announces, whilst bouncing and frowning at his feet, arms out for balance and lips slightly puckered, ‘Yeah... I really want a proper job. I think. I mean, I like wearing a tie, you know?’

#23

Host brother: What is the name of the wife of the chicken?

Me: Dorothy.

Host brother: ...

#24

Being thrown around in the waves the day we went to the beach at Tono, Viola shrieking with euphoria and somehow managing to jump on top of me every time I succeed in regaining my balance. Something is hilariously funny and for some reason I just can’t stop laughing, which doesn’t help the falling-over situation. Water in my mouth, nose, eyes and ears, sun on my head, the sound of five people screaming with laughter and, through the spray, Viola, Morgana, Brigitte and Josué’s faces mirroring my own, Carlotta sat on the water’s edge and Mia barking at us protectively.

#25

On Bergiggi beach with Becci, the waves are too rough to swim so we’re concentrating on just staying upright. A particularly strong wave sends me crashing into Becci, who has her back to me. She whoops in surprise and flings her arms out in a fruitless attempt to break her fall. Snorting with laughter and spitting out sea water, we struggle back to standing and brace ourselves for another wave.

#26

Becci coming out of the toilet at the Centro Nautico Vadese and announcing, ‘It’s a squattie. I just pissed all over my shoes.’

#27

Just had the strangest encounter in the McDonalds at Verona Porta Nuova station. A lady (she was a bit rough-looking but she didn’t look totally destitute) came and asked for my fries. Now, I’m really not averse to sharing my fries with a roughish-looking lady who is polishing off a burger I guess another generous-looking traveller donated, so I told her very clearly (in my baby Italian) that yes, she could take one or two. But when she went to take the lot, I became a bit confused. I removed her hand from my lunch and repeated my offer of a few, not the lot. But I guess that’s an all-or-nothing situation, and she obviously felt I should check my privilege, because she told me to go fuck myself. Now why did I come out of that feeling like a bad person? And why, if she was so hungry and I so stingy, didn’t she just grab the 5 euro note and my purse, which were sitting right next to the tension-inducing fries the whole time? 

#28

Asking the bus driver for my ticket to the airport in Italian, and HE RESPONDS IN ITALIAN! Well it only took until my very last morning...

This is just a handful of the most precious moments I shared with just a few of the people I had the pleasure of meeting over the course of the summer: mostly fellow tutors, travel companions and, largely, the wonderful host families I had the luck to live with. Once again, thank you.