Siena has been very rainy all week. It's the same every day: overcast in the morning, sunny for the four hours that I'm in class, then rainy once I start walking around the city. When I got out of class yesterday at noon, Daniela and I went to a small restaurant and got sandwiches. She had to go back to the school for classes and I went exploring. One of my good friends from high school, Jackson Deere, and his parents are in Italy and they were in Siena yesterday. We had talked about meeting up and having dinner together, but I have a hard time finding internet connection and the headset I use with my computer broke, so I had no way of contacting them. I was on my way back to the school to do some work, but I decided to take a different route and explore some of the smaller streets I hadn't seen yet. I was walking up one of them when I saw Jackson and his parents! I caught up to them and we spent the rest of the day together. They had been trying to find me for quite a while. They had called Rita several times, but she doesn't speak any English and they don't know Italian so they hadn't gotten very far. Then they had gone to the school looking for me but I wasn't there. We had dinner reservations at 7:00 so we had a few hours to walk around the city. We went inside the baptistry of the Duomo and it was beautiful!
Dinner was delicious, but I don't think I have ever been so full! First they brought out bread. We were all hungry and the bread was really good so we ate a lot. After about three baskets of bread, the antipasti came out. There was some bruschetta, a salad, and a mushroom/eggplant/ham concoction that was actually really good! Then came the main courses: I had pasta with fresh tomatoe and pesto, but there were also gnocchi (potatoe dumplings) with a cheese sauce. Then I had some wild boar that Jackson's dad had ordered and some pork that had been flavored with honey. After that I didn't think that I could possibly eat anything else. I was wrong. Jackson's dad insisted on ordering desserts. We got three: a chocolate souffle, meringue with ice cream and caramlized strawberries, and a home-made cone with vanilla cream. We staggered out of the restaurant about two and a half hours later and walked to the car.
It was too late for me to take the bus home so I was supposed to direct Jackson's dad to Rita's house. That was a problem. I have only driven from the city to Rita's house twice by bus. Both times I was very tired and didn't pay very much attention to directions. We drove around in the dark for about an hour. After taking a dozen different roads and somehow ending up in front of the same soccer field, we asked for directions. I went into a McDonald's and asked a woman if she knew where my street, Strada di Pian del Lago, was. She gave me directions that led us right back to the soccer field! We went back to the McDonald's and I asked a man in the parking lot. He gave me different directions that led us right to Rita's. It was amazing. I got back pretty late and Rita was waiting up for me. I tried to do some of my homework because I had been given a lot, but I didn't do very much. After about 8:30 here I start losing cognitive power. My homework wasn't a problem, after I told my teacher about last night's adventures she understood and said that if I was Italian I wouldn't have done it at all!
Dinner was delicious, but I don't think I have ever been so full! First they brought out bread. We were all hungry and the bread was really good so we ate a lot. After about three baskets of bread, the antipasti came out. There was some bruschetta, a salad, and a mushroom/eggplant/ham concoction that was actually really good! Then came the main courses: I had pasta with fresh tomatoe and pesto, but there were also gnocchi (potatoe dumplings) with a cheese sauce. Then I had some wild boar that Jackson's dad had ordered and some pork that had been flavored with honey. After that I didn't think that I could possibly eat anything else. I was wrong. Jackson's dad insisted on ordering desserts. We got three: a chocolate souffle, meringue with ice cream and caramlized strawberries, and a home-made cone with vanilla cream. We staggered out of the restaurant about two and a half hours later and walked to the car.
It was too late for me to take the bus home so I was supposed to direct Jackson's dad to Rita's house. That was a problem. I have only driven from the city to Rita's house twice by bus. Both times I was very tired and didn't pay very much attention to directions. We drove around in the dark for about an hour. After taking a dozen different roads and somehow ending up in front of the same soccer field, we asked for directions. I went into a McDonald's and asked a woman if she knew where my street, Strada di Pian del Lago, was. She gave me directions that led us right back to the soccer field! We went back to the McDonald's and I asked a man in the parking lot. He gave me different directions that led us right to Rita's. It was amazing. I got back pretty late and Rita was waiting up for me. I tried to do some of my homework because I had been given a lot, but I didn't do very much. After about 8:30 here I start losing cognitive power. My homework wasn't a problem, after I told my teacher about last night's adventures she understood and said that if I was Italian I wouldn't have done it at all!
Great story, Hill-billy. That's so cool that you happened to bump into them. It's always so fun to see friends in a foreign country. And that meal sounded amazing!
ReplyDeleteHills! I love reading this blog it sounds like the most amazing adventure. When you meet Paolo and Isabella make sure you take a picture with them. I love you.
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