Bologna (23 September -- 24 September)

Day 1
Porticos and kilometers of terrazo; two towers at odd angles; Hotel Panorama with high ceilings and huge rooms.  We got to Bologna at midday and walked the city.  We ate lunch at AF Tamburini, a crazy cafeteria made from the same mold as Ratto's in Oakland.  The city feels insular with narrow roads and no idea of right angles all contained within the city walls (which now are ruins, but the boundary of the old city still exists, it has just become a four-lane road, the other side of which presents a time conumdrum [with minimarts and buildings approximating strip malls populating the other side]).

For dinner we had reservations at Drogheria Della Rossa (previously a pharmacy).  We  arrived at 9pm and closed the joint down with the owner, Emanuele Addone, an odd mix of Yves Saint Laurent and the reverberating voice of Louis Prima.  Emanuele made everyone feel like we were eating in his home (and he made every woman feel surprised when he rubbed up against her) .  We were greeted with a glass of prosecco (which was refilled as much as needed) and he gave the menu verbally (nothing was printed, including the wine list), stating the three or so primi and three secondi.  A salumi plate was provided to every table and it was either vino bianco or vino rosso (Emanuele had some algorithm only known to him where he determined what type of vino bianco or vino rosso you got [i.e., they were bringing bottles to the tables, not carafes]). Amy got the tagliatelle bolognese and I got the cheese tortellini for the pasta course (amazing), and we both got the filet with a balsamic sauce (again, amazing). After the wine bottle was empty, unpromted, one of the severs brought a half a bottle of dessert wine and left it with us. Not soon after, Emanuele sat down next to us and brought a bottle of grappa with him, which he also poured for us and we went on about the differences between people from Bologna and people from San Francisco. At one point, Amy mentioned I was going to be taking a cooking class, and suddenly the chef Francesco was saying hello and he and Emmanuel were telling me to come in to make pasta the next morning at 11:30.

Day 2
11:30 and I swallowed my nerves and walked into the kitchen at the Drogheria and was greeted by Francesco and his two chefs (well the two chefs didn't quite greet me.... they proceeded to crack jokes in Italian about the American who didn't speak Italian, but I  expected something like that). They were in the middle of making pasta for the day, and, Francesco, who doesn't speak a lick of English (or didn't to me), proceeded to teach me how to make their fresh pasta (both tortellini and taglitelle; I will share the recipe in my kitchen...). I ate the pasta we made at a table out front with a glass of prosecco.  A good day.

That night I ran a bottle of Ron Anniversario Pompero over to Francesco and gave him two bags of his tobacco.  He was surprised, we had an odd moment of not speaking the other's language, and I then I got the hell out of there.  We ate dinner at a place around the corner from the Drogheria called Bistrot Marco Fadiga.  We took the long way around so we wouldn't run into the Francesco and Emanuele after considering going over for dessert but then deciding there was no way we could repeat the previous evening's closing out the Drogheria.  Dinner was nice, but they were trying, somehow, not to be Italian (reminded me of some combination of Blue Plate, Range, and insert obligatory San Francisco restaurant here that serves sea bass sauteed on a bed of wilted greens [I know, poor us... but still]).

We left for Parma the next morning (will catch up on Parma and Tuscany, but about to head to a Farm that doesn't have hot water and may not have electricity... so may be a while... 


And this picture is for Jane:

Trieste (20 September - 23 September)

Day 1
On our first day in Trieste, we struck out for a lavanderia across town (it turned out there was one a block from where we were staying [James Joyce Hotel. Never stay here... I was a sucker for the name; the hotel staff were less than helpful, especially when providing locations of various services such as lavaderias and internet cafes. The staff also believed their broken internet was Christ-like (they kept claiming it worked, and every time Amy went over to the computer and proved it didn't. Doubting Thomas?)]) with two plastic bags filled with wash (pretty romantic, eh?) to the neighborhood with the self-service lavanderia. After throwing the wash in, we went to the trattoria next door to have a beer. There was a loud gesticulating man hunched over a large plate of boiled shrimp voraciously consuming them and sending shells everywhere (we were the only people in the place; although it was Italian, the most immediate translation was: Vietnamese-place-in-the-Tenderloin-with-plastic-tablecloths-where-you-know-it-is-a-bad-idea-to-order-the-seven-course-beef). After a while, he called us over, introduced himself as Marino, owner and chef, and had the bartender pour us more beer. He went on to tell us about a book he was writing about exercise, that we could have stayed at his friend's house for less than what we were paying at the hotel, that we could visit his house in Croatia, and that it was a Miracle that Italy worked on any and all levels (in an immediate way, we had already seen infrastructure around Trieste that showed a very patched together approach... Some of the buildings reminded me of Gieger; they had corrugated plastic tubes half embedded in their sides and somewhat covered with stucco, erupting from below the surface randomly, carrying electrical wires, water, whatever). 

Later that day, we were wandering the neighborhoods and while Amy was taking a gentleman’s photograph, we heard whistling and yelling up a street and it was Marino (we unknowingly passed his home). We met his wife and cousin, talked for a bit, and promised we would come by his restaurant the following evening for dinner.  

For dinner, we went to Il Buffet da Pepi for various parts of pig and cow (nice parts as well as blood sausage, tongue, kidney, heart).  Who needs Whole Hog, when you get this set up with kraut, mustard, and beer?

Day 2
On Day 2 we went to Carso, and after several bus trips wondering if we should have brought our passports (we were flirting with the Slovenian border in and out of several towns), we arrived in Samatorza. The town was a bend in the road, but we had heard there was an osmizza in the town (kind of an underground restaurant... .they are marked by signs with very loose wreaths and you have to be accepted in order to, well, order a meal [kind of like the Soup Nazi]). we had prosciutto crudo, fromaggio, salami, hard-boiled egg, pickles, and a mezzo liter of house made wine (come to think of it, it was all house made). 

That night we returned and had dinner in Marino's restaurant.  He sat with us and continued his monologue while we ate Scoglio (spaghetti with a shrimp saunce and seafood basically).  It was great to meet him and we hope to see him again.

20 September (Freedom)

 

Basel is behind us and to say we are pleased is a bit of an understatement.  Of course it also means my continuous work, and Amy being a sport about it, is behind us.  After emerging on the southern side of the Alps, we didn't quite contain our whooping and hollering (our mistake was thinking that we had to contain ourselves, in Italy, in order to prove we were civilized by only expressing ourselves in staid monosyllabic tangential musings on what we might want to communicate to those around us in Switzerland).

L'enfer (Wormhole to Paris, 12 September)

Catching up on a post meant for last Saturday, September 12th. We met up with a great friend in Paris, Catherine "Katy" Wallace. Katy went to graduate school with my mother and they have been close friends ever since (and I have had the luck to spend time with Katy since I was a wee lad pretending to be a student at UCR while my mother took me to classes because a babysitter couldn't be had?).

Katy grew up in Liverpool alongside John and Paul and used to head straight to "The Cave" at lunch break from her civil service job and watch the Beatles play.  

We went to a lovely restaurant, Cafe d'enfer on Rue Daguerre in the 14th, where we were quite entertained by our waittress, had a fine meal, Amy and Katy got to know each other, and Katy and I caught ourselves up on the last six years since we had dinner in San Francisco in 2003.

If I Had Only Known Fondue Would Turn it All Around

Finally found a good dinner in the city center at Walliser Kanne Tuesday night.  That seemed to turn things around immensely.  Below is a postcard that will never get to Sue because we addressed it to her old address on 14th Street.

This dinner was after a day of Amy recklessly cannonballing around Basel on my staffperson Jenny's bicycle.  Amy joined me and my crew for 7-dollar Starbucks coffee drinks (it serves us right for going to Starbucks in Europe) on Tuesday inbetween biking adventures.

Tonight (Wednesday night), after Amy spent a day with my colleague Robert's wife Renee tooling around the German countryside and the Black Forest, we went to a lovely Italian restaurant along the Rhine that I had been to with Robert and Renee previously.  Amy had a crazy ricotta-stuffed gnocchi and Robert, Renee, and I all had the wild boar (can't even start to describe how good the pig was...).  We ended up at R&R's home eating ice cream topped with hot raspberries.

Dark Days Before Freedom....

We are staying in Basel's version of the Hanoi Hilton.  It looks retro and cool, but it is a prison until Sunday.  I am working down the street (a 10-minute walk), but coming back in the evening to work in an attempt to wrap things up before we go to Italy.  I perceived subtle themes of mutiny as my colleagues smirkingly asked me whether people from Genentech earn their sabbaticals or if they just decide to take 6 weeks off whenever.  I had to remind them through gritted teeth that they take basically a month off every year, so they probably come out a bit ahead... Methaphorically and literally it is overcast with some rain; haven't had a decent meal yet and I think the Swiss tried to poison Amy our first night here.  Other than that, it's beautiful.

We all live in worlds that are much smaller than the World we live in

Our second evening in Paris, Amy and I followed some suggestions of Kate's boss, Anthony, first trying Chez Pauline (closed... note to self: call ahead next time) and then happening upon Willi's Wine Bar by total chance (I hadn't looked the address up).  We had some good wine (Côtes du Rhône and Châteauneuf-du-Pape) and a really nice dinner:

• Fricasse of artichokes, baby onions, chanterelle mushrooms
• Tatin of apples, baby onions, chanterelles, on a bed of wilted spinach
• Sea bass with a parsley pesto containing preserved lemons, julienne carrots, and a eggplant tapanade
• Beef boucheron with fingerling potatoes and some crazy devine reduction
• Chocolate tarte with an angaliase-like sauce
• Rice pudding with fig, apricot, and other fruit from trees
  

So, in the middle of dinner we started talking to the two people next to us at the bar.  They are in the Cordon Bleu sommelier program.  I mention Kermit Lynch (Kate's company), Amanda (Linn) mentions she is friends with the guy who works for Kermit Lynch in Los Angeles, we ask her if that is Anthony (Kate's boss), she says yes, and that he had dated her best friend.  Hence the title of this entry.

We walked to Montmartre after dinner, sat on the steps with a bunch of teenagers drinking Heineken, and watched the city for a spell.

Riots in Paris?

 

Who would have thought Paris would be so glamorous?  After several quick plane -change houdinis, Amy left her bag in the dust. Now it's like we are living in the Lower East Side (we are in Montparnasse... Jean-Paul Satre and Simone de Beauvoir are buried a stone's throw from here [not that they had anything to do with Amy's bag not arriving at Charles de Galle or the Lower East Side, but still...]) and Amy's got what she wore on her back and that's it.  We hope her bag shows up soon, but in the meantime it is getting pretty goddamn Parisian around here.  Nothing to report other than I spent the day in a conference room, Amy's birth from de Galle, and how nice it was to see her after 15 hours of travel on her part.

Parisian Basecamp

This one is for David Moore.  He knows why (so does Barbara).  That's citron vert in my hand, and it was the best goddamn lime glace that I have ever had and I am going back to Berthillon tomorrow, the next day, the next day, and the next.  Take that! And take this audio experience of me eating my glace on the corner:

In Paris.  The desk clerk at the hotel, Pedro, has a wooden hand.  Amy is arriving tomorrow and will actually enjoy Paris while I am in a conference (I know, poor Scott... there is a charitable organization that is supporting my pain; I will find the contact information and forward it on).

T-Minus .3 Days to Launch (for Scott); T-minus 1.3 Days for Amy

Mission Beach Cafe for a last breakfast with the tribe (dungenous crab benedict was crazy good) this morning.  It is now 11:38pm.  I leave at 8:45am tomorrow morning.  Amy's going to close up shop and hand the keys over to our friend Heather on Wednesday.  Still don't have any hotels once we enter Italy, but Amy has always enjoyed camping....

T-Minus 1 Day to Launch (for Scott); T-minus 2 Days for Amy

 

Amy and I are in crossing-things-off-the-list mode (most interesting: buying a hoodie at Ambercrombie Kids store [which has no designation as such... it would be like Gap Kids being called "Gap"] for my German colleague's son).  We have decided to go to Sicily for Week 4 and we shot across town to The Perish Trust, owned by Amy's friend Kelly (shown above).  Kelly has been to Sicily and we needed a last check-in that we weren't going down the wrong path (Nanci Clarence cemented it by telling us later in the night that Sicily was something to do now... we could do the Amalfi Coast when were 60).  Just finished the transportation puzzle today with Rail Europe and Aegean Air, but still need to reserve hotel rooms (who needs shelter?).  Back to Nanci, we visited with Nanci and Lidia this evening for a couple of fine St. Germain cocktails and a post-wedding catch up.  Fading fast; need to wake up early to get near to being ready to go Tuesday morning...

Last Home-Cooked Meal Before Departure to Europe

Friday evening dinner of barbequed rosemary, oregano, tarragon, garlic, olive oil, and salt-rubbed chicken with rice pilaf.  Also, barbequed corn was in the mix.  spending the weekend getting organized for me leaving for Paris on Tuesday and Amy leaving on Wednesday.  Will work through the weekend, only breathing for breakfast Monday with Micah, Stacey, Anika (AKA S.A.M.), Rick, Anja, Jessica, and Sarah.  We are Meeting at the Mission Beach Cafe for the last tribal get together until we meet up with Vassili on October 20th.