Friday night my college roommate and her husband came down from Germany to visit. Schankey is on a project in Bonn, Germany and her husband Chad was visiting her and they decided to come down for the weekend. The drive is about eight hours but of course Schankey and Chad took the scenic route (on accident) and it took them a little over ten...oh and along the way they cheated death on a one lane road through the Swiss Alps. Apparently there are also some fees for crossing the boarder (both Switzerland and Italy) and just FYI Switzerland is not on the Euro and they will accept Euros at the boarder but they will give you Swiss Francs back! I hope Schankey and Chad found some way to use them on the way home!
They met me at the office (as that is easier to get to) and it was so odd to see them standing across the street (one because they were in a Benz and two because they were in Italy)! I was very excited to have them here! After a crazy driving experience to the parking garage, I still am unclear on why cars use the same lane that the trams drive on, we settled in and got ready to go to dinner. We went out to a place on the corner by my apartment that a coworker recommended. The food was very good and of course so was the wine. We decided to walk around a bit and take in the area and the first place we stumbled upon was like the Wando's of Italy! We walked in and people were using straws to drink out of giant fishbowls! We decided not to stay too long and began walking again!
We found a cute little place and went in. Using our best Italian we asked the waiter what wine he recommended and he asked if we would like to hear the recommendations in English. Of course we said yes! He recommended a couple of locally made wines and we chose one and he offered to show us the cellar where all the wines are held. It was pretty cool to see all the wines in the cellar! As you can see from the picture dinner was not enough for Chad and he asked the waiter if they had any cheese. I am not kidding those are the actual words that he used! Of course our waiter said yes and we chose the small meat and cheese platter. All the cheeses and meats were very good (unless you are like Schankey who doesn't like any cheese that is "brie like").
The next day we walked around the city a bit. It was cold and a little rainy but I got to show them the shopping district of Via Roma (Torino's Michigan Avenue), Piazza San Carlo, and many other beautiful piazza's (there are a lot here!). We also went shopping along Via Garibaldi and sadly Schankey didn't find any Italian shoes to her liking. We went back to the apartment to regroup before dinner. Schankey and Chad wanted to try some pizza and I tried to remember where Natalia had taking me for pizza when I was here in November but I just couldn't. No one here carries a blackberry (when they leave work they leave work...although they don't leave the office until after seven!) we decided to wing it. We ended up at a very good pizza place but of course it is always a gamble when you order. We were able to make out most of the toppings on each pizza but there were always one or two things we were unsure about. Thankfully I have learned something from my Rosetta Stone and steered Schankey away from the pizza with egg...although I did want her to order the Mario Brothers pizza even though I had no idea what was on it. After dinner we stopped and got some gelato! All in all it was a great trip!
Side Note...why did Mario get the games named after him? Why is it Mario Brothers and not Mario and Luigi or the Giovanni Brothers? I mean what is their last name? Is it Mario? Is it Mario Mario and Luigi Mario? If not it doesn't make any sense as to why the game is called Mario Brothers.
1 comment:
there are so many different aspects of your last two blogs i would like to comment on that i fear i would have to create a whole new blog to comment. so i will just stick to the important topic. mario bros. apparently, mario was named after the landlord of nintendo's america office at the time, and the character was not originally given a last name as it was just him. later, when his brother was added, i think people just made the assumption that the last name was also mario.
and on another note, remember when dad got us that 110 game cartridge? that had to be illegal.
love you
ta
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