A triple first

Three firsts today: my first ‘lesson’ with an Italian student; my first time behind the wheel of a left hand drive car and my first time driving in Italy.

I’m not sure I can officially call it my first lesson, though, as it was not so much teaching as working with Elsa’s daughter, Lara, on her homework. I offered my services to do some tuition with her as I thought it would be a useful way of getting to know the standard of Italian school children’s English and Lara is a charming girl to work with. However, she turned up with her homework so we used that as the basis for the session, with me suggesting and guiding and her doing the work.

I also have the possibility of a paying student – not bad seeing as we’ve only been here three full days. As ever, it came about through the MSP grapevine when the brother of someone that Stephen knows sent him a text saying he had heard that we were here in Italy. The young man, Alessandro, is finishing his PhD at Ancona University but comes home from Thursday to Sunday and he wants to improve his English. Obviously I said would be interested so we now just need to meet up to discuss things.

As for driving, Stephen left the car this afternoon so that when my lesson with Lara finished I could go to the factory to meet him. In the event, it was not as fearsome as I had anticipated (except for pedestrians here insisting on walking in the road rather than on the pavement, which is not helpful when you hit a narrow part of the town and there is a car coming in the opposite direction) and I even managed to remember the way to the factory. We can count it a success.

I went to the factory as I’d been invited to join a meal at Pomod'oro, a local agriturismo, with one of their customer's agent and several of the men of family and Marco – no women, this is Italy remember. The food was very good: lots of antipasti then two enormous Florentine steaks that came still pulsating. Fortunately for me, I was able to sear my slices using the hot plate on which they had been served so that they were only slightly red in the centre rather than oozing blood.

The main thing to know, though, about Italians and eating is nothing to do with food. It’s to do with television. Whether at home or dining out, they love to watch TV while they masticate. Tonight we were treated to some football match, which I think was vaguely important. It went into extra time, when happily the team we wanted to win (which may have been Juventus but I’m not sure) scored the deciding goal meaning we could go home happy and without indigestion.

Question: why were half the players wearing orange boots that looked like balloons? I don’t remember seeing Wilson in ‘The Hornet’ wearing anything so ridiculous.