Market value

I’m starting to think I should change the name of this blog to Household Words. All those months ago when I started out, it was with the intention of logging the various musings of an ex-pat becoming acclimatised to life in a different country. Now, however, due to the still on-going saga of our broken telephone line, it seems to have turned into a weekly serialisation of which Dickens could have been proud: not so much Jarndyce and Jarndyce as Webster and Tim.

If you recall, we left the story last week having been promised that someone would definitely be out to see to the problem on Monday. Well, the operator may have assured Maddalena of this, who was acting on our behalf, but for a telecom company their internal communications obviously need improvement as no one else in the organisation seemed to be aware of this promise. When late afternoon rolled around and we were engineerless yet again, Maddalena called them up for her now daily chat and was told by a member of the front line staff that the issue would be resolved without fail by 8pm on Wednesday. And, you know what, to our surprise, delight and relief, it was.

Two fine gentlemen appeared shortly after 10.30 on Wednesday morning and set about the business of replacing the broken line and re-establishing our connection with the World Wide Web. The main man briefly considered shimmying up the pole in his crampon boots but, on closer examination, soon thought better of it and opted for a ladder instead. Up he went and an hour later all was done and dusted, and I was able to finish off the FaceTime conversation with my mother that had been so rudely interrupted 17 days previously. Not that we are taking anything for granted, mind you, but, as the engineer said as he bid us farewell, it should all be all right until it snows.

As you will appreciate, for us getting back online was more than enough excitement for one week, so the rest of the time has been filled with pretty humdrum bits and pieces. Stephen bought some more vegetables for the lotto from his friend the plant man at the Monday market, including some field fennel. What the exact difference is between this and common or garden fennel is anybody’s guess, as the plant man didn’t share this information with Stephen.

What he was unable to source, however, was a carton of fresh milk as there was none to be had at the supermarket, even for ready money. Whilst this would be seen as a major catastrophe on a shopping expedition back in the UK, it is really no great shakes here in Italy, being somewhat less lactose dependent. Whereas in Britain no self-respecting supermarket would be without chiller shelves full of milk in a range of different sizes and types with a whole raft of provenances, at the local store here in MSP if there are four cartons of semi-skilled then it’s well stocked. Not that they are without their calcium fix, it’s just that they prefer to get it from their cheeses or frothed up in a cappuccino (only in the morning, of course).

We had no problem, however, in getting milk when, on Friday, we did a major shop at the large Iper supermarket in Civitanova (where we can buy 200g jars of Nescafé Gold Blend - just don’t tell the neighbours) as they had at least six cartons on offer. What we did have, though, was a bit of a shock when we came to pay for our groceries. I thought the total was a bit steep, but then again it would be when they charged us €59 for a pack of salami labelled €2.39. No big deal, we’ll just explain the hiccup at Customer Services, get a refund of the difference and be on our way quickly…

…or so we thought. This being Italy, though, it wasn’t that simple. We told the nice lady behind the counter what had happened and she commiserated appropriately. She examined the packet, compared it with the receipt, and then examined the whole of it forensically before investigating the item on her computer. Next she consulted with a colleague, who seemed to have nothing to contribute to the discussion and disappeared to do something else. Fortunately, another colleague appeared who took a bit more interest and went off somewhere with the packet, we think to get an opinion from a higher authority. She didn’t, however, come back with a definitive solution, though one suggestion seemed to be to scan the whole of our shopping through the checkout again to see where the problem was. Well, surely the problem was charging €56.61 too much for a packet of salami. However, after another consultation, and a brief pause while our lady had a bit of a chat on the phone, it was eventually decided that we didn’t need to unpack everything and we’d be reimbursed the difference. All that remained was to take another five minutes for our assistant to print off a few sheets (for which she needed my name, address and codice fiscale) for me sign and the money was ours. Simple.

It is just as well then, that if our weekly food bill is about to skyrocket, that my teaching load has increased. My student, Irene, started again on Thursday after the summer break, and on Friday morning I began a weekly lesson with the two sisters, Erica and Mara, who I saw last week. As is the usual case, they have recently graduated and are looking to improve their English. Then, in the evening while I was out getting our Friday night pizze, Stephen took a telephone call from someone interested in starting lessons. Apparently, the poor man had been trying for a couple of weeks to get in touch with me but no one had answered the phone - well, we know the reason for that, don’t we TIM? Still, one has to admire his perseverance – and indeed his keenness – for when he came yesterday morning to discuss the lessons it was agreed that he would have an hour a day, Monday to Friday. Presumably, this is to make up for all the time lost while we were waiting for the line to be fixed.

Also yesterday, in another concession to the changing seasons, we took some time in the afternoon to store our outside furniture in the garage for the winter, leaving just a lone bench sheltering by the downstairs front door and an abandoned looking terrazzo. Then, in the evening, we were invited for dinner to Marco and Maddalena’s, who, with another nod to the drop in temperatures, garnished our plates of antipasti with an edible penguin made from black olives. I just hope, though, that it wasn’t some sort of presentiment for the months ahead and that however hard the winter may be, it won’t be quite that hard.