Friends come to visit
The day after we moved into our place we had some friends come to visit. It was good for me, it really motivated me to get things unpacked and organized. And crazy enough I was almost completely done by the time our friends arrived Thursday night. Of course my main goal was to have the guest bedroom and bathroom set up, and I definitely met that.
We met Steve and Colleen on our awesome trip to Egypt. We were the only ones in our very small English speaking group. So things could have gone really good or really bad. And luckily, for everyone involved, it went excellent. We had such a great time with our new friends and were excited to exchange information so that we could meet up in the future. Colleen and Steve are stationed in Naples until they move to Germany in a few weeks. Colleen and I had been in touch and she asked if it might be okay if they came down for the weekend. I jumped at the chance to see them again.
They got in late Thursday night after a long drive down from Naples (made longer because of construction and very slow moving traffic). And the fun began. Patrick had to work on Friday, so I decided to take them up to Taormina, a beautiful little town I think I've mentioned before. We enjoyed meandering through the streets and shops, stopping for lunch and pictures along the way. It was so great to have some time with them, I feel very blessed to have met them. Colleen and I have a great deal in common, and Steven has a wicked sense of humor. Sometimes he and Patrick can get a bit carried away, but it's all in good fun.
The next day we decided to take a trip Southwest from here to Agrigento. It was a Greek settlement established in 582-580 BC. It's now a park that you can walk through with some pretty impressive ancient temples. The most well preserved temple is so well preserved because it was converted into a Christian church in 597 AD. It was a beautiful day and we enjoyed walking through the area.
On the way out there we took the Autostrada (one of two main highways in Sicily), and I drove. We had been on the road for about 20 minutes and I was thinking to myself 'Shoot! I don't have my Italian translation for my driver's license. (Not that I really need it, when will I ever need to produce such a document.)' Then I glanced in the rear view mirror. '*Expletive.*' There was a polizia (police) car behind me with their lights flashing. I looked at my speedometer. Hmm, well I'm really not speeding, especially in the Italian point of view.
'Oh no! What do I do?!' Patrick very calmly tells me, 'Everything will be ok. Just pull over. It's fine.' (Sometimes I surprised at how calm he can be, and how well he knows how to 'handle' my roller coaster moods and anxiety.) So I proceed to pull over, palms sweating, heart beating. The polizia car pulls over in front of me and three extremely well dressed police men (their uniforms are designed by Armani. No. I'm not kidding.) get out and walk to my window and start asking things in Italian. By the confused and perhaps slightly nauseous look on my face they realize I don't speak Italian well, especially under pressure! In English one of them asks, 'Is something wrong? Did you need something?' Um, what? 'No thank you. In America you just pull over when you see flashing lights behind you.' And they gave a little chuckle and walked back to their car.
So that was that. My first pulled over in Italy experience. Though I guess really I wasn't really pulled over. I'm not sure what Italians do when there is a police car with flashing lights behind them, but apparently it's not stop. Now that I think about it, it's probably drive faster. We certainly had a good laugh on our way, and eventually my heart did stop beating so fast.
Overall our weekend was wonderful and we had a very fun time. I love exploring this little island, and our friends had fun seeing where we lived. Now we get to go visit them in Germany! Maybe twice? Once for Oktoberfest and once around Christmas time for the bazaars.
We met Steve and Colleen on our awesome trip to Egypt. We were the only ones in our very small English speaking group. So things could have gone really good or really bad. And luckily, for everyone involved, it went excellent. We had such a great time with our new friends and were excited to exchange information so that we could meet up in the future. Colleen and Steve are stationed in Naples until they move to Germany in a few weeks. Colleen and I had been in touch and she asked if it might be okay if they came down for the weekend. I jumped at the chance to see them again.
They got in late Thursday night after a long drive down from Naples (made longer because of construction and very slow moving traffic). And the fun began. Patrick had to work on Friday, so I decided to take them up to Taormina, a beautiful little town I think I've mentioned before. We enjoyed meandering through the streets and shops, stopping for lunch and pictures along the way. It was so great to have some time with them, I feel very blessed to have met them. Colleen and I have a great deal in common, and Steven has a wicked sense of humor. Sometimes he and Patrick can get a bit carried away, but it's all in good fun.
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| Taoromina |
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| Emily and Colleen |
The next day we decided to take a trip Southwest from here to Agrigento. It was a Greek settlement established in 582-580 BC. It's now a park that you can walk through with some pretty impressive ancient temples. The most well preserved temple is so well preserved because it was converted into a Christian church in 597 AD. It was a beautiful day and we enjoyed walking through the area.
On the way out there we took the Autostrada (one of two main highways in Sicily), and I drove. We had been on the road for about 20 minutes and I was thinking to myself 'Shoot! I don't have my Italian translation for my driver's license. (Not that I really need it, when will I ever need to produce such a document.)' Then I glanced in the rear view mirror. '*Expletive.*' There was a polizia (police) car behind me with their lights flashing. I looked at my speedometer. Hmm, well I'm really not speeding, especially in the Italian point of view.
'Oh no! What do I do?!' Patrick very calmly tells me, 'Everything will be ok. Just pull over. It's fine.' (Sometimes I surprised at how calm he can be, and how well he knows how to 'handle' my roller coaster moods and anxiety.) So I proceed to pull over, palms sweating, heart beating. The polizia car pulls over in front of me and three extremely well dressed police men (their uniforms are designed by Armani. No. I'm not kidding.) get out and walk to my window and start asking things in Italian. By the confused and perhaps slightly nauseous look on my face they realize I don't speak Italian well, especially under pressure! In English one of them asks, 'Is something wrong? Did you need something?' Um, what? 'No thank you. In America you just pull over when you see flashing lights behind you.' And they gave a little chuckle and walked back to their car.
So that was that. My first pulled over in Italy experience. Though I guess really I wasn't really pulled over. I'm not sure what Italians do when there is a police car with flashing lights behind them, but apparently it's not stop. Now that I think about it, it's probably drive faster. We certainly had a good laugh on our way, and eventually my heart did stop beating so fast.
Overall our weekend was wonderful and we had a very fun time. I love exploring this little island, and our friends had fun seeing where we lived. Now we get to go visit them in Germany! Maybe twice? Once for Oktoberfest and once around Christmas time for the bazaars.
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