True Life: I'm Meeting my Huge Italian Family

While most of our blog entries thus far have been basic, step-by-step chronicles of our journey, I'd like to use (or abuse) my freedom of blogging to go off on a bit of a tangent about a particular phenomenon that has caught my attention.

I definitely had an innaccurate perception of what Italians look like. I have been assured by various people that Italians, particularly Italian men, would love me as they are very appreciative of a voluptous figure. Color me shocked and disappointed to find that Italy is not crawling with Sophia Lorens. Practically all of the Italian women I have encoutnered (particularly Siclians) are RAIL THIN and wear the tightest clothes and highest heels imaginable. I know I’m going back to Sicily and we’re currently in Rome, but I feel that Sicily was a more accurate representation because it had hardly any tourists. Rome is crawling with them, and I know that any time I see any woman even slightly overweight that she must be an American. How’s that for a workout incentive? Katie and I like to guess a person’s nationality before we hear him or her speak, and the tightness of clothes and percentage of body fat have been dead giveaways.

We have also been playing an original game of Cherubs vs. Couples and counting which we see more of. Cherubs are flying rampant in Rome with all of the churches and Christian art, but for every cherub I run away crying from we see twice as many couples engaging in serious PDA. I’m pretty anti-PDA at home, but here it seems very natural and beautiful to see the possible conception of a child happen on a street corner. Matt feels quite differently.

End of tangent. ANYWAY. Today’s adventure brought us by train to Chivitavecchia, a town about an hour out of Rome that gave me serious Ardmore/Media vibes. What brought us to this unpronoucable town, you ask? Famgilia! Matt and I have been telling stories for years about how we actually do have family members somewhere over in Italy, and today we truly proved ourselves to Katie and Tim. Cousins, uncles, aunts, great uncles, second cousins’ fiances – EVRYBODY showed up for lunch. Every time we became acquainted with a new family member, another would ring the doorbell and join the group. Between the endless courses of food, the inevitable issues with communication and the constant addition of new people, it felt like we were living our own family sitcom. In Italian.

Paola, Matt, Pietro, Me, Keti and Giorgia

One of the few pieces of information I could decipher was that everybody thought I looked like my mother. I’m sure this will please her greatly as she is always upset at the fact that Matt and I got some very strong genes from my dad and that “nobody looks like” her. Also, Matt looks identical to practically every male in the family that we encountered, I bear a striking resemblance to my cousin Giorgia, and Pino, my grandmother’s brother, has my grandmother’s exact same mannerisms and even sits the same way that she does. So bascially, we all have some alternate universe twin over here and I find that equally comforting and creepy.

Matt and I with our Great Uncle Pino and Great Aunt Antonietta

After tons of hugs and even more homemade food (including capponata, spaghetti pomodoro, veal parm, and the world’s greatest tiramisu and cannolis), we bid farewell to our extensive Italian family and headed back to Rome.

Cousins Giuseppi and Giorgia with Matt

The evening was spent in Piazza Navona, a hop, skip and tourist-y jump from our hotel. We managed to stuff down a miniscule dinner and then walked around a bit, enjoying the entertainment of street performers, musicians and artists. What do guitarists perform for tourists in Italy? Dire Straits and Pink Floyd. So… not exactly authentic Italian entertainment, but whateva. I saw the bones of Capuchin priests organized into what could pass for Leatherface’s place of worship the other day. Life is good. - Joanna