Giorni (Days) in Italia

Prima Notte (1st Night) in Italia

The apartment was spacious and I loved the view from both the balcony and the kitchen. I did not waste any second to unpack the luggage and arranged all the items we brought into the drawers and cabinets provided. We went to sleep late and to our surprise, there was a fireworks display at the park nearby. I guess it was the longest I have ever seen. We managed to have it recorded for almost 4 minutes out of 30 minutes, the actual duration. I felt so excited and cold (yet warm and glowing  inside). 'What a romantic evening," I was happy to be there by Hubby's side at  such place. Well, we certainly felt great at that moment. \(^0^)/

<Love was in the air>

Prima Settimana (first week)

        Hubby was scheduled to go to work early in the morning at 9 AM and came back around 5 PM everyday. We had to wake up earlier than that for Subuh prayer which ended before the clock struck 4 AM. 'Oh dear.' 

        The first few days I was still in a high spirit to join Hubby and Mr. W (Hubby's colleague) at breakfast. We had nothing on our plate except for cereals and milk. We dared not consume other meals since the Halal status was unknown and it'd be best if we played it safe. I was recommended to take only two types of packed biscuits which seemed free from the u-know-what-i-mean content. Sometimes I even took more than two packets and brought it back to the room.

 The dining room

         Whenever I was left alone, Facebook had become the place for me to kill the time while waiting for Hubby's return. I also switched on the television and jumped from one channel to the other. There were 1000 channels altogether but I found myself preoccupied with TLC channel and gosh I forgot what the other one  was. Apparently The Cake Boss, Say Yes to The Dress and Paint Your Life were the programs that I liked to view the most. The spoken language was of course in Italian. FYI, not even a single channel was aired in English. Everything was translated into Italian, let alone Spongebob. I was quite breathless and went half crazy (a lil bit of a drama queen here :p) at first over the sounds of the language. As time passing by, surprisingly I got used to it. 

       Oh yeah, I forgot to mention about the daily 'room cleaning' early in the morning. Since the room floor was cold (the aircond was on and the weather was cold), I was eager to meet the cleaning lady on the first morning I was there to ask for a few things. Around 10 Am, the door bell rang and I found an old lady standing with her paraphernalia outside.She smiled at me and greeted me with 'Ciao. Buongiorno." I answered in English instead due to tongue-tied (actually I had spent my time googling some of the important phrases in Italy back home. I just couldnt let out the word 'Buongiorno' from my mouth. Not yet). She said something in Italian. I didn't get her message but I knew she meant 'cleaning the room.' I let her took her sweet time tdying up the apartment, emptying the trash bin, strengthening the bed linen and mopping the kitchen floor. (Our bathroom didn't have a drain hole. Instead of having a bath under the running shower which got its own drain, Hubby had it outside of the shower area. Thus, the water couldnt go elsewehere other than flowing out into the kitchen). 

       After the old lady was done with her tasks, she approached me who was lying on the bed that time to say thank you in Italian 'Grazie.' I nodded and stopped her before she made her way out of the room. I told her that I needed two bedroom slippers, a mop and a bottle of dishwashing liquid. She shook her head, clueless of what I was talking about and went to the telephone before she called someone on the other line. Not long after that, came the receptionist that I saw earlier yesterday into my apartment. He informed that the old lady didn't undertsand me and he asked me of what did I request earlier. I repeated the same message and he seemed to have problems in understanding of what slippers mean actually. I had to use hand gestures and expressions when describing the item. (I laughed out loud everytime I remembered this incident). He then understood me and the two people left my apartment. I got what I needed when it was really late in the evening because the old lady forgot to hand over the requested items. She said 'Ho dimenticato,' which meant 'I Forgot.' I smiled and replied 'Grazie.' Inside, I silently said "Va bene," (it is okay).

        

      I felt funny but It was a good experience...really.