Closing Thoughts on Italy/Europe

This has been an ongoing list of things that are terrible, funny, interesting, or great about Italy and sometimes Europe at large.  In no particular order:

1. I have seen more random penises out and about than I care to.  When driving, Italian men will pull off on the side of any road to pee.  They don't pee behind their cars though.  You can clearly see them.
2. Neapolitans hate to make change  They WILL NOT DO IT.  Even when you can see that they can easily make change for you, they won't.  They will just stare at you in silence until you either figure out how to pay the exact amount, or give up and go away.  Sometimes if you wait long enough, they will begrudgingly acquiesce.  This can be long and awkward and painful. 
3. Neapolitans are a liquid, at least when mobile.  They fill any space they are in and loath to be in a line or any sort of order.  
4. Italy was done by Monet.  From a distance it looks lovely.  Colorful picturesque coastal towns and hillside villages, and whatnot.  Up close it's a big mess of nonsense.
5. Bathrooms.  In Italy and most of Europe there aren't hooks in the bathrooms for women to hang their purses or bags.  Many of the toilets also don't have toilet seats.  This is more common in Italy than else where.
6. Gelato is sooooo good.  It's better than ice cream.  I will miss the accessibility of gelato.  My favorite flavor is fior di latte which is basically mozzarella flavor.  It's delicious, don't make that face.   Fior di latte is the name for mozzarella when it's from cow's milk instead of buffalo's milk. 
7. Wine flows freely here, sometimes almost literally.  Some enotecas have gas pump like systems for filling whatever container you want with wine.
8. When it rains in Naples, your car gets dirtier than if it hadn't rained.
9. Cemeteries are weird.  In Italy you are only buried for seven years, then they dig you up, condense your remains, and put you in a family vault.  This is because Italy is Catholic and they believe in the resurrection of the body.  If there's no "body" you can't be resurrected.  This also leads to weird apartment-looking buildings that are actually huge mausoleums.   They are apartments for the dead.
10. It is hard to get anything done.  No one calls the plumber when your sink is backed up.  They call their brother's friend's cousin who once installed a doorknob.  They then proceed to insist everything is fine, even though it clearly isn't.  Also, they will randomly show up to "fix" your problem.  They won't tell you when, and you probably won't be home.  This is now your fault and you will never see them again.
11. Fireworks.  Fireworks all the time.  For any and everything.  Tuesday at 1am?  FIREWORKS.  Wednesday at 10 am?  FIREWORKS.  Birthday, Wedding, found a Euro on the street?  FIREWORKS. It's a little funny and kind of wonderful.

Final Adventure Count

I thought a tally of our adventures might be fun, because....I like numbers and Dan likes data.

Time stationed in Naples, Italy: 23 Months, 2.5 weeks.
# of Countries Visited: 31

1. Austria - Vienna
2. Belgium - Bruges, Brussels
3. Bulgaria - Rila, Sofia
4. Czechia - Prague
5. Denmark - Copenhagen
6. England - Greenwich, London
7. Estonia - Tallin
8. Finland - Helsinki
9. France - Nice
10. Germany - Munich, Stuttgart (Dan only), Ulm, Warnemunde
11. Hungary - Budapest
12. Ireland - Carlow, Dublin, Dingle, Galway, Inis Mor
13. Italy - Assisi, Cinque Terra, Lecce, Matera, Naples, Orvieto, Rimini, Rome, Sicily, Spoleto, Tuscany, Venice, and a bunch of other small towns and places.
14. Monaco - Monaco
15. Morocco - Ait Ben Haddou Kasbah, Casablanca, Fez, Marrakech, Merzouga, Ourazazate, Todra Gorges
16. Netherlands - Amsterdam, Delft, Hague 
17. Norway - Bergen
18. Poland - Krakow
19. Portugal - Azores, Lisbon (Dan only)
20. Romania (Maura only) - Bran, Bucharest
21. Russia - St. Petersburg
22. San Marino - San Marino
23. Serbia - Belgrade, Sremski Karlovci
24. Slovakia - Bratislava
25. Spain - Barcelona, Estartit, Valencia
26. Sweden - Stockholm
27. Switzerland - Chillon, Geneva, Luasanne
28. Turkey - Marmaris
29. United States - California, Colorado, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Virginia
30. Vatican City (Maura only) - Vatican City
31. Wales - Cardiff

Trying to Leave Italy/Trying to get to California

A few days are covered in this post.
First and foremost, a HUGE thank you to Ryan and Heather and to my mother.

Sometime a little before Ireland
The flights that SATO booked for us to leave Italy went like this: military flight from Naples, Italy to Norfolk, Virginia with a layover in Rota, Spain.  Once in Norfolk we had to transfer from the military terminal to the public airport.  We were then to fly to Monterey via a layover in Dallas and a 26 hour layover in San Francisco.  I was freaking out about transporting our dog since airlines will not fly pets in cargo (she has to go cargo, she's too big) if the ground temperature is above 85 F.  The average temps for Norfolk and Dallas for the first week of September are 86 and 95 F respectively.  I was afraid that either A) the dog wouldn't be allowed on the flight out of Norfolk or B) the dog would make it to Dallas, but wouldn't be allowed to transfer and then be stuck in Dallas.  This lead to me asking my mother to meet us in Norfolk so that she could take us to the public airport and take our dog home with her to pet sit until we get settled in Monterey.  She agreed.  Dog freak out taken care of.

At some point we moved out of our house and into Ryan and Heather's house.  While living with them, we found out that the base vet, who needed to do the pets' certifications to fly, couldn't do them when we thought.  Instead, they could do them while we were in Ireland.  Thankfully, Heather agreed to take the pets to their vet appointment.  All I had to do was go to the vet with my ID and POA in Heather's name to verify that I was who I said I was and Heather was an acceptable sponsor for the pets.  I did this and then left Heather with all the documentation she could possibly need.  Oiy.  Side note: it turns out our cat, Tungsten, hates Heather.  We don't know why.


During Ireland
I contact Heather, from Ireland, the day of the appointment to ask how it went.  It did not go smoothly.  Tungsten wouldn't let Heather get near her.  Ryan had to come home from work and try to get the cat into her carrier.  She was having none of it.  They ultimately got Tungsten into the dog crate (by chasing her with a broom) and took her to base in the dog crate.  Once at the vet, they made the vet come out to the car to do Tungsten's health screening.  The vet didn't want to deal with the super pissed off cat inside a giant dog crate, so....he just signed the paperwork for the cat.  The dog, Tantalum, had no problems at all.


September 1st
Today we sold our second car in preparation for leaving Italy.  We took it to Capo to drop off our luggage for our military flight (we were allowed to drop it off the day before the flight) and to turn the car over to the new owner.  Ryan was going to give us a ride back to their house afterwards.  Dan dropped off me and the luggage and he went to transfer the car.  Upon checking in and checking the luggage, I am asked "Did they contact you about the delay?".....What delay? No, no one has contacted me about any delay...  (How would they?)  It turns out the military flight is stuck in Souda Bay and will go out later than expected on Friday or maybe Saturday.  I was reassured someone would contact us with updated details.  I have no faith that this will actually happen, and demand to get a contact number so I or Dan could call and see what the status of the flight is ourselves.  We inform my mother of the delay.


September 2nd
Dan calls to verify that the flight is still delayed.  He gets told, yes, it's delayed because it's broken down in Sigonella.  It'll go out Sunday.  Wait...wasn't is just broken in Souda Bay?  What?  Whatever.  We hang out at the house.  We inform my mother of the delay.


September 3rd
Dan calls to find out when the flight is going to leave.  He gets told it's not going out until Tuesday, because it's broken.  Okay.....now what?   Ryan and Heather had plans to go out on a boat on Sunday and were trying to figure out if we would be able to go with them or not.  Heather has a friend who was in charge of the terminal so she had been texting him to see if he knew what was going on with the flight.  He wasn't 100% sure but didn't think it would go out on Sunday.  Dan and I don't have bathing suits anymore, so we ran to the NEX to find clearance swimwear/things that could work as swimwear.  We inform my mother of the delay.


September 4th
Dan calls to find out when the flight is going to leave.  He gets told "definitely not until Tuesday."

While all of these delays were going on Dan kept calling to try to get our civilian flights reassigned.  He got told we'd have to deal with it when we got to Norfolk.  Great.

 Anyway, cool, we can go out on the boat.  So we do.

We're on a boat!

We anchored the two boats off of Procida to hang out for a good bit.  We got our anchors stuck and Dan pulled himself down the anchor line to try to get it unstuck.  I swear he had to be down 80 feet.  It was ridiculous.  He got one boat free and tried again for the second one but ultimately couldn't get it free.  A nice Italian man came over and tried maneuvering the boat around to get the anchor to release.  He finally did and we were very grateful.  We gave him some of our booze in appreciation.

We stopped for gelato at the Sant'Angelo marina.  While we were there Heather got in touch with her contact who told her that the flight was DEFINITELY going out tonight and that we needed to be there at 23:00.  We had plenty of time to get back to the house and get ready, but seriously.  If she hadn't of called, I think we would have missed our flight since we thought we weren't leaving until Tuesday.

We got home, got cleaned up, and we took a nap.  We say goodbye to Ryan and Heather.  We pile our stuff into Ryan's car and head to the military terminal.  We check Tantalum into cargo and board the flight.  It is hot and stuffy and super uncomfortable.  People were tired and hot and grumpy.  We take off and after a few hours arrive in Rota at like 03:00.

We are allowed to deplane.  Dan, who had been asleep, is very grumpy about everything and I leave him in the waiting area with Tungsten.  I go get Tantalum so I can walk her around for the duration of the layover.  We walk around and putz for about an hour.  I contact my mom to leave her a message to let her know that we made it to Rota and we should be taking off in another hour.  They make me give Tantalum back so she can be loaded back on the plane.  We're told that we're boarding in 30 minutes.  30 minutes turns into an hour and a half.  We get back on the plane.  I call my mom to tell her that we've boarded.  Dan falls asleep.  He wakes up 3 hours later and thinks we have to be almost halfway to Norfolk.  We had only taken off about 30 minutes ago.  We sat on the tarmac for 2 and half hours.

September 5th
Hello America!  We finally land in Norfolk and I call my mom to tell her we're Stateside.   We get our luggage and the dog and a cab and meet my mom at the NEX parking lot (she couldn't get on base to get to the military terminal).  My mom wasn't going to head straight back to Winchester from Norfolk anyway, so she had a hotel room booked (with capacity for all of us plus the pets just in case of nonsense like all of this).  She took us over to the Norfolk Airport first so that we could straighten out our follow on flights.  We are able to get a flight out the next day at the crack of dawn to San Francisco via JFK.  Mom took us to the hotel, we dumped our stuff, found food, and passed out.

September 6th
We get up super early and mom takes us to the airport.  She leaves with Tantalum.

 Bye Norfolk!

 A rainstorm over....something.

We land in San Francisco and find this:

 Cilindro Costruito (Cylinder Built) by Arnaldo Pomodoro.  Mr. Tomato has a sculpture here.  Remember all the Sphere in Spheres of his we've seen?

Welcome to California!

This concludes our adventures for leaving Italy and getting to California.

Ireland - Day 7 Dublin Part 2

August 30th

This morning we got up and drove back to Dublin.
We decided to spend it at the National Museum of Ireland - Archaeology.
We started with prehistoric Ireland.

These are Bann flakes from 4,300-3,900 BC from the River Bann (Northern Ireland).

Various food vessels from 2,000-1,800 BC from all over Ireland.  

Also two Halberds from 2,000-1,700 BC from County Mayo.

This is a two-piece mould for dirks or rapiers from 1,700-1,300 BC from County Cork.

A rapier from 1,400-1,000 BC from County Derry.

Horsehair tassels from 900-500 BC from County Antrim.

Crotal bells (the hanging things) from 900-500 BC from County Offaly.  

And side-blown and end-blown horns from 900-500 BC from County Kerry.

Gold dress fasteners from 800-700 BC from various counties.

Gold Torc from 1,200-1,000 BC from County Mayo.

Gold Torc from 1,200-1,000 BC from County Galway.

Gold Earrings from 1,200-1,000 BC from County Roscommon.

Gold and Amber beads from the Later Bronze Age from County Kilkenny.

Ear-spools from 800-700 BC from County Westmeath.

Gold dress-fasteners and gold ear-spools from 800-700 BC from County Wexford.

Gold collar from 800-700 BC from County Tipperary.

A little boat!

Torc from Broighter Hoard.

Silver chalice from the 9th century AD from County Tipperary.

Two silver brooches from around the 9th century AD from Counties Kilkenny and Cavan.

The Tara Brooch from 8th century AD from County Meath.

This is a bronze and silver belt shrine from the 8th century AD from County Sligo.

Two sliver annular (closed ring) brooches from around the 9th century AD from County Limerick.

Penannular (open ring) brooch from 10th century AD from County Limerick.

Silver penannular brooch from the 10th century from County Kildare.

Also 9th century silver ingots.

Silver brooch from 9th century AD from County Antrim.

Also 9th century silver ingots.

St. Patrick's Bell from sometime in the 6th-8th century AD from County Armagh.

And now, several photos of the Shrine for St. Patrick's Bell; it's from 1100 AD.

The Clonmacnoise Crozier from 11th century AD from County Offaly.

The River Laune Crozier from 11th century AD County Kerry.

The Lismore Crozier from 1100 AD from County Waterford.

And now the Cross of Cong from early 12th century AD from County Mayo:

A Romanesque Door from a church - 12th century AD.

Antler, bone, and stone motif pieces from between the 5th-11th centuries AD from various counties.

Oh, remember the harp that doesn't belong to Brian Boru?  Well, here's more info about him.

Cogadh Gáedhel re Gallaibh (The War of the Irish with the Foreigners).  This is James Henthorn Todd's edition and translation from 1867.  It represents the first print version of this text that probably originated in the early 12th century.  

Hoard of silver and brass artifacts from the 10th century from Dunmore cave in County Kilkenny.

Copper alloy seal matrix of the episcopal town of Kilkenny from the 13th century. 

The Latin inscription reads "Common seal of the town of Kilkenny of Ossory."

Random fact: A large portion of Ireland's towns were founded by the English in the short period from 1170 to 1290.  No further towns were founded until after 1550. 

Locks and keys from the 12th and 13th centuries.

How the locks work.

The museum also had several bog bodies, which I saw, but did not take photos of.  Like the body casts from Pompeii, I found them very upsetting and didn't feel comfortable taking photos of them.

We stopped for some snacks at the museum cafe and a random thing happened.  While waiting in line, the guy behind me asked if my name was Maura.  I said yes, but I was very confused because I did not recognize him.  It turns out he used to take karate with my brothers and me when we were younger and is still, at least, Facebook friends with my one brother.   He was visiting Ireland with his girlfriend.  I, apparently, still look like I'm 10, because I'm pretty sure that's the last time he would have seen me.  Anyway,  small world!   

We meandered around Dublin for our last night and in the morning headed back to Italy.

This concludes our adventures in Ireland.