Hotel life

     As a lot of you know, we have been living in a hotel since being in Italy.  I remember when I would hear of someone living in a hotel I thought, " That would be alright with me". Someone else would do all the cleaning, cooking, laundry,etc.  Well, it's nice for a few days.  I actually feel like doing some cleaning and COOKING! not to mention, I actually enjoy laundry :)  In fact, the first week we were here, I didn't send my underwear off to be cleaned by the hotel laundry service.  It just felt a little weird to me.  Well, needless to say, I ran out of clean underwear and washing them myself in the sink wasn't all that great..haha 
     Since Boeing covers the cost of laundry service, I decided to just get over myself and send my unmentionables off for cleaning.  I think those who have been washing our laundry here have,
 what I've been calling, "Laundry Magic".  Our clothes have been coming back to us cleaner than I can remember and a few difficult stains that I have tried removing, have disappeared! I guess that 250+ Euros a week to have our laundry done is worth it.  At our current hotel, our clothes were brought back to us in boxes and wrapping as if they were giving us Christmas presents! A little over the top..but interesting.

 The view from our current hotel: (top) facing southwest; (below) facing north

                                      

 Each shirt, skirt, pants, etc. were individually wrapped.   
Stay 'tuned',  we are moving to a temporary appartment next week in the rich part of Naples-Posillipo.  

Belgium!

     We had a terrific opportunity to go to Belgium this past weekend.  The draw was an international motorcross event: Motocross of Nations.  Race and Aaron attended the event while Juliann and I explored Lommel, Belgium.
     First things first though; we found affordable plane tickets from Rome to Eindhoven,Netherlands so we drove from Naples to Rome (2hr-ish drive) It was nice to see a little more of Italy. You know, there are a lot of hills/mountains around here?nice :)   When we got to Rome, relatively simple arrival,etc. we got worried that we wouldn't have time to make our departure. Our gate was supposed to close at 11:25 and got in line (a VERY long, convoluted line) at 10:20. Once through the line, we rushed to our gate. We rushed? We didn't need to because we got to our gate and saw nothing but a sea of people.  We had no idea where our gate line was so we just stood in the general area. Let me tell you that this was our first experience with RyanAir-known as the Cheap Airline..haha. You know the saying, "you get what you pay for" well, we paid to stand in long lines, be shoved in a little space to fly 1,000miles(or kilometers, I can't remember) or so..haha!
       Needless to say, our flight departed about an hour and a half later than originally planned.  We made it to Eindhoven safely (Thank God!) and the airport there was so quiet and peaceful. Night and day difference compared to our Naples and Rome airport experiences.  When we walked outside the airport we enjoyed.....fresh air! Naples is a bit..smoggy, smoky, stinky. ugh  Anyway, we felt a lot more comfortable immediately, in Netherlands.
     When we got to the hotel Aaron booked, we learned that he had scheduled with a hotel(sister hotel) about an hour away from Lommel.  Knowing this was a very busy weekend for the small town of Lommel, we thought we were going to be sleeping on the streets of Belgium.  Thankfully, there was room for us at the Inn :)   The hotel was older; filled with several antique pieces of furniture,etc.  The woman who operated the inn, was very nice and spoke fluent english! (sad to say, we don't know any Dutch which most Belgians spoke in that area)
   Aaron and Race spent all of Saturday and Sunday at the event (see Race's blog via his Facebook page)  Sounded like it was above and beyond too crazy for me so I'm not sad I didn't go.  Juliann and I walked around the town. We explored some of the shops until it started pouring rain. Thankfully, the visitor center was near us so we took cover there.  I'm so glad we did too because we had fun exploring the 'museum' that was there. Lommel is quite proud of their sand and there were several areas in the museum where we could learn about that. It was actually, pretty interesting :)  Next door there was a glass museum and school.
      Since we had the whole day to do what we wanted, we went to the Chocolat Cafe and had waffles (Belgian, of course!) and swedish pancakes. (Keep in mind, for the past month, we have only had Napoli breakfast: fruit, undercooked bacon, salami, toast, etc.)  Juliann and I, especially, were really excited for pancakes and waffles! :)  I also indulged in a Cafe au latte(pic below)  After brunch, we walked past a hair salon that was open. (Lommel was a pretty quiet, unbusy town :) Since Juliann has been bugging me to get her hair cut since before we left for Italy, I took her in.  The hair dresser spoke ONLY Dutch so Juliann drew a picture of what she wanted and off they went. I encouraged her to be brave :)  Thankfully, all turned out great! She looks amazing!

 Belgians love their bicycles!

 room 'o sand samples from Lommel as well as around the world

 Cafe au latte-can you see how the spoon was dipped in a cube of chocolate? yum! Pinterest idea!

 Isn't she lovely? :)

 Just about every door on the houses were different and interesting-loved it!

 All the homes and yards were neat and tidy. It was so nice. Hydrangeas-my fave-must love the sandy soil in Lommel, they were everywhere and every color. So pretty. (Below:) some kids rode their dirt bikes right up to McDonalds and parked them in the outside seating area. Only in Europe. haha!

     Like I said, it was quite peaceful in Belgium.  We greatly enjoyed the beauty of the trees, farmland and lovely homes around the area.  It was also quite fun to see everyone riding around on bicycles-some with large wicker baskets on them. I loved it! I was sad not to find some bikes to rent for the weekend, though :( oh well.   Last, but not least, I enjoyed seeing all the horses around in Lommel. Medicine for my soul :)  sorry no pictures..
    

Miscellaneous Italy observations

     We are definitely noticing a lot of differences between what we know in the States versus what we see here.  Besides the obvious of the language, here are few other things:
     *Electrical outlets- 3 small holes or sometimes 2 small holes usually in a vertical line. It's funny, at the hotel, it looks a little like a 'Griswald' special. There are several plugs and different adapters for each plug.
     *Businesses open and close whenever they want. Even if the signs says it's open, a lot of time there's no one there.  I have found that to be true about the post offices, especially.  Ergh! I've got all these postcard but no stamps! ha
     *Lots of horn honking (as mentioned in a previous post)
     *No cheddar cheese ;( 
     *Lots of odd cars
     *Musicians have to/supposed to have legal authorization to be allowed to play music in some public places.  Juliann wanted to play the hotel piano but was told she needed this 'said' authorization..what?!  odd
     *Apparently, Naples has a lot of laws...hmmm..no one really cares about those laws though.  Don't be surprised if you hear that we have a 'run-in' with Italy polizzia for playing the piano in public...haha!

      Keep in mind that these are just a few things and we have, essentially, only experienced this 1 city in Italy.  I'm sure I'll be able to add to this list.

      On another note, thought I'd mention that there were some protests going on here in Naples.  Not sure what it was about exactly, but we think it had something to do with the people being upset with some governmental agency.  There was a group that walked about the streets shouting something in unison and then would proceed to create a ruckus by any means possible; usually knocking over garbage cans, etc.  It was funny because I saw the front-runners would make the mess and then those in the back of the line would semi-clean it up.  They seemed real hard-core. haha

Italy house hunt

Last week we went house hunting.  We looked at 17 places.  That's a lot of work; even though we had a guide and he drove us around everywhere-Thank God!!
 All but 3 of the places were not furnished. 
Definition of 'unfurnished':  no furniture, (frequently) no light fixtures, and no kitchen accessories at all-including no cabinets. Empty, empty, empty.
  That's fine except the fact that on top of it taking a while to get into a place we like, it would take a lot more time to get it set up for us to live in it. 
  Ugh. we have only been in a hotel for a week and a half and I'm all ready to be in a house or at least something with a kitchen-believe it or not, it's more work to go out every day to eat, than to cook at home. haha
    I hope I'm not coming off as if I didn't have a good time looking at the houses.  I had so much fun with that! I would like to go see more places..hmm..not sure that we will though. 
I loved several of the houses-they were huge! and had lots of light.  A few of the places had amazing views..ahhhh...  We even looked at a dwelling in a castle-esque building. 
   We did look at a place here in the city.  A 3 bedroom apartment that is fully furnished and would be totally ready for us to move in to Nov 1st.  It is in the most chaotic part of the city but it might be the best option for us since we won't be in Italy all that long and it would be easier to get around to places,etc.  The other part to it is that Aaron's co-worker will be taking over the house right after us and he feels it would be best for him to be right in the city too.
   Well, we haven't made a solid decision yet.  The one place that we all LOVED is in a really bad part of Naples-I guess there is a strong mafia presence and lots of prostitutes? ugh..

   I hope you enjoy the included pictures :]

Italia, the first few days

      We are staying at Royal Continental Napoli.  It is a rather nice hotel across the street from the Gulf of Naples.  There are 2 castles near the hotel. 1 is directly across from us-I'll let Juliann fill you in on that.
Since we are in the heart of the city, there is constant activity all around: sirens (lots of polizia here!), scooters moving all about, cars whizzing by, people always walking or jogging by (the Stones will blend right in with the runners here), sounds of vehicles crashing into, what I'm guessing, dumpsters or buildings or? oh, not to mention HORNS. Napolitans LOVE to communicate with their car horns. It's funny.
     I'm sure you're not surprised to hear that we are eating quite well.  There are so many restaurants for us to check out here-fun!  We could probably eat at a different place every day. I think we might try that. haha

     We all are working on our Italiano.  It's fun. Some people around here seem surprised when we say more than Buongiorno.  I wish I knew more though!  I get a little frustrated that I'm not able to communicate better..ahh..back to work on Rosetta Stone..
     2 more things: sorry I didn't post about our Arrivederci party. It was so much fun and we all were extremely grateful to see all those who came.  It truly was a marvelous time!  Thank you all so much! (pictures got left on home computer..ergh.. sorry about that.)
     Next post:Italy House Hunt!

Ciao!

     I read somewhere that when in new surroundings that it is best to take time to 'soak everything in' around you.  I think this might be my motto for this Italian adventure.
     This was my first experience flying in Executive/First class.  It is something I could definitely get used to!  Eat, sleep, watch a movie, eat, watch a movie, eat, enjoy the massage feature of the seat, eat, sleep..you get the picture. Wow!  No complaints here...

    So, that was all the way from Seattle to Frankfurt, Germany.  As soon as we got to Germany, we learned that many Lufthansa (the airline working with Air Canada-our original airline) crew members were on strike.  That caused our flight, along with 899 other flights, to be cancelled indefinitely.  Yikes!!  I always wanted to take my family to Germany and stay a while but not at the airport! haha  Anyway, an extremely creative and kind Lufthansa clerk helped find flights for us to make it to Naples-8hrs later than our original flight, but we made it!  You know those news stories about people sleeping at airports for hours on end? Well, we were some of those people last week.  In fact, I think we actually did make it in some Germany news footage-there were camera men and reporters right near us at one point...ugh..
     We flew from Germany to Milan and then Milan to Naples. Definitely not ideal but we were so grateful to get to our destination.  Once in Naples, we had to take 2 taxis (do you see all that luggage we brought?!What were we thinking? haha).  The taxi ride to get to our hotel was more exciting than any theme park ride we had ever been on. Just ask Race about it!

Prepping to go to Italy

We have known that we are moving to Italy since May of this year but I finally decided to update our blog about our impending move.
  I'm sorry I'm not much of a blogger or writer...ugh, hope you'll bear with me.  I am a communicator though, and love to keep in touch with those I love so thought this would be a good opportunity to do so.  Race and Juliann will also be blogging while we are in Italy; should be fun for you to get their perspective on this family adventure :)
   I don't think it has totally hit me that we will be living in another country for several months. Of course I'm going to miss everyone here but I'm also going to miss our animals!! Our dogs, chickens and barn cats will be home in the care of my parents. The rest of the 'menagerie' will be with friends-Thank you to those who will be caring for everyone.
   It's hard to know what to pack. We don't want to take too much but also don't want to not take stuff since Boeing is willing to ship 1000lbs of our belongings for us-on top of our luggage on the plane.  We also plan on buying a few things while we are there. That should be fun, right?

   Hmmm....well, I guess that's all for now. We will have an Arrivederci Party before we leave so that will probably be my next post...stay tuned...