Atherton Family Notes

Well, we made it back! Everyone survived, and we didn’t have any major disasters, although our car sustained some minor damage sometime while it was parked somewhere. From a discussion with one of the engineers in our department, it appears that this is a result of a bit of Italian culture that I wasn’t aware of. More on that later…

Like any vacation where a lot of touring is done, this one had its ups and downs. We spent a lot of time being lost, some sights were better than others, and sometimes the kids were cranky. Overall, though, it was a good vacation.

It’s strange, but after 2 weeks in Italy, it feels good to be back home in Germany.

We stopped in 4 major locations during our trip: Paestum (near Napoli), Rome (including the Vatican), Florence and Venice, plus we made some side trips to other locations like Capri, Pisa, and Milan.

While we were on the trip, I kept a journal. It’s not finished– we were too busy seeing too many things for me to have much time to write. Over the next several days, I will post the parts of the journal that are finished and try to finish the rest. So far, it amounts to 10 typewritten pages.

We also got some nice pictures, particularly of the girls. I will start cleaning them up so that we can post those along with the journal pages.

More later!

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This post is out of order, but I just put the picture together, and I wanted to post it. The picture below is a panorama of St. Peter’s Basillica, one of the primary locations in Vatican City. As you can see the panorama looks pretty bizarre– I took the pictures without benefit of a tripod , so the rolling nature of the pictures is due to my unsteadiness. There are also a lot of places in the pictures where shapes don’t quite match up properly causing some serious blurriness, and there are spots where people in the picture moved between shots. Plus, I wasn’t standing in the middle of the circle– the obelisk in the picture occupies that spot. Carissa and Celia aren’t in the picture because they are behind the fountain. If you look very closely, you can see Sandi back by them.. . she can be seen just over the shoulder of a man wearing a yellow shirt and sitting on the fountain.

I think it still gives a pretty good idea of the spaciousness of the basilica. The picture is almost a complete 360 degree view.

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There are definitely worse places in the world where you might have to drive slowly. The Swiss Alps are dazzling, even from the Autobahn. There are lakes, and villages clinging precariously to the mountains above them; There are sheer cliff walls and beautiful mini-waterfalls cascading down; There are lush valleys lit in the late morning by the sun just cresting over the peaks. Even during the section where we were routed off the Autobahn onto a smaller road, the re-routing was a blessing in disguise. We got to see an area of Switzerland that we would never see otherwise, and it was beautiful. The route was filled with mountain views and scenes of picturesque rural Switzerland, and we even saw hot air balloons floating above the mountains in the morning light. Then, there are the tunnels. Tunnels in southern Switzerland are almost as common as the open road. The tunnels increase in frequency the further south you go, and at one point, you pass through the one of the longest tunnels (17 km in length!!!) in Europe. This tunnel is called Gotthard Tunnel, and it’s a very interesting construction. It’s only two lanes wide, so one can imagine that an accident inside the tunnel is extremely serious. To help prevent such events, markers are placed inside the tunnel to help indicate safe following distance. I’m not sure it helps much. We still came to a complete stop at least once during the 17 kilometer stretch. Our average speed through the tunnel was about 40 kph. On the upside, there are 3 radio stations broadcast inside the tunnel to help pass time. In most tunnels, radio reception disappears about 100 meters away from either end of the tunnel, so this is nice to have. Of course, the real purpose of the stations is to broadcast emergency information. We listened to the station that was broadcasting authentic-sounding traditional Swiss folk music. We could almost see the dancing men with lederhosen, feather caps and biersteins. I say authentic-sounding, though, because I’m not sure how authentic it really was. One of the songs we heard ended with a rousing chorus of “She’ll Be Comin’ Round the Mountain,” although the lyrics were in German. I don’t know. I guess that could be a Swiss song. They do have enough mountains around that she probably has come around at least one of them at one time or another. The other interesting thing about Gotthard Tunnel is that it forms the dividing line between the German-speaking and Italian-speaking areas of Switzerland. It was very strange; as soon as we exited the tunnel, all of the road signs and town names were in Italian. Ausfarht (exit) became Uscita and Willkommen (welcome) became Bienvenito, for example. Even more disconcerting was that the predominant common architecture suddenly switched from German half-timbers to Italian stucco. I am amazed that this part of Switzerland is actually a part of Switzerland. Of course, in the western area of Switzerland, there is also a sizable French-speaking population, so I guess the Swiss have just learned to adjust.

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Italian drivers have a reputation for being the worst drivers in the world. Every German I talked to about this trip commented that I should be very careful in Italy. All of the guidebooks about Italy we have also make this observation.

Our experience so far largely confirms this, especially as we progressed further south towards our destination. In fact, driving in this area of Italy reminds me a lot of driving in certain areas of Mexico. Here are our observations so far:

Italians use their turn signals, but not necessarily to indicate anything in particular. In fact, a lot of Italians seem to use them as a history indicator, as in, “at some point in the past, I made a left turn.” I have never seen so many people forget to turn off their turn signals after executing a turn or lane change. At one point, we were at the bottom of a hill after dark, and looking up at the highway, there appeared to be tens of small yellow fireflies mixed in with the red tail lights.

The white lines that divide between lanes are only suggestions. Not only do they sometimes straddle two lanes deliberately, but sometimes Italian drivers also seem to have a drift problem. They randomly drift into adjacent lanes and back repeatedly. We saw this happen so many times we were beginning to wonder if Italy has laws requiring drunk driving.

Speed limits are only suggestions. This seems directly related to the lack of police presence on the roads. I can’t say that I blame the police—it’s dangerous out there on the roads!

An Italian driver will always pass using the minimum possible clearance. On the highways, this is really mysterious because there is plenty of room to pass, but once we traveled on a side road for a while we understood why, especially when combined with the assumption that lanes are only a suggestion. It’s really an adjustment to the way people have to drive here. The town roads tend to have a lot of traffic jams, so if an Italian is only a few hundred meters from his turn, he will essentially create a third lane in the middle or side of the road, pass people with mere millimeters to spare, and then execute the desired turn—at least in that case it is somewhat understandable if not particularly safe. In other cases, however, the people who are doing are just rude—they are really just driving around the traffic jam in the hopes of butting in somewhere further ahead.

Consider the following situation. You are trying to turn left out of a parking lot into fast moving but heavy traffic in both directions. What do you do? Well, if you are an Italian, you slowly move out into traffic until the near lane can no longer go around you and must stop, then repeat the procedure for the other lane. Actually, in many cases, as soon as you cut off the first lane, you can immediately pull into the far lane, and people will route around you until you get up to speed and merge. We see this happen in groups of three or four, because once one person blocks the lane, other people behind him pull out also. We have even participated in a few, letting the Italians run interference for us.

Headlights are a major form of communication for Italian drivers, especially in the Napoli area. Flashing your headlights is a major way to make your desires known, even if the person you are communicating cannot act on the request. It’s interesting that the headlights are often used for the same messages that people from other countries use the horn for. Here are some example messages:

1.“Get out of my way.” This message is often used on the highway to request that slower moving traffic get out of the high speed lane. The request is usually delivered even if the car involved is passing even slower traffic, and can’t immediately react.
2.“No, I mean it. Get out of my way.” This is a high speed repetition of number 1.
3.“If you don’t get out of my way, I am going to run over you.” By the time this message is delivered, the sender is usually driving so close behind that you can’t see his actual headlights, just the reflections.
4.“Here I come, so don’t even think about pulling into the high speed lane to pass that slow truck.”
5.On a two-lane road: “Hey, I’m going to drive in your lane for a while.”
6.“What did you do that for? Didn’t you see me there? I have the right-of-way.” This message is often delivered to people who turn across a lane on a two-lane road, even if the sender is stuck in a traffic jam.
7.“F#$k you!” Ahh, the classics are always the best.

UPDATE:

After we got back from the trip, I told Martin Kuner, one of the engineers in my department, about our experience and he shared some information that explains some of what the Italians were doing, although it’s still not clear why they think it’s a good idea.

Martin says that unlike most of the rest of the world, the rule in Italy is that drivers never look back.

When you want to execute a turn, you turn on your turn signal, pause a moment, and then go… everyone behind you is responsible for getting out of your way.

Remarkably, the per capita death toll on the roads in Italy is about the same as the US and Germany. I am very surprised to hear this after driving there.

The other thing that Martin told me has to do with parking your car, and probably explains why our bumper got marred up while the car was parked: In Italy, drivers are expected not to set their parking brakes when they park and cars should be left out of gear. The reason for this is that Italy has many more cars than places to park them, so parallel-parked cars are positioned with almost no room between. If one’s parking brake is not set and the car is in neutral, then if the person next to him wants to leave his space, he can wiggle out by(relatively) gently nudging the cars in front and back out of the way. If someone’s parking brake is set, his bumper is likely to get dented.

That’s a “when in Rome” fact that we needed to learn before the trip, because I think that’s what happened to our bumper. Our car developed some nice little dents on the rear bumper one night in that very city while we were parked near the Spanish Steps.

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I have not been posting the journal entries from our trip to Italy very regularly, but there is a reason for it: I’ve been spending a lot of time studying for a driver’s test over the last week.

Yes, it’s true. I have to get a German driver’s license (and so will Sandi). It’s been a real pain so far, and I’m not done yet.

Here’s the situation: Germany only allows residents who are not EU citizens to use a foreign driver’s license for 6 month after establishing residency. At the end of that period, you are no longer legally allowed to drive in Germany without a German license.

In addition, Germany issues driver’s licenses on a nation basis, but the US does so at the state level. Germany has a reciprocal license program that allows it to negotiate simple license transfers with other governments, but it requires the other government’s desire and effort to happen. In the case of the US, there are 50 different governments to deal with. A few US states have worked out reciprocal agreements with Germany, including Illinois and Kentucky, but most states have not, including, as you can imagine, Indiana.

If my driver’s license was from Kentucky, essentially all I would have to do is turn in my current license to the German government, and they would issue a German license in its place. Since my license is from Indiana, though, I have to go through almost as much as a new driver would.

We decided that I would be the first one to get a new license for a few reasons. Sandi doesn’t drive much, but I have to get to work 5 days a week. Also, through a loophole in the German laws, Sandi may have up to a year to convert her license. The 6 month limit on using your foreign license only applies if you are going to live in Germany more than a year. Because Sandi doesn’t have a job, the foreign office here only issued her a 1 year residence permit, whereas my permit is for 2 years. So Sandi can file a form that will allow her to continue driving on her Indiana license for another 6 months, if necessary.

In any case, my six month period is over at the end of October, so we have been trying to get all of the pieces in place.

Here’s what it has taken so far:

1. We filed paperwork with a driving school to start the process.
2. We took a first aid course. You have to be certified in first aid by the Red Cross in order to get a driver’s license in Germany. We actually did this before leaving the US, because we already knew about this requirement and wanted to take the course in English!
3. We got eye exams. This is more than an eye chart–it’s a full eye exam by a doctor, including a colorblindness test.
4. We filed paperwork with the local Burgermeister and paid a small fee.
5. We went to the Landratsamt to give them copies of our current licenses.
6. We waited for the Landratsamt to notify our driving school that the paperwork was ready.

Here’s where the real fun begins.

We have to take both a written and a driving test to get our licenses. Since I am going first, Sandi scheduled my written exam for today.

Studying for the test has been difficult because the driver’s manual is only available in German. It’s possible to actually take the test in English, though, and Thomson supplied me with a set of 60 test papers that (supposedly) represent all of the possible exams that are given. It’s a very backwards way to learn driving rules, but it’s all I have.

Over the past week, I have been working through all the tests. Many of the questions are just common sense, on the order of “A ball just rolled out in the street. What do you do? a. Speed up, or b. Slow down and prepare to stop.”

On the other hand, many of them are German common sense, meaning that the rules make sense to people who have been in Germany their whole lives, but maybe not to everyone else.

Then there are some that are just off-the-wall. One of the question is: “An employer can transport up to how many people to work in certain types of trucks?” The answer is 8, but it’s hard to see what value that bit of knowledge is going to have when I’m hurtling down the autobahn at 200kph on a dark and stormy night.

I didn’t feel very well prepared for the test, but a student is allowed to take the exam once a week until he passes. Since I’m on a time limit, it seemed like a good idea to start trying now.

The exams are held at 8AM every Monday at the local TÜV office (the German organization that is responsible for just about everything to do with safety or transportation). I went this morning to take the test.

Each test has 110 points on it, and each question is worth 2 to 5 points. Losing more than nine total points for incorrect answers is a failure. And even though I had been very careful to study all 60 of the tests I was given, there were questions on my actual exam paper that I didn’t remember seeing at all while I was studying–at least 30 points worth of questions.

Although we were told to expect to spend an hour on the test, I finished in 20 minutes, even having checked my answers twice. I think I was probably the first person finished, but I didn’t really understand the test proctor’s instructions, so I wasn’t sure what to do. About 10 minutes later, people started going up to the front to give the proctor the exams. He was grading them on the spot.

I was the 4th person in line, and all three of the people in front of me failed the exam. I was feeling pretty nervous by the time he got to me. When he marked a 3-point answer incorrect on my paper within the first 10 questions (out of 40) I was getting panicky. I had blown one of the common sense questions, so I knew I was in trouble on the technical and memorization questions on the last page. That’s where most of the questions I hadn’t see before were.

As he continued to grade, I was happy to see that I had answered all of the questions about right-of-ways correctly. Those rules are much different than in the US, so it takes some time to adjust and learn them.

Then he started grading the last page… I had spent most of my time during the test looking at these questions. There were a lot of questions I didn’t recognize, and I didn’t have a good frame of reference to answer some of them, either. As I watched nervously, he put the key down next to the answers, and none of them matched. I thought that was it. I would have to come bakc next week to try again. Then he realized the key wasn’t lined up right, and suddenly I had many more right answers.

As it turns out, I didn’t miss a single answer on the last page. I got 107 out of 110 possible points, so I passed the test. Now I can start concentrating on the driving test, which I probably dread even more. I have a meeting with my driving instructor on Wednesday to discuss what is on the test, and whether I should take any driver’s lessons before attempting the test. If parallel parking is on the test, this may take a while. At least I have a month and a half to work with.

By the way, the question about how many people can ride on the truck floor was on my test. So I guess I do know what practical value that bit of knowledge has: it’s worth 3 points!

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Carissa’s first day was today.   She’s going to the Catholic Kindergarten just down the hill from us.

Here’s a picture of her on her first day wearing the dress that Nana made for her:

Oh, and Cece wants her picture posted too:

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Here’s the latest ultrasound picture… If you look really close you can see if it’s a boy or a girl…  Feel free to post your guess!

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When I went to pick up Carissa at Kindergarten today, I asked her if she had talked to any or the other kids or learned any German.

She said, “Daddy, I talked to some other kids on the slide and in the green house. The kids call me Wieheissdu, but I told them my name was Carissa.”

For the German-impaired, “Wie heiss du?” means literally, “How are you called?” or “what is your name?”

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The hotel where we are staying is a typical example of an Italian holiday resort. It has a pool and a private beach (although access to the beach is through 300 meters of woods). The common areas like the lobby and the restaurant are well-kept, and in the same style of every other decent hotel you have ever seen. Our room is clean, but somewhat sterile, The tile floor helps with the removal of the sand tracked in from the beach. In the evening, the hotel runs a same dance club with a family atmosphere, but it starts late enough in the evening it will be difficult for us to attend. The relative luxury of the hotel was a welcome relief after our initial encounter with the town of Paestum. Honestly, from the drive into town, it was hard to imagine that there were any nice places to stay.

We opted for the half-board plan at the hotel, meaning that breakfast and dinner are included. We expect to eat out most days for lunch. Breakfast is typical European fare–the so-called continental breakfast-consisting of breads, meat, cheese, cereal, coffee and juice served in a buffet style.

For dinner, we select from a set of limited options. The meal is served in two courses, with an appetizer (usually a pasta dish) followed by a main course. One of the options for the main course is a buffet consisting of (cold) dishes from the local cuisine. There are a lot of interesting choices on the buffet, and we (at least the kids and I) have taken the opportunity to sample many of them.

For example, we have tried dishes like:

Mozzorelle di Bufala. This is a local delicacy that is advertised on nearly every restaurant sign in the area. It is made from buffalo milk and not “low-moisture” like most mozzarella served in the US.  It is very light and fluffy cheese with a very light taste. It is very good with balsamic vinegar.

Pizza rolls. Imagine Jeno’s Pizza Rolls, which are available in almost every frozen food aisle in the US, but made by someone who cares how food tastes.

Cold meat trays, containing proscuitto, pepperoni, salami, and all those other good, fattening, Italian-style meats.

Spiced Glazed Carrots with Parmesan Cheese. This is a really interesting dish that seems like it would be relatively easy to fix.

Random Rice dishes. There are several different rice dishes, each containing a distinct set of vegetables and sometimes meat. All of which have been very tasty, although I can’t really identify what the ingredients in all of them are.

Even more random vegetable dishes. There are all kinds of odd looking vegetable dishes that, with enough Italian spices and cheese, actually taste pretty good.

Garden salad. The buffet includes a salad bar, and some of the toppings are fairly unusual by American standards but very tasty. We have discovered, for example, that CeCe will eat her weight in the vinegar-soaked carrot, onion and bell pepper topping.

Meals are ended with a cappuccino or gelato dish. The kids are really enjoying the ice cream, so much that “eisss-cweem” is CeCe’s favorite new word of the week.

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The Campania region of Italy, which contains both Napoli and Paestum, is one of the poorest regions in Italy. Much of the economy is driven by agriculture and tourism, but on the other hand the economy is hampered byone ofthe worst corruption problems in a country where terrible corruption is well-known.

Let’s put it this way: one of our guidebooks says that crime is so well organized that the criminals have formed unions. No joke.

From my impression so far, the word I would use to describe Italy is “chaotic,” and that goes double for the Campania region.

Much of what we know about Europe so far has come from living in Germany. Italy, however, seems like another world entirely. Germans love rules and, in general, follow them. In Italy, it seems like the only rules are whatever you can get away with.

One of the most obvious areas where this difference appears is in terms of the environment. Germany has many laws designed to protect the environment, and everyone lives by them. German cars are inspected each year for compliance with smog laws. Germans live by strict trash and recycling laws. By contrast, in Italy, it seems like every other cars you see is pouring black smoke into the air, and in this region especially, trash seems to stay wherever it falls. Napoli seems to be trapped in a permanent smoggy haze. Mount Vesuvius, the volcano, is barely visible until you are almost at the base. And, no, it’s not because the volcano is spewing ash–Vesuvius has been completely inactive since the 1940s.

What does this mean for Paestum? Well, Paestum seems to suffer from the same problems as many other tropical regions around the world. If you have ever been to the Bahamas or to Cancun, Mexico or even to certain areas of Florida, you have seen Paestum. Every vacant lot is filled with trash. There are construction projects that seem to have been abandoned in the middle. Semi-paved dusty roads lead through dilapidated neighborhoods. Everything has been sun-baked.

And then there are tiny oases such as our hotel where order and beauty have been forced on the background environment, paid for with the travel dollars of tourists from elsewhere, like us.

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