Cell Phone and SMS
if you don't have _AT LEAST_ one then you do not exist!
Do you send at least 10 SMS's per day? no? then what are you an alien?
if at this point you are asking yourself 'what the fuck is an SMS anyway?' then you
are simply from planet Mars or beyond. :-)
I have sent and received more messages, and used my cell phone more in the last 4 days
than in the previous 3 years! I'm already thinking of getting a second one so that I
can have cheap rates with all Vodafone subscribers as well as WIND subscribers. :-)
Decartes once said: Cogito erogo sum (or something like this), but right now it must read
SMS ergo sum! :-D
Good night! Shahram
Sunday, January 30, 2005
Melina Velba And Friends
First 3 days
Hard to define a 'mood' for these notes. Since there is no wireless :-) I wrote them at different times and with very different moods from pissed off to ecstatic. I'm pretty sure you can tell my mood from the notes.
one thing though: the traffic is so crazy to be almost funny. 405 near LAX at 3pm in LA doesn't look that bad any more. :-)
26 January
SMART:
I saw the first one on our way yo my old place from the airport.
I thought someone with a toy car (I'm dead serious!) had got on
the highway by mistake. I was then told this was the famous SMART car
(I really think the name is meant to be ironic) which has a
Mercedes engine and a swatch (the fancy swiss watch company) cover.
roma nord:
I was misquoted on this one in Francesca's account. What I recalled
from my old neighborhood was far from the reality today. to some extent
it reminded me of the dirtier part of East village in NY. crowded
like crazy and pretty old compared to the images in my head.
when we first moved to this neighborhood in 1996 I thought it looked too
new and industrial compared to the beautiful 'old' and ancient centro storico
di Roma.
6 years spent in california in places that are at most 20 years old, and now
all of a sudden this place looks 'old' (not in a good way).
Next week Francesca will take me for a tour of Colosseo and all around it
on her motorino. I already know that's gonna be a wonderful view of
old buildings. :-)
28 January
food:
well let's start with the best thing so far: food!
of course not unexpected but way too good to be true.
from the cheap sandwich on campus for 1.60 euro, to the espresso
at the bar (meant as a coffee shop in Italy and not a place for liquor
as intended in the US:-)), from pizza al taglio, to fior di latte
and mozzarella from GS supermarkets, the quality is just superb!
Food tastes good and there's no more that disturbing sweet taste in
everything. Not to mention that the calorie content of the stuff
actually makes sense now. :-)
Even the 'cornetto alla crema' at the airport tasted great. and I had
my first supli` at a rosticceria in the neighborhood tonite after
6.5 year!
bad bad bad: bureaucracy! It was bad then it is probably worse now.
It took 2 days to find out who to talk to about my starting the job.
This was the easy part.
Obtaining the permit of stay (il permesso di soggiorno) is by far more confusing.
Nobody has seen a contract like mine, nor has any idea which documents
could be needed to apply for my soggiorno! This is supposed to be
done within the first 8days after one's entry. 2 days are lost and
6 more to go. Needless to say the official website of the police department
has nothing useful on this regard. The information reported are correct
(probably) but apply only for a specific set of jobs. More on this on
Monday. This can potentially become a pain in the ass since anything
I can think of doing requires me first having the soggiorno issued:
bank account, visa to other countries, just to mention a couple of
things that come to mind.
overall this has been the most frustrating and discouraging aspect
of being back.
Luckily there is Daniele's mom who has come to save me twice in the last 14 days.
Looks like I can now go to the police office (in 6 hours) and hopefully file for
my permesso di soggiorno. :-))
How does it compare to the US? It just doesn't. In the US things
can go slowly sometimes but one knows _exactly_ what to do, where,
what to expect. here it's more of a hit-and-miss style. not efficient
and definitely not pleasant.
transportation:
certainly improved. way more busses all over the place. I could
find my way easily. and even the website http://www.atac.roma.it
works really nicely and gives useful and correct information. I must
admit this goes by far beyond my expectation. But of course there
is the problem of traffic...
traffic:
if you thought LA or SD were bad, well come to Rome for a change.
It took only a few hours here to realize that what I called traffic
in SoCal is a funny joke down here. I still look around amazed by the
number of cars and moving objects on the streets. Not sure how long
before I'll dare to drive or ride one myself. Hopefully sometime before
the end of February or I'll be in trouble checking out the night scene. :-)
Hard to define a 'mood' for these notes. Since there is no wireless :-) I wrote them at different times and with very different moods from pissed off to ecstatic. I'm pretty sure you can tell my mood from the notes.
one thing though: the traffic is so crazy to be almost funny. 405 near LAX at 3pm in LA doesn't look that bad any more. :-)
26 January
SMART:
I saw the first one on our way yo my old place from the airport.
I thought someone with a toy car (I'm dead serious!) had got on
the highway by mistake. I was then told this was the famous SMART car
(I really think the name is meant to be ironic) which has a
Mercedes engine and a swatch (the fancy swiss watch company) cover.
roma nord:
I was misquoted on this one in Francesca's account. What I recalled
from my old neighborhood was far from the reality today. to some extent
it reminded me of the dirtier part of East village in NY. crowded
like crazy and pretty old compared to the images in my head.
when we first moved to this neighborhood in 1996 I thought it looked too
new and industrial compared to the beautiful 'old' and ancient centro storico
di Roma.
6 years spent in california in places that are at most 20 years old, and now
all of a sudden this place looks 'old' (not in a good way).
Next week Francesca will take me for a tour of Colosseo and all around it
on her motorino. I already know that's gonna be a wonderful view of
old buildings. :-)
28 January
food:
well let's start with the best thing so far: food!
of course not unexpected but way too good to be true.
from the cheap sandwich on campus for 1.60 euro, to the espresso
at the bar (meant as a coffee shop in Italy and not a place for liquor
as intended in the US:-)), from pizza al taglio, to fior di latte
and mozzarella from GS supermarkets, the quality is just superb!
Food tastes good and there's no more that disturbing sweet taste in
everything. Not to mention that the calorie content of the stuff
actually makes sense now. :-)
Even the 'cornetto alla crema' at the airport tasted great. and I had
my first supli` at a rosticceria in the neighborhood tonite after
6.5 year!
bad bad bad: bureaucracy! It was bad then it is probably worse now.
It took 2 days to find out who to talk to about my starting the job.
This was the easy part.
Obtaining the permit of stay (il permesso di soggiorno) is by far more confusing.
Nobody has seen a contract like mine, nor has any idea which documents
could be needed to apply for my soggiorno! This is supposed to be
done within the first 8days after one's entry. 2 days are lost and
6 more to go. Needless to say the official website of the police department
has nothing useful on this regard. The information reported are correct
(probably) but apply only for a specific set of jobs. More on this on
Monday. This can potentially become a pain in the ass since anything
I can think of doing requires me first having the soggiorno issued:
bank account, visa to other countries, just to mention a couple of
things that come to mind.
overall this has been the most frustrating and discouraging aspect
of being back.
Luckily there is Daniele's mom who has come to save me twice in the last 14 days.
Looks like I can now go to the police office (in 6 hours) and hopefully file for
my permesso di soggiorno. :-))
How does it compare to the US? It just doesn't. In the US things
can go slowly sometimes but one knows _exactly_ what to do, where,
what to expect. here it's more of a hit-and-miss style. not efficient
and definitely not pleasant.
transportation:
certainly improved. way more busses all over the place. I could
find my way easily. and even the website http://www.atac.roma.it
works really nicely and gives useful and correct information. I must
admit this goes by far beyond my expectation. But of course there
is the problem of traffic...
traffic:
if you thought LA or SD were bad, well come to Rome for a change.
It took only a few hours here to realize that what I called traffic
in SoCal is a funny joke down here. I still look around amazed by the
number of cars and moving objects on the streets. Not sure how long
before I'll dare to drive or ride one myself. Hopefully sometime before
the end of February or I'll be in trouble checking out the night scene. :-)
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