Trains, Friends and the tiniest mention of my Nespresso Machine.

I’ve been busy and I have had no idea how to write of it all. 

Perhaps I should blog a story of each day because I know I have missed telling some beautiful stories along the way. I saw it begin to happen back in the Genova.  I dropped the ball when it came to some of the every day beauty of people and place.  There was the time I wanted to save the story of eating at Chichibio with Stefano until I could tell it beautifully ... but it slipped away in the cascade of the life I lived there.

It’s not too late though, and if you are ever in Genova and want someplace where you can enjoy exquisite food in elegant surroundings, I would suggest you hunt down Chichibio at via David Chiossone 20R.  You can phone for a reservation on 010 247 6191.  Not to be missed.  And, as always, I followed Stefano’s advice when ordering and had not one single regret. 

Grazie, Stefano ...a long overdue grazie.

Then, on Thursday, I was up and out the door with Gert.  Well, that was the intention however, he did ask me if I had my 10-ride train ticket for the big trip to Leopoldsburg and perhaps I didn’t ...

So I set out again, scarf and train-ticket packed, arriving in plenty of time to board my departing-hourly train and blogged my fabulous Wednesday from the train.  Destination reached, my lovely lovely friend, Judy, met me there with her car and over coffee we agreed, Maastricht was the destination.  I had heard rumours of book stores ... rumours whispered to me by Judy, who just happens to love books as much as me, if not more.

We started out in Selexyz Dominicanen, which has to be seen to be believed.  It is housed in a most unexpected space, a cathedral full of books, with a coffee-selling cafe up the back ... seemed like heaven to me.  I was disappointed with their selection of English books but then again, I’m not the easiest reader to please and have been spoilt by De Slegte, my favourite secondhand bookshop in Antwerpen.  It seems the English-reading Antwerpenaars and I are compatible.

After exploring Selexyz Dominicanen, Judy and I wandered off into the streets of Maastricht, making our way to the secondhand bookshop, De Slegte, Maastricht ... hooray.  And it was there that the wheels fell off Di’s Intention to be a Good and Frugal Wife.  No really huge crimes were committed.  There was a beautiful book titled Venice is a Fish, a sensual guide by Tiziano Scarpa - a Venetian poet, novelist, playwright, and essayist.  And a couple of others.  Under 20 euro altogether ...

If books are my heroin, then I think we could view this visit to my ‘supplier’ as hopeful in terms of managing my addiction.

It would have been more positive were I not currently intent on roaming the ‘Roads to Santiago with Cees Nooteboom.  A beautiful book ... exquisite.  I think you might really enjoy this one Shashikiran. 

But back to Thursday ... so Judy took me over to the river Maas, after book-shopping, to a beautiful little cafe on the edge of the water.  She wanted to show me that Maastricht really wasn’t in Luxemburg, Germany or Austria (silly kiwi girl), and it takes its name from the River Maas.  This river Okay? 
Okay ... I get it now.  Mostly.

Happy, we drove back across the border and into Belgium for dinner, where we devoured the most excellent pizza I’ve had in a while.  Dank u wel to Judy ... it was a lovely day in a lovely place with a lovely person.  And the pizza, a thank you to Willy too. 

Back in Antwerpen, and waiting for a very tardy tram 10, on the very day that Belgium was having its coldest 14 July since records began back in the 1860s.  It was an unexpected 12-14 celsius, with rain.  No one else there at the city tramstop was prepared for the summer plunge.  We were all very sad and grouchy.

Friday came along and was a slow day, where I caught up on housework and photo-processing.  There was a wee Nana-nap in the afternoon, some lovely Chianti in my evening ...

4.30am Saturday morning. 
I should have been sleeping.  I wasn’t.
I tried but no, that was me, still awake when the alarm went off at 6.30am. 
A mad dash, my bag packed (more or less), running from the house at 7.15am.  I was on my way to Brussels to visit with a lovely family ... or two.

I’ve been enjoying my recent adventures to parts of Brussels I’ve never been in.  Yes, it’s less compact than Antwerpen, difficult to navigate in some ways but those little villages within the city, like Ixelles and Stockel are so very worth visiting.

I was at Paola’s by midday and off on whole other adventure.  An international group of sculptors, a presentation of their work to the city ... champagne, red wine, lovely nibbles, excellent company and enough space in the big open-sided tent when the heavens opened and the rain poured down.

Evening came and it was a girls night in ... a multi-national private event with excellent conversations.  Oh, and the most delicious selection of food, accompanied by yet more champagne and red wine. 
Bliss ... just the 4 of us.

I arrived home today, using that first class train ticket that only costs 4euro more return on the weekend. I love first class.

Now I’m just waiting for tomorrow morning ... for breakfast and a Nespresso. 
I love my Nespreso machine.
Tomorrow ... the story of the machine.  You might want to find someone else to read, just in case I lose myself in Gollum-like mutterings ... my precious, my precious, drool, and etc.

Oh ... and I had the pleasure of spending quite some hours hanging out with this sweet little man this weekend.

Kathleen's Mum

I’m sure that every person who meets this delicious woman falls in love with her ... in all the various forms of ‘falling’ that there are.

I just adored her.  And this photograph almost seems more painting than photo but I think it suits her and so here I am, sharing this beautiful person with you.  I caught her at work in the kitchen ... but really, no one has made me giggle like she made me giggle.  Not in a long time.

A Slice of Life

It’s been busy lately, for weeks and months really ... an odd kind of unpredictable busy but these last 24 hours or so have felt slightly exceptional.  Full of good people, but exceptional.

Sunday afternoon found me feeling unwell.  I tried sleeping it off but only succeeded in messing up my ability to sleep that night.  Monday, I was up, on 4 hours of sleep.  I was heading for Brussels and had it all mapped out in terms of train times and which tram to catch to this new part of the city.

My idea was that, somewhere along the way during the day, I would find myself a really good espresso for strength.

I arrived at Antwerp’s Central Station with not enough time to join the queue that had formed in the coffee place.  I wasn’t prepared to have just any old coffee, I needed a really good espresso.  This much I knew.

No coffee ... I had no sooner settled on the train than I heard the conductor announce that this train would not be stopping at North Station ... my destination.  Okay, it said it would on the website but it wasn’t and so ... I climbed off in Mechelen to catch something else.  As I was waiting, a young man came sprinting up the stairs, just missing the Brussels-bound train I had left.  He threw his bag down angrily.  I waited a moment and mentioned the fact it wasn’t stopping at north station and then, voila, we ended up chatting a while.

His English was impeccable.  He was a student on his way to a mathematics exam but better than that, he was studying law and politics.  After talking of his year in Australia, we boarded the next train, held our breath while it tried to break down and the train guy announced that it had ... before it suddenly and successfully pulled out of the station.  We talked about Belgian politics all the way there.  Interesting, so interesting, as we head into a second year without a government since the last elections.

We said our goodbyes, I wished him luck although he was very relaxed about it all, and I wandered off to spend some time with the loveliest family over there in the big Belgian city.  They had a son with the most beautiful blue eyes I’ve ever seen and a delicious black labrador, as per the photograph below.  Anyone who knows me will know how I’ve been yearning for a labrador here in my Belgian life but never mind, it was enough to get a bit of a dog-fix for now.

After time spent in the park, the lovely family dropped me off on a tram that would get me back across the city more quickly however ... they assumed they were dealing with a normal adult who had a reasonable knowledge of Brussles.  I was ‘misplaced’ for a while but amused.  It’s never really that serious and getting unlost usually makes me laugh at myself.  I climbed off at Parc and found Central Station by some weird kind of instinctive luck. 

I NEEDED a coffee by now. But every place in the station, open at 3.30pm, looked like a place that make rubbish coffee.  I know ... it’s about me being a brat but I’m still readjusting to life after the exquisite Genovese espresso. 

I bought sparkling water, sadly, washing down the brie baguette thingy for lunch and boarded the train home ... falling asleep along the way. 

By the time I reached Antwerp Central Station I NEEDED a coffee.  I wandered into Starbucks, hoping their espresso was at least decent, as I can’t stand their other coffees. I followed the queue of people waiting, right to the end and voila, I was at the other exit door, so I exited.  Tram home, falling asleep, aching. 

Made it home and found it full of Miss 7 and her mum. 
Dinner was cooked by my very kind husband. 
Miss 7 was storied up and put to bed,then I couldn’t resist downloading and going through some photographs.

Getting late, I wanted to do one last check of the wedding photographs, before burning the 1,000 to dvds for the different bride friends who have been patient as I’ve sprinted through life since their weddings.

I fell into bed. 
Jess phoned, ‘How is Miss 7?’
‘Okay’, I replied. 
‘Okay ... good’, she tells me ‘but keep an eye on her because I’m vomiting’.
‘Oh ... she did say she had a sore tummy, I thought she didn’t want to sleep’.

1.32am ... Miss 7 starts vomiting.
I’m so tired.  The only solution seems, in that moment, to carry her bedding and put it next to my bed.
I do it.  I almost fall down the stairs doing it and ponder how nasty that would have been as I continue down.
We sleep until 3.23am when she vomits.
We sleep until 6.20am when she vomits again.
I consider this an uncommonly civilised kind of vomiting, as usually sleeping between bouts is all but impossible.

Morning finds me here at the computer.  Miss 7 on the couch, watching tv, drinking powerade slowly, sleeping a little ...

So it has been an active few hours, and then some, but by crikey ... I did meet some truly lovely people.  And a really nice dog.

Piazza delle Erbe, Genova

PasseXout internet cafe is one of the places I haunt while staying in Genova, is the internet cafe down in Piazza delle Erbe.  It opens at 10am Monday to Saturday, closed Sundays ... understandably closed, as they stay open until midnight or later.

The staff are friendly, they speak English and will sign you into their system as long as you can provide them with ID.  When I returned after almost 9 months away, I still had .80 cents in time sitting there in my account.

They don’t offer a wifi service but you can print A4 and A3 papers there.
Internet time costs 3 euro per hour.  Free wifi is restricted to a few cafes, 2 more since I was here last year but forget about Sundays, I haven’t located a Sunday internet source yet, and I have never seen more than 2 secured wifi signals floating loose here in the old part of the city.

No, my hands aren’t shaking ...

Anyway, PasseXout is located at Piazza delle Erbe 12R, and if you want to know more, you can mail them at ellepiemmesas@libero.it.

Bottega degli Aromi is just next door at 16R Piazza delle Erbe and I was so very glad I wandered in this time, as the mosquitoes decided to feast on me.  Initially, I did the usual and saw the pharmacist who gave me cream with hydrocortisone in it.  I resisted smearing it all over my bites not liking the idea of the cortisone.

Bottega deglia Aromi was an impulse followed.  I popped in to see if they had anything homeopathic and they did.  Crema cinque Fiori is the cream version of Rescue Remedy and my bites were much happier after it was applied.  In English the cream is called Five Flower Cream and comes from Healing Herbs.

You will also find Mario Rivaro and his exquisite gelato on Vico delle Erbe, 15/17R.  My favourite flavour is the cherry gelato, the piccolo version in a cone is more than enough to satisfy on a hot day.  However, that said, every choice offers new delights ... the lemon meringue gelato is stunning, as are the chocolate varities.  Tasting them all is too much to ask.

Piazza delle Erbe is one of many excellent places if you are looking for lunch or an aperitivo in the evenings.  A popular local haunt, you can order from various bars.  It reminds me a little of Campo dei Fiori in Rome but unlike Rome, locals outnumber the tourists

Ciao from Genova.