Disastro

Hey all,

went out last night after getting a text telling me where people were meeting – this had been relayed on to me by someone who had my number from someone else again (I relayed it on to yet another) – so wandered back in to centro – and met up with a bunch of people from the school, none of whom I really know, all of whom are Spanish and although probably in their early 20's seem (from my state of ancient decrepitude) to be about twelve. German opera singer showed up and had the same opinion as me – we wandered along in the group for a bit, but the only other person there that either of us could really talk to (theoretically) was this Scot in his late 20's – as far as Scots go he is a bit of a cliché in that he smiles, exactly once, when you first meet him, in a thin-lipped uncomfortable kind of way, like he taught himself how to do so in a mirror – and that is the last expression you see from him until you catch it out of the corner of your eye as he introduces himself to someone else for the first time. Presumably back home he communicates emotion with other Scots by way of hints, subtle metaphors, slight twitches of the eyelid and barely perceptible nods. In Scottish terms he may even be gregarious. But neither I nor opera singer can figure him out, so we headed off – on the way back we bumped in to contemporary dancer, as well as this Spanish girl in her late 20's: a very attractive girl in a very sinister kind of way – spends her time chain smoking and glaring at the world through lidded eyes – I suspect she has killed at least one man. Certainly she plans to. When I noticed her this evening across the street she was leaning against a wall in the shadows, smoking, peering from side to side in a baleful kind of way – directly underneath a brass plaque for a private investigator. Wonderful. Also another Spanish girl who is quite lovely – she has missed a few classes because she is being led astray by the exuberant pianist, who doesn't seem to need sleep and exists on a diet of alcohol, cigarettes and conversation. The young Spanish girl stays out on the gas with him, but unlike him she can't manage to get up and go to school half an hour later – fyi: despite appearances, behaviour, and the intuition of everyone at the school, the exuberant pianist claims to be homosexual. I am not at all convinced. I think it is just a rumour he spreads for complicated reasons to do with his music.

Anyway, this group was off to meet the group that opera singer and myself had just left – but I thought it would be a bit rude to turn around and head back after just leaving them (“Hi guys, some more interesting people decided to join you so here I am again...”) so I said goodbye and wandered off – opera singer went his own way to meet up with some other girls in some other piazza that he had some other vague plans about.

I planned to walk home by the river and take some photos, but ended up wandering around in circles in increasingly smaller alleys (which was fun) until one of them kind of exploded out on to this piazza near the Uffizi, when I figured out where I was – took a bunch of photos to try to give a sense of how beautiful it all is at night – no tripod, so was just doing it by sitting the camera on ledges, fences, rocks and so on – hopefully I captured a sense of it. I think one of them might be of that above-ground hallway the Medicis built to the Uffizi so they could go there without having to see or speak to people who were beneath them, in every sense. At one point The Doors, “Come on baby light my fire” was blaring out across the river from underneath some medieval castle. Nuts. I Finally got home, spoke to K on Skype – her office is now chock full of weird props for the latest production – video chat is becoming increasingly surreal: her face, surrounded by creepy things that should be in a horror movie, lurking at the edges of the screen. I am sure I will have nightmares.

Also have a photo of my latest purchase – a book which I might have an outside chance of being able to struggle my way through by the end of the month. Have I mentioned the effect it has on my ego to go from Milton in English to Winnie the F***ing Pooh in Italian? And I still only get one word in ten. Then, just because I can't resist, another one of those little three wheeled ute things that look like they would tip over whenever you opened the door, let alone when you drove one around a corner with a load in the back.

Is raining today and I am having a break from trying to memorise vocab – which is about where I am at – all the little words, like “the” (of which there seems to be, as far as I can understand it, about eight versions, maybe more) are beyond me at this point – but I figure if I can memorise some basic vocab then at least I can get corrected when I try to use it.

Cheers, B.

Later: just made lunch – opera singer looked at it, said, “Oh my God! It's a disaster! An Australian disaster! That is what they call you at school, by the way, the Australian 'Disastro'”. I asked him if this were true, as seems likely. He said it was not, but I think it might be.