Stinco 10th ottober 2011

Back to the childish names for Italian things section - today we have "stinco" - mmm a fine cut of stinco, mmm a fine slice of stinco. Yum yum,

Actually, I purchased before I knew what it was, and only because of the funny name. Indeed, I ate it before I knew what the name meant too! Actually it means "shin" and it is partiallywas partially cooked, and with a load of veggies roasted it was tremendous.

I had not this word before, but it reminded me if a funny time I had recently (why am I getting a flashback to an Escort letters page here??). Living in Siena you get used to being surrounded by tourists. Siena has plenty: German, American, Dutch, French, occasionally English (strange that there are not so many Brits in Siena - compare to when I was in Venice recently when all I heard was English accents). I was out walking with Martin when he came to stay and an annoyed German father came past us dragging a young child along with him. The child had his shorts down round his knees and his hand almost fist deep up his behind. The father said "ohne schtinken" and that has kept me in private giggles ever since. The poor child clearly was touching cloth, well the turtles head was out and was physically trying to return the pesky brown trout back to where it came from, whilst being dragged along by his father doing the classic "I need a poo" walk. Thank you tourists.

Shockingly open venerdi 7th ottobre 2011

It has been the case of the century - Amanda Knox and some other people (I am being deliberately bathetic here) have spent 4 years in jail for a crime they did not commit. Or did they?

4 years ago, a young British student was murdered in Perugia, a town in Umbria, about a couple of hours south east of Siena. Her throat was cut after a night out. Several people were accused, including Amanda Knox who become a media sensation, due to the fact that she was young, attractive, american, and had what the british and american press love to work with - a saucy past, very much into sex games, and also had a great moniker "Foxy Knoxy".

Some years ago, three people were found guilty of the murder - Foxy Knoxy, her Italian boyfriend and another fella. There has been a review and and after a very protracted court case in Perugia, Foxy Knoxy, I will call her Amanda (and her boyf, well, ex-boyf), has been released.

The statement read by the judge was "Non hanno commesso il fatto" - "they have not done the thing". The DNA evidence on the knife used to kill the poor girl was proven to be of such poor quality that it should not have been sufficient to prove guilt.

This leaves of course a very unfortunate situation for the parents and family of Meredith Kircher - the girl who was killed - who still have no answer as to what happened (of course, ignoring the fact that Rudy Guede is still incarcerated for the crime). "Vogliamo la verita' su Meredith lotteremo ancora per avere giustizia" - "we want the truth on Meredith we will fight on to have justice". "Movente troppo fragile ed errori sul DNA cosi' sono crollate le prove dell'accusa" - "Motive too weak and errors in DNA evidence caused the collapse of the case against the accused".

Despite all this, the Italians are not happy. In fact, in the same headline which stated that they did not commit the crime, the second part read "Fischi e urla in piazza: vergogna" - "whistles and yells in the town square: shame". The Italians are not happy, and apparently did not take Amanda to heart the same way that the british and american press did. Her final plea in Italian, was well scripted and very well said, with a good accent - as you'd expect after living in an Italian prison for 4 years (at this point I am fighting extremely hard to avoid trite references to my job as being in an Italian prison - anyway - at least she can now speak Italian and will make some money out of her experiences!). But no - the Italians seem to not like her. Mind you, Italians don't really like Americans at the best of time, from what I've seen. In fact, a few months ago we were at a friend's (British) place for a barbeque. Later in the afternoon one of the Italian's had to go and pick up her mum from somewhere and brought her along to the party. She was a real character - so much fun, full of beans and life. Absolute Italian through and through, probably very typical Tuscan - poor, but heart of gold, and of course, does not speak a single word of English. Interestingly enough, as she was introduced to all the people at the party - British, Aussie, German, USA. She politely said hello to all of us but when she was introduced to Dawn - the only American - she smiled and rolled her fingers in the Italian symbol for money. This was absolutely shocking and really tells you a lot about how normal Italians and certainly Italians who live in tourist areas, think of the yanks.

However, the most shocking piece of this, in my mind, came out yesterday. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/8809514/Amanda-Knox-judge-She-may-know-the-real-truth.html

The judge of the case has come out and said he thought that Amanda Knox could know who the real killer is. In fact, "the judge stressed in a television interview in Italy last night that the verdict handed down by the appeal court was a reflection of the “the truth that was created in the trial.” “But the real truth could be different,” he said, adding: “They (Miss Knox and co-accused Raffaele Sollecito) could also be responsible, but the proof isn’t there.”"

This has left me frankly speechless, it is in complete opposition to the statement at the conclusion of the trial, and the ability for a judge to come and say this I find disgusting. Is this a reflection of the pointless respect to authority in Italy? Berlusconi is a jerk, but noone does anything about it, because he has power. Working with Italians, there is pointless amount of "respect" to people who are older, or at a higher level in the work organisation is frankly disgusting, as well as being extremely annoying. Whilst I appreciate the respect in society, at work it makes certain things absolutely impossible. Of course, when you buck the trend and start swearing and shouting at Italians who are senior to you it gets quite funny. Managed to make someone cry yesterday in the office with this behaviour, which I was pleased with, because you have to stop Italians thinking like Italians to get any work done.

Back to Foxy Knoxy - she said that she struggled to speak in English when she got back to america, and if you look at her hand gestures in the picture that I've attached, she has clearly really picked up the Italian way of speaking and expressing herself. I hope that she hasn't gone too far, as it can be hard to express yourself in English after picking up all these Italian memes and hand gestures. I do wonder if some of the deference that they have to authority is related to the language and the body language - you can learn so much from just watching any group of Italians chatting to each other animatedly. There is no need to actually speak any Italian - observing hand gestures without speaking any English you can follow any conversation. Come se dice in Italiano? Non lo so, ma in francese e cosi' - "Vive la difference!"

There is lot of volatility in the system sabato 8 ottobre

There is a lot of volatility in the system

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-15222803

Italian debt has been downgraded. Again. For the second time this week. What does this mean? Is the GBP the best place to put money? Or should it be in Swiss Francs which seems to be going up and up? Or even gold which retains money through the toughest of times? From what I have read the debt of Italy is triple the combined debt of Greece, Spain and Ireland. Now that is terrifying. Not least the terror comes from a lack of realisation about this. OK so it is reported in the papers but nothing seems to change, and how Berlusconi has stayed in post is just simply unfathomable. At least Italy has a very strong tourist industry and food industry, which allows it to survive better than Greece. But where does this leave me? I work for a Swiss company but am employed under an Italian contract. Italian salaries are an absolute farce, the pay is incredibly low and the tax is very high. In fact, at current situation we would be better off moving to the USA and one of us stopping work!!! However, I am lucky that I am employed on what is essentially a foreigner's contract so relatively I am doing very well - I really have no idea how the Italians at non-executive level do well enough to afford food, let alone buy a house. In fact, a lot of houses are handed down through families in SIena, partly fuelled by the ridiculous prices - it's nigh on impossible to buy a 2-bed apartment for under 550k EUR, and also influenced by the low birth rate - Italy's birth rate is the lowest in Europe at 1.4 per capita.

So where does this leave me? I feel overworked, underpaid, underappreciated, but I do have a job and live in a beautiful area of the world. I have to remind myself of this a lot a lot a lot a lot. At this moment, there is volatility in the company - head count is very very tight, and budget restrictions are, well, strict, restricting, restrictive, dictatorial. This comes down to me as being extremely frustrating trying to get things to work and make ends meet, whilst trying to keep the pipeline going. As much as I would like this not to affect me, it does. I spend far too much time in the office and this affects me. The volatility I feel at work and the volatility and frustration that one finds when living as an alien means that me life is volatile. Once again, I have to remind myself of the good stuff.

Now where is that good stuff? Wine is good and cheap. Ambiance is good (when outside the office). Food is great, if overpriced. People are very pleasant - if difficult to get to know them beneath the veneer. And it's safe. Volatility is also present in equal measure in the UK and the USA, and looking back, although the grass is greener, its pretty green over here too. So for now, we stay put.

Stay sane inside insanity.