This is my new dilemma.  I am in search of a hairdresser.  Italian women go to the hairdresser weekly.  They have their hair washed and set, the color touched up, a little snip here or there.  They always look perfect.  I've mentioned before how much of their time and money goes into their appearance.  Even the school cleaning lady, who spends her days pushing around a wheeled bucket and mop, is impeccably coiffed.  Moi, not so much.  I find it all exhausting.  I'd been going to Super Mario in the city but he is too far and too expensive.  Frankly I just don't care enough about my hair to spend half a day and half my salary for a cut and color.  He's too high end for me.  A while back I tried a place down at the bottom of our hill with a distinctly less chic look.  When I walked in everyone stopped what they were doing.  When I started talking everyone stared.  I don't think they'd ever heard an accent before.  The problem is that when I suspect someone doesn't understand me, instead of slowing down, I start to speak more quickly thinking that speed will cover up any grammatical deficiencies.  Strange, but that rarely helps with comprehension. The woman who cut my hair didn't speak to me at all but just pointed at the chipped sink and the worn chair when she wanted me to move.  I'm not going back.  I really would rather not be stared at like a zoo animal, the cut wasn't great and I think they overcharged me.  So maybe that time I aimed too low.  I asked around at school and an American mom I know said there was a place very near me that she'd heard good things about.  It's close enough to walk, looks good but not too good, and when I stopped in to make an appointment I was greeted at the door by a chocolate lab, a big smiling bald guy and a laughing little old lady in curlers you kept pointing at the dog and saying, "That's the hairdresser, that's the hairdresser!"  I'm going in on Tuesday.  I feel like Goldilocks.  The first place was too hot, the second too cold and hopefully this one will be just right.  xxoo me

101 in Italian bureaucracy.  Anything that should be simply can and will be made complicated.  Example number one:
I have somehow or another been made the go-between for a couple of colleagues, who don't speak much Italian, and their utilities companies, who speak no English.  I have been given the assignment of setting up satellite TV for one and questioning the bills from the electric/gas company for another.  Today at school I called ENEL, the energy providers.  I was typically, (just as in the States), put on hold, sent from one representative to another and told to press lots of buttons before finally reaching a live person.  The live person asked for my name, ID number, (SS#), client number etc and I explained that I was calling for a customer who spoke little Italian and only needed to ask a few questions.  The rep told me that she needed my info because one never knows what I could do with friend B's electricity account.  I was already in a bad mood, (more on that later), and didn't feel like giving her my info so I tried to argue that my data wouldn't do her any good as she would be looking at B's account.  That didn't work.  So I tried something else which was to say, "Fine", but to give her B's info.  (I thought I was being very clever.)  However, when she pulled up the account my ruse was discovered and she became most huffy.  She said that B had to speak to her and I again explained that she couldn't because she doesn't speak Italian.  This was getting us nowhere, so finally I gave her my name, which for all she knows was false, and told her I didn't have an ID number as was just visiting from the US because to be perfectly honest, it wasn't a matter of principle as I don't really have many, it's just that I haven't memorized the damned number because it 20 characters long and I didn't feel like getting up and digging through my purse to find my card.  Bingo.  I got the very top secret information regarding B's electric and gas bills.  Now I am trying, unsuccessfully, to set up a time for another friend to have SKY TV antenna installed.  He set up an account online but needs to speak to them on the phone to make an appointment.  Unfortunately anytime he calls and tries to communicate in his very broken Italian, they hang up on him.  First I called SKY and was told that I have to speak to the technicians who are actually subcontracted, and therefore at a different number.  I called the technicians who said, no, I have to speak to the installer, whose name in Stefano, who is subcontracted through yet a different company and so at another number yet again.  I called Stefano who obviously is in the antenna installers union because he told me he only works from 9 to 5 with an hour lunch break so essentially only does 4 installations a day at 9:30, 11, 2 and 3:30.  I asked for 4 but couldn't get it.  He has to clock-out by 5.  "Ahhh, of course.", I said.  (He didn't seem to catch the sarcasm in my voice.)  "So how does a working person get an antenna installed?"  Silly me.  As though he gives a flying ****.  And they wonder why the Italian economy stinks.  I don't know how this one will be resolved.

Example number two, (and reason for my bad mood this afternoon):
Back in October, my library colleague and I put in the first of our supply and book orders at the school.  Subsequently we have placed two other orders, all of very essential materials.  We have received 2 rolls of tape.  That's it.  Any inquiries just pass the buck until they reach the desk of a man whose actually position is very murky.  He's there because he used to work with the Head of the school's Board of Directors in FIAT.  I don't know what he did there either.  The Head brought him in to the school some years ago where he marches smartly along the halls, dressed to the nines in expensive suits, and doesn't make eye contact with lowly workers like myself.  This is very common in Italy and another huge problem with the work force.  Too many people are given positions because of who they are related to or friends with.  They are paid a bundle of money to do absolutely nothing except hold a job title.  Our orders are held up because somehow this guy controls the purse strings.

I am now going to go get a glass of wine, or two.    xxoo me

I'm not crazy about Milan.  It's a huge, grey, smoggy city with little character.  But last night my friend B and I went to an area that I'd never visited.  It's called Zona Navigli or "navigable canal zone".  Many hundreds of years ago, canals were built connecting some of the large northern lakes to the river Ticino which empties out into the Po river which leads to the Adriatic near Venice.  It was all part of a navigation system for Milan transport dating back to the 1100's.  Most of the canals were covered over in the mid 1900's but some remain and have been revitalized.  About 10 years ago someone recognized the value of this cool, old area of Milan and it became a haven for artists and funky secondhand retailers.  The area is mostly pedestrian and the canals are lines with restaurants and bars and shops and galleries.  It reminds me equally of parts of Venice and the Old Port.  Last night was chilly and pouring but the locales were still packed, with even the outside bars filled with people huddled under the canopies and umbrellas on the sidewalks.  We grabbed a drink in one of these places, sitting under a canvas "roof", with warmth provided by those tall gas outdoor heaters.  We were very cozy.  We had a few hours to waste while our girls enjoyed their concert so we wandered in and out of various shops that were still open at 8 in the evening.  I found lots of wonderful, useless things that I wanted to buy but thankfully I didn't have my credit card so GP was saved from waking up to a clock made out of a vinyl record and a hanging lamp made from an old vodka bottle.  Next time!  xxoo me