Birthday Girl, Wildflowers and a new Baby

Since I sprained my ankle last month hiking on the trails above Portovenere I have been limited to strolls on the passagiata of Chiavari. Not today. Wednesdays - the Ladies Walk and Lunch (see the side bar link to the confusing Dutch/English blog in my roll). This week in honor of Joanne's "mmm hmm" birthday, the ladies were ready to hike, and, hike my favorite trail. How dare I refuse? But, I did convince Sam to give us a head start and spare us (and  my sore ankle) a two hour slog uphill from Lavagna by dropping us off at the trial head on top of San Giacomo - 500 + meters above sea. Thank you Sam!
We might have had a head start, but we walked! The idea was a nice 2-3 hour hike from San Giacamo across to Capenardo then down into Sestri for lunch at Luna Blu. Ok. Easy enough.
All started out fine, after all, Sam got us started on the right trail and is was just as lovely as the last time I saw it a year ago. See my profile photo to your right? That shot was taken in June last year just after a heavy thunderstorm.  And, as you can see in the photo above, the wild flowers are just as beautiful this year as they were last year. A little rain and lots of sun and the hills around here bloom alive. Thankfully, today, though we were in the clouds and it was threatening to do so, it didn't rain.

We were doing fine, until, we reached the point where we started our descent. Me, the only one who has walked this trail, and I will admit, I have walked this trail many times in both directions, made a bit of a mistake. I was having a hard time with my sore ankle and walking downhill was not proving easy, therefore I took the nice road to the left when, I really should have taken the narrow trail to the right. We ended up on the right road, but, in the the wrong place. Story of my life and, actually, how I ended up in Italy. A move to Monaco in France somehow took us to Genoa in Italy... but I am going off topic, again.

We now found ourselves on a road that I had no recollection of -  and was twisting and turning in every direction but the way we wanted - downhill towards the sea.  I was just hoping that my walking guru skills weren't failing me, because I hated to admit it but, it seemed we were walking into the entroterra (wrong way) and not down to the mare (right way).  I stopped to scratch my head, get my bearings and read the trail map - with out my glasses I may add. Hopeless aren't I? Fast thinking Nicole came to my rescue. She whipped out her fancy cell phone, complete with GPS, downloaded our coordinates, and, in seconds reassured us we were going in the right direction on the correct road! Soon enough we found the red triangle marking the trail on a wall. 30 minutes later we were sitting on the beach in Sestri taking off our hiking shoes and slipping on our sandals..... Ahh.... Who needs a man, or a compass for that matter, when you have NOKIA with Global Positioning! Kiitos Finlandia... 

Four hours after we started out, we were more than ready for lunch, me, I was ready for a nice glass of white wine. Hey, this walking guru thing is STRESSFUL! 

Was the day over for the intrepid walking ladies of Liguria? Nah. They hopped on the bus that took them back to Chiavari and in their own directions. One went home to take care of her family, the other to a flute lesson. Me? No sooner I was in my apartment, I was out the door. Today was a very important day, OK,  it was Joanne's Birthday, but, it was also a special day for another reason.

 Today, Sarah's new violin was BORN!

After 6 months of waiting and a fitting midway. Sarah's new violin emerged from the liutaio's workshop this afternoon! 

This is Sarah's very first Italian, custom made violin. It has never been played by any other violinists. Why did I use born? Well other than a bad translation from Italian, Sarah has to "raise" this violin. Give it a "life". And to do that - she has to play it, and play it so much as to give this instrument its "anima" or soul. Perfect. Sarah HAS to play, this is music to my ears. Sarah HAS to play her violin. Did  say that again? Oops. 

Now, my baby, has, her delicate baby in her hands. If Sarah loves her violin and cares for it tenderly, hopefully, her baby, will make Sarah as proud as she, my baby, makes me. 

Krista

Personal Projects

 

Here is Sarah Friday afternoon presenting her "personal statement" at school. She played her violin, gave a lecture on Paganini and his violin the "cannone" which now lives in a vault located in the "Municipo di Genoa" or City Hall. Her violin teacher is one of only a few who has privilege to play it, so once a year Sarah gets to gaze upon the priceless violin. I digress...

Getting back to Friday evening and prom night and my little personal project, Sarah. 

Povera Sarah, Friday, she just couldn't get a break. 

• In the morning she went to the station - all the trains were late...We drove in, and she was still late for school. 
  
• After school, she had to present her personal project first so she could leave for Orchestra practice. Her teachers were late... She was an hour late for orchestrata.... 
  
• To add insult, traffic was snarled on the streets surrouonding the tiny church where the young orchestra was practicing, she had to take a bus to meet me when she was done... 
  
• I took her to the hairdresser to fix her up for the prom. They made her wait an hour...

And so the day went...

At the end of the evening - which rewarded her day's struggles by being perfectly magical - she got out of the taxi, took a step to the door - and the contents of her tiny clutch spilled out into the road, including, my nearly new digital camera. 

Sunday morning, all excited to see the photos, we plugged the camera to my laptop and tried to download the files. On the camera screen there was no menu to select from, only a white fuzz with jagged black lines. The screen was cracked! Thankfully, the photos moved from the camera to the laptop, but, the camera was rendered useless. Sarah apoligized over and over again. I felt bad and what can you say? Lending children your precious things always comes with a risk.

What did my plucky little girl do? She went out for a walk that afternoon - in the rain - and bought me a new camera with her OWN money. Money she earned doing translations and diligently saved with the intention that Sarah would buy herself a new digital SLR camera this summer. When presented with my "gift" I could have cried.  The broken camera was already written off and any disappointment no longer lingered - I mean, things happen. I was standing there in the hall stuck in an awkward moment. As a parent, I looked at her little face, so full of pride that she had made a wrong - right. I had to pause to collect my thoughts and respond as to not hurt her, but I knew in my heart, there was no way that I could accept that camera. Then it hit me, I knew exactly why my dad, every time I buy him a gift, says, "ah you don't have go and do that, I don't need anything". I get it now. I understand why parents never feel comfortable with "bought" gifts from their kids.  

Will I keep the camera? Yes. How could I not? Making Sarah take it back would only break her heart. Am I going to give Sarah back her money? You betcha!  

Prom, Italian Style

Sarah went off to her first prom Friday night. Sigh.

Thoughts?

My, little miss I cannot be bothered to dress neatly to go to school showed up looking like a glamourous flapper straight from the roaring 20s complete with feathers in her hair. I bet she turned a few heads. Sarah - Sarah who? I think, from listening to the playback, our comfortable little world that did not include boys has been put up on the shelf for us to long wistfully over and the time has come for Sam to brush up on his shotgun skills.

That sums it up quite nicely. Atta girls Sarah. You were the Bee's knees and it is none of our beeswax if any boy cashed in.....


Cheers!

Update

Finally, after over of week of radio silence - yes, my lack of blogging was because we were off the information super highway thanks to Telecom Italia updating the "centro linea" and throwing us off the grid. For an unbelievable 5 days we had no dial tone! Then, when we finally got back on  "the centro linea" our internet provider's inability to sort out the mess was, well, enough for me to dream of the efficiency of AT&T and the love of ol' Mabell. But, mysteriously, amazingly, after Sam threatened to cancel our contract with our internet service provider - Tiscali - our adsl signal is back. Hmmm. Strange, no?

Lessons learned from our week of phone ping pong trying to sort this mess out:

• Always have a back up internet service if you have a home office and a blackberry is a mighty communication tool.

• We are all, Sarah, Anna,  and especially me - internet addicts. 10 days of no email, facebook, messenger, Drudge Report, and Perez Hilton! We were at each other's throats, withdrawal anyone?
• Threats work, really work.
  

Right, so what have we been up to for the last few weeks? Without internet, it is amazing, but life does go on!

The biggest "happening" was last Sunday. Anna celebrated her confirmation into the Catholic faith. The church was packed and Anna glowed. She wore heels for the first time and towered over us all. My baby, well, she is gone. 

After the ceremony Anna chose to have her party at the beach. On a perfect spring/summerlike day, 
we headed to Luna blu for lunch and a swim with friends. Perfect end to a perfect day!

Krista

Marcia di Chiavari

Ian, Jan and Sam after the Marci di Chiavari. 12 gruelling kilometers of jogging up and then down into Chiavari. Real sport for real men.

Feeling a bit peckish after that, Sam Sarah and I headed off into the hills of Santa Stefano d'Avento for a hearty lunch at one of those places that after you sit down, the food just appears... and never stops coming.Gotta love the senile old lady serving the food - sweet and complete with pink stockings! As she exited the kitchen, she just shouted the name of the dish and we pointed to where it belonged. Priceless. Then, after eating way too much pasta, polenta, scaloppina, fries - even dessert, for little money, we pushed ourselves from the table and hiked to a secluded "prato" with a stream and laid down a blanket. A little light reading then a little light napping...
and we were golden!

Hey There Birthday Girl!

Quick post for my baby.....

I love you!

Happy Birthday my princess.

Mom

Easter, Italian Style

How is that for catching up....