Groceries

I will never get used to the meat aisle. Could not find ground beef today, but there was ground horse, which is an odd maroonish brown, almost like the pulp of an over-ripe blood-orange (or, you know, like horse flesh). Then I had to reach over a two-pack of skinned rabbit heads (freaking staring at me buggers) to grab some chicken breast. So, vocab of the day: machinato di cavallo, testa di coniglio.

Looking for a picture to add to this posting, I came across a recipe for rabbit head pasta, using all the ingredients readily available to those of us in Italy, and readily avoidable to anyone not. And there are pictures. Lots of rabbit head pictures.

PS: My google search for "rabbit head" taught me not to attempt a "horse meat" query.

Residency

Let me write down just the punchline of our saga to get G into asilo nido, and since I tell stories more and more like my mother, this will probably take several hundred words, so less punchline-y and more, well, by the time you’re done you’ll be thankful I’m only including two attempts and not all five.

Episodes #3 and #4 in the Asilo Nido Saga are all about residency: to be a part of an Italian community, you must be a resident. As I was researching our move to Italy, I saw the idea of residency come up a lot in online forums, but I thought it was retired hippy expat speak for “I didn’t truly understand Italy until I moved here.”

Nope, turns out it’s a legal term.

Italy is split into regions and the regional governments provide services that apply only to their residents. We wanted to enroll G in an asilo nido comunale: a community nursery. For residents only.

This idea of resident-only facilities or perks exists in the U.S. as well -- though I won’t digress into discussions of Arizona, which would like to kick non-legal residents out, or Alaska, which pays its residents to live there. In most American cities, to apply for a library card, one must prove residency by bringing a utility bill in one’s name that is also in the correct zip code for that library. My husband loved having a San Francisco library card, and if you’ve ever been in that library you know why. My sister lived in the city of Los Gatos, California but was once denied a library card because the Los Gatos Public Library is part of the Village of Los Gatos, and her street did not apply.

Having a utility bill won’t cut it for Italian residency. To be a resident, one must go to the local anagrafe office, show ID, fill out forms, sign documents and thereby request to be listed in public records as a resident. A police officer will eventually come to your address to confirm that you do, in fact, live there, but residency begins on the date you announce your residency to the anagrafe.

We made our 3rd attempt to apply to asilo nido with Jeremy’s residency paperwork in hand -- both the first paper he was given to prove he’d requested residency, and the confirmation letter that came several weeks later -- because we knew one of the child’s parents must have residency in the comune for the child to qualify. This was where we had mis-translated the Italian. The rule is not “the child must have one resident parent.” Rather, “the child must BE resident with one parent.”

G was not a resident. Neither was I. Back in March we were told by our local anagrafe that only Jeremy qualified for residency because only Jeremy had his permesso di soggiorno. Miss G and I had applied but not yet received them.

So when we went to apply for asilo nido, we were told that they were very sorry but since G was not listed on Jeremy’s residency form, SHE was not a resident of Trentino, and therefore she did not qualify for the public nursery system. So sorry. If only she could become a resident by tomorrow at noon, this year’s deadline to apply.

As it turns out...she could. I had checked the questura website just that morning and yes, my permesso di soggiorno and Miss G’s were available for immediate pick-up. And here’s where the insanity of Italian office hours worked, for once, in our favor. We were at the Servizi all’Infanzia office at noon on Thursday, April 29th. Most offices are open from 8:00 or 9:00 until noon, but one day each week each office is open for the afternoon as well. The Questura di Trento has Thursday afternoon office hours. We went home, ate lunch (they’re closed for lunch), took a 15:00 bus to the questura and by 16:00 were back home with shiny new permessi for G and myself.

Wait, wait, you say? What about the anagrafe office? Well, indeed, their afternoon hours are on Wednesdays, so we had to wait until the next day to visit them. Povo has its own anagrafe office for this small section of Trentino, and they were expecting us (Servizi all’Infanzia had called the day before to confirm that G was not yet a resident). The woman at anagrafe helped me fill out the proper forms, took photocopies of our passports, glanced at our permessi and then presented us quite proudly with a printout that declared G and myself residents of Trentino as of April 30, 2010.

She pointed at the date, “Last day!” she said in excellent English (English which she had refrained from using to help me fill out the forms).

It was now 9:00. We caught another bus to downtown Trento for our fourth (but not last, but that’s another story) trip to Servizi all’Infanzia. Where we successfully applied for full-time asilo nido. A mother at an adjacent desk was furiously trying to argue her way onto the list as well, but the manager told her adamantly that she was not a resident and services are for residents only. I think the manager caught my eye.

Toilet Training

Our plumbing is on the fritz and the landlord blames us.

He brought over a roll of paper towels as a prop to explain "don't use this kind of paper in the toilet." Well, I may be new to Italy, and I may not understand European plumbing -- ahem...bidets are for what exactly? -- but I know the difference between toilet paper and kitchen paper, thank you very much. And yeah, it sucks, but I also know not to trust tampons to the toilets. (Okay, I did, once or twice, but I was so paranoid about the possibility of clogging our pipes that I haven't done it since February.)

Since this conversation with the landlord took place in our entryway, which is adjacent to the bathroom in question, I quickly held up the roll of paper sitting next to the toilet and said, "this is what we're using!" The landlord looked quite puzzled because, yes, that's the right kind to use. He then explained that a plumber just yesterday pulled a large ball of thick paper out of the pipes. "That's strange," I said, "because this is the only toilet paper we're using."

Our landlord scratched his chin and said hmmm (really, he does this!!). "There is no one below your apartment yet. It could maybe be the apartment upstairs. It is one pipe. It is either them or you."

Now, is it possible that my husband and I use so much toilet paper when we wipe that it clogs the fragile Italian pipes despite it's uber-thinness? Sure, I suppose, but I think it's much more likely that our upstairs neighbors are the culprits. However, the upstairs neighbor explanation does not seem to have crossed our landlord's mind until today, when I showed him the clear shining proof of our Italian toilet paper.

The landlord also mentioned, as he left, that there will likely be a plumbing bill for the work. We'll see how much we get charged -- and if the neighbors upstairs are being asked to split the cost.

The Road to Asilo Nido

A.k.a. nursery school or Italian daycare, asilo nido is available to infants aged 3 months to 3 years, at which point Italian children attend scuola materna until age 6. Scuola materna is often translated as Kindergarten, but it's more like three years of preschool. More on that if we survive Italy long enough for Miss G to reach scuola materna age.

We decided in January or February that we wanted to enroll Miss G in asilo nido next fall. I've been asked why, if I'm not working, we would want G in daycare. One answer is that Italy is lonely, and being alone in a 68 m2 apartment with a toddler is lonely. Try doing both at once. I dare you. Another reply is that asilo nido will allow G to learn Italian and allow me to take language classes, write, find a part-time job.

Asilo nido comes in two flavors: private and public. Private daycares range from okay to excellent and are rather expensive. Public daycares are run by the individual comune; they are gorgeous early education facilities and highly subsidized. From what I can tell, most Italian parents would prefer the public nido for their children. Getting in is a tricky numbers game that balances limited availability with a family's need (need criteria include physical, mental or social disability, income level, number of children in the family, parents' work hours). As a family, J and I don't rate high on the comune's need criteria, but it would be foolish not to try to get G in.

The application is simple: bring an ISEE form (a financial statement filled out by a qualified financial services office) and proof of residency in the comune to the Servizi all'Infanzia office. Even non-Italian speakers like ourselves should be able to pull this application off. However, it took 5 trips in 4 days spread out over two weeks to get the application completed, including a last-24-hours-before-the-deadline dash to the questura (police/immigration headquarters) and our local anagrafe (Povo Technical Office -- see previous post) to gather the necessary documentation.

I don't have the energy to walk through the steps again here. One kind expat we've told the full story to was kind enough to reply, "Oh, but now she has to get in. There's no way she won't get in after all you went through to apply."

The believer in me knows, "Yes, of course she'll get in."

The exhausted immigrant in me says, "But this is Italy, and nothing works out for the best in Italy."

***
The Comune of Trento provides tantalizing bits of information to its foreign population in English and sometimes French. For more info on the public asilo nidi of Trentino, see Servizi all'infanzia: introduzione.

Che dobbiamo fare...?

It was a frustrating morning of government offices, but in the end we got more accomplished than expected. We’ve been waiting on our registered housing contract so that we could take the next steps in getting stay permits for myself and G. Cinformi had told us to go to the Povo Technical Office with our registered contract in order to apply for a Certificate of Housing Suitability, without which we can’t file our visa applications. So, having *finally* received our housing contract yesterday, we set out at 9:00 for Povo Civic Center, where we hoped to find the office in question. It turns out the Povo Technical Office doesn’t exist, because Povo Civic Center directed us to the central Technical Office of Trento, which is two bus rides away. As we left the Civic Center with a new address in hand, we saw our first bus drive away.

An hour later we arrived at “Via Brennero Top Center,” which is a large mall and office complex in the Trento suburbs. It’s also across the street from Cinformi, so we know the area well. Once at the address, however, we could not find the mysterious Technical Office. After 45 minutes of searching, we discovered that the main mall elevator goes to a rooftop parking lot, and in the midst of this parking lot is a large government building. Yes, the office we were looking for was in a second building ON TOP OF the building at Top Center.

We took a number.

15 minutes later, we went into an office and expressed in limited Italian that we needed the Certificato di idonietà allogiativa. There was some confusion at first because he spoke no English and we speak only baby-food vocabulary Italian. He eventually picked a form and had us fill it out, but it was soon discovered that we didn’t have everything we needed to apply for our certificate. You need an official map of your apartment issued by the land registry office (Ufficio Catasta), which is in another building -- luckily across the street and not across town.

And here’s another stroke of luck. The Trento utilities company had earlier in the week given us some forms to take to the same land office. Otherwise, there’s no way we would have recognized the word Catasta, nor would this man’s vague pointing have given us any sense of where to go.

We hurried across the street to the most well-marked office in Trento. That is, there’s a sign on the outside of the building AND in the elevator AND on the office door. Amazing! The line here was just two people long but was another 20 minute wait. During this time, I half-translated a sign next to the desk which said something to the extent of “In order to request an Apartment Map you must have the **something something** from the building owner,” so I was pretty sure we weren’t going to be able to get the map required by the guy in the building on top of the building across the street, because whatever **something something** is, we didn’t have it.

When it was our turn, we started with the easy part -- handing the man behind the desk the forms our utility company had given us. The lower part had to be filled out by the land registry and the upper part by us. To fill out the Catasta portion, the employee had to look up our official apartment map on the computer. This took some time because he found our building easily but kept pulling up the wrong apartment units. Once we had *our* apartment map in front of us, he filled out the forms. THEN, J broached the subject of our Certificato di idonientà allogiativa by showing him one of the forms from the Technical Office. The man very helpfully filled in part of the form for us, smiled, and handed it back. I then attempted a new phrase I’d looked up the night before: “Che dobbiamo fare...” or “What must we do to...” and finished off my phrase with “Planimetria dell’Immobile”: apartment map!

This was when I expected him to point to the sign and tell us to get **something something** from our landlord. Nope! He pulled our map right back up on the computer, printed it out, charged us 6€ and that was that! We have no idea why we didn’t need the **something something** that was clearly underlined as obligatory on the sign. J suspects that since we had our housing contract and the utility forms with us, it was obvious that we lived there and so this employee wasn’t too concerned about the requirements. I suspect that the smiles and giggles he was getting from Miss G may have paved the way.

It was now 11:26 and the Technical Office closes at noon. J raced back across the street (G + stroller + self were slower), grabbed another number, and soon we were all back in the office with the same guy, who looked rather stunned that we had returned so quickly with exactly the piece of paper he required. I suspect such efficiency may well be unprecedented, especially for non-Italian speakers wading through the murky system.

At noon we walked out of the office with a receipt. Our Certificate of Housing Suitability should arrive by mail in about 20 days. At least, that’s what we think he said.

Cinformi -- 1st Visit

All non-EU citizens intending to stay in Italy for longer than a week must let the local government know within 8 business days. For Miss G and I, this meant filing a Dichiarazione di Presenza (declaration of presence) at Cinformi. Cinformi is the province of Trento’s immigration services office. They are located at Via Zambia 11. Like many things in Trento, Cinformi took some finding. The best landmarks for the obscure office are that the building is directly behind Via Brennero’s “Top Center” mall and door 11 is in the center of the building, adjacent to a “Loro” baby store.

Cinformi is on the third floor, and some frustrated immigrant has helpfully scratched the word “Cinformi” on the elevator controls next to the #3 button. When you enter the office, take a number. We arrived about 30 minutes after opening and didn’t have to wait to speak to the front desk people. At the front desk, state your reason for being at Cinformi, or better yet have it written--only Italian and German spoken here. Based on your reason for being there, reception will hand you any necessary forms to fill out and another number. These numbers are more specific because they’re linked to what kind of services you need that day. I was waiting to present myself so my number said “Presentazione 119.” Other numbers might be for visas, and I saw one category simply called “Informazione.” A monitor above the front desk lists seven or eight categories and numbers currently being served.

Soon after I started filling out my form (which thankfully had instructions in Italian, Spanish, English, French and German), I noticed that “Presentazione 120” was being served. At the California DMV--the office upon which I base all bureaucratic comparisons--missing your number being called means you’re pretty well screwed because you’ll have to get a new number and wait your turn again. I hurried to the front desk, pointed to my number, then the monitor, and managed to say something like “but e cento-venti,” which is atrocious non-Italian, but the lady understood. She asked if I had filled out “tutti le forme” and I shook my head. I only had my name and birthday down. She then said something in Italian that sounded reassuring, so I sat down and continued with the forms.

As I filled in the forms, the receptionist took both passports from me and came back a few minutes later with photocopies of all pages. As soon as I was done, I looked up and the receptionist was smiling and pointing to the monitor... my number!! She showed me a spot where I could park Greta’s stroller, and Miss G and I proceeded to the numbered desk that coincided with the monitor. Here, I handed over the passports, photocopies and forms to another Cinformi employee. She compared the info on the forms to the passports themselves, then signed and stamped the forms and gave them back to me. She wrote a date at the bottom of the forms and made it clear that we have until 30.03.10 to leave the country or apply for a more permanent visa.

Everyone around here rolls their eyes and complains about Italian bureaucracy, but this part was easy. The entire Declaration of Presence event took thirty or forty minutes. It might have taken only twenty-five, but Italians love babies and the receptionist, the woman who notarized our forms, and another man in the office who answered some questions for me in English -- all three Cinformi workers stopped at some point to smile and chat with G and say how beautiful and happy she is. In fact, the woman who received our Declarations came from behind her desk, picked G up and had a long chat with her, in Italian, about who knows what. You don’t see that at the DMV.

Perhaps having a cute baby makes Italians happy and friendly and a bit more helpful than they might otherwise be, but it was also important that we were there early. The office opens at 9:00, and when I arrived at 9:30 there was one man ahead of me at the front desk and one or two people waiting for their official numbers to be called. When I left, more than a dozen people sat in the waiting room chairs, looking a bit uncomfortable and resigned (the DMV effect). The office gave me the impression that waits are more the norm. For instance, there are a lot of chairs. Also, for parents, Cinformi anticipates that you may have to sit and wait with children: there’s a small play area in the corner with a toddler-sized plastic play house, and there’s a changing table with diaper pail in the women’s restroom. It’s great that they have these, but it’s also an indication you’ll need them.

I have other suspicions about why this first contact was so painless. Whereas visas are involved and iffy and require a lot of complicated documentation, the Dichiarazione di Presenza is no big deal. Italy wants you to come and stay and declare yourselves--and then to leave in 90 days or less. But G and I have no intention of leaving by 30.03.10, so we’ll see how the rest of the process goes.

Deep breaths

Last week, our house sold. No joke, we’re moving to Italy after the holidays and arrive in Trento December 31st. My first thought upon signing the papers to put escrow in motion was that I wouldn’t be cleaning my house again. Awesome. No more open house days. No ready at a moment’s notice for potential buyers to drop in and inspect. No more toilets. But then I looked at the toilet this morning and thought, ugh, must clean. So while we no longer fold the couch blankets neatly over the arm rest before heading out the door in the morning, and I conspicuously left the toaster on the counter after breakfast, I vacuumed the carpet of bread crumbs last night and I’ll sweep the floor before Greta wakes from her nap. There’s nothing like a crawler in the house to put your plans of slovenly bliss to rest.

Admittedly, not having to clean was not my absolute first thought upon the sale of 2312 5th Street. My first thought was oh crap I hope we really want to do this because it is happening and I had made plans for next semester and I was going to start writing again and now I need to learn Italian and I should probably get my degrees and transcripts notarized and translated in case that’s required for finding a job and how much will that cost and do we have enough passport photos to give to the questura when we arrive?

The Stand-Upright Waiver

J sent the following update email to our family and friends this morning. Today had been our scheduled flight to Europe:

Yes, the Ridgeway family is still here. We hit an interesting catch-22 with the Italian government that must play out before we can move (oh, and the house hasn't sold). First, let me say that our new plans are to move to Italy after Christmas. The University has granted me a one-time extension until January 1.

We were recently notified by the Italian government that our visa applications could not be processed because "the youngest in your party is not yet crawling. Please resubmit at the time s/he is able to stand upright." We took this news badly. Already, the immigration laws are such that moving to Italy from outside the European Union is very difficult. We face income and living requirements that must be validated and certified by the local police and health and human services within a tight time window. Now, they are requiring us to be able to stand upright!?

Of course, with every bureaucratic rule there seems to be an exception, assuming you file the right forms. We found ours through Italy's disabled persons act, "no one may be discriminated against due to a physical disablement whether permanent or temporary." Clearly, they are discriminating against G's temporary unable-to-walk-ed-ness, and that, we claim, is illegal. Working through our local Honorary Vice-Consulate, we were able to secure the proper forms for a Stand-Upright Waiver. We had the forms translated into English, notarized, and affixed with an apostille stamp from California Secretary of State. This stamp certifies that the document is true and legal as recognized by countries who signed, or by countries who recognize, the 1961 Hague Convention Abolishing the Requirement of Legalisation for Foreign Public Documents. We filled-in our English translation stating:

"Due to our daughter's young age, she is temporarily unable to crawl, stand-upright, or walk. We expect, in due course, and through physical rehabilitation under the supervision of a pediatrician, she will soon be an upright member of society."

We then translated the forms back to Italian, had them notarized and, again, affixed with an apostille stamp. Our local Honorary Vice-Consulate accepted the forms and sent them on to the Italian government. Unfortunately, the government replied with (English translation):

"We validate the temporary disablement of your daughter/son, but, unfortunately, we cannot issue a waiver at this time because your daughter/son is too young to apply without sufficient evidence of her/his character. Please resubmit this form with her/his transcripts from her/his local legal daycare."

After further clarification, we found that a "legal daycare" is one that has the necessary local, county, and state licenses to operate as a daycare. This is not necessary for a private daycare with one child, that's babysitting. So, in addition to taking G to Folsom Mondays and Fridays for her regular daycare, we have enrolled Greta in a regular daycare on Wednesdays. Two months of daily logs, translated into Italian, notarized, and affixed with an apostille stamp by the California Secretary of State, is sufficient to fulfill the request for "evidence of her character."

Now, the point is moot because G is standing! She started crawling on two weeks ago and now she's using anything she can get her hands on to pull herself upright. It's pretty darn cool, albeit a little nerve racking since she always looks like she's going to fall. I've attached photos of her crawling and standing.

Of course, since we've already started down this path with Italy, we now must wait until after the Holidays to move with or without the temporary Stand-Upright waiver. Oh, and if we sell the house by December 1.

Here we (don't) go...

I’m listening to Jeremy argue with Orbitz about getting our flights to Italy changed. The “customer service” rep he’s speaking with says that the fine print does not allow the change we are requesting. Jeremy read him the part of that fine print that says “changes are allowed within country of origin up until departure date.” Now he’s on hold again. Now they accidentally hung up on him.

We are not moving to Italy next week. Despite dropping the asking price on our house by $25K, we have had no offers to buy. We’ve spoken with realtors, accountants, property managers and it all comes down to this: if we sell the house by December 1st, we can move to Italy on January 1st. If not, we cannot go at all.

Documents I.

At some point during our stay in Italy, we are likely to need to our birth certificates and marriage license. In fact, as soon as we arrive in Trento, an authorized copy of our marriage license is required to apply for the family stay or family cohesion visa. That is, J will be allowed to live in Italy and travel in the Schengen states on a student visa, while G and I will be allowed to stay with him as family members. J read somewhere that the signatures on authorized documents should be no more than five years old. Apparently the more recent the date, the less hesitant the Italian authorities will be to accept a document's validity.

We were married six years ago, and the only birth certificate copy I have is dated 1983. It's small and gray and has a slight signature in purple ink that looks like a kindergarten teacher made the authorization. Therefore, last week we drove to the Bay Area to get more recent and official-looking copies.

As long-time residents of California, we have learned to expect lines, bureaucracy, vacant information desks, and getting snapped at several times in the course of any official business with the state. We've also learned that arriving as close to opening as possible at the Department of Motor Vehicles, for instance, will lead to more friendly service and fewer waits, presumably because everyone has just had coffee or is too drowsy to snap. On Thursday, we were already running a few minutes late, so J dropped Miss G and I off at the Santa Clara County Clerk Recorder's Office (SCCCRO?) to wait in line while he searched for parking. Ten minutes later, I met him at the building entrance, birth certificates and marriage license in hand.

We had a morning's worth of bottles and extra clothes with us for G, and J had even brought Harry Potter 7 along to pass the time. Instead, it took longer to find the automatic pay machine in the parking garage than it had taken for me to speak to information, stand in line, write a check and wait for my documents to be processed. Three cheers to the SCCCRO.

With a free morning in front of us, we were able to meet my mother in Los Gatos for coffee and almond croissants before J went off to work. It was G's seven month birthday.

Lists I

Moving forward involves lists. For a long time, we avoided the "moving to Italy" lists because it felt so daunting. If we wrote down everything we needed to do to make this happen by November, we might realize that it can't be done.

Finally, last week, I wrote the following list:

To Research

• car export & insurance
• shipping costs (mail vs other)
• language classes
• online teaching/editing opportunities
• health insurance options
• vaccinations
• infant formula
• arrival to-do list

To Do

• international driving permit
• translations (transcripts, degrees, marriage license, birth certs)
• call honorary consulate (re: translations, visas, codice fiscale)
• email contacts re: job options/suggestions
• process visa

Obviously not a complete list. On accomplishments-in-progress, though, we met with our realtor and spent the weekend rearranging furniture and purging. Lots went to Goodwill. A few items got sold on Craigslist. We need to have the house on the market by next weekend.

If the house doesn't sell, we can't go.

Flight

J just returned from two weeks in Trento, where he met the group he'll be working with for the next three to four years. He feels good about the people, the place, the project. Finally, now, I find I'm able to be excited. I just hung up with a friend in Virginia, who told me I sound more relaxed and happy than I have in a long time. And it's true: this feels good. Late October, the three of us will fly San Francisco to Dublin to Munich, where we will board a train to Trento.

Since my brain is set, it seems, to dwell on the small picture, as I fell into sleep last night I realized October means Halloween. G will spend her first Halloween in Italy. I don't think they have Halloween there. Not American Halloween with babies dressed like strawberries. Maybe I'll dress her like a strawberry anyway, and we can trick or treat door to door in our apartment, like when I was six and had a fever, and my sisters stood behind their bedroom doors and gave me candy when I knocked.

First

We’re going through the vodka in earnest. I sip the cranberry juice mixture as I listen to my four month old fuss herself to sleep. She’s found her toes this week and it complicates her ability to nap.

The vodka sat on the shelf untouched for over a year, as we bought it shortly before we learned about the pregnancy. (This is not to imply that my husband stopped drinking for the pregnancy; there used to be some gin up there, too.) The point is we have to get rid of everything for the move. The consumables must be consumed. Two days ago—because I’m counting—my husband was offered a research position to be a PhD student in Trento, Italy.

My initial reaction is to dwell on minutia and the details that won’t confront us for months or more. When my hair dryer burned out this morning, I commented to J that I might have to do without a hair dryer until we move: no point in buying one that won’t fit European plugs or wattage. I set the table and consider whether we should bring utensils from home or buy new once we arrive.

Then I wonder where we’ll store G’s crib, the beautiful solid birch crib that we spent the most money on of any nursery item and that she won’t get to sleep in through her first year. If I thought of things and milestones we’re walking away from—no grandparents or great-grandparents at G’s first birthday, and will some of these relatives even be alive when we return?—I could never leave. I have to think on what we’ll gain in experience and the way we’ll get to know ourselves and each other all over again. I pray that learning to live within 58 square meters, to cook in metric, and watching my husband teach our daughter to ski in the alps, that all this is a rich trade off.

In the meantime, none of us speak Italian.

G doesn’t even speak.