I'm in Italy, now what?

The sun is shining - albeit through a constant cloud of fog and/or pollution - and even though the Italians are still wearing their winter coats I have already spent two days walking around in jeans and a t-shirt, exactly the dress code NOT encouraged by work.. Oh well.. It's spring! And the Finn inside me is dying to get  out. I will restrain from acting out the Finnish spring rituals of getting drunk in the park, peeing between parked cars and the minimum amount of clothes possible as soon as the snow is gone, but I don't care if I get funny looks from people! For me +24 is summer and in the summer you don't have to wear a winter coat, or a coat of any kind for that matter.

On Monday, as a friend decided to put it, I took a pasticceria turn in my life. I decided to test the gas oven which my flatmate never uses and make chocolate squares (mokkapalat without coffee). I figured it was a pretty easy and foolproof way to start and even if something did go badly wrong I wouldn't end up crying for lost money or time. I found a recipe here and they actually turned out to be pretty nice, despite a little icing malfunction. I think it has been about 13 years since I last made them and I forgot I should have let the cake cool down before the icing so much of it actually just disappeared inside the cake. Fortunately I had sprinkles to cover it up with so it didn't look too bad in the end. As the recipe says, the squares really do get better as they get older. They were a bit too fluffy when they were fresh but a by Tuesday and Wednesday they actually were very nice. Next week I will try with something a little more challenging, I spent a few days looking for oats and finally located them in a ipermarket outside the city so I think oat and chocolate cookies could be a good plan. Watch this space.

I'm happy being in Italy. I was walking home last night tired after work and knowing I would have to spend yet another Saturday morning at work too (my Saturday student doesn't want anyone else teach him despite our administrator's best efforts in trying to free my weekends), but I still felt pretty good about being here. At best my students are great and funny, at worst they are usually only boring, which is better than being verbally abused by customers while all you can do is smile back. Of course every job has its downsides and this one isn't perfect either, but for now the downsides are still mostly related to finances. Regardless, I find I'm regularly asking myself "I'm in Italy, now what?". I have realised my dream of moving here, what is the next step? The next city, the next job, the next dream. Usually I catch myself doing this and remind myself that I should just stop running for one second and enjoy now. This is going to be a fun - and - sun -filled spring starting from next weekend when the lovely Laura is visiting me, all the way to the Take That concert in Milan in July. Even waking up from an afternoon pennichella (nap) with the flatmate coming in with friends who then proceed in slagging off all us foreigners here (very rudely) until the flatmate points out to them that I actually understand Italian, is not going to ruin it.