Roman Sentiments

Hey,

After I said a goodbye to London, rode a train and arrived at Stansted Airport in the suburban London countryside, I would get on the flight from hell and head to Rome. Not only did I arrive at the airport entirely TOO early because of my own poor planning, but I was tired from being out the night before TOO late. I got up too late, and rushed, breaking my neck and not realizing that I could have taken my sweet time and arrived just like I wanted. However, getting there so early allowed me to experience what the airport SHOULD be.

In a word, Stansted cannot be described. It's clean, sunny, bright and people are really happy to be at work. Well, except those who work for RyanAir. (I'll get to that later). The airport is totally state of the art, with internet stations, showers in the restrooms, duty free shops like Chanel, M.A.C., Sephora, and a full fleged deli with caviar...sigh. Duty-free shops are simply places in the airports overseas where you can buy things and not pay taxes on them. Unlike America, where you pay MORE for goods at the airport, in Europe, it is LESS. Hindsight, I would have bought more from there. This is what it looked like.

Well, the flight from Stansted to Ciampiano Aiport was interesting. I'd never seen anything like it. The flight on RyanAir was more like the Wild Wild West. Passengers were drunk, flight attendants rolled the cart down the aisle selling food, then trinkets, then liquor, then jewelry. Random babies then began to walk up and down the aisles, and then they started to cry. There was a smell of body odor that ran rampant, and the Italian lothario on the flight proceeded to make his way down the aisles flirting with woman after woman, and by the time he got to me, he reeked of rum. People were not wearing their seat belts when told, the flight attendants were screaming at people...it was pure insanity. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. I instead shrugged my shoulders and did a lot of head shaking.

Finally, I was off the flight and in Italy. Signs were in Italian, people spoke Italian. I landed at night, in an empty airport, and I got in my hostel late. I managed to drag my hefty bag there, and fell asleep. The next morning, hungry and out of money, I searched for a bank. In doing so, I would get my first taste of true Roman hospitality.

"Get out!" were the first words I heard upon surrendering my purse to a locker, and walking through a kind of revolving doorway that locked as you stepped in, which was unlocked by bank staff. I was confused. I'd said nothing and done nothing, and after walking in triple degree heat, I did not understand why I was being treated in such a way. I asked if they knew how I could get money from my account, and after rudely being told that my business was not wanted or desired, I was escorted (and I use that word nicely) out of the bank and into the street. I started to walk away, until I realized I'd placed my purse in a locker. I went back and after some fussing at the guard, I was able to retrieve it, safe and sound. It would take me almost two hours to find another branch, one in which my money and my business was appreciated. It happened to be in a tourist-y area, where I should have remained.

As I did in London, after getting enough money to last me for a moment, I began to explore my surroundings. However, while I was amazed by the history, and noticing the buildings and underlying beauty of Rome, I began to notice something else. People...were staring. At me. And I didn't know why. I walked along the Tiber River, down to the Campo de Fiori and watched the city light up at night. I walked past Termini station and down into Chinatown, where I scored two of the most comfortable pairs of sandals I've been fortunate to wear. However, I felt like people were staring. When I got back to the hostel, I asked why the people of Rome might find me so interesting and got no reply from the Australians who worked the desk. I showered, went out to eat my first Italian meal and shrugged it off.

My first Italian meal was pasta, of course. I washed it down with a Coke, and it's pictured to the left. It's known as a local seafood special, and consists of mussels, langoustines (shrimp), scallops and clams tossed with olive oil with garlic and a hint of basil on a bed of linguini pasta . The plate doesn't look too big, but it was deep and cheap and orgasmic. I found myself eating here everyday, where they knew me as an American, and because I tipped well, they took care of me. I was so hungry on my first visit, that I ate this bowl and took another as a take-away (to-go)! Hey, why not, I was on vacation! Who cared if my waist expanded? After a night of walking around, I settled in my room and went fast to sleep. The next day, I did not wake up until around 430pm. I didn't realize I'd slept so long until I looked up and realized housekeeping had managed to clean all around me. Invigorated, I decided to try my hand at a night of Roman partying in something called a pub crawl.

To Be Continued in:

Roman Sentiments, Part 2

Colin Says "Yes I Can" (Vote For Barack Obama)

Hey,

So I'm guessing that I was the only person not surprised that Gen. Colin Powell would be endorsing Senator Barack Obama. Why was I not surprised? Well, Mr. Powell has always been a man of sound judgement and reasoning. (Well, except on that whole IRAQ thing...)

But anyway, anyone with proper judgement and reasoning would see through all the crap that McCain is trying to dish out and realize that Obama is by far the better statesman. It's the same reason why the polls are turning against the self-proclaimed "underdog". (And by the way, no one LIKES being the underdog..that's like saying you like losing.) I don't know about you, but I never liked losing anything and I still don't. 

Everyone is shocked because Powell is Mr. Black Conservative..and represents the base of people who are staunch Republicans and McCain supporters. So, some are in a bit of a tizzy about it, and I'm sure Powell will be getting some weird glances at the country club. But hey, at least he's gotten some cool points with all the black folks who claimed he just wasn't "black enough". Personally, I don't think he's losing any sleep over his choice to tell Tom Brokaw he was saying "Yes We Can" on November 4th. Besides, it's not like he's going cross-country with Obama, holding hands with Hillary and drinking PBR with 'old regular' Joe Biden laughing at Sarah Palin. He has not turned in his Republican stripes of honor. Not yet, but just maybe.. we can hope he'll see the Democratic light. :-)

Speaking of Palin, was it just me or did that whole Saturday Night Live appearance just seem really flat? The only time I got interested was hoping she'd mess up the entire thing. I mean, I was on the edge of my chair, white-knuckled and rooting for crash and burn. Instead, I got this lackluster 'thing', where in the one moment she had to truly shine, make light of herself and her geriatric experienced running mate and be extraordinarily funny as a result, she passed it off to poor, pregnant and wobbling comedianne Amy Poehler. Watch, if you haven't seen it yet here. Personally, I'd have been laughing my a** off if she just went on and did the rap herself, and she probably would have gotten some votes respect from young people because of it. We all know it's in jest, and in good fun...but I guess after talking to Gramps John McCain, she opted against it. Shows who's wearing the pants in that relationship!! LOL!

Instead she played the straight guy to all the jokes and was called a thoughtless little pig horrible woman by Alec "I take out my drama with my ex-wife on my kid named after a country in turmoil" Baldwin. The best comeback she has is that his brother Stephen, an nut laughingstock idiot actor in his own right, was her favorite Baldwin. I'm sure Alec cried on his pillow all night long for that one. Oh, and Mark Wahlberg didn't even acknowledge her standing there! No, "Hey Tina" or "Hey lady, say hi to your mother for me." NOTHING. Even Lorne Michaels barely looked at her. Funny times. It'd have been the same show had she not been there, mainly because she was too much of a coward uncertain to rap a little. She sure was nodding in agreement to the rap, so she should have just done it. My advice, JUST DO IT! Barack would have...maybe. But then again, he wouldn't have had to. He's got flow and can dunk. 

Thoughts?

*Ashley Robin*

A Series of Funny Events

feel like I've been laughing for the past few days, despite feeling like total crap. The week's been good, despite my catching a virus of some sort, has me all messed up. I can see the humor in everything. Here's a list of things that had me rolling, maybe they'll give you the giggles too..

..1- Flavor of Love. Talk about hood ass women. Just when I thought the scary big girl was about to do a New York and spit on someone, she tops that and does the most foul thing in the world and takes a shit on Flav's floor. I mean, DAMN!. She tells him that she askef for permission to go to the bathroom (something I haven't done since I was in grade school), and gets told no, meanwhile her stomach was going "Uh-uh, Bitch", so she dipped out of camera frame and took a shit on this man's marble floor. Now, this was after the clocks were given to the girls moving forward, and yes, she was one of them, but if I would have been Flav, I would have kicked her out the crib, shitty drawers and all. I mean, my dogs were even trained not to do that mess in the house...so her doing it is just nasty, nasty, NASTY.....and poor Rick had to clean it up. I'd have told them skip that....no job pays that much, to clean up human poop. Sorry.

..2- TMZ.com is basically a celeb-sighting site. They post pics of celebs out and about, people comment, etc. Kinda like PerezHilton.com....but anyway...TMZ fans really dislike Paris Hilton. I mean, they really hate on her. One guy said she was nothing but a 'oversized human condom' another said that he didn't understand why she was alive, that she should just kill herself...that her singing sounds like garbaage, etc...you get the point. That's sad, not funny. What's funny is that one of the reporters for the site actually found Paris and her press agent, on the way to some meeting, and read this stuff aloud to her, asking her "what do you think about it?" I mean, come on. If some dude came up to you, reading you negative bull about yourself, he'd have been picking himself up off the ground. She actually tries to be poised about it, does a good job being nice about it, but you can tell it hurts her feelings. I mean, it's common sense....who would want to hear that kind of thing? And, who cares if she says her feelings are hurt...certainly not the folks who wrote it....the stupidity of the world...

..3- My not taking myself seriously. I was playing with a baby today at the salon, and she was just sooo cute. I was dancing with her, while I had rollers in my hair, and she seemed to enjoy it. When it was time to return her to her mom (and I was sad, since I love the kids), I asked her for a kiss. She grabs my face like she's gonna lay one smack on my mouth, looks into my eyes with her little amber eyes and doesn't kiss me, but instead spits up the apple sauce I'd fed her while her mom was getting her hair blown out. Right on my nose and mouth. And proceeds to laugh, like it was the funniest thing ever! Because she was so cute, I had to laugh (after I washed my face about three times).

Life is always interesting,
Ashley Robin