BUZZURRO

This morning I showed up for what was supposed to be the first day of a two day temporary assignment.

I actually only worked for 5 hours because at the last minute the big guys in the head office in another state decided to cancel the project us temp workers were supposed to do, so the office in which we were located sent us home after 5 hours of doing ‘busy work’ such as filing, making tabs for notebooks, alphabetizing mail and hole-punching documents, boring stuff that everybody in the department obviously didn’t want to do because some of the stuff I was filing was dated from October.

The company had a coffee machine, and the actual employee who actually requested the service of temporary workers offered us both some coffee.

I have never seen such a machine before in my life. It was free, like in most business places in the US, but none that I have seen in Italy.

There were numerous choices too, some of them being teas and hot chocolates. You can even turn the flavored coffees into cappuccinos!!

The coffee/tea/hot chocolate comes in little sealed packages. You insert them, still sealed, into the machine which opens them and adds water. Like many coffee machines there is a digital display telling you when the coffee is being prepared, or is in fact done.

Having lived in Italy for several years, I have become accustomed to the habit of drinking several cups a day. I started my day with French Vanilla Roast. Then 2 hours later I took an Espresso Roast Un po’ schiffo (a little disgusting) as they say in Italy so I spilled most of it out and drank instead a Hazelnut blend.

Before lunch I slowed down a little and drank a decaffeinated House Blend. It tasted pretty good, so after lunch I had a caffeinated House blend.

I washed it down with a Japanese Green tea. Later on in the afternoon I drank a Columbia blend. I was pretty much well caffeinated by then.

Tonight Buzzurro and I met a friend for dinner at a Malaysian and Thai cuisine restaurant. I’ve never had Malyasian food before, but I’ve never met a cuisine of food that I don’t like, and Buzzurro ,unlike many Italians, likes new and different cuisines of food too.

We went to the restaurant and met our friend. We then were seated at a table, all 3 of us.
Then 5 minutes the waitress came by, took my friend’s order, and then walked away. She didn’t take our orders.

Since when does a waitress come to a table of 3 people and only take one person’s order? The last time I looked neither Buzzurro or myself were invisible. Eventually we flagged her down as she was clearing the dishes off a nearby table and she did take our orders too.
The food was very good. I haven’t had Thai food for so long and the Malaysian cusine was very good too! The conversation was good. We had a wonderful meal.

At the end of it the waitress came by and asked if we wanted any desserts. We were all pretty stuffed and said ‘No.’ Then my friend asked ‘Can I have some water?’
And the waitress replied ‘Do you want a menu?’ For water? What a strange waitress.

Yes, bad service exists in the US too.

I took my written test for the NJ driver license for the second time today. I only got 4 wrong out of 50. That means I passed! YEAHHY ME!

Honestly though this test seemed easier than the first one that I failed last week. It had me wondering if there is a second level NJ driving test for idiots who failed it the first time.

It is true that I studied the driving manual, like all the good 17 and 18 year olds in the room with me, but really there were only a handful of questions regarding fines for young drivers and provisional drivers which throws me for a loop. I’m just not good at learning all those rules. Perhaps a little bit of Italy has rubbed off, huh?

There were also several questions that to get wrong really would defy logic. ( such as’ Do you (a)stop at a stop sign , (b) slow down, or (c) honk the horn?’ If you don’t know the answer to that, then you really should NOT be driving.)
I even got the question about ‘highway hypnosis’ right, although I’ve never heard it referred to by that name.
I was so happy that I passed, that the girl sitting next to me (who I didn’t even know) congratulated me.
After I passed the test a clerk took my 24 dollars which is required for the license, and then asked me if I was happy with my photo or wanted to retake it, as if I were in a photography salon instead of the Motor Vehicles agency! Not that it was a bad photo, the clerk explained, but this is a service they offer their ‘clients’ who are trying to get a driver’s license. In Italy they make you bring in your own photos, and if you try to save a few Euros by going to one of those photomat machines you get what you get. Not only that, you have to pay the eyedoctor for the visit as well as pay for the written test and the actual license.
I even got some free job advice! Now, THAT is service!

Buzzurro and I have been doing a little shopping while in the US and comparing those prices to Italy.

Clothes are much cheaper in the US by far. Even when you are a bad girl like J.Doe and buy the most expensive coat in the whole store! OOPS. Sorry Buzzurro!

Shoes are very, very much cheaper too, even those shoes that are made in Italy!

Beef, chicken and pork seem to be cheaper, but I cannot really say the food is cheaper because eating styles are different. What we were used to eating in Italy is very expensive here (but at least available) and when we were in Italy the food that we became used to eating while in the US on vacations was very expensive, if even available.

Aspirin and other OTC medicine is very much cheaper. We spent 3 hours in Walgreens checking out the prices in amazement. They are so low, and then on top of that everything seems to be available in the generic store brand.

Buzzurro is still to this day, surprised by the low cost of gasoline in the US. Gasoline costs 4 times as much in Italy. Where we used to fill up the gas tank of our little Fiat with 60 Euros, here in the US, on a much bigger car, a 20 dollar note will do.

Last week I went to the New Jersey Department of Motor Vehicles to apply for a New Jersey driver’s license. The employees were very nice to me. It’s good to be back with civil civil servants. The clerk asked me for some identification documents, and if I had a current driving license. I proudly handed her my documents and my international driving license which I got 2 years ago in Italy.

The clerk said to me “You know this license is expired, right ?’
Very surprised by this development, I replied ‘But they told me in Italy that it was good for 3 years. I thought it expired in 2007.’ (they took enough money for it too)
And she responded “It’s only good for 1 year.’

Great. I’m driving around on an expired license.

Not even 1 week in the United states and already I’m breaking laws. (well, not exactly, as a tourist I can drive on my Italian driver’s license which still is valid. As a resident of the US however, I cannot drive.)
To make a long story short, the employee used my Italian driver’s license, finished with her part of processing me, and I advanced to the next desk.
So I wait in the line of 1 person, pay my 10 bucks and they take my picture. Then I go to the Eye Doctor, who looked at my documents and then asked me if I wanted to read the eye chart in Italian. HA HA HA.
After that I go over to the computer to take the written part of the driving test, which as Buzzurro mentioned in a previous post I failed. In defense of myself I only barely, leggermente failed. I got 11 wrong out of 50 questions when you are allowed 10.

One of the questions had to deal with road rage. It asked ‘If you are upset or angry, what do you do?’ and the answers were ‘A. drive or B sit or rest awhile to calm down’.
They wanted B as a response, but I chose A. I mean, what if you are already behind the wheel ? Are you just supposed to turn the car off and sit in the middle of the road? Or what if you have some place to go? Maybe I’ve been living in Italy too long. I don’t see a little bit of road rage as an abnormal event. Surely nothing to delay your plans about.
Other questions had to do with the penalties for 17 year old drivers who drive after midnight and cause property damages of less than 500 bucks. How do I know what happens to them ? Put the young road criminals in jail forever and throw away the key. It’s not relevant to me ! Why do I have to suffer while sitting in front of a computer test ?

Well, in short since I did not pass the driver’s test I will study and take the test again next week.

…but we have a good excuse. We moved. I had things to do, I got a permanent resident visa, we did food shopping, bought a cabinet of drawers, sent our resumes around, we unpacked SOME of our clothes, struggled to stay awake despite jetlag, J.Doe had a written test for her driving license and FAILED, I applied for my social security number, we had a walk around home, we bought Dorito chips…
In the next days I’m pretty sure we won’t neglect the blog anymore, but we gave our lives priority over the blog. Thank you, dear readers, for your great patience.
We are organizing our lives.

It’s done. Tomorrow we will leave Italy for the United States.
I’m nervous. J.Doe is nervous too. This is not a “vacation”, despite we filled suitcases, bought plane tickets, like for a leisure trip. We mailed many heavy boxes overseas.

When we mailed our first box, a few days ago, we found that shipping is more expensive than we expected — about 100 euros for a 5 pounds box. Then, shocked for the expensive price, decided to rethink the list of things to mail — i.e., we brought less stuff with us for saving money.
Nonetheless, the sum we finally spent was again a lot. In these cases you have to be selective, to decide what to leave behind you; what is necessary and what is not. Not a very easy task. If it is easy to pick just one of two clothes that look very similar (for instance, two black shirts or two dark pants), it’s hard to leave back stuff you’re affected to, things that remind you nice moments in the past, things that we think we cannot do without but that probably it’s useless to bring because are things easy to find and cheap to buy in the USA.

We are also carrying with us heavy suitcases. We spent part of our time weighing them more times, finding them heavier than the maximum allowed, redistributing the excess weight among the other suitcases.

You know, we knew that we are allowed to bring up to two suitcases up to 26 Kg each, and one carry-on suitcase up to 12 Kg. This lets us bring up to 128 Kg in 6 suitcases. Believe me, they’re not enough.

Is it anti-economic to bring one’s own clothes instead of buying them there ? It depends on how expensive clothes are, and how much you like those clothes on you. It’s not easy, and stressful to leave pieces of your life behind you.

Yesterday we had a farewell dinner with a couple of friends. We gave them our left food supplies. Obviously, They were only closed boxes of food.
They were two huge bags stuffed with food. It was our supply to be used in case of nuclear attack !
Obviously, it was all unexpired food. I told them: “anyway, you double check the expiry date, just in case !”
That food was A LOT. J.Doe and I have been repeating each other: let’s not make food supplies, because we are gonna move… sure, last famous words.

She is Canadian and he is Italian. I will miss them.
I am grateful to her because, in these 3 years of marriage, and of J.Doe’s life in Italy, she was J.Doe’s closest friend. I’m happy that J.Doe found this friend in our town.

I should have told them all these things yesterday night, instead of just writing them on the blog…

Last night I received a phone call from my mother who is in the US. “Did you send your resume to an insurance company ?” she asked me.
“No” I responded, dumbfounded that she would ask me such a question. How would an insurance company in the US even know that I’m planning to relocate there? Then, just like a lightbulb turning on in my head, it came to me.

“No” I said again. “I didn’t send my resume there, but I did put it on Monster.com. They might have seen the resume there.”
“They probably did.” replied my mother. Then she gave me their phone number and told me that they left a message for me to call them back on her answering machine.

Today I called them. The lady answering the phone was not the one who left the message. I asked her to speak to X. She replied “She is not here right now.” And then she asked me “Are you calling from out of the country?” Maybe I’ve been in Italy too long because instantly I became suspicious. I answered curtly “Yes. Why? Is that a problem?” and she answered in the same nice voice “No. It’s not a problem. I guess this call is expensive, so I’ll direct you to another person.” I was astounded. Why would a stranger even care that I’m spending a lot of my money on a phone call or not?

Anyway, the other person, a man, picked up the phone. The insurance company is opening a new office and are having several orientations where they explain about the company to several people at one time and then interview them for various positions, especially sales positions.They need people to see their insurance policies to people, mainly older people.

I finally told him “Thanks for calling, but I’m not interested in sales positions.”
He replied”That’s OK. We have several openings in our management trainee program too.”
Then I said. “I’m not interested in a management trainee program.” (and all this is from a girl who for years complained that noone wanted to offer her a job (other than cleaning toilets).”

Finally he said “Well, we have some administrative assistant positions too, some jobs are part-time and I think some might be full-time.”
“OK” I said. And then I signed up for an orientation. He told me to bring a hard copy of my resume with me because afterwards there will be interviews.

I am 98 percent sure that it won’t amount to a job, but it is an interview with a prospective employer, and knowing how I do terrible on job interviews the experience of just having an interview will be more than helpful. I am glad to be able to have the experience of the interview, and I am more glad that someone even looked at my resume and wanted to speak to me.