The 60-Hour Workweek (for our child, that is...)

She's only three and wouldn't you know it, I have done the thing that I loathe, the thing that New York City Alpha moms are notorious for, the thing that I rant about all the time when I hear the horror stories coming out of the United States: I have overscheduled my child.

She has preschool (école maternelle) every weekday morning from 8h30 to 12h30. She has stopped taking the afternoon nap, so the rest of her day is, I mean was, free. I figured that since many if not most parents in this country put their three-year olds in preschool for the whole day, five days a week, the Bambina had it pretty good. So I went ahead and signed her up for afternoon activities. Monday she has free. Tuesday she has theatre class at the Centro San Luigi dei Francesi. Wednesday she has dance class (in Italian). Thursday she had an English playgroup and Friday, Suzuki music class.

Did I mention that she has stopped taking the afternoon nap? The result: an exhausted child, ready to collapse at about 18h00, and a schedule that is falling apart. The English playgroup was the first to go. What on earth was I thinking? English is already her dominant language and all the other kids in the group were speaking Italian. What's the point?

I'm now considering dropping Suzuki music, too. I had always dreamed of putting the Bambina in Susuki music but, besides the fact that the class is at 16h30 on Friday afternoon and takes four metro stops and three bus stops to get to, it's an hour long, which is manifestly about 30 minutes too long for the Bambina. At 17h00, she has had enough Twinkle Twinkle Little Star to 20 different rhythms. Plus most of the other kids in the class are a year or two older than she and are far more capable of the finger coordination exercises. She seems a little too young for it all, notwithstanding the Suzuki instructor's insistance that three is the ideal age to start the rhythm classes so that they can begin to play an instrument when they are four.

At least she still loves the dance and theatre.

If I were prime minister of Italy...

I hereby issue the following decrees:

- It shall be henceforth forbidden to show, distribute, broadcast, sell, or disseminate any film or television programme in dubbed version. All foreign language films and television programmes shall be shown, distributed, sold, broadcast and disseminated in their original language, with Italian subtitles. Persons who violate this decree shall be subject to twenty-five years imprisonment.

- And while we are talking about television, all game shows are hereby banned as well.

Troppe caramelle!

My question for Italian parents, teachers, caregivers of children, and strangers in the post office: What on earth are y'all thinking handing out candies to every child who passes you by?

Let's take a sample day: I walk out of the house with the Bambina. The friendly chauffeur, who happens to be standing beside his car and waiting for our executive neighbour, sees the Bambina and, you got it, he gives her a candy.

We go to the post office and take a number. We are number 100 and they are currently dealing with number 18 at the counter. The old folks waiting beside us wouldn't dream of giving me and the Bambina one seat between us, but here's a sugar-and-artificial-flavour-laden candy to rot your girl's teeth and make her even more hyper than she already is.

I take the Bambina to her school, where the teacher, being French and in a French school, wouldn't dream of handing out so much as a cookie crumb to the kids without permission, but that's okay, 'cause all the other parents (who happen to be Italian) give their kids (and mine) candy that the school won't provide.

We drop in on our neighbours to say hello and ask if their baby daughter is feeling better after having had a fever the night before. They say yes, and pass the candy dish over to the Bambina.

We head to dance lesson, where the wonderful teacher spends an hour each week transforming our darling girls into elegant ballerinas - and then at the end of the lesson, hands them each a candy. The second time this happened, my friend Laura (who happens to be Italian herself, so this is not just my anglo-saxon bourgeois alpha-mom hypersensitivity to junk food coming through) chimes in (thank god she did so I didn't have to) to ask whether the candy was really necessary, given all the other candies the girls are handed all day long. Si, si, the girls needed una gratificazione for having completed the lesson. Then how about a sticker? Or a stamp on their hand? And good grief, isn't the dancing itself a gratificazione? I mean, it's not like I am dragging the Bambina on her ass to dance lessons every week. She does actually enjoy the activity.

You would never know that the slow food movement started up in this country. So far, I am convinced that they expect my daughter to be on a diet consisting of candies and maybe the odd plate of pasta once in a while.

And God Created the Au Pair

I never understood the signficance of the title of the book until last week when She arrived. Our French au pair. She helps me out with the Bambina in the afternoons, babysits a couple of evenings of week, and goes grocery shopping with us on Saturday mornings. Can I say just how nice it is to be able to try on clothes in Zara with the assurance that no one is abducting your child or even offering her sweets that you don't approve of? And yesterday afternoon, I was able to go grocery shopping, take a shower, cook supper, and finish an article.

I was initially afraid that the Bambina might not like the Au Pair, but boy, was I wrong. On Saturday at 13h, the Au Pair's quitting time for the weekend, the Bambina all of a sudden became very sad and said to her, "Why you leaving? When you coming back?" And yesterday, coming home from school, her first words at our front door were, "I want to see E!".

One glitch: she's a vegetarian. Not just any kind of vegetarian but the worst kind: she won't eat meat but she doesn't replace it with any meat equivalent and just eats starch instead. I need vegetarian recipes so the poor girl doesn't end up eating pasta and pesto sauce the entire year. She is only 21, after all. In continental Europe, that's still practically a child. I don't want any accusations from her parents that we are malnourishing her.

Chill!

When I first met the Frenchman, it struck me how alike we were. Now that we have been together for six years, it occurs to me that, although I still think that we are alike, we are opposites in certain ways.

Example: our approach to lost objects. Recently, I misplaced my apricancello, which is this remote control device that opens the large gate outside our home. It used to hang on my keychain, then the little plastic round piece that allows you to put it on a keychain broke and the apricancello fell off my keychain, so I had to keep it in my pocket. And of course, once it was no longer permanently suspended on something, it got lost.

My solution to this problem: spend half an hour looking for the thing in our house (it can't be anywhere else), then pay the portineria (that's our doorman) 25 euro for a new one. And, of course, hope that one day, I will find the old one so that I will have an extra.

In fact, if it weren't for the economies involved, I would buy five or six apricancellos to begin with, so that I always had one around, even when one got lost. Sometimes I would know where all six were, sometimes one or two would get misplaced and then turn up. No biggie.

The Frenchman's approach: Search for half an hour. Curse in frustration. Search for another three hours that evening. Become extremely stressed and refuse to do anything else until the &%$(& apricancello has been found. Search for another three hours the following morning. Finally concede and ask the portineria for a new one. Search the house some more after that.

Total losses
Me: half an hour of time and 25 euro
The Frenchman, hours upon hours (would you believe that he is still looking?), 25 euro and a lot of stress, and don't forget about all those other things he never got to do (watching TV, reading the paper, hanging out with the Bambina) because he spent all that time looking for a gate opener.

I like to minimize hassle, stress and time lost. Once when I was in university, I knew that in the coming month I would have NO time to do things like laundry. So I went to the store and bought twenty five pairs of socks and underwear. My roommates thought that I was nuts, but with the socks and underwear that I already had, my bulk purchase allowed me to have clean socks and underwear everyday for a month without ever doing laundry. The Frenchman would have rejected this strategy. He would have stressed about the cost of socks and underwear (which is silly 'cause you can NEVER have too many socks and underwear), not bothered buying any new pairs, and ten days later, stressed out about having to find the time to do the laundry.

The reason for our different approaches? At first I thought it might be cultural, and then I realized that the reason was probably a lot more basic and boring than that: he is the oldest (and "responsible") child in his family and I, the youngest (and carefree).

Sigh. Now if I could just get the Frenchman see things the my way.

Losing Weight Without Trying

North American expats out there: ever notice how you weigh less where you are than you did back home, without ever having gone on a diet?

In Canada, I had to make an effort make sure that my weight did not exceed 57 kilo and usually it was more like 59 to 60 kilo. In France, my weight dropped to between 56 and 57 kilo without me even trying.

And here in Italy? Well, people had been asking me if I had lost weight and I said no, I don't think so. Then a couple of weeks ago, I noticed that some pants that I had not worn in a while fit me very loose, indeed. I got onto the scale and lo and behold, 54.5 kilo! Wow!

The Mom Song

I just had to share this performance.

I have watched it about twenty times and I still find myself in tears of laughter everytime I see it. Enjoy!

Lost Luggage

So last Friday, I headed to Fiumucino airport for a long weekend in Paris, taking with me:

1) the Bambina;
2) the Bambina's stroller (which I was planning on checking in);
3) the Bambina's carry-on suitcase;
4) my carry-on suitcase; and
5) my purse.

We arrived at the airport and proceeded to the check-in counter. We had to wait in a long line to get to the front, during which time a horde of Japanese tourists in front of us provided in-line entertainment for the Bambina. When we finally got to the counter, the AlItalia agent looked at the stroller and told me that we had to take it with us to the airplane and check it in there.

"But that's not how it works on Air France (AlItalia's partner). Air France says that all strollers must be checked in at the check-in counter," I explained. (Why do I bother?).

But the agent was adamant. The stroller had to stay with me.

Now under normal circumstances, I am happy to push a stroller, but I also had a fairly full purse replete with crayons and books and travel snacks, plus I had the two travel suitcases and the Bambina. Looking back, I should have checked in the two carry-on suitcases. But I was reluctant to do that, first of all because the Bambina would have launched into an enormous, all-out tantrum on the floor of Fiumicino Airport if she were forced to watch her little suitcase disappear into check-in land, and secondly because the last time I checked in luggage in Rome that was not "special luggage" such as the stroller, it took two hours to retrieve it in Paris. So we kept everything.

Or should I say, we didn't check in anything. I unfolded the stroller, and the Bambina, promptly upon realizing its availability, sat in it and refused my suggestion to walk and pull her beloved little suitcase along with her. So I slung my purse over my shoulder, pulled the Bambina's suitcase with one arm behind me, pushed the stroller with the Bambina in it with another, and left my suitcase sitting in front of counter number 130 of Terminal A.

I didn't even notice the loss until we were boarding the flight and suddenly it dawned on me.

In France, the airport police would have blown my luggage to bits as soon as they realized that it had been abandoned. In Italy, not so. The very kind flight attendant told me that they had found my luggage, that they could not bring it to the plane now as the flight would have been delayed as a result, but that it was being taken to the airport Lost and Found and that I could ask the Lost and Found Office at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport to arrange for the suitcase to be retrieved from Rome. Quelle naivete! Of course, the Paris airport authorities would have nothing to do with an abandoned piece of luggage in Rome. So I had to wait until the end of my long weekend to retrieve my luggage on my return to Fiumicino Airport. And nothing had been stolen from it (not that anyone would want to steal four-year old jeans, socks, underwear, and a bunch of used cosmetics).

The Frenchman was furious. How on earth was I able to leave an entire piece of luggage and forget all about it until boarding the plane??? On the other hand, my friend Francesca made me feel much better today. She told me this morning during our scambio di conversazione that four pieces plus a child was way too much for one person, what on earth was I thinking, and that the mother of the child she babysat regularly had lost her passport and ID three times while travelling with the little one. So while I may be somewhat absent-minded, it is a relief to know that I am not the only one. Assures me that I am not going crazy.

A rare sight

This morning, a driver was standing in front of our palazzo waiting for someone. Our palazzo is surrounded by woods and there is some surprising wildlife near us. There are salamander lizards scampering about. After it rains, worms the length of my foot appear out of nowhere. And once I saw an enormous toad the size of my fist squashed on our driveway, poor thing.

As I passed the driver to get into the house, I said my "Buongiorno!" and he said to me, "Guardi! Ha visto lo scoiattolo? Nel albero li?" He was frantically pointing to something in a tree nearby that he really wanted me to see, but I didn't know what a scoiattolo was in English. Then I saw a squirrel run down the branch of a tree near us. I looked up scoiattolo in my handy pocket dictionary and sure enough, it means squirrel.

"Oh. Uh, yeah. Aren't they all over the place here?"

The driver didn't seem to think so. Not in the city at least.

"But aren't they all over the parks?" (and we live on the edge of a park).

He didn't think so. Come to think of it, I hadn't seen many squirrels around here either. But seeing a squirrel was an amazing thing for him and no big deal for me. And now I understand why. Our cleaner has just informed me that squirrels are pretty rare in Europe. Back in Canada, I used to see squirrels crossing my path every day. Sometimes, they sat on our front porch! (But the SPCA put out a notice not to go near them because they could have rabies). So to me, squirrels are a complete banality, as are racoons, skunks, porcupines, and various vermin that used to raid our outdoor garbage bins at night (at that was in the heart of the city of Toronto).

On the other hand, before coming to Europe I had never in my life seen or heard a cicada. I don't think they exist in Canada, or at least in the province of Saskatchewan, where I grew up, or in Toronto or Montreal, the other two Canadian cities in which I have lived. I guess it is too cold there. So cicadas are something I tune in to everyday here (at least in the summer. They have recently stopped making noise). And the amazing thing is, they all stop making noise for the year on the exact same day at the same time. How do they know to stop? Incredible!

Gym Slippers

Never seen these before. Am I the only one? They are called chaussons de gymnastique and they are what the Bambina's teacher has instructed me to supply for the Bambina's gym class. They kind of remind me of Robeez, which the Bambina, like all good Canadian babies, wore when she was in the early stages of walking, and for a good while thereafter, until she wiped out in them one day and cut her lip and I decided to hell with the baby books insisting barefoot or slippers were best, and went out and got her some real shoes. (It was also getting to be cold and rainy outside and I didn't think it reasonable to expect the Bambina to walk on freezing wet Paris pavement in leather slippers, notwithstanding encouragement from other Canadian mothers to hold out as long as possible on getting real shoes for the baby).

Unlike the Robeez, the chaussons de gymnastique have grips on the bottom. I think I'm going to write Robeez and tell them to take a look at the chaussons de gymnastique and make some changes to the Robeez slipper based on them. Come to think of it, why don't French babies wear chaussons de gymnastique instead of those hard clunker shoes that their parents force them into at ten months to "support their feet" and "help them learn to walk"? Their parents wouldn't even have to buy imported Robeez shoes!

The four-day school week

This in from France: Xavier Darcos, the French Minister of National Education, has announced that there will be no more school on Saturday morning.

You're probably raising your eyebrows right now wondering why on earth French children were ever going to school on Saturday morning in the first place. The Frenchman explains it this way: historically, the church in France put a lot of pressure on the state to close schools on Wednesdays so that children could go to catechism (the idea being that if catechism was held on Saturday, no one would attend). And so, to this day, in many communes of France, there is school on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, 8h30 to 16h00 or thereabouts, and on Saturday morning from 0830 to 12h00. In other communes, there is school on Wednesday morning (but not the afternoon) and no school on Saturday.

But as of September 2008, there will be no more school on Saturday morning, in any school in France.

So the million euro question becomes: what about Wednesdays? And much to the delighted surprise of many parents and to the annoyance of many other parents, the Ministère de l’Education Nationale has decided that there will be no school on Wednesdays either, and children will have a four-day school week.

I'm thinking that the four-day school week will further ingrain the cultural affinity of the French for as much leisure time as possible. Forget the 35-hour work week so cherished in present day France. This generation of French children will be pushing for the four-day work week once they are adults...

The Italian system (at least in Rome) is interesting on school schedule front: school Monday through Friday from 0800 until 13h20, then home for the day. But I think that Italian kids go to school for thirteen years instead of twelve years (not counting kindergarten). The four-day school week could also be a good idea, if there are activities on Wednesdays that children can do. To me, either system sounds better than the traditional North American system of school Monday through Friday, 9:00 AM to 3:30 PM!

And I have no idea what this means for the Bambina's school next year (it being an accredited French school but in Italy).