These are legit Italian hand signals. I was suprised to learn that they have their own variety of non-verbal communications and just now randomly came across this snippet.
Also when they wave you over they do it facing the ground instead of the hand facing up so the first time someone did it to me I thought they were telling me to sit down.
Bruschetta with dried tomatoes and burrata. I could eat burrata and arugula every day. It's a great combination.
"Scalloped" chicken with porcini mushrooms
Maccheroni and eggplant in a tomato sauce w garlic and I think onions. I do not fully grasp why some pastas are labeled as such in certain restaurants and i think of lot of it is local names and colloquiallisms because the pasta seemed exactly like pici (pronounced "peachy") but wasn't called that. This restaurant is at the "base camp" of Mt. Etna and has been in business for over 70 years. I played rhythm guitar with the country line dance band yesterday and we ate between sets.
I'm going to give this a try. Puedo comer vidrio, no me hace daño. Have a feeling my accent will give me away as being a non-native, but it's a nation of immigrants so quien sabe? At a minimum I'm bound to score some bonus points.
Back in the 90's a shaggy expat who spent every winter in a small Mexican beach town and who had a reputation for being a "crazy gringo" told me that the locals expect craziness from the gringo expats and so it was better to differentiate yourself from the annoying American tourist archetype and give them what they want/expect instead of disappointing them. The respectable folks look at you like you're crazy, but everyone else wants to buy you drinks and be your friend. There's a wisdom to it. It's like a very minor version of being able to get away with rock star behaviour.
"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered."
These are legit Italian hand signals. I was suprised to learn that they have their own variety of non-verbal communications and just now randomly came across this snippet.
Also when they wave you over they do it facing the ground instead of the hand facing up so the first time someone did it to me I thought they were telling me to sit down.
These kind of gestures and some local words/phrases can get you far as far as respect from the locals when living in a touristy area.
They do the same thing here with palm facing the ground wave. I used to hail cabs by sticking my arm out and up and giving a bit of wave of the hand but then noticed everyone else doing it with the arm down
"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered."
I'm on the train earlier in my window seat and across the aisle from me is this woman with a bunch of kids, one of whom marginally has the seat next to mine when he's not running around. So the kids are running around all over the place, sometimes slamming into me in a group of two or three as they're playing rough. The mother's deep in her smartphone and not doing a damn thing to reign them in. She obviously doesn't care.
I usually give 'the eye' in these cases and it usually works to get the kid to at least chill the fuck out around me and fuck around elsewhere. Didn't work this time. So the next time a pile of them crash into me I get their attention and the mom's with a sharp "¡Oye!" and say loud enough for all to hear after a dramatic pause and a determined look - "I can eat glass, it does not hurt me," saying the first part looking the kids in the eye and the second part looking the mom in the eye.
She drew her kids near, said something quick and low to them pointing her finger, and that was the end of that problem. Minute later somebody who had been standing came over and took the seat next to mine and gave me a nod and a smile like I was Don Corleone.
"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered."
