When I think of prostitutes and weed.....

That's right - Momo made it to Europe!!! 

And yes, she I and I are both thrilled that she FINALLY made it here - and not just to Italy, but also to Amsterdam!!!!

In the 'a' of I love Amsterdam - and yes I do! Can't wait to go back

Amsterdam loves bikes = part of why I heart Amsterdam. This is a multi-level bike parking garage

Two days in Amsterdam to see it all, so what better way but by bike and boat

Double fisting Heinekens at a clog factory - When in da Nederlands

Spears' long lost cousin serving us up pickled herring, which was surprisingly good, like a mild sushi 

We're on BIKES! (through the Dutch countryside)

We're on a BOAT! (through the Amsterdam canals)

Communing with our gouda maker - happy cows make happy cheese, Laurie doing her part. 

Did I mention I love bikes AND water AND sun? 

Visiting one of the house-boat villages on the canals of Amsterdam - Laurie in dreamland

Benvenuto a Italia! And all the glory and crazy that it has to offer (glory pictured here in Piazza Navona)

Enjoying one of my favorite parts of Rome - free water everywhere!!!!

Laurie regressing to her modeling days unintentionally at the Spanish steps. Italy has a way of bringing out the glamour in all

Embracing appertivo with a spritz

You know what THAT means......

Laurie getting a glimpse of a days work at the UN in Rome

Setting off on her own to explore Venice and Florence, while I toil away solving world hunger

What? I'm a gelato expert now

Oh hey Amalfi Coast, it's been awhile

Laurie forcing me to stop and smell the roses. Please see Pace below

The view from our room in Ravello, sleeping in the clouds, high above the tourism madness

And yes it was so awesome that Laurie had to pinch herself at times

Sorry I should have warned you that this was going to get R rated with a 61 year old gun show

And as we do, we made time for posing like statues (this is the cave of Eve)

I finally absolutely tuckered her out. Please again refer to lessons below. I'm pretty sure I have this same picture of my father on his visit. But where better to have a nap than on a beach in Positano, with Rick Steve open on your lap

The glory that is the Amalfi Coast - Positano

Gelato expert in Positan0

The pool at our hotel looking over the sea. Not a bad place to recoup. While lounging here, Laurie eyed a hiking tour and exclaimed, "Ugh, look at those people hiking, I feel so bad for them". Officially, relaxing

I'm pretty sure reading the Happiness Project while relaxing next to a pool in Ravello, Italy overlooking the Amalfi Coast means you could probably close the book and call it done

And then yes of course we made time for frolicking

Momo! I can't thank you enough for coming all this way. And I can't wait for our next two country (or more! we're crazy as established) adventure!!!!

When I think of prostitutes and weed.....naturally I think of my Mom. So who better to take a visit to Amsterdam with than LKB herself. But I'm getting ahead of myself.....You avid blog readers may have noticed than with all my visitors over the last 1.5 years in Italy, my Mom had not been one of them, much to her chagrin but very much due to her own new adventure with picking up, selling our house and relocating to Seattle. But she rarely let a phone call go by without mentioning her desire to visit, to which I of course always responded - You're welcome anytime, ahhh except when I'm in Tunisia, Thailand, Tanzania, Peru, New Zealand, or Sierra Leone. And of course with my always uncertain future, Ldog did not want to miss the opportunity to visit Europe while I'm still here.....so in late May she decided it was time and booked her ticket for one week later. Yes, if you had any doubt where I get my crazy, now you know. However, I also get my love for planning from LKB and obviously with a week's notice there was not going to be a spreadsheet or even really a suitcase packed or clean sheets for her arrival - but we both embraced this moment to fly by the seat of our pants and enjoy 10 whirlwind days together.

Europe watch out:  While LKB has been to Costa Rica, New Zealand and Australia - she'd never been to Europe!!! (yeah, EVER) And as you know, she refuses to go to a region without at least taking down two countries (please see December 2010 post if you're unfamiliar). Ldog and I both love tulips, biking, straight talk, and tall men - so we quickly decided the Netherlands would provide the ideal second destination to the visit to my current home in Italy. Within an hour of arriving in Amsterdam and stepping off the train from the airport, we had barely glanced at a map when a stranger stopped to ask us where we needed to go and then pointed us directly to our hotel. I immediately had a flash back to LKB's visit to Aus/NZ where she liked Aus so much more because of the evil weather conspiracy.....I could see immediately how the Dutch were trying to beat out Italy for favorite of the two European destinations, and I warned LKB not to hold it against Italy but there was no way anyone was going to stop and offer her directions, much less in English, but Italy had many other charms to offer.

Curiosity:  You may remember from LKB's visit down under that I was amazed by her curiosity even into the smallest things, and with proper planning time I would have reminded myself of this and prepped with some research, topping up my random knowledge. But alas, there was no way even with years of time that I could prepare for the questions/ideas that come out of Laurie. One example on a boat from Amalfi to Positano - LKB points at a random building in the cliffs and asks me who lives there? Ummm......but then to be more fair, when we were walking through Rome we happened into a piazza with a large church where Laurie asked me what the Piazza was and what the church was, to which I replied "There are more churches in Rome than piazzas, so this is just one more random one". Ok, what I actually said was, "I don't know, some church". Luckily, Super Hero Laura saved the day again when she heard about my Mom's visit she showed up one day after hearing with a full 10 day itinerary, including sites, restaurants and more. She even offered to go with us one evening, and where did we end up? At the same random church Laurie had enquired about, which happens to have an optical illusion of a fake dome, because they didn't have enough money to build an actual dome. And the moral here is two-fold, 1) When Laurie visits, call in reinforcements. I seriously don't know how my Grandma handled all her questions since I can only imagine they were even more abundant as a child; and 2) I still have no idea about this eternal city I call home and discover new things on a daily basis. Laurie was even curious to "try" Amsterdam's finest at a Coffeehouse, which was our biggest FAIL, since all I really wanted was to post a photo here of Laurie giggling with pipe in hand. Please see Pace below for why we failed.....

Pace:  As you may have my noticed, my life sort of moves on fast-forward right now, and I've gotten quite used to jumping from one thing to the next, maybe too used to it......As you may remember from Laurie's visit down under she requested an action packed trip. On this latest Euro adventure, there was no time for me to overplan our activities, so I will say I wasn't to blame there, at the same time I knew we only had 2 days to see Amsterdam and I know how much there is to see in Italy and even 1.5 years isn't enough time. In Amsterdam we both definitely wanted to ride bikes, but what did we do less than 24 hours after Laurie landed from a 12 hour flight? We decided doing just the 25 km country bike tour OR the 12 km city bike tour wasn't enough, and we should do BOTH in one day back to back (please see crazy above).  And then of course after we finished our bike marathon, we decided it was a good time to hunt down a coffeehop, because of course the wares of the coffeeshop would definitely energize us. Flash forward to Italy, where we land from the Amsterdam and I immediately take Laurie for a full city walk so she can decide what she wants to go back to - yes after flying I took Laurie to Villa Borghese, Spanish Steps, Piazza Navona, Campo di Fiori, the Pantheon, Trevi Fountain, Vittorio Emmanuele - all in 3 hours. And then what did I do? I packed her up to go see Venice and Florence, with only one day in each, only the ability to say please and thank you in Italian, and an Italian SIM card. One smart pace decision I made against all recommendations from Italians on where I should take my Mom for the weekend in Italy, was deciding against Tuscany (pls see Dec 2010 for my Mom's opinion on wine tasting), and driving between towns, in favor of the Amalfi Coast and a cliff top resort in relaxing Ravello. Would I let us just rest though? Nope, Mom we're hiking to Amalfi, then we'll boat to Positano, then back, sound good - great, let's go, hurry!

My 'Real' Life:  One thing that I will forever be grateful and appreciative about my Mom is her unending curiosity (see above) in my life. She would have probably been perfectly happy not seeing one ounce of Europe if it meant meeting my friends, seeing where I live, where I work, seeing what I eat, where I shop, etc. So of course, this extended to meeting my landlord? Luckily, my landlord and my Mom are kindred spirits since my landlord's son (Flavio my boyfriend you may remember) is studying abroad and she misses him terribly and secretly (or not so) has made me her daughter in his absence - so it wasn't super weird for me to ask her to dinner in the end, and luckily she speaks English well (with a bit of my translation help) and it wouldn't have mattered anyway since they were both besties right away since my landlord studied English in Seattle, and of course the fact that they both like MOMing me. My Mom even got to meet my neighbor and use her Italian/Spanish to explain that I was her baby so that my neighbor didn't think she was breaking into my house. And in awesome Momness, when she came to my office and met my colleagues (the ones I don't like) she acted like she'd never heard of them (and that I don't complain about them daily) - best Mom ever. One aspect of my real life that Laurie is not a huge fan of is that I live on the 4th floor (which she insists is the 5th) without an elevator. She's sure my spine is in danger of misalignment from carrying things up these stairs everyday - I would say it helps me keep the marathon pace my life is moving at, but let's just agree to disagree on this one Momo.

-Language/Culture: I knew that Amsterdam would be no problem because Dutch people probably speak the best English of any non-native speaker i know (thanks a lot Dutch!) and the fact that Amsterdam is 60% non-dutch residents. I told my Mom she'd have no problem getting around with English in the major tourist centers of Rome, Venice, and Florence; but that she just needed to learn a few phrases/words - Thank you, please, and hello and goodbye (and who to say them to in which formality). However, I may have a skewed perspective now that I can actually speak Italian and the fact is that yes you can go, but then when a problem happens (which by design in Italy of course it will) there is very little recourse if you don't speak Italian or understand that there will always be 5 stories/directions for the solution you're seeking, probably none of which are actually correct. I tried to prep Laurie with Italian rules/customs - no cheese on pasta with seafood in it; no one respects lines; no olive oil served with your bread; no dinner before 8pm, etc. And she embraced a lot of it and came up with her own cunning strategy of speaking in Spanish when her Italian failed, so that no one would know she was American - like mother like daugther. She was a bit horrified of how rude I've become in lines etc. elbowing people out of the way and then she also showed me to remain open to Italians surprising me. After our first night in Ravello, she wasn't happy with the softness of the pillows and she wanted to ask the desk for new ones. I informed her that this was not something that they were going to do anything about, but as she started to ask at the hotel desk and I translated (to which they looked slightly horrified), they did change the pillows. I did however make her ask for the olive oil with the bread, there's certain rules I won't even let myself break at this point.

So of course it was a whirlwind 10 days of Momo/EAB time, where again I'm just left with amazement and appreciation for this woman of 61 who can take down two countries in 10 days, booked one week prior with a smile and a never-ending sense of wanting to do more (plus a few more nights sleep). I love you Mom - for coming all this way to see me, for embracing all that you saw and experienced, and for always showing me how to be a better person and open my eyes in a different way - you are my ultimate super hero and I can't wait for our next adventure.