October to November… Where Does the Time Go?

I can’t believe I am writing my first detailed post in about a month… Whoa! Where has time gone?

Looking back at my calendar, I see some good bike rides had, a few projects accomplished, a couple of exams have come and gone, and as I turn this page– yup, that is the end of October.

I look back on October– maybe I spread myself pretty thin, but I would argue to limit myself would limit my experiences here.

Some highlights from October would be an Ex-Patriot seminar, “The Chestnut Festival” in Cittadella, the visiting CIMBA representatives from the Consortium of schools, a history of the Veneto region, LEAP, Halloween (or rather the lack there of), and the regular day to day life.

The Ex-Patriot seminar was a panel of four people who have lived either in the U.S., or another country, and now work in Italy. Our questions allowed us to hear some firsthand insight in differences between Italy’s ways of doing business versus the U.S.

Another Seminar was on the history of the Veneto region, a region that has a very low rate of unemployment (3.5%), an Agrarian background, and is strong in manufacturing. 1 out of 8 residents own their own business.

Our venture to a festival in Cittadella came about because a few locals invited us. It was basically a street fair. Some vendors and bars were offering 1 Euro drinks of Torbolino. Torbolino is the left over of wine. It comes from white or red, but there was only white. It taste sweet and builds in affect… gradually.

Utilizing the local ‘’taxi'’ drivers is essential to getting out and experience the surrounding towns. If you take the initial step to arrange a ride somewhere, then you can really get out to the bigger towns (Castelfranco or Bassano del Grappa). Some students struggle to see that it really is as simple as planning ahead, when it comes to getting off campus. There is a town close, Crespano. Crespano has Gelato, a great Osteria (type of Restaurant that is very homey and has a great policy on glasses of wine), and a place to spend the weekend evenings.

The setting of Paderno del Grappa is great in many ways. It has allowed me to cycle in the country roads, meet locals, and I feel centrally located in Europe. This program is original and has many unique elements that wouldn’t conceivably work anywhere else. The two full weeks of travel, basically a month of built in travel, is not like any other program. With that much travel time, I’ve been able to see places and experience things at my own pace.

With all this travel, is it hard to study? Yes and no. Yes, but it is hard for me to study whether I’m in Iowa or in Italy. Besides that, the travel and all of the other usual distraction of day to day life are 100% managable. The nice thing about studying, there is always someone in you’re classes that can help you solve a problem or explain an idea.

Moving forward… during the second holiday week, my mom came to travel Italy with me. We met in Venice Friday night, seeing her was a great. Saturday we traveled to Bologna for two days. Bologna is the heart of the Italian manufacturing and Italian food industry. Companies such as Ducatti and Ferrari are based out of Bologna. Bologna is a great mix of old and modern Italy, it’s a university town (the University of Bologna was founded in 1088), and Bolognese food. Our hotel was in the heart of the town, so we spent the first day walking around, checking out shops, and searching for a place to eat.

The next day, Sunday, we traveled about an hour outside of Bologna to Parma. Parma may sound familar, especially if you enjoy Parmigiano-Reggiano or Prosciutto. We found ourselves on a tour of the Parmigiano farm/factory just as they were finishing the final steps of making the day’s cheese. It is an interesting process of mixing skim milk and cream with curds in a large copper kettle. The milk cooks, the machine turns, and the curds form into one giant soft ball of cheese. At this point, they suspend the cheese with cloth and cut it into two. Next, the cheese is put into a circular wooden wheel ‘’mold,'’ if you will. They will sit over night before moving onto a few more lengthy steps. The cheese will air dry for a few days before soaking in huge salt-water baths for around a month. At this point, the salt-water is working to rid any bacteria and the cheese has already formed a outter rind, so it is not necessarily soaking salt up.

The space in which all these steps take place in, from a business-student’s perspective, was extremely impressive. Seeing how they manage space and how well the process flows was amazing, considering the length of the process to produce one wheel, is about 12-14 months. The factory had about 10 kettles, eight 20 meter-long salt-water pools, another couple of rooms for airing out, and lastly was an impressive room with shelves from the floor to the ceiling.

It was a perfect day for touring, the weather was cold and rainy. We went about 40 minutes to a differnt part of the region to see a Prociutto factory. This tour was not so action packed. Similarly to the cheese process, the Prociutto goes through about a year or 14 months of curing.

These two places were unique, they were still Italian family run businesses. Some of the other factories have immigrant workers because Italians are moving away from continuing the hardworking family business. It will be interesting to see where these industry’s go in the next few years.

From Bologna we traveled to Florence, the Renisance capital. Florence was great on a lot of different levels. The rainy weather that had been stuck over Italy for a few days lifted as we came into town. We went to the east side of the city and took it all in from high on a hill top.

Ah, ok. There was plenty to see and not enough time to see it all. What we did see were a few of the local artist’s shops. We saw the Statute of David and the Uffizi Museum which houses Leonardo da Vinci, Donatello, Michelangelo, Raphael, to name but a few.

It’s interesting to think about, but my friend Madeline made me realize that turning 21 this month will have a completely different level of importance. For my birthday, my mom signed us up for a cooking class. It was great to see how an Italian kitchen is run. It is pretty similar to the kitchen’s I’ve worked in back in the States. Some interesting gadgets were a machine that stirs ice cream up instead of having to let it thaw and a $22,500 that is self cleaning.

The meal we ate was great, a lot of interesting dishes. We tasted 3 different types of olive oil with a chic pea and bread. We had Pecorino cheese flaun, fresh pasta we made, and chicken. Dessert was a chocolate lava cake.

It was a great holiday.

Ciao more later!

Peace and such.