The American Invasion, Part Two

Dateline, Monday, May 31st, 2010. Labor day in America, but just another day here in Italy. It was the third day of Alee's visit, and we had some big plans for the afternoon. Classes had recently ended for my schoolmates and I, so we were eager to get out and celebrate the good weather during the day. Saar, Birgit and I organized a little picnic in the public gardens so we could get out, get some sun, eat some food and show Alee what it's like to be a lazy Italian student drinking in the park. While the others were bringing wine, cheese, and meats, I was tasked with finding a certain kind of bread to bring to the party. I was told where to find it and how much to get; it sounded like a lot (five kilos, about ten pounds), but I had no idea how freakin' big it would be until we got to the little store that sold it. This GIANT wheel of bread was so enormous, the guy had to cut it into four pieces just so we could carry it with us out of the store. We lugged the darn thing to the gardens, set up our little picnic area, and waited for the others to arrive.

On the way we stopped by the little creek that runs through the gardens to feed the turtles in the water some of our bread (we could spare a few bites).

But there was a duck armada bent on intercepting all our bread torpedoes, and the poor turtles were too slow and dumb to get any of the crumbs.

 The others were operating on Italian time, so Al and I sat there chitchatting for a while by ourselves. Little did I know, Al is a sneaky, sneaky girl. She kept my attention away from the footpath that circles the park as her plan unfolded behind me; and to my complete and utter surprise, in the middle of our conversation I hear a giant backpack plunk down next to me and it's owner, Ryan Burch, exclaims "You know how hard it is to set up a surprise like this from 6000 miles away??" Completely unbeknownst to me, he and Alee had planned this whole thing out weeks before. I was so shocked I could barely say anything for about half an hour! I was totally taken aback, but in the best way possible. That moment definitely ranks up there with some of the coolest stuff that's ever happened to me. They filled me in on the whole plot, and what he'd been doing recently - after graduating from MBA school at ASU, he went to Vegas with my other friends back home (which I knew about), but then flew directly to Croatia from there and spent a week backpacking around that country until he came Italy to hang out with Al and I. He recanted his adventures there as my buddies from class slowly trickled in to our little encampment. Pretty soon we had claim over a sizable portion of the park, and we dug into our provisions with fervor. Birgit showed up with a few friends of hers, a Danish girl and an American guy; at that point, with the four of us from the States, we outnumbered all the other nationalities represented. America for the win! Here are some photos of the day:

That's about 1/8th of the giant wheel of bread, for the record. We only ended up eating a quarter of it between about twelve of us, so I took the rest home, froze it, and ate it for another month! We had quite the afternoon there in the park, drinking, chatting, and playing games. Once we were good and lubricated, we somehow developed a game wherein fresh grapes are hit with a paddle towards a group of hungry participants, who then try to catch said grapes in their mouths:

Nothing like some good clean fun in the park. Afterwards, we decided to head to an aperitivo at a nice little bar that's located halfway up one of the hills that surround Bologna. It was a bit of a trek (especially with Ryan's travelling backpack!), but it was such a cool place it was worth it. Through the trees you could see most of Bologna's rooftops, with the famous towers and churches dotting the skyline. Very cool. And Riccardo managed to knock another wine glass off the table at that place, breaking it into a zillion pieces, just like a few nights before. Like I said, some people you can't take anywhere!

Here's me hamming it up at the bar with some of the leftover bread:

We stayed there fairly late, having a couple drinks to cool off after a warm sunny day in the park, until Saar's boyfriend mercifully gave us a ride home. Ryan's backpack was heavy, and we were nowhere near my place, so that was a godsend. Tomorrow would be the start of a big trip for us, so we hit the hay fairly early to get up and start the adventure the next day. Stay tuned for the next installment when the American Invasion heads out of Bologna!