A visit to the nunnery

We had a couple of items on our agenda today. First re-load the cell phones with more minutes; next, visit Sister Adelaide; then eat lunch. As they say, living in Italy is really just killing time between meals!

For those that don't appreciate their rollover minutes in the States, appreciate it. It's a foreign concept here. You pay for a set amount of minutes per month on your cell phone and if you don't use all your minutes within 30 days, say good-bye. On the other hand if you blow through your minutes, you can no longer make out-going calls until you re-load. We're learning how the system works. But clearly, you have to have a pretty good idea of just exactly how much (outgoing) talk time you'll need. And while you can re-load on-line, the WIND shop is right along our bike route on the Via del Corso. So we decided to stop by in person to see our man, Tiziano. I don't think he's used to customers with so many questions...but we promised to be in and out next month.

Next, we had an appointment with a nun at Santa Maria del Anima. This church here in Rome is specifically for the German-speaking community. We were tipped off that they run an au pair-like program. The girls are all from either Germany, Austria or Switzerland (the German part) and come here to Italy, generally on a gap year from school, to learn Italian and have a cultural exchange. We really did not want to go the "live-in" route for this year in Italy. We have had au-pairs for the past three years in Chicago and while it's been a great help, we thought we really wouldn't need the help here. After all, neither of us are working and why not devote ourselves entirely to the kids after 3:30pm each day?

Well, that sounds ideal but (and at the risk of sounding completely spoiled here) it still means that someone has to clean our their lunch-boxes, pre-stain, soak and try to clean their uniforms, fold laundry, get dinner ready, then clean up after dinner. It seems to me that that does not leave too much time for actually enjoying the kids. It's more like once they're home, you're working for them rather than playing with them.

Having the ability to go out in the evening every once in a while without sweating over getting a babysitter is just an added benefit of having an au-pair living with you. But of course, that also means you do have someone living with you. In any case, here we are with sister Adelaide, exploring the possibility of hosting another au-pair. We'll see what comes of it.

We finish at the nunnery just in time for lunch. Yeah! Not a long and fancy lunch. Just a quick, choose it yourself from the case, and have it served to you at your table kind of lunch. Enough nourishment to help you bike up the hill home.