Neapolitan Love

You learn that while the driving is insane, and theft is well above average, the Neapolitan people are some of the most amazing people in the world. While it is obvious I have little to no Italian language, they are willing to go above and beyond to get their message across. This doesn't stop at the Quick Bite in the malls, where the teens who work there (I assume they are teens but it seems time stops and no one ages here until the get over the hill) speak English when they see me do my best impersonation of someone ordering "Una margerhit pizza per favore".

The man at the coffee shop by the port, clearly a tourist location, chose to show me my exact change and pull down his eyelid (a sign that means "be aware" for the others around me). Last week I was on the bus and a woman in her broken English felt it was very important that I love Naples, something I readily do, she shared with me how the churches are open and this is the year of open doors and pointed out some I must see. She also told me of some forest that is huge and no one goes to.

We are very lucky with the our neighbors. They are our landlord and her family-- which includes frequent visits from extended family. We knew after our first meeting that we liked these people. It was our second meeting that we decided we love them. Yes, our landlord and her husband speak only Italian, and we were learning "Ciao" and "Allura" but there is something about them. They open their home to me and my guests. Not the home we rent from them, their home. They feed us. They over feed our children with sweets, bagged and baked. It's not just what they give us (or what we pay them). There is a respect for each other. We play charades frequently to get the point across generally with a few nouns we know-- like I said "maestra, cucina, me?"  (teacher, kitchen, me) to mean "could you teach me how to cook?"



Landlord showing Bugsies the plants

Today I am reminded as I took the kids to take our compost over to the landlord. We fed the chicken and the son picked up Monkey so he could grab and egg. The landlord washed the egg and gave me 4 "frigo. Domani buono" okay, they are cold, I'll put them in the fridge and eat them tomorrow. The kids went in front of her tv and she said to me "Mamma, okay, 5 minutes, okay" in her kind way saying "Back off, your kids are fine and we love having them here, 5 minutes won't kill you". So I drop the eggs back at my house and chop some shallots and come over, reminded there is possible mildew growing in our kitchen and I tell her son (in English). He comes over to check it out, then they switch. Landlord believes it is not mildew, takes her glasses off, and her shoes, asks to stand on my table, grabs a wet rag and scrubs the ceiling, touches it and smells it and declares "no fungo. Problem? por you?" I assure her I don't care. And she asks if we need our heater turned on and gets her son. They show me the timer and then click on the radiators. They want to make sure I don't fail in life here in Italy. This is how you turn on the radiator: take the switch, flip it from the sunshine to the snowflake. That's it. Poof. Done. Yet instead of showing me, they wanted to make sure it was done right and waited until winter to do it for me.


Hard to tell we don't speak the same language!


This is how it is. You open your eyes, your heart, a smile, and Naples is rich. Gleaming with love for people, food, life! It is a breath of fresh air.