How to be foreign...

I'm in Rome this week, away from my scanner and any chance of getting a drawing into my computer. I tried feeding my sketchbook into the DVD slot, pressing it against the screen, but nothing worked.

The idea of going to an Italian internet cafe is impossible; as I speak no Italian it took me the entire day yesterday to get a photocopy. So, this week, I'll be posting a daily 'naked' diary without illustrations. After all, a picture may be worth a thousand words, but it takes three thousand times longer to download...

(First entry later today)

Comments

[La Belette Rouge]

Hope you are having a fantastic time in Rome. And, while I appreciate the need for naked posts while you are on vacation, I hope you will delight us with some of your images of Rome as soon as you return.
Dreaming of pasta,
LBR

[badaude]

There will be drawings which I'm storin up for when I return next week...

[badaude]

+g

[Alice]

Ah, Italy -- lucky gal! I would KILL to be in Italy right now. OK, OK -- maybe not kill, exactly, but I would love to be there with you! I adore Italy, my second-favorite country, after France bien sûr. Ciao bella! Eat lots of gelato for me.

[lagatta à Montréal]

Dear Badaude,

I'm looking forward to your Roman sketches - I lived and studied in Italy, in Perugia and Rome. Was back there summer before last, and actually working so I had to face the problems of getting things done. I speak fluent Italian but can assure you that even Italian-speakers - and people who have lived therer all their lives - have problems navigating an endless series of complicated rules - that people sometimes obey and sometimes avoid - there seem to be codes as to when and where avoidance is acceptable.

Hope things are in bloom!

[badaude]

I thought I was used to being a foreigner and was unprepared for the restoration of my linguistic and cultural virginity.
I find I have an automatic foreign language switch. When I'm not speaking English, it flips over into French and visa versa. When I switch my speech to 'foreign' in Italy, it comes out in French. I've been saying, 'merci' and 's'il vous plait' all week to uncomprehending Italians.