FLORENCE eLAN

First six weeks in Florence

2009-10-20T07:51:00.000-07:00

November 5, 2009

First six weeks in Florence

Routines are good, they provide a grounding effect on us.

We seem to have settled into one, which brings some sense of stability to our new life here.

I like it! We get up at six fifteen, get the boys out of bed-not easy-a quick breakfast and if we are lucky we are out the door by seven thirty.

I usually do the drop off, Heleen stays home for some needed quiet time. As usual, she finds twenty projects to do at home.

This place is wonderful in the morning; amazing tranquility and peace, when the boys are in school of course. Gorgeous views and the sounds of the Tuscan country side punctuated by the most soothing of city sounds: church bells. I love them! there are so many churches here, they echo all the time from different parts of town as if they were competing for the most beautiful sound. They all resonate up in the hills where we are.

Florence is like a shallow bowl, the city in the bottom surrounded by gentle, beautiful hills all dotted with gated villas and small village enclaves, in time, blessed by nature with the most exquisite combination of foliage: rows of cypress trees interrupted by umbrella pines, fields of olive trees and a myriad of shrubs and other trees layering the panorama in fantastic variations of green; (The landscapes of Benozzo Gozzoli's magnificent fresco "Procession of the Magi" at the Chapel of the Magi in the Palazzo Medici Riccardi come to mind).

They delineate the hills which gently descend into town. This time of the year, October being the most beautiful in my opinion, the light is extraordinary here and all this visual feast seems to vibrate in front of your eyes.

Back to our little routine: (got slightly sidetracked....) our daily route to school takes us down the hill from Casa Rosa at Torre di Bellosguardo down a very narrow road to Piazza de Bellosguardo where lies the gated entrance to Villa dell'Ombrellino, its place in history marked by this plaque on the wall commemorating all the luminaries who at one point lived, worked or visited there, such as: Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry James, Elizabeth and Robert Browning, Adolf Hildebrand and many others.

Then we have to negotiate several impossible blind curves on a road that barely accommodates one car. On each side there are 7-12' high stone walls, and a 4" gutter so the road virtually ends where the wall rises. In all curves on the descend, you have no visual contact with oncoming traffic. Originally country roads built for horses, they are today two way streets with no restrictions. Often in certain stretches one car has to back-up the whole way to let the other one go.When you have a big vehicle like a school bus the tactic is to press steadily on your horn and everybody moves out of the way. It happened to us the other day when I almost had to scrape the wall to get out of his way. I applied that strategy right after and it worked like a jewel! You just have to go with the flow, which, when it comes to traffic, is aggressive. Zero tolerance! -if you leave a little too much room-that means more than the width of a moped- between your car and the one in front at a stop light, that constitutes a direct affront to the person behind you and a threat to his or her vitals... they get enraged and immediately honk! mopeds fly from left, right, behind you and on sidewalks and every direction imaginable.

In one blind spot, in a fraction of a second, you have to choose between a hole or a head-on collision with a wild moped coming at you at 60 miles an hour. Always go for the hole.

Crazy (Pazzi) drivers here, mostly people on mopeds and motorcycles. Much has been written about that but when you live it, it really hits you. It's nuts!! Actually when you think about it, these drivers are some of the most dexterous and brilliant in the world when it comes to space perception, in other words, the awareness they have of the space they occupy or must occupy to move on and avoid collisions. The maneuvers they make are amazing! it is a spectacle to watch and we do every morning.

From Piazza di Bellosguardo we continue down hill to an almost full circle turn-we saw a middle age woman the other day perched up on a flimsy ladder occupying half of the road letting a cat out of a cage...you figure it out! made no sense! it seems there are a lot of stray cats living up the stone wall at that spot, on a tiny green patch. Then, two completely blind turns where we usually have to honk and hope nothing is coming up hill. Learned it from the taxi drivers who drove us for the first 3 weeks here.

At the bottom of the hill is Piazza di San Francesco di Paola. At Porta Romana, 2 minutes away, is where we begin the ascend up to Piazzale Galilleo via Viale Niccolo Machiavelli through this exquisite park like area lined with old evergreen trees, lamp posts and beautiful old villas.

The two way road, ample for Florence, gently snakes up to the piazzale, where the road now named Viale Galilleo continues fairly flat and surrounding the city up on the hill towards Piazza Michelangelo past San Miniato. then a short descend to school on another gently winding stretch. The entire drive is a visual delight! aside, of course, from the traffic!

After drop-off I usually go on my city haunts. There is so much to see and so much to learn in this place. I am also searching out sources for a new e-commerce website Heleen and I recently launched with our partners Ed and Toni Sarraille who are the marketing force behind it. the website features our current collection of greeting cards, journals and gift wrapping paper, formerly known as aritmeticas. New products are in development and include home goods and clothing. You can check it out at:

www. mauricioarias.com. Tell your friends.

Afternoons we spend picking up the boys from school, usually an outing somewhere, then home for some homework and dinner. bedtime usually at 8:30 on school nights.

Getting papers in order

Pretty much the first few weeks here, we spent getting our papers in order. It is not a smooth process, since the information on what is required keeps changing. We first visit the Post Office, then the Questura, back to the Ufficio Anagrafe at the Commune di Firenze where we finally get an appointment with a very nice lady by the name of Zara, who explains in a clear way what we need to do to obtain our permits for extended stay. Since Heleen is european it is supposed to make the process simpler for us. So far it has not been. After 5 trips to the Questura we finally get a small piece of paper with proof of registration and we are asked to come back in 2 months to pick up the "Permesso di Soggiorno".

School

The first six weeks of school have gone remarkably well for both Jubis and Stefis, considering the huge change they had to endure. Julian is not shy at all when we go out about practicing what he has learned, talks to everybody in Italian, throwing some Spanish here and there bit it works for him- he has a great attitude! Heleen and I are very impressed! He has great ability to learn languages. In Holland he was speaking dutch after the first week there.

It has been difficult for him to be "the new kid in class". Tough terrain to navigate at that age and this group of boys have been together since Kindergarten. He's handled it very well so far but there are times, understandably, when he says he wants to go back to Palo Alto. There are also bright moments. He has made a few friends, one is Penn who lives just down the street from us and also goes to Sacro Cuore, though he is in Fifth grade and not in Julian's class. They have play dates and plan on having a sleepover soon.
His parents Alison and David and his brother Walker, a bit older than Julian moved to Florence from Seattle about 6 years ago. They are a wonderful family and have extended a very kind and heartwarming welcome to us. Another friend is Patrick, our neighbor and son of the gardener at Torre di Bellosguardo. They play calcio every afternoon.

He also had a nice surprise visit by Nico Vallone and his father Bob form Palo Alto. Nico and Julian have been friends since pre-school at Escondido. He moved to Hong Kong with is mother a few years ago and goes to school there. He flew from HK alone and met his dad in Rome. They traveled by car up to Florence and stayed a couple of nights. They had a lot of fun climbing up to the top of the Duomo and hanging out. Short but sweet!

The nuns running the school are wonderful! Madre Lupoi pretty much runs the show. She is fantastic! tenacious, firm, affectionate, her english is excellent and when you look in her eyes you know she's reading you through. She mainly oversees the upper and middle schools. She is a jewel! Madre Carol, who is american but has been here many years now, also has her plate full! She is in charge of the elementary and Materna (pre-school) groups and speaks perfect Italian. She is constantly bombarded with either parents or students demanding her attention and she is always kind and equally attentive to all.

Stefis has made a few friends: Alessandro, Francois (Italian mother and French dad) he calls him "Soinfra".

Elle & Phant

"and the search for the perfect Croissant"

About 4 years ago, after we had made a presentation to a client developing a Bakery in Pasadena, California,the idea

for a children's book was born. Upon reviewing some of our designs which were not accepted, I came upon a sketch I had proposed with 2 characters, One elephant named Phant and a bird named Elle. and a tag line (appropriate for the bakery): "and the search for the perfect croissant". At that point it was just a logo. No story or anything deeper than just a nice visual. During that time, I was also looking for an idea for a children's book based on a friendship of two animal characters that would come together because of their love of travel and croissants. It was basically an excuse to develop a story for children about travel and the wonders that come from it. It made perfect sense to me to take this logo and develop a story around it. Four years later-after many interruptions- we now have a script and a general mock up of the story. By we, I mean I am in partnership in this venture with my good friend and old partner in the design business, Ed Sarraille. He is a great force behind making this book a reality.

I Include here a preliminary schematic of the spreads devoted to introducing the characters and also the cover.

I think our move to Florence is in great part inspired by Heleen's and my desire to give our children a taste of the exposure to a different culture, language and ways about life which will enormously enrich their adult lives.We hope the book will touch kindred spirits.

More on this to come.

Monday, October 5, 2009

Stefis had a rough night, a bit of a fever and plugged up. We keep him home from school, Julian, of course,wants to stay home too but no luck. His motive seems more like the monday school blues. I drive down to the San Niccolo area to photograph and have a capuccino at Il Baretto del Riffrullo. Cool cafe with many locals in a great neighborhood. The barista, Stefano, seems like a popular guy, everybody knows him.

Great capuccinos! Lively place with good energy and style. I sit down with my capuccino and "svoglia con la mela" a pastry with apple like an apple struddle, to watch the scene and write some notes. Heleen calls after an hour and tells me Julian has called and wants to be picked up (not feeling well...) I indulge him and we go home. In the afternoon Stefis and I drive Heleen to her interview at the Four Seasons Hotel. While she's there we go get some gelatto and walk one block to this playground in the Piazza de Azzeglio. The beautiful Regency hotel fronts the Piazza.http://www.regency-hotel.com/en/10/hotel_florence.aspx

I had stayed here on my first trip to Florence with Grace Louise in 1984. Never in my wildest dreams I imagined 25 years later I would be living here and playing at this park with my 3 and a half year old boy.

The interview went well. She has to come back for another interview with the director of the Spa on Nov.6.

2009-10-10T13:12:00.000-07:00

Monday, September 7, 2009

Moving to Florence

Today marks the 30th day since we arrived in Florence.

It is about time I write something about our journey so far, - time passes and I forget; pressure is on!

I decided to start this blog mainly to keep a daily or at least weekly casual journal for our family to remember this big trip. It certainly comes with moments of great joy, stress, sense of discovery, incertitude and a broad range of other emotions hard to describe. It will also allow relatives and friends and anybody else interested to follow our crazy adventure.

In addition, I will be posting information about all things Florence, places, events, historical points of personal interest and things to do in this incredible city, which may be useful to others already here or traveling here in future.

About a year ago Heleen and I, after many talks about moving to Europe, decided to take the plunge! Julian, our 11 year old son, was finishing elementary school at Escondido in Palo Alto, California and we thought it would be a perfect window to make this move. Later, we thought, would be much more difficult for him to make this transition. Stefan, our 3 1/2 year old, was finishing his first year of pre-school at Stanford's Bing school and it would be an easy adjustment for him.

We are both strong believers that one of the best schools of life is travel.

Any way we looked at it, pros and cons, in the end it would be a positive thing no matter what.

A long lasting gift for our boys and for us. One big sad note for me though: Michis, my beautiful grown up girl, living and working in San Francisco now, would not be coming with us. She will visit us in the spring and we can't wait.

So, committed and without looking back, we set about planning the trip. Looking back, much more daunting than we thought: move of my office to a smaller location in Palo alto, closing our home and putting everything in storage, moving inventory of our greeting card business to storage, organizing all this under one roof of storage. Insane to think about it now, but we did it! in 3 very busy and stressful months.

August 16th we were sitting inside a KLM 747, with with two highly spirited boys and our dog Lupi in a big crate in the haul of the plane, on our way to Amsterdam. Our first stop in Europe, for a much needed little vacation and visit with family.

For anybody interested in bringing a big dog to Europe from the US, it is a fairly smooth process, at least as KLM handled it, just make sure you land with the dog at your final destination in Europe, otherwise you have to transport the animal somehow within the continent and there are no airlines that accommodate a large pet. The aircraft most airlines use within Europe are 737s and they cannot take a big crate in their cargo. we found out the hard way.

There are special services "door to door" that will pick up your pet-and luggage sometimes- and drive it to your final destination, thus freeing you to fly light and stress free! Of course this comes at a hefty price. the two services we contacted were:

Danny at www.petrelocator.co.uk his estimate was about US$2,400. The other was called Dieren Transport : www.vck.nl

In the end, Lupi was driven door to door by Jeroen and his buddy Goran.

Jeroen is Heleen's childhood friend Sandra's brother. This came about when we were having dinner one night and we mentioned what we were going to pay the transport service and Sandra's husband Dennis said half jokingly: I'll do it for a thousand Euros, then Jeroen offered seriously to do it and that was it! two days later, on the seventh of September he was at our door bright and early to pick up Lupi and our luggage. 15 hours later Lupi was in Florence! They all spent the night at a hotel, we flew, stress free, the next day and arrived at our apartment at about 1 PM. It could not have worked better. Jeroen and Goran were angels from heaven! They saved the day!

Suzanne Pitcher, from Pitcher and Flaccomio, the agency that helped us with our living arrangements, was at the apartment to meet us, accompanied by Baron Franchetti and his wife Ana. very gracious couple. It felt great to finally be in Florence! The apartment we are renting is part of Torre di Bellosguardo, a hotel that sits in the hill of Bellosguardo, one of the most beautiful areas of Florence. The views are stunning! hard to match.

In the 13th century, the tower was built by Guido Cavalcanti, a close friend of Dante and illustrious poet, as a hunting lodge; later confiscated by Cosimo de Medici who later lost the property to the Michelozzi family. Most recently, in the 1930's, it became the property of Baroness Marion von Hornstein Franchetti who used the villa as a gathering place for her artistic friends. Giovanni Amerigo Franchetti, her grandson, is credited with converting the villa into a luxury hotel in the eighties. The grounds and location are magnificent!

Three Weeks in Holland

Before moving on with Florence, I wanted to insert a few notes about the 3 weeks we spent in the north part of the Netherlands, or "Noord Holland"as is most commonly known here. Italians call it "I Paesi Bassi" .

One of the principal cities of this area is Alkmaar, which dates back to the 13th century and it is best known for its cheese market and festivals. It is a beautiful old city, full of narrow cobblestone streets everywhere.

Since the sixties and mainly in the nineties, there has been a spurt of suburban sprawl which has linked adjacent towns and villages to the city. One of these towns is Heerhugowaard, where Heleen grew up.

The town with its "main street" called Middenweg which pretty much crosses town from one end to the other and functions as its main artery, really feels likes a neighborhood of Alkmaar.

We all love this place! We rented this house that belongs to Sandra's aunt Joke and her husband Aad. Great people. He is an architect and the house we stayed at is his home, he designed and built in the 60's. Great house with a beautiful lush garden surrounding it on 3 sides. Lots of light and room. Very comfortable, it feels great here! First morning we wake up to the sounds of bells from a church nearby, roosters and peacocks from an animal park that our house fronts. On the other side there is this this incredibly lush park with meandering canals, wood bridges and weeping willow trees all over.

It is totally fairy tale landscape. Cows look very happy-I think that is why milk products are so delicious here. There are biking paths nestled among all this lushness that criss-cross the entire town and for that matter link every city, town and village in this country. It is an amazing pleasure to ride a bike here. This town suits me!

Open, green, lush flat land everywhere. The beauty of this landscape does something special to my soul.

We spent most days resting, sleeping in, visiting with friends and family and taking some rode trips in the near towns. We went to the new Heritage Museum in Amsterdam. Perfectly stunning! The conversion job from an old folks home to state of the art modern museum is masterful. The modern interior architecture work by Luuk Kramer, blends beautifully with the classic 18th century exterior. Graphics are top notch!