What Italians Do Better...

No, I'm not talking about gelato or pasta... I'm talking about healthcare. (Although, I must admit, they take the prize on the former also)

This past week for me has been like a rollercoaster of sickness in more directions than imaginable. From a sinus infection, to a fever and chills, to a wisdom tooth swelling my bottom gums and paining me to smile--my reasons for misery have been plenty! Even more, I'm leaving for my spring break to Dublin tomorrow, for which I'm extremely excited yet nervous because traveling while sick is never the best idea.

As to be expected, I've been having moments of panic thinking about going to a doctor, then trying to figure out how I'd pay for the visit and any medications prescribed to me with my limited insurance and low budget. Then I remembered... I'M IN ITALY! Healthcare is not only extremely affordable... it's practically free! Better yet, oftentimes no doctor is needed in order to receive the exact antibiotic that you're looking for. Through the grapevine I heard that you can just walk into the pharmacy, tell them your symptoms, and be given exactly what you need to heal your woes. So I figured I'd give it a shot.

15 minutes and 30 euros later I was the happiest patient ever! With 2 antibiotics for my sinuses and an all-natural anti-bacterial spray for my gums, I am completely set for traveling. My attitude has sky rocketed, and I feel better already knowing that I don't have to worry about feeling miserable and sick during spring break. What a relief. No doctors, no insurance companies, no long lines and annoying processes. Just the medications I need at an affordable price and in a timely manner.

So I've been walking around ecstatic all day blabbing to my friends about the great news. A few of them--especially the Italian ones--just chuckle at me. Americans they think, So excited about something so normal to us. But for me, the American who pays 10-50 dollars for a prescription AFTER my insurance deductions, doctors visits, and long lines at the pharmacy, this is quite the steal!

Point is, America, we've got this healthcare thing all wrong. Politicians and pharmaceutical companies are so intertwined that even when we have presidential candidates promising us reform, we have no one promising us what is absolutely necessary: a step away from corporate greed and bureaucracy that profits off of human illnesses. We must begin to learn about the different systems and alternatives that would be most comprehensive and cover the most people with the best quality at the lowest cost. I personally, along with many progressive doctors and politicians, believe that the single-payer system is the way to go. (Read more about single-payer here at http://www.pnhp.org/). If you're interested in seeing more about the healthcare issue in the States, I would highly recommend Michael Moore's Sicko. It's one of his best documentaries yet, and focuses on the issue at hand more than a political bias.

Well I hope that you're all enjoying your spring break in good health and happiness. And if you're fighting the healthcare insurance companies over one thing or another, I advise you to book a flight to Italy, get what you need at a pharmacy, then stay at my place for a week and make a vacation out of it. I can guarantee it'll be the best trip to the pharmacy you'll ever make!

Ciao,
Rachael

Parigi! (Paris in Italian ;)

Ru and Jodi at a tapas resturant in HOTlanta. Summer of '06.

We'd been planning this trip since the time we figured out our semester's abroad in Europe would all overlap. Jodi, my long time soul-mate, is studying Music and English in London right now. And Ru, an incredible Croatian woman who we met at an international hostel in Atlanta, is working on her masters in French and English in Paris. So last weekend after much anticipation and e-mailing back and forth, we all met in the middle. My friend Anna who's studying with me here in Florence also joined in on the fun.

The trip was flavored with all kinds of ingredients: crepes of every assortment, red wines to the nine (ok, they were 2 euro bottles), cappuccinos on the corner, toss a few sexy Argentinean men in there, and some KFC to make you feel right at home.(Hey!--when it's pouring rain in every direction, there's no where under 20euros for lunch and you need a place of refuge...fast!...KFC's good for it!)

Exquisite tastes aside, Paris was nothing like what I was expecting. (This is what happens when you go places without reading or researching practically anything before hand...) It was much more quaint and quiet seeming on the outside. Yes, the city is HUGE, as we quickly learned after spending probably 1/5th of our time on the Metro...but when you're walking around outside, there's such a pleasant, clean, relaxed feel to things. Nothing like huge, dirty cities in the U.S. (NYC, Boston...). Maybe it's because so much of the traffic is happening underground on the Metro...they've got a really great system.

So we did most of the touristy things, which were really nice--Notre Dam was absolutely beautiful on the inside; the Impressionist Art Museum had a great exhibit with some of the first photographs ever taken; the Lurve...incredible architecture and tons to appreciate when you're not on the same floor as the Mona Lisa--when you are, it's just a sweaty hell; Mount Martre and the Moulin Rouge windmill; and of course, the Eiffel Tower.

Ah, the Eiffel Tower... so beautiful... and to make it even better, Jodi, Anna and I picked up 2 bottles of cheap red, brought along some empty water bottles, and when the time was right, overlooking the river and the tower, we popped those babies open and had one of the most romantic moments of our collective lives--sipping cheap red from water bottles, giddy that the Eiffel Tower was "having sex with the sky" (it did this pulsating, sparkling thing every half hour that would last for about 10 minutes and get really fast at the end before it stopped...sounds like sex to me), and to top it all off (no, not in that way, gutter-brains..) it was international WOMAN'S DAY!!!--A holiday widely celebrated across Europe with the giving of mimose flowers. So naturally, in English, we cheered happy woman's day to every woman that passed. The whole evening was flawless. Except when we missed the last Metro home, wandered around aimlessly for about an hour, then finally agreed to take a taxi which was surprisingly inexpensive. 1 point for the French!

Actually, despite all the bashing that the French always get, I think they do a lot of things right. They're the artists of the world who say they need vacation time so their minds can rest and their creativity can harbor. I say more power to them! Who says the rest of the world's got it right? Maybe they can be a little snotty, but maybe they just feel misunderstood (shout out to all the NFs of the world)...

And this is when you can tell that my thoughts are getting blurry, and my mind too lazy to write coherently. Apologies for neglecting this blog more than anticipated... I think shorter, more frequent posts might be good... I'll post some pics from Paris if Jo sends them to me. Unfortunately, my camera died part way through...

Ciao lovers,
Rach

Everything Must Change

(Written Saturday afternoon)
Yesterday was a day of hopeful letdowns. I went to bed the night before with a mission to do two things the next day: go to the Boboli Gardens and Michelangelo’s Piazza. It was strange moment though--one of those times when I knew no matter how set in stone my plan was, and how easy to accomplish it would be, something was bound to get in the way. Well, there's nothing like trusting my intuition 'cause that baby knows what's up! For more excuses than I care to explain or you probably care to hear, I didn't accomplish my plan. My entire day consisted of a series of wrong-time-wrong-place situations added to my already miserable drippy nose and broken cell phone, making it all too easy to just give up on the plan and spend most of the day reading depressing poetry in an English bookstore near the Duomo.

Allura, I've found that there's no worse feeling these days than when I feel like I've wasted a day here--a day in Florence, a day in Italy, a day in Europe that could have been more, more, more than what it was, was, was. And then my internal thoughts go something like this: WHY did I NOT follow through on my PLAN that was supposed to be so EASY? What's WRONG with me? I'm in ITALY--what am I doing wasting this day?

In all honesty, I just have to laugh at myself. Of course I didn't accomplish the easiest plan in the world that I had all day to do. Of course not! Because when I woke up yesterday morning (or better yet, when I went to bed the night before), I knew I didn't really want to go to the gardens or piazza anymore--I felt sniffly, sick and gloomy. But I didn't want to give up on the only thing that seemed worthy of my precious time here. I didn't want to let go of The Plan (meaningful experiences only possible in Florence) and leave things up to The Universe (probably meaningless things available world wide; ie, my laptop and snot-filled tissues).

But I'm convinced that sometimes we makes plans to do tangible things because we know that we have tons of soul work to do. We write: buy toilet paper and new sponges, and go to the museums and gardens, to avoid writing: be honest, be brave, and trust yourself (even your lonely or bad-mood self). We spend days accomplishing lots of things but nothing that we really needed. Nothing that was really what our heart was calling out for.

So yesterday was one of those days where I tried my ass off to accomplish what I didn't actually feel like doing--and I never accomplished it.

But today, on and on like a mantra, the phrase "everything must change" sang to me on constant repeat. I woke up and knew that today was going to be different. Without the slightest plan in mind (no, I was not going to try at the gardens and piazza again...not yet), I was ready to greet whatever the Universe had in store for me. I was ready to listen for what I actually wanted, what I actually believed was important for this day and this moment in this place. And suddenly, my cell phone rings and it's my roommate Anna asking if I'd go to brunch with her. Of course! Says the girl who hasn't seen signs of life in ages, seemingly.

Brunch was delicious and even better thanks to such honest conversation between Anna and I. So as we're walking home, there's a hair salon that I decide to peak my head into. I've been contemplating chopping off my hair for some time now, but I've never had the feeling that it was really what I wanted--just a fluky thought. So I peak my head in and ask them what they think of me going-afro style...to which all the people in the salon replied that they thought it would be absolutely beautiful and they could do it right here, right now, give me your jacket, do you want to be shampooed?, we'll give you a student discount, here's a picture, is this what you want?

John Lucca was his name and I am in love with the way he took an electric razor to my hair and perfectly buzzed it into place. The feeling I have from finally letting go of the idea that I need a certain hair style or image to be myself is so liberating. I don't need that length to feel the length of me. I can just let it go and let loose. What a feeling.

I've never felt so positively effected by a hair cut in my entire life. I feel like taking the scary step to buzz it all off gave me so much courage today--courage that I really needed. Courage to be strong enough to admit my clarity, to be kind and honest enough to gently break the Truth to someone who really needed me to say it, to be wise enough to let go of the missed imaginings, to be peaceful enough to embrace the beautiful present.

Sometimes we make lists of things we don't really need to do and we fill our days trying to get them done. But sometimes, those things can be magically meditative, and just doing them can be enough to clear our minds and lead our strides exactly where they ought to go.


What magical places has the Universe led you lately?

All my love,
Rach