June 2007

Difficult Breasts

June 29, 2007

I had my first mammogram about ten years ago, around age 35. I was surprised when the gynecologist I was seeing suggested it; I thought routine mammogram screening didn’t start til age 40 or 45. He said: Lei ha un seno difficile – “You have difficult breasts.” By which he meant that they were naturally [...]

Read the full article →

My Potter Predictions

June 25, 2007

^ Hari Potter aur Paras Patthar – Harry Potter in Hindi Like most of the reading world, I await with bated breath the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the seventh and final Harry Potter book. In a moment of pure self-indulgence during my last US trip, I bought Mugglenet.Com’s What Will Happen [...]

Read the full article →

An Over-the-Top Italian Restaurant in the US

June 24, 2007

I usually avoid Italian restaurants in the US – why bother, when I can get far better Italian food from the grocery store at home? But during my last US trip I did end up going with friends for takeout to an Italian chain restaurant, Buca di Beppo (whose name is already funny to an [...]

Read the full article →

Learn Italian in Song: Com’é Profondo il Mare

June 22, 2007

Lucio Dalla, 1978 Com’é Profondo il Mare How Deep is the Sea Siamo noi, siamo in tanti We are us, we are many Ci nascondiamo di notte we hide ourselves at night Per paura degli automobilisti for fear of the automobilists Dei linotipisti Of the linotypists Siamo gatti neri We are black cats Siamo pessimisti [...]

Read the full article →

Milan Cow Parade 2007

June 20, 2007

junior art critic – Piazza Castello Street art didn’t fare so well in Milan. The newspapers reported that Milan set a record for the number of cows vandalized, particularly during the night that the AC Milan football club won the European championships for the seventh time. The poor cows were variously burned, thrown into a [...]

Read the full article →

Pandecena Milano June ’07 – In Which a Cunning Plot is Hatched

June 19, 2007

Famed Italian blogger Luca Conti (pictured above at right, showing off his Nokia to Sara Piperita) has pulled off what many bloggers dream of (and quite a few actually do, in other parts of the world): making a living by blogging. Or, at least, managing to get paid for various kinds of consulting (as a [...]

Read the full article →

Growing Up in Boarding School

June 18, 2007

Though Rossella is by and large a wonderful young woman and a joy to be around, she does have her teenage moments and attitudes. She doesn’t like to wake up in the morning, her floor is usually strewn with clothing, she is undisciplined about studying… I sometimes reflect ruefully on the fact that my parents [...]

Read the full article →

Italian Garden 2007: June

June 14, 2007

herbs for sale at an Italian garden center The garden has been largely left to its own devices in the last six weeks, and is thriving. We’ve had monsoon-like rains almost every day for weeks, so it certainly doesn’t need watering, and the vegetables are large enough now that they’re mostly holding their own against [...]

Read the full article →

Getting Girls Into Science Early

June 9, 2007

During my recent trip to Colorado, I stayed with Tin Tin Su, a Woodstock School classmate who is now an associate professor in Molecular Cellular Developmental Biology at the University of Colorado in Boulder. Tin Tin is good at explaining what she does, and delights in sharing her knowledge with people of all ages. I was thrilled [...]

Read the full article →

Learn Italian in Song: Come Mai

June 8, 2007

by 883 Come Mai How On Earth? Le notti non finiscono The nights don’t end all’alba nella via at dawn in the street le porto a casa insieme a me I bring them home with me ne faccio melodia And make melodies of them e poi mi trovo a scrivere And then I find myself [...]

Read the full article →

BerluscaSpam: Silvio Wants Me to Share in His Millions?

June 5, 2007

I have received the following email: Good day. Please, understand my reason for contacting you today through this medium; I am Mr. Silvio Berlusconi, Former Italian Prime Minister who was charge for purchasing of movie and television rights at Mediaset. Despite the accusation levy against me, I have be working tremendously to support the less [...]

Read the full article →

Everyday Italian: Newspaper Headlines 9

June 2, 2007

upper left: The hospital has waste 8 million [euros] and meanwhile cuts more beds – “I saw again in Lecco the gypsy women who wanted to kidnap my daughter.” lower left: Tragedy: Drowns in the sea the wife of Luigi Belmonte – All the school results, one first-year in three is flunked lower center: [Driver's] [...]

Read the full article →

Why Send My Child to Woodstock School?

June 1, 2007

Someone who has never attended Woodstock School may legitimately wonder why anyone would wish to send their child there. I went to Woodstock in 1977 because I had no better educational choice (except to continue with correspondence school in Bangladesh, where my parents were living and working – a year of which had already been [...]

Read the full article →