My book's going to be published!!! - 30 Aug 2010

I've just received the most wonderful news! One of Flanders' biggest publishing companies is going to publish my book!!! I can hardly believe it... It's like a distant dream come true... Next week they're going to offer me a contract. Then, the text is going to be revised by a language expert and the publishing date is set for May 2011. Yes... It sounds so long and I'm so thrilled that I can hardly wait. But it will be here sooner than I think. It's like when Christine and I said goodbye to eachother exactly one year ago. She was going to remain in Italy while I had to return to Belgium. Eventually those 10 months went by in a flash. Oh... I'm having tears in my eyes of pure joy... Sorry, folks, but I have to stop writing...

10 Do's and Don'ts when moving to Italy - 27 Aug 2010

1. Never ever buy (Italian) real-estate through a real-estate agent. And especially not through these websites designed for foreigners looking for property. The prices on these websites are 30% to 50% (!) higher than the seller's asking price. Ideally, you should try to find out who are the owners yourself or via a local friend. Most sellers would be happy to bypass the agency (if at all possible) and sell to you directly. After all, they have to pay the commission.

2. Often, with the purchase of a house comes a local geometer. A man (or woman) who turns up unexpectedly when the sollicitor's act is signed and who promises he'll arrange everything for you. In 99% of the cases, this geometer is an imposter whose only concern is to try to gain your confidence and then to rip you off. Christine and I got rid of our geometer just in time. An English family who moved here a couple of years ago wasn't so lucky. Our advice: After you've purchased your property and you want to restore it, look for your own geometer or architect. Compare prices and never trust anyone who doesn't want to put a price on paper. In Italy there are official fees which every geometer should adhere to. If not... he or she's no good.

3. Study the geometer's estimate for the restoration carefully. It is almost a given that it will be far from complete. What about sewers? What about the seismic study? What about the "law 10" concerning insulation standards?

4. Be aware of builders or any other workers presented to you by your geometer. It is likely that they have to pay the geometer a commission for having received the job through him. In some cases (like ours), this may go up to 20%! In the end, YOU will have to pay this commission. Ask around. Find your own contractor, plumber etc., preferably in another town (the further the better - hence there is a smaller risk that this person is connected to your geometer) and compare prices with the contractor presented to you by the geometer. This will most probably make your geometer very upset. Not surprisingly because you're about to sink his plans for a new and fancy car. Tough luck for him.

5. Be aware of supplements. Many workers will only present an "estimate" of the work to be done. Often they will claim that more work or material was needed to do a certain job and they'll happily charge you for it. No matter what price was agreed in the "estimate". Don't agree on a job to be done unless you have the final price black and white on paper. This will avoid unnecessary discussion afterwards.

6. This is very important: No matter how difficult this must be, please please make sure that you (or a friend you trust) is always present at the building site when work is carried out. And make sure that the site is closed when no work is being done. The house of the English family I just told you about was literally STRIPPED by the builder. Wooden floors were removed ("they were rotten anyway") etc etc. This family lost in total about 100.000€!!! With "total" I mean being overcharged by geometer, overcharged by the builder, materials gone etc etc. In any case, being present will also prevent you from finding some nasty surprises when you come to visit your newly finished dreamhouse. Hey... where's the water tap I needed here? And look at the floor! It's laid upside down! And who decided on these tiles?...

7. Budget. When you've received the geometer's estimate about all the works to be done etc. and you've made all the financial calculations about your project: DOUBLE IT! You can rest assured that you'll run into "unexpected expenses". Either they'll discover that the foundations are in a worse state than expected, they'll tell you that the house needs an additional supporting wall, they'll inform you that certain works were not included in the contract, and so on and so on... Believe me: DOUBLE IT! Of course, this only refers to the works to be done and excludes the purchase price.

8. Administration. Italy is a country keen on its paper tradition. Be prepared to have to drive to the capital of your province at least a couple of times (driver's license, car license plate,...), to the main town nearby ("tessera sanitaria"; the social security card, and so on) and to your local commune administration.

9. Continuing on the paper tradition, make sure that - if there's any doubt - you have the person in question write it down on paper. For example: If your geometer tells you: "The law 10 doesn't apply here so you don't need a thermal study", you reply: "Allright. Put it in writing for me then". Or: If your builder tells you: "Just a bit of extra concrete and this crack in the wall will not get any bigger", you reply: "Really? In that case you wouldn't mind writing that down for me?"...
10. And finally: expect the unexpected. :-)

I know, all of this sounds a bit negative. I should indeed mention that there are lots of honest and hard-working people in Italy. And that it is a fantastic place to live in. But I thought I could better warn you in case you were starting to have similar plans after reading my blog. It's better to be prepared. This will make it much more likely that your venture will eventually succeed. Because on the telly they'll only show you success stories. Not the stories of people who lost everything because of their dream.

The final straight line to the finish - 23 Aug 2010

At last, you might say, the latest pictures of our house. And the good news is: it's nearly finished! We've even already moved some large pieces of furniture. This is very encouraging because especially Christine is having a hard time to keep motivated. The poor girl is really holding on by the fingernails. I'm very much afraid that her chronic fatigue will take the better of her the minute we've moved in. But that's allright. From then onwards she'll have a lifetime to recover.


Look, here's the kitchen. The floor's been cleaned and we already installed a big cupboard and the fridge. The carpenter's taken the measurements for the rest of the kitchen furniture last week and hopefully this will be delivered in September. In the mean time, we'll have to do the dishes in the laundry room. It's just like going camping! :-)

This is the living room. As you can see, it's not what you could call a ballroom. But it's cosy and that's all that matters. I can already imagine our piano standing against the far wall...

This is the main bathroom with its floor-level shower. Joints still to be done; sink and taps still to be installed. The plumber promised he would pay us a visit tomorrow morning. We'll keep him to his word!

Main bathroom, other angle...

The front part of the house. Do you like the colour of the windows?

And finally the house as seen from the entry lane. As you can see, we're already quite busy moving stuff...

The customer is always right - 18 Aug 2010

Do you still remember the days when the customer was king? In those days, when you entered a shop, a most friendly man or woman wearing a very tidy apron kindly hailed you with: "Goodmorning sir. Welcome to our shop. How may I be of service?" After which the man or woman did everything in his or her power to answer to every single one of your requests. After all, you were the highly valued customer; the bread and butter of the vendor in question.

Sadly, in these days of internet merchants, who only open a shop because they believe it will make them rich in a very short period without having to work very hard, these values of servitude and responsibility seem to be lost forever.

A month ago, Christine and I bought a new cooker for our house. We got a very good deal on one of these eBay shops and were very happy with our purchase. I made it clear to the seller that the cooker should be sent to our Italian address and not to the Belgian address which was still showing in eBay. The seller wasn't very happy about that and asked me to change the address in eBay in order to avoid confusion. Which I immediately did of course. After all, she was the highly valued seller. I changed the primary shipping address and sent another e-mail confirming the Italian address. Just to be sure.

Weeks went by and all of a sudden I got a rather distressing message from the people who'd bought our Belgian house. It said that someone wanted to deliver a large package with our name on it and originating from Italy. But since we didn't live there anymore, they had told the man to take it back to Italy.

So I sent the seller another e-mail, playing dumb and asking if our cooker was well on its way. To which I got the stunning reply: "Check your local UPS office, thanks."

Obviously, I foregave the most venerable seller this not so friendly answer. I understood that she was on a holiday and I felt very humble that I had to disturb her while she was having a juicy cocktail on the beach. I begged her pardon and asked how it was possible that the cooker had been sent to Belgium. After all, I had confirmed the Italian address many times. This is what she replied:

"We, as a rule imposed by eBay, can only send to the address registered in eBay. For you it only takes two minutes to change it, even after the purchase. I told you numerous times to change it if you wanted me to ship to another address. We open the eBay page and send to the registered address, also because you can imagine that if we have to look at all the e-mails for every shipment, and we can not change addresses on eBay ourselves. Up to you what to do next and by the way we're closed for holidays. Thanks."

This made my blood boil. Yes, I know. I'm a very bad customer. I'm simply incapable of keeping my calm when I'd rather should. I know I should've bowed at the seller and apologised for my incompetence. Of course it was all my fault. How is it possible that I didn't want to admit that? Because of my stupidity, the seller had totally confused between "address of residence" and "primary shipping address". I could use as an excuse that at the time of purchase we were still having a very shaky internet connection and only changing the shipping address had taken me over half an hour. After all, eBay is not what you could call a very light website to download. But that would be a very poor excuse indeed.

If you now click on the cooker we bought, it says that the seller has put it back up for sale. What a pity. And of course we'll never see our money back either. Tough luck. It's yet another lesson learnt.

NOT!!! :-)

Life is like... - 14 Aug 2010

My apologies that I haven't posted any new messages for a while. This has three causes:

1. A lot of progress has been made to our house. The terracotta pavement has been laid and the tiles in the bathroom are almost finished. And after more than six months, we finally have windows that can actually open and close. I had to chop off most of the plasterwork on top of four of these windows in order to achieve this, but at least we can open them now. So why keep going on about such a minor detail like a bit of plastering?

2. My mother in law's visit. She's had a relaxing holiday of almost a week over here. Err... well... relaxing... :-) And she'll be going home again later this afternoon.

3. What is life like? I could quote Doulas Adams here and argue that life is like a grapefruit. But I don't entirely agree with that. I'd rather say that life is like a watermelon because mine's got a lot more pips in it than the average grapefruit. And I've got the impression that after breakfast there definitely doesn't remain half a one anymore. I'd rather say that all that's left is the peel. On the other hand, it feels a lot more squidgy too. For example, when we drove back from Parma yesterday and Christine had spotted a nice plant by the side of the road from which she absolutely wanted to take a shoot to put in our garden. She said:

- "If I were to turn 'round and drive back to take a shoot from that plant, would you kill me?"

Isn't that a squidgy moment? And when she looks at you with those eyes burning with desire. The desire for a plant, that is. Isn't that simply an offer you can't refuse? Well, at least I couldn't.
If I were to say that life is like a jellyfish? It's very squidgy and it's got poisonous needles in stead of pips. Yes... that's much more like it.

Nah... Just kidding! ;-)

What is life really like, then? I'd say... life is like... a baby's bottom. It's so soft that it makes your fingers tingle. It's so smooth that even if you'd polish pure marble for decades it wouldn't nearly be as perfect. And at times, it can be quite smelly too! :-)

Someone else's fault - 03 Aug 2010

Today I'd like to elaborate on the Builders' Disease. This is a cerebral malfunction of unknown origin that affects roughly 90% of all people in some way employed in the building industry.

The Builders' Disease reveals itself in two forms which are quickly interchangeable:

1. The "The next guy will fix it" Syndrome

For example; imagine a building structure with a concrete foundation. On this concrete foundation, someone will put an insulation paste consisting of cement and polysterene grains. This person will put a layer that is way too thick. When confronted with the error, the person will answer: "The guys from the floor heating will scrape it off".

When the guys from the floor heating come, they'll draw your attention to the fact that the insulation has been laid too thickly. But in stead of fixing the problem, they'll tell you: "The guys from the sub-floor will fix it".

When the guys from the sub-floor come, they'll again explain that the insulation plus floor heating have been laid too high. These guys are a bit more advanced. Meaning that they'll try to negotiate first. In a sense like... "Now if you put your floor tiles a bit higher... Allright, you'd have an edge at the doors... But then everything would be straight and level..." When you then point out that you will not have an edge at the doors and that all of the outside doors have already been made at the appropriate hight, waiting to be installed, they'll reply: "We'll see what we can do". Meaning that they lay'll the sub-floor level and leave you with a sub-floor depth at the doors of... only 5mm. Upon which they'll say: "The guy who'll lay the tiles will fix it".

But when the guy from the tiles eventually arrives, he's facing an impossible job. The tiles are 20mm thick (real, hand-made terracotta). Plus at least 2mm of glue. You're getting the picture? If nothing's done, the tiles will stick out so much at the doorstep that someone may easily trip over them.

Solution: We can scrape off 17mm of the sub-floor with a grinding disc.

Result: Buckets full of dust. And my lungs full with dust too. But at least the door opens. Barely.


2. The "Someone else's fault" Syndrome

For example; imagine you want to order new windows. You have to do it well in advance because obviously all the firms are very busy. In January they're coming to measure the window frames, between the external window sills and the concrete beam above the window. They're professionals who are obviously aware that there's something called "plastering", allright? So far so good.

Oh, did I tell you that they're very busy? Only 7 months later they finally come to place the windows. Hurray! But... Uh oh... There's been a slight misunderstanding. The windows won't fit. In most of the rooms they manage to cut off just enough from the upper and lower edge so the windows barely fit. But in our bathroom and bedroom... they won't. The window is simply too large. Then you'll invariably get the following statement: "This is not my fault but it's the builder who went in the wrong. He must have lowered the upper beam. And look! The carpenter didn't do a very good job at installing the inner sills either because they're sticking out at least 5mm! (editor's note: it's only 2mm...)". If you then ask what they're going to do about it, they'll tell you: "You have to get in touch with your builder and he'll have to chop off the plastering and some of the concrete on top. When that's done, we'll come back to install these last 4 windows." At this point there is no more arguing because they'll deny every responsibility.

Fortunately, they still had to come back the next day to finish some of the other work. So I started chopping off the plastering on the upper part of the bathroom window. It broke my heart because I had to destroy a work that was so beautifully done. But... o surprise... Christine immediately recognised the original concrete beam sitting right under 15mm of plasterwork. This beam was already there from the moment the house was built more than 60 years ago. And we showed it to the windows man. When he saw it, he became all red and his lower jaw nearly hit the ground. But he quickly composed himself. At this point, it depends how far the Builders' Disease has already developed. In this case, it had reached the terminal stage.

- "See!?", he exclaimed, "Didn't I tell you?"
- "Tell us what?", we replied.
- "I did measure it correctly! Look, I even have 5mm of headroom!"
- "Hold it... hold it... And what about the plastering? You didn't think we were going to let that ugly concrete beam exposed, did you?"
- "But look, even with a normal layer of plastering, I still have enough room. They've just laid it too thickly!"

And so on and so forth. Even if you point out that the windows have a cuttable edge of at least 3cm both on top and below, the man will still state that this edge has to be cut off anyway (it only serves if you place the windows on the outside so it will cover the hole on the sides) and that he only has 5mm he can play with. 5mm he already lost because of the carpenter...

Solution: We can chop off the beautiful plastering on the upper part of the window opening and try to put a new (and thinner) layer of plastering ourselves after the window's in place.

Result: Buckets full of plaster and dust, an ugly concrete beam exposed and serious doubt whether any plaster can still be put up there with the windows still opening.

Well, in the mean time we were up for a surprise. I had already chopped off all of the plaster in the bathroom. And when we came back to our house this morning, the window was in place! Not only that, when I opened it, I noticed that I had 30mm (!) of space between the window and the concrete beam. In one word, I had chopped off the plastering for nothing! So for the other 3 windows I merely copped off a slit in which he can slide the window edge. And if he still dares to make one single complaint... Grrrr!!!

Harry's visit - 02 Aug 2010

Saturday evening. It has been a long and very hard day for Christine and I. Tired but happy we're overlooking our garden from the first floor of our house. I give her a big hug because she's earned it. After all, if it wasn't for her we wouldn't be standing here now.


The shadows grow taller. The sky's slowly preparing for the night. The gentle afternoon breeze has gone and everything's silent, apart from the singing cicadas . Even the birds seem to have temporarily stopped quarreling. Probably for them it's already bedtime by now.


Suddenly Christine tells me to be quiet and she points at the far end of our field in utter excitement. And then I see it as well. A family of wild boars is having an evening out to our garden! There's mum and dad... and three little piglets too! It's just amazing. Even though they must have spotted us, they don't seem to be alarmed at all and quietly, apart from the odd grunt every now and then, they head for the pool of mud next to the well near the top of the field. They're no more than 30 metres away from our house! Pity we don't have the camera. And by the time I'm getting it from the car, something startled them and they run off into the bushes on the other side. Christine and I are speechless. And happy... very happy indeed because we've been so fortunate to see these shy animals in the wild... correction... in our garden!


Sunday evening. It sounds too incredible to be true, but dad decided to come back on his own. He goes to the pool of mud, makes a bit of noise in a large bush next to it and then goes all the way behind our house and back. Not more than 15 metres away! This time I have the camera, although unfortunately it's already quite dark under the trees and at 8x zoom it was impossible to make a decent picture. Well, at least they're clear enough.


I decided to call him Harry, after a very close friend of mine who I'm sure will appreciate the compliment. :-)


And off he went, back into the forest. Goodbye, Harry. See you again soon!