Understanding autism

Pictures of the day

2012-03-07T23:09:00.000+01:00

This morning, Christine got up a little earlier because she'll spend the week in Flanders, helping her mother with the move to a new apartment. But that didn't stop her from taking the following two gorgeous pictures. Yes, after a good week of summer, winter came back to give us a final snow blanket. And then there are some who hate winter? Well, that's perhaps easy for me to say because I don't have to endure peak hour traffic. Or rather make that... any traffic at all. But still every season has its beauty and perhaps winter even more so than the others. That is what I truly like about the Italian Apennines: here one can still find true seasons. Summer over here is real summer and winter is real winter. Not the wishy-washy all year round twelve degree rained down excuse for a weather we get in Flanders or the rest of Western Europe. Christine just told me through Skype that she can't wait to return to Italy. And who wouldn't believe her? It's just 6 more days, my love...

Harry's back!!!

2012-03-03T09:33:00.001+01:00

Yes!!! Harry's back!!! Well, at least we believe it's good old Harry because you can't really be sure, can you? But for about a week we get a regular visit from a wild boar, probably attracted by our heap of compost. A couple of days ago I went out on our terrace to absorb a bit of sunshine with a nice glass of wine, and I noticed that our cats were a bit nervous and were staring towards the bush next to our house. So I went to take a look and didn't immediately see anything until... Harry suddenly stormed out of the bush and away, over the hill behind our house. I was a bit startled because the boar had been sitting just 10m in front of me. But apparently Harry was more startled than I was. The day afterwards I saw him again, by the trees behind our field. I immediately ran for my camera, but by the time I got out and close enough, Harry had spotted me and hotted off again. So my apologies for this bad picture, but at least it will still count as proof for my story! :-)

A tribute to the most wonderful woman in the world

2012-02-24T17:58:00.004+01:00

She... is the flame that keeps me alive.

From her lips I receive the honey that gives me strength.

She... is the shield that protects me from getting hurt.

On her frail shoulders our paradise is built...
and I can finally find peace

I believe it is about time that I dedicate a blog post to a wonderful person. In the thirteen years that I know her, she's never ceased to amaze me with her incredible amount of abilities. Whether a tree needs to be cut down, a wall needs to be built or plastered, a Christmas market needs to be organised, electrical wiring needs to be laid, a birthday cake needs to be baked and decorated, snow chains need to be put on a car's wheels, stockings need to be knit or a derelict house needs to be revived... she'll do it. And what's more, she'll do all of these things as if she were born with those talents. Even though she may humbly say that there isn't anything she can do well... believe me, this is false modesty because anything she does, she does it with so much care and so much attention for detail that she excels well above the gray middle-mass. Never have I met anyone so gifted...

But then again, these are not the important aspects which make a person truly special. What's truly amazing is that on top of all of this she is kind. She is caring and loving. She constantly puts herself on the background in order to give priority to others. Even more so, she dedicates her life to helping other people. She's a problem solver. She's a fighter. More so for someone else's rights and worries than her own. She makes other people rest and feel comfortable while she takes care of everything. And she does this with so much vigour and strength that even mob bosses who've been oppressing whole towns for decades start trembling when they see her.

And yet, she is fragile. She's fought so hard and for so long that her wings have been cut and that the almost infinite amount of energy she was endowed with has started to fade. Tears roll off her cheeks every time she reflects on the things she still has to do in this life and the unjust disease which keeps her in its grasp, painfully binding her hands and feet.

But not her mind. In her mind she is free and spreading her unstoppable love across the Earth. And especially over me. And for that, I'm eternally grateful.

Winter wonderland

2012-02-16T17:18:00.002+01:00

The snow is melting, the cold days are over. Time to awake from our hibernation and return to normal life. But before we do, I'd like to treat you with some of the pictures Christine and I took from our garden over the past two weeks... a journey into winter's paradise...

The old pig stable, now wood storage...

Snow covered trees...

The far view... misty, snowy mountains...

Also our cats didn't mind the snow at all! Here's Blu on the lookout, unaware that she's being stalked by cunning little Tobi... :-)

And two extraordinary pictures, taken by Christine this morning around 7:45... We could hardly believe our eyes! Four male deer, wandering about in our field!!!... What majestic animals, aren't they? Is there still anyone of you in doubt that our motto "Paradise exists" is slightly over the top?...

Flora is ours!

2012-02-10T13:17:00.003+01:00

Yes, ladies and gentlemen... Those of you who've been following my blog over the past years will very well remember the story of Flora, the penultimate addition to our family. Otherwise I'd suggest you read "Flora's Poem" (July 2010, if I'm not mistaking).

Our trust in the Italian judicial system turned out to be justified because this week the judge rejected all of the vendor's claims. This means that Flora will definitely remain ours forever and that I was right in asking my money back through VISA. Our solicitors are now considering a claim for damages and veterinary expenses (which are nearing €2.000 in total!) and if they believe we'd have a fair chance we'll sue those disgusting animal traders very hard indeed. A couple of months ago, I still received a promotional mail from them (they were stupid enough to leave me in their distribution list... :-) ) in which they were offering a big sale: "this month: all puppies and kittens go for just €150!". As if they were selling plain clothes or pieces of furniture! How can they even look at themselves in the mirror? Here's their main website again - for the sake of "name and shame", but there are at least three or four others leading to the same business:

http://www.vendita-cuccioli-caniegatti.com/

These people are ruthless animal molesters who import so-called pedigree cats and dogs by the lorry from shady breeders in Eastern-Europe. Many of them die during transport or from continuous malnutrition and abuse. It's unbelievable that this can still happen in the twenty-first century! It certainly confirms my opinion that there is only one animal on this planet which can be totally vile and who doesn't want to live in harmony with nature at all: man!

Fortunately, at least one furry creature could be saved from them: our little Flora, the "true lady" among our cats, with her gracious and almost "dancing" ways and her incredibly kind character... Flora, we love you... and she definitely loves us... :-)

Thomas' poem

2012-02-03T14:09:00.000+01:00

Hello! I'm Thomas, a very easy-going Norwegian Forest kitten. I was born and raised at a very nice and dedicated breeder somewhere way up north in Holland. The lady who cared for me during my first weeks was extremely kind and she made sure that I'd grow up in perfect health and with the best of care. Then, one day in August 2009, two people came to visit my cat family. They were Christine and Peter and they had driven for more than three hours all the way up here to collect my half-sister Chloe. But in a sense also for me because they had already seen my cute little smoke-black muzzle on the internet and they were very much inclined to take me with them as well. It took some convincing because i was only eight weeks old at the time and for a pedigree cat this is a bit too young. But the lady clearly saw what a big heart Christine and Peter had for cats so eventually she gave in and I went into the box with Chloe for the long trip back to Belgium. I have to admit that i was very much afraid and all of the time I was making squeeky little noises. But Chloe wasn't afraid at all and her presence comforted me, together with the kind words Christine and Peter said in order to put me at ease.

Once we had arrived at their Belgian house, I already started to feel a lot better. The house was really big and had those enormous windows all the way down to the ground so I could look very far into their garden. I also got to meet Canelle and Blu, their other two cats, and since I'm so relaxed I immediately became everybody's little buddy. I always patiently awaited my turn to eat and hungrily emptied all of the little saucers of food. I'm not picky at all and all the leftovers always disappeared in my little tummy.

Then, six months later, disaster struck for the first time. Chloe, my dear big sister, was run over by a car and died. Oh, how much did I grieve... how much did I miss her... Certainly, there was still Blu with whom I got along so well and who omforted me, but things were never really the same after that.

Another couple of months later I suffered another big trauma. Four big men came with a huge lorry and they barged around the house all day long and made a lot of noise. I was so scared that I hid in the back of the garden, under the hedge. Eventually they left late in the afternoon, but still I was stiffened of fear and didn't dare to leave my hiding place, even when Peter started calling me. After half an hour or so he found me and he stretched his hand out for me. I was a bit in doubt about what to do. He called me friendly names but I sensed that something was wrong. When I indicated that I'd rather hide a bit further away, he suddenly grabbed me. I panicked... Why did he grab me? Why did he drag me back to the house where all of these men had been making so much noise all of the time? No... I didn't want to go back there! I scratched Peter... hard... so hard that he's still bearing the signs... But he didn't release me and dropped me inside, making sure that I couldn't go out anymore. What I saw devastated me. The whole house was... empty. Gone were my big cat poles, my sofa, my little carpet... everything was just... gone. I ran upstairs and hid in the only place there was still left: in the shower. There I spent a dreadful and sleepless night, knowing that the nightmare wouldn't end right there.

And I was right. Very early the next morning I heard sqeals from Canelle and Blu. I ran out of the shower and tried to hide behind the bathtub. It took Peter quite some time before he found me and I heard in his voice that he was getting a bit desperate. But eventually he spotted me, dragged me out and shoved me in the biggest cat box, together with Blu. And then we were all carried away. We all cried but to no avail. We were put in a car and drove away... far away... Then we arrived at a very busy place. We couldn't see where we were because the boxes had been covered with a piece of cloth in order to keep us as calm as possible. But I could clearly hear that the place was very big and that there were a lot of people there. Hundreds, maybe thousands! Oh no... I was soooo scared... The worst still had to come! I heard that Peter abandoned us and that our boxes were suddenly grabbed by someone who didn't care as much about us as Peter. The man carried us a long way down, outside to a very noisy place and then inside a kind of trunk. We were in the belly of an airplane!!! The flight took an hour and a half and I've never been through anything so scary in my whole life! It was bumpy... we couldn't see what was going on... the air pressure went down and then up again... We were all so terrified that we didn't make a single sound anymore. And then everything went quiet. We were abandoned again. The place was empty. And then... I heard Peter's voice again!!! He had come to collect us!!! Hurray!!! He opened the cloth a bit and said hello to us! And a couple of minutes later, there was another big surprise: I saw Christine again! She had left us nine months earlier for a reaso which I didn't understand, but there she was! Again we were put in a car and drove for an hour and a half. But I already started to feel a little better because I sensed that the torment would soon be over. We arrived ad a small house. Just a couple of rooms, but reasonably cosy. There we were to stay for three months. I didn't like the idea at all and wanted to go back home. But Christine and Peter made sure that we wouldn't be able to get out for at least a couple of weeks. There I also met another lady cat: Flora. We all hid under the sofa's and didn't get out for days. We didn't make any noises either, apart from the occasional hiss at eachother. But in the end I started to appreciate Flora. After all, she's a very beautiful girl and we started to get along quite well.

Would this be the end of it? No. After three months, we were all put in the car again and we drove off. Only ten minutes this time. And to a place far beyond any of my dreams. To a truly beautiful little house, in the middle of the woods and with a vast field in front of it. It was cat's paradise! It didn't take me long to adjust to this new place and slowly I became happy again. Yes... I was truly happy.

And now... I don't know where I am anymore. My beautiful home, my little paradise has gone. It has been exactly two weeks. From time to time, I think I can hear Christine and Peter call my name in the far distance. But they can't hear me. I really want them to hear me, but they can't. In the meantime the mild spring weather has gone and half a metre of snow fell overnight. I feel lonely... hungry... scared... Where is my warm little home? Where are Christine and Peter? What happened to me? And why? Can anyone please help me? can anyone please bring me home again?

Missing

2012-01-27T11:40:00.000+01:00

It's been a week now. Exactly a week since I came down the stairs in the morning and went into our living room. There I was greeted by Canelle, who way lying in her armchair by the window. But hers were the only purrs I heard. The sofa was empty. This immediately alarmed me a bit because every morning Thomas used to sleep there and everytime I entered he would raise his cute little head and ask for a cuddle. But no Thomas that morning. Well, cats have a mind of their own and he's been out partying for over a day before. Yet, I had a feeling that this time it was different. I instinctively knew that something was wrong. The day went by. Every now and then Christine and I would call his name in the vicinity of his usual hang-outs. Thomas is the biggest talker of all cats I've already known and normally you'd immediately hear his reply in his unique suqeeks and purrs and little meows. That day, however, the replies never came. A night went by and Christine and I almost didn't sleep. The next morning I went down, desperately hoping to find him in his sofa as always. Alas, again he wasn't there. Christine and I searched day and night in all of the fields and woods in the area, going far beyond the limits where our cats would usually go. We looked by the road, looking for signs of an accident with a car. We looked into every little bush, hoping to find him hiding, frightened by something. But we found nothing.

At that point, we started hypothesising about what could have happened. Could it have been a fox? Very unlikely. A fox must be pretty desperate trying to attack an adult cat, and even if it did manage to kill one, a cat would never be killed without putting up a hell of fight and making a lot of noise. In fact about a year ago Christine and I were sitting in front of the telly when we suddenly heard the most frightning sound you could imagine. And when I went out I saw Thomas fighting with a fox indeed, until I chased it away. Above all, cats are the most excellent climbers (remember my post "Thomas the mountaineer", October 2010) and will usually escape from any attack from a fox or wild dog unharmed. Then, we were thinking about cat's season. Around this time of the year male cats will go out on a trip, looking for the ladies. But Thomas has been spared so also this theory seems very unlikely, meaning that he would not likely disappear for a week and go that far that he wouldn't hear our cries anymore. Another frightning theory is the one of the hunters putting traps or venom. Also truffle seekers dear to spread venom in order to kill the dogs of hunters - the two can't stand the sight of eachother. But also this sounds pretty unlikely because in that case we should have found him, or at least traces of him. And who would put a trap late in the evening and return very early the next morning in order to see if it caught anything? Well... I don't know, it sounds very far fetched. Then there is the car accident. But again no trace and none of the vets have seen him. Or perhaps someone realised that Thomas has a pedigree, caught him and kept him or tried to sell him? Good luck! Thomas is extremely shy of strangers and only comes to Christine and I. Whenever we have guests he's the first to disappear and will only return after they have gone. And it must have happened during the night because the evening before we still saw him. I've checked on eBay and all of the Italian announcement websites, but no Thomas. In any case, he's been chipped and all of the vets have his number.

And now... it's been a week. My little buddy has gone, god knows whereto. Because that's who he is... my little buddy. My very best friend. Always well-humoured, always greeting me or wanting to be with me, with his "windscreen-wiper" tail... Thomas... I miss you. Please, wherever you are, come home.

News and Special Offers!

2012-01-22T19:45:00.003+01:00

Hello Italy lovers!

I've just finished a couple of changes to our website: from now on you'll find an extra button with news, special events and special offers! Do you want to find out what we have in store for our Valentine guests? Click in order to find out! :-)

www.bb-lastella.it

Ciaooo!

Black Gold

2012-01-16T14:16:00.000+01:00

What do you think of when you hear the expression "black gold"? Let me guess... oil? Hmmm... WRONG! :-) How long have people been drilling for oil? One hundred years? One hundred and fifty? Right here, in the area of Reggio Emilia and Modena and nowhere else in the world, a liquid has been made for THOUSANDS of years which is so exquisite and so beyond words that kings have been fighting over it. The earliest written mention of this particular liquid dates from the year 1047 when Holy Roman emperor Henry III ordered a silver case containing this liquid... clear evidence that even a thousand years before the invention of the internet and the iPad this liquid was already seriously famous far beyond the Emilian boundaries.

Now, which liquid am I talking about, you might ask?... Haven't you got any clue yet?... It's black... dense, like a syrup and soooo sour-sweet... It's the true Balsamic vinegar! No, please, forget the wishy-washy black dishwashing water you can buy in your local supermarket! The biggest European factory of so-called "Balsamic" vinegar apparently lies in... Naples, more than 600km away from Reggio Emilia! And do you know where the biggest factory in the world is situated?... In China for heaven's sake! Imagine that! Balsamic vinegar made in China! No, no, no!!! Please, do not mistake this horrible product with the real stuff. In any case, once you've tasted the real Balsamic vinegar, you'll never settle for anything less again, I can assure you.

Why am I telling you all of this? Christine is very active on Twitter, trying to make some publicity for our B&B. And after a while she became quite close with a whole bunch of other "Twitterers" from this region. So they decided to organise a big lunch in order to get to know eachother in person and obviously we wanted to be there as well. It was in fact held yesterday and for a venue they had chosen the vinegar factory of Andrea, one of the participants, in the Reggio Emilia valley. So apart from an excellent lunch and making a lot of new friends, we also got a very interesting visit of the vinegar factory. :-)

Balsamic vinegar can only be made with must from the Lambrusco or Trebbiano grapes, vines that only grow in this region. The grapes for the Balsamic vinegar come from dedicated vineyards, so no Lambrusco wine is made with them. The must is boiled for up to thirty hours, evaporating about thirty to seventy percent of the liquid, and is then left to ferment in these barrels, exclusively made from oak wood.

After the fermentation process, the vinegar is moved upstairs, to smaller barrels and there it is laid to rest. These barrels are in fact open on top (covered by a piece of cloth to prevent dust or dirt getting in) because the liquid in the vinegar must be allowed to evaporate slowly over the years.

After a year, the vinegar is then poured into a smaller barrel... and the year after into an even smaller barrel and so on. The liquid becomes ever more dense and concentrated.

The whole process takes at least seven to eight years... for the lowest quality product! The better-quality vinegar is at least twelve to even twenty-five years old ("gold label")! The picture below is a 100ml flask of "gold-label", costing... €105! But I can assure you, we've had a small taste of this exceptional vinegar during desert (as a condiment to ice-cream!) and... it is well worth it! Really, it tastes like heaven!

Real Balsamic vinegar can not be sold in your local store in flasks bigger than 100ml and must have the inscription "tradizionale" ("traditional") on its label. And of course, only originates from this small area. If you ever get the chance to taste the real stuff, please don't hesitate. And for those of you who're considering a stay in our little B&B, we can arrange a factory visit! :-) http://www.acetaiasangiacomo.com

Good intentions for 2012

2012-01-04T15:05:00.000+01:00

We all do it, don't we? Making good intentions for the new year... Sadly most of these good intentions water down after already a few weeks and we give in too easily to our old, bad habits. But for this new year I've made a solemn vow which I intend to keep: to spend more time with Christine. It sounds a bit weird, doesn't it? We're living here together, almost completely isolated on our Italian hill and yet we don't seem to have enough time for eachother. But I must admit that I've been neglecting her a bit because I was so terribly busy doing other things, such as writing my second novel, moderating an autism forum and... dare I say it... Facebook. I, who'd never give in to the Facebook hype and always considered it to be a stupid way of spending your time. But eventually I fell for it because of my book and all the people who suddenly wanted to hear my advice. Up to the point that a lot of my time was in fact consumed by replying to all of these questions and participating in all of these autism groups. Fortunately, I discovered in time that a lot of what's going on in those groups is not very nice at all. Some people even tried to intrude into our private lives, there was a hacking attempt on our PC and have I mentioned all of the backstabbing yet? No, I firmly decided I would no longer have any part in that and now I seldomly appear on Facebook again. Perhaps it's a pity for all of these good people who appreciated me and to whom I could be of some help. But the price Christine and I had to pay was simply too high. From now on I've decided to concentrate on us being happy... go out a bit more... go hiking or any other fun activity we can do together.

Christine, I love you more than anything else on this Earth and I'll keep doing my very best to make you happy. <3 <3 <3

End of the year wrap up

2011-12-26T14:00:00.000+01:00

First of all, I'd like to offer my sincerest apologies to all of my loyal readers for not having written any new posts for a while. Yes, I've been awfully busy, e.g. finishing my new book which I hope to be able to offer to my editor by New Year. Hmmm... it's going to be tight. Then there was the lecture I was invited to do about autism more then a week ago. Unfortunately the organiser, founder of a major Flemish autism organisation, got terribly ill and the whole event had to be cancelled. Well, I already had my flight tickets so I took the occasion to visit my family in stead. For what it's still worth, I prepared a little movie for my lecture, in order to let the audience feel what it's like to be autistic. I've uploaded it on Youtube and if you like you can see it here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V90Eh3g-umY&feature=g-upl&context=G265a57eAUAAAAAAAAAA

Well, what do you think? Horrible, isn't it? I hope that it will do away with the incessant remarks that we get in the sense that we "exaggerate" or the invariable "come on and get your chin up's". Believe me, this movie is very realistic as already testified by a great number of autistic people who got a preview.

So, it's that time of the year again. The time to review what has been and to look forward to what is to come. 2011 has been a real rollercoaster for me with very high ups but also with a few very low downs. It was the year of my breakthrough as an author, which brought me in many of the national newspapers and even on television. But fame, even in the very limited form which I was to enjoy, has its inevitable downside. There are always people who'll try to abuse your trust and since I'm so terribly naive I often let people take advantage of me. That's one big lesson I had to learn for the umpteenth time and I'll definitely do my best next year to not let it happen again. Even though this will undoubtedly lead me to live an even more secluded life. It's a true pity because there are also a lot of people out there who genuinely appreciate me and the actions I take to promote more understanding for my autistic brothers and sisters. I'm so sorry for them, but I just have to be more careful.

2011 has also seen the beginning of my career as an English teacher and it looks like I'll do a lot more of that next year. Yet another secondary school contacted me and there are even plans for an English summer camp in June. But I'll tell you more about that later when things are more definite.

But in general, 2011 was the year in which Christine and I truly became an integral part of the Italian social life here in the Emilian mountains and when we were embraced as fellow inhabitants of this gorgeous region. It's astonishing what a bit of good will can achieve... just trying to speak the language, even if we still make a lot of mistakes, just trying to blend in and respect the original culture of the local people, participating in the social events... it all takes you a long way and the local people return your efforts tenfold. The result is that we now have more friends over here than Christine and I probably had during our entire lifetime in Belgium and that we are very much appreciated for the new things that we've brought with us, such as Christine's delicious cakes and my English lessons. We celebrated Christmas eve with the local people, at a hostel of one of our closest Italian friends. Christine offered to do all of the cooking so that our friend, for the first time in her life, could truly enjoy Christmas without having to do all of the work. It was a bit of a culture shock for our friends because Christine wanted to offer them a taste of Flemish cuisine. Italians are generally not eager to try something from beyond their boundaries so she took a bit of a risk there. But everything she prepared, from the dried plums with bacon, the scallops with mashed peas and basil, the sellery-salmon-blue cheese soup, the Flemish "witloof" (chicory) with fried potatoe mash in an almond crust and chicken rolls stuffed with mince/onions/raisins, dressed with a port-fig sause up to the cheese pie desert... it was devoured like they haden't eaten in months.

Needless to say that Christine are now truly settled here and that we never ever want to go anywhere else anymore.

Merry Christmas everyone, and we wish you all of the best for 2012!!!

The master-decorator

2011-12-10T12:56:00.000+01:00

Something I forgot to mention yesterday... When Christine was making her buiscuits, she got a little help from Flora, the master-decorator. Flora was so enthusiastic about it that she even did a bit of decorating on herself... :-)

The Christmas Fair

2011-12-09T16:32:00.002+01:00

Yesterday Christine and a close friend organised the first Christmas Fair in the whole region. These types of fairs may be a major happening in some countries and especially in Germany, in Italy they haven't caught the Christmassy bug yet. Christine thought that she had to change all that and together with one of our very best Italian friends she went for it. The venue would be the small town of Casalino di Ligonchio, even higher up the mountains than where we live but a very cosy little place indeed. In the end there were seven stalls, but actually our stall counted for three because Christine sold her home-made buiscuits, I sold my special egg/honey brandy and we olso put a lot of Christmassy stuff on offer for a local shop, the owners of which couldn't be present unfortunately.

For many days, Christine worked day and night making and decorating her special buiscuits:

Here's our little stall:

In the afternoon quite a number of visitors showed up, not really by the hundreds but still a few dozen. Not bad for a first-time event in such a little town. Christine and her friend are determined to do better next year and make the Christmas Fair grow little by little. The comments were all very positive so that's what counts the most, isn't it?

Some more of her buiscuits... Christine was surprised at how much of them she eventually sold because she didn't want to sell them very cheaply after all the work she had put into them. But her work was obviously appreciated... :-)

And this is the special brandy I made, after an old, traditional, Flemish recipe. It's called "Advokaat" in Flemish and it's actually a kind of sweet and thick liquor which goes very well with fruit, cake, ice-cream, pancakes or other sweet dishes, or on its own of course. The local people loved it so much that at the end of the afternoon I was completely sold out! :-)

At the end of the day we were both exhausted, especially Christine because she had worked so hard for this. But we left with a deep sense of happiness because her efforts to bring some life into this region were appreciated a lot by everyone. It was fun, it was cosy and we did good trade, so what else should one wish for? Roll on next year!!!

Free as a bird

2011-11-23T10:05:00.003+01:00

What is more beautiful than absolute freedom? The endless possibilities without restraints or shackles, the World at your feet and dreams coming true… Unfortunately absolute freedom is a utopia. It is said that someone’s freedom ends where someone else’s begins, and rightfully so because we are all entitled to our own little place, both physically and in our world of thought. Therefore we humans have created rules and laws in order to safeguard everybody’s freedom to the maximum extent and to set clear boundaries. As such it is guaranteed – at least in theory – that everyone enjoys exactly the same amount of freedom. But there’s the rub for people with autism, because we often demand more from our environment than we are entitled to by the written or unwritten rules. Let me illustrate this with a small example. When I was still in the Air Force, I shared the same room with about ten other blokes and this was a disaster to me. After these tiring days I absolutely needed rest in order to be able to process the events of the day. But I wasn’t allowed that and in the room the law of the strongest prevailed, meaning that those who had the least need for sleep decided when the lights went out and when everything would be quiet. Not seldom this was way past midnight and since we had to be up on our feet again by six, there was not a lot of sleep in it for me. Not only are six ours way too few for me, but the constant frustration because of the incessant noise in the room drove me som ad that I couldn’t sleep anyway anymore when things eventually settled down. When I asked for a bit of understanding (obviously in those days I couldn’t think of anything else than arguing that I just needed more sleep) I was scorned at and my motion for silence was outvoted all against one. “Democracy”, they used to call that and I was to respect it.

Now I realise that if we want to take the need for more “breathing space” into account in our society for people with autism, or people with a different condition, that this has its consequences for the others, who’ll hence have to give in on their freedom. Like in my example not being allowed to talk anymore or put on the lights after let’s say ten, even if they’re all still wide awake and still have so many things to say. This will undoubtedly lead to frictions, directed at the “privileged person”. Frankly, I don’t think that any autistic person would actually want to be “privileged”. We attach to much value to fairness for everyone so this would most certainly make us feel bad.

But what is the solution then? A solution which doesn’t take away any freedom from anyone and yet will satisfy everyone? Honestly, I don’t know. What I can say is that we, the autistic people, claim the freedom which we can’t get in this harsh world in another, more cunning way: we create our own world in our thoughts and dreams. It’s the perfect catalyst to undo all the frustrations which we are subject to on a daily basis, the impenetrable defence mechanism which protects us from an overdose of stimuli and at the same time becomes our image of a better world, a world which is tailored to our needs and which we desire so much to become reality one day. Alas, also that is a utopia. But this will not stop me from growing wings and fly off into the deep blue sky, far away to a place where nothing or nobody can still touch me. And there I find peace, while I see the mountains and forest slide past below me. I understand that I’ve been very lucky so far because I can get pretty close to my dream. Like I described in my previous post, whenever things get too hectic for me, I can run away to a high and nearby mountain top. A place where you truly don’t hear anything anymore and the infinite grandness of this World stares you in the face. Mountains and valleys… yes, even the Mediterranean you can see from up there and if the weather’s cooperating, you can even make out Corsica on the horizon. Deep below me I see the tiny little villages, and the little winding roads on which cars the size of ants crawl on. That part of the World that makes my senses go berserk. And I look down upon it, from my mountain top, so far away from it all, and I can feel all of my worries slide off my shoulders. I wish so hard that also all of the other people with autism could find such a place of their own. Is that too much to ask for? I don’t thinks so. What if we started right now with that project? Let’s vote, us, the autistic people, and let us claim this right. The right for one place for each and every autistic person, especially chosen by him or her, where we can finally find peace and where we – at least in our thoughts – can truly be free.

Some time on my own

2011-11-16T16:15:00.000+01:00

What's the number one thing that autistic people really crave for? Yes! You guessed correctly! It's... REST! Peace and tranquility in order to absorb and process the horror of these thousands of information pulses that we are subjected to in the real world. Hence our decision to start a new life in the Italian mountains, a place where I can truly come to terms with who I am so that I can build up enough energy to face the unavoidable contact with busy society.

Unfortunately, however, living isolated on a hill is sometimes not enough. From time to time there are still tensions and messages from the outside world which haunt me and sometimes even drive me completely balmy. When that happens, there is only one remedy: fleeing, as fast and as far as possible. Lucky enough for me, there are places here where I can flee to. Places where I'm not going to be disturbed, where there's no noise, no social clutter and chitchat, only peace. What about the summit of Mount Cavalbianco (1855m), for instance? It's the highest peak I've visited so far, at a time when I really needed it.

I know that I have to consider myself very fortunate that I can do this. Many of my autistic brothers and sisters have no way out and can only scream at the walls that surround them. Yes, I truly am very lucky. Then again, I'm not feeling guilty at all about it. I've tried my utmost to blend in into society and to contribute to it, for twenty years until I eventually collapsed. So I see it that now society owes me. And I will keep up my struggle until society realises that it owes the same to my brothers and sisters too.

Some pictures I took during my yourney...

The spells of nature

2011-11-08T13:23:00.000+01:00

Living in the middle of almost unspoilt nature gives one a completely different perspective about who we are and what life if all about. We people feel so secure about ourselves and go about with our little lives without the slightest care in the world. We watch TV chat shows and frantically twitter to our thousands of followers that X just kissed Y as if that petty fact would be of such terrible importance that we'd want the whole world to know about it. Well, I pity those people... I truly pity them. Because what do they know? It clearly demonstrates how much we're living in our insignificant cocoons, totally unaware about what truly matters. And then, we wake up in a nightmare, like the people in northeast Italian Liguria, and the fair city of Genova in particular. In a matter of minutes that city was overwhelmed by a tidal wave of mud, leaving many people dead and a chaos of debris and crushed cars. And this is only a small example of how fragile we are. Ask the people in Japan, in Pakstian, in the eastern Indian Ocean or everywhere else where nature recently demonstrated its true power.

And yet, when destruction has come and gone, we take up our lives again and continue unabated, as if that what happened was only a bad dream and we feel good about ourselves because we're living so far away from the place where it happened. It is written in an old, stupid book that man has power over anything that lives on this planet and that we can use this Earth as we please. How wrong can anyone be! Because there's an unchangeable law of nature, which says that every action is countered by an equal and opposite reaction. Burn down the forests and soon we'll cause a greenhouse effect and the earth will slide away in massive, uncontrollable avalanches of mud, killing everything in their path. This is just one example. Another is the following. Some idiot who was keen on hunting thought it'd be a good idea to release rabbits in Australia. Of course, they had already shot all of Australia's natural predators such as the Australian wolf before that. With the consequence that the rabbit population soon went out of control and they turned most of the continent into a wasteland. "Oh", said man, "but then we'll introduce a predator of our own to control the pest!" And so they released wild dogs to kill all the rabbits. But soon these dogs turned on a better prey: the kangaroos and other animals who weren't prepared for this new threat. And so on. Everytime man has tried to intervene with nature, it ended in tears. And I'm afraid that we'll never learn. Never! Just look around you! Just listen to the people! If you ask anyone about the importance of saving nature, they'll all say "yes" immediately. But their actions are completely opposite! Some quotes I picked up over the past months:

- "Roes are a pest because they spread ticks."

- "Wild boars are a pest because they create havoc in the garden."

- "Cattle should be kept indoors because otherwise you're not certain what they eat and then the quality of the milk may not be consistent."

- "It's not necessary to sterilise cats because most of them die anyway in the winter."

- "What's that? Silicone? Paint? Acetone? Boh... don't bother, just throw it in the skip." (said to me by a tenant of the local special waste disposal facility!)

Doesn't this make your blood boil? Well, it certainly does that with me. Anyway... While in Liguria they were assessing the damage, I managed to take these photos. Even in its fury, nature can still be stunningly beautiful, can't it?

And then I saw mummy roe deer, resting in our field only 20m away from our house. Well, she can spread ticks as much as she likes in our field and if any idiot ever lays a finger on her, or on her calf, he'd better start running... terribly fast!

A haven of tranquility

2011-10-28T09:20:00.000+02:00

What does an autistic person like me crave most of all?... Yes! Right first time! I need rest... A place where I can be on my own, far away from all the stress, the hassle, the incomprehensible complexity of everyday life. Now, if you look at these pictures I took this morning, would you say that I found it?

And what if you asked them?... :-)

If they haven't learnt their lesson by now...

2011-10-16T19:00:00.000+02:00

... they'll never learn it.

Yes, it's that time of the year again. Since three or four weeks the hunters are on the loose again in their relentless frenzy to kill innocent, beautiful wild animals just for the fun of it. They justify themselves by saying that they're the proud inheritors of a 'beautiful tradition'. Well, twothousand years ago they believed that the gladiators were also a 'beautiful tradition' but eventually the human race grew out of it, at least to some extent because we're still blood-thirsty animals. Just look at the success of the tabloids and these websites full of 'sensational news'. The more blood, the bigger their success. Will we ever become true civilised beings? When I look at these idiots who're roaming the countryside over here these days, I doubt it. Of course, in Italy it is a requirement for a hunter to have an IQ under 30 so that may explain some part of their behaviour. And we shouldn't take away the hobby of the poor, demented ignoramusses. They too are entitled to a bit of fun. But there are limits.

Just before the hunting season started we had a friendly chat with one of the local forest guards. The man took our case very seriously, moreover because we're now running a B&B and we wouldn't want our most honourable guests to get shot. The forest guard was going to have a word with the local hunters and, surprisingly, it did seem to work. They always maintained a safe distance from our property and we weren't even bothered anymore by their dogs. For the first couple of weeks though. Because this morning we hit the jackpot again. I already saw it coming... Dogs were running closer and closer to our house. First in our woods at the far end of our field, then in the woods below our field. These dogs usually run in circles because that's the pattern a hare makes when it's trying to escape. I didn't see the hare popping out from between the trees. But six big dogs were suddenly running towards us, barking like mad. Christine still tried to chase them off the gentle way, with little success since the dogs were just everywhere and didn't pay any attention to her shouts and gestures. So I took out... THE SECRET WEAPON! Following the advice of my closest Italian friend, I got me one of these: the humble football horn! :-)

The blaring noise scared the living wits out of those dogs and they ran off ten times faster than that they had first appeared. But... I had barely let go of the 'blast' button when we suddenly heard a furious hunter shouting at us from a small open space behind our field.

- "You imbeciles! You bastards! I'm going to sue you! I'll have you! You dirty sods! Stick that horn in your wife's *ù§!&£µ, you , !àèaji)!éù$^$iipu (not for senitive readers...) ... ù$'àço-à:;é'!ç ... µù*£$^[; ... "

And so on (for the next five minutes or so). Then the well-educated gentleman called his dogs back (which were still in a kind of shock I presume) and went away, still shouting very rude words. Obviously I should have been more understanding and forgive him the fact that he was breaching the law at least tree times: hunting within 100m of an inhabited house, hunting with more than 2 dogs per person (he was alone) and art. 649 of the Italian law code which prosecutes disturbance of one's rest at his/her home.

But then we also heard him shouting at someone else, a bit further on. Eager to know who we were dealing with I jumped on my scooter and rode along the road which goes uphill behind our house and then runs parallel to our land. There I saw his mates, posing on the middle of the road with their guns as if they were the local generals. Or perhaps my new friend had left so many valuables in his two cars that he needed four armed men to protect them. This was in fact another breach of the law: hunters are not allowed to carry an assembled gun less than 100m from a house or 50m from a road. These men were carrying loaded guns ON the road. At first a bit of fear crept in me that they would perhaps try to stop me. But fortunately they stepped aside as I approached and I drove past, trying to have a glance at their licence plates. When I rode up the next hill, I could just see their mate arriving with his dogs, which he put in the dedicated trailer and off they went. Probably to harrass somebody else.

That's the sort of people we have to put up with during the hunting season. And you know what's the most shocking thing of all? In Italy you are NOT allowed to stop a hunter from entering private land! A hiker, a biker or anybody else you can throw off as you like, but a man wearing a gun you can't! Unbelievable, isn't it? And you know whose fault this is? A guess anyone...???

Dear old BENITO MUSSOLINI!

In the twenties or thirties (somewhere) he passed a law that allowed men wearing weapons to roam freely across the country, private property or not. The goal of this law was to stimulate 'heroism' and to create a national sense of 'war'. Isn't it astonishing that even today Italian hunters are still using a law from Mussolini in order to defend their interests? People who'd swear they'd kill every fascist they'd come across, but at the same time try to prevent the laws of Mussolini to be changed or deleted. Now do you believe me about this IQ below 30?

Well, we're confident that these prats will from now on think twice before they come too close to us again. They spend years training their dogs and they will not risk that this training is completely overturned in a matter of seconds by our horn. When you're dealing with idiots and you've tried talking and being nice to them for a year without result, this is the sort of thing to do. It's the only languge these savages understand.

In the meantime, we're getting ever more visits from the local wildlife, as if they sense that there's a safe haven for them at our place. Especially a mummy roe deer with her calf is visiting us every day now, early in the morning and in the evening. She's also getting ever less shy and I already managed to approach them to about 15m without scaring them off. A couple of days ago, they even came right next to our house! These two pictures were taken with my mobile and through the side window, so please forgive me the bad quality. And you can't see the calf on them either (though it was there!). But just to show you in what a stunning place we're living!

The Monte Cisa Challenge

2011-10-02T14:15:00.002+02:00

It has been a dream since I first came to live in Italy: climbing the Monte Cisa. Not that it's a particularly high or spectacular mountain with its 1698m, far from it. But it's been staring me in the face right from the start. On the following picture, taken from our terrace, you can see it on the left, with its steep rocky westerly slope. If you look very carefully, you can see that right to the left of the summit there is a meadow. And in that meadow there is a tree. Well, I've always said that one day I'd be standing right next to that tree. So I went for it...

I rode with my Vespa along small, winding mountain roads to get as close to the mountain as possible. Here I'm already getting nearer... tension is rising... I'm filled with anticipation... I simply MUST get to the top!

The road is getting worse, only dirt and rocks. But I carry on unabated. The problem is that the road goes through the forests so I haven't got a clue anymore whether I'm close to the point I had selected to start my climb or not. Eventually I guess I must be close enough to have a go so I park my scooter and look up through the woods. I can hardly see any sky, let alone a recognisable point, but I just know the mountain must be there. Filled with courage I start to climb. The ground is very steep and slippery with all those leaves, but by jumping from tree to tree I have sufficient things to hold on to in order not to slide all the way down again. Apart from painful, this would have been quite embarrassing... :-)

Slowly I'm beginning to make out more and more blue in between the highest trees. Could it be that I'm already approaching the summit?... No... It's just a wide open space filled with what looks like an avalanche of rocks. Above these rocks there's another forest. But it appears to me that the summit couldn't be far beyond that so I just carry on, leaping from one rock to the next until I reach the outskirts of that second forest. The view is just spectacular and I can already see our house way below in the distance, so I must already be quite high indeed.

I climb through the woods again. Steep... tiring... slippery... The top can't be far now... it can't be far... Again there's more and more blue in between the leaves... it must be right over there...

Uh... not quite. Apart from having slightly miscalculated my point of departure (i.e. much too far to the west, right under that incredibly steep wall of rock in stead of the easier way through the woods on the left) I'm absolutely gutted to find out that the hardest part is yet to come! Oh bother...

Holding onto branches, leaves or even lumps of grass, I manoeuvre very carefully to the east, high, forested cliffs as well right above as below me. Very scary but still doable. Again there are more and more trees which give me grip and places to rest and I climb and climb... And then... the trees in front of me open up... behold... the meadow with the tree where I wanted to be so very much... I've made it!!!

The panorama is just breathtaking from the summit! Here's a zoomed-in picture of our house, indicated with a red arrow. I called Christine with my mobile and told her to get the binoculars. "Yes!", she said, "I can see you, barely, but still...!"

As usual I've made a 360° panorama. You can download it here:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/24841015/Panorama.jpg

It's over 6MB but I can assure you that it's well worth it, at least I think so...

Then, after about half an hour of gazing and feeling good about myself, I decide that it's time to go down again. By chance I meet a local sheep herder who was looking for his flock (they're roaming about freely in the mountains) and he told me that there's a much easier way down, right along the westerly edge. It's steep, he assured me, but not too difficult. I'm holding my breath because I'm not really a big fan of "steep", "deep" and ladders but decide to give it a go. All in all, this mountain is steep everywhere. One last look at the summit...

And one other piece of rock, sticking out just a tad lower...

The way down...

When I've finally reached more solid ground about half an hour later, I meet the road again I was following earlier on to reach the mountain. Now I'm following it down, hoping to find my dear little Vespa again. It's almost an hour's walk, during which I actually spot a male deer, and eventually... there it is...

Riding home again, watching the sunset...

The art of driving

2011-09-20T13:11:00.000+02:00

Yesterday we went to collect Christine's car at the garage where it had been for maintenance. While we were waiting for our turn to speak to the mechanic, the latter was having a conversation with a (very) senior citizen. The old man was incredibly shabby, with worn, dirty clothes and a dusty old cap on his balding head and he spoke very rough local dialect too. We couldn't understand all of it, but after living in this area for almost a year and a half now (Christine already two years) we could make out most of what he was saying. Apparently he had dropped by for a broken stop light of his old little Peugeot. The mechanic was most helpful and asked the man to press the brake pedal so he could investigate the problem.

- "Errr... which pedal would that be?", the old man asked.

- "It's the one in the middle", the mechanic kindly replied.

In the meantime Christine and I were standing there in wonder. That man was driving his car without knowing where the brakes were??? We had hardly overcome our initial surprise when we overheard him mutter something else which we didn't understand but which ended with:

- "...I'm not seeing too well anymore because I have cataract."

Our eyes must have seemed to pop out of their sockets and our jaws dropped open wide. How on earth... There wasn't much time to think because the bulb was replaced in no time and the man appeared to want to reverse his car. There was little room to manoeuvre and Christine's car was parked pretty closely behind his so I shouted at her: "Quick, move your car out of the way as far as possible!" Which she immediately did. Better not take chances with that bloke behind the wheel! To our great relief, however, the mechanic was so friendly to reverse the car himself because after all it was a rather tight spot and so the man could take over straight onto the entrance lane.

And then... suddenly an elderly lady arrived on foot and took the driving seat of the little Peugeot.

- "Yes, I'm driving because my husband's sight isn't too good, you see", she explained. Christine and I were having difficulties not to laugh too obviously and we really had to clench our teeth together. And off they went...

The frailty of friendship

2011-09-15T18:05:00.000+02:00

Friends for life... such sweet words, but altogether whispers in the wind and too easily forgotten because of a sad misunderstanding. I had a friend once... someone I believed to be a true friend. Someone who'd always stand by me and never let me down... Alas, wrong interpretations of words cast in stone, the unwillingness to listen to explanations and the stubbornness of the own right shatter a bond that I once thought to be unbreakable. I went down on my knees and begged... begged for forgiveness, which I shouldn't even have done. But I though that this friendship was too valuable so I gladly humiliated myself in order to save it. In vain.

Now I realise that noone, not even the closest true friend, is worth going down on your knees for. I realise that when someone remains stonecold to this ultimate act of trying to make a mends the original friendship wasn't as true as it should have been and that once again I've been deceived. I'm a terrible chooser and all too often let myself be indulged by sweet words. More whispers in the wind... Whispers... which dissolve in absolute silence...

The red bracelet

2011-09-09T14:17:00.000+02:00

- "Hurray! Today we're going to my favourite amusement park!", a little boy shouts overjoyed when his mum announced the big news. He's autistic and he just adores going to that park because to him it's his fantasy world come true. All of his friends from television will be there, like Samson the dog, dwarf Plop and Maya the bumble bee. It's summer and for a change the weather's very nice, which only adds to the boy's excitement. He's filled with impatience and anticipation as they drive all the way to the park. Of course, summertime and nice weather also mean that the park is very crowded. The boy's a bit anxious about that, but fortunately the park management has a special arrangement for children like him: the red bracelet. Children with a disability, either mental or physical, are entiteld to wearing this bracelet which offers them a priority entrance at the various attractions. No horrible queues which could possibly drive him mad and cause a crisis.

Unfortunately, however, not everyone is as understanding towards children with a handicap. Some heartless people watch the priority entry with vicious jealousy.

- "Hey, where can you buy these red bracelets? I want one for my kids as well!", a vile woman shouts hysterically at the little autistic boy. But to the woman's surprise, the boy remains as cool as a cucumber and calmy replies:

- "Do you want my bracelet? Well, you can have it. But you'll have to take my autism with it!"

The mad woman is stunned and doesn't know what to say anymore. And so is everyone else who's watching the scene. The boy then enters the attraction and tries to forget what just happened. In vain, obviously. It keeps nagging in his head and he so wishes that his autism would go away. As if it had only been a bad dream. The rest of his day is ruined and he only wants to return home and cry.

It's an ordinary day out of the life of little Thomas, and I guess from personal experience out of the life of every autistic person or people with other disabilities. My brother, for example, has always been a keen boyscout and once they went to the city of Antwerp with one of them sitting in a wheelchair, just for laughs in order to spot the people's reactions. Although not a lot of verbal reactions were encountered, the faces of these people said more than a thousand words. Ranging from pity to annoyment because the wheelchair was in their way. There's still a long way to go as far as education is concerned...

Clearing the debris after "hurricane" Thomas

2011-08-28T12:59:00.001+02:00

Oh boy, what a week, what a week... My dear friend Thomas and his mum paid us a visit. A visit that we're definitely going to remember for a very long time! He was soooo thrilled to see me back after all these months that he nearly stormed past me in his enthusiasm at the airport. But then he gave me the warmest "hello" I've received in ages. Even though it was his very first time in an aircraft (let alone going abroad), he was very brave and even encouraged his mum (who wasn't quite as brave at first but in the end also thoroughly enjoyed the flight). It was a moment we've both looked forward to for so long, and there it was. The not-so-little-anymore lad jumped with joy because of this whole week without worries, far away from pestering administrations, a new school (for the 8th time), a new appartment (for the umpteenth time), being beaten up and a shipload of family problems. One thing was almost as important to him than seeing me though, and that was visiting a real Roman amphitheater. So we drove all the way to Verona because there we would find the nearest of these ancient buildings which is still in a very good state. Obviously, not-so-little Thomas knew everything about amphitheaters so he gladly showed us around like if he were a professional guide!

But that wasn't nearly all! Thomas's birthday is next month, but nevertheless Christine insisted that we'd already celebrate it during his visit. So she baked him a cake. And what a cake! She even sculpted Tabaluga, his favourite cuddle, out of sugar paste...

And on Friday we went all the way up one of the mountains. Well, not quite up to the top because Thomas was suffering too much from the high wind, but he nevertheless reached 1.700m! Can you see how proud he was? :-)

That being said, the visit wasn't all roses. Apart from being autistic, I suspect that Thomas is also endowed with some form of ADHD, just like his mum. I want to be very careful with this because I know all too well how easy it is to make a wrong diagnosis and of course I'm not a doctor. But Thomas was just... too much for Christine and I to handle. Always talking, humming, singing and jumping about... Obviously he was so enthusiastic about this holiday, but it had to be more than just that because I've never met an autistic person with, let's just say, so much energy. Today, Thomas and his mum have returned home and Christine and I are totally wasted. Up to a point that we feel it would take us at least a month to recover from the terrible amount of stress we've had to endure this entire week. It's all so sad, really, because Thomas is such a great kid and the very best friend you could ever imagine. Anyway, I'll take a bit of rest right now, get the batteries recharged and then see how it goes. Thomas will be returning in two months, so we'd better be prepared! :-D

At least someone wasn't bothered by Thomas' enthusiasm...

Campaign for a better understanding of autism?

2011-08-18T11:10:00.005+02:00

The Flemish Autism Society (http://www.autismevlaanderen.be/) has recently launched a new poster campaign and are even running for the renowned "solidarity prize", issued by one of the leading Flemish newspapers to reward the best campaign supporting a better and more tolerant society. The poster is a cartoon, combining the two protagonists in the Belgian political crisis, Bart De Wever of the Flemish Nationalist Party and Elio Di Rupo of the Walloon Socialist Party. The header reads: "stereotype of an autistic person?" and at the bottom left it reads:

1. Doesn't consider somebody else's feelings

2. Doesn't take the initiative to or doesn't participate in the discussions

3. Resists heavily to change

4. Leaves the initiative to contact to someone else

5. Is strongly attached to certain objects

This was published full-page in the newspaper with the enormous header: "Campaign depicts Bart De Wever and Elio Di Rupo as autistic persons".

I'll give you a second or two to make your own interpretations.

Now, bear in mind that I'm autistic. This means that I'm incapable of reading "hidden messages" or "ironic interpretations". The way I see it, is that those two politicians (who after more than a year still haven't come to an agreement for reasons which I shan't explain here) must be autistic because they can't reach a compromise etc. Hilarious! Our politicians are autistic! Or, in other words, this campaign reinforces the known stereotypes about autism in stead of tearing them down, which is what the Flemish Autism Society are trying to make us believe.

Well, I'm terribly hurt by this campaign. Also because I'm a fond supporter of Bart De Wever because he's the first Flemish politician in 180 years who doesn't bow his head for the incessant Walloon demands. But that's personal.

Am I exaggerating? Am I seeing things? Am I growing mad? I'll leave the verdict up to you...

We have a new lodger

2011-08-07T14:01:00.001+02:00

Last Thursday evening we had to go to the vet's urgently because Canelle wasn't feeling very well. She was constantly vomiting, didn't eat or drink anymore and was clearly in pain. In the end, she turned out to have a severe infection in her stomach and intestines and had to be kept on a drip against dehydration. With tears in our eyes we had to leave her there, the poor thing...

But while we were sitting in the vet's office during the examination, we noticed that all of his animal cages were filled with little kittens, 3 of which had been abandoned and found by the road. One in particular immediately attracted our attention, poking his grey little muzzle as far as he could through the bars and indicating with his tiny paws that he wanted to play. Which I obviously did. He was just soooo cute and friendly... I had great difficulties putting him back in his cage when we returned home. The next day we went back there to see how Canelle was doing and... exactly the same story. Eventually Christine persuaded me not to get too attached to the little kitten because we already have four cats to look after. But I just couldn't forget that poor little sod. So after a lot of moaning and grunting, Christine succumbed and yesterday evening we went back to the vet's in order to collect him. :-)

I named him Tobi, which is indeed quite close to "Thomas", but I couldn't think of anything else that so much reflected his high an playful spirit. So here he is... barely 6-7 weeks old. Nevertheless he already managed to scare the living wits out of Flora, even though she must be at least 5 times as big. But he charged at her like a brave knight and she was forced to withdraw. :-) Hopefully he'll become the protector of our domain now because Flora and our two Norwegians are just too... cowardly..., even though they're so big and Canelle can be a real fury but she's simply too small to make an impression on some of these stray cats that roam the neighbourhood.

Welcome, little Tobi!

To all of the "normal" people

2011-07-29T11:47:00.000+02:00

Thomas, the autistic boy I have already talked about and one of my very best friends, has been beaten up severely by a couple of "youngsters" while he was visiting his favourite amusement park. Why, you might ask? Because he was once again roaming in his fantasy world and started talking to a couple of balloons. The result: a concussion, a ruptured eardrum, a black eye, a bruised back, a bloody nose and bitemarks on his fingers. He's terrified now, afraid to go out and swore that he'd never go to that amusement park ever again, even though it's his favourite place on earth.

It is beyond words, regardless if it is autistic or not, that a child can get beaten up so severely in a so crowded place. What did all the bystanders do? Just watch the scene? Where was the park security? The saddest thing about this case is however that Thomas has now lost his only "safe" spot in the world. Remember what I told you about my clay mountain? This is ten times worse because he's not just "lost" it like me, he got assaulted in it and I can only imagine how he must feel right now. According to his mum, he hardly says a word anymore and it seems that many years of effort to try to integrate him somewhat into the "normal" society have been flushed down the toilet in one single blow.

THIS is why I'll struggle for the rest of my life in order to make people understand about autism. THIS is why I'll never again tolerate that any autistic person is bullied, threatened or hurt, just because he or she is "different" from the so-called "normal" people. What is "normal" anyway? The way I see it, is that WE are the "normal" ones around here because we would NEVER do such a thing to someone else. "Just for fun"... "Hilarious"... "I can't stop laughing"... THIS HAS TO STOP RIGHT NOW!!!

Thomas' mum is currently planning a week's holiday at our place (hush hush... secret!) and we sincerely hope that this will bring him back among the living, so to speak. After been sent to hell by the minister of education about his school problem (when the cameras were gone of course), this must be another major disappointment for poor little Thomas. I wish that I could help him overcome all of this and mind you, my determintation for my struggle to defend autistic people has grown tenfold. We have already stood halfway across the bridge for a long time now, stretching out our hands to you. It's about time that the "normal" people will make an effort too and cross their end of the bridge.

Mob tactics - part 2

2011-07-10T17:31:00.001+02:00

Odd, isn't it? The last court session was barely over, I just wrote my previous blog, or we've been vandalised. No, the damage isn't extensive. It's just the B&B sign that I had planted by our entrance lane was torn down this morning.

Obviously this is the work of someone from te Danilo clan or perhaps one of Nezio's buddies. Well, if they think that we're intimidated by this, they're seriously mistaking. If this is he worst they can do... huh! I already fixed the sign just now and tomorrow morning we're going to report this straight to the Carabinieri. Of course, it will only be a "complaint against an unknown person". But then it will be on record. And Sabrina might just like to slip it in during the next court session. "Oh, not that we want to accuse dear Danilo of course. I'd just like to highlight that my clients are being threatened" or something. Let the judge make up his or her own mind.

Mob tactics

2011-07-10T12:22:00.000+02:00

The tale about the Big Bad Wolf is getting ever more sordid. Believe me, it will have a happy end. But the way Danilo's acting right now is just... despicable. Last Friday Christine had to go to Reggio Nell'Emilia to court, remember? She there met with our brilliant solicitor Sabrina and what she told her is just... beyond words. The Danilo clan has been threatening her! If she woulnd't let go of our case, they would report her to the bar and the solicitor-general! Their argument is that a friend and colleague of Sabrina's had once defended Danilo in another case and to them it would be a conflict of interest. Even though Sabrina is not professionally associated to her friend, so in reality she's got absolutely nothing to worry about. It's all bluff. But now it's become more than clear why our first two solicitors (among whom a very famous one) eventually tried to get rid of our case, even though in the beginning they claimed that they had enough evidence to have Danilo's business closed for good. The Danilo clan apparently's got so much daylight-fearing information about almost everyone that nobody dares to stand up against them. Fortunately, Sabrina is very much like Christine. These ridiculous threats are to her like a red flag on a bull: they make her even more determined to carry on. Also Christine felt very much reassured. If Danilo wants to take that route, it's obvious he knows that he doesn't stand a chance in a fair (legal) fight. That didn't stop him by the way to be represented by his own brother, the other head of the clan and owner of his own lawfirm. It's normally deontologically not allowed, but "my colleague was suddenly detained so I had to take over".

The case itself on the other hand was over very quickly. It turns out that the judge who's normally responsible for our case is leaving and will not treat our case anymore. We'll have to wait for the new judge to be sworn in. Which will be in... april next year! :-) There was a judge ad interim but she was so terribly busy that she proposed an adjournment. Christine wanted to ask whether we could at least already have some of the parties' arguments treated but Sabrina insisted she'd leave it as it is. After all, it's not us who're after our money. It's Danilo who wants his €16.000 (which he BTW already reduced to €6.000 by now... how striking...). Pity for him, but he'll just have to wait a little bit longer. Danilo's brother was apparently sitting there in such an arrogant way, with shabby clothes, leaning back in his chair, and said: "she expects all of us to work for free! Huh!" How about that for a too self-confident and despisable attitude! Obviously he forgot to mention that we've already paid Danilo €3.300. For non-existent work, but I suppose that's only a small detail. And when this case is settled, we'll have another little surprise in store for Danilo, which I'm not yet going to elaborate about. You never know who's reading my blogs... But Christine and I are sure that he's not going to like it... :-)

Homesick

2011-07-07T15:16:00.006+02:00

It is generally known that people with autism don’t like to go outside of the places where they feel safe. This can be their private little room, their hugchair, a bench under their willow, or in my case, the top of the clay mountain in the town of Boom, Flanders. From there you had a wonderful view of my town, the old clay pits surrounding it and if the weather cooperated a little you could even spot the Atomium on the horizon. Yes, sitting there abandoned, on my own, were to me moments of pure magic. They brought me peace and I completely felt at home and sheltered, amidst my world.

What is less known, is that this urge for security is not only limited to places, but that it also – at least as far as I’m concerned – encompasses moments in time. Moments in an often very distant past which I long back to, and not always for positive reasons. Sometimes I just long for a moment like the one I just described about the clay mountain, somewhere in the middle of the eighties. Images appear in my mind, but also sounds and the music I strongly associate with that period. The perfect whole of observations which make me in my thoughts go back to that safe moment; a rare moment when I was allowed to taste perfect happiness. I close my eyes and the world around me doesn’t exist anymore. There’s just me, the clay mountain and that music. You know, a number of years back I had the opportunity to visit my clay mountain again. A moment which I had longed for for perhaps fifteen years and which ultimately became a true disaster. The clay mountain wasn’t my clay mountain anymore. The elements had eroded the long peninsula of clay, which stuck out no less than thirty metres above the wasteland of the old clay pits around it, such that it had become dangerous to still walk all the way up to the end. But what was even worse, the wild nature with the derelict drying sheds and the crumbling chimneys had gone completely. Instead they had created a modern public park with tidy lawns bordered by straight footpaths. My world had been destroyed! My safe place had been taken away from me! Even now, again many years later, I think back with regret and anger to this horrible discovery. It’s like something inside of me has broken. Fortunately I can still turn my world alive and as it should be in my thoughts . With the derelict sheds and the tunes of Scritti Politti’s “Absolute” on the background. It’s the only thing I’ve still got left.

These nostalgic moods don’t only carry me back to safe moments, like I already insinuated. They’ll also not fail to remember me about my big failures, or at least those events which I consider to be failures. In my mind I relive them second per second, word for word, but this time I react differently and I say different things through which the in reality painful scene will get a happy ending. Often this is about love, because I’ve had my share of misery in my youth. With my pathetic way of communicating I wasn’t what you could call the dreamdate of all the girls I fancied. It’s weird that I still cling so hard to that because eventually I’ve found the perfect love in a woman who loves me unconditionally and supports and understand me. Even if I make life for her sometimes far from easy. Yet I can’t resist going back to these many parties and other events in the distant past in order to rectify a thing or two which I seriously cocked up back then.

This week however, I was struck by the most dangerous of all of my nostalgic moods. The sort that actually tries to bring me back in touch with that past which I should rather leave in peace. Why I’m doing it I don’t know. It’s so strong. I just can’t resist the urge, even though I realise for more than ninety-nine percent certainty this mood will lead me to a disappointment infinitely greater than the disappearance of my clay mountain. Because I was so clumsy at chatting up girls but still had so much love to give, I sought again refuge in my fantasy. I made up the perfect girl and at least she saw what a small, kind, golden heart was beating inside of those seven foot thick walls of armed concrete which I had built around my person. She was my great love. By coincidence I then found a picture on an ad with on it the girl of my dreams. It was truly amazing! She was indeed the girl like I had always imagined her in my wildest dreams. I nicked the magazine she appeared in and secretly worshipped her picture, day and night. Sometimes I even took her to my clay mountain to show it to her and to be happy together there, in our little paradise. Eventually, twenty-five years later, the memory of her has withered although every now and then it still appears in front of me. Not as such because I regret my current situation. I already told you that eventually I’ve found a dream of a wife. But only because I would like to have had a better, happier past. Coincidence would strike even more mercilessly this week. Every now and then people mention the power of the internet, but I’m sure that only very few people actually realise how powerful it truly is. I was just surfing a bit and before I knew it I was back in my safe past again, although this time with “Everybody’s got to learn sometimes” by The Korgis in the back of my head. I surfed ever deeper and deeper on the infinite web and suddenly I ended up on a website about beautiful girls of the eighties. And to my amazement also about my girl of the advertisement. I had lost her picture since long, but there she was, with name, date of birth and the lot. Apparently she’s Danish and there was even a picture of how she looks like today! Her eyes were still the same but now she’s a woman in her mid-forties and she doesn’t really resemble the girl I cherished for so long anymore. A most painful stroke went through my heart and I cursed myself that I had once again wanted to return to that bloody past. The shock was so hard that her beautiful memory exploded like a soap bubble. My dreamgirl wan’t anymore. Of course I do know that people grow old and change. Perhaps I can accept it more easily of myself or the people around me because you live the aging process so silently that you hardly notice it. Except maybe when you’re standing in front of the mirror in the morning and you suddenly discover yet another wrinkle. But those twenty-five years difference with my picture hit me hard in the face. As cold as ice and merciless.

After the clay mountain, the fact that my parents recently sold our house to go and live somewhere else and so on, this is once again a terrible blow to me which I refuse to accept. No, everything should remain exactly as it was and how I want it. And everything should happen exactly how I want it. Sounds pathetic, doesn’t it? O, how I long for a bit of peace of mind…

Updated website

2011-07-02T10:51:00.000+02:00

It took Christine and I a lot of time, but finally here it is: our B&B's website is now also available in Flemish/Dutch, German and French. We would like to thank our dear friends Viktoria and David sincerely for their help with the German and French versions. Really, thanks a lot you two!!! :-)

http://www.bb-lastella.it/

Enjoy!

And a bit of good news

2011-06-22T15:55:00.002+02:00

Just to end on a happy note...

This morning, the expert that Nasty Little Nezio had hired to take a look at the damages to our house came to pay us a visit. He was a very kind man who didn't really examine all of the problems in detail. The first glance probably already told him more than enough. So it was probably with a lot of reluctance and embarassment that he delivered the latest explanation from his client regarding the drainage... and you're gonna love it... :-)

"The drainage was only temporary. It should have been replaced with a definitive one later on."

When you've stopped laughing, you'll realise that Nezio knows all too well that he's gone terribly in the wrong and that he's most afraid about going to court. That's another thing the expert told us in a covert way because he stressed the problems with the Italian judicial system and that it would be better for all to swallow our pride and try to come to an agreement. Not! We'll have Nezio's private parts on a plate and our solicitor is going to take care of that. Two down, only Big Bad Danilo to go... We can't wait!

A bit of sad news

2011-06-22T15:33:00.000+02:00

Living in the middle of nature is just great. It's like feeling connected to the environment, to be one with nature, feeling whole. It's an experience I've been searching for for all of my life and I could recommend it to anyone. Life just takes a different pace, a much slower one. And I daresay a more satisfying one. Sometimes I reproach some of the mountain folk around here that they're not grasping this at all. When they see a tree, they think about "stove". When they see a deer, they think about "shooting it". It's so terribly wrong. They should appreciate a bit more how fortunate they are that they can live here instead of nagging all the time about their petty little problems.

But sometimes, nature can be cruel as well. Two days ago, late afternoon, we lost our cockerel, two of our three hens and one of our little chicks to a fox. It all happened in a flash. Normally when they're in some sort of distress our hens shout very loudly and in a way that leaves no reason for doubt that they're in trouble. Not this time. They're capable of flying onto our roof, 6m high. But again, not this time. All that was left was a bunch of feathers and the corpse of one of our hens which the fox hadn't been able to take with it in time. Christine and I were devastated. We already lost all of the hens Christine had driven from Belgium to a fox in September, after they'd been here for only six days. This time we thought we'd do better and we always kept our hens under strict surveillance. But even that was not enough. The only thing we can still try is building a strong fence and keep the hens within the enclosure. It's something we were reluctant to do because our hens were so happy because they could walk about as they pleased. Perhaps we were too naive about this and it was only a matter of time before we had to pay the price for it.

Anyway, that's that. We're not angry at the fox at all. It's got cubs to feed too and it's a very useful animal, no matter what some stupid people may say. Our attitude towards them hasn't changed a bit. It was our own fault. Later in the evening, the devious fox even walked straight past the big window of our living room and even looked inside. It's got such a cute muzzle and friendly eyes that one may wonder how such an animal can be this cruel. Then again, the same can be said about our cats as well when they return home with a mouse, lizzard, bird or even rabbit. Sometimes even still alive, just to have something to play with. It's just the way nature is. We humans should be a bit more humble and finally admit that we can't change it, and the times we did try always ended in disaster. We should rather become a part of it again. But try to explain that to most part of the world...

Some news from the legal front

2011-06-12T13:32:00.000+02:00

Three weeks ago, the court had called both parties in the Danilo-case for a first hearing. Christine and I were not present there in person, but, Sabrina, our brilliant solicitor defended our interests. Not a lot was said, but according to Sabrina, the judge must have spotted immediately that the official documents, such as the building permit, seismic study etc. were backdated and issued long after Christine had already given Danilo the sack. He's now summoned both Christine and Danilo in person for further inquiry. Which Christine obviously looks forward to a lot. If the judge already has doubts now about the authenticity of all of these documents, the forged signatures will undoubtedly also come to light during the next session. Given that Italians generally tend to be very much concerned about their bad, "mafiosi" image abroad, it's very likely that the judge will not be mild on Danilo for having stained the image of Italy even more with ignorant foreigners. Counterfeit is a major crime and hopefully Danilo won't find any rock to crawl under anymore.

BTW, I should also mention here that nasty little Nezio has all of a sudden also agreed to an independent expert who'll come to take a look at the damages somewhere next week. Didn't he say earlier that he'd go to court right away or something?...

All of this is yet again a sign that things are looking up for Christine and I. You'll remember that last year Christine contacted two different solicitors, among whom a very famous one, in the hope that they would take our case seriously. Unfortunately, both of them suggested that we should pay the bastard and said that we didn't stand a chance in court. Now, we're no longer talking about paying Danilo. Oh no! Now we're talking about tens of thousands of Euros in damages that he should pay us! I won't be too optimistic here because if fate can turn so quickly to our advantage, it may well turn again in the opposite direction just as fast. But all things considered... I'd say we have both of them by the B... :-)

The TV show

2011-06-10T11:28:00.000+02:00

It's been a couple of very difficult weeks for me, but I'll give you an update one step at a time. :-)

So, two weeks ago I got invited for an interview on the popular talkshow "Goedele" on the Flemish commercial television. Needless to say that I was thrilled about it, moreover because all of my travel arrangements were paid, airport pick-up and drop-off were included and I received a hotelroom for the night. They had sent me a list of no less than 15 questions, to which they wanted my answers already beforehand, probably in order to be able to plan the timing of the show. Of course, I was not the main act, but I was only asked to support Thomas, the autistic boy I told you about. Which I gladly did because I admire that boy a lot.

- "You are my inspiration!", Thomas shouted at me when we first met in the TV station's dressing rooms. How about that? It made me feel inside like a chocolate toffee in the hot, summer sunshine. My heart melted away... I could only smile and replied that he had done it all by himself. Shortly the minister of education will come to visit him personally, so that's quite an achievement, isn't it? Anyway, Thomas insisted that I'd sit next to him during the show and so it happened. In the mean time we've become close friends and now I know truly everything about Minecraft, his favourite computer game. :-) After a brief rehearsal and make up, we were accompanied to our chairs at the big, centre table in the studio, surrounded by a live audience of about a hundred people. Then Goedele, the talkshow host, entered the stage and she immediately tried to reassure little Thomas and... probably anticipated on some unexpected remarks that he might give. The table was in fact a bit wobbly...

- "Yes, I know that it's only plastic and not real wood, but that'll remain our little secret, ok? Don't say that out loud!"

And she made a similar comment on her false eyelashes too. :-)

Then the recording of our part of the programme started. It was only ten minutes and out of the 15 questions I'd had to prepare, in the end I only got asked 2 or 3. But I think I did rather well, which was confirmed later by the many, very positive reactions I received. My message apparently came through very well and that was the most important bit.

I still haven't seen the show on TV yet; the TV station was going to send me a copy on DVD which I'm yet to receive. So I'm very curious... :-)

In the end, all of the publicity I get for my book through newspapers and now this TV appearance is starting to bear fruit. After a rather sloppy start of the booksale, things are now running like a train and according to my editor already 900 copies have been sold in these 3 or 4 weeks and orders are still pouring in daily. The sloppy start was mainly due to a kind of boycot from the biggest chain of bookstores in Flanders. They're not really interested in new, unknown authors and only buy books from the established ones. But after all of this publicity they've changed their minds and now offer my book in their shops too. So I'm very happy indeed.

I've also been asked to write a few columns for the newsletters of the Flemish Autism Association, which I'll gladly do... later, because for the moment I think I need a lie-down... :-)

The chicks!

2011-06-01T10:14:00.000+02:00

And... for those of you who're wondering how our 5 little chicks are doing, here a couple of photos. I haven't got much time right now (just returned from Belgium for this TV interview and in a few hours I'll be off to the annual Star party of my astronomy internet forum). But expect more news from me after the weekend!

Rollercoaster - part 2

2011-05-26T15:36:00.002+02:00

I've only barely written my previous post when the rollercoaster is suddenly picking up even a lot more speed. In Flanders there is a lot of commotion for the moment about a boy called Thomas. He's 12 years old, high-functioning autistic and they're threatening him to take him away from his mother. The reason? Thomas can't go to school anymore. If I'm correct, they've tried no less than seven schools (imagine that for an autistic boy!) but none of them was able to give him the special attention he needs. So he and his mother are desperate. The appalling thing is though, that if by September he is not inscribed in any school, the "juvenile protection centre" will take him away from his mother and put him into foster care because she'd be supposedly a "bad mother" for "not sending him to school".

But brave little Thomas isn't giving up so easily. He's planning to start his own school, especially for autistic children! He's already found a suitable building (a school that was recently closed) and... he wrote a (very emotional) letter to the minister of education asking him permission to use this building for this purpose. "Only the water and electricity supply is still a problem, but that can certainly be fixed", he wrote. And "since there are so many unemployed teachers, we'll have no problem finding teachers for the school. My brother said that unemployed people receive an income from the State, they call it unemployment fee or something. So these teachers will cost you nothing more". :-)

His story and his letter caused a national outrage and next week he'll be in one of Flanders most popular talkshows on TV ("Goedele op dinsdag").

Now, what does this story have to do with me, you might ask? Thomas was present during the presentation of my book last week, and he claims in the interview that I've given him the courage to write the letter, because I told him never to give up. As an autistic boy, he's taken my words very literally. Personally, I doubt it if I have truly triggered him to take these initiatives. He's obviously a very courageous boy; courage which he already possessed long before he got to know me. Nevertheless he's asked the producers of the talkshow if I couldn't be present as well. So I also got an invitation and they're even willing to make an effort to pay for my flight (which doesn't come cheap at this short notice) and a hotel for the night.

Probably Thomas sees in me someone who truly understands his problem, and rightfully so. When he asked me during the presentation what I did against all the bullying at school, I felt very sad having to reply that I hadn't found the answer to that question yet. We, autistic people, have such a hard time understanding irony and mockery so we are the perfect victims. Our frustration for not being able to properly respond quickly turns into anger and sometimes even aggression. Which makes us even more perfect.

I sincerely hope that I can help him feel better and I'm absolutely convinced that he's destined for great things. He's already achieved more in one week than I in over forty years! Kudos, Thomas!!!

Rollercoaster

2011-05-22T13:17:00.002+02:00

Have you ever been on a rollercoaster? That's the feeling I'm having right now. Tuesday and Wednesday I was back in Flanders in order to meet the press regarding my book. They were two long and tiring days because the interest in my book turned out to be a lot bigger than expected. Journalists from two of the biggest Flemish newspapers were there ("De Morgen" and "Gazet Van Antwerpen"), and no less than five magazines, including "Knack" (a highly renowned one). I even got interviewed by a journalist from "Dag Allemaal", which is largely regarded as the sort of magazine nobody ever buys but which everyone has read at the dentist's. This sounds a bit disrespectful because after all it remains the biggest-selling Flemish magazine of them all and in the end I'm very happy that they came. Mostly because it has such a wide coverage and it is read by the "man and women in the street", not just an "elite" audience. I believe that it's mostly the "man and woman in the street" who'd like to know more about autism and for whom this article and my book may be enlightening.

On the downside, I was informed by my editor that the book sell hadn't been very good so far. Mostly because Flander's biggest chain of book shops ("Standaard Boekhandel") had refused to buy it. Apparently they're very reluctant to take in new authors and they concentrate on the ones who've already made a name for themselves. Pretty stupid, I would say, because when they're left with an unsold stock they can always force the editors to buy it back. But now that my editor (all credit to them!!!) has awoken a big interest from the press they've come 'round and started buying the book in limited quantities. Everytime someone asks me where they can find the book, I now promptly reply "Standaard Boekhandel". hehehe... :-)

In the mean time the two newspapers have already published their articles. 3/4 of a page in "De Morgen" and a whopping full page (!) in "Gazet Van Antwerpen". I just can't believe it. When I agreed to do the interviews I thought that it would be for a small review on the "new books" page. You know, together with 4 or 6 books on the same half a page. But no... a full page! The interviews also didn't really focus on the book as such but mostly focused on me being autistic and how I coped with "real life". With its ups and downs. And I can only say that I'm touched very deeply by the way that these journalists transcribed my words because they really caught very well what I was trying to say. I'm eternally grateful to them...

On Wednesday evening came the climax of these wonderful two days. A presentation of my book by noone else but Dirk Verhofstadt, the former prime minister's brother. Together with a mother of an autistic child and a representative of the "VVA" (Flemish Autism Society) we discussed the subject in front of a big audience and afterwards all of the books my editor had brought along were immediately sold out. They even had to put my personal copies up for sale and even that wasn't enough.

My whole life long I've tried to be in the centre of attention. As a stupid attempt to be "accepted" by the others and most probably as a strange sort of cry for help. Most of the time this brought me into a lot of trouble. Now, after forty-two years, when I finally realise that I should rather stay out of the centre of attention, this attention is coming to me all by itself. Life can be so ironic... Hopefully the rollercoaster won't crash in the end! :-)

We're grandparents!!! :-)

2011-05-14T11:25:00.000+02:00

I would have posted this sooner but Blogger has been unavailable for a while... :-( Anyway, as from this week our household has been extended somewhat. Our hens and cockerel are the proud parents of 5 little chickens!!! They're absolutely adorable, aren't they??? :-)

Unfortunately, two other eggs were about to hatch but the chicks inside weren't strong enough to break through apparently, and Christine and I were too late to lend them a hand. It's a pity... but nevertheless our grief is more than compensated by the joy of seeing these playful little creatures run about in the enclosed space under our henhouse. Rest assured that we'll take good care of them!!

A false note

2011-05-11T12:10:00.000+02:00

Here's a small example about how quickly I lose control and a situation can get out of hand. It's one of the small "details" through which others may perceive that something's "wrong" with me and which led to me becoming an outcast up to the point of being severly bullied for being "different".

Obviously I was terribly enthousiastic about the Star Camp. It all went so well and everyone was so kind... Also the reactions I received on the astronomy internet forum were so nice... And then it happened. One of the forum's moderators suddenly intervened and said that the thread on the Star Camp had only had the intention to talk about the "planning phase" of the event and that all comments about how it had gone were off-topic. Normally, forum members are requested to make their comments on the forum's management only through private messages. But I was so stunned by this intervention... I couldn't understand why someone wanted to "ruin" my topic while other, similar, topics were allowed to continue, that I lost control. Emotions started to rage throuh my head... my whole body started to shiver out of frustration and anger. So I openly questioned the intervention and argued that I had started the topic to talk about the event "in general" and that people were allowed to continue with their comments as far as I was concerned. My message was very polite, unlike some of the things I've already said and done in similar situations, but nevertheless it directly challenged the authority of the moderators. Afterwards the moderator acknowledged that his intervention had been a mistake but he warned that such public neglect of a moderator's intervention could not be tolerated, although he would turn a blind eye for now.

Do you know what this did to me? I haven't slept for two nights and yesterday morning I sat at the breakfast table weeping. It felt as if the whole world was against me. For two full days I couldn't think, couldn't almost do anything else, I was shattered. I sent very angry private messages to that moderator, style "I thought you were a friend", because I believed it all to be so terribly wrong. For such a stupid thing... When things calmed down a bit and I started clearing up the mess in my head, I sent another, very emotional message to that moderator and explained what's the matter with me. And if he hadn't been so many miles away he would have given me a good hug. :-)

These are those little things that makes being autistic so difficult. Everything has to be "just so" because otherwise my "perfect world" goes to pieces and I lose control. We, autistic people, need this "perfect world" so very much because the "normal" one makes us so terribly confused that we need something firm and stable in order to cling to. Take this stability away and we're gonners. How frustrating...

The Star Camp

2011-05-09T14:12:00.004+02:00

What another busy week this has been! But unlike before, this time I've brought it onto myself. Last year I had the intention to organise a sort of "Star Camp" for all of my Italian astronomy friends because I wanted to thank them for their support and invite them to our place for a sumptuous BBQ plus observing night under the dark skies of our field. Unfortunately, there were the Big Bad Wolf and Nasty Little Man because of whom we went months past the deadline for finishing our house and so the whole plan collapsed.

Not to worry, however! This year I wanted to do it all over again and so I re-launched the invitation on the Italian astronomy internet forum. It didn't take long before the reservations rolled in and even though the event remained at a small scale (on Friday evening we were with 7 people and Saturday 13), we all had a wonderful time. The BBQ worked out really well and we were fortunate to have two nights of clear skies in a row, even though at the beginning the air was poorly transparent due to humidity. But after midnight it all cleared up and observing became a real joy. There were lots of telescopes and binoculars and we all went round to take a peek in eachother's treasures.

I was totally knackered on Sunday, but very satisfied indeed. Most importantly because the guys and girls from the astronomy forum all turned out to be even more kind than how they appeared on the forum. And this is what makes me so proud to be a member of it. I believe that I have established a lot of true friendships for life with these people. They all brought us some local delicacies from their respective regions (3 had even driven all the way up from Rome!) which made the BBQ an all-Italian event. Even though I insisted on giving it a "Flemishg" touch of course by putting a pot filled with delicious double-malt Trappist ale in the middle of the BBQ in order to "steam" the meat with its perfume. Really... I love this country and its people. Well, most of its people anyway. :-)

And one last thing I insist on writing. The whole event wouldn't have been possible without Christine. The whole weekend she worked day and night, mostly invisible in the background, in order to spoil everyone with food, make up he beds, clean the house and do the dishes. I'm eternally grateful for everything she's done. Today she's having one of her terrible blows again. Exhausted to the point of collapse. But she doesn't mind because she believes it was all worth it. What a woman...

Here are a few pictures to illustrated the wonderful atmosphere of the Star Camp (3 of which courtesy to Monica):

Lift off

2011-04-30T19:18:00.002+02:00

It's about time that I tell you some more news about my book. I already informed you that it'll be out for sale by early May, which is actually within a week or so. My editor's publicity machine has been doing overtime lately and you can already find my book on all of the major book websites in Flanders and the Netherlands. But that is not all. Apparently there's a big interest from journalists and therefore my editor asked me to return to Flanders for a couple of days to do some interviews. 5 journalists have already confirmed so the 17-19th of May will be quite hectic for me. I don't know yet from which newspapers or magazines they are, but it's not unlikely that they are major ones. I'm beginning to fear that things are slowly beginning to run out of hand. The fact that the director general of my publishing company told me that she wants to take me out for dinner doesn't really help to take this feeling away either! There used to be a time when I was always trying to be at the centre of attention, merely because being autistic I didn't get any attention from the other children and also because I didn't know how I could claim my "normal share" of the common attention. Most of the time, however, this brought me into a lot of trouble because my ways of seeking attention were far from the generally accepted ones. It was (and still is) so very hard for me to figure out what is "generally accepted" anyway. So after more than 40 years and a serious breakdown I'm now more inclined to stay out of the floodlights. Oh holy coincidence... it's now that the attention is suddenly coming my way without me asking for it! How strange life can be, can't it?

And now I still have to tell you the best bit. My editor just sent me a review of my book by nobody else but Dirk Verhofstadt - yes, the former Belgian prime minister's brother. I'm not going to translate all of the review because it's simply too long. Let me just say that it was stunnigly positive! A few excerpts:

"... the author draws a profound image (of autism)..."

"... to create a coherent picture of what autism is, something in which the author masterfully succeeds."

and especially this one:

"Some of the pieces have been written exceptionally well and even remind me of "Kleine Dagen", the book which won Bernard Dewulf the Libris Prize 2010" (one of the most important literary prizes in the Flemish/Dutch language)

Mr. Verhofstadt is even organising a public presentation of my book, under the auspices of the Flemish Liberal Party. Taken aside the without any doubt political aspect of this presentation, it will most certainly be a wonderful promotion for the book itself. I will have to answer questions and then Marleen Verpoorten, the former Flemish minister of education will speak about her ideas to improve the integration of autistic children at school. Afterwards there will be a reception and book sale (with autographs?...).

Well I'll be... Phew...

Reconciliation?

2011-04-23T12:59:00.003+02:00

I've already elaborated a lot about the various courtcases Christine and I are involved in for the moment. It's a bit cynical because all we wanted when we moved to Italy was to lead a quiet and more secluded life and we didn't want any trouble with anyone. Alas, fate decided otherwise. Sometimes circumstances can force you to accept something you had preferred otherwise. In our case, the attempted rip-off by our ex-geometer and contractor. Last Thursday our sollicitor had organised a meeting at our house to bring all the parties round the table. It was something I didn't look forward to at all. There used to be a time when I could face a possible conflict situation with my head up high, as my former colleagues might remember. It was a very good front because in reality I can only run away from conflicts. These days the front is gone and running away is all that's left for me. Fortunately there are still Christine, our brilliant sollicitor and the expert she hired to assess the works carried out to our house and the damages that appeared afterwards. So I held myself together and watched the scene from the background. And it was a very nice scene indeed.

First our solicitor arrived together with Alberto, the expert, and we went through a couple of the details that were to be discussed. They agreed that for the works carried out so far we had already paid more than enough and that this would be the position they'd take against the others. Christine greeted them first while I was still creating some sort of order in the house. When I came out a couple of minutes later, Christine suddenly held a paper in front of my nose and asked: "is this my signature?" It obviously wasn't. It was like if a five-year old had written it... on the "Safety report for the building site". This is a document that should have been produced long before any of the works started and which we had never seen in our lives! "And this", Christine asked, "is this perhaps my signature?" No, again it obviously wasn't. "And this?" Again clearly not, although the last one was forged a lot better than the two previous ones. So apart from the building permit, Danilo had suddenly forged another three vital documents which he had "forgotten" to produce. Obviously responding to the request of our expert who hadn't found these vital documents in the files of the commune's administration. It was a very nice start of the event and things would only get better. Soon afterwards they arrived. Nasty Little Man Nezio leapt out of his truck and barged towards our terrace with his big belly high up in the air. His fat head resembled to a red balloon that was about to explode. He was after his money and his gestures didn't leave any room for doubt about that. Then we saw a rather unexpected little car drive up our entrance lane: a flashing yellow Fiat Panda. Not the sort of car you'd associate with a solicitor of the Danilo-clan, to let alone Big Bad Wolf Danilo in person. Then again, you may recall that in November 2009, when the works to our house had only just started, Danilo drove his brand new VW Golf off a cliff and was lucky to escape alive. Afterwards we heard about his drinking problem and when I saw him crawling out of the vehicle it was obvious that the serious overconsumption of alcohol had taken its toll. He was no longer the stylish and extravagant man we had got to know in the beginning and who had been able to completely fool us in this adventure. He had become an old man, his hair still long but thinning and very untidy. His overall looks were shabby and the wrinkles on his pale face had become deep, black grooves. The evil sparkle in his eyes had remained though and made us aware that he'd not be easy to deal with. This man was highly experienced in this sort of thing - he's probably been ripping people off since childhood - and he feels very secure because of the power he and his family enjoy in the area. Our two ex-solicitors, among which a very famous and respected one, had already wetted their pants, as a matter of speaking, when they heard about who we were up against. Danilo strolled calmly towards Nezio and us, sat down on one of the rocks bordering our terrace and grinned. He didn't say a word, but just sat there. Out of the same car stepped the family solicitor - Danilo's nephew. He was exactly the sort of solicitor you'd expect to defend a family of mobsters: slick, black suit and tie, unshaven, enormous black sunglasses (which he never cared to take off, even though there were more and more clouds in the sky) and a toothpaste smile. He presented himself and firmly shook our hands. The game was on...

Sabrina, our solicitor, was not impressed at all and decided to take the bull by the horns. She made a brief account of the problems and proposed that we'd rather come to an agreement because going to court wouldn't be good for anyone. She stressed that the works that Nezio started were still far from finished and the we had already paid him x Euros so far... "Period!"

- "Period? Whad do you mean... Period???", Nezio immediately intervened. Steam was blowing out of his ears and nose.

- "Yes, you heard. Period", Sabrina repeated. "Let's take the entrance lane, for example. You charged my clients a whopping €5.000 for turning it into a decent road. Look at it. Do you think that it looks decent?", she asked, pointing at something that rather looked like a tractor trail through a field.

- "It was decent when I left!", he shouted, "It's because of all the trucks and machines that came afterwards that the road is now in such a bad way!"

- "So, do you say that your concrete and materials arrived by aeroplane?", Christine wittingly asked. Nezio grunted furiously.

- "It is obvious that this road was not built properly", Sabrina went on, "and if necessary we'll have a court expert examine it. Would you agree to that?"

Nezio didn't say a word.

- "Right then, let's talk about the water problem", Sabrina said. Nezio shouted that he had carried out the drainage works correctly and that it was the fault of everyone who had continued after him that the drainage didn't work properly anymore.

- "They've damaged my tube!", he shouted.

- "Even if that's true, are you saying that they also raised the level at which you've laid the tube by half a metre?", Alberto intervened, "We've made a hole behind the house and found that tube of yours... only a foot deep, without protecting cloth, decent foundation or a sufficient layer of pebbles on top."

Nezio was about to burst. His head turned all purple. In rage he steamed to the back of our house, followed by Alberto. We couldn't hear anymore what they were saying but Nezio was shouting in the sort of frenzy of a madman. In the mean time Danilo and his sollicitor were standing a bit apart and were whispering to eachother. I couldn't understand what they were saying, but I did hear one sentence the solicitor said about Sabrina:

- "She's right, you know."

When everyone had calmed down again, Sabrina made her final offer to Nezio.

- "Or you agree that my clients have paid enough and we leave it at that, or we go to court. But be advised that if we go to court, an expert appointed by the court will investigate the works carried out with a miroscope. Every inch of concrete, every stone you laid... and will compare this to the figures in your calculation. You do understand this, don't you?"

- "Your clients agreed to the price proposed by my client", the other solicitor said.

- "You know very well that this was only an estimate", Sabrina replied, "and that these prices should always agree with those laid out by the Chamber of Commerce. It is the duty of the Director of Works (meaning: Danilo) to verify that these prices are in agreement with the legally established ones and to defend his clients against the contractor if they're not!"

Danilo didn't move an inch.

"So, Nezio, do you still want to go to court?", she repeated her question.

Nezio hesitated a second. His whole body trembled and he stared at the ground.

"Yes", he stuttered, "let's go to court then."

"Allright. It's your call. And remember that we'll then also have to send a convocation to the Director of Works because he didn't properly supervise the works, as is his task, and that he is also responsible for the damages."

Danilo was still sitting on that rock, behind Sabrina's back. He looked at her with his evil eyes and smiled in a very vile way when she said this. As if he accepted the invitation. "You go ahead... Let's see if you dare..."

Sabrina on the other hand only just got started. She then mentioned other damages, like not being able to open our B&B.

- "Thanks to you, my clients already suffered a year's delay for the opening of their B&B (the contract stipulated that Nezio had to be already finished by December 2009!). If you pursue this courtcase there will be a lot more delay involved and of course we'll ask the reimbursement of these damages!"

I hadn't thought of that, but a quick calculation told me that we'd be talking about tens of thousands of Euros in damages!

The meeting ended in a stalemate. Nezio would go to court and Danilo would hold on to his courtcase (which is due to have a first session next month). Although we're dead certain that their solicitor is getting more and more reluctant to take this road. Alberto showed him the damages to our house and they're pretty impressive indeed. At places the plastering is coming off and algae are beginning to show. Also parts of the floor in the corridor is covered in patches of chalk. Didn't Nezio say that water didn't get through the floor or something? And didn't we already mention the detrimental effect of water in the floor to the efficiency of our floor heating? The solicitor didn't say a lot anymore indeed. But we realise all too well that Nezio and Danilo are way too stubborn to give up their claims. Nezio because he's too stupid and Danilo because he's too confident. About this self-confidence, just to show you; when they left, Danilo had the bloody nerve to shake our solicitor's hand and to tell her "You've said that very well".
How about that???

So, there we are. In fact, we're almost hoping that they'd go to court because we are now confident that we're having a very strong case. Much stronger than we had ever imagined. We've found an excellent solicitor who'll do everything in her power to defend us. And a very good expert who easily overthrew all of Nezio's claims about a job well done.

To be continued...

A welcome guest

2011-04-22T10:58:00.001+02:00

For about a week or so, we've got a new guest. No, not in our house, but in our garden. It's... a nightingale! And he doesn't just sing in the evening or at night, oh no, even during broad daylight he bursts out in a wonderful song for Christine and I to enjoy. Or to repel his neighbour which we can hear a bit further in the woods. Yes, there are at least two of them around! Yesterday morning we heard him quite near and we went looking for him. And there he was... hopping about in the lower bushes whilst whisteling and squeeking as loudly as he could.

In the evening I tried to make a recording from our study. Unfortunately he was a bit further away so I had to filter and boost the recorded audio file a lot. So don't think that you can hear aeroplanes all of the time in the background... it's the unfortunate effect of having filtered as much of the noise away as I could. But in the end his voice sounds very clearly on the recording so you'll have an idea of what we can enjoy nearly all day and all night long! :-)

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/24841015/Nightingale281.mp3

The website is on-line!!!

2011-04-20T12:44:00.000+02:00

At last... I did it!!! The website for Christine's B&B is finished an on-line. Please feel free to visit it and I truly hope that you would pass the link on to as many people as you can... highly appreciated! (and comments would also be more than welcome of course...)

http://www.bb-lastella.it/

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Observatory is finished!

2011-04-18T15:22:00.000+02:00

I did it!!! My little observatory is finished and it fills me with a lot of pride. It's one of the few things that I started and also finished. I'm always so full of ideas but usually get bored halfway through and abandon the project. But the call of the stars must truly be so strong that it pulled me through the hardest bits. On the other hand, once I get started with something that I like, I don't feel any fatigue anymore and if it didn't get dark in the evening I could have continued working on my shed until I'd fall asleep on the ground, without eating or thinking about anything else. "Very few but incredibly strong passions", they say about people with autism and this must really be true because it's all me. Well, I hope you like the result and that one day I can show you the beauty of the heavens because most people have forgotten about that and only rarely look up anymore. Of course we have to blame streetlighting for that as well because there are hardly any places left where this beauty can still be admired in its true splendour. Streetlights... the most useless invention of man if you ask me because coontrary to what many people believe it makes the streets LESS safe for traffic or against burglars, while consuming billions of € on electricity every year. How about that for CO² emissions!You don't believe me? Here are a couple of pictures to prove it! Below is a picture of totally dark crossroads. See how easily you notice that a car is approaching from the right...

Or how easily you notice a pedestrian (wearing a reflective vest)...

Compare this to illumlinated crossroads. Do you still notice the car coming from the left that easily?

And what about burglars? Streetlights provide them with just enough light to do their business without having to use a torch, but also offer them enough shadow where they can hide. The following picture was our backdoor in Belgium, illuminated by a one of these bloody halogen streetlights... When a burglar needs to use a torch in total darkness, I don't know, but according to me he would stick out like a sore thumb, wouldn't you agree?

Anyway, enough about that. I know that I can go on and on about certain things up to the point that everyone finds me bloody irritable. So at last, here are the pictures of my new observatory... :-)

The Carù National Observatory - Progress Report

2011-04-11T13:01:00.004+02:00

The last couple of weeks have been blessed with excellent weather... 28°C in the shade... a golden sunshine... Ah, it's summer!!! :-D This meant that after my sister-in-law and her family had left I didn't have any excuse anymore to delay the construction of my little observatory-house.

First I made a structure of wooden girders. It was quite a daunting thing to do as there was quite a bit of wind at the time - unusual over here - and the top of the house is 3,5m above the ground. Moreover, I had to do it completely on my own. But I kept repeating to myself that "there's nothing a man can't do" and in the end I succeeded. And before I get any complaints from the ladies, yes... perhaps there are things a man can't do. But when you're 3m up a ladder, balancing against the gusts of wind and trying to hold these heavy girders whilst bolting them together, you need to say something like that to yourself in order not to wet your pants. :-D

Here the structure was nearly finished:

And then I started with the roof. The sky was still a bit threatening with rain the first couple of days and therefore I didn't want to take any risks with the wood I had just bought. With the roof finished I could safely store all of my stuff.

But in the end it only rained a couple of drops and the sky quicky cleared. I then started laying the brownish roofing tiles...

And here's the finished roof. I'm quite proud of it actually! :-)

At the time of writing all the walls are already finished and all I still have to do is putting the doors in place, but I haven't taken any pictures yet over the last two or three days so you'll still have to wait a bit to see the final result. I've also already painted everything with a second layer of a special, whitish wood protector (a first layer had already been done by the factory where I bought the wood), so I'm ok for the next 5 years or so. In the mean time, Christine has also already decided on the climbing rose she'll put against the little house. For the experts, it'll be a "Kifts Gate" rambler which is a really wild rose that'll cover the entire house in no time. That being said, Christine was full of admiration for my work and if she says that, it has to be true... :-)

The booking office is now open!

2011-04-09T18:17:00.000+02:00

Again, I'm so sorry that I'm not regularly updating this blog at the moment. Not only are we so busy with finishing or house, but on top of that my computer's crashed and I can't find my Vista DVD anywhere... (it must still be in one of the cardboard boxes from the move, but where???...) I currently have to revert to my laptop which doesn't contain all of the pictures but it's better than nothing. So, here we are... Christine's B&B is ready for you!!! :-) Please, let it be known to everyone who's looking for a break from the everyday rush. In the Italian mountains there's a lovely B&B where you can relax in the middle of nature and, of course, with an excellent service! :-D Unfortunately, the website isn't on-line yet (stupid pc... grunt...) but here are already two pictures to show you what we have on offer...

There's just one room, specifically targeted at couples or two friends who want to get away from it all and therefore you will enjoy our full attention and the house is all yours. BTW, in the latter case we provide two single beds... ;-)

I don't think I have to show you any more pictures of the view from our domain because this blog is already full of those. But ok, here's one more...

More cupcakes!!!

2011-03-30T16:58:00.001+02:00

And what were the girls up to when Patrick and i were doing our "macho" stuff, you might ask? Well, Christine taught them how to make cupcakes with a creamy heart and coloured sugar-icing on top including lots of figures also all hand-made out of sugar. You can tell they enjoyed it, can't you?...

Here's the result of a whole afternoon's work. I can assure you that they tasted deliciously, especially after the mountain hike Patrick and I had done... :-) Although it was kind of a pity having to eat them, wouldn't you agree?

The Pradarena Adventure revisited!

2011-03-22T12:43:00.025+01:00

Patrick, my brother-in-law, has a rather adventurous nature. And even though he thoroughly enjoyed staying at our house and just being in the middle of nature and its overwhelming silence, he was looking forward to a bit of a challenge after a couple of days. So I proposed that we'd drive all the way up the Pradarena pass and see how high we could get from thereon. The ladies were terribly busy doing "ladies' stuff" (of which I will report more later on) so there was nothing that could stop us. We jumped into his car and drove off, hungry for the ultimate thrill.

The road towards the pass was perfectly clear and the sun was shining as brightly as always so we didn't encounter any real problems getting up there. But the higher we got, the more we couldn't stop noticing the enormous pile of snow on either side of the road. Like white, concrete walls that became at times higher than the car itself. Perhaps they provided the ideal surface for a fanatic skier, but as we hadn't brought any skis with us, or not even a pair of snow shoes, the thrill suddenly appeared a bit bigger than we had anticipated. There, high above us, I saw the "Monte dell'Asino" ("the Donkey's mountain") where I had hoped we could climb onto, like I already did last September. But with this enormous pile of snow, this began to appear impossible. Anyway, we're two strong lads and not easily intimidated. We would at least give it our best shot!

Once we arrived on top of the pass, we saw a group of other adventurers like us. But at least, they had been smart enough to bring their snow shoes with them and they easily marched off into the woods that lead in the direction of the mountain top. We were just standing there with ordinary hiking shoes. Hmmm... let's give it a try anyway. We've driven all this way up here, it would be a pity not at least having tried.

Surprisingly, the snow was that thick that it supported us quite well. Every now and then we sank into it up to our knees, but on average we managed quite well to walk on it. There, in the far distance, two hundred metres higher than where we were standing, we could see the top. We just had to do it! The trees suddenly stopped and we were all alone from thereon, with just this big white carpet stretching out in front of and above us. It was heavy work because ploughing through the snow is still something else than just walking uphill. Then again, it wasn't too hard either because the snow provided us with solid steps to climb on. Halfway between the tree line and the top we arrived at the weird pile of stones (see previous Pradarena post) and we took a brief rest. Already there we felt like being the kings of the world and although the sky was a bit less transparent than last time I was here, the view was still spectacular. And you could hear... absolutely nothing. Not a bird, not the slightest breeze... absolute silence.

After five minutes or so we continued. We could see the top and we were going to make it. We just had to. Still fifty metres left to climb... forty... thirty... We rushed forward, powered by adrenaline and the promise of the ultimate sensation that lay ahead. So close you could almost grasp it. And finally... we got there. You can see how proud we were, can't you?

The amazing panorama immediately took our breath away. Click on the following link for a 360° view, from northeast to northeast...

https://dl-web.dropbox.com/get/Pradarena/Panorama%20%28small%29.jpg?w=b4e4a516

Unfortunately, the wind was freezing up there, so we didn't stand there for long. A pity we hadn't brought any big plastic bags or something to slide all the way downhill. We had already done this in our field and it was great fun. But this would have been one hell of a ride! :-) Anyway, we leapt and stumbled down through the snow as if we were still kids. Boys will be boys or something... Well, at least we felt pretty much alive. Yes, you only live once and that day we truly took everything out of it that we could.

One last picture before we would disappear into the trees again...

Mr. Apennines

2011-03-18T11:28:00.003+01:00

These days teaching English isn't going well for me anymore. It's rolling like a train! After the first school there soon followed a second one, where I now go to every Saturday morning to teach for four hours. And I've also already given two hours of "trial" lessons at a third school. The teacher there said she would also be very happy to have me to assist her, but I'm afraid that this school doesn't have the budget for this school year. Perhaps next year then? And two days ago I was contacted by school number four. This school (in the town of Ramiseto) in fact falls under the same management as the first secondary school where I now teach (in the town of Busana). It was the original intention that I would teach at both of these schools for a total of sixteen hours for the rest of the school year. But then I got the unfortunate message that the Ramiseto school had already found someone else in the mean time and so the sixteen hours were split between me and the other English mothertongue teacher. However, the real (Italian) English teacher of the Ramiseto school has now contacted me in a kind of panic. It seems that the English lady who signed up for the 8 hours there, suddenly doesn't want to come anymore and she begged me if I could take over in stead. Which I obviously gladly accepted. I found it a bit shocking that when you've not only given your word to a school, but when you've also signed a contract, a so-called "teacher" says after only one or two hours that she's not interested anymore. Not only is she letting the school down, but more importantly the kids who are so eager to learn because they realise all too well how important English has become. A real shame, that is, but on the other hand it's all the better for me.

The Italian teachers already told me how difficult it is to find an English mothertongue teacher because most of the English are either not interested or give up after a brief period. On the other hand I can understand this because teaching has to be in your blood. It's not without reason that so many teachers get a burn-out after ten or twenty years. It's very energy-consuming and at times it can be frustrating as well. But in the end, when you've managed to get something across and you feel the appreciation of the children (sometimes even with applause!), it's ever so rewarding. Yes, to my own surprise, teaching must truly be in my blood. Then again it's not so big a surprise because when I was a teenager I already taught Astronomy to younger children at the Urania observatory in Hove, near Antwerp. I really loved it back then, and today I love it just as much.

I also try to make my lessons a bit funny and to include as much interaction as possible. After all, the most difficult bit is to get the children to speak so I try to "force" them a bit. Either with the aid of games like "who am I", word riddles, bingo etc, or role plays. Lately I made a whole Powerpoint presentation about airports, from check-in to boarding and everything in between. At the end, I invited one student to be e.g. the check-in lady whereas another student had to play the passenger wanting to go to Chicago. In order to spice things up a bit, I joined the passenger queue, holding a big student's desk. I explained - and very nicely too - that I wanted to go to Chicago as well with my precious table. The check-in lady then had to try to explain that it was too big and too heavy and that I had to pay an overweight fine. Which was obviously a very unpleasant message for me so I insisted she'd call the manager. And so on... Or when we played the security screening, I suddenly became John Wayne with his gùùùn (trying to imitate a heavy cowboy's accent). And I just walked through the beeping security monitor without a care in the world. "Oh... this gùùùn? That's only for shooting pigeons. It's completely harmless..." :-)

Only the "crown jewel" is still missing on my list of schools and that is the higher secondary school of Castelnovo ne' Monti, where all the kids of the whole region go to as from the age of 15. I already had a chat with the (very friendly) Headmaster who was so sorry to inform me that she had already found someone for this school year. Indeed, just before Christmas the original teacher suddenly left for England (there you are...) but they had immediately contacted the local ministry of education in the city of Reggio Nell'Emilia and they had already found someone for them. Nevertheless the Headmaster kept repeating that I had done a very good thing by presenting myself and she definitely gave the impression that she was most interested. Perhaps for next year? A nice thing she told me was that she's a close friend of the Busana English teacher, who will undoubtedly tell her about my exploits and make some very good publicity. In the mean time I can also already present a very nice CV with references from three different schools and, of course, my TEFL licence. I WILL add that school to my list as well. It's only a question of time... hehehe... :-D

Our first visitors!

2011-03-13T15:15:00.009+01:00

Phew! What a couple of weeks these have been! My sister-in-law and her family, including two wild girls of 11 and 14, came to visit us and the B&B part of our house was still far from finished. Actually, it was still closer to "derilict" than to "habitable". Only a concrete floor, dust and dirt everywhere, no doors, no bathroom, scattered cardboard boxes and other stuff of which we didn't know where else to put it...

So when they announced they would like to visit us, we kind of went into overdrive. I need a bit of pressure in order to get going, but this was close to madness. In a matter of weeks we had to decide about which wooden floor to put on the first floor, whether we were going to use the same tiles for the guests as in our bathroom, which bed we would order for the guests, which doors we would choose, find nice second-hand wardrobes we could restore and to do all of the actual work. In the end, we didn't really make it. The doors couldn't be ready in time (in spite of big promises), the flooring company hadn't ordered enough wood and Dopey Dwarf, the magic plummer, had made a total cock-up of the guests' bathroom. Some of the plumming had been put too deep into the wall, making it extremely difficult to connect e.g. te tap for the sink. Or the two exits on which I had to connect the shower tap were too far apart by almost a quarter inch. In the end, we hired some help with placing the tiles because we couldn't manage ourselves anymore. By the previous Sunday, when our family arrived, Christine and I were both knackered. Exhausted to the point of collapse. Fortunately Cosetta, our Italian mum, lent us a hand with the enormous cleaning job. Christine had also had to finish the plasterwork on the stairs which had created a mess you wouldn't believe. Even Thomas was surprised about it! :-)

But in the end she's done a cracking good job. I'd dare challenge all professional plasterers to do it just as well.

When my sister-in-law and her family arrived and saw our guest room, they were speechless. Even though there still weren't any doors and the toilet still has to be glued to the floor. No, not bolted because otherwise we'd probably pierce through the floor heating tubes! ;-) So it would just be a question of sitting on it very carefully. Hehehe... I'll post some pictures of the result later. Let me just conclude that they had a wonderful holiday here in Italy and that we all throughly enjoyed the warm sunshine during the outdoor lunches...

And a last picture of the two sisters...

Courtcase number 3!!!

2011-03-01T10:34:00.002+01:00

We're going for the record!!! :-D 9 months in Italy and I'm already involved in 3 courtcases! I dare anyone to do better, hehehe!

It was to be expected that Nasty Little Nezio would go sulking and moaning with his sollicitor, not coincidentally Big bad Danilo's little nephew. This courtcase isn't cast in stone yet. For the moment his sollicitor has only sent us a very polite registered letter, asking us to pay our good friend Nezio 37.000€ plus 200€ for "sollicitor's intervention". Failure to do so within two weeks will result in further legal action. This figure is, of course, vastly exaggerated and is based on Nezio's calculation, totally neglecting the fact that Nezio can't count. If you subtract the things he counted twice or the works he had planned to do but hasn't carried out, the total is already down by a third.

Unfortunately for Nezio, I don't think he has already informed his sollicitor about the "slight" water problem we're having. It's only a minor detail, I know, but nevertheless I think that his sollicitor would like to know about it. So our sollicitor will take the burden off Nezio and inform him herself with a very kind reply letter. She will also include the expert's report that will soon be finished. The expert eventually found the drainage tube, just put in the ground like that without any cloth to keep the holes in the tube from being covered in dirt. The tube was also laid at a measured depth of... 30cm, whereas our foundations go down as much as 70-80cm. And this measurement was carried out somewhere half way. Since this tube is supposed to be laid in a slope, we can only guess what the depth at the beginning would be. According to the expert there is no doubt where the water in our walls originates from. The problem now is that since we had a wall constructed behind our house to stop the hill from crumbling down, there is no more room for a crane or bobcat to make excavations behind the house. Whoever is going to repair the damages will probably have to dig by hand. Through thick clay and rock.

But I haven't told you the best bit yet. A couple of days ago, we received a visit from the local stone cutter. He's a very friendly man but he had a very delicate message. He had already been asking our good friend Nezio about the money the latter owed him for the external window sills on our house (which had already been installed in autumn 2009). And do you know what Nezio told him?

- "They refuse to pay me so if you want your money you'll have to ask them!"

So that's why the poor stone cutter came to visit us. We explained that we indeed had paid Nezio. We've paid him about 3/4 of the total amount due and we've certainly paid him for the works carried out over a year ago. And then we've showed him our internal walls. The man's eyes opened so wide that his eyeballs almost popped out. He immediately understood what a nasty trick Nezio had played on him. He also showed us the total amount due. It was about 600€. This gave Christine a shock and when the man had gone, she immediately leapt upstairs to find her notes. In Nezio's estimate, he claims that the materials for the window sills, installation excluded, amounted to almost 1.150€! Nearly twice as much! We had already found a couple of serious discrepancies between Nezio's price for the materials and their real price. But this was obviously a rip off.

So, what are we going to do? We are going to the stone cutter and pay him his 600€. Not only will it make this man very happy, it'll also be another blow to Nezio because we can then subtract another 1.150€ from his bill. "Ah... of course, because we've already paid for the window sills! You asked the stone cutter to send his bill to us, didn't you?"

Oh... I'm really beginning to enjoy this! :-D

The Carù National Observatory

2011-02-27T12:08:00.008+01:00

Hahahahaaa... Spring is in the air, the sun is shining brightly, the birds are singing... My whole body is awakening and above all, the part that wants to... construct something! And let us hope, without cutting in my hands this time... So, what could I make? A whopping 25" telescope? Ai... Christine throws the frying pan at my head and only misses me by a hair. OK, I cancel the telescope... for now... But what else could I do then? I've already finished the henhouse. The porch next to our house perhaps? Forbidden because Christine says that needs to be done "professionally", and she's probably right. What could I do... what could I do... my hands are itching...
- "Hey! Where are you going to?", Christine shouts at me.
- "I'm going to construct an observatory!"
- "But... an observatory??? And where exactly???"
- "Right there!", I say with a lot of pride in my voice, pointing at the top of the crest in our field.
- "There???", she responds in horror, "Straight in the middle of the view from our terrace??? No, it can't be true!"
- "But where do I have to make it then?"
- "A lot further away from our house! A lot!"
There's nothing more to do. Whatever Christine says is law. I walk about twenty yards further into the field.
- "Here?"
- "No! Still way too close!"
- "But... if I go even further, I'll be in that wood over there!"
- "That's fine with me!"
At this point there is a slight argument which I won't mention here because it is not intended for the faint-hearted. And because we're still "Belgians" (for the moment still), we make a compromise that is no good for noone but which assures a kind of armed peace. I can construct my observatory where I'm standing, and she can put a large tree in front of our house. You can imagine that I have always violently resisted this tree when I still wanted to observe the heavens from in front of our house. But since I can soon look at the stars from my observatory in the field, this tree doesn't matter at all to me anymore.
- "And you can put a nice climbing rose against my observatory. That way it'll not disturb the view as much."
Ah... I'm so brilliant, aren't I? I know exactly how to move my dear wife in the right direction.
- "OK... allright...", she says with a bit of doubt, "but first I want to know how much it will cost."
So, I start making a plan so I can give her an estimate:

On this page you can see the front of the observatory/shed, with a big double door 1,6m wide and 2,3m high. Big enough for my future 25" Obsession telescope. But Christine doesn't know that yet... :-)

In order to lower the cost even further, I've already begun to make a foundation which will cost us nothing at all. After the restoration of our house there was still some cement and sand left and in our field there was an entire pile of old terracotta tiles which we can't use anymore in the house itself. But they'll make an excellent observing terrace. I would have preferred to make it in wood, like teak or bankirai, because wood doen't absorb the heat as much and will create less turbulences inside the telescope. But this owuld cost us a fortune and above all, I'm having serious doubts about the origin of tropical wood.
So I started putting a layer or two of tiles to stabilise the ground a bit:

Then, I made the final layer on a dry mixture of sand and cement:

This is where I am at the moment:

Oh... I just can't wait to put my telescope there... :-)

Next week I hope to be able to get started on the shed itself but it's going to be bad weather for the next couple of days. Soooo frustrating...

We've won the first battle of the war!

2011-02-14T10:00:00.003+01:00

"When will I get my money?"

It's last Thursday evening. Christine and I were enjoying a DVD, when all of a sudden Christine's mobile bleeped, indicating that she had received an SMS. Oh dear, Nasty Little Nezio was after his money again. Hadn't he warned us that if he hadn't been paid by the end of December, he'd take "further steps"? Well, if "further steps" means sending us an angry SMS every once and a while... that's ok with us. :-D We're actually beginning to find it amusing. At first Christine thought it wise not to respond. But then she changed her mind and wrote:

"When you'll finally reply to our sollicitor's letter."

By doing so, she thought she could kill two birds with a single stone. One, to shut him up for good, and two, to have him put something on paper we could use against him. Ah... isn't she a genius?

"So... is this how you want to play it? I thought that Danilo and I had come to visit you in order to work something out!", he still replied.

But we left it at that. The DVD was far too exciting and his text message was only a bad joke. It hardly brought a grin to our face. "Work something out"... huh! Did he really mean that? He's even more daft than we imagined. And that was already very high on the fruitcake-scale! Besides, our funny friend Nezio still hasn't got a clue about what else we have in store for him. Our sollicitor had already contacted an expert to come to our house and have a look at the damages. About time too because the water problem is getting worse. The man was shocked by what he saw and didn't leave a shred of doubt that it is caused by bad or non-existent drainage.

"I'll come back within a couple of days with my wife, who also is a geometer, to take some pictures", he said and advised us: "Don't pay a single penny to anyone for now!"

Something which we weren't going to do anyway, so we liked his advice very much. He also asked us to make a hole behind the house so he and his wife could see actually how deep this so-called drainage was laid. I was about half a metre down when I found this:

You can see that I arrived at the gravel with which the "drainage" is covered. And with the gravel I found something which can rightly be called an underground lake. The more I removed the gravel by hand, the more standing water I found. Obviously this is the ground water level and when this level rises during moist days, it enters our foundations. When we've had a dry period such as the past two weeks, the level drops and our internal walls dry up again. Obviously, the "drainage" doesn't work at all! We have this Nasty Little... and Big Bad Danilo by the $ù=#(µ!!! The way things are looking now, it seems to become more likely that Danilo and co will have to pay us a lot more in damages than what they are still claiming from us.

When our sollicitor came to visit us with the expert, she even had more good news for us. The Rovigo judge has concurred with our argument that he isn't competent in this case and that it should be transferred to the court at the buyer's residence. He'll make his final verdict on... THE 12th OF DECEMBER!!! Well, err... if you must... :-D It's that 80-year old animal-mistreating bitch that's after her money, not us. We can wait... and wait... and wait... And so can little Flora! :-D

Back to school

2011-02-11T09:56:00.002+01:00

This must be the first of September, the day that in Belgium the schools reopen after the summer holidays. The sun is shining brightly in the deep blue sky, but it's a bit chillier so this must be autumn indeed. I put my school books in my bag, together with a new pen and a new notebook, give Christine a last hug, and off I go. Back to school...

I arrive at ten 'o clock, perfectly on time (yes, today there are special hours...) and one of the assistents immediately directs me to my new class, being the third grade of the "scuola media". That's a bit disappointing because I had hoped to still have a bit of time to adjust myself to my new life at school, but unfortunately I wasn't granted any respite. I was pushed into the lion's den right away. The worst thing of it all was that this time I wouldn't have to sit in class, where I could blend very well into the background. No, this time I'd have to stand in front of it! And from personal experience I know very well what a handful 14 year-old kids can be. Then again, they say that poachers make the best game keepers so if that were true I should be more than allright. :-D Mara was already standing there too and she immediately pointed at the centre of the stage, meaning that I should do the main act this morning. That's what I was already afraid of, but I didn't have any choice. Twenty pairs of eyes were staring at me with big interest (perhaps the kind of interest cats display when they're looking at little birds?). I took a big sigh...

- "Goodmorning! I'm Peter!"

- "Goodmorning Peter!", all the kids shouted back at me most enthusiastically. Hmmm... that already went well, didn't it?...

I briefly introduced myself and then asked all of the children to introduce themselves too. I added some extra questions like "Have yo got any brothers or sisters?" or "What are your hobbies?" so that nobody would get away as easily as to just state their name. Then the tables were turned and the students were allowed to ask me as many questions as they liked. To my surprise I was quickly getting the hang of things and it felt again like more than twenty years ago when I was teaching Astronomy to children of about the same age. I truly enjoyed standing there in front of the class. Perhaps it was partly because of my urge for attention, something my disability often provokes and usually to my detriment. But mostly I felt glad that I could do something for those children. To help them and possibly even to give them a brighter future because obviously a decent knowledge of English will become ever more important. It's such a rewarding experience... Perhaps I also have to admit that due to my disability, deep inside, I have always remained a bit of a child, which in this case would be an advantage. It makes it easier to relate to the children, and vice versa. Yes, I truly felt that they considered me as "one of their own" in stead of "one of the teachers". The hour flew past and in the end the children all stood up and gave me a warm applause. I humbly bowed at such a token of appreciation. I felt deeply moved...

In this class there were a couple of children who were a bit behind of the rest. Some of them because they're a bit slower and need an extra bit of attention; but one had only just arrived from Macedonia and one even from Brazil. The Brazilian boy came to Mara and me in order to ask if I wouldn't give him a couple of private lessons because he was so eager to learn. I discussed this with him, Mara and another teacher who's responsible for looking after the kids who need the extra attention and I said that if there would be four or five children interested that I could do this for only a few Euros per lesson each. To me it doesn't matter if I have to spend the hour in front of two or five children, and five still isn't too much so that not everyone would get the personal attention required. All we still need to look into is a venue because Busana is more than a half an hour's drive. Perhaps if we could find something half-way we could go ahead with the idea.

Mara and I were about to say goodbye when I looked into the classroom of the second grade. All of the children were looking at me through the open door and making gestures like thumbs up and funny waves. I asked Mara if she didn't want me to briefly say "hello" to those children as well. And she immediately replied that it would be a wonderful idea. So there I went again. I immediately noticed that the class of the second grade was a lot more "lively" than the third, where most students were a bit shy. Not in this class! There were three or four real rascals here, but the "nice" kind though. :-)

- "If you could already introduce yourself", Mara suddenly told me, "then I can pop out for five minutes or so because I have to do something urgent."

- "Huh???"

There I was... all alone at the mercy of these children. After five minutes she indeed returned, briefly, just to see that I was doing allright and then leaving me alone for the rest of the hour! Well, there was absolutely nothing to be worried about. I introduced myself and they did the same. Then they started asking me questions. Lots of questions. Whether I liked "womans". I corrected the smartass and wrote "women" on the blackboard, stressing its correct pronunciation. I asked the entire class to repeat and they happily did. "Women" rolled like a thunder throughout the school building! I replied that I liked one "woman" in particular and again they enthusiastically repeated me. Then I threw the ball back at the smartass and asked him whether he liked women.

- "Yes!", he said, "Pamela Anderson!" :-D

- "But... she's old!", I replied, "she's even older than I am!" And then I mimed what happens when you've had a facelift and you're having trouble laughing. The kids thought it was hilarious. Obviously I wasn't going to demonstrate what else dear Pamela had already had lifted... :-D

Throughout the question session I also got to explain the expression "used to". Which turned out to be most helpful during the rest of the class because when someone asked me whether I liked Michael Jackson, I could explain that he used to be a singer. But not anymore. Because he's... dead (making cut-throat gesture). Obviously none of the kids were going to admit that they ever used to play with dolls or teddybears, although one of them was ready to admit that he used to play with Lego stones. "But not now!!!", he immediately added, "I'm playing with a Playstation now!" Well, they thought it was funny to hear me confess that I used to play with Lego as well...

Again the hour was over when I though it had only just started. The kids applauded even louder, if at all possible, than those of the third grade and they were begging me to stay. Mara came in and explained that this would not be possible. She had asked the head master for a few hours for the second class also, but the budget wouldn't allow it. After all, it's only a small school. I proposed that I would do the second class for free then. After all, what's most important for me is to give something back to the community, for as much as I can. This experience was so rewarding that I truly wouldn't mind doing it for free. And if I could do it on the same day as my lessons for the third grade, so much the better. Mara promised she'd take my offer back to the head master and let me know. Although she added that it may create a legal problem because normally, as a "third person", there are strict conditions before someone can stand in front of a class. But about twenty minutes later she already called me to say that the head master had agreed and that he wanted to thank me for my generosity. Well... How about that?... Again, I felt so deeply moved.

So that's it. I'm going to be an assistant English teacher at the Busana school and next year my hours will probably be doubled. But that's not all. In the evening I got a call from Cosetta's aunt, who used to be an English teacher but who's now slowly retiring. Whether I wouldn't be interested to take a similar position in a school in Casina. Of course I would! Five minutes later the head master of the Casina school called me to offer me a twenty hour contract! The nice thing is that it would be four hours for five saturdays in a row, saving me a lot of driving over and back. Tomorrow I'll be going to Casina to meet the head master and to discuss the details.

Slowly things are moving, aren't they? Oh... I'm so happy... :-)

Teaching English - Part 2

2011-02-07T11:12:00.009+01:00

You'll remember that half-December I received a phonecall from an English teacher of a local secondary school, offering me a part-time job? Well, from thereon I hadn't heard a peep anymore. Slowly I began to wonder whether it had all been merely a dream and I was getting a bit disappointed. I had been looking forward to this opportunity so much... Anyway, I wasn't going to give up that easily and last week I drove to that school in person in order to find out if the offer was real and if it was still standing.

The school is situated in the lovely little town of Busana. In direct it's only a couple of miles from our house. But unfortunately there isn't any direct road and in all it took me over half an hour in order to get there. That's because I have to cross the Secchia valley and there are only two bridges nearby, both of which take me to a totally different direction. But the sun was shining brilliantly again (actually, today we've got 25° in the sun!) and the road is just stunningly beautiful. When you're used to the nice, straight roads of the Flemish countryside, these winding mountain trails may come as a little shock. At first they seem tedious and nerve-wrecking. But as soon as you discover the beauty of the landscape you're cruising through, it becomes a totally different story and half an hour seems to go by in a whizz. The school is a reasonably modern building in red brick and all seemed perfectly quiet. I parked the car and walked to the entrance, where a man kindly greeted me. I explained who I was and asked if the job offer was still standing. The man turned out to be the head master and he told me that only Mara, the English teacher who had phoned me, would be able to tell me. He confirmed that there was indeed a project going on where they would ask a native English speaker to assist in class for a 16-hour contract, divided between this school and their subsidiary in Ramiseto. He gave me Mara's phone number and urged me to give her a call the following day, as she wasn't present at school at the time.

And so I did. Mara turned out to be the same enthusiastic person I spoke to over a month ago and I stressed how much I would love to take the job. But... there had been an unfortunate coincidence. Her Ramiseto colleague had already offered the job to another English speaker, without having informed her. But on the bright side, she would try to divide the offer between the two, so I'd get 8 hours in Busana and the other person 8 hours in Ramiseto. It only seemed fair that way. She also asked me to drop by at her house to discuss the matter in greater detail.

When I arrived, Mara was already waving at me from the door. She greeted me like if I was a king and kindly invited me in. She asked me about my past and about our decision to come and live in Italy. From her side, she told me that she had graduated from University twenty years ago and confessed that her English had suffered a lot since then because she hadn't had any serious conversations in this language anymore. As a student she still regularly visited London. But after that she had always remained in Italy. She also confessed that with the children in class you could still easily get away with an error but she realised that this was not the proper thing to do. I was very impressed about that because at least she admitted that she had a problem and was prepared to do something about it. Much unlike the teacher of the boy I'm still giving private courses to who insists that you have to pronounce "key" as "kay" and when asked "How are you?" you should just reply "Fine" and that "I'm fine, thank you" is actually wrong! Mara also told me that since my visit to the school the teachers are constantly talking about me and they would be so happy if I were to take the job! :-) So the first impression I made must have been quite positive. I also explained some of the ideas I had about teaching the children, with the aid of games such as trivia, "who am I?", snakes and ladders, role-playing games etc. and Mara was thrilled about this idea. In the end, she asked if I wouldn't be interested in giving a small refresher course to her and anoter colleague of her, which I gladly accepted.

So now the contract is signed. I officially have a job! :-) Oh... there was just one minor misunderstanding... It's not 8 hours a week. It's 8 hours for the rest of the school year, so only one hour a week from the beginning of March onwards. But that's allright. It's a start, isn't it? And most probably I'll get the Ramiseto class as from the next school year as well.

Mara urged me to go and talk to other schools as well, which I did. I already went to Carpineti's secondary school and also there I received a very warm welcome. Especially when I heard the primary school children practise the English alphabet out loud and commented to one of the secretaries how good they were at it. The secretary immediately went upstairs to the children and came back down with a little, black girl by her hand. The girl was obviously shy and held a big plastic bag full of sweets firmly against her chest. Oh... she was so adorable, with her hair tied in all these little tails. I asked her how she was (in English) and she replied with a frail voice: "I'm fine, thank you". Then I asked her about her name and she said, so faintly I could hardly hear it, that her name was Deborah. Then, she offered me the bag. I said (in total amazement) "Oh... is this for me???". She nodded. So when at the same moment the head master asked me to step into her office for a chat, I was still holding the entire bag of sweets. That should've gone down well as a first impression also. :-D In the end, I returned the bag because I wouldn't want to rob these little children of their sweets of course.

One thing's for sure: I'm definitely going to find my way in my new home country. Not that I intend to work full-time again because I've learnt the hard way that this will be impossible for me. But I'm still going to contribute to society as much as I can.

The Italian judicial system

2011-02-01T14:52:00.013+01:00

Yesterday was a very big day for us, and more specifically for our little Flora. We were summoned to go all the way to Rovigo, a two and a half hours' drive, because the judge wanted to see me in person. You may recall that the malignant cow who sold us little Flora was a bit upset about me asking (and receiving) my money back through VISA because to me (and also to VISA) it was a clear case of internet fraud. The most important victim of which was a poor little kitten, almost starved to death and with a severe infection on her lungs, nose and eyes. "Well, if half of the truckload of kittens coming from Hungary dies, that's just too bad. As long as enough survive which I can sell for an exuberant price via our fraudulent websites". Yes, you read it right. In the mean time I've discovered no less than four different websites, possibly more, all from the same vendor and all showing the same, heartbreaking pictures and clips of the most adorable pups and kittens. I've decided to name and shame them after all, hoping that this message will spread and that this horrific animal trade will be rooted out. Idle hope, I know, but doing nothing would be even worse, wouldn't it?

http://www.vendita-cuccioli.com/

http://www.venditacaniegatti.com/

http://www.venditacuccioli.com/

http://www.vendita-cuccioli-caniegatti.com/ (now all of a sudden closed)

So as I was saying, Christine and I drove all the way down there, to arrive at the local courthouse. "Courthouse" is in fact a bit exaggerated because it was just the first floor in what rather looked like an appartment building. The only things that betrayed its true nature were the Italian and European flags which were proudly decorating the façade. By the front door we saw Floriano, one of our two sollicitors, making a call on his mobile. We had been a bit surprised that both of them would be present here because also for them it was a long drive. Well, as long as the other party will be paying the bill... :-D Sabrina, our other sollicitor, warmly greeted us when we arrived on the first floor and explained that it was better that they'd also appear in person, rather than to hire a local sollicitor for this session. The judge had after all summoned both parties "in person". Then again, we were in for a little shock. The corridor on the first floor was absolutely packed. Sabrina told us that our case was number 66 in line, whereas they had only just begun case number 34! We had anticipated on a little wait, even though the invitation had carried a specific time. But the way things were going, we would be standing here until nightfall. Oh bother... Sabrina tried to console us by telling that this is mostly what a sollicitor's life in Italy is all about: waiting. By a strange coincidence, the police had chosen the very same morning to present all of the pending fines to the judge. In Italy there's no such thing as a "police judge"; a person who only deals with traffic fines and incidents. All traffic cases are presented to a common civil judge, who in this case happened to be ours. And it goes without saying that all of these fines took presedence over our case. Grumble... The only wicked sort of amusement we got was staring at the faces of the people coming out of the judge's office. Most of them looked as if they'd just done the latrine's job in a major pig stable. Their noses pulled up high and their mouths closed so hard that their lips went all white.

We had been ordered to be there at 11:40, but by 01:00 we were still standing there, together with a whole bunch of other people who still had to present their civil case. The judge, obvioulsy concerned about his lunchbreak, then ordered all the remaining people in at once. It didn't look very good but Sabrina and Floriano assured us that they would press the judge to still hear our case. After all, we had come all the way down here on his orders. Alhough Sabrina wondered how the judge could still be all ears to our story if he had just had a hell of a morning with about 70 traffic cases to do.

The judge's office was, well, like a normal office. It certainly wasn't the sort of court hall that one could expect. Needless to say that when all of the remaining people were in, there was hardly any room left to breathe. The judge put the files of all of the remaining civil cases on a big pile on his desk and started to call all of them, in order to see who was still there. About half of them turned out to have already gone out for lunch! The remaining half were then divided between urgent and not so urgent. Meaning, to be postponed until March or some even until September! "My agenda is totally full", he apologised. Well, if it had to be September also for our case, personally I wouldn't mind. It's that wicked bitch who wanted her money, not me. Although we're still hoping to have all of the veterinary expenses refunded of course.

With those non-urgent cases out of the way, he still had half an hour to deal with all of the rest. "I'll continue until half past and that's it", he said.

So all of us had to go out again and wait for our turn. In the mean time Sabrina had already pointed out the vendor's sollicitor to us. A nasty old, little man; exactly the sort of person who'd make the kinds of remarks that we found in his reply to our defence. But there was another interesting detail: the vendor herself hadn't shown up, even though also she had been summoned. This normally shouldn't go down too well with the judge. I had been looking around to all of the women I saw, wondering who it would be. She certainly wouldn't be very young because setting up the whole animal trade business would take a certain amount of time. And it had to be a person without a heart. I can't imagine any other person doing the things she does for a living without the slightest sense of remorse. In the end I asked Sabrina if she could find the lady's age in the file. And indeed she could. Apparently, the vendor was born in... 1931!!! That bitch was eighty years old!!! Sabrina grinned that she'd probably provided her sollicitor with a medical note so she wouldn't have to appear. I said that perhaps they'd have to wheel her in on a wheelchair. Christine on the other hand wondered how such an old lady could still be running such a big business. Obviously she'd still be in charge on paper but leave the running itself to someone younger, like the nasty man who had delivered our Flora. In any case, even if she'd only be responsible on paper, that's exactly what she is and she'll have to bleed for what she did (and is still doing to other unfortunate animals).

Finally, at 13:25, it was our turn. We all went in apart from Christine. The case was started against me personally so she wasn't allowed to take any part. The judge began by saying that this was a "compromise" meeting. Sabrina immediatly intervened that if this were so, we hadn't been informed about any possible "compromise" by the other party. The judge said that in that case he'd propose fifty-fifty, which neither I nor the nasty sollicitor could accept.

- "If that cat were really half-dead as you claim, then why didn't you inform my client about it?", he said in a very arrogant way.

- "As a matter of fact I did", I replied, "I've tried to contact her for days on end!"

- "That's a lie", he said.

- "No it is not!", I replied and Sabrina added that we have copies of the e-mails to prove it.

The nasty sollicitor went on and started speaking to the judge.

- "That man", pointing at me, "just wanted to buy a cat from my client without paying 5 bloody Lire for it! If he's truly so unhappy, then he should give the cat back."

I was perplexed. How low can anyone go? As if Flora is just a stupid cupboard! A heartless stone which you can chuck away if you grow tired of it! This was indeed the "compromise" he proposed.

- "And what about all the medical expenses then?", Sabrina also mentioned. The other sollicitor didn't care to reply. Sabrina took the conversation back to the heart of the matter we wanted to discuss here. The European consumer's law stipulates that, unless otherwise agreed, any dispute following a purchase should be treated by the court at the buyer's residence.

- "Can you believe that?", the nasty sollicitor intervened, laughing and looking at the judge, "They'd want this case to be treated in Belgium!" He shook his head in mockery.

- "Or in Castelnovo ne' Monti", Sabrina went on without paying any attention to that prat, "the court where our client now resides."

The judge, clearly tired and unmotivated, said that he wouldn't take any decision now and that he'd let us know. He typed the names of the people present in his computer and added a note about our sollicitor's claim about the transfer of competence to either Belgium or Castelnovo. He would let us know as soon as possible. And we were sent out again.

Now we'll have to wait once more. Probably for months, but I don't care. Sabrina said that technically the judge wouldn't have any other choice than to declare himself "incompetent" in this matter and to pass the case on to Castelnovo. This would already be a big blow to the vendor. Sabrina added that she'd then have a word with the Castelnovo judge, apparently a good lady with a heart for animals, and that she'd have high hopes. Although she warned us that the Rovigo judge might still decide to keep the case at his court and that he may summon me again. Perhaps - if he's really stupid - to treat the entire case and at the end declare that he's incompetent after all so the whole thing will have to be done over again by another court. It's like looking at teabags for the moment.

But in any case, I'm not afraid. And above all, NOONE will ever take our Flora away from us. Even if we have to send her temporarily to Flanders or whatever. She's OUR little baby now and we'll never allow anyone to take her away. We love her with all of our hearts and she loves us back at least just as much. Every evening while we're in front of the telly she comes jumping on our laps, rolling about and thoroughly enjoying our caresses and the brushing of her tummy with a special cat brush. Oh yes, she definitely loves her daily beauty treatment! :-) And isn't she a beauty indeed?

Busy busy busy...

2011-01-27T10:15:00.009+01:00

Oh... I'm so sorry that I neglected my blog for a while. The thing is that Christine and I are so busy for the time being. Much of this has to do with the strict deadline that Christine set for the opening of her B&B. She wants to be completely ready by April and there are still so many things to be done. Moreover, we'll receive her sister's family for a break early March, so already by then most of the work should already be finished. It's going to be tight!

To make things even more hectic, Christine and I've started to grow our own ideas about what "being ready" implies. When we were having such fine weather last week, I felt I had to start building my own observatory. Yes, you read it correctly. With all of the original floortiles of our house, which have been laying about in our field for more than a year now, I've started making a foundation of 4 by 7 metres. This should be big enough for a shed in which to store my precious telescope, king-size binoculars and other astronomy stuff, plus allow for a sizeable terrace, or rather, observatory platform. But more about that later.

Christine on the other hand, thought it would be absolutely necessary to make a special box in which our hens would be able to lay their eggs in comfort. I already finished the henhouse in September (see picture below) but according to Christine chickens prefer a more "confined" space to brood...

So she made a covered box out of scrap wood. Yes, Christine admitted that it does look a bit "antique" as she put it, but the hens definitely seemed to love it, as you can see...

In fact, from thereon they always lay their little eggs in the box! :-)

Christine was also preoccupied with our kitchen. For the moment we only had the "structure" of the cupboards made because we don't have any money for proper doors. Christine thought that as a temporary solution she could make a couple of curtains instead. But now that she's finished them, we are inclined to make that "temporary" solution a lot more permanent. What do you think?...

Please don't mind the drawer on the left because I still have to finish a front for that...

Now as I was saying, the weather last week was pretty much like an early summer. But two days later we had... HALF A METRE of snow!!! It's just amazing! In two days time from over 20° (in the sun) to 0°! Which meant that I had to abandon my observatory project temporarily. Which also led Christine to remind me of something much more "important" (what does she know... :-) ) I still had to do: making the website of her B&B. I already showed you a couple of trials I had made some time ago, none of them really satisfactory. So I started over from scratch and this time Christine is extremely pleased with my work. She absolutely wanted a flying bird on it, so she got a flying bird - which I didn't copy from the web but honestly created myself. The attached AVI file is giving you a glimpse of the title page, without the buttons or pictures. Its quality isn't near as good as the original Flash file (which "Blogger" refused to accept) but I hope you like it.

Who says we'll be cold???

2011-01-16T11:22:00.004+01:00

"You'll always be cold in that house! You just wait and see! You'll never be able to heat it up properly!", a certain idiot once told us. Not coincidentally the same idiot who was responsible back then for making the house habitable and who had assured us at the time of purchase that we had found "a rare jewel" which would become a real "dreamhome".

So when winter came, we were anxiously waiting for the cold to kick in, carefully wrapped up under a pile of blankets. But one after the other we had to throw these blankets away because it felt we were living in a sauna, rather than an igloo. The materials we used during the restoration obviously had something to do with that, as did the state-of-the-art floor heating system. But since this week, we won't have to burn any expensive propane anymore either. Yes... Dopey Dwarf returned! Since he received his money last month, he's one and all flattering and kindness! How's that for a change?

After two days' work, our brand new wood stove is connected to the central heating and hot water system, which means that we are now virtually independent! With the enormous supply of wood that we've collected from our grounds, we are good for at least a couple of years to come. The chimney still has to be finished with plasterboard, but what do you think of our stove? :-)

What do you think we did this morning???

2011-01-14T10:43:00.006+01:00

We've had... (NO, YOU PERVERTS, NOT THAT! :-D )... breakfast outdoors! This morning when we stuck our sleepy heads outside, we thought that we were still dreaming because it felt like early summer. Yes, you read it correctly, summer and not spring. So we had our first breakfast on our terrace of 2011! With locally made ham, and delicious honey and marmelade from one of our friends.

What do you think of that? I even had to take off my sweater because it was too warm! Christine immediately took her mobile and rang Cosetta, asking her the same question about what we were doing. When she heard, she almost went ape! She's spending the winters in the valley, just like most Italians, and only comes up here in the mountains when she opens her B&B in April. But down there it is cold and there's an unpleasant, thick fog! Unbelievable, isn't it? Well, she was very happy for us anyway.

Also Christine couldn't resist making a photographic composition...

The meeting with our sollicitor

2011-01-09T17:00:00.007+01:00

Since things are going so well with us lately, one would almost forget that we're still involved in two courtcases. Last week we met with our (very good!) sollicitor in order to find out how things are going on the legal front.

As far as the case is concerned that the seller of our little Flora started against us, a first hearing was held last month at the court near the vendor's residence. The judge heard the two sides of the story and scheduled a second hearing, where we should be present as well, on the 31st of January. In the mean time we've received the response from the vendor's sollicitor to our defence. It's in one word: shameful. Our sollicitor said that this guy really doesn't show any respect and that is obvious when you read his letter. He says i.a. that I "only wanted to make a good impression on my wife, if that is really what she is, giving her a kitten without having to pay a single € for it" and "if the kitten truly was not the one I wanted and if it really was in such a bad way, why did we keep it?" I'm not sure about you but this is so respectless. Well, I suppose that's just what certain sollicitors do. I won't lose a night's sleep over it.

But now comes the good part. The vendor made the big mistake of not removing my e-mail address from her contacts. That's why I received a rather stunning e-mail from her, addressed to all of her clients, the day after this hearing. It said that the website will be closed with immediate effect and that she had opened a new one, under a different name, where the esteemed clients would receive an even better service and blablabla. I checked and it's true. The day after the hearing the website shut down, without even leaving a link to the new one (where she also upped the prices BTW)! If that isn't a sign that she's getting the impression that things are going pear-shaped for her... :-D Oh... I'm not going to mention the new website here. It's not worthy of your click.

And then there is the case the Big Bad Wolf started. The first hearing for this one was scheduled last Friday, also probably just to hear the two sides of the story and to determine a date for further proceedings. Two noteworthy items to mention, though:

1. The Big Bad Wolf is all of a sudden willing to settle. His sollicitor proposed LESS THAN HALF of what they originally claimed as settlement. Which we haven't accepted yet. We believe that we'll be able to settle for a whole lot less still.

2. The Big Bad Wolf, nor the Nasty Little Man have yet responded to our sollicitor's letter regarding the water in our walls. The NLM did send Christine a text message, asking about his money. To which Christine replied: "I will be able to tell you when you'll get your money when you tell me what you're going to do about this water problem". To which he replied: "The water is coming in through the gas tube (???) so deal with it yourself". Obviously both gentlemen are in a bit of trouble about what to put on paper regarding this water issue. Whathever they reply, they'll either incriminate themselves or demonstrate their total incompetence.

So that's it. And today I went for a nice evening walk in the vicinity of our house. The weather is exceptionally mild, whereas two days ago the temperatures were still around 0 and the roads were covered in ice. Today you could almost walk about in a T-shirt! The following picture and panorama were taken from a spot about 1km from our front door. Oh... I'm feeling so happy... :-)

The eclipse

2011-01-04T11:47:00.004+01:00

This morning there was a solar ecplise! Unfortunately not a total one; for that treat you had to go to Poland, Hungary or the Ukraine. But nevertheless, here in northern Italy the sun would be eclipsed for about 75% so well-worth getting up early. Around 8:30 that is... ;-) I grabbed the camera and went out, immediately followed by Blu, Thomas and Flora. Whenever Christine or I go out, so do they because they just love playing outside and even more so when we're around. It was a pity that there were a lot of high clouds. But here and there some blue appeared so I was having high hopes to get at least a glance of the eclipse. In the mean time, when I was waiting in the freezing cold, I already took a picture of another interesting phenomenon. I'm not sure what kind of strange turbulences caused these bird-like clouds but they were truly fascinating! Pity the picture doesn't really show these clouds in 3D because they were absolutely stunning. Also note the vail of cloudiness covering the summit of Mount Cusna!

Just when my toes wanted to tell me that they were reaching critical temperature, the sunrays broke through the cloud cover and I managed to take this picture of the eclipse being more or less near its maximum. It's a bit hazy but clear enough.

And then quickly back inside for a mug of hot tea!

Bingo!

2011-01-01T16:01:00.006+01:00

The day before yesterday, a local friend of ours invited us to the yearly Sologno bingo night. Sologno being the village, or better the metropole, where Danilo and his clan are in charge and where Christine and I stayed during our first months in Italy. Every Italian town worthy of this name has a so-called "pro loco", a committee which organises just about every social get together. Such as this bingo night. The Sologno pro loco people think, let's just say, a bit high of themselves because they're such good friends or even family with the Apenninian mob boss. But Christine thought it would be fun to go there nonetheless; even if it's just to participate in the Italian social life and to be together with our many friends over here, who were also going to the event. I, on the other hand, was quite reluctant to go because I've never been good at social venues and certainly now I wouldn't be able to cope very well. It's all become a bit too much for me and the thought of all these many people cramped together in a reasonably small hall frightened me a lot. So I asked Christine if she wouldn't mind going there by herself. Of course I didn't want to force her to stay at home with me. She's a very sociable lady and I realise that she needs to get out from time to time. It's something that I wouldn't want to take away from her because having to live together with an autistic man must already be more than demanding enough.

- "Bring back the big prize!", I told her, just before she went.

- "You can rest assured of that", she replied with a big smile.

And off she went, into the lion's den.

A couple of hours later she returned home with an even bigger smile. I immediately sussed that she hadn't just been enjoying the evening out. Oh no! There was this twinkling sparkle in her eyes that told me that she hadn't come home empty-handed. Suddenly, she brought her right hand from behind her back and showed me this...

Can you actually believe that she had won one of the main prizes??? :-D The leading ladies of the pro loco apparently went green of frustration and jealousy! It can't be... Not that bloody Christine again!!! Hehehe... Can you also believe that Christine used to be a keen and, dare I say, very good tennis player when she was younger? Perhaps it's a hint that she should take it up again? ;-)

Once more this confirms that fortune has finally taken a turn for the better. Christine holds the strong belief that her late grandfather is watching over us closely. And who am I to disagree? After all the pain we've been through, the sun is finally shining. Today it actually shone so warmly through the veil of high clouds and Christine and I really enjoyed an afternoon walk... our first walk through our new home in 2011.

A very happy New Year to all of you!!!

Christine - Hunters: 1-0!!!

2010-12-26T12:45:00.005+01:00

This morning we woke up a bit later than usual. It has been a very hard couple of days on the digestive side. Friday evening we hosted a very copious dinner because we wanted to show our Italian friends that the Belgian cuisine is quality-wise a very good match for the Italian one. And yesterday we were invited for an extensive lunch ourselves. So after two days of hard labour at the table we thought that we could do with a small break. I opened the curtains around ten and was thrilled to see that at least we'd have a white Boxing Day. The past couple of days have been quite warm and a bit rainy so the sight of the snow-covered trees and fields was quite a lovely surprise.

But then came the shock. Christine was raising the curtain at the side window of our bedroom and suddenly screamed that there was a car parked in the middle of our garden! I couldn't believe it at first, but indeed, there it was. Someone had driven by our letterbox and the pillar which will one day hold one part of our entrance gate, made a 180 degree turn through our rose beds and parked his car just there. We immediately sussed that it must be one of those bloody hunters again. I took the camera and went outside to take a couple of pictures as proof, while Christine called the Carabinieri. Who obviously didn't feel like driving half an hour through the snow on a holiday, so they advised us to call the Provincial Police (who's responsible for hunting issues) the next morning. So that was that.

Suddenly, Christine had a brilliant idea. She asked me to go and park our car at the entrance gate in such a way that the stupid idiot wouldn't be able to leave anymore. Which I did right away. That should come down as a shock to that bastard! A bit later we saw him, walking across our field. Again we took a couple of pictures. This man was in breach of the law no less than 4 times:

- Parking on private property

- Walking through a private garden (I'm not even referring to our field because this would be regarded as "agricultural land")

- Hunting in the snow (only allowed to a very select group of special licence holders)

- Hunting less than 100m away from a house

So we prepared ourselves for the confrontation, which obviously wouldn't be far away anymore. It was nearing lunchtime and the guy certainly wouldn't want to miss his hot tortelli. And indeed, Christine shouted at me that the man was headed for his car. Showtime! Just to be on the safe side, I quickly installed a very powerful studio microphone by the window just above the front door. In the not unlikely event that the man was going to utter threats to Christine, he wouldn't be able to get away with it so easily.

But eventually, the man turned out to be very... apologetic.

- "Private property is private property and this should be holy to everyone!", he exclaimed with a big, shining halo above his head. He probably realised that Christine was not the person to mess around with and he certainly didn't fancy walking home several miles through the cold and snow. His tortelli would probably also be cold by then. So he suddenly was the holy pope himself and assured us that he would make it clear to everyone that they're not to come onto our property!

Victory!!! :-)

BTW, if any of you speak Italian and fancy a big laugh, the recorded audio file is available on request in mp3 format! hehehe...

Merry Christmas to you all!!!

2010-12-24T10:46:00.004+01:00

With this picture of our first Italian Christmas tree, I'd like to wish all of you a merry Christmas and a very happy New Year. You've all been such a big support to us and you've contributed so much to our survival through this horrible year. Therefore Christine and I would like to say a big "thank you" and we wish you lots of happiness for 2011. May all of your wishes come true!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow...

2010-12-18T12:30:00.009+01:00

Do you remember that you used to love playing in the snow when you were a little kid? Our children seem to love it too! With "children" I obviously mean our cats of course. :-) Especially Blu and Thomas, our two Norwegian rascals, truly live up to their breed and adore rolling and jumping about until they're totally covered in snow. It's so delightful to see them at it. Why does anyone still need a television, we often wonder.

Canelle, our oldest, prefers to stay away from all that juvenile violence and is carefully threading on the big, white carpet, stearing well clear of the other three...

Here's Blu. She's just had a couple of rolls and a big shake to get all the cold snow off her. And then she lays down in the hole she's just made in order to enjoy the warm sunshine which is shining abundantly on her thick fur.

Flora, our Maine Coon kitten and the youngest of the pack, tries to follow Blu's example, be it a little less enthusiastically...

Thomas, on the other hand, doesn't need any convincing to go out in the snow. On the contrary; he just loves it! Just look at him... He can't bury himself deep enough in it! :-)

Flora eventually returns to a spot where she can rest high and dry while she's watching the two Norwegians making havoc.

"I'm the king of the hill", Thomas squeaks. Apart from me he's the only man in the house. Well... err... was apart from me the only man in the house. :-) And indeed, there's nothing "macho" about him. On the contrary, he wants to be friends with everybody - humans excluded because apart from Christine and I he doesn't want to get to know them at all.

Blu quickly follows Thomas onto the "throne" he's just discovered. Isn't she a lovely lady?

So you can see that our cats are absolutely happy in their new home. For Christine and I our new Italian home is a dream, but for our cats it truly must be paradise. So much space to play, so many trees to climb and so many things to discover... They've had a very difficult move from Belgium which must have scared the living wits out of them. And after that they still suffered for months because when they were finally getting used to the small house we rented at first, they had to move again to our new house. But now, if you ask them, they never want to go away from this place anymore. Just like us... ;-)

I'm going to be a teacher!

2010-12-15T17:39:00.003+01:00

That's right! A real teacher teaching real students. Well, kids actually, which is probably even worse. Remembering the good old days of my own childhood I know what a cunning horror children may be to a teacher. That being said, poachers make the best forest keepers, so to speak, meaning that my own experience as an inpertinent little brat will certainly have me prepared for a situation in which the tables are turned.

Now, what is this all about? This morning I received a phonecall from the head master of one of the local schools. She's a very friendly lady (well, she sounded very friendly over the phone anyway) and she's very much concerned about the level of English that Italian children are being taught. I already told you the story about that little lad who's had five years of English in primary school and who can't even say something basic and simple like "How are you?". The head master wants to do something about it and heard about me as an "English mothertongue" teacher. Even though the word "mothertongue" is a big exaggeration, I was honoured to receive her request for help and I assured her that it would be a real pleasure to become a part-time teacher at the two schools for which she is responsible. She offered me a contract for 16 hours a week, 8 at each school, and for a very interesting salary too. The details still have to be finalised of course; for the moment she only had to be certain that I was interested. In any case it would be just perfect for me because a part-time job will allow me to make myself useful to the community without (hopefully) overstressing myself. It'd give me enough time to recover and to remain my "normal" self. She'll contact me later this week in order to sit together and discuss all of this a bit better and to share some ideas about a better approach at teaching English. Since I completed this TEFL course I have quite a lot of them, such as games and other fun exercises which will let the children assimilate with the language in a much more pleasant and above all effective way than simply learning words and grammar rules by heart. Oh yes, I'll be very well prepared and motivated! :-)

The lessons should start in March so I'll keep you informed about how well it goes! Oh... I'm so excited! Finally things really seem to be going our way now. I think that we deserved it after all the hard times and I'm sure that you'd agree with me on that. So... on with OUR NEW LIFE IN ITALY!!!

A new home for my mother-in-law

2010-12-09T10:24:00.006+01:00

Last week my mother-in-law received dreadful news. She'll be thrown out of the cottage she rents because the owner's daughter cast an eye on it and fancies living there. She has until summer to find a new home.

This news didn't come totally unexpected. The owner's father had promised my mother-in-law she could live in that cottage for as long as she wanted. But when he came to die two years ago, this promise died with him. My mother-in-law had already picked up some rumours about the daughter wanting the house a couple of months ago. So she wasn't totally unprepared for it. But nevertheless the official announcement came as a total shock which was even aggravated by the blunt, careless and truly arrogant manner in which the owner came to tell her.

He barged into the house with a big cigar, polluting the air with the foul breath he belched forth. Then he asked for a drink. He didn't wait to be offered one, oh no! He wanted a drink.

- "Allright", my mother-in-law said, "I have water or orange juice..."

- "Don't you have anything else?", he asked.

- "Well...", my mother-in-law wittingly replied, "I've still got a bottle of Champagne in the garage."

- "Oh, that'll do nicely!"

And he meant it! Upon which my mother-in-law exploded and asked him whether she should really serve him a bottle of Champagne when he came to tell her he would throw her out of her house.

But there it is. Christine and I have already offered her the room of our B&B, even if it's only temporary. But in the end we believe that she prefers to stay in Flanders where all of her friends are, in stead of moving to a foreign country where she'll be much more isolated and where she doesn't speak the language. Today she's actually living in the same street as her other daughter and her two grandchildren, so that must hurt very much too.

Well, mum, the room's still available if you want it. It's up to you. In any case, Christine and I would like to send you lots of courage and support, even though we're 800 miles away. We're sure that in the end everything will be ok. Remember that we told you that you'll certainly find an even much nicer home? Just like Christine had to do two times in a row. When she left her ex-husband for me, she also had to leave the house of her dreams behind. But then we built an even much more beautiful house together. Which we sold in order to achieve our Italian dream. And now, we're living in this Italian paradise which you visited only two weeks ago. So if we can do it, so can you. Never give up hope. Keep believing in yourself and keep repeating that you've deserved a nice place of your own. And everything will be just fine. Just trust me! :-)

The following picture was taken last September. Do you remember that I told you that Christine had won this private concert from one of Flanders' most renowned artists? Well, here's Christine on the left, Paul Michiels (the famous singer) on her right, then Christine's mother and on the right is Jeroen, Paul's pianist...

Fear of confrontations

2010-12-03T16:09:00.003+01:00

What a busy weekend this was with my mother and sister in law staying for a couple of days. Christine and I very much enjoyed this visit and it really was a pity that they had to go back again so soon. But there it is. Back to "normal" life again. Today life really became back to "normal".

Someone knocked on our door this morning. I was a bit surprised because we've had a lot of snowfall last night and you'd have to plough through at least half a metre of snow on foot to reach our house, along a steep uphill entry road of more than 100m long. Not the sort of thing someone would endeavour unless it was absolutely necessary. So I opened the door, curious about who it might be. To my horror it was... the Nasty Little Man. He wanted to know when we'd pay him. I was a bit in shock and luckily Christine immediately came down and took over from me. There was a brief discussion about the origin of the water in our walls. According to him the water now comes from the top of the entry road because from there the slope goes a bit downhill again towards our house. And on the sides there are still a couple of holes from the unfinished ground works which according to him accumulate the water and send it to our house. Christine asked him why the water is not in our kitchen then. Obviously no reply. The Nasty Little Man even said that the drainage behind the house had become obsolete since we've had the wall constructed to stop the hill behind our house from crumbling down. Yes, you read it right: "obsolete". Nonetheless we've had to pay thousands for these drainage works and the Big Bad Wolf still wrote in his letter to court that he had drainage works done around the entire house "to the benefit of the entire structure". This means that he, our so-called "expert geometer" had us pay thousands for "obsolete" drainage works and then afterwards told us we'd need to have a wall built behind the house - yet another five thousand - to stop the hill from falling down. Oh yes, this'll look nice in court! Definitely it will!

Sadly... I can't take it anymore. Last time when the Big Bad Wolf and his Nasty Little Creep paid us a visit to inspect the damage, I already had to hide behind Christine's (very slim) back because I couldn't face those two bastards anymore. I was a total gonner for three days, trembling and totally in shock. I've got a feeling that after today it will not be very different. I can still get my thoughts together and hence I'm still capable of writing this blog post. But at times it feels as if a knife is cutting straight through my heart. My head starts spinning and all I can think of is escape. Escape to a place where noone can ever find me. Especially those irritating voices in my head. They're driving me insane and I wish so hard that I could shut them up forever. Why can't I just leave it be? Why does such a small event, an event that once again clearly demonstrates that we were in the right from the beginning and that we shouldn't pay that ghastly man the rest of his money until all problems with our house have been solved, have such an impact on me? It's even more surprising because especially my former colleagues will remember that I could be very ad rem and assertive during the meetings when I had to defend the interests of my clients. Sometimes even a bit too much... Without the slightest blink of an eye I could tell directors and even state-secretaries what I thought of them. And now, I can't even look a stupid, incompetent builder in the eye anymore. It makes me realise that what I did at work was only a front. A very good acting game, perhaps even worthy an Oscar. It was the enormous firewall that I constructed around me in order to protect my true inner self from the outside world. A true inner self that noone must ever discover. Today, it feels like this firewall has been torn down completely. I can't pretend anymore. All that's left is a shy little boy that just wants to be left in peace. Autism has caught up with me at last. I just have to accept it. Fortunately, Christine won't have me any other way. She's so sweet... I love her so much for that. And at least she takes my defense whenever necessary, like today. I can't thank her enough... She really makes me happy. When I got to know her, it was the first time in my entire life that I enjoyed true happiness. And it's still lasting, strong as ever... :-)

Christmas, Christmas, what a lovely Christmas...

2010-11-26T11:23:00.002+01:00

Perhaps a bit early to start singing this lovely carol. But it was the song that immediately sprung to mind when I woke up this morning and opened the curtains...

Up here in the mountains the weather can truly change overnight, can't it? Yesterday we were still having a pleasant sunshine and you could almost walk about in a t-shirt. This morning however, there is 15cm of snow.

It may just be a coincidence, but... Today is also the day that my mother- and sister-in-law arrive. True, it isn't one and a half meter of snow like in March. But I can only conclude that my mother-in-law must have a truly amazing impact on the weather over here. Fortunately, she now already knows where to find the Sheraton airport hotel! Hehehe... :-)

Just kidding, mum,... Welcome to Italy! :-D

A new book

2010-11-25T16:52:00.003+01:00

I really must be feeling better lately because I've just started writing a new book. And the good news is... It's like if the book is writing itself! Haven't you ever had this experience when you were writing something... a story, an essay or, why not, a book... and you just couldn't stop because you were having so much inspiration that you thought that you could keep writing for ever? This is exactly what is happening to me right now.

All in all this should not come as a surprise because, like you've certainly already noticed, our Italian adventure has turned out to be just hat - a very big adventure indeed.

The book begins just a short time before the point where my first book ended: buying a new home in Italy. It describes my final years at work and how my autism is slowly getting the better of me. And in the mean time the Italian dream matures and eventually we want to make it come true. With all the highs and lows in between. I'm already extremely happy with the first 25 pages and sincerely hope that my editor will be equally pleased.

In any case, let's see first whether my first book will become a success. I guess that if it has to be pulped my editor will not be jumping to the moon from joy when I present her the sequel... :-D

Getting prepared for winter

2010-11-20T12:23:00.007+01:00

The winters up here in the mountains are usually short but can be quite severe, as you'll probably remember from the images I posted in March. One and a half a meter of snow! My mother in law and I believed we had arrived in Greenland rather than in Italy! It was so bad that Christine couldn't make it to the airport to pick us up because her car had been totally snowed in. So we had to spend the night at the airport Sheraton. But now we're not in the least bit worried that we'll freeze to death. :-) Last week two strong and friendly men came to cut the enormous pile of wood that came from the various trees Christine had cut down in order to give our house a bit more air. In just two hours all of the logs and branches were cut to a size that will easily fit the wood stove we've ordered...

It was very hard work but absolutely worth it. Now we'll probably have enough wood to heat up the house for years. In fact, the toughest job is to collect all the pieces and logs and stack them in the small adjacent building on our property. This used to be a pig stable, hen house and typical outdoors oven but nowadays it's in a pretty derilict state. Nonetheless, it has enough space for all of our wood and at least it will be dry. Just a couple of days more work and it will be done... Phew!

For the moment we're still heating on (expensive) gas, although we're astonished how little effort our heating system must do in order to make the entire house snug and warm. The special state-of-the-art floor heating system we've chosen will eventually save us a lot of money. Even though our garage now more resembles the boiler room of a steamboat... :-)

But the mortgage should be finalised by mid-December and then we'll finally be able to have the wood stove installed in our living room. As it will be connected to the central boiler, the wood will be the main source for heating and hot water. The boiler is insulated so well that it can keep the water at temperature for 24 hours!

And we'll certainly not be on our own this winter. A couple of days ago, in early morning, a family of roe deers came to visit us. Aren't they just lovely?

Halt! Private property!

2010-11-13T17:30:00.003+01:00

When we bought our house and the generous plot of land that came with it, we were hoping to find some tranquility at last. But this tranquility is currently far away at times. I already told you about hunters some time ago. And today I'd like to have another go at them because I'm slowly getting fed up with their arrogant and uneducated ways. Before you ask, I'm a carnivore and since humanity has survived primarily on meat and fish for the last three million years I see no need why I should change. But there are limits and hunters should learn to respect not only animal rights but also the rights of the people who live in their "recreational area". In brief, the hunters over here show absolutely no respect at all for private property. Yes, they have the law at their side. In Italy you have to enclose your land with a fence of at least 1,20m high if you want to keep hunters out. Otherwise they have the right to roam as they like. This right, however, is not absolute. They are not to come within 100m from houses and domestic animals. Meaning that, technically speaking, they're not allowed to come into our field. Fence or not.

Unfortunately, as I already mentioned, I have to conclude that Italian hunters seem to have failed to evolve since the dawn of the neolithicum. It's temping to generalise but really, I still have to meet the first educated hunter. All the ones I've come across so far are careless, arrogant, rude and have a serious portion of raving insanity over them. Some even seem that old that it would surprise me if they'd still see the difference between a deer and a man at 100m anyway.

My problem now is that they don't care about the chains with the "private property" signs through which I've closed off every entry to our house and field. They just do as they please. They even pass right in front of our house! Through our terrace! And then there are the excuses...

- "But we're not doing any harm to anyone"

- "Our guns are still bagged up"

- "I'm just going downhill"

- "We haven't got any dogs"

or the following hilarious quote:

- "I didn't know that anyone lived here" (strange if you've just passed the new letterbox that Christine made, ignored the "private property" sign and you're standing in front of a restored house with curtains, terrace furniture and the whole lot.)

To my opinion, hunting should be left to professionals. People who know what they are doing and who only hunt in order to maintain the natural balance, given that there aren't enough natural predators anymore. But who am I of course...

On the optimist side, we haven't had as much trouble with hunters lately as at the start of the hunting season. Hopefully they're slowly beginning to understand that they have to keep away. Obviously, if you only have one braincell... Perhaps we should give them a bit more time... :-)

The colours of autumn

2010-11-10T12:41:00.004+01:00

One more "picture of the day", taken from our bedroom window this morning. On moments like these, we realise that it has all been worth it...

Two unexpected visitors

2010-11-09T18:59:00.005+01:00

Knock knock knock knock!!! I just came out of the shower when I heard someone banging on our front door. Christine was downstairs and she took the honours of opening it in order to see who came to disturb us during this lazy Tuesday afternoon. I immediately recognised two voices. They were two men whom I had hoped never to see again in my entire life: the Big Bad Wolf in person with the Nasty Little Man right behind him (hiding in his shade). They came to inspect this "so-called" water damage. Christine was more than happy to show them the moist inner walls. But as could be expected, they weren't impressed at all.

- "Of course there is water in your walls", the Big Bad Wolf said in his usual arrogant way, "it's the sub-floor that needs to dry. You'll see that it will disappear in no time."

- "The sub-floor???", Christine answered in astonishment, "But that was laid last July! How do you explain that this water has only appeared after the heavy rains we had four weeks ago? And how come we only have it in our corridor and not in the rest of our house?"

Silence.

- "Who laid these floor tiles?", the Nasty Little Man interrupted.

- "A very good expert", Christine said.

- "Well, it's obvious. The water from the subfloor can't get through the pointing of the pavement. So it has to go through the walls."

- "What??? Water can't get through the pointing???"

- "That's right!"

- "Besides", the Big Bad Wolf continued, "there is no standing water behind the house at all!"

- "I tell you there is..."

- "Listen, I've got my idea about this water and you've got yours. I just wanted to see it so that I'd know what to reply."

And away they went. Afterwards I went round the house because after two days of rain I'd have been surprised not to find any standing water there. And indeed, at first sight there wasn't any. The pool of water was covered in leaves.

We'll see whether his explanation about the sub-floor will still hold up in court... :-)

P.S.: This sub-floor was dry after a day already (meaning you could already walk on it) and was exposed to the summer heat for weeks. The tiles and windows weren't installed until weeks later. It's so obvious that again he is trying to intimidate us.

P.P.S: Oh... I almost forgot to mention the juiciest detail! The Big Bad Wolf literally said that it wasn't his responsibility anyway because Christine had sacked him in February while the drainage works hadn't been completed until months later. But... dear Mr. Big Bad Wolf... You did have your sollicitor write in his accusation that you had resigned yourself in April and that the works you had executed included "proper drainage around the house to the benefit of the entire structure". It's one of the most important items which contribute to your exuberant €13.000,- claim. So... How do you explain that???

Out... out with the telescope!

2010-11-03T19:04:00.002+01:00

It's been more than four months since I moved to Italy. To a place where the sky is still virtually unpolluted by useless streetlights. Where I live, the Milky Way is still a clear and soft veil across the night's sky. Isn't it a real shame then that I've never bothered to put my telescope together again to take it out for a night's observing? Last week I finally did it! I really must be feeling better... :-)

The things I saw were just amazing. You can't believe what a difference a decent sky makes compared to the wishy-washy, dirty orange-glowing smog we get in Flanders (and I suppose in most of the rest of Europe too)? The faint nebulae were so much brighter... starclusters so much more scintillating... Jupiter showed so much more detail...

Around midnight the moon rose above the horizon which meant the end of a wonderful evening under the stars. I just can't wait for the next clear night! Apparently they've forcast fair weather for the next couple of days... :-D

Hurray! We've got water in our walls!

2010-10-29T16:07:00.003+02:00

To normal people, this would be a disastrous discovery. But to us, it is like a gift from heaven!

We've had quite a bit of rain during the 2 previous weekends. Probably, the water in the foundation of our house has already accumulated for months. But a week ago, it became apparent in all of the walls of our central corridor. At first we were afraid that our floor heating system would have a leak. But the pressure in the tubes hasn't gone down, even after we had closed off the circuit for days. So it has to come from outside. Probably from the drainage tube behind our house. Christine recalled that the men who constructed the wall behind the house had found this tube when they dug a trench for the foundation. And they had warned her that it had been put there in a way that violated all the rules of a decent drainage. The guys have tried to mend it for as much as they could. But obviously not enough.

So, why is this good news, you might ask? It's Danilo's first big mistake! He, who never bothered to show up at the construction site but nevertheless charged us €11.000,- just for being "director of works". He, and his buddy Nezio who did the actual work, will now have to answer for this major cock-up. We're very well aware that in the end we'll probably have to make a compromise with him regarding the lawsuit and the amount we still ought to pay him. After all, the works on our house have been completed, even if he is a big con who's brought us in so much trouble. But with this, we'll see how fast he'll be willing to settle...

Realistically, Danilo is far too arrogant and will probably not want to abandon the courtcase or settle for a reasonable amount. But now we're sure that he'll be digging his own grave in that case. Our new (and very good) sollicitor was very clear about that! She's going to send Danilo and Nezio a very juicy registered letter about the damage to our house. We can't wait for their reply!

Picture of the day

2010-10-26T18:44:00.004+02:00

After rain comes sunshine. Proverbially and literally. The last couple of days were filled with rain and low clouds. But this evening the sky cleared up and revealed a magnificent landscape, with snow covering the hills in front of us. Autumn is such a beautiful season, isn't it?

Floating between hope and despair

2010-10-24T18:32:00.002+02:00

It's truly amazing how my emotions can change from one minute to the other. From total exhilaration after the news about the mortgage to utter depression when the thought of the courtcase the Big Bad Wolf started against us took over again. Why can't I just be happy that our financial worries may be over and live one day to the next? Why must brain constantly process worst-case scenarios? It deprives me of a good night's sleep and keeps me on the brink of anxiety all day long. And for what? I was doing exactly the same thing when I was worrying about the loan and that turned out allright, didn't it? It just seems stronger than me and there's absolutely noone or nothing that can cheer me up. Hopefully our sollicitor can do so next Thursday, when we're having another appointment. She's very good at what she does and she gave us renewed hope that our arguments aren't as void as the "famous" sollicitor we previously consulted tried to make us believe. All of a sudden. It's quite unnerving that now also our new geometer seems to be making a 180° turn. Christine could barely convince him to join us for the appointment. The Big Bad Wolf is a very powerful man in this area and probably has a lot of influence everywhere. It feels like David against Goliath.

But in the end, David won, didn't he?

There is a light

2010-10-21T16:54:00.003+02:00

I want to be very careful with this. But Christine called the bank this morning and... they said that our mortgage will be approved!!! We just can't believe it! It's the most wonderful news we've heard in a very long time, perhaps apart from my book. At last we will be able to start enjoying our Italian dream!!! :-D

But like I said, we're not jumping about in total euphoria yet. It was just a spoken promise and we still haven't seen anything on paper. But we have absolutely no reason to believe that the lady from the bank would be leading us on. She's always seemed very honest and never made us any false promises. Unlike most of the other bank managers we've encountered. She said that they'll still have to look into the precice details, such as the timeframe (20 or 25 years) and whether it will be an additional mortgage on top of the one we already received in June, or if the old one will be closed and we'll receive a new one for the total amount we've originally requested. And they're also going to send an expert to ouor house to value it. Well, he'll be more than welcome. Our house is worth at least three times than what we're asking for. So no worries there. The only problem we're still facing is having to tell all of the workers that they'll have to wait another month or so before they'll see their money. We're feeling very much ashamed about this because they've done such a wonderful job and under normal circumstances we would have paid them right away. Then again, at least they'll see their money in the end. And in these days of crisis this already means a lot, don't you agree?

Tomorrow's the day

2010-10-20T19:12:00.004+02:00

Tomorrow we'll know whether our request for a mortgage will be accepted or not. It's our final chance. Not really according to Christine though. She says that if we receive a "no" tomorrow, that she'll mail all of the people we still owe money to to explain the situation and to ask for a bit more patience. Where she gets the courage is beyond me. Last Friday she drove 400km to see the most renowned Italian professor specialising in the chronic fatigue syndrome. He told her that (at first sight) she only seemed a mild case. Well, what does he know? Christine collapsed yesterday when she was merely painting a cupboard. She had been feeling a strong dizziness for some days now. Today she couldn't leave her chair and she looked as pale as a sheet. But like I said, even in this condition she still finds the courage to continue fighting a seemingly hopeless fight. If tomorrow the answer is "no", I don't know what to do anymore. This morning the guy who laid the floor tiles came to visit us, asking why we hadn't paid him yet. I explained that we were still waiting for the reply from the bank. My answer was true, but must have sounded like a pretty lame excuse. He reminded me about all the favours he's done to us and that he had even sacrificed two days of his vacation because of us. I felt so terribly guilty. I wanted to explain all that had happened to us; about the Big Bad Wolf and all the rest. But that's not his problem, is it? He's got a family to feed too. And debts to pay. And he's not the only person we still owe money to. We're really wondering what we've got ourselves into. It's such a mess and so far away from the dream we were pursuing. Is it our fault? Certainly not. With the right people we would have made our dream come true. It's all "ifs"...

And that's not all. Yesterday I noticed that a couple of our (new) internal walls were moist at the bottom. First we were afraid that our floor heating was leaking, but we soon found out that it's not losing any pressure. The moisture comes from the outside, from behind our house.

And to round it off, this morning one of our bathroom windows exploded. Well, it didn't blast out of its frame. But it did make a big bang and now it has a crack from top to bottom on the inside. Probably a construction error...

Well, we're not too worried about these last two things. In fact, we're not too unhappy about our internal walls sucking up moisture. It proves (like was already pointed out to us by another worker) that the Nasty Little Man has made a mess of the necessary drainage pipes behind the house. And who's the person bearing all of the responsibility, you might think? Yes! It's the Big Bad Wolf himself! So if any sollicitor is still asking (with a smirk on his face) whether we're pleased with the house, we'll tell him: "definitely not"! Apart from abusing our trust, throwing the geometers' ethical code out of the window, ignoring nearly every building law in existence and forging Christine's signature, we now also have a big structural error to hold against him. And Christine just found the perfect sollicitor for it. A woman and... a real pitbull. Christine can't wait until January.

Personally I just hope that we'll survive tomorrow...

Thomas, the mountaineer

2010-10-13T17:38:00.003+02:00

Cats have an adveturous nature. Sometimes a bit too adventurous. So Christine and I always call all of our cats inside in the evening so we can rest assured that they won't get into trouble in the middle of the night. Especially Flora and Thomas, our little ones. They're still too unexperienced to be left outdoors the entire night. Even if they wouldn't really mind themselves; on the contrary...

So a couple of nights back, I went outside to call our cats when it was time to go to bed. Flora, Canelle and Blu quickly responded to my call and happily entered our house in search of a late supper. Thomas, however, was nowhere to be found. I called and I called... and suddenly, I heard a faint "meow" coming from the northerly border of our field. I called again and once more I heard Thomas replying. His "meow" sounded a bit afraid. Oh no, what's he been up to this time? I took a torch and went into our field. It was utterly dark. But the "meow" got louder. Yes, it definitely came from the edge of our field, by those oak trees on the border. There's a well over there so maybe he went for a late-night swim? It wouldn't be the first time he came back in a wet suit. But what made me anxious was that he didn't seem to come any closer himself. As if he were trapped somewhere. Slowly I came nearer to the trees and his cries definitely came from over there. Cats... trees... I understood that he had climbed in one of them and didn't want to come down anymore. Thomas is a very good climber and I had already seen him go up and down trees before. His "meow" also sounded very close by so he couldn't be all that high. Or could he? I pointed my torch upwards, hoping to find the reflection in his eyes soon. He had to be right above my head somewhere. So why couldn't I see him?

And then... finally, I saw the reflection. My mouth fell open wide. As I said, I've seen him climb a tree before. A couple of metres and back. But what I saw then filled me with horror. He was somewhere near the top of that tree! Christine had also arrived in the mean time and while she kept calling Thomas, hoping that he would still come down on his own, I went back to the house to get our ladder. Although I wasn't very optimistic. Our ladder consists of three parts and reaches about 5,5-6m high. My impression was that Thomas had climbed a whole lot higher than that.

It wasn't all that easy to install the ladder against the tree with all of those branches in the way. But I managed to put it more or less stable against the main trunk. And up I went. Higher and higher in the direction of the twinkling eyes and the desperate cries. Obviously the ladder wasn't big enough. Trembling of fear, I climbed so high that my feet were standing on the penultimate spoke and my left arm was holding the trunk very tightly. Fortunately there wasn't a lot of wind because the slightest breeze made the trunk swing. Way too much to my liking. But there I was. And Thomas... was still about 2m above my head. I kept calling him and eventually he carefully tried to come down. He extended his paws towards me. He twisted and turned his body around the branch he was sitting on. Finally he managed to turn himself in such a way that he could climb down with his bottom first. Until he arrived at the branches right above me, but still too far away for me to be able to grab him. And when he saw my arms reaching out at him, he fled further and further away from me again, onto those branches which were not very thick at all. Nothing seemed to work anymore and I climbed down in despair, hoping that Thomas would follow my example.

Fortunately there was still Christine. She had gone back to the house to get some tuna. Thomas is a very good eater - to say the least - and a bit of tuna would certainly attract his attention. So I went back up, with some tuna in my hand. And indeed, it didn't take long to get his interest. I put the tuna on a fork right above me on a place where I hoped to be able to grab him. And after some hesitation, Thomas moved back towards the safety of the trunk. Finally I managed to grab him, albeit only just and not without danger of falling myself. Thomas clenched the branches with every claw he had so I had to use considerable force to drag him off and hold him close to my chest. But at last I had him. I climbed down again very carefully and under protest from Thomas who tried to grab every branch within his reach. But eventually, after having tried for about an hour, we were both back on the ground, safe and sound.

In the house, Thomas received a very nice treat under the form of a big plate of tuna. And afterwards he came to thank me with a lot of purrs and friendly gestures. We hope that he's learnt his lesson because when I went back the following day to look at that tree, to see where exactly Thomas and I had been... no... please... not again... :-)

The return of Dopey Dwarf

2010-10-06T17:59:00.002+02:00

At last!!! Our central heating system has arrived!!! After a 3-month wait, Dopey Dwarf finally knocked on our door with our new boiler and state of the art gas heater. He's done everything in his power to stall delivery as much as possible. Probably hoping that in the mean time we'd be freezing cold in our house.

- "Oh, you want that boiler?"

- "Sorry, but I'll be away on holiday then."

- "I've just called the factory, but they can't deliver until October." (this he said in September, meaning that he failed to order it in July)

Tough luck for him, but we're already feeling the benefits of the materials we've chosen for the restoration right now, such as a sub-floor in terracotta. Even at night the house still seems to keep a pleasant temperature. These materials were much more expensive than ordinary plaster or concrete. But we're already certain that we'll win this investment back in no time.

But then Dopey suddenly said:

- "But... you are living here?"

As if he didn't know that. Or perhaps it was his twin brother who installed the temporary gas heater about a month ago.

- "Yes, of course. Why do you ask?"

- "You realise that you'll be without hot water for at least three days, don't you?"

I was shocked by this announcement but didn't twitch the smallest of my facial muscles. I didn't want to give him the satisfaction. I replied:

- "Well, that's allright. We're already used to camping here anyway."

And I left him to it. His assistant later assured me that we'd have hot water again by Friday afternoon. Certainly before the weekend. So that's ok by us. If Dopey believes that he can lower our spirit with such childish trivialities, he's sadly mistaking. We'll see who'll be the last to laugh. When he'll have to wait a couple of months for his money, or something.

- "Oh, you want that money?"

- "Sorry, but we were away on holiday so didn't make it to the bank."

- "We've just called our Belgian bank in order to transfer the funds to Italy. But they won't be able to do it until next year." :-)

Heartache

2010-10-03T17:57:00.003+02:00

Hello!!! Welcome to my new blog! :-) For those of you who're still visiting me on my personal website (whyamime.com), I'd like to advise you to visit me on

http://understandautism.blogspot.com/

because whyamime.com will be closed soon.

Anyway... I know that I have been neglecting my blog a bit over the past weeks. The reason is that things aren't going all that well. Even though we're now living in our own house and we're slowly constructing our new lives here. It feels as if the sword of Damocles his hanging right above our heads and that the last little threads that are still holding it are breaking off. The tension is rising. Debts are growing. Lawsuits are becoming bigger uncertainties. And both of us are feeling tired. Very tired indeed. Last week I started wondering whether it would not be better to just sell everything and try to find a smaller and less expensive house. I just can't cope with this financial pressure anymore. And all that because of one man: Danilo. Yes, I know, I also lost a great deal of money by taking too many risks on the stock market. But if Danilo hadn't put us in this dire position in the first place, I would never have tried to find alternative ways to make a lot of money in a very short timeframe. When we were going through our documents in order to prepare the courtcase, we were shocked to find that the price we eventually had to pay for just the structural works was 67% (!) higher than Danilo's original estimate. The estimate which seemed pretty complete at the time and through which he lured us into this adventure because otherwise we would have looked for another house. Probably one with less work to be done and hence less money for him to be made. The things he "forgot" to mention... The wrong estimates he made... It's just incredible. And then they say: "But technically speaking everything's fine with your house, isn't it?" Yes. Technically speaking our house hasn't collapsed yet. And we won't know whether it is technically ok until it collapses. But what about "a person of trust"? "Transparency"? "Honesty"? These are all words which can be found throughout the official Code of Conduct for geometers. Don't they mean anything then?

So back to last week. Christine and I had a frank conversation about giving up and selling everything again. Some time ago I wrote about having reached the point where some of the people who share the same dream would give up and where we were still full of courage to continue. At that time I thought things couldn't get much worse. But they can. And now we are on the brink of giving up. Christine had to shed a few tears, mostly because of everything she has left behind. Her garden for starters. Although I'm sure that she exaggerates the good bits. Yes, our old house was lovely and the garden was just about to grow into its full splendour. But there were also a lot of bad times. And we've never really felt "at home" there. When things get bad, you tend to idealise the things you don't have anymore.

But the last couple of days, Christine changed. She said that suddenly she had received the firm conviction that things will get better from now on. Yes, she said that suddenly she was dead-certain of it and that she could feel it strongly within. And with her, also I started to get a grip on my feelings again. We're entitled to a bit of good news. Let's say that my book was already a start. Last week, our cooker finally arrived (be it with a small and nasty surprise, but nothing so serious that it would make us lose spirit). From now on, we should receive more good news. I'm so terribly convinced that we deserve it after all that we've been through, and especially Christine. If I don't deserve it, then at least she does. That our mortgage request is being accepted, for example. That would truly fill us with joy. Christine's worked her socks of at making a business plan for our B&B. Truly a great piece of work which must make the bank very impressed. We keep on fighting then. We must keep the faith...

Sorry... Moving to yet another website... :-o - 03 Oct 2010

2010-10-03T13:22:00.002+02:00

Yes... my book is going to be published in May next year by one of the biggest and most renowned publishers in Flanders: www.houtekiet.com Unfortunately, this means that I will have to close down my website. The contract firmly states that I have to hand over all the rights to my work - something which is only logical. Rights which also include the English translation and the Italian version which two of my dear Italian friends are working on.

But for you, loyal readers of my blog, there's absolutely nothing to be worried about. From now on you can follow my adventures on the original site:

http://understandautism.blogspot.com/

I preferred to have everything on my personal website so that I could earn a bit of extra cash through the advertisments. But there it is. I hope to see you all on the other side. And the good thing is... Blogspot is in English so no more problems for English speakers if they want to leave a comment... :-)

The noble sport of hunting - 23 Sep 2010

2010-09-23T13:13:00.003+02:00

Moving to a different country is always some kind of a culture shock, even if it's a reasonably nearby and by all means European country like Italy. And I apologise to my dear Italian friends, but there is one aspect where Italy still hasn't made it to the civilised world... and that is hunting.
In Italy, a hunter is almost omnipotent. He doesn't need to undergo any psychological or technical exam prior to being given a license. He's merely "supposed" to know the rules. And there are very few rules. In fact, as far as Italy is concerned, the situation is not far off of being a Far West. Not suprisingly, in this country there's an average of over 50 mortal incidents each hunting season. The number of injuries is of course much higher. Hunters can happily enter private land and shoot as they like. They only have to maintain a distance of 100m to houses. But what is 100m of course. If you want to keep hunters away from your property, you need to close it off by a fence of at least 1,20m high and put visible "private property" signs on regular intervals. Meaning, to close let's say a 100m perimeter you're easily in for a 300-400€ expense without the poles. If, like in our situation, you have to enclose 2 hectares, this is as good as impossible. Just putting signs or putting a plastic rope or chain isn't good enough. Obviously the Italian legislator has made it so difficult for private house owners that they'll usually give up and let the hunters have their way.

Last Sunday the hunting season started. Christine and I were still in bed when we heard a shotgun fire really close by. A bit later when we were outside, in front of our house, we suddenly saw a hunter fire at a partridge in the middle of our field. Roughly 60m away from us! He came barging into our field and I went to meet him because I wouldn't have that. I was still only 20m away from him when he suddenly raised his gun and fired in the air at another partridge. The argument that followed wasn't pleasant at all. Especially when his dogs suddenly entered our garden and started chasing our hens. Christine and I chased them away of course. But this made the hunter even more furious. Up to the point that he started making hidden threats. He went back uphill, to his mate who was standing there, laughing. And then they just stood there, observing us. Every now and then they took their binoculars to look at Christine and I and when they noticed we were still there, they made angry gestures. Fortunately, after half an hour or so, they went away.

In the mean time I've already put "no hunting" signs everywhere. And I've dug a little deeper into the Italian hunting law. In fact, it seems to make a difference between a private garden and private land for agricultural purposes. Because under no circumstances a hunter is allowed to enter a garden. It's the "private agricultural land" that has to be closed off by a fence. And there is more. A hunter also has to remain at least 100m away from domestic animals. Which includes the normal cats and dogs but also horses, cows and... hens! :-) So I've put the new henhouse at such a distance from our house that basically no hunter can still come into our field. I've also been thinking to put our old, plastic garden furniture towards the far end, to really make it look like a "garden".

I can understand that the hunters must really be frustrated. Our field is the perfect hunting ground because from the field above you can take a very nice pop shot into ours. Our house has been abandoned for forty years so there has never been anything in their way. But as from now, they're technically no longer allowed to come, let alone hunt, in our field. And on top of that also a large portion of the field above has become off limits due to its less than 100m distance to our house.

Christine and I don't care in the least. On the other hand, we're very much afraid because it's clear that there are a lot of cowboys among these hunters who don't give a toss about the rules. A good advice a friend gave us is to keep a camera nearby. So whenever a demented hunter tries something illegal, we'll have a picture as proof to the authorities. And hopefully they'll listen...

Moving in at last!!! - 23 Sep 2010

2010-09-23T12:50:00.003+02:00

Sorry... this post is a bit late; my apologies. But since Tuesday of the previous week we're living in our own house!!! This is actually one of the reasons why I couldn't write any earlier. Moving in is one thing. Creating some sort of order is another... :-)

But slowly we're getting there. The house already looks a whole lot tidier now. Even though we're still more or less camping. There is no running water on the ground floor, simply because we haven't got any sink there yet. This is mainly Dopey Dwarf's fault because he put the taps too low and had to send one of his assistants, an even more stupid dwarf, to mend it. The even more stupid dwarf came, put the taps where they should be but left a big mess. "You can repair it any way you like", he said. And left in a big hurry. Well, we're not going to let it ruin our good spirit, are we? The cooker... was supposedly sent but then again not. A simple inquiry with the courier confirmed that there's nothing being sent to us. This means that we have no other option than to inform the "Postal Police" which is responsible for internet fraud. Hopefully they can eventually talk some sense into that ghastly woman. Fortunately there's a very friendly English family nearby who were happy to lend us their camping cooker. It does its job more than well.

On the other hand, we do have a toilet at last. You may remember that the one we got turned out to be broken underneath and had to be replaced. It took some time and a week's survival on a camping toilet (again many thanks to our English friends) but now we can at least go to the loo properly.

So this is more or less where we are at the moment. One thing's for sure: the cats love it here! We were so confident that we left our two oldest ones, Canelle and Blu already outside after two days. And without any problem. They simply ador these surroundings full of bushes, trees and a view you only get in travel magazines. Thomas and Flora will still have to wait a bit. They're less experienced and more likely to get into trouble. Perhaps we'll try a guided walk this afternoon. After all, the weather's just superb today...

The Pradarena adventure - 13 Sep 2010

2010-09-13T16:57:00.017+02:00

One thing I try to escape from the ghosts in my head, is taking my Vespa for a spin. For me there's no better way to get rid of all the worries (for a few minutes) than to ride along the winding mountain roads and enjoy the magnificent landscapes that await you behind every bend.

The day before yesterday I was feeling so down that I definitely needed a slightly bigger adventure to get my mind off things. It was around four 'o clock in the afternoon and the weather was just perfect. So I decided to make one of my dreams come true, which is riding my Vespa all the way up the Pradarena pass (1575m). It's only about 20km away from our house, so there I went.

Initially the road takes you along the valleys towards the town of Ligonchio. No problem there whatsoever. But then the climb gets steeper. Much steeper. Over 10% steep. Not the sort of thing my Vespa was keen on. After all, it was designed as a city vehicle; certainly not well-adapted for mountain-goat adventures. At times its maximum speed dropped below 20kph and I almost felt like getting off and give it a push. Very embarassing, you know, when motorbikes are zooming past; the riders of which obviously thinking that I must be bonking mad. But I let them mock me. My brave companion eventually made it to the top!!! Here's the living proof: the sign which told me that I was leaving the province of Reggio Emilia and entering the province of Lucca, in Tuscany:

Obviously I wanted to enjoy this moment a bit. It's a pity that at the top of the pass the view isn't all that superb. It's closed in by mountainsides and forests. And I hadn't had enough at all. I wanted more... and higher. Much higher. So I continued on foot, through the forest leading to the nearest mountaintop.

Hey! Look at these big mushrooms! But you better no eat those...

The forest got thinner and thinner. Eventually I arrived at the tree limit and to my great joy I could see the mountaintop. Well, at least I thought I could see it...

Much to my disappointment, the mountaintop was a lot higher still. Oh... my poor old legs... :-) But I would not give in! I would make it to the top, even if I'd collapse. Then I saw this weird pile of stones. Would that perhaps be the top?

No! Not in the least! I had to climb about another 50m still. But then... tadaaaa... the big moment...

WOOOOOOWWW!!! Just look at that!!! The following picture was taken in northeasterly direction. You can see the Bismantova rock in the far distance, with to its left the town of Castelnovo ne' Monti. And all the way against the horizon (not very clear on the picture) I could make out the outskirts of the city of Reggio Emilia, which must be about 60km away!

To the east, the majestic mount Cusna, the highest mountain in the Reggian Appenines...

And then... hold your breath for this panorama which ranges from south to northwest.

On the left (south) you can see the sharp outlines of the Alpi Apuane in Tuscany. Then the panorama goes through the southwest (sun), past the Alpe di Succiso (also over 2000m), then nearby Mount Cavalbianco (+/-1850m) and to the northwest Mount Ventasso (on the last picture). I absolutely haven't got the faintest idea how the mountain that I was standing on is called (couldn't find it on any map) but it must not be much lower than Mount Cavalbianco as you can see for yourself. Unfortunately the mountain I stood on just wasn't high enough to be able to see the Tyrrhanean Sea. But it was a spectacular view nonetheless.

After half an hour or so I climbed down again. Here's a picture of me and my loyal ride on the top of the pass, with Mount Cavalbianco on the background...

One last glance at Tuscany before I'd drive back...

Look, mama, that's how high I've been!!!...

Almost home. The Bismantova Rock in the evening light. Just a few more bends and I'd be home...

Sundown over the Alpe di Succiso...

The end. :-)

I wish I could fly - 13 Sep 2010

2010-09-13T12:41:00.003+02:00

Being autistic means i.a. that I'm much more sensible to emotions. Good ones, but also bad ones. How hard I try to keep on smiling and to laugh at the problems we're still facing, I can't hide my innermost feelings any longer. Tears are rolling off my cheeks nearly every day now. In spite of the good news I received about my book and our house being habitable now.

Financially we're still in a lot of trouble and also Danilo decided he'd be his old stupid self and went to court to ask another €13.000,- from us. Even though he messed up completely, "forgot" to order the seismic study and to ask for a building permit and last but not least forged Christine's signature on an official document to make it seem like he did his job. So that's courtcase number two.

Courtcase number three is also well on its way. We bought a beautiful cooker through eBay and at a very sharp price too. Unfortunately, the lady of the eBay shop also messed up and had the cooker sent to my address of residence (still in Belgium at the time) in stead of my primary shipping address (in Italy of course). The discussion is already going on for over a month because she doesn't want to admit that she made a mistake. "I sent it to the address as mentioned in eBay", by which she means "residence" in stead of "shipping". And then she says it's all my fault and that I have to sort things out myself. Three courtcases in three months... I had imagined things a bit differently...

I also fell out with a hunter who came barging through our land with his dogs, regardless if it is a private property or not. I've put "no entry" signs everywhere but that didn't seem to bother him. He even warned me that if I tried to stop his dogs one more time... I asked: "Is that a threat?" "No", he replied "but I'd see what would happen otherwise".

Then, last week there was a terrible tragedy in the family about which I will not elaborate here.

And so on and so on...

I'm feeling empty... chased by dark shadows which have come to haunt me. I can't find any peace anywhere because they always know where I'm hiding. At times I take a seat on our terrace and try to enjoy the warm sunshine. To no avail. My heart keeps beating restlessly. The pain is throbbing in my chest. The slightests of sounds blasts through my ears even harder than usual. Do you remember when you were really startled once? That's how I'm feeling all of the time now. As if my poor old heart could give up any minute. No... please... leave me alone!!! All I want is just sit here quietly on my terrace and be left in peace. Why is that so difficult?