My landlady has got me listening to the scariest (pink) Italian pop cd! And if someone gives you a cd you are of course obligated to listen to it. She reckons it will help with my Italian. I wish I liked it enough for it to help. I really do. Then maybe I could learn all the words and serenade some poor Italian and maybe he�d be impressed and we could keep chickens and adopt Albanian children, just for fun.

I�m here. Sono qui. See I know a little, but when in situations where you need to really know a lot in your more complex situations, it�s really tough. I really hope I get better, really fast.

This CD sounds like it wants to send you to a happy place, whereas it�s sending me somewhere nearer a razor or bottle of pills.

I manage pretty well without music. I guess I�m just too busy. Music is a must for people with silences that need filling. Or voids. That�s why I sang to myself all the time on holiday.

So you step out onto the street and you�re out of your world already. Tiny narrow streets, with buildings in shades of red and faded something else, about as high as two houses and decorated so delicately with your standard graffiti, which I�ve never actually read, thinking back. Dissatisfaction is on the streets, you can read it, and if you don�t read it a little girl will attach herself to your arm and say something you can�t understand. You can�t shake her off, she follows you and whinges. Non parlo bene italiano, mi dispiace, io non capisco. All you can think about is your bag, I do wonder, what was the girl thinking?

It�s not too hard to see what people are thinking as they seem to shout it so loudly to each other.

I find myself feeling small and lost in this city, everyone is busy and rushing and I don�t know where I�m going, I follow blindly and generally afraid.
Will it feel ever feel like mine?

And then I look a little closer and suddenly I�m interested, it catches my interest, the beauty seems so honest, the city holds no false illusions of expectation. The most enchanting view is attached to a crumbling ruin of some sort of building. Walk a little further and suddenly it changes again, the piccolo negozio becomes a perfume boutique, it keeps changing, the views, the people�the little girls.

Her voice isn�t even pretty. I mean, what�s going on?

It takes some getting used to. It will take some getting used to. But I�m feeling optimistic, there�s something so warm I can sense but at the moment a little out of my reach or at least, my understanding.

So this is my city apparently. This is home. I have to make it home, I have to feel at home, and then it will be home. But that, I believe, is the plan.

prende mi adesso at 12:00 a.m.

and every face I saw was the same face | some of them want to be abused