Well, I'm back, from Italy....what a place. I could live there quite happily, I love the Country, the people and I reckon I could manage the language after a while. I was picking it up after two weeks, so I reckon I would have been speaking sentences in a month. I could ask for my cappucino hot at least, the first one I got at the Rome airport was lukewarm, and it seems that's how they serve it there, so "Multo, multo calde" was my response after that....and I got hot cappucino.....YAAAY!!!!!

I was picked up at the Rome airport, late, panic, panic, panic, Massimo was held up in a traffic jam, and they have some doozies!!!!!! We drove through the Italian countryside and through Tuscany (Toscana) to them, and arrived at Firenze....(Florence to us) and had my very first meal in Italy at a lovely Ristorante....you don't have to guess what that is

....anyway, dogs are allowed in the eating places over there, I snapped a cute Chihuahua at the table with his mistress and friend....

And the FOOD they pile in, I couldn't eat it all, honestly, it was HUGE what they served, and different too.... not like our pasta and pizzas.....better...much better.

They, Massimo and Giovanni, the AIALA Club President, showed me around Florence and it was magic. I took pictures, they probably wont mean much to others, but I remember the great day seeing it all... I stayed with Massimo and Guilio in the house of the latter, along with his mother Maria, who never spoke a word of English but we communicated just fine... I learnt the bathroom is a "Bangi" pronounced "Banyo" which is the name of a suburb in Brisbane here.... I learnt the words for "when, what, this, how much, count to seven"....and my hot cappucino, plus a few others...

Saturday morning another friend of theirs arrived, Stephanie, she spoke a little English, who was driving us all to Genoa....I should have said "flying" I asked her did she has a pilots licence, that made her laugh� they all drive at 140kms PLUS, an hour.....

We got to the show and I was astounded at the size of the building....

it was massive, I took a picture of one side, and this was doubled in one hall with a second hall just out the door and over the way..... After judging the dogs that day, we mooched around, and with Guilio�s help I spoke to a few people, mainly Pug and Peke people about their dogs....I found my Best of Breed Peke was a Nowai bitch from UK, and I had Roy Stotts Tubthumper entered, but he never turned up, mores the pity, I would have liked to have seen him..... then we drove to the hotel, the Bristol Palace, no less, we all got changed in my room, on my insistence, as they were going to go to Massimos family to change, and then we went window shopping in Genoa and then to dinner at a lovely Ristorante....complete with an army of waiters and waitresses....and the food again, was plentiful....I was starting to get pretty tired around midnight and we left and they took me back to the hotel and Guilio, Massimo and Stephanie went to stay with Massimos family.

They next day was Afghan judging, with four Sighthound breeds on first. Then on with the Afghans, and it was a big entry they told me, the biggest for a while. I was thrilled with the amount of dogs in each class, and even though it is judged to a different plan to Australia or even USA, I got stuck into it and found the dogs I liked. When I had arrived at my final decisions, I was pleased to note later on, that the Open Dog, Open Bitch and the Champion Dog were all by the same sire.... and the Best of Breed Afghan went through two more judges to become Best in Show, I was over the moon.... what a thrill for me.

We then all got into Stephanies car and drove back to Lucca.

Guilio, Massimo and Giovanni, along with his wife Valeria and their handler and partner in the grooming shop, Stephan0, took me around to see Italy over the next two weeks.

I visited the old city of Lucca, with it's impregnable walls that Napoleon couldn't conquer, with Guilio, we went to Pisa, met Giovanni and Valeria and explored there,


to Livorno, with Massimo and Guilio, who took all the pictures this time, not me... so I have to wait for his pictures from there.... a coastal town, to Massa, famous for it's marble, all the streets were paved with the stuff and all the shops had marble fronts, floors, etc., we also went to Montecatini an old Roman thermal city, to Prato where Giovanni lived, to Verona instead of the Paris Dog Show, as there was no accomodation available, we went to a huge Horse Expo and it was tremendous....

to Siena with Giovanni, Valeria, Guilio and Massimo,

back to Florence at night with them all.....

we were walking around there at 2.30 in the morning, they keep weird hours and eat at even odder hours....lunch around 2pm with dinner at somewhere around 9pm..... and it was weird when they�d say to me, "Cappucino??" and walked into a "Bar" and stood at the counter drinking Caff� and munching sweet pastries....some liquor was sold there but it was mainly a coffee bar.

The toilets in these bars was a �study��.unisex, and one was even a square hole in the floor, tiled and done with marble�blew me away when I was in this one and a man opened the door to �go��luckily I was washing my hands at this stage�. Guilio laughed and told me that it was �their way� in the shops�

I saw a whole street of jewellers shops on the Ponte Vecchio bridge in Florence,

what I could have done with a few hundred dollars there!!!!!.....a full street of "Names" in designer clothes,,, like Armani, Gucci, Versace......and one Enrico Coveri, from whom I was presented with a handbag in Florence colours, purple, at the show.....plus a shawl type throw around the shoulder thingie, with a pekingese picture on it...both gifts from the President of the AIALA Club.... I saw statues, that I couldn't do justice to with the camera....night scenes of Florence which are lost in the pictures....they took me to Monteriggioni Castle on the way to Siena,

it was still original and being lived in now....and their streets are so narrow in these towns/cities, yet cars whizz around in them like you wouldn't believe...

I have been asked to go back, and from what I could make out, it's in 2004 to do a Raduno (National) and a Hound (Levriere) Show and Italian Greyhound one as well, the (Piccolo Levriere Italiane)... I�m rapt.

We had dinner at different Ristorantes, Chinese, Spanish, Italian of course, Giovannis home and Guilios home. The atmosphere at these dinners was fantastic, everyone trying to talk to me at once with poor Guilio trying to eat and translate as well, it�s a wonder he got anything to eat.

Would you believe I wept when I had to leave, and the guys nearly broke my ribs when they hugged me goodbye.

Then I tripped and fell getting off in Frankfurt, the plane landed at 9.40pm and my connecting flight to Singapore left at 9.31pm so I was trying to hurry, from gate A1 to B25 which was in another building on another level at the other end of the airport..... my little purple case got snagged on the walkway, it stopped and I kept going, landed on my left hand and spent half the flight to Singapore with it packed in ice to stop it swelling... what a pain!!!!!! Caught a head cold and sneezed most of the way home, got back and Patrick also had the head cold brewing so we have both been under the weather for a week. Today I finally started catching up with the grooming, did six of them today, more tomorrow....

I can't think of anymore to tell you, other than I had a great time, and I miss Italy, and my friends there, very, very much.....

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