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Conversation in Rome:

A: "Look at you! You definitely are well!"
sy: "Ah, thanks. By the way, I brought something from London: scones! We can have them with mascarpone and marmalade because I had to leave the clotted cream behind..."
A: "Oh, you're so English."

Conversation in London:

B: "Are you having another beer?"
sy: "No thanks, I am fine."
B: "Oh, you're so European."

First of all, HAPPY NEW YEAR! 

To be totally honest with you, I would rather have nailed myself to the old one and let it linger, just a little bit more. I really enjoyed the past year, for which I didn't have great expectations and instead it turned out to be very productive, therefore I am welcoming the new one with a bit of wariness.
But it's just a sensation and will dissipate very quickly, as the division of time in years is just a notion: to comfort myself, I have started to think about time as a continued, uninterrupted flow.
It's up to us to make this new year work, not the stars or the planets' conjunction.

The year 2010 ended accompanied by many sensations.
The ones discussed in the reported conversations, for example. The labels that make you feel an in-betweener. You go home and everyone sees you as very English (??), whereas when you come back to your new home, where you started to feel even more comfortable (!!), here it comes this sort of disillusion. The result is a question: where do you belong now, exactly?
Deep down, you know of course. Then why do you feel so strange, even physically, in your hometown?

About last post and all my purposes, I did respect many: I went around a lot, saw friends and family, wore short sleeved garments which left everyone astonished.

C: "Oh my God, aren't you cold?"
sy: "My dear, it's minus one in London! Here it's 18 degrees!"
C: "You've become so..."
sy: "English, I know. In fact, it's called acclimatization."

The first days were accompanied by too much food and a persistent feeling of dizziness, nausea almost. I blamed it on the fact that the air must be much less polluted in Rome, but as you may imagine such symptoms bring up other kind of speculations, like pregnancy. Smile politely and let your interlocutor know that no, you're taking it easy. Same sentence as last year, of course.

After all of this is gone, you lapse yourself into family and friends cuddles, the true thing that makes you feel home once again. Some of them still ask you what is it that you miss the most. Well, after five minutes thinking, the answer is: definitely this, but unfortunately it's not unbearable anymore.
Not quite, at least.

I will leave you now with some pictures of places. Not the charming alleys of Rome that I so much wanted to visit again (and I did, avoiding the already mentioned traffic jam this time!), but other kind of places with their dense atmosphere.
Places where people come and go, sit comfortably for a while, share life, experiences, leave and come back the day after, or the year after.

Caffe' Necci, Rome

Caffe' Terzi, Bologna

Trattoria Anna Maria, Bologna: all frames contain greetings by very happy clients. No surprise: amazing tortellini.

Trastevere, Rome: please notice the blackboard next to the entrance.

Book store in Trastevere, Rome: I see Jamie Oliver has reached us

Very old Restaurant in Piazza Campo de' Fiori, Rome

I have stolen this last two pictures on a very crowded underground in Rome.
I had to act quickly, and pretend I was just browsing the images on my camera.