Base In-Doc Training

Wed- Fri Jan. 25-27 - This week I had to participate in the Base Indoctrination which all military, dependents, and civilians must take within the first two weeks of arriving to Sigonella. Overall, the military intro was pretty useless for me due to the short amount of time I'll actually be here and the fact that I don't need to know how housing, pay, or drivers tests work. After all that was out of the way, I did really enjoy the intercultural relations part of the class. It was taught by an Italian/Australian guy named Andrea. That part of the class took the majority of the time and it went over things such as shopping tips, etiquette, language skills, gestures, traveling on the bus and trains hints, details of what Italy has to offer, and finished the class with a trip to Catania where we went to a restaurant to use our Italian to order everything thing. I was really surprised how well I did and how much Italian I learned in 1 1/2 days. It was really fun and the class only had 9 people in it. I made some good connections and Andrea was really impressed with my Italian. I spoke it during the entire field trip on Friday. Friday's field trip was so much fun. For breakfast we went to a bar (which is totally the opposite of a bar in the US) and ordered a raviola. Its a warm sugar-coated pastry like a donut filled with ricotta cheese. It was to die for and Andrea was right when he said they become addictive. I toured Catania with some of the guys and we went to the famous market. They have a huge fish, vegetable, meat, and cheese market in the center and also a giant flea market a little further into town. The market was amazing. The vegetables were so colorful, large, and smelled wonderful. There were crazy looking whole animals getting plucked and carved right in front of your face (sorry Amy) and the fish and other seafood were still moving. They have an amazing selection of fresh fish, mussels, sea urchins, oysters, and eels. I took some pictures of a huge swordfish, the little sea urchins, and anything else that looked ugly. I was surprised, but its true, fresh fish does not smell. Well, doesn't smell bad. I almost tried an oyster, but I chickened out. A little ways from the market was a wine factory where I bought 2 liters of wine for only $3.60. I felt like an idiot for buying that Pinot Noir for $22 euros last weekend. Oh well, I definitely know where I'm buying wines from now on. I got the famous Sicilian Nero D'Avolo. It's really tasty. After shopping, we went to the restaurant I Crociferi where we were served 3 courses. The first course had bruschetta, fried cheese, cauliflower, and smashed chic peas made into a little tortilla. The second course was two types of pasta. A white and an amatrachana. Andrea ordered this pasta called ink pasta which is coated in ink from a squid or something like that. He made me taste it, but it was a little too fishy. Last course was chicken with lemon and a small mixed salad. They don't use dressing like we do, they only have oil and vinegar or lemon. A bunch of people ordered the calamari and of course they made me try it. I tried someones grilled calamari, but it tastes like a tire and had no flavor. I did actually like the fried calamari though. The breading was really good and the legs were dangling outta my mouth. I told myself when I got here that I was going to try everything once, even fish. It was really fun and we left downtown after lunch. I went over to ITT when I got back to see how everyone was doing and what was going on tonight, if anything. Kim and Mack were going over to NAS II to the sports bar called Jox for some beers. They told me to come so I would know why I never need to go back there. It's got a reputation for being pretty lame. It was alright. We just hung out with these 5 Air Force guys that were leaving in the morning for Bahrain. They fly a C-5 which is like the big cargo plane from Operation Dumbo Drop. They were hilarious and I caught the 11 oclock shuttle back home.