Egyptian Hats, Big Dick Towers, and a Cow called Gigi
I write this on a high speed train from Bologna to Bolzano. Bolzano is where we'll start our six days of hiking through the Dolomites. We spent three days in Bologna where we learned about their history from the Paleolithic people, through to the Etruscans, to the Celts and the Gauls, through to the Romans, the Lombards, the Holy Roman Empire, the Napoleonic times, up to the Nazi bombings of WWII.
It's something that hits me every time I come to Europe - just the longevity of all of these places. The layers that intersect and sit on top of each other. The intertwining of the history of the place with modernity. The churches that span centuries. The churches that took centuries to build. The fact that all of these different cultures sit within, not just Europe, but within each of the countries of Europe. The unique foods of each region. We have some of this in the United States, but we're much more homogenized, particularly when you consider our size. We'll see what the Dolomites brings with the mixture of mountains, Italian, Austrian, and Swiss cultures.
So I feel like a pretentious college kid who just spent a semester abroad and comes home thinking he is wiser and uniquely worldly.
Bologna is a city known for its towers, its churches, its university that dates to 1088, and its food. It's mostly known for its food. The surrounding area gave us Lasagna, Mortadella, Parmesan Cheese, Prosciutto, Balsamic Vinegar, Tortellini, and (of course) Bolognese. We did everything we could to pack as much of that into our gullets over the short time we were here.
We learned that the building of their famous towers - currently 22, down from well over 100 of them - was mostly just a dick measuring contest as wealthy families tried to show how wealthy they were. We went to the really impressive Egyptian exhibit at their Archaeology Museum where we mused about the fact that Egyptian statues and mummies and artwork that span millennia all seem to wear the same hat, showing that fashion doesn't need to change every few years.
It all felt relevant as my mom is currently in Egypt, dealing with some stuff.
How I'm feeling
Much better than I anticipated. Energy levels have been mostly good. My cough is gone. I've proven that I can walk 8 miles a day, albeit through the relatively flat, but sometimes cobblestoned porticos of Bologna. I feel ready for the hiking - we will take it day by day and take a day off if we (I) need to, but right now…It's all systems go.
There are also some really good tea leaves to read from my last appointment with Dr. Yorio. Nothing definitive, but we have three really good signs that the medication is working:
My cough - my precious and persistent cough. The noise I was making most mornings and evenings that had gotten substantially worse over the last couple of months. It's gone - don't let the door hit you on the way out. Dr. Yorio indicated that it may be an indication that the large tumor in my right lung is shrinking.
My night sweats - the drenched series of nights that I would change my clothes and towel off multiple times. They are gone.
My red blood cell count - the thing that started this all, that caused me to go through all the initial tests to find out what was wrong. My red blood cell count is improving. It's still below normal thresholds, but it's moving in the right direction.
I'm careful not to get too excited, but these are all very good indicators that my body is responding very well to the medicine. We'll have more information after the scans on 9/27, with a review of them on 9/28.
Beyond that, the side effects are supposed to ramp up with each progressive dose. I'm just about 1 week in after my 3rd dose, and so far, so good. Just mild fatigue and this damn shoulder issue that, supposedly, is further inflamed by the medication.
What I'm thankful for
My sister, Amy. We got some pretty scary news last Tuesday from my mom in Cairo. She broke her hip and was in the hospital, awaiting hip replacement surgery. In Cairo. We've been able to talk to her every day and confirmed early on that she was at a private hospital (which meant western standards), which was reassuring.
I'm happy to report that my mom’s hip replacement surgery was successful and she is starting to walk with the support of a walker. She'd gone through this with the other hip (and both knees - she's truly bionic), and it's amazing how short the recovery is.
That's easy for me to say.
My sister worked with the cruise line to extend our mom’s time in the hospital to sync up with her departure date on Friday the 18th (they wanted to discharge her this past Saturday, 3 days after the surgery); and helped get her and her traveling companion upgraded to Business Class for the flight home, so that she can be as comfortable as possible. This was no small feat as there was dealing with language barriers, customer service, figuring out passwords, time changes, and just breaking through barriers. Amy also has had a lot going on with her family and at work - just a ton to juggle and this was a really tough plane to land. Both of us were trying to figure out if we needed to fly out there, but we now feel like there is a good plan in place to get my mom home safely, and I'm really appreciative of all that Amy did to make that happen.
There will also likely be needs both big and small that will be coming up after my mom gets home, and I don't feel great that most of that will fall on Amy as she is local. Huge thanks, and I owe her a spa day (or week).
A memory
As I sit on this train, it's hard not to look back at other train rides I've taken through Europe.
I traveled around Europe when I was 20 with Brendan, Josh, and Josh's roommate, a guy name Guy, where we hit 11 cities across 8 countries. We were supposed to take a train from Berlin to Dresden, but mistakenly took the train from Dresden to Berlin, giving us a brief stop at the Baltic Sea, before our return trip to Dresden. By the time we got to the hostel we were supposed to stay at, it was full, so we wound up sleeping at the train station before an early trip to Prague. Regardless, Dresden was beautiful. East Germany had only recently opened up and there were still remnants of WWII as the Soviets intentionally left statues and buildings that had been bombed during the fire bombing of Dresden as reminders.
Another time on that trip we were supposed to go from Barcelona to Paris, via a connection in Lyons. We had a sleeping car that I left my money belt in when we departed the train. In the 90s your money belt was not just a sign that you were a dork, it was also your life. Mine carried my passport, airline tickets, traveler's checks, and cigarettes. I jumped on and off the train and then on again just before it departed, telling my friends that I'd be back. This was before cell phones - I have no idea how we ever found each other back then in general, let alone in this circumstance.
I headed in the direction of Switzerland on my own. Pretty quickly, I found one of the workers on the train and asked him if they'd found my money belt. Officially, I think I said "avez vous mon Money Belt". After three years of French this was, sadly, the best I could do. Fortunately, he did. He returned my money belt, with the only thing missing being my cigarettes. I got off on the next stop and grabbed the next train to Lyons.
I think the total detour cost us four or five hours. Unfortunately, it was a Sunday and all of the shops in Lyons were closed. This was a problem as everyone was out of cigarettes.
Since that trip I've done a sleeping car with Brendan and Diana from Budapest to Belgrade, and been stranded with Amy for hours at a connection in France due to French strikes, which are reportedly pretty routine. Today, it seems like everything will be uneventful.
But we're not there yet.
What I'm looking forward to
Tomorrow we hike! Six days of guided hikes through the Italian Alps, with distances ranging from 5 to 12 miles. We get to choose our own adventure each day, with three different options for distance. We'll stay in three different luxury lodges, eat local food, get a spa treatment or two and enjoy epic views, scenery, local food and mountain air.
Our entire trip here was centered around this adventure, and I'm really excited that we're going to be able to do it!
Something I recommend
I just finished this great book called "Overstory". I'm cheating here as it was in Amy's recommendations on an earlier blog post. It covers ~6 different characters whose stories revolve and intersect around their love and protection of our trees and forests. It's an epic piece of story-telling that at times puts you in the forest and makes you feel the different micro-ecosystems and life forces that exist there. Real page turner.
What I ate
Yesterday we had one of the best meals of our lives at Trattoria Da Me Nella Torre in Bologna. It's built into one of the towers in the city. We started with their plate of local hams paired with cheese gelato - when we looked at the menu we were a little perplexed by the idea of ice cream as a starter course, but it came highly recommended and didn't disappoint. It was a half dozen different local hams (mortadella to prosciutto to salami) and three cheese gelatos, all bordered on savory, with the highlight being the gorgonzola.
We followed that up with a Tortellini in Brodo (broth of a Capon) and a Lasagna. Both were amazing, but the Lasagna sort of defied what Lasagna can be. The pasta layers were epically thin and just melted in the mouth. One of the best things I've ever eaten. 5 stars.
Random thought
In 1872 the average American farmer fed roughly four other people. Now it's about 155. In 1950 the average cow yielded 5,300 pounds of milk. In 2016 the average cow yielded 23,000. A Wisconsin Holstein recently yielded nearly 75,000, which equates to about 24 gallons a day. Her name is Gigi.
Whether you think of this as a good thing or a bad thing is up to you. I sort of think it's both. Much is made about the negative aspects of the industrialization of our food supply, and geez…poor Gigi. Honestly, hearing that Gigi produces 75,000 pounds per year, makes the mere 23,000 pounds sound reasonable, but seriously?
And cows aren't the right example for this as they are notoriously resource intensive. They require a lot of land, produce a ton of methane, and are really just not the most productive way to produce calories. This combined with the inhumane practices that take place at industrialized cattle farms, both in the US and abroad, makes this…not the best example.
Except, we now feed over 8 billion people on Earth. And that doesn't happen without industrialization of our food supply. We also have 1 farmer feeding 155 people, versus only feeding 4 people in 1872. That frees up a lot of people to work on a lot of great (and some not so great) stuff.
It's sometimes easy to point to all of the ails of modern society, but, in most ways, our standard of living is better now than it ever was. One can romanticize the hunter gatherer, pastoral, or agrarian life, but really…We have sanitation systems, healthcare systems, air conditioning, transportation, communication, and all sorts of other stuff. Less people, by percentage, go hungry today than at any time in human history.
So yes, there is a doomsday clock and many things that could end life as we know it, but there's also plenty of hope.
