The maid came today...

said my 32 year old work friend, Marco. I say dumbfounded, "I'm sorry, WHAT?"

He continues, "My maid came today and I told her not to touch my electronics because it was all messed up the last time she came..."

"Marco," I interrupt, "you have a maid?"
"Yes." he says, as if it were a silly question.

I turn to my other work friend and say, "Tomaso, do you have a maid?" He says plainly, "Yes."

Seriously? I mean, OK, Tomaso is a director and 38 years old. Even still, it surprised me... And Marco - c'mon! Marco is an only child who had an Italian mother that waited on him hand and foot - lame excuse. My two cents (and the reason why the chance of me finding my future husband in this country is unlikely), if you've never had to pick up a broom and clean up after yourself you certainly shouldn't have the luxury of someone else doing it for you. Time to take care of yourself, boys!

Then I ask, "Quanto Costa?" (How much?). They both pay 25 euros per week for a woman to clean their apartment for 3 hours at a time... Ah, but the plot thickens when Tomaso says, "Yeah, but mine (yes he actually said "mine") doesn't like to iron so I take my clothes to the shop."

Wait a minute, the "maid service" includes ironing? Now I'm interested... for about 30 seconds (I hate ironing).

No thanks, I think to myself. I will pocket my 100 euros per month and travel and spend 4-6 hours per month cleaning up after myself. Crazy... I know!

Still though... to realize that a "maid" is as common as fender benders in Milan (which is VERY common - see previous post "A day in the life") blew me away. My research is not finished on this topic. Marco and Tomaso are both single men living like bachelors (and no, I'm not interested in either or them for those of you who already went there...) but what about the married folk? Or even the single women? Very interesting. Marco constantly is telling me that Italians are very lazy. I have a fairly good hunch that it isn't "Italians" but just men in general (except my brother, Jeremy - he cleans a lot ;))

OK, more pictures next post - I promise.

Nuovo Italain words/phrases:
Nuovo - New
Lingua - language
Tutti molto buona (Everything is good) - learned that at dinner tonight ;).
Cato (bad four letter word - also learned at dinner tonight ;))
Tu amo - I love you (learned in a movie over the weekend :))

Buona notte!
Jamie