This day started out like the rest. Sun crept through the window of my room, waking me from a peaceful slumber. I rolled out from under my sheets, removing the cocoon I had forged out of an assortment of blankets splattered with strange but now endearing cartoon characters, and quickly put myself together. Still half asleep, I put on a pot of coffee, having finally mastered the three-piece Italian gadget that somehow churned out the perfect cup of coffee when properly assembled. I smiled, mind wandering to future plans of an afternoon at the Borghese gardens, a class trip to Florence, a weekend in Paris.<\/p>\n
My roommate Lisa joined me, drawn to the smell of morning coffee. We idly chatted until I glanced at the clock, realizing that we had only minutes until class. I rushed to grab my school bag and followed Lisa out the door, coffee mug still in hand, an unintentional habit I had developed.<\/p>\n
We rushed down the eight flights of stairs from our apartment to the Campo de Fiori market below. The market was busy already, overflowing with fanny-pack-toting tourists preparing to conquer the sights of Rome. Our friend \u201cSpicy\u201d was already working, corralling people into his restaurant for morning cappuccinos, a textbook example of unwavering charm.<\/p>\n
\u201cHello, spicy girls!\u201d he called as he sauntered over to us. After six weeks in Rome, we responded to this as if he had been saying our names.<\/p>\n
\u201cHi Spicy, how are you?\u201d we responded, perfectly synchronized.<\/p>\n
He leaned in, arms draped lightly around our shoulders. \u201cI am so fucking tired,\u201d he whispered, before turning his back to us once again. Moments later, I could hear him laughing with new potential customers, an easy smile returning to his face as if it had never left.<\/p>\n
I told Lisa to save me a seat in class as we went our separate ways, and I ventured off to get some breakfast. Tardiness, I had learned, was a small price to pay for that fresh market fruit that we had only a few more weeks to enjoy. And it didn\u2019t strike me as unusual at the time, and maybe that\u2019s what made it such a big moment, but as I walked through the market, that living postcard with its lively characters and its constant street music alternating between Edith Piaf and Led Zeppelin, I remember feeling an overwhelming sense of ease. I was no longer fazed by the vast array of vendors as I made my way through the chaos to get my daily morning banana.<\/p>\n
For the first time that day, the man working at the stand looked up as I approached, his face lighting up with recognition. With an expectant look on his face, he gestured toward my usual purchase: a perfectly ripe banana. I nodded and thanked him as I paid, too quickly reaching the extent of my Italian.<\/p>\n
I walked away, laughing at my own predictability and smiling at the recognition. Somehow, unbeknownst to me at the time, I had made myself at home on the other side of the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This day started out like the rest. Sun crept through the window of my room, waking me from a peaceful slumber. I rolled out from under my sheets, removing the cocoon I had forged out of an assortment of blankets splattered with strange but now endearing cartoon characters, and quickly put myself together. Still half […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[48],"tags":[54,12,40,39],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/chidint\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/chidint\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/chidint\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/chidint\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/chidint\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=127"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/chidint\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":388,"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/chidint\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127\/revisions\/388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/chidint\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/chidint\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/depts.washington.edu\/chidint\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}