Dov'è l'acqua?

[muckefuck]

Since it's intersession, I expected the cafe to be half deserted; instead, it was hectic. I saw a lot of name tags, so I'm assuming there's some conference going on. That's okay: Middle-aged professors mean better eye-candy for me than vapid young things anyway.

Some of the foreigners seemed a little baffled by the drinks dispenser. I saw one kind of confusedly fingering one of the dispenser tabs, like he couldn't quite figure out what it was for. Later, I saw two men huddled together discussing the options. One poured a few fingers of dark soda, tasted it, and poured it out.

"What are you looking for?" I asked, helpfully.

"Biera. Beer? Which one is beer?"

"None of them."

"Where is the water?"

I pointed to one of buttons.

"It says 'Ginger Ale'."

"If you push, ginger ale. If you pull, soda water."

He nodded and his companion began filling a cup. "You know," he said, "In the United States it's hard to find plain water." I shrugged. "Not like Italy," he added. "Of course, everything's better there!" I replied, grinning. "You know it?" he asked before moving away.

Comments

[gopower.livejournal.com]

They have self-serve beer in Italy? That explains a lot.

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

I would think so. AFAIK, most fast-food restaurants in Europe sell beer. It figures, then, that the self-serve ones would let you pour your own.

[aadroma.livejournal.com]

"You know it?" he asked before moving away.

What, was he amazed you knew that things are better in Italy, or that you simply knew what Italy was? That reaction can get read a few ways, y'know ^^;;;

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

I took it to mean "Conosci Italia?" And I do, mai non bene. (I was only there once and that's a loooong time ago now!)