Young girls love poo

Last update was March 31st. Why? Don't know. For me writing a blog comes natural as a flow of random words out of my brain (do i have one?). And my brain is on only when under pressure, which is not the state I am in in the last month and a half. I've been traveling in spain with some of my best friends from IESE. Then graduation day and then again vacation. But i cannot stay in this state too long. That's why I asked BCG to anticipate my starting date to June 4th instead of September. I don't have money to travel as i would love to do and I am bored of asking money home. Now I don't want to force myself too much to write something so i will just post some pictures from the last weeks, starting from the spain roadtrip to the last event, Chris and Kathi's wedding!

Jumpin under the windmills in memory of Don Chichotte!

The advantage of being the taller of the group: we were 6 in the car but I was on the passenger seat!

Matteo is sleeping? Let's jump him!

A close up of Matteo on the atlantic coast between Santander and Bilbao

Salamanca, university city. Let's have some action!

You don't need a reason to jump

It didn't work out very well...

Many things to remember of this trip... among them for sure:

• Matteo Marcietta bullshitting every other sentece. Like when we entered salamanca and just by being there two minutes he made an estimate of the size of the city and the population and compared it to Piacenza. Definitely he will found the PCG (piacenza consulting group).
• Huy who booked an hotel in san sebastian and we've been looking for it for two hours ending up on the hills just to find out that the hotel he booked was not in San Sebastian (and Matteo's "logrobobos" in the middle of the phone call with the hotel, a word that in spanish does not exist at all!).
• Huy's "PERDONAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"
• Saturday night at VIP Cielo of Pacha in Madrid with Diego. Back at his house at 8 in the morning and eating whatever was in the fridge, even cold meat with chocolate cookies. Suddenly, at 2pm in the middle of my best REM phase of my life, a very high tone voice woke me up yelling "A Despertarseeeeeeee!"... coplued with sheets pulled out of the bed and bulbs at full light in the room. Nice to be woken up by Diego's cute nephews!
• Diego joking about Huy "Yo no hablo espanol, yo solo chupo poja" and Huy "chupo pollo??"

Fuck i think i already forgot many of the funny things... i should have wrote this post long time ago. Shame on me. Here we go with graduation..

El trio italiano

With La Mamma and Il Papà!

I guess you know all of them

Graduation is the less funny part of the MBA, probably the one that i will remember less of these two years. It's just a ceremony where your parents discover what the hell have you been living the previous two years and have a glimps on who are this new friends with wierd names you always talk about! Then some hanging around in Barcelona with the few people that are still around in Barcelona...

Lovely Martina... Who said that models are dumb?

A nice daily trip to cadaquez, delicious village in costa brava.

An absolute must: the Dalì museum in Figueras! What a fuckin genius!

And finally here we go with the wedding, one of the most funny weekends of my life. Chris and Kathi got married in Neaudau, a small town in Austria. For most of us, this will be the next big step of our life, after the MBA. For most of us, this will be the moments when we will get together again, time for memories and hugs, laughs and tears.

Black Tie Ladies and Gentlemen

The just married couple with the IESE friends

Could a jumping pic be missing? Naaaaaaaaat

At 8 in the morning after the big party, with still lot of willingness to party!

Touching the bed at 9am and waking up at 11 can be a tough experience

How to forget people having 4 beers before the ceremony, being two days in a row hungover as part of the wedding celebrations, Francis going to bed at 9, and waking up 2 hours later still with the tux and cufflings on! Not to mention the trip into the fetish shop in Wien when i learnt that Oh-De Toilette can be a movie and that Young Girls Love Poo! Francis: "Hey we have been to a fetish shop this afternoon on our way back from the wedding!" Alexandre:"Already?" Ian:"Did you mean 'Oh really' or 'Already'?" A friend of Francis in a motel (with tiny walls), hears some voices from the room next to his Man voice (angry tone): "Where is it!!!?" Man voice (again): "Where is it!!!?" Tiny lady voice: "It's in my ass" Man voice: "You're damn right, it is!"

Tales from another century

As an italian, very often you are identified abroad as Pizza, Mafia and Mandolino. Given the fact that i never saw a mandolino in my life, i am very proud of the pizza I always had some doubt in identifying myself with the Mafia.

Mainly because i come from Milan, a city in the north where probably the Mafia has planted its seeds as well but for sure is not as visible and rooted as it is in the Sicily. One of the historical reasons why mafia and other crime organization were born in the south is the lack of institutions mixed by centuries of foreigners' dominance of those regions during the XIX century. Local bandits started to supply the need for protection and for somebody above the others able to impose some rules on the society. In sicily they had strong traditions that needed to be preserved, and the Mafia was the grantor of these rules. Rules that survived for centuries and that people wanted them to survive forever. Then Italy was unified and new institutions and bureaucratic figures came into place trying to substitute the old ones. But was not a great success. People still belive in the rule of man rather than the rule of law that came from Rome. People still saw in the Mafia the ideal grantor of what they believe are their values and traditions, even though the price to pay was a burden of terror, intimidations and cospiracy of silence.

Among these old traditions that needed to be carried on forever, was the role of the woman and, most important, the behavioural rules among man and woman.
So, for example, if you smile at a girl, basically you are proposing yourself for marriage.
If you look at a girl without previous consensus from her brothers, you are in trouble.
If you have sex with a girl before marriage, you are dead.

But how was all this enforced? Easily. Suppose on a sunny day you are walking downtown with your daughter and you notice somebody is looking at her. So, you go to the local mafia CEO and you kindly make him aware of this. The next day, two big guys go to the poor boy and propose him a deal: his life in exchange of not looking at her anymore. However, even if the Mafia is till well rooted in Sicily, these rules cased to exists anymore.

Now that you know everything about how Mafia ruled in south Italy, i tell you a story.
Yesterday I was in Sutton. I was commenting on a girl with Valerio when a guy came to me and said "hey you motherfucker stop looking at my girlfriend". We didn't even reply. We laughed and continued talking with the other people who were with us. After two hours, we were dancing at 4 meters distance from the same couples even though i didn't even notice that. At a certain point, two brave guards of the club came and thrown me and Valerio out of the club. The reason: we were annoying those ladies. Whaaaaat???

Welcome to catalunya 2007. Welcome in the XIX century of Italy.

I didn't faint... almost

New York State Law 2165 indicates that anyone taking 6 credits or more must provide the universities with 2 measles, 1 mumps and 1 rubella.
That's why, before leaving for the US I did, in Italy, the vaccinations mentioned above and I sent a paper to the US signed by the doctor that said that I am immune. Unfortunately in the US they have 2 shots while in Italy these 2 shots are used only on kids while adults have a single shot, but with a higher dose of drug.
Obivously no way to convince the health office of Columbia that I am fine with my immunization. So my grades are on hold until I don't provide this proof.

Today, bored by this neverending ping-pong of email between me and the health office of Columbia, I decided to make a move and have a blood test in a Hospital in Barcelona. In this way I should be able to have a certificate that I am fine with the Columbia requirements.
This for me is a big step because every time I have a blood test, I faint. Every superhero has his flaw. Superman has the cryptonite, Bertrand has Tibidabo, I have the needles.
I faint whenever I expect it less. Even after 10-20 minutes from the test. The most tragicominc occurence happened in the elevator of an hospital in Milan. I wooke up when the elevator reached the ground floor and people witing for it saw the door opening and a body (mine) lying on the floor. Really embarrassing, i won't whish for it not even to my worst enemy.
So I was prepared to that. But this time didn't happen. They told me to stay a bit ona chair and I felt comfortable.
So i went to pay and get my bill to get the results back.
141 Euros!!!! (170 dollah!).

I fainted.