Rotary GSE Italy Team 2010: Una Giornata di Maratone (a day of marathons)

*Like before, let's give credit where credit's due... JESSICA wrote this one, not me! Again, it's a team effort - she took the time to write it and then I'm taking the time to paste it in and update with pics (cause uploading pics takes a looooooooong time!). Enjoy!*

Okay...so all of you out there reading this blog know I run marathons and half marathons. Running, outside of work, is a big passion of mine and I spend many hours during the week running with friends and training on my own. There is no marathon in the world that could have prepped me for the incredibly busy day that was planned for us....

So as I said, we didn't get much sleep after our trip through Slovenia and Muggia, and we were expected to meet our next host at 8am. Let's do some math here....3 women + 1 bathroom + 1 hairdryer that is working + 8am meet time = a very well coordinated schedule of who is getting up first and how much time each will need. Dave and Tim are so enjoying our discussions of hair prep and makeup products - all part of the GSE experience!!

Alberto "Uno" met us exactly at 8am and thankfully took us to caffe lattes in a square near our first visit. Coffee!!! we NEEDED coffee!! Alberto was the picture of a professional lawyer, as he introduced himself quickly, and immediately impressed the group with his impeccable English. He took careful pains to speak to the group always in English and even took some of the load of interpreting Italian spoken to us into English off of Dave's shoulders throughout our day. A BIG SHOUT OUT to Dave for constantly interpreting - even if he sometimes interprets English into Italian for us by accident when a host actually speaks English to us :) But back to Alberto "Uno" - I'm going to stress again that he was incredibly polite with a gentle smile and the professionalism of a true gentleman. This was daytime time Alberto "Uno" - we'll get to nightime Alberto in a few minutes....but let me tease with a quote from Dave, "who put the quarter in him and powered him up??"

Alberto "Due" meet us shortly after our caffes and joined us in meeting the president of the Trieste Chamber of Commerce and then we continued on our tour of the Chamber of Commerce museum. We immediately fell in love with our second "cartoon character" engaging host - who loved to call Dave "Cop Bertini" and enjoyed our American sarcasm. What we learned in the museum is Trieste and coffee have a long relationship. That is a huge part of the history of importation and exportation of the port of Trieste. Illy coffee - we've now seen the birthplace. It was stressed heavily to us in the tour, something that was mentioned over and over through our visit in Trieste, that the diversity of the port city had a big impact on the culture and industry of the city as a whole. AFter the museum we trekked around the city squares a bit, seeing the various buildings that indicate the diversity - a Greek shipping building, a synagoue, a Slovenian family home.

After a second caffe latte (thank DIO for the caffe!!) we went off to our appointment at the Regional police station. Dave was in his element. We met the chief and some of the divisions leaders in a central chamber. We were given a warm welcome followed by a tour of the bomb diffuser truck, a police vehicle, a tour of the dispatch chamber, and finally a view of their "CSI" division. The dispatch chamber was incredibly interesting - Trieste has 70% of the city covered with cameras that constantly patrol the public spaces for disturbances - we got to see the place all those images come into the police centrally. The camera locations are publically known and were published in a local newspaper - Alberto Uno joked that the tiny amount of crime that occurs in Trieste is found in the 30% of the city that isn't patrolled by cameras. The CSI division was interesting for the old model of a crime scene recreation that was out in the hallway. We learned that in the past, before the days of the CSI we know of, the police in the division would have to build models depicting crime scenes that often took 3 years to build!! Very detailed models but talk about old technology!

After our numerous pictures and goodbyes at the Police Station we went to meet the Mayor at City Hall. He was very gracious, welcomed us in a booming voice, gave us a gorgeous book on the area, and then left us as quickly as he came in. We did a quick tour of the building and headed off to our lunch meeting at the Rotary Club de Trieste. After a truly affascinante lunch, we all quickly got up, gave our presentations and basically ran out of the meeting to get to our next appointment - a "board meeting" at the Research Park - calling out goodbyes to our favorite Alberto "Due" on the way.

WOW! Silicon Valley, eat your heart out - there are some amazing intelligence firms in Trieste!! One CEO of a new product line the Research Park showed us software that helps in solving crimes involving video or surveillance tapes. Dave and Wendy would like to buy a copy for their work places.
So at this point, you must be thinking "that's it - their day has to finally be over"....but it's not. It's a GSE trip after all!! We then went for a quick car ride to the Electron Accelerator plant that houses a large source of energy and scientific research for the Trieste area. We were joined by the President of the Rotary Club de Trieste, Pierpaolo. The accelator was amazing and our tour guide was so nice and informative...but we started to get a little rummy. I'll go ahead and out myself, I was falling asleep while standing listening the talk of how light and energy is created in the accelator. At one point I was swaying while standing and trying desparately to hold my eyes open. Oh did I mention that we wore our uniforms and at one point all of us had heels on?? Kimmie was smart enough to think of the idea of a change of shoes, so those puppies were off pretty much by the time we finished the Chamber of Commerce tour :)

We finally headed back to the hotel for a quick change of clothes before embarking on our nighttime adventures of a cocktail in a famous bar/coffee house followed by dinner at a famous fish restaurant. Here is where we get back to Alberto Uno. Alberto left us at the hotel and went to work for an hour. When he came back to pick us up - the lawyer was gone and the rockstar had joined us. He was cracking us up with jokes, told us some great stories of Trieste, and showed us a fabulous time at both establishments. Alberto and I had gotten into a great conversation on our way to the Rotary lunch meeting earlier in the day about true hospitality and the meaning of the GSE exchange. Our conversation over dinner was so memorable - I left with his business card filled with the names of books he wanted me to read and a you-tube clip of his brother's rock band video he wanted us to see. Thank you Alberto Uno for your amazing hospitality through the day and night and for the entertaining and engaging conversation over dinner!!!

Ciao for now!!

look at the original coffee makers