ah, allora.........

On Friday DJ and I tried to find a toy store in a different area of town. DJ did a great job navigating the bus system and getting us to the address listed online but unfortunately the address must have been wrong because there was no toy store to be found. We walked around the middle of nowhere for awhile but eventually gave up and took the bus back to our apartment. Ah, allora.... We went to the little tobacco shop just below our apartment and bought a deck of cards for ~$10 which seemed kind of expensive but Amelia has been enjoying them so it was money well spent. To be honest, her favorite "toys" are still her burp cloth and our belts :).

A cool thing happened on the bus though. A young girl (~15?) noticed Amelia and I signing and started to ask us about it in Italian. It turns out that she is also deaf. She showed us her hearing aid in one of her ears and explained that her mom was also deaf and they used sign language in their home. She was fluent in Italian, English and Sign....impressive :). We only had a chance to talk for a few minutes before she got off of the bus. We told her we were here from CA for a special surgery to help Amelia to hear. She thought that was very cool and we were all happy to make a new connection :).

Last night we set off for another adventure. This time we were trying to find the Birreria (beer hall) that DJ found online. It was only a short walk from our apartment but we had to find streets with sidewalks. We tried to cut through the hospital but it didn't work (unless we wanted to scale an 10' stone wall). DJ was determined though and we did eventually make our way there - without having to climb any walls :)

Everyone got what they were looking for:

It was a fun place and I'm sure we will be back there again before we leave :).