Viva Italia!

Business trips to exotic locations in Europe are just so hard, aren't they? As someone I met recently, would say, "Aw, bourgeois tragedy."

So, the last six months or more I've been totally, completely obsessed with the Democratic primary. I've been explaining it to all of my colleagues, who are young Saudi women, and now they're almost as well-versed in the delegate selection process as I am. I give free daily updates and scandal alerts. They all like Obama. Apparently, so does Europe. I'm not very surprised. And, just to share my two-cents, all of this talk about whether the Islamic countries think he's Muslim or not (and therefore whether he is an apostate by converting to Christianity and therefore whether he deserves instantaneous painful death) is totally ridiculous. People are more impressed that he might, unlike some people I can name, actually know something about Islam, and stop making embarrassing statements confusing major sects or lumping Muslims together in one happy terrorist family.

There was a lot of talk about Obama at this conference. And Hillary, of course, because it was all women's educators from women's schools. What a fascinating contest this was. And what a fascinating chapter for American reputation abroad. I'm with all of those, most recently Thomas Friedman, who have noted that Barack Obama, all by himself, just by existing, has improved American reputation immeasurably.

Anyway, I had a great time in Italy. The prettiest part was undoubtedly the cathedral in Milan. Totally gorgeous.

And here, to the left, a 700-year-old university courtyard attached to the University of Pavia. It always surprises me to realize "this thing is older than America." And it always reminds me of the Eddie Izzard quips from Dress to Kill about age and Americans. Two stick out. One, about renovating a building to the way it looked "almost fifty years ago." He then mimes passersby, in shock, gasping "No! No one was alive then!"

Or the one about Disney building Eurodisney and replicating the Disney castle. Izzard snidely remarks, out of the side of his mouth, in reference to the castle, "You better make it a little bigger... they've actually got them here." Yes, in Pavia they actually have 700-year-old Universities, who graduated people like Golgi (we all learned about his apparatus) and Mr. Voltae, after whom the Volt is named. Yes. People from the olden days.

And here, the bathroom in my hotel room which was, as you can see on the right, in the lounge. And there was no separate shower. So, in order to bathe onesself, you had to sit (or, i guess you could have stood) in the bathtub pictured here, and use the shower attached to the tub. Obviously, the room was intended for honeymooners or people with exhibitionist tendencies, and not for people used to showering in the privacy of, well.... privacy.

And, walking back from the Duomo on the last day, accompanied by two Saudi women, one of whom at least is fairly conservative, we walk into the middle of......the 2008 Milan Gay Pride Parade. There was some shock and awe. There were scantily dressed men in angel wings. It was a party! And if I needed something to cleanse my palette of Saudi Arabia, remind me that the rest of the world does exist somewhere on the outside, it's a gay pride parade. Nothing could be less Saudi.


As the parade faded into the distance, one of my colleagues turned and yelled after it, "See you in Jeddah!"

Ha.