On Saturday, Vayla and I went to Rimini Wellness 2010 in Rimini. Since it was once again raining biblically (I'm confident we aren't very far from a storm featuring locusts and frogs falling from the sky) it was a good day to be indoors although it was a terrible day to be driving on the autostrada or walking the one kilometer from the parking lot to the expo center. Lothar had told me on Friday that this fair was the biggest of its kind in Italy so I thought I was prepared, but I wasn't prepared.
During the drive we decided to stop for a coffee and the first place we tried to go to, the parking lot was completely full and there was a line of people out the door waiting to get in, along with several large touring buses in the parking lot. A strange site for 9.00 on a Saturday and no way the coffee at a rest stop restaurant was good enough to draw a crowd. Most people were wearing tennis shoes and sweats or workout gear of some sort. Also a strange site. The same thing happened at the second rest stop we stopped tried. We finally found room at the third. By then it was sinking in just how big this show was going to be. People had booked tour buses to bring their groups to the show! It takes about an hour to drive from Ancona to Rimini. It took another hour in traffic to cover the 7 kilometers from the autostrada to the expo center.
Rimini Wellness 2010 is a huge expo for all kinds of indoor gym and fitness equipment - and by all kinds I literally mean every kind you can possibly think of and many you couldn't think of but someone else had thought of it did and they were at the expo trying to sell it. In fact it appears that hammocks are now some sort of exercise craze. Like any expo of this kind, the vendors are there to demo and sell equipment. But it soon became apparent why everyone was wearing workout wear. It wasn't to fit in. It was to workout! All the equipment was available to try and test in organized sessions. There were classes and organized workouts being offered all day long in any discipline: yoga, Pilate's, running, walking, aerobics, weight-lifting, step, spinning, pole dancing aerobics, hip hop, tai chi, boxing, something with a bag full of sand, and something with a stick. Imagine five LARGE expo halls full of equipment, tournaments for footy, kickboxing, boxing, and karate, aerobics and step classes with at least 500 people participating, two spinning classes with a few hundred bikes each, indoor pools with water aerobics classes going on, even LiveStrong was there with something called a Krank. Completely overwhelming. Insane. It was like visiting the world's largest gym.
A Lazy Sunday Afternoon
Sunday afternoon in the US this time of year probably means basketball, baseball and maybe some golf on the TV. Fairly typical. In Italy it meant the F1 Grand Prix from Monte Carlo, Giro d'Italia, and Superbike from South Africa. Lots of choices but all of them overshadowed by football.
It's all soccer almost all the time right now. World Cup is coming and the publicity and even propaganda to get people excited for the national team are in full swing. On Sunday, Serie A finished. Roma trailed Inter by 2 points going into the final weekend. If Inter lost or tied and Roma won, Roma won the title. If Inter won their match, they won the league. Against Siena, a team headed to the lower division next year, they triumphed 1-0 on a late goal by Milito and so won the league. Inter have already won the Italian club tournament, now they have the Serie A trophy. Next weekend is the Champion's League final. If Inter win that they win the treble and they become even more obnoxious than they are already. They are playing Bayern Munich who have also won their league and club titles.
Inter are like the Yankees only more popular. Lots more popular. At least in Italy. They buy the best talent (the starting 11 didn't include an Italian which is a bit of a scandal), the best coach (the self-proclaimed "The Special One", Jose Morinho) and beat up on all the nerds in the playground. Literally minutes after the game ended a few thousand fans here in Ancona gathered in Piazza del Popolo to celebrate. There was the usual singing and waving of flags along with cars full of fans sounding their horns all around the town center with banners streaming from the windows. Scooters and motorcycles too. In Milan, where Inter are from, there were tens of thousands of fans in the Piazza del Duomo going nuts. And while quite rowdy it was never violent. Strangely, no cars were torched or stores vandalized like when the Lakers win. Go figure.
The Giro d'Italia
There is a little bike race going on in Italy right now. It's the Tour of Italy and the Italians are having a rough go of it so far. No stage wins, struggles from their favorite sons, and scant few podium appearances. So while the tifosi (fans) are restless it's still a celebration of the country.
Later this week (Thursday and Friday) the race comes racing through these parts. On Thursday the stage finishes in Porto Recanati just a few kilometers to the south of Ancona. On Friday it actually comes through the middle of town before finishing farther north. The plan for now is to catch parts of both stages and I'm hoping that works out.
Save Greece! Take A Holiday
There is nothing like the feeling of helping others, especially when it helps you too. Like donating your 15 year old used jeans from high school to Goodwill and claiming a $75.00 value for them on your tax return - everyone wins! If you've been paying attention to international news lately, and I don't mean the weekly results for this show then you know Greece isn't doing to well. They need all the help they can get. And tourists help. And you can be a tourist. I recently found out that I can use a house for free on the island of Santorini. This one not this one. So if you're interested in a holiday, and you weren't sure where to go, may I be so modest as to recommend Greece. Help me help you help them. Did I mention the Free House? You're welcome.
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