Lucky me! I now get to test every two days for COVID to get a renewal on my Green Pass. This gives me permission to go into restaurants and museums, etc. Carlotta, and old friend from the farm, helped me to figure out that I could drive to the Fiesole pharmacy in the morning and get tested when they open at 9am. Side note – it is so important to be supported by a local or someone that can help you navigate certain more complicated things in Italy. I am finding on this trip there are not many English speakers so I’m grasping to communicate and figure things out at times. Carlotta is my angel!
I drive up to the Fiesole pharmacy to get my test when they open at 9am. I figured driving there early in the morning was my best chance for the clearest of traffic on what I consider to be 1-way roads that Italians use as 2-lane highways. As I am driving up there, I keep talking to myself – ‘That’s good, that’s good all you Italians, sleep-in today, it’s Saturday, please be as unproductive as possible this morning!’
I make back up to Fiesole and find the pharmacy. Of course, it is on a corner with the tiniest of access. I will need to keep driving to find something remotely close. I do find a spot that is a parallel spot, but there are two open back-to-back, so it’s not like I have to park this large car on a rice grain. I move into the spot, I look at the signs…I have no idea if I can park there or not, or park there during these hours, but I figure it is a Saturday morning in a walled City, I should only be gone 15 minutes, this shouldn’t be a problem. Are parking attendants really combing these spots up in the oldest City in the world on a Saturday morning in late November? Um, the answer is yes, yes they are. More on that later.
I walk up to the pharmacy and find about 10 Italians waiting outside. It is 9:10am. I’m making up a story in my mind. Good grief. What? Has the pharmacist not opened up yet? This IS a small town. Wow. And on and on I am going on in my head. I try to make eye-contact to see if anyone will look at me and I can ask them if they speak English. They are all talking amongst themselves and not looking my way. Then I see someone walk out of the pharmacy and I realize they are open!
I keep hearing them say ‘tampona’ – and I’m like, surely, they can’t all be talking about tampons. Well, as it turns out, I figure out, they are Italians that need to be tested every 2 days to work and the COVID test is called the ‘tampona’ in Italian. They have all already had their test and are just waiting on results, so I can go in and let them know I want a test. Which is what I proceed to do. After I talk to the pharmacist, he let’s me know he still isn’t ready to test any new people as he is currently processing the results for the first 10.
I go back out to the crowd and they realize I am American. They first thing they say to me is ‘Let’s go Brandon. Let’s go Brandon.’ Imagine that. They don’t speak an ounce of English, but they want to communicate that to me. I laughed and said, ‘Yes, exactly. Let’s go Brandon.’ Hard to believe that phrase has traveled all the way over here and that would be the first thing they want to communicate to me, in this oldest of Cities in Italy. Every where I go it seems Italians are very anti the current administration.
Pretty soon, a short little doctor in a white coat tells me to go around to the side of the building to a window to get tested. He then asks me, ‘Are you Juliette Louis the American actress?’ I hand him my passport and say, ‘I’m definitely not Juliette Louis.’ He continues to insist I might be her and I look exactly just like her. We get that settled that I’m not her and he asks me to step up closer to the window. It is literally so high, I feel like I am on tip-toes trying to reach the window of a castle.
Then a long stick that looks like a miniature mascara wand at the tip, gets twirled around in both my nostrils. I literally have to stand on the sidewalk on my tippy toes while he does this. When he is done, he says – okay, go wait 15 minutes and we’ll bring out your green pass if you are negative. So I go back and wait around the front again with the ‘Let’s go Brandon’ Italians. About an 1:15 after my arrival – I am done with my testing and sent on my way.
I get back to my car, relieved it hasn’t been towed. The whole walk back I think, this took so much longer than I thought, please don’t let the car be towed, please don’t let the car be towed. Well, it’s there! But now someone has pulled behind me and it will definitely be an Austin Powers 30-point turn to get out of there, oh and what’s this? Something on the windshield? Oh, that must be my parking ticket. So to answer the earlier question – yes, in this oldest City in the world, they are up early on Saturday mornings, roaming the walled City parking areas, looking for infractions.