I found them; an Italian guy was selling them on the side of SP.106 SP is short for "Strada Provinciale" or something close to that, which basically means county road. So the wife and I were heading down county road 106, the one that gets you from one part of the base to the other, and on the side of the road a bunch of these rugs were hanging. We decided to stop as there was a particular rug that E and I had both independently noticed on seperate occasions and mentioned to each other. Since we were on a time schedule--the thrift store has dollar bag saturdays every payday weekend and we received a three dollar coupon as part of INDOC--we kept going, deciding to stop on the way home. After getting E's hair cut, sampling some local wines at the NEX, and realizing that the thrift store wasn't open this particular saturday, we headed back, in the rain (another side note: Catania flooded last night. Somehow I'm glad we're this far up the hill).
By the time we reached the rug guy it had slowed to a slight drizzle but the rug we wanted was gone. grr. We realized this only after parking precariously on the side of the road and investigating what other cool wares the man had to offer. We told him about the green rug that we had previously laid eyes on adn he informed us that he had sold it, the last one of its kind, to "Americano." He took us to the back of his truck to show us more of his stuff, and we noticed a very similar rug to the one that we had in mind. Turns out it was the same pattern and colors, but this one had tassles on either end. "Cool, I can live with tassles."
The man was willing to part with said rug for 70 Euro ($84ish US). Another rug however, came with his recommendation as it was bigger than most of his stock and thus more suitable for the Americanized homes that we live in. He offerd that rug to us for 200 Euro (approx $240 US.) The wife and I really liked our original choice but this new option had its appeal as well. The concessionare could see the hesitation and said "for you my friend, both for 200 Euro." E and I decided that this was a stellar deal, but it was too bad that my wallet was lacking the funds for this. I told the gentleman that I only had 145 Euro on my person, otherwise we would gladly take him up on this great deal. He replied that he would also consider any american money we had ($5) and any gas coupons we might be able to part with. (side note: gas coupons are like little pieces of gold. I buy coupons good for 5, 10 or 20 litres of gas at about two thirds of the cost that gas would cost on the economy. These coupons are rationed out based on the size of your vehicle and its horsepower. For my Nissan I am afforded 300 litres a month. I pay about $210 for the 300 litres which ends up costing me a little under one euro a litre.The locals pay about 1.22. Since these coupons are rationed and signed for with serial numbers it would be a bad idea to use these as currency. I was told stories about people paying "umbrella girls*" with these tickets. Anyways, thankfully I had left my coupons at home so this was of no further issue.) We thought briefly of buying one rug, or coming back some other time with more money, but as we were trying to come up with a way of phrasing this in Italian the man offered to sell both rugs to me for what I had on me.
Hooray cheap rugs from Italy:
this is the one that we really like.
this is the big one, we also like it. The boy is thrilled to have something else to sit on other than tile.So I guess I didn't really haggle, per se, but I did get a great deal. I think.
*Umbrella girl = lady of a certain class who sits under an umbrella by the side of the road waiting for passers-by, get it?
15 comments:
LOVE the first rug-we must have similar tastes? ;)
for those of you who are all about the math, right now 1 euro is about $1.25 US.
What size are these? They look like they cover a lot of space.
I am drawn to the green one too, but I'm thinking that the other is a great nuetral. You can add any other color to that room. You probably won't let the baby spill grape juice or anything on it though. Although, really, wouldn't a nice deep purple be a great color to pair with the tan?
I want to look at the pictures again before comment (the other post) but I have a great companion picture to the baby in the sink pic. heh.
no to the purple, ditto to the strong emotional attachment to the green. it's just big enough to fit the table granny refinished and four chairs. Perhaps 4x6. The other one is big, maybe 8x10 or 10x12. we can paint here, as long as we primer before we leave, so I'm thinking about that.
also, I've heard about lanolin spray for covers, am wondering whether it would work on the carpet as a stain repellant. I might just have to experiment.
Would the lanolin become a magnet to dirt? Otherwise nice rugs! Can't wait for the house tour.Love you.
there are definitely stainguard type sprays but I've not used any. I think they work. You could definitely research.
They will be a nice souvenir if they make it back here.
Do you want me to investigate "babylegs"? What temp is it there? Is the floor cold (between rugs)?
the floor is kinda chilly and hard, babylegs might not be a bad thing. oh and we all of the sudden need a password and user id for the tag board. so ntil this gets figured out we can't read tags =(
(it says we need a cpanel name and password for every blog with a tagboard. weird.)
that was waaz's comment above, but I agree, and add to that that even though babylegs look kind of odd, I bet they make diaper changing really easy with no pants to take off...which is probably why longies are so popular.
I noticed that cpanel thing too. I'll try to investigate. Tomorrow.
yeah, that weird password thing is popping up on all the blogs now and I'm too tired to figure it out. let me know when you figure it out Big B.
er, Babylegs?? are those kinda like the knitted leggie-things we wore in the early 80's?
and Em, how're the diapers working out? When my time comes I want to try to go with cloth diapers.
b- when your time comes let me know and I'll hook you up with a few different styles to try. I love cd'ing; it's EASY (don't let anyone tell you otherwise), economical, healthy, and fun. It also helps that mom's interested, so she's making me all kinds of fun things with her serger and knitting needles. At some point I'm going to put together a cd post with pics of everything I've got, just because I like it that much and a few people have shown interest.
and yeah, babylegs are basically leggings.
I think it helps that I'm not grossed out by bodily functions as I deal with them everyday in my job. I remember when I came back from Alaska and enthusiastically told mom all about Simone's neat cloth diapers-she was so grossed out she wouldn't even let me finish telling her about it (maybe it was the outhouse/no running water bit that was the kicker?)
I guessed by the early baby pictures that Simone uses wool on the outside? What does she use inside? I got all excited when I saw the plaid wool in the photo, though no one seemed to know what I was talking about.
I confess that at this point, with the research I've been doing, that disposibles kind of make me ill. How's that for radical?
the disposables make me ill too, esp. all that blue gook on the inside that soaks up everything.
Simone uses some kind of cloth pad on the inside, sort of like a pad you'd place on underwear for a period. She unbottons it from the outside holder and empties the poo into the outhouse or else throws the wet one in a a special bag. her husband launders them at the local laundromat (where you can take a shower for just $3.50!) and adds tea tree oil to them. he runs them a second time if they have poo on them.
About the cpanel thing: If you try to go to the tag-board site to try to fix it, you get the same page asking for your username and password. Arrghh!
oh mom!
Post a Comment