A Trip Abroad
My parents left for a cruise yesterday. They’ll board a shipin Venice and then visit Greece, Croatiaand Turkey.As they were getting ready for their trip, I was reminded of my first trip to Italy in thespring of my senior year of high school.
My high school’s Latin teacher took a group of students to Italyeveryyear (or every other year, I’m not sure I can remember which at this point). Myyear, there were 16 of us going, and I’ve rarely been so excited for avacation. I was lucky to have visited Europe before – London, Paris and Ireland -- but there was something about Italy.I imagined myself surrounded by art, buying tons and tons of clothes and eatingas much pizza as I could stand.
I was surrounded by art, but the clothes were still quite abit out of my price range (no “discount” Prada for me), and thanks to some sortof ridiculous travel bug, I could barely keep anything down, let alone eat myweight in pizza.
Because of this very unpleasant stomach problem, I ended upin a pharmacy in Florence having one of the most awkward conversations a teen girl can have.
“Excuse me?” I said. “Do you have any Pepto?” Admittedly, itwas naïve of me to expect that I could ask for an American pharmaceutical brandname, in English, in Italy,but I was miserable. And, I hoped that the pink stuff was universal.
The woman behind the counter didn’t answer my question atall. She just stared at me before going off to find a man in a white coat. “Yes?”he said.
“I was wondering if you had any Pepto.”
“Pepto?”
“Stomach stuff. I have an upset stomach.”
“Oh,” he said and nodded. “You have the cramps.”
“No, no, not the cramps,” I said. “Upset stomach.”
“Yes,” he nodded again. “The cramps.” Then he looked over somemedicines behind the counter. “Woman problems.”
“No, not woman problems. Stomach problems.”
“The cramps,” he said even louder while motioning with hishands in wide circles in front of what I think was his imaginary uterus. “Thecramps!”
Just a little FYI here, teenage girls don’t like to talkabout their periods. Buying tampons is beyond an ordeal for adolescents, and wego to great lengths to hide these womanly matters from our male peers and mostothers. Having a strange man in a foreign land yell about cramps while comingup with hand motions to illustrate his point is a tad bit, well, mortifying. (Also, I was pretty sure whatever he wanted to give me wasn't going to work. Otherwise, I probably could have sucked it up and given it a shot. But, Midol wasn't going to cut it.)
“Cramps,” he said one last time before digging for moremedicine.
Having turned bright red by now, I ran from the store while thepharmacist was checking his inventory. We clearly weren’t getting anywhere.
Eventually, my stomach just settled itself out, and I wasthoroughly grateful for the absence of pain and the fact that I wouldn’t haveto try that conversation again.
So, here’s to wishing my parents a trip without smallhumiliations, and here’s to learning to buy medicines for any and allsituations before leaving the country. It’s not a mistake I’ve made since.