Gelato for your soul

No, not like the "soup for the soul" where I give you a motivational speech about "your" self-esteem. Literally a trade of goods, not one, but two ice creams for the low low cost of your immortal soul. In June of 2005 Crystal and I entered in to holy matrimony. The next day we decided to throw what was left our our student loans into a dream honey moon to Italy. The keystone of our trip was gelato, we ate it everywhere we went, every day we were there and most of the time two to three times a day. Saying it was a staple would be selling it short, saying we lived for it would probably be more accurate.

It seems like every corner in Italy has a little Mom and Pop gelato store, they didn't charge much and it was all homemade tastiness. By the time we came to our our last day in Rome, we figured ourselves to be gelato vets. We had been eating tons of it everyday and had visited almost every shop in walking distance of our hotel. Walking in the streets below the spanish steps we decided it was yet again time for ice cream. Up until now we had avoided the big touristy shops and stuck to the low profile ones.

We decided to splurge and go to a shop on the main drag that looked like they were celebrating some sort of gelato revolution. Waffle cones, damn yeah! Little Italian flags and dyed decorative waffle cone biscuit things, you bet your ass! Pile it on! I could easily imagine a more extravagant serving of iced cream (gold leaf, bits of real diamond and such), but none that I have ever held in my hand. I imagined the price would be a little higher (as it was not listed) than the standard price we had been paying. Two to three euros for the run of the mill two scopes down the corner, so about five to six euros or close to it for a waffle cone and some frill?

Right? Wrong, when we got to the register the clerk announced the cost of forty euros. For ice cream? Maybe there was diamonds in it or possibly the blood of some endangered bird was used to dye the decorative biscuits? Crystal jerked her arm out toward the clerk like an ice cream spear of Sparta, while informing them that she would not pay their gelato dowry. I, the cautious travel experienced husband, imagined an escalated situation in which the Italian police were brought in to sort things out. Beretta sub machine gun and lack of the English language in hand. So I decided to inventory our cash. All the while Crystal remained steadfast in her refusal to pay and the clerk continued to reassure Crystal that it was a "special cone".

While I was adding up the money we had with us, the clerk was doing the same. She must have spotted thirty, because a moment later that was the new price she offered. My exact words to the clerk after she offered the new amount were "thirty?". Please take note of the "?" as it was the emphasis for me, but not for the clerk. Apparently this was confirmation enough for her, not the question I had meant it to be, she reached across the counter and grabbed the money out of my wallet. Transaction complete. Any attempts to reason or argue with the clerk were now meet with "no English", while her hands proclaimed innocence in the air.

In the words of Willy Wonka, "You lose! Good day sir!", except in this case I couldn't get all Grandpa Joe up in it, because this Willy Wonka only spoke Italian. We took it as a life lesson learned and walked away, embarrassed and short thirty euros. Oh and the salt in the wound, the gelato wasn't even that good, we had much better, for tons cheaper, on many other occasions.