"American" Food

Hooray, I made it back from Atlanta in one piece! No real surprise there: the return trip was as uneventful as you could wish.

Leonardo did give me a nice car tour of Rome, during which I got to see some of the most chaotic traffic that exists in a western city. Picture a busy six-way intersection on a broad piazza where the limited traffic markings and signals are broadly ignored. Now add buses, trams, pedestrians, reserved bus/tram/taxi lanes, lost tourists, and famous landmarks and you have a reasonable picture. If you have ever seen Richard Scarry's depictions of traffic in Rome, he got it exactly right. I didn't see any accidents, so the locals must be used to it.

Now back to the title of the post. Since Todi, an in fact all of Italy, has limited non-Italian dining opportunities, I made it a goal to sample as much different fare in Atlanta as time allowed. In my one week there I managed cuisine from the American South, Ethiopia, Thailand, Vietnam, Japan, and India. I also got a quintessential American food--a hamburger--made with bison (at Ted's). Oh, yes, I also have to include the classic Jewish bagel with cream cheese, lox, tomato, onion, and capers that I picked up at 6:30 in the morning at that classic Atlanta institution, The Bagel Palace. Thank you to all my friends and family who helped my quest, and to America for welcoming wonderful favors from around the world,

Michael