Marios

This is Marios, AKA Mario or Miles. Not sure why italians have a problem pronouncing Miles but Marios, which is not even a name in Italian, seems perfectly normal to them. A lot of people call him Mario too, which makes much more sense. In fact, Miles has started introducing himself as Mario. We take him to the main square here, Piazza del Campo, almost every day so that he can see other kids and play with his ball. He introduces himself to everyone and also asks EVERYONE their name, "Ciao! Come ti chiami? Mi chiamo Mario!" He's learned just what to do and say so that he gets total adoration from everyone, and cookies or chocolate if he's lucky. He is so popular that pretty soon there may be a poster of him in the Piazza.

Mario is doing really well with his Italian. He has totally honed his whine and cheekiness so that within seconds he usually gets what he wants. Yikes. Gonna have to totally re-educate him. He knows all the variations of dolci here and seems very sophisticated in his desert ordering skills. Besides total re-education, he's gonna go into some serious sugar withdrawl too. I've been slow to come around to all the italians slipping him some sugar treat when I'm not looking. This is the italian phenomenon of the "merenda" or snack. Loaded with refined sugar and chocolate they are marketed as FULL of vitamins and MILK. Everywhere you turn here you see ads of good parents giving their children healthy merenda snacks. Even Gabri's mom gave me the evil eye when I asked her to stop giving Miles kinder sorpresa (a chocolate egg with a surprise inside) after every meal. The message here in Italy is that you are either a complete failure as a parent, or a total foreign freak if you do not give your child a steady supply of packaged treats during the day.