There are so many things that have to be discovered anywhere when one moves someplace new. In my case this week, it's trying to figure out how to be properly licensed and registered for a Gran Fondo. It's not like there's a guide to this anywhere in existence. In Italy, 1/2 of the information seems to live on the internet. The other 1/2 is tribal knowledge: the information (appears) to exist in one person's head or a combination of a few people's heads and a paper flyer. The system here hasn't frustrated me like I hear other people being frustrated. (But I haven't tried to buy a house or do anything complicated yet, either.) Also, I don't think there's a system in the world that wouldn't be a little frustrating to someone totally new to it.
Tonight I visited the bike shop that I really like and talked to one of the mechanics who speaks English very well (my hope was that I could get by without the English, but not for this sort of information). I needed to apologize to him for not making the shop rides that he had told me about (and I had planned on attending prior to meeting the group of guys who I rode with this past weekend and last weekend). I was also hoping he could give me information about the upcoming Gran Fondo (which I absolutely can't wait for but in no way am physically ready for).
He was super friendly and he already knew that I had found this other group to ride with. To make a long story short, the cycling world is a very tight-knit, close community. It's a family of sorts and I could already feel it here (as I've mentioned in previous posts); but this was really nice, it was heart-warming to feel that I'm not as anonymous as I was when I first arrived.
The answer about the license is that I need to talk to some other people who will be around tomorrow, so that's a priority. There's a possibility that I'll need an International UCI license (which shouldn't be a problem to get). Hopefully an interesting post tomorrow night (though there might not be time to post anything until Wednesday).
No comments:
Post a Comment