The flight itself was your typical 25 hours including the stopover in Singapore. I bought myself a nifty little laptop bag to replace the dodgy one I’d created back home and that had already given me a nasty pain in the shoulder. I’d been so positive about my packing leading up to today thinking that I had just 20-21kg of stuff, being so proud of myself with the work clothes, normal clothes, shoes, etc…then I realised that I hadn’t been measuring the whole backpack properly and in actual fact my bag was a hefty beast at 27kg. Hence I had to do the bogan country thang and wear my manly work boots on the plane, then somehow cart them with me after I’d converted to thongs in Singapore. Let’s just say that if carry your sports bag on just one arm like a lady and make it look like it’s really light and under the required 7kg (when it is really cutting off your circulation and you can feel your pulse slowly fading in the one arm)…well hey, they don’t ask you to weigh your bag and you walk right through, one functioning-arm less!
Once the flight was over I was lucky enough that my bags came through in the first decent load onto the carrier. Then it was just me and my three bloody bags to lug around the airport until I reached the station, got my tickets from the airport to Roma Trastevere, then continued on from there to San Vincenzo. Once I reached Roma Trastevere I made a phone call to my boss Giorgio to let him know I was alive, and well and truly on the way to the area. He sounded absolutely lovely and reassured that I’m not a complete liar and can actually speak some Italian and wasn’t lying in my curriculum vitae and emails to him. Two and a half hours later, after spending the train ride to San Vincenzo with a man who had a staring problem sitting directly opposite me, I arrived at the coastal town of San Vincenzo where I was greeted by my boss Giorgio Meletti-Cavallari, his girlfriend Francesca and the other girl who’d just arrived yesterday from Milan, Greta.
We drove off together in the car and talked about how everything went, how my last name is said with an emphasis on the ‘g’ in MeneGazzo and not like a C to make it MeneCazzo…you Italians out there will get it. In summation, they are all equally lovely. Giorgio is 30years old, is very open and always has a smile on his face. He started his own business back in the early 2000’s and his father, Piermario Meletti-Cavallari is the man who owned and ran Grattamacco, a very well-known label of some beautiful wines from the Bolgheri area. Francesca is 24years old and just this year finished studying Enology too. She is your typical Italian, brown haired, though with green eyes, tanned and gorgeous. Greta is my age and too finished her degree this year in Enology but has had very little experience working only one vintage a couple of years ago. Her and I are living together in separate rooms in the large villa that will eventually be Giorgio’s house.
- La Villa Borgeri
For now he still lives with his parents in their gorgeous estate surrounded by vineyards up near Castagneto Carducci.
That night we go to Giorgio’s friends place for his birthday party and swim in their pool, eat some lovely food, and drink some of Giorgio’s wine he shows me. By the end of the night I am about to fall off my chair from extreme tiredness so I’m off to bed by 11pm. Poor form, but they understand with what, my almost 30hour journey to get here!
La Donna del Vino 
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