An Unwelcome Reception (or: Encounter #3)

If you are moving with a large group it will be hard to find a place to eat in Rome. Restaurants are generally about twelve feet wide and they rarely jump at the chance of seating fifteen large American college students. On this night a group of fifteen was wandering in Trastevere looking for a decent meal. Someone among the group spotted a small restaurant, and as groups like these tend to become like one large unintelligent worm, everyone followed what the "eyes" had seen. The restaurant was small and narrow, there was only enough room for us to walk single file through the central aisle. As we entered Italians looked up from their meals. There was a man with a microphone in the center of the room and another at a keyboard in the corner. While he must have been singing previously, he had by now stopped and was looking at us also. As we filed past him he would ask us questions. After each question (usually "what 'bout you, where you from?") he would make some comment to the rest of the Italians in the restaurant and they would all laugh uproariously, pointing fingers at us and tipping back their heads. "You from Seattle? Seattle, Jessica Alba". As we finally learned the dinner cost 48 euro (or perhaps this was simply a trick) a person. Needless to say, we left red-faced. Tail turned, we could still hear the man singing a sarcastic goodbye song to us with the accompaniment of the keyboard and punctuated by terrible laughter.