I’m feeling the whiskey and “coca” already. “They make them strong at this cafe,” I tell my teammate, Alyssa. The heat of half-past noon feels good here on the Piazza della Repubblica. The soft wicker of the cafe chairs seem too good to rise from. I want to sit longer chatting with my team and our translator Valentina, but Gino has spotted our quarry. He’s screwing the tripod onto our video camera and setting up a few yards behind a group at the fountain.

“I should get up there since this is my story,” I say to Alyssa and Valentina.

I’m already speaking to one member of the party as well as I can. A few simple phrases, some gestures to Gino and the camera, and the man understands what we’re doing and who we are. Gino focuses his shot on the few young men wearing crowns of laurel wreaths standing by the fountain.

Michiko, our fourth member, has disappeared a half hour ago, following the same kind of groups up the street with the still camera.

It’s only now, when really needed, that Valentina steps in to more fully explain what’s going on while I take notes and speak through her.

I don’t realize until a minute later that I’m still holding a Duff beer in my hand (yes, they make The Simpsons’ beer here). The locals seem not to care, not to even notice. They’re here to celebrate their friend’s graduation from Urbino University after all.

The three of us walk back to the table where Alyssa still sits. “If this is what being a foreign correspondent is like,” I’ll say later that evening, “I really hope I do get to make this my career.”