On Friday afternoon, the day before our EuroBowl Semifinal, I had to stop by the Raiders office to pick something up. As I pulled in, I was pleasantly surprised to find an ice cream truck sitting in the parking lot! Yes, America, you were not the first to develop the concept of an ice cream truck! The name on the side read, "Eisspezialitäten da Luigi," which I'm sure you all recognize as meaning one thing - AUTHENTIC ITALIAN GELATO!
I quickly grabbed my wallet and rolled up to the window. The proximity of Innsbruck to Italy - just a half hour to the south - ensures a proper dosage of proper Italian cuisine (and most notably, gelato!) To be sure, I thought I'd brush off a little of my Italian language skills and say hello to the vendor.
In a few minutes, I learned that the owner of the gelato truck - Luigi - was from Palermo. This explained the good Sicilian taste of my stracciatella gelato. Unfortunately (or ironically in this case), the man I was talking to was not Luigi, but rather his partner Mario from Naples.
Let me see if you just caught that -- I had just bought gelato from MARIO and LUIGI. COULD IT BE THAT I JUST DISCOVERED THE SUPER MARIO BROS. IN INNSBRUCK?
The most famous video game duo in history!
Posing with Menyada and my main man Mario! (He's shaved the mustache and lost the glasses to remain inconspicuous.)
For those of you "not from my generation," the most popular video game for the original Nintendo Entertainment System was the classic Super Mario Bros. The game featured a pair of Italian plumbers - Mario and Luigi - who raced around a world of mushrooms and spiky looking enemies in an attempt to free Princess Toadstool from the clutches of evil King Koopa. Released in 1985, it became a staple for all kids from my generation, and would go on to sell 40 million copies! (It is currently the #2 selling video game of all time, surpassed only by Wii Sports!) Can you imagine my luck to have actually met Mario and Luigi here in Innsbruck?
The opening screen gets me salivating for some side-scrolling action!
Now I know you are probably rolling your eyes at this - thinking that these two dolce-wielding brothers here aren't the real thing. For that I have prepared a number of very plausible hypotheses which would explain their presence in Innsbruck:
1) With the recent slow-down in the economy, Mario and Luigi could no longer find work in the plumbing business and therefore had to try their luck at gelato.
2) After saving the princess and retiring to the Caribbean, the Bros. got a little bored and decided that spreading joy via gelato in the Tirolean region would be a better use of their time.
3) Angered at the number of sequels they were forced to do, the Bros. finally walked out of the Nintendo offices in Japan and are currently hiding out here in the Alps.
My guess is the latter of the three, for when I questioned Mario in broken Italian as to his true identity of a goomba stomping superhero, he quickly denied it and gave me a puzzled look. What humility. Amazing.
~ J. Twice
2 comments:
I love little coincidence things like that.
That's cool. :)
Maybe the Bros. got annoyed at the number of people asking for them to stomp their goomba, etc., so they decided to ditch the princess-saving plumber live and sell gelato in Austria. And they chose gelato because Mario's sick of pasta and pizza, and Luigi recently acquired a love for chocolate gelato. Thus, they shaved off their moustaches and threw out their hats and overalls to sell gelato, and Luigi sneaks out every night to eat heaps of choc gelato.
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