The Baking Dilemna

so during my 1st week of school i decide i would like to do something nice for my teachers and classmates. Taking my cue from Mrs. Joycie (kiley's mom), i decide the best thing to do would be to bake a sweet and delicious treat.

This is where i run into problem #1: my apartment does not have an oven.

There is really only one solution for this: NO BAKE COOKIES.

Everyone knows what these are. Sweet chocolatey, peanut buttery bits dropped onto wax paper that harden into what look like (and sure taste like) straight from the oven cookies.

I am so proud of my problem solving skills that i decide to tell my classmates, teachers, AND some of the students from the class next door that i will be making them cookies and bringing them to class. The excitement and anticipation i receive only fuel my desire to "bake."
so now all i have to do is get to the store...

here is where the problems really begin:

My list consists of your standard baking items: cocoa powder, sugar, oats, peanut butter, etc. I find most of the ingredients with only a little bit of trouble - but cant seem to find the peanut butter or oats. This is strange.

Ok. peanut butter. i guess i can kind of understand. I mean where i come from, pb is abundant and usually takes up about 1/2 an aisle in the grocery store. But i do realize that it was invented in the U.S. - and only within the last 2oo years or so. i think. fortunately, i met another student here who says he is having peanut butter shipped to him and it should be here any day...good to know i'm not the only person who has encountered this problem.

Oats, on the other hand makes no sense to me. i mean people have been eating oats since they were still writing on cave walls. I scour aisles and aisles of grocery stores - sifting through foreign labels and unfamiliar packaging only to find no oats and anything that resembles oats. So i do what any reasonable and resourceful American might do when traveling overseas -
consult the iphone.

unfortunately, my itranslate application cant even convert the word 'oat' from English into Italian. apparently 'oats' is a foreign concept to these people.

Someone please explain this to me. Is it possible that Italy does not sell oats? maybe with their abundance of pastas, they figured they would just pick up a little rice for risotto and leave all of the other grain/cereal varieties out of the picture entirely. who knows.

So another day ends where my usual resourcefulness is tested to the limits - and tomorrow, another day will begin with my classmates asking me where the cookies are that they have heard so much about but have yet to see or taste.

i feel like a failure..
but i will continue my quest in search for oats. hopefully before i leave, there will be a happier part deux of this story that ends in success. i still have faith that the oats are out there somewhere....waiting....calling to me from the bottom of some shelf in the cereal aisle in some remote grocery store in milano.....

in the meantime, will someone please send me some damn oats??!!!!!