Viva Italia!

This morning started early with Italian at 8. It’s been a little frustrating for me to not be able to speak the language here. I often think that the people are disappointed that none of us really speak Italian and I often worry they think I am being rude. I really hope that’s not the case. I’m really trying to pick up and use as much Italian as I can, but it’s difficult—especially when I’m constantly mixing French and Italian in my head! Anyway, the lessons are fun and I’m really excited to be learning a little about another language. We had a quick’n’dirty photo lesson following Italian because our assignment for the rest of the morning was to go out and shoot photos of the parade for Festivale de la Repubblica. Festivale is basically our 4^th of July and we talked about it in Italian this afternoon. I had no idea that Italy only recently started to unify. They became a country in the late 1800s, but didn’t become a Republic until after the fall of Mussolini in the mid 1900s. Even after the end of monarchy in Italy, cultures have been very segmented by city/region and Italian was adopted as an official language within the past 50 years! Anywho, my assignment for the parade was to shoot children and families. It was really fun and I think I got a couple decent shots, but I felt a little creepy! It was kind of weird to get up close to these small children to take their pictures when their parents clearly know we are strangers. We were using our own cameras today, which I think made it worse. If we had real cameras we would probably look a little more legit. While we were shooting, an old Italian man started chatting with Victoria and I. It was pretty interesting because he didn’t speak any English and we really don’t speak any Italian. Claudia, who knows Spanish, came along and was able to help us communicate a little. He seemed to be a pretty interesting guy, and he actually ended up buying the three of us a cappuccino after the parade! After he left, Victoria, Claudia and I grabbed a panini from Caffé d’Italia and  my first gelato of Italy! Che deliciosa! The man who served us the gelato there, Jack, told me that he speaks French, so we spent half of our conversation in French. It was nice to finally be able to talk to and understand a local here! We relaxed on the piazza before going to class again. It ended up being beautiful today and no cars were allowed to park in the piazza this afternoon, so it was a great place to hang out. We had a couple classes this afternoon and finally got Internet access! Woohoo! As I said before, we had more Italian this afternoon and talked about “Italian” culture. I found it really interesting that Italy seems to have a lot of the same cultural issues as the French. Both countries had to deal with uniting under an official language when all of the regions originally had their own dialects, both have a lot of race issues, and both are interested in their “ness” (ie: French-ness and Italian-ness). They also compete to be the best in all the same things. Maybe if they weren’t so concerned with being better than one another, they would realize that they are basically the same country! We also had a Story class and an Intercultural Communication class. We haven’t gotten into too much yet, but we are supposed to have story ideas by the end of the week. Yikes! After class, we hung out at the school for a little while, got reacquainted with the Internet, and did an assignment. We all went out for pizza at 7, which was a good time. After dinner, there was of course more gelato (from the other gelateria) and then some walking around the city with Victoria, Charlotte, Kevin, Michelle, and Nicole. After our walk, things got interesting. We decided to grab our computers and sit out by the school. I was about to walk into the garden when I realized the gate was locked. Key inside. Crap. I ran all over the city (which isn’t a lot) trying to figure out what to do. Carol and Dan ended up lifting me up so that I could jump over the wall and get into the garden. Pretty hilarious. I even pulled a heel hook on the ledge. Assisted buildering? Funniest part: apparently after I jumped over, the vice-mayor walked by. Niiiiiice. I’m just glad we didn’t have to wake Daniella up with more key issues! That was pretty much the excitement for the night and now it midnight and just about time for bed. Buena notte!