Finalmente

Not write for one whole week?! How dare I? Well, it wasn’t intentional, darlings. I’ve just been as mad as a hatter with everything I’ve been doing. I’ll try to give you the highlights of the week and some more interesting facts I might not have mentioned before about life here in Italy. The differences are everywhere and I want to make sure I write them down before they become too commonplace for me so that I don’t even notice them.

First of all, Monza: Now this is no diss to any Rotarian or Formula 1 fan- but I just don’t dig car races. They aren’t my thing. I watched Formula 1 with my host dad before on the television, and at least you stay with the cars and always know what’s going on, but these race tracks aren’t just like circles and you can’t see it all at once. So basically you are sitting in some bleachers and every few minutes a car goes by. So I wasn’t thrilled- but I didn’t really need to be because I met up with all the other exchange students from the whole region and I hadn’t seen them all together since the week I got here. It was a lot of fun, and I also really like the coordinator guy, and he is always making his way around talking to us and generally being a really cool smiley guy.
Sunday I took a bike ride with Marco and Daniele out of the city to the neighboring village of Marimondo. I think that’s how it is spelled. It was something like a 16 mile ride, which felt really good 1) because even if I walk everywhere here- I never really get my heart rate up without sports in school and a gym to go to. And 2) The weather was amazing and we escaped the city to see actually country-like horizons. Once we got to the village I met up with Marina and we went into this really old historic church where the monks lived back in the day to see a really amazing concert of this duet- one lady on harp, and another guy playing a sort of exotic guitar that I have never heard of before. I met some friends of the family too. They all seem to be teachers! It was nice.
This week at school was significantly better, because I felt like I was actually getting somewhere with the English teacher who is helping me set up my schedule. I t took a good bit of me figuring out things on my own, but eventually we both came together with the possibilities and nailed down a functioning ‘orario’. I’ll try to write it here. I have a lot of self-study blocks. Too many, I think. I can use these to do all of my homework for my lessons and school, but I’m hoping to fill some of them with online courses about religions or history or some hybrid of the two. Like, I know what the beginning of America was like- but can I get in on the beginning of anything else? It’d be cool if, you know- when I’m in Europe I understand more of it’s history and the movement of its cultures. I feel like there are such huge gaps in my knowledge of history AND religion. Coming here makes me oh too aware. I don’t even care about getting credit for school, I just wanna know. I seriously find it fascinating and I’d rather spend my free hours figuring out the origin of Buddhism than checking my facebook.

So anyway. My schedule as of now.
There are five lessons each day, one hour each.

Monday: Art History, Religion (maybe), Self Study, Self Study, Physics
Tuesday: Italian, Philosophy (3rd yr.), Philosophy (5th yr.), Self Study, Self Study
Wednesday: German, German, Italian, Italian, Philosophy (5th yr.)
Thursday: Italian, English, Religion, Philosophy (5th yr.), Self Study
Friday: Self Study, English, German, Physics, Philosophy (3rd yr.)
Saturday: Philosophy (3rd yr.), German, Self Study, Self Study, History

I actually feel pretty lucky because not all schools go out of their way to help the exchange students like mine does. You have to understand, the whole class has the exact same schedule. They stay together for YEARS with the same people. They stay in the same room. They do not go anywhere for different lessons to see different students and professors. So really, it is quite difficult for it to be arranged for me to do so. And now I don’t have to take things like Latin, gym, or their math I did a long time ago, or French, or biology which I also already did.
OK, what else this week? Oh, there are protests in Milan about transportation and the Education system and lots of students and teachers go to these so it is pretty pointless going to school because like 5 people are there, so I’ve gotten out of school twice this year already and they say there is a big protest soon in a couple weeks. There was one this week and it was great because I went to school- figured out it was a protest day since like nobody was there- went to Jody’s house which is close and we made nutella crepes which is like breakfast for God. Kylee came too and we watched The Three Musketeers. Can you tell I like protest days? I do know what exactly they are protesting about but it is kind of complicated and I don’t feel like explaining it right now because I am already writing a lot. If you are super interested- write a comment about it and I explain it in another post if desired.
Also- fun fact. There are espresso machines in the schools, and they do not cost 1 euro like they do in the cafes, but like 30 cents and they are just as good! I love love love espresso. These machines also give you hot chocolate, lattes, machiattos, etc.
My philosophy teacher of the 3rd year is my favorite teacher here. I haven’t met the other philosophy teacher yet, since I only just started my schedule (I get extra philosophy J). But the one in my original class- 3LD- is very fun to watch. I say watch because he is entertaining just like television. Or like television muted. Maybe not that bad, but he speaks crazy fast so it’s hard to catch the meaning but he gestures so wildly one day he is going to fall out of his chair. And he tells these stories/jokes which I of course don’t get, but he laughs so hard and it’s nice to see him laugh. He also wears the same outfit all week long (or longer), which creates suspense for what he will wear next. This is what happens when you do not comprehend the subject matter. You find other things to observe.
Also, whenever they translate his stories for me it comes out like this “He said that he went to a seminar with his friend and they were dancing with everyone and his friend went crazy and hit a monk.” Or this “There was a beautiful man and a woman fell in love with him and she gave him one of her houses to be living in. He is living in dis house but he was sad and wanted to kill hisself, and so he has tried but it did not work. And the woman came and asked him why he is sad and he said that he was very happy and did not want to kill hisself and so she left and then the man went and stole the neighbor’s cat and ran away and nobody never saw him again.”
And this is why I like this class.
Also this week I made Mexican food for my family and some guests. I went to hear an amazingly beautiful choir of mountain singers. Alpine culture. Gorgeous. I also saw an exhibition about Galileo.
Fun Facts:

The grocery store down the street is jalapeno-less.

I found out my school has a computer lab and they seriously have a guy in there just to chill with the computers and book classes for lab time.

Milan makes me both appreciate fashion more, and realize how unimportant it is. I like the way people dress here better than at home. It is more elegant, and simple, and I think I could definitely adjust with no complaints. But it can also get more extravagant here- and when I see some really expensive and severe looking high-heels I don’t understand. It’s not like you are in American where you walk to your CAR to go to work, you walk everywhere here. I would seriously die if I wore some of the shoes here. At times, Milan feels much more concentrated on image.

I feel so much more patriotic here. Maybe it just happens when you leave your country. At home, I didn’t really feel the need to proclaim my love for my country. It kind of just came with living there and being all American doing American things. But here, well- it’s not America. And when I appreciate the differences between my own country and the rest of the world, naturally I get a lil’ red white n’ blue running through my veins. I really do feel proud to be an American, whatever situation we are in as a nation, because it is MY nation.

I want boots and scarves and coats and purses.

Today I saw the oldest church bell tower in the city of Milan. I believe they said it was from the first century. Maybe I should google that, because some things gets lost in translation as my philosophy teacher’s stories prove.

I adore the 80 yr old grandmother. I think she can be a little needy and this can irritate the family, who sees them all the time. But I’m not used to having a grandparent around all the time- especially not an 80 yr old one, so I don’t mind keeping her company and helping her with her seatbelt or walking slow with her. She is rather frail and she loves to kiss.

I ran this week!

I want to find a team sport. I start yoga this week I hope. Tomorrow is a Monday which makes me happy, because as you can see on my schedule, it’s a quite easy day.

OK BASTA.
More than enough for now.
I will write soon, because tomorrow I am going to La Scala which is the most important theatre house in Milan, everyone says it’s beautiful so I’ll try to include some photos!

Ciao!
Grace