Una tempesta.

The title means, "a storm", which is kind of what the memory of the past few days have been like. I've been really busy doing stuff with classes, with the first-years, getting involved, planning trips, getting stuff squared away still. So basically, it's all just a blur. I don't mean storm in the negative sense, just that it's crazy!

I don't have any real substantial things to update you on except my trips for this weekend and next. I leave in three hours or so for Chiavari in Genoa, Italy. It's about 3 and a half hours from here. It's the town where some of my family lives and hopefully I will be able to make contact with them. I am going up there with six of the first-years and Kate, one of the other mentors. Next weekend I will be traveling to Vallodolid, Spain which is about two hours south of Madrid to visit Juan!! For those of you who are not in the know about my buddy from Spagna, he stayed at my house in Smithfield at the beginning of my junior year of high school with the LaSallian exchange program. It will be roughly four years since the last time I saw him - I absolutely cannot wait.

Classes went well this first week. Lots of work but I'm staying on top of it so far. I'm looking forward to the site visits with FIA 313/ARC 300, The Mediterranean City and the acting and laughter from DRA300, Comedy in Italy.

Other than that, I think that I'll say a few things about the culture here as opposed to the mundane goings-on of my day to day activities.

I am clearly an American. I stick out like a sore thumb around here. We all do. It's not so much the fact that we stick out either, it's the fact that the Italians make sure we KNOW we stick out. The staring down, the more than blatant judging and the talking about us right while we're walking past them. It is quite uncomfortable at times. But the Italians, like most people just judge before really taking the chance to know. I have become quite friendly with the people who own Il Masaccio - the best sandwich place in town - because of my rather frequent visits to their place of business. The first few times I went in there, I had to wait an excessive amount of time to be recognized whereas today I walked in and was greeted with, "Ciao, bambina!" (translated - Hello, little one(feminine)!)

Walking into shops and trying to business is the most difficult. I see it as even harder for those of us who speak a little bit of Italian. We try to utilize our knowledge of the language and are scoffed at sometimes when we try and use it. What do they want from us? Be real tourists or actually try and appreciate the language? It's baffling.

Clearly, American style of dress (and my "look") in particular are quite different. I dress comfortably and in what I wear in the States. The Italians live by what is known as the Bella Figura. They always dress as if it was a special day; no dress down days or even comfy casual for that matter. We're all overshadowed by this. I tried wearing a hat the other day - even with my hair down - and got so many weird looks by the time I hit the piazza (about a two minute walk) that I just put the hat in the backpack for the rest of the day. It's so tough trying to live here knowing that ultimately, the way you dress is going to affect the type of treatment you receive. Needless to say, I'm not changing a thing about my wardrobe.

Anyhow, just some food for thought.

Spero che questo blog e vi trovando bene.

(I hope that this blog finds you well.)