wordseventeen: November 2013

Saturday, November 23, 2013

Random Thoughts In My Head

I'm cold. It may be warmer here than in MN, but it's still cold.
Domino's pizza sounds good right now...I'm in the land of pizza and I want Domino's. WHAT.
I can't wait for my package to arrive...MOM have you sent it yet? I love youuuu, but I also really want my Indiana sweatshirt...<3
I wanna wish you a merry Christmas, I wanna wish you a merry Christmas, I wanna wish you a merry Christmas from the bottom of my heeeeaaarrt!
Oh Christmas, Christmas, I love Christmas. I'm so excited to see how the Italians celebrate it. I realized today that November is almost over which means it's totally acceptable to start singing Christmas songs, right?
Where should I go for my walk today? It's quite nice out today so I think I will go farther than usual. :)
My biggest pet peeve... So many people in Italy smoke that I've gotten quite used to it. It drives me crazy when they leave the ash on the end of their cigarette instead of tapping it off. Seriously, it makes me insane.
I went out for pizza with friends and during our conversation one of my friends told me that he hates when the pens that click are left with the click thing open...he said he literally goes crazy if it's open and nobody closes it. Talk about OCD.
I went on a motor bike for the first time. It was fun! Not nearly as big of a deal as I thought. :)
I realized I cannot go to bed without a way of telling the time within reaching distance. I woke up so many times last night and couldn't fall back asleep because all I wanted to know was what time it was. But I wasn't going to stand up because my bed is quite creaky.
I've been in Italy for 2 1/2 months and I still can't speak Italian. I feel like that awkward late-bloomer.
Italians are not a fan of Justin Bieber. I really hope he doesn't ever try to make it big here.
People in America use red plastic cups for parties, people in Italy use small clear plastic cups. I haven't seen a single red solo cup here.
Italian parents are way more chill than American parents. No offense against you guys, but it's nice that they're so accepting and forgiving of everything.<3
Basketball games get canceled because of leaks that let a ton of water into the gym.
Italian schools- where everything that's supposed to happen doesn't happen.
I found out I've been accepted to St. Kate's with a scholarship of at least $19,000 :)
Italian ketchup has a funny taste about it. I miss good ol' Heinz.
Italians cheat for everything, and when a teacher comes to watch the class while your teacher goes to the bathroom, he also helps you cheat and warns you when your teacher is coming back.
Everybody appears to be friends, but nobody hesitates to talk about each other behind the back. It happens with everyone. That's the biggest thing I cannot get used to.
Parties are actually quite exclusive here. I used to think that anybody could go, but that's not true. Luckily, people like the American. ;)
Euros still feel like play money to me. I can't get over the fact that stores actually accept my money!
I read a book called Il Profeta...it was really good! It made me question quite a few outlooks I have on life.
Italians don't always yell, but when they do it doesn't mean their fighting. When I first arrived I thought my family was fighting all the time because I couldn't understand anything they were saying. I'm starting to be able to understand normal conversations now and I've realized that everybody here just really likes to yell.
Watching t.v. for five hours a day is totally normal here. I absolutely hate it, so I go for walks a lot. Who knew such a small town could be so interesting! I could literally spend hours walking around the old part of Galatina because there are so many random little alleys and streets.
While I love Galatina, everybody here hates it. They are astonished at the fact that I find it lovely here. My friends always ask me why I chose to come here, of all the places in Italy. I quickly reassure them that I simply chose Italy and from there it wasn't my decision anymore.
Even though it may be 65 degrees here, everybody still wears a winter jacket and scarf. I walked outside in jeans and a button up shirt once and I don't think I've ever received more strange looks in my life.
TODAY IS SATURDAY. Except I'm not feeling very well, so who knows if I'll do anything tonight...
English songs are played everywhere- the radio, the supermarket, in the center of town...literally everywhere. And the majority of people don't even understand them! It's a little odd.

Until next time, P&L.

Ali :*

Thursday, November 14, 2013

Ciao ragazzi!

On Monday, there was a special celebration called San Martino. This celebration consists of new wines for the coming year and the Italians basically just use it as an excuse to get drunk. There seems to be a lot of different 'wine' celebrations throughout the year, so I've learned.

So on Monday at scuola we had an assembly which the Italians define as doing nothing for the entire day. The first two hours of school I was supposed to be in class and the second two hours of school I was supposed to have different assemblies in the auditorium and gym. So I go to class in the morning and the first thing I notice is that nobody has brought their backpacks with them. A little strange, considering we were at school. I decided to let it slide, sat at my desk, and proceeded to become surrounded by 14 year old children who were eager to know of my plans for San Martino. Let me tell you this, 12 hours earlier, my friends and I had no idea what we were doing. I'll get to that later. So these children are crowded around me and I'm just sitting there thinking to myself, shouldn't we be learning italiano? What the h*** is going on? Then the one kid in the class who speaks English walked in and informed me that when it is the day of an assembly, nobody wants to do anything beforehand, so they don't. They just sit in class for two hours and talk to friends until it is time to go to the auditorium. Interessante. I eventually went to the auditorium and happened to know the guy with the mic, who so kindly called me out in front of the school and asked how I was. Perks of being friends with the popular fifth year guys. Not. The assembly was completely pointless for me to attend because of the fact that I still don't understand Italian, so I just talked to my friends for the whole thing and made faces at my friends who were up in front. It was incredibly fun. Note the sarcasm, please.

I returned home after four hours of school, ate some lunch, napped, then met up with my friends because we needed to finish planning what we were going to do that night. As I previously mentioned, we planned the night in a bit of a rush. I guess my group of friends doesn't like to plan things, because it was the night before San Martino, we had a guest list of about 60 friends, but no place to party with no food or wine. We spent Sunday night walking around the center, asking if anybody knew of a place that we could rent for the night. So it comes to Monday afternoon, we have a place and we have a guest list, but we have no food and wine and no idea of the plans for the night. My friend called me at about four and told me to meet him at the park with seven euros. Casual. So I go to this park where I find about 15 of my friends hanging out with a ridiculous amount of money, a piece of printer paper and many intense conversations happening. They were going around collecting seven euros from everybody on the guest list, which they had printed out on a spreadsheet. Things were getting serious. Three guys left with about 200 euros to go buy a ridiculous amount of alcohol and wine, some others left to find chairs and tables, and yet another guy left to find speakers. The party was happening in approximately four hours. Awesome.

9 o'clock rolls around, my friend arrives with her dad to pick me up, we pick up two other friends, then arrive at our destination. Boy do Italians know how to throw a party together in no time. The location was prime, the music too loud, the wine disgusting (oh well, teenage boys can't be expected to make good wine, can they?), a large amount of hard liquor (however, teenage boys can be expected to buy too much vodka), and an overabundance of pizza, calzoni and other typical Italian fast foods (about 200 euros worth). And so the party began. Tons of people came, many new friends were made, drinks were spilled, dance moves were displayed, and another successful party came to an end early Tuesday morning.

Yes, I said early Tuesday morning. Meaning, school. That was the most difficult thing of my life, having to wake up after a mere four and a half hours of sleep and go to school. The lack of sleep made things difficult, but also the fact that I had partied for many hours, using too much energy and not having any left to go to school the next morning. During my first two hours of Italian, I slept. Yes. I put my head down on my desk, said buonanotte and went to sleep. Third hour I had English, but luck of the Irish, my teacher wasn't there! So my class went to the auditorium and a few of us got cozy together and continued to nap. The story didn't change much for my fourth hour of Italian. I went to the class, sat in my chair, put my head in my hands and I could not tell you anything that happened in that class afterwards.

I sometimes wonder why I am even required to go to school for the first few months of my exchange. Granted, parties don't happen every single school night. However, my day at school was pretty normal. I didn't do anything in class, the teachers ignored me, what else is new. I've learned absolutely nothing while at school and I've understood even less. I think the only reason AFS has us go to school is so that we can make friends. That literally is the only benefit I have gained from school. Oh well. More time to think, more time to write, more time to talk to friends.

As for now, I have to study for an English test. My teacher so kindly informed me about it today, even though I'm not even supposed to go their class tomorrow. Looks like I'll be skipping an hour of Spanish to fail a test. Lucky me.

Ciao tutti.

Until next time,

Ali