Italia per la seconda volta
OK, so As you all probably know, Italy won the world cup!!! I have never heard a whole city collectively cheer at the same time, but that happened in Florence when they won. It was amazing. I was at a smallish piazza near the apartment we're staying in, and there were maybe 2000 people there total (better than the 20000 that were at Piazalle Michaelangiolo)and when the italians won by penalty kicks, people started breaking bottles and screaming... thank god gun control is good in Italy, or people would probably have started shooting into the air as if we were in texas or something... Funny side story: So we were talking in my conversation class about traffic or somethign, and somehow we got on the subject of road rage, which brought us to the subject of how people in our respective countries kill eachother. The people from japan said that it was mostly strangulation for them, the girl from turkey said a lot of times there were stabbings, and when I said that in our country a lot of people kill eachother with guns, the whole class sort of went "Ahhh... siiii...sapemo questo (we know that)." Since gun control of the scale that they have in european countries is almost non-existent in the US, they think we are all gun toting maniacs.
Anyways, back to the trip so far. Kelly and her friend Lindse(a?)y came to Florence for a few days on their whirlwind trip around europe, and we got to hang out a bit. We went to dinner at a restaurant overlooking a piazza (very stereotypically italian), we went to watch the world cup, and we went to a discoteca on saturday night. It was a lot of fun (a little sketchy at times when we were walking through a less desirable part ofthe city on our way to this discoteca and we were not exactly dressed in an appropriate manner to be walking late at night...) and it was good to see Kelly! Kelly and Lindse/ay, if you read this: I hope the rest of your trip goes well, and you know who to call if you have an emergency and you're not having fun ;)
Let's see, what else... I have made it my rule to not refuse to try anything just because I had a previous aversion to it. Example: We had pasta with mussels and fish in it the other night, and I was eating it and trying to politely school my features to not show my dislike of seafood. I guess I didn't do so well, because they called me on it and I just had salad for the rest of dinner (and by 'salad' I mean the italian idea of salad, which means 'lettuce'). But I am trying (If my mother reads this at any point, or Marianne, if you want to show mom this, I am actually eating raw tomatoes and pretending to like them. It takes all of my acting skills, but I'm doing it.)
Also, stuff costs A LOT here. With the conversion of Euros to dollars beign abotu 1.35 dollars to a Euro, I am seriously getting the shaft. I really want to go on this trip to the campagna (literally the countryside) but it costs somethign like 30 euro (like, 40 dollars) and I can't (for some reason) do a balance check from any of the ATMs here. I'm working on getting a phone card and calling the bank to find out my balance, but I'm getting kind of worried, because I don't want this trip to completely drain my bank account.
um..... By the way, everyone, the subjunctive tense is WICKED hard. We don't have a test for this level until the last week I'm here, so I still have time to learn it, but it is riDICulous. And the annoying thing is that everyone in the class seems to get it but me (and the students from asian countries are having a bit of difficulty too, but they had to learn a whole new structure and alphabet, so they have an excuse).
OK, I had better go, because I wanted to send postcards today before the post office closes and also go see the Chiesa di Santa Maria Novella.
Keep me updated on the goings on in the US!!! Ciao!