One Month Down.....

Ok so yes I realize its been forever since I’ve blogged so this one with be pretty long. Sorry to those who don’t like to read (cough cough Mr. Bishline cough cough) I can’t believe its been a month already! I mean like how is that even possible! This has been the greatest month ever! Really there hasn’t been any worries, stress or anything go wrong. Can you say blessign? So there has been so much happen I don’t really no where to start so I’ll just start with what happened this week. This week I started volleyball and Romanico. My volleyball team is actually really good it is just slightly frustrating when something you’ve known for years is slightly different and its hard to translate. Ugh lol but its been fun so far. The only thing right now is they don’t know if I can play in games because I’m not Italian. There is some weird rule about foreigners. And Romanico is a private School that teaches Italian. I will go twice a week after school. So my schedule is quite busy. Palavola (vball) 3 times a week, Romanico 3 times a week, AFS Italian lessons 1 time a week plus homework and friends and family! Fun fun! Lol school is pretty fantastic as well! I’m starting to understand people. I can understand it when its spoken, read it, and write it and speak a little. I’m not like reading books in Italian or anything I’m just able to translate things if they are within a subject being discussed. Hopefully with all my classes and studying I’ll be speaking it very soon. There are a lot of culture shocks that I’ve recently come to. I’ll list those at the end. Oh Carnivale just ended. It was pretty cool, nothing like we have. People dress up and watch parades and eat food and its awesome! There is confetti everywhere and silly string and lil kids everywhere! My friends and I dressed up as good and evil, angel and devil. I was the angel and she was the devil. Oh and we got to wear it to school! Tuesday was the last day so a lot of students dressed up. It was pretty awesome I’m not going to lie. I’m so glad spring is coming! I’m ready for some warm days. Somedays it is pretty cold when we ride to school. The coldest we got was -2 C one morning. Yeah I about froze! Last Saturday I spent the whole day in Corlo with my friends so Papa took me to school by car and yeah bike is way faster. Random note but I was pretty pumped cause my bike has this sweet light on the front of it lol I’m getting really good at getting around the town by myself too. I go to italian lessons by myself now and if I have to go to the Centro I just ask and I can go. Tomorrow I’m meeting friends for lunch there after school. When it comes to school I don’t understand a lot of things still so I study italian a lot! I have like 6 English classes though. I go to all the older classes and help with what ever they need. Basically I read cause they love to here my accent. Oh and I have to read super slow. I really want to talk super fast to someone cause I usually talk fast and I haven’t been able to for almost a month. My friend who came with AFS who is in Pisa is coming to visit this weekend so I’ll finally get to talk at my normal speed. I’m sure there is a ton more I’m forgetting but I’m just going to list some culture differences and call it good for a day. I promise I’ll try to blog again soon!

Culture Differences
*So I’ve decided that the Italian road system is similar to a Hot Wheels track. Seriously it is like one roundabout after another and there are so many Michigan turns its crazy. Oh and a little bit of Pacman as well cause riding the middle line is a hobby of most drivers lol.
*They are pretty particular when it comes to clothes. The first day I wore a short sleeve shirt my host parents asked if I was hot I said no I just don’t wear sleeves. We talked about it at school and everyone was like what? You even wear shorts in the winter? Oh and to gym I wore Basketball shorts and everyone was starring at me and I realized girls don’t play Bball therefore they don’t have bball shorts lol. They all wear sweats to gym instead. To the carnivale I was wearing this white dress thing and my legs weren’t covered and literally everyone looked at me. I was like Sono Americana lol it explains it all
*At school if a teacher can’t be there they don’t bring in a sub you just don’t have that class. They rearrange it so you can either go home early or sleep in and come in late.
*In between classes its like a jungle in the classroom. All the boys literally fight eachother, most of the time making a lot of noise. And people write on the board (american cuss words a lot of times cause Profs don’t know English lol) and no one really cares. Its so relaxed. And people right on the desks and walls and its no biggy. Its kinda do what you want type attitude. Its great lol
*You have to dry your hair, no matter what. Kinda pain after a while.
*They iron EVERYTHING! If its clean and not ironed you can’t wear it until it is.
*Americans are super spoiled! There are so so many things that I will not take for grandite ever again here are a few examples
-having a clothes dryer, not many people have one here
-A large water heater, if your shower is longer than 10minutes the water is freezing!
-A big shower, the showers are all really small in the corner of the bathroom
-Having more than one TV, my mama was talking about this rich politician and how he had like 4 TVs and 4 cars. I was like wow, we have 7 TVs in my house and 5 cars. Yeah makes you think.
-Phones, cellphones are super expensive here so people don’t text as much as we do at home.
-Energy, Italians are so energy efficient and Green. They recycle everything and never turn on things that don’t need to be on. We could learn a thing or two from them.

My Papa and I have decided to form a new counrty. The United States of Italyerica. It will take all the good from America and Italy and form one super nation! Leaving all the bad out of course. Italian food and energy conservativness, American opportunities and government. Perfect! Lol

Love you all!