Meeting other students

Today has been a successful day. It was the first day of classes, so we learned Italian for 4 hours. After arriving back at the apartment building, I saw my luggage had arrived (!!!!!!!). After a quick lunch, we walked over to studio and got the new schedule and took a walking tour of several piazzas. And when we got home, we had internet for the first time since Friday! And it's only 7 pm. The following picture is of the Piazza Navona, with our apartment on the left- it's the big church building.

I love the way our Italian class is structured. it is based off of how to speak italian. So its focus is not on grammar at the beginning, it in on speaking and listening and interacting. Because we have 26 people, we were split into 2 groups to learn. We learned how to say your name and ask someone else's name. Then we moved on to how to order things at a bar, like a cappucino. A bar is a restaurant, not an American bar. They sell coffee (caffe) and sandwiches (panini). And we learned how to make words plural. but the  focus was on pronunciation and getting comfortable with the language. In the last part of class, we went out into the piazza and used the phrases we had just learned to ask about the food/ order food or drink. It was nice to know that I could speak Italian and be understood!

I went inside the Pantheon this weekend for the first time. it's interesting because I am constantly walking past it, and there are always flocks of tourists. But to actually go inside was quite cool. Seeing and walking through architecture that I've studied in class is always awesome- it's not just in the textbook, people are constantly interacting with it. Outside of the Pantheon, and in most of the piazza's, are fountains were everyone congregates. There is a water fountain usually for drinking out of that runs out of the spigot. it's from the old aqueducts. I couldn't believe they are still in use.

We have also hung out with the Penn State students a lot. One of them had come up to our floor and then come into the kitchen where I was, asking how to use the stove. I ended up going down to their floor, because a friend at home (Clare) had told me about a girl in the program, and I wanted to meet her. Turns out they are all really cool and invited me for wine and pasta. So I ran up and grabbed some fellow Tulanians and we hung out with them for a while. When the kitchen got too crowded (and hot), we went down to the Piazza Navona and sat on the fountain and talked.

We've pretty much gone out every night as a big group- the first time was for Jen's birthday on Wednesday, the next was for Laura's birthday on Friday, and then on the weekend we've walked around, getting a feel for the area. On Frioday, we went across the river to Trastevere (Trahs-te-var-eh), which is apparently the place to be! It was so crowded. We went to this place called the Long Island Cafe, and got some drinks there. They had mojitos and long island ice teas by the liter (litro), so we split them amongst us. The night went well, except for the fact the waiter got a little too friendly with me as we were leaving, but no harm done.
On that note, I'll say that the Italian men aren't too overly friendly. The only time I've gotten comments was when i was walking by myself last week around town. but usually I am with other Americans, so it doesn't happen. And Italians walk slow here. I'm ok with it because I've walked slower all summer because of the New Orleans heat, but if you talk loud, walk fast, and wear sneakers, you stand out. If you wear a backpack, you stand out. Sometimes we'll be walking and we'll get kind of separated, so that we are more in a line than a cluster, and that stand out too. If Italians are in a group, they walk together, or at least in pairs. And there is no air conditioning here, so at least New Orleans summer heat got me used to that.