Change

Uh huh. I do remember promising myself that I wasn’t going to be one of those exchange students who kept a blog then just forgot about it for months. Well, bad news…. I am. But it’s not a bad thing! In fact I’m using my excuses for not writing as an excuse to write something that I hope helps future exchangers now. To all those who are like me and promise themselves things that they will do/ keep up during their exchange year… trust me… IT DOESN’T WORK. You can’t plan your exchange year. Nothing about it. Not going to the gym, not continuing your favorite hobby, not even talking to your best friends in your home country (and certainly not keeping a blog). If giving up your best friend, or your favorite thing to do for a year sounds depressing to you, it is. All of my exchange friends and I have experienced it. For the first months here we had no idea what to do with ourselves. Everything had changed. The first month I tried living life as I had in America. I talked to my best friends from school. I kept up with news from my family. I spent my evenings and afternoons inside the house, just as I had done in America. I went to bed at 8:30 every night.

But in Italy my American lifestyle isn’t normal. People go out in the afternoons just to hang out in the streets. They meet acquaintances and make friends. They have groups of people to go out with that change. They don’t stay at home. In America my house is constantly full of my family and foreign students. There is more to do at home than outside. Before leaving I hadn’t even thought of the possibility of that. I knew it would be different, but I was stubborn and unwilling to change.

When I switched host families about a month in, I was forced to change. And I did. Not just my daily habits. I grew up a lot in the course of just a week. Had I ever thought that it would happen like that? No. That was the most immediate change that I went through here. My habits changed slowly over time too. I have done things here in Italy that I never would have done before. I started liking Italian clothing (some of it… fashion still sucks here), I spent a period of time when I went to the gym, I have been swimming at the beach. I look back to myself in America and I can’t remember who I was. And this sounds really cheesy and fake… but it’s so true. I have grown up and become Italian. I have 35 days left in Italy… and I don’t know what I am going to do when I get back. People might not recognize me. I might not recognize people. They moved the Borders out of my town. I have forgotten how to drive. They remodeled my school cafeteria. I don’t know how to speak English any more. My family has lived a year without me, but with two foreign exchange students in my place. My little brother has grown to my height. I think half in a different language and respond first in Italian before translating what I say into English. I have no vocabulary anymore (which is by the way another reason I have not been writing in my blog…. I feel like I can’t express ideas in English anymore)

Now this post isn’t the most organized, and I don’t know how much sense it will have for whoever reads it. But the bottom line is…. You can’t plan your year. You will change. You won’t want to do what you enjoyed before. You will give up your life, your friends, everything. And the best part is, it’s not the end of the world. It is a complete change in everything. And it’s cool. Only now I realize, an exchange year isn’t changing your life once… It’s changing your life twice. I’m going back to America soon. And it feels like my life is going to change all over again. We shall see. 

Anyway, I’m not thinking about anything else. And everything else I am thinking about pertains to my normal boring Italian life. I don’t know what else to tell people who read this. So please, if anyone wants to know about being awesome (aka a foreign exchange student), or about Southern Italy, please ask specific questions! It’s my life now so I can’t just write a blog on nothing… tell me what you want to hear!

 (also, if anyone really wants to know, I will be back in CA the 18^th of July, after my NYC adventure with my friend and NYC college tour with my father… WOO!)

Halfway

So hey. It's been what, like a month and six days? Yes I do think we can safley say that I suck at blogging. I'm back though now. And on a good day! It's the half way point! I have been here for 5 months, and I have 5 left to go! It's a little of a bittersweet thing, I really love Italy, and as the time passes I worry that I haven't done anything in all this time. I worry that in the next five months I won't do anything either. I have still not seen Rome, Milan, Florence, Venice..... and I've been here so long. It feels like I no longer have so much of a life in America as I have in Italy, but even then, I don't have a complete life in Italy either. I talk to other foreign students and it's the same for them. So here is my message to all future foreign students: THIS IS HARD!!! Don't go abroad thinking that it's going to be all fun. Everyone has these thoughts that can't be expressed into words and can only be partially understood by otehr foreign exchange students. It's not just feeling divided, it's feeling (no matter how bad you wanted to come in the begining) that maybe things would just be easier if you hadn't come. And yes, many of us foreign students feel horribly depressed, I have felt sad and have dealt with my foreign friends feeling so down that they try to push away their friends, the family, the culture, just looking for something stable in this experience. So let me tell you, nothing is stable. You have got to learn to go with the flow of your host country, everything can seem different and stupid, you may not understand the culture or the language, but we foreign students accept it. Foreign exchange students are saints. We deserve to be appreciated. Seriously. But enough of the part that normal people will probably entirely skip (hopefully future foreign students won't, but hey they can't be included in the normal person catagory, we are crazy for wanting to put ourselves through such crazyness).
So now, on to the part that you like to be reading...... FUN THINGS!

1. I am going to Trento soon! Trento is in the north, my host dad is from Trento. It is supposed to be very green. Now excuse me for knowing absolutely nothing else about this place, but I am going there. I'll tell you about it later. Promise. (BTW this is for exchange week, a special program specific to AFS Italy that sets students up with host families for a week in other parts of the country to see the different cultures, which trust me is WAY different throughout Italy)
2. I'm going to Germany!! To Koln. To learn German. Crap. German? I can't even say a frase in German. But I will have fun anyway. I hear we might go to a chocolate museum. God I hope so. I'm going with my school, but I really don't know anything else about it... once again an adventure.

Anyways, I really cant think of other things I want to include in that list. Hmm. Well I can talk to you about my language, because it's important. And maybe useful. Yeah. So people in America always ask me if I can speak the language yet. The answer is yes. Am I fluent? I don't know. I don't think so. I understand really almost everything of people's conversations. I can answer any question you ask me. I structure my sentances well and people understand me. I can have long discussions about culture, people, problems, and just complicated topics in general. Politics and history are a little hard because I don't know all of the specific vocabulary, but usually when a person is lecturing me on something I understand it all. Now, does that mean I can keep up in school if I can understand everything now? Um, no. I do not understand teacher lectures. In Italy they never take written tests, just oral tests. That means to get your grade you have to memorize many pages of a textbook and repeat exactly what they say outloud to the teacher. I can't do that, because it is hard enough to understand and translate, bu then to memorize it all and repeat it in a language where half the time I have no idea what I'm saying? yeah, like that's gonna happen anytime soon. Well, actually to tell the truth I kind of prefer it this way... XD
Hmmm, what else... well I am losing my skill to make sentences with nuances in English. I lost a lot of my vocabulary fast, so now I am trying to say something serios without making it sound harsh, I just can't. My word choice sucks. I am the laughing stalk of all my English speaking freinds. My goal has been reached.
Also, I eat too much. Not just pasta. Everything. I swear I didn't like cream cheese this much when I was American. So much bread. So many good places to eat. I love Italy. Next blog post will be a list of foods I can't live without. Meaning the cause of my death when I return to CA.
I love Italy. It is starting to feel like my home, my foreign home, but nevertheless, it's a home. I am happy here. I'm just not Italian. So foreign, but I like it. Italy is nothing like me, you can't label someone with the perfect country for them, being at home here is a matter of looking past so many flaws and just liking it anyway. Which is why we tend to stay in the same place we grew up in I think, for me America has it's farmilliar flaws. Now as Italy's flaws get more farmilliar, I can start to love it in the same way as America. But different.
Now since I have made this post at school, there is no spell check. Sorry. I have reread this many times to try and hide the fact of how much my English sucks. Sorry. It still sucks. The bell just rang, no more badly needed correcting. Live with it. I am off to go do something Italian. Ciao ciao!!!!

Happy (Belated) Holidays!!

Looks like once again I have forgotten to write here for a while.... whoops. Apologies to people out there who are actually reading my blog!! So in my absence from this blog lots has happened here =)
First thing: My host sister's 18th birthday!!! She had a big party with all of her friends one Saturday to celebrate her birthday that was on the 15th of December =). So I'm just gonna say once again: Auguri Fede!!!!!
Second: Christmas!!! Almost the same as a US Christmas but with a few different traditions:

• Il presepe: when we put up the Christmas tree (fake) we set up a cute little scene or figurines and moss with a little nativity scene in the corner. It is really cute. And it's still there so I will go take a picture of it later and put it on facebook (because pictures don't work on my blog... sad)
• In California we can go in the pool on Christmas. Here it was freezing. Not like California "freezing". Literally 0 degrees Celsius. Brrrrrrr....
• We stayed up until 3am on Christmas eve watching Avatar. Oh yes.
• The next day during Christmas lunch (Turkey and lots more food) we watched (and I sang XD) MAMMA MIA!!!! 
• When we got bored later that night we watched (and sang) to Phantom of the Opera!!!! 

And if you know me at all you will know that the last two points were definitely the highlights of my whole Christmas. And you will also probably figured that I have sworn not to watch two movie musicals in one day to prevent massive headaches/ sore throats.
Third: MY FRIEND DANA IS AMAZING!!! Just kidding, she just told me to say that. No, really I love NZerssss!!!!!
Fourth: Happy New Years!!!!! I spent New Years this year not watching the ball drop over NYC, but burning a giant scarecrow then lighting so many things on fire we couldn't see anything through the resulting smoke XD. And singing karaoke. Needless to say, best New Year's ever!
Fifth: I don't really have anything else to say except..... My host mom made Kiwi jam!!!!! It's amazing. Oh yes, and a package from America got here containing warm clothes and enough Jello to last me three lifetimes. Thank you America!!!!

Snow and Santa Lucia

Last Friday it snowed here!! It was only the second time I've ever seen it snow, and it was beautiful! I have no pictures of it actually snowing (because during that time I happened to be making a four hour skype call.... Lauren.... XD) but it was still there the next morning so I took some pictures then,(blogger isn't letting me put them here, so I put them on facebook in my second Italy album). There was a lot less that morning, so we had to go to school. Apparently, if it snows enough (from what I hear, still not a lot) we don't have to go to school! It is supposed to snow again this week on Wednesday and Thursday... I'm excited!! But scared since all I have to wear is still a fall coat and converse... hmmm. Strange having to buy all these clothes and wear layers.

Oh, and today is a holiday. Santa Lucia day. Last night we put out little sacks, fruit, milk, and raw polenta by the fireplace. And then this morning when we woke up and there was chocolate and presents all over the floor!! I am told this is a tradition in the north of Italy, and not usually in the South. My host dad explained to me that in the past Santa Lucia day used to mark the solstice, but when Christianity came about it kept all the old holidays and transformed this one into a day for Santa Lucia, a little girl who rides a donkey and died for the religion by having her eyes pried out. She is the saint of vision now. Lovely. Anyway, cool holiday, I have some chocolate and new house socks and gloves that I really needed now =). Thank you Santa Lucia!!

Spongebob and Chirsmas Lights

I have things to say! Sort of....
First thing: The Sponge Bob song in Italy has no words! It was so horrible the first couple of times I watched it, it's just an instrumental version of it along with the normal animation, but it feels so empty without the picture of a pirate singing. So of course at the begining I was the one who had to sing it out loud every time to make myself feel better about it's emptyness. But THEN, a couple of weeks ago, we found that if you change the language on the TV to English, that the song plays like normal! Now people believe me that the song has words! Oh yes!!!
Another thing: In America I always used to randomly start talking in a British accent. If I am speaking English and I do that here, no one notices. I have English class with one of the first year classes at my school and they have recorded voices that they have to repeat. The voices are recorded in British and I find it hilarious to repeat it in British as well. Then I start laughing at myself and the entire class is like "what???" which makes it all even more funny. No one finds the humour (hehe) in me walking around saying "I'm Harry Potter" in British either..... oh the depression.
Good news! I might go to Germany! I would be going with a class a year older than mine who has had a lot more German than I have studied and in the mornings I would be expected to go to their intermediate language class with them. I find that very funny since my German level is so low that I walked into German class the other day and the teacher asked me how I was and I got really confused because I couldn't understand her. Yes, that's right, 2 months of German and I still can't say "How are you?". Good news is that most Germans speak English better than I speak German, so I think I'll be ok. It's easier to just focus on Italian, not German, for now.
My town has started hanging up Christmas lights! Some people in the city even hang them from the balconies and the whole town is pretty now at night. Next time I'm going to take some pictures of it because it's beautiful! But I will still miss the way it is in America... I have yet to see a shiney penguin hanging anywhere. I expect many, many, many front lawn penguin army pictures to be sent to me from America. 25 days until Christmas anyway (more important now, becasue I skipped Thanksgiving...), I'm excited!

I feel boring. No, not bored. Boring. Read this anyway.

I would like to say somethings about my life.
1. I eat cookies every morning for breakfast. This is considered healthy.
2. I'm freezing. I want to buy a coat.
3. When I come back to CA I would like a radiator. These things are so amazing and warm to sit on.... who cares if CA is the same all year round I WANT A RADIATOR!!!
4. I love how we get fresh bread and cheese every day for lunch, mmmmmmm....
5. I think if I skipped drinking an espresso (that's normal coffee here, none of that watery american stuff) everyday after lunch I would die.
6. When I first saw the town's historic center I was in awe. Now it's normal, there's a beautiful, old, historic building right there and all I can think about is finding gelato.....
7. THEY TAKE AWAY THE GELATO WHEN IT GETS COLD!!! Sad Emily.....
8. Hot chocolate here is just hot pudding. Amazing.
9. I go to the bar almost everyday. There is a bar in my school. A bar is not a place where old drunk men sit here, it's like an American cafe with alcohol still, but it's like just for show behind the register. Bars are for pastries and coffee and hot chocolate and tea. And just general Italian amazingness.
10. People really like labels here. They will wear the ugliest thing in the world just because it has a designer on it. Even a fake one. This explains why I haven't bought anything here, EVERYTHING has labels. Not good shopping for me at least.
11. I know you all want to know this because everyone asks: no, Italian guys are not all hot. It's about the same ratio of hot to ugly as it is in America. The only difference here is they iron their clothes.
12. Throwing trash on the ground is normal. If you don't they think you are weird. Then you explain how you don't because you want the town to be pretty. Then they tell you that the town is clean and get insulted when you point out the piles of trash. It's an exciting cycle.
13. I love focaccia.
14. it is necessary to eat fruit after each meal. I like oranges.
15. I love how there are millions of roundabouts here and no one knows how to use them. There are so many people who don't look just to almost crash and get angry. Entertaining.
16. Gonna stay here forever just for the fact that there are pigeons and no seagulls or crows.
17. Ending with a happy thought: The city next to me, Taranto, is full of iron factories. It is famous for the number of people who get cancer there. Wooooo!
I'm getting lazy. I don't want to write on my blog. Apologies for the general unexcitingness of this post. It's what you get. Be happy. I really am having a great time =D. Greetings from Italy until next week!

Sorry! It's gonna be a long one...

I haven't written for a while... sorry! I've been really busy with things, but that's a good sign because before I was bored a lot (still am, but I have better things to do than inform America of my life in Italy... haha). So I'm just going to try to briefly explain what I have done in the past... oh wow... almost a month =)

1. Went to a camp with all the AFS kids in the Puglia region. Boring meetings all day, but god do I love foreign exchange students =D. We had the best time ever, it was so sad to leave after only 4 days together. I'm just lucky a lot of the awesomest people live in my town so I can see them often =)

2. I went camping. It was pretty. I walked in a cave. Which was really beautiful. But the camping part wasn't so fun. And I didn't bring my camera because I thought I would break it. I was probably right.

3. I went to northern Italy. Saw the city Padova and met my host brother who is in University there. He's awesome. And Padova is beautiful! The next time we go up to the north though, my family said they would bring me to Venice which I am way excited to see! There will be pictures of Padova on facebook eventually as well =)

Those are pretty much all the cool adventures I have had since I stopped writting... so here are some updates on my daily life:

1. My family. My host sister is awesome. We are still like real sisters. I am so glad for this because some of my friends aren't close to their host siblings... I can't imagine not being anymore =). My little host bro is sooooo awesome!!!! As some people may know, my name when I am a man is Paco. I taught my little brother to say "I am Paco" and now he runs around the house shouting this. I love it =D. My host mom is what I had always thought "Typical Italian" but even more, and real. She really cares about me and my brother and sister, especially about us being cold. Especially about me being cold. Because everyone knows that you get soooo much colder than Italians when you have lived in California your whole life. Haha, she likes to give me food too. Lots and lots of food. =D. My host dad likes to talk to me about intelligent stuff. But for some reason he and my host mom are the two Italians i can understand the least of what they are saying so explaining intelligent stuff to Emily is difficult. But they really feel like my family and I am so happy to be here =).

2. My school. Boring. Haven't really been getting along with the class I am officially in. I like them, but I think the novelty of being American has worn off, and I don't have really much time in the class anyway because they take subjects that I don't understand. And most of my other classes are cool too. I have been taking German, yes for nine hours a week, and I have not learned a thing. It is soooo hard learning it in Italian when it's not my first language and I'm so focused on the Italian that the German pretty much slips through the cracks.

3. My friends. As I mentioned, I don't really hang out with my class a lot like I would probably be expected to. I like the group of foreign exchange students too much =). It's not really a bad thing, because I don't get to go out a lot, and I still speak Italian all day. But foreign students are the awesomest people on earth. It's proven.

4. The food. Yes, I know, everyone wants to hear about it. It's the first question I always get when I talk to people... yes it is amazing! The food at my new house is even better than the first (which I didn't know was possible). Because it's cold now it seems we are eating lots of soup. Not as much pasta as you may think. Also lots of fish, bread, and pizza. And the coffee. My favorite thing ever. I can't live without it. And Italian coffee is amazing.

5. Wait. That's all I can think of.

Here, I can tell you guys what I miss:

1. The warm weather in CA. But I can survive.
2. My little dog. We only have big dogs here. I want my little dog to sit on my lap.
3. American milk. The Italian milk has a nasty aftertaste...
4. Not being tired all the time. It's my fault actually... if only I didn't stay up all night talking to my host sister...
5. Having time to do things. I don't even know why I have no time. I seem to wake up in the morning and then suddenly it is like 11 pm...
6. My dad's cooking. He needs to send me his recipe for cinnamon rolls.
7. Not having to dry my hair. They literally freak out if you have wet hair here. They think it's going to give you a headache. No joke.
8. American stores. I personally, do not like Italian fashion. Come here and you will see. Some things I see people wearing or buying just get on my nerves.
9. My car. I wish I could just drive myself somewhere whenever I wanted.
10. My little Pedro. It's ok though. When I start missing him too much I just look out the window at my host cousin who is a 13 year old boy. He throws sticks at cactuses. It gets on my nerves just enough to be angry at little Pedro again XD
11. I really want a warm waffle with real maple syrup right now!!
12. Starbucks. I don't think I even really have to say this. Everyone who has met me knows that no starbucks for a year has killed me just a little inside.
13. My school in America... not specifically my school, just American schools in general... what I wouldn't kill for a little organization and an activity or two instead of a monotone lecture in ever class..
14. American gum. My parents sent me some. Seriously though... only 6 packs?!?!? That'll last me a day!! Send more!!! Anyone who wants to send some peppermint flavored extra should ask me for my address on facebook... please!! Gum, people, gum!
15. Carpet. My feets is cold.

I don't think I miss much else.... that I can think of now XD. Sorry again that I haven't written in so long... comment questions you want me to answer here next time, and I will try to next week =). Ha wishful thinking. I'd much rather sleep than write about my life. It has become so normal... I feel like I live here, but not completely Italian... it's really weird... but it would be weirder if I came back home right now... I feel like I belong here more that in California... can't explain that. All I know it that I like it =). Sooo... if you miss me you should send me some gum and skype me!!!!
Ciao ciao =D