New friends, new places

Ciao! :)

My past two days have been a lot less stressful. I am beginning to feel more comfortable in Italy and I am understanding the way things work at school and around town. I still am completely lost at school, but maybe hopefully I can find my way sooner or later. At home, I am feeling more comfortable with Leonardo and Paola, and I really like all of my family and friends so far.

Tuesday was my busy day. Tuesday morning at 9:00, I met all of the exchange students that go to my school. There are 6 of us, I am really surprised how many there! We met in our "counselor's" room. Her name is Sarah Martini, and she is in charge of us and helps us if we have any problems while we are in school. Here is the list of exchange students:

• Anika and I are from America.
• Tim is from New Zealand.
• Nicolas is from Ecuador.
• Nam is from Thiland.
• Matias is from Argentina.

They are very nice and we all had so much to talk about- our first week of school, our first impressions of Italy, how the food is, etc. Tim is a special case however- in New Zealand, school ends in January. So last year, he finished his year of school and came to Italy in the middle of the school year here. He did one semester as a fourth year student, enjoyed the entire summer here, and is now doing another semester as a fifth year student with his class. The rest of us asked him many questions and he tried to help us the best he could. We talked for about 2 hours, and didn't go to any of our classes that morning. We had all agreed that we couldn't understand anything anyway!! (Excpet Tim, but he didn't mind missing a class for a while..)

That afternoon, Paola and I went to a discount store that her friend works at to look at cheaper shirts for running in and for school. I found a few shirts I like and I bought them, along with some slippers for the coming winter. After buying the shirts, Paola's friend invited us to her house for a cup of coffee and to catch up with Paola. Her home was beautiful surrounded by a countryside and it was very homey. I feel like every single home in Italy is homey and comfy and beautiful, no matter where it is. Her two sons were also there, and they were polite and spoke a bit of English with me. Its really nice to meet new people and to widen my horizon of people I know! Her friend also made us a cappuccino- a frothy, creamy coffee. It was fantastic. Italians love their coffee, and luckily so do I! :)

Later that night, the local Rotaract club invited me to a pizza dinner and to get to know all the people in the club. Rotaract is basically a Rotary club for younger people in their twenties. They do community service and projects and events. It is very similar to me like Leadership in which I was involved in for 3 years! I will have to see if there is something like that in Reno when I come home!

The dinner was fantastic- and it was my FIFTH pizza!! Oh my goodness I need to slow it down with the pizza. But it is so fresh and delicious that I can't resist... ;) I got to know the club a bit, but I was kind of shy to be around so many new people. After dinner and dessert (Tiramisu of course!), the president of the Rotaract club invited us to go walk around Marostica- a beautiful little city known for its ancient castles. It was fantastically beautiful, even at night.

This is a Google image of the area of Marostica.

An ancient part of the Marostica wall surrounding the castles.

The fantastically beautiful castle in Marostica with the moon shining in the background.

The giant chess board.

 

One of the girls from Rotaract when we were looking at the castles told me the tale of Marostica and why there is a giant chess board. This is what she told me:

 "Once upon a time, in this very kingdom, there was a King who had two daughters that needed to be married. One daughter was the most beautiful girl in the world- blonde hair, blue eyes, and not a flaw on her. The other daughter was not as pretty as the first daughter- in fact quite ugly. There were many men who wished to marry the first daughter because she was a gem in the kingdom. The only problem the king had was that he must have both daughters married. The king searched through all the suitors and came upon two men who desperately wanted to marry the beautiful daughter. The king decided to have a chess tournament between the two men. The winner would win the beautiful daughter, and the loser must marry the ugly daughter."

 And that was the story she told me. I felt quite bad for the ugly daughter :( The girl from Rotaract also told me that every two years, people come from all over Europe to have a festival here and there are real horses, real people, and real moveable buildings and there is a mini game of chess on the giant chess board. It reminded me of Harry Potter's Wizard's Chess! Although I highly doubt anyone gets smashed to pieces.

 

This is what the event would look like.

 

It was a fantastic night and so beautiful, and I even got to meet more people! I can't wait to see what else will be in store for me :)

 

New Friends and School

Buonasera everyone! :)

I am so excited- I have already made new friends! :) And school is going pretty good so far, but man is it difficult. So I will try to explain to you my schedule and how Italian school works:

• Everyday, I ride the bus to school. It is not a normal school bus, but it is a regular city bus, and there are often other people on the bus besides my classmates. We ride the bus for about 20 minutes and it drops us off right in front of the school. I am lucky because I have two classmates and two cousins who ride the same bus as me. Also, another exchange student from New Zealand rides the bus with me, so I want to get to know him better!
• After the bus, I wait with my two classmates for the class to begin at 8:10. I don't know why it doesn't start at 8 exactly, but its okay with me. Then we head to whatever class we have that morning.
• In Italian school, you are with the same 20-25 kids all 5 years of your high school career. Hopefully you like your class! So the kids I am with now are all best friends and they have really gotten to know each other. I am also very lucky, because my class is the friendliest group of kids. They are so polite to me and have already included me in their group. I sort of like this system because you get to be really comfortable with your class and you can be yourself around them. Its not like you have to impress a new class every day. It is very laid-back.
• As I already said, there are 5 years of high school. That doesn't sound like fun to me at all. You also have to pay for high school. When kids are 13ish, they decide what they want to do with their life- whether it be science, math, writing, etc. If they don't want to go to school they can go to a trade school to learn about factory work and stuff like this. In high school, the first four years are similar to American high school- there are classes you have to take to know a certain amount. But their fifth year is the most difficult. They must study, study, study for this huge exam at the end of the year. It is a test to determine if you have learned everything you needed to learn in high school. If you fail the exam (this is the worst part!), you must retake your fifth year of high school. I would just die! And my friends have told me that there are people who have not passed before. Though I don't think the test is ridiculously difficult, I think it is similar to the American SAT- the higher the score, the better chance of getting into a good university.
• The classes part of high school is a bit confusing. Everyday I have a different schedule- math in the morning on Monday, science in the morning of Tuesday, etc. Some classes I have for two hours and some I have for one hour. All the classes I have are:
• Math
• Science
• History
• Italian
• Drawing
• P.E
• English
• Physics
• Religion
• Information (computers)
• I do not have every class every day. It switches from day to day. The most I have in a day is 5 classes.
• School is 5 hours long with one 15 minute break after 3 hours, and there is school on Saturday. It definitely is much harder than American school. The kids here study all the time and work much harder than Americans (on the average). It is very different.

The good news is that I get out of school at around 1:10, and I am home by 1:30, so I have the entire afternoon to myself. Lately I have gone running in the countryside near my home, and it is always beautiful. Leonardo even went for a run with me today! :) But I feel like I cant only run to keep myself busy. I would really like to volunteer with kids or animals or join a club or something! So I will find out what is available.

On Saturday night, some of my new friends and I went to the center of Dueville to eat at a pizza restaurant and to walk around and hang out. It was a relaxing night and I got to know my classmates a bit better. They speak really good English, but they also like to talk really fast in Italian to one another, and I cannot keep up. I want to already know the language!! Hopefully I can learn soon :)

These are a few of my classmates that I will be going to class with everyday!

 

 

Also, on Friday night, I went into the most beautiful theater I have ever seen. I went for a Rotary event with my family and Rotary tutor, and there was also another exchange student there named Lauren. She was very sweet! For this event, we had to get all dressed up in our fancy attire and go to the Teatro Olimpico to watch a youth orchestra. The theater was so beautiful and the orchestra was fantastic. The people performing were aged from 14 to 22, with two older people who were the leaders. I was amazed at the high quality of the performance. The performers were from all over Europe and obviously the best of the best.

 

This is the other exchange student, Lauren.

The amazing orchestra in the beautiful theater.



More of the theater! :)

 

Italy has been treating me very well. I love everything so far. School may be a bit difficult, but I will try my hardest to do my best. I also will try to find a fun hobby to do- so more on that later! My lovely mother dearest told me she would prefer if I do smaller blogs every day than a biiiig blog every few days. As you wish, Mom :)

 

I will write soon! Ciao!

Exploring

These past few days have been FANTASTIC. I am definitely still in my "Honeymoon" Stage of my exchange. I am in awe of the beautiful Alps in the horizon as we drive through the city. I admire the cobblestone streets and the little cars everywhere. I look in wonder at how green everything is here (compared to brown Nevada...). And I absolutely adore my family and friends here in Italy. Can it get any better?!

On Tuesday, Paola and I went to the Supermarcato in the morning to buy some food for the week, and to get me some things that I like in America. I kept telling her that I want to eat Italian food, but she insisted I buy some things. So I bought some carrots to munch on as a snack, I bought some fruit juice, some green tea and some Kellog's cereal. Though I was surprised to find that the cereal and the juice taste a lot different than they do in America- not as sweet and...just different!

This is the inside of the Supermarcato. It looks pretty much the same as in America!

 

After we bought my food, Paola bought the food for dinner- the meat and the cheeses and the bread. What was different about this was that in America, most bread is packaged and has loads of preservatives in them, and you can only get a small amount of bread fresh baked. In Italy, all the bread is freshly baked, all the meat is freshly sliced and all the cheese is brand new. It was fantastic.

 This is the deli: the fresh meat is ready to be sliced right away. There is no leaving slices sitting in plastic for days and days until someone buys it here.

 





The Italians love their cheeses, and have many different types to choose from. Lucky me, I love cheese too! :)

 

Later that day, Anika and I really wanted to go shopping for some Italian clothes. Around 4:30pm, we went to the center of Vicenza and went to many different stores and we found some cute shirts! Every time Anika and I went in between stores, we had to stop and stare at how pretty it looked from the streets. It was a wonderful afternoon, and that evening there was a beautiful sunset to top it off.

 

Wednesday was another adventure. Anika and I went to Brock's house, the other exchange student from Idaho. Brock lives up in the hills of the Vicenza area, and his host family has a fantastic view of the entire area.

 

 

 

 

Brock and his host brother and Anika and I talked outside Brock's house for a bit while the adults had to work on Brock's residence of stay. When they were done, we all went in to have a fantastic lunch prepared by Brock's host mom. Brock has two host brothers. One is my age, 18, and one is only 9. But the entire family was very polite and very cheerful. It was good getting to know Brock and Anika even better. After lunch, we were given an espresso (a little shot of strong coffee with sugar) and a fantastic ice cream cake made by Brock's host mom.

 

After lunch, Brock, Anika, Brock's host brother (ahhhh I forgot his name! I am so bad at names...) all went to the city center of Vicenza. This time however, there were no adults with us, so Brock's host brother could show us all of the best bars and shops. He even showed us a fantastic little park with old statues and fountains everywhere.

 

 

Anika and I, being goofy!

 

In front of an old building and a pretty little pond.

A beautiful ancient looking fountain!

 

Today I started school, but I will post more about school later once I get familiar with how school works so I can explain it better. Also, all of the pictures I have taken are up on Facebook, so just check them out anytime! I will be writing soon...

 

Ciao! :)

 



Still Learning!

Yesterday was a Sunday, which is an important day for Italians. This week, I was allowed to sleep in because of my jet-lag, but next week, I will be expected to go to church. I can't wait to see what Italian church is like! Around 1:00pm, Leonardo told me that the whole family eats lunch in the large dining room in between our house and Nonna's house. There were definitely a lot of people that were there for lunch- Nonna, two uncles, two aunts, 5 cousins, Paola, Leonardo and me. Nonna (Grandma) made lunch for everyone. What I realized halfway through my second plate of scrumptious pasta was that the pasta was just the first dish, and there was an even bigger dish coming next, followed by desert. I was already full from the pasta, but I tried the chicken braised in fresh tomato sauce and sausage in olive oil, with bread and beans and lots of other side dishes. It was quite a huge meal, and now I know to save my hunger for the whole thing! After lunch, Nonna presented me with handmade pastries with cream filling and fruit. Next Sunday, I will have to take pictures of the delicious food. After lunch, the entire family sat down in front of the TV to watch a sports car race, which seems to be very popular here.

 

 This is what the racing cars look like. There are about 30 or so cars that do 53 laps around a track. There were also fall outs and people that crashed, which was exciting for my family.

 



 

 This is what the racing reminded me of- the second Cars movie!

 

After lunch, I went over to Anika's house. Her parents own a hotel, and there was a swimming pool in the back of the hotel. That was the last day it would be open, so we decided to swim. Anika's host brother, Marco, swam with us. Anika and I wanted to play water games, and it was very interesting trying to explain how to play to Marco. He did however, love to play Marco-Polo, mainly because his name is Marco and also because he was a good little swimmer! After I swam with Anika, Paola and I wanted to go see Leonardo's cousin play the clarinet in a orchestra performance. There were three different bands, and it was a long performance, but it was relaxing!

 

Today was about finishing business. Paola and I went to the bank to exchange money. That by far has been the most disappointing thing so far- I exchanged $390 American dollars and only got 280 Euros. Everything here is more expensive than in America, so I will have to budget my money wisely. Then Anika and her host mom and Paola and I went to the school where I will be going. Anika and I are in different classes, but we will still see each other.

 

La mia scuola, from the front entrance.

 



This is a helicopter view of my school from online. As you can see, it is three stories high and not very spread out like American schools.

 

So far, Italy has been good to be. I can't wait to experience more and more and more! :)



First Three Days

Ciao from Vicenza! :)
All I can say is "Wow!". Italy is so incredibly beautiful. I am just in awe that this is really happening to me. Everything is so fantastic! Where do I even begin? (Unfortunately my computer died because I didn't figure out how to charge it for three days, but now it is up and running and will work from now on! So please excuse the terribly long post!)

The beginning of my adventure was when I was in the Reno-Tahoe Airport. I had some friends come say their last goodbye to me, (Thank you Kimmie, Nick, Jessica and Jessica!) and my mom and dad and sister Kathryn said goodbye to me as well. I kept telling myself "Don't cry!! Don't cry!!", but of course I cried. I had three flights in all- Reno to LA, LA to Frankfurt, and Frankfurt to the Venice Airport. I met another exchange student boy named Brock who was from Idaho who was also going to the Vicenza area. He was only 16, but such a sweetheart! I hope I get to see him again! Brock and I flew from Frankfurt to Venice together, and when we got off the plane to the checked baggage claim, we waited for our bags. Brock got his right away, and I was waiting....and waiting...and still no bag. So I walked out to my happy, smiling new family and friends, and had to tell them I had lost luggage! But they were absolutely amazing about it- they waited for me very patiently, they were very friendly and helpful to me. Almost all of them spoke a little English, and so we chatted a bit about my flights and the things we liked to do.

This is me, coming out of the security doors, and saying hello to my new family!

This is my new family and Rotary friends. They were the sweetest people ever! :)

 

 

After waiting a bit, the security guards told me I would have to come back the next day for my lost luggage at 10:00 am. One of the Rotary guys, Obrad, told me he would give me a ride the next day, so that settled that.  Everyone said their goodbyes (mostly just a lot of "Ciao!"). My host brother Leonardo, my host mother Paola, and my host father Flavio all went to a Pizzaria in Vicenza. You can order a meter sized pizza there and every square be a different type of pizza. Flavio ordered mushroom, cheese, ham, and a different type of cheese. It was fantastic food, so much better than American pizza. Later that night, we went to the house where my host family lives. The house is big and gorgeous. It is connected to two other houses so that we all practically live together. We are on the left, the grandma lives in the middle, and the aunt and cousins live in the far right house. Our house is very pretty, inside and out.

 

This is my room, or camera. It is quite large, and there's even some exercise equipment that was Camilla's!

This is the bathroom that is also quite large. It is my own personal bathroom also, I am the only one who will use it. I think its fantastic! :)

 

That night I slept like a log! The next morning, Obrad and I left at 9:00 am to go to the airport and get my luggage. It is about an hour drive to get to the airport, so Obrad and I talked a lot about Italy and what it will be like for me. What I found most interesting, and Leonardo told me this too, is that every region in Italy has its own dialect. It is similar to America and our different accents, but he told me that if someone from the north tried to talk dialect to someone from the south, they wouldn't be able to understand each other at all!

This is the view from the car on the way to the airport. Very, very green! And very pretty. I will have to get better pictures of the landscape soon!



I came home after the airport, and unpacked my bag. I realized quickly that for some reason, I thought Italy was going to be colder. It is quite warm here, and I didn't pack enough T-shirts for here. I did however pack a lot of cardigans, which is not what I needed. So, I will soon need a shopping spree!! :) My mamma Paola made lunch for me and Lorenzo around 1:00 pm, and it was a delicious pasta with meat. The food here is soooooo good. I will eat my life away! After that, I talked to Paola and Leonardo about Nevada and the US and about my life. It was fun to talk to them and show them about my life.

That evening, Paola and I met up with another girl name Anika (hopefully I am spelling that right!) who is from Minnesota. She is such a doll. I like her already! We will be going to the same school so we thought it would be a good idea to meet. We first went to the SuperMarcato, and bought some things. Then we drove to her host parent's brother's house, and we all took a walk around the city center of Vicenza. This by far was the most beautiful thing imaginable. Vicenza is what you think picture in your head for Italy: cobblestone streets, outdoor cafes, beautiful and fashionable people, and lots of old buildings. Here are just a few pictures I took:

Mia mamma, Paola!

There was a big September festival that night, and there were many street performers!

 Vicenza is even more beautiful at night...

This is the other exchange student, Anika. She was very nice! I hope I get to see more of her! :)

Exchange students and our mammas!

This was our dinner that night in an outdoor restaurant. I was very surprised to find that Italians don't eat a lot of snacks throughout the day, but we get enormous pizzas all to ourselves for dinner. I will definitely have to exercise often if this is what I am eating!

 

 

That night, we got home around 1 in the morning, and I dropped like a log into bed. It was a great day! The next day, I slept in until 12:30 in the afternoon and my host mom had to wake me up! It was funny because she told me she didn't even worry about breakfast and just made lunch! She had made a delicious chicken and veggie dish. It was sweet and so delicious. She is definitely a talented cook. After lunch, Leonardo had to study because his exam for the university is on Monday, so I went and watched some Italian Modern Family and looked through my phrase book. I figure that reading the phrase books over and over will help me eventually get enough for a good conversation. When Paola came home from being with her friends, we decided we needed to figure out a solution to my technology problem. My computer died the first night, and I have not been able to charge my camera, I-pod, or laptop. So Paola and I went to the technology market to look for an international charger. We couldn't find a single one anywhere. We went back home and asked Flavio's (my host dad's) brother who is very good with technology. He had a charger that works all over the world and we also figured out I could unplug my laptop's charger in half and plug the other half into the Italian charger. It was all very complicated, but we made it work. :)

 

Later that evening, Leonardo and I went out. We first went to his friend's house in the city of Este. His name was Elia, and we had another huge pizza to ourselves. I met Elia's mom, grandma, and younger brother and his friend, and they were so polite! After dinner, which was around 9:00 at night, Leonardo and Elia and I went to the center of Este and met up with a lot of Leonardo's college friends. I of course was very shy, but I did try to talk to a few of them. The names I remember were Giula, Toni, Marko, Davide, and...that's all. But they all were very polite to me and tried to make me feel welcome. Almost all of them however spoke little to no English. Only Leonardo and Toni spoke English. We all stood in the center of Este for an hour or so, and then we went to a party a few minutes away. It was a toga party and it was packed full of college kids. I was so shy! But it was interesting to see how the kids there enjoy their Saturday night. Leonardo was explaining to me how you MUST go out every single Saturday night, because it is the only night to have fun. In Italy, they have school Monday-Saturday, and Sunday is the relaxing and church day. I should have taken some photos from this night, but I didn't want to seem like the nerdy American taking lot of photos with her camera. I will need to buy a cell phone very soon, for pictures and communication.

 

So, this has been my Italian life so far! Italy is amazing, and I am having a blast. Now please excuse me, I have a language to learn! ;) Ciao!