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!