Frutti di Bosco

Fruit of the woods. A.k.a mixed berry, the type of yogurt I eat for breakfast every morning here. I get up and go into out little kitchen and take my time eating and drinking a little (un po) espresso. My host family is so wonderful. They have all kinds of things left out for us for breakfast. And dinner is always delicious and fun, with everybody talking at once while I try to grasp a few words. Luigia and Franco often have silly arguments, neither one actually mad, about things like vitamins versus better shoes. I am not just mistranslating, that is what they were talking about the other night. Virginia often tries to explain what is going on, but there is a still a lot left out. I think my host family thinks I understand more Italian than I do. I tend to nod when they say something, and when I don't know the words I can usually figure out what they are saying. Sometimes I am able to form the right response in Italian. A lot of times Virginia helps me. Lucrezia just laughs at everything. She is your typical fifteen year old, sighing and making fun of everything. Some things are international like teenage behavior or fathers falling alseep while watching tv. Every night after dinner I hear Franco snoring on the couch, just like my dad at home.

Italian class is going well. We start the past tense next week! I will finally be able to tell Luigia what I did at school not what I am doing. I like pronouncing the words, and figuring out how to use prepositions even though it is hard. I just want to be able to communicate in this language. My literature class, aptly named by Heather Love and Betrayal in Tuscany is also going well. We finally finished Dante's Inferno (thankfully!) and have moved on to Boccaccio's Decameron which I like much more. The Inferno was just so disgusting and depressing. The Decameron keeps me a little more interested. But perhaps that is because I tend to prefer short stories over novels... or epics, as it were.

After a rainy morning to sun has come out and we are all crossing out fingers that this will be the beginning of warmer weather. Though, as soon as I leave for Prague in two weeks I will be freezing again. But I can warm up afterwards in Barcelona. I am feeling more at home here. I am confident in my ability to navigate the city and to speak enough Italian to get around, if I cannot yet have long conversations with people. Overall, life it Italy is good. I live in Italy, in a tiny medieval city in Italy. I still have trouble believing it.