Four Weeks Left

With only four weeks left in my escapade overseas, I decided to take time out of my busy day, (well I’m actually just bored on a Wednesday night), and do a little reflection of my trip.

 

It’s crazy to think about my trip already coming to an end, especially when it seems like it just started. As I look back on it, I feel like I haven’t accomplished or fulfilled everything I wanted to do. One of the biggest things holding me back was probably the terrible exchange rate between the US dollar and the euro. I had so much more planned in my head, but limited time and money prevented me. It stinks to think that I never got to do some amazing trips and go to amazing places, but that’s what will make me come back for more. Yeah, maybe I only added three new stamps in the passport, but it has really allowed me to explore Tuscany more than I expected. Taking daytrips to smaller towns that I wouldn’t have otherwise done, such as San Gimignano, Lucca, Viareggio, Siena and Pisa, has really made me appreciate the Italian culture much more. I’m living in Italy, learning Italian, cooking Italian, eating Italian, drinking Italian, and speaking Italian, so why not travel Italy? I’ve learned so much from these little towns that haven’t been spoiled by tourism.

 

Another thing that has surprised me is my improvement in Italian. I knew that it would improve, but I’ve really surprised myself. It’s really cool to be walking down the street and understand a group of people talking to each other, or be able to order my whole meal and get what I ordered, or even getting bumped up a couple levels of Italian classes. Knowing the language, and actually knowing it, not just using some phrase book or going off of what you remember your parents or grandparents teaching you growing up, helps so much. I remember the first time I came and couldn’t even pronounce the name of my hotel! Now, being able to effortlessly carry on a conversation is becoming second nature. I just hope that when I go home, I’ll be able to keep it up, because they always say, if you don’t use it, you lose it.

 

Now for food. I. Love. It. There are so many dishes in America that we consider Italian, but aren’t Italian at all. And there are so many dishes here in Italy that are hard to come by in America. One dish I recently learned and made, is a typical Florentine dish that was invented around the time of Napoleon. His wife was living in Florence and one day demanded something to eat. Her servants quickly came up with a dish to suit her needs. The dish is called, Tasche di Marie Louise, Pockets of Marie Louise, and is a piece of chicken with prosciutto and cheese folded inside and secured with a toothpick. Fry it up in olive oil and butter in a skillet and it’s one of the best combinations of flavors in one bite ever! The sweetness of the chicken combined with the saltiness of the prosciutto, plus the smokiness of the cheese is overwhelmingly good. What I’ll miss the most is our family dinners. Every once in a while, I’ll dress up in my chef’s jacket and hat and cook up a big Italian dinner for all 13 of us at one of the girls’ apartments. I love cooking for large groups, and for other people in general. It’s great to get other people’s opinions and the praise :)

 

 

I love going to mass in the Duomo. It’s an experience unlike any other. Being able to look up and realize you are under this enormous dome is amazing. I tend to go to the Italian mass on Sunday mornings as opposed to the English mass on Saturday nights, because not only is it great exposure and practice, but because it is so much more expressive than English. I went to mass last Friday for the celebration of the Feast of the Annunciation at a famous church in Florence called, Santissima Annunziata, where the Archbishop celebrated mass. The first thing he said in his homily was, “Oggi, il Figlio di Dio si fa carne nel seno di Maria,” meaning, “Today, the Son of God was made flesh in Mary's womb.” It just sounds so much more passionate and convincing in Italian than in English. Yes, Christmas is the day Jesus was born, but with Mary’s Fiat, her unresounding yes to God when she says, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. Let it be done to me according to your word” (Luke 1:38), is the day that God was made Incarnate. It is the day Mary conceived Christ in her womb, the first day that God lived on this earth as a human being. The word “Incarnate” comes from Latin for, made flesh, but I’ll use Italian since it’s more relatable. The word “carne” means meat, or flesh, so it’s funny how the Feast Day fell on a Friday of Lent, allowing us to eat meat!

 

I’ve briefly touched on Katharina, my Art History professor, but I haven’t really talked about my other teachers. That’s another thing I’ll have to get used to back at Mason, calling my professors by their last name! Everyone here goes by their first name; I have Katharina for art, Adriano for government, Francesca for Italian, Jim for psychology, and Franceschina is the secretary. One day, Adriano was staring out the window before class and commented on how it would be a perfect day to go hiking. So the next class, he filled us in on the details for a class hiking trip to Cinque Terre, which I actually just got back from on Wednesday. Francesca is just so much fun. She’s not only my Italian teacher, but also the Director of Studies for the school. Like all my Italian teachers, she loves me as her student and constantly pokes fun at me in front of the whole class. All three of us.

 

I guess you can’t see all of Europe in one trip, so I guess I’ll just have to come back again some day. All though, money might be a problem, so you can just send a check to my home address written out to me and my mom can deposit it into my account. JUST KIDDING! (My mom’s going to kill me when she reads this!) At this point, I’ve got to make the best of what I have left. I still have a whole month living here, and there’s so much more to do. I guess I better get busy!