Blog Day 13 - Italian Analysis

So today was not a very good day. We went to school and that has been frustrating. This Italian course is normally taught during a 15-week semester. We are doing the ENTIRE course in under 3 weeks! It is MUCH harder than any of were expecting. It is a 100-level course but Italian is nothing like English. Knowing Spanish or French only seems to get in the way of our Italian. It is really difficult but I actually really like it! And lots of people that we encounter in our daily routines enjoy teaching us new things, and every where we go, we learn something new about Italian culture. The guys at the bar that we stop at for paninis teach us how to properly order food. The waitresses at a restaurant down the street teach us curse words. The train rides teach us geography. Walking the streets teaches us how to act Italian, dress European, read signs, and dodge cigarette butts and dog poop! :-P Everything here is a learning experience... and an adventure!

After school, we did nothing but study. We have an exam tomorrow! I'm scared :( So yea... nothing more to write about the day because we just studied.

So since this is a boring entry, I will write about some things I have observed (I'll probably repeat a lot of things that I have already said but oh well).
- Everyone has a dog and they go to the bathroom everywhere. They are taken into stores and restaurants and anywhere that the owners go.
- Everyone here smokes.
- Italy keeps weird hours, compared to what we are used to in the US. Stores, shops, and bakeries open at a normal hour in the morning, like around 8 or 9, close around 2, and reopen around 4, and then close for the night around 7. At 7, the restaurants open. Bars here are not like bars at home. They are more like cafes and little sandwich shops or bakeries.
- Everyone here owns at least 10 pairs of boots. I bought myself a pair to feel Italian :-P
- All the girls have dark hair, dark eyeliner, and either straight or side-swept bangs that fall in their eyes.
- All the guys are dressed either super metro or really punked out. Their pants are so tight, I can practically count the change in their back pockets.
- People live off of wine, foccacia, pasta, gelato and oranges.
- People walk a lot and from far distances, but they also CRAM onto the buses during rush hour. They are packed in there so tight, they pretty much POP out the doors when the bus stops!
- In this region, everyone's home has a gorgeous view of the Sea.
- Bathrooms are not meant to spend much time in here. The windows let in cold air, the flusher on the toilet takes all my strength to push in, the shower temperature changes at its own will, and the towels are rough!
- People drive CRAZY in this town! There are sometimes 4 mopeds side by side in one lane on the streets and they zip in and out of the itty bitty cars that are driving the same streets.
- The cars are MINUSCULE! You know the smart cars that are on campus that you can pay to use? That is the size of a normal family car here!
- The pigeons and seagulls are fatter and meaner here than in the States. I HATE birds! Stupid creatures, trying to steal my foccacia.
- There are CONDOM machines at random places along the streets!!! So weird and random. I guess maybe they are for the prostitutes that we saw around the older areas and down on the water front?
- There are more churches than grocery stores.
- Everyone makes out EVERY WHERE!!! and for no reason! It's kinda ridic, and REALLY amusing. A couple will just be walking down the street and for no reason, stop and start making out in the middle of the sidewalk! Standing at the bus stop, I guess they get bored, so they start making out! Full tongue and everything! It's really funny and shocking :-P
- If you are an art history major, move to Italy and study for the rest of your life. There is enough artwork to last a lifetime and longer.
- The Italian language sounds pretty because pretty much everything ends in a vowel and accents are naturally in the middle of many words. This makes the language sound since since there aren't as many hard sounds.

That's it for today! Bacioni! (*Kisses*)