Viaggio in Italia

I'm in Naples now, at last, and I'll be here for the next 10 weeks as an intern in public affairs at the US consulate. My last few weeks in Bologna were pretty stressful as I had oral exams and papers spread out over about a three week period. The oral exams were all super stressful experiences. Partially because of the nature of the whole system, partially because I didn't do enough studying during the semester to prepare for them. And at the same time, all of my friends finished earlier than I did and I wanted to do stuff with them and enjoy my last time in Bologna, which made my exam stress feel even worse. In the end, though, I survived, and I didn't do too badly. By the end I felt kind of sad to leave Bologna but I also couldn't wait to be done with the stress and away from the academics.

So after having my last exam on Tuesday and packing frantically on Wednesday (as well as hitting up all of my favorite gelato places, by the end of which I felt slightly gelato-ed out), I got to Naples on Thursday. I was a little nervous because I'd never sent the deposit for my apartment like I was supposed to and I'd never set up an arrangement with the landlady to get keys or anything, so I didn't know what was going to happen. It turned out the consulate had sent someone to pick me up at the airport, which was unexpected, and they wanted to take me to my apartment to drop off my luggage and then go straight into the consulate. Well, thank god we managed to find the apartment and that my roommates were there to let me in.

I thought I might just go in to say hi and fill out some paperwork, but no, I was expected to stay there for work and to meet everyone, including having a one-on-one meeting with the consul general. Luckily I'd decided to take a shower that morning despite having to wake up after just three hours of sleep. Still, though, I felt incredibly scruffy and exhausted. I was wearing my converse sneakers and a stained t-shirt and my hair was all a disaster, and I had to go around and meet all of these people in suits. I didn't even have a purse on me, all I'd grabbed from my backpack was my wallet and cell phone, and I had to give up my cell phone at the entrance as it wasn't cleared for security. Anyway, I was a mess. I got gently reminded by the consul general's secretary that dress was formal, by the way, and especially for public affairs where we have to interact with the public. thankfully the consul general turned out to be a brown alum which i think made him a little forgiving with me than he otherwise might have been.

and then my supervisor wasn't there because she'd gone to rome for the day and no one really knew what to do with me. i ended up going to a three-hour-long cpr course so now I guess I'm cpr certified. And when I got out for the day I had no idea how to find my way back to my apartment. The funny thing was I managed to figure out the public transportation to get back to the piazza my apartment is near just fine. And then, knowing I was within two blocks of my apartment, I couldn't remember how to get to the building so I wandered around in circles for like an hour. And eventually spent 20 euros calling my mom, and then my brother, having them google maps it and try to explain to me how to get there. I'd even tried to ask people on the streets and no one knew where it was. There are so many little streets and they all change names every block, so even within the neighborhood people couldn't tell me how to get there.

Anyway, I made it in the end. I finally got the chance to properly meet my roommates, who were incredibly nice and incredibly curious about me. There are three of them, all from different small towns in this region, Campania. One's 26 and a pharmacist and the other two are pharmacy students, I think maybe 24.

After I did some unpacking they went out and brought me back a pizza and sat down to watch me and interrogate me while I ate it. By the way, best pizza I've ever had. The first things they asked me, after the usual where I was from and how old I was and what I studied, were whether I had a boyfriend and what I eat for breakfast. Italians are fascinated by the concept of American breakfast, which is always entertaining. I told them we don't eat eggs and bacon and everything except for maybe on weekends, but they said when their american relatives came over they asked for the big american breakfast.

(By the way, although neither of them have been to the US, they both have american relatives. Most americans of Italian origin come from this region, and I've talked to tons of people who've said their family's from Campania, even though they've never been there or never met their relatives who are still there. It's interesting now to meet Italians here who have American relatives they've never met or never visited in the States.)

Anyway, they were entertaining girls. The other thing they asked me was who was that guy I was with earlier when I came to drop off my bags. They tried to bring it up casually but it was pretty clear they'd been trying to analyze it all day. They were kind of disappointed when I said I'd just met him and didn't know anything about him aside from the fact that he's italian and he works for the consulate. i said i thought he might be gay and they were horrified and insisted it couldn't be true.

Right away they told me the same thing every southerner I've ever met has told me: since we're from the south, we're way friendlier than those northerners and we'll always be here for you and we'll get you anything you need. And we'll cook for you. Also, if we get along, they said, we're definitely coming to visit you in the states.

And the next thing: we prefer it if we all hang out together so we expect you to come out with us to bars and clubs and whatnot. And, once they found out I didn't have a boyfriend: we have lots of guy friends you can meet and they're from all over italy and they're all carabinieri. and they have cars and can drive you places. (Carabinieri are like police except that in italy they have different types of police, so carabinieri are basically the government police and the most high-prestige types. they're also the coolest ones because they get to wear berets and carry around machine guns. they're the ones who guard the consulate, for example.)

So I think it'll be fun to get to know these girls a little bit while I'm here. all of the italians i got to know in bologna were guys, since the reality was that guys were a lot easier to meet... anyway, it'll be interesting to get to know some italian girls for once.

The consulate should be interesting too. My second day I wore one of my new suits and felt a whole lot more comfortable, though I was still exhausted. I met my boss, who's really nice. she's an american woman married to an italian. she seems like she's really into getting me involved in a ton of different stuff and including me in everything she's doing. I left the house at 6:30 am and got back at midnight, after the head of the poli/econ section had us interns over for dinner at his house. I ran around all day, too, at a staff meeting and lunch with the consul general and a town hall meeting with some u.s. navy reps over the trash problem, and a trip over to the university with a guest speaker, and then dinner. i didn't even get a chance to run back to my office to get all my papers, all the tons of materials they'd given me to read over, so I guess I won't be able to do any of that over the weekend.

Even this weekend there's more to do. There's a protest tonight against the mafia (called the camorra here) and their connection to the trash problem. Tomorrow, Sunday, there's a marathon that has two parts, in Naples and in New York, that we have to make an appearance at. Then next week president bush is coming to rome so i might be able to go up there for the day and see him, or at least see the accompanying frenzy.

I think I'll end up being glad I chose public affairs instead of another section. The interns in some of the other sections get to deal more with real political issues -- like the trash problem, and the camorra -- but they mostly sit in front of computers all day. i think i'll be getting out of the office quite a bit, both to different events around naples and hopefully on little day trips outside the city -- and i should be able to use my italian. One thing I appreciate about Italians is that even when they speak english, they're always pretty excited about meeting americans who speak italian and they're usually happy to speak italian instead.

Naples, by the way, is more beautiful than I ever imagined it. It's huge compared to Bologna, so much more lively and complex, and so much more stunning. there's a lot of trees and greenery and of course the water and gigantic mount vesuvius looming over everything. it's an odd atmosphere, because while naples is more extreme in its italianness than bologna in every way -- crazier driving, more corrupt government and police, more loud and friendly and rowdy people, more ridiculously eurotrash style -- there's also a palpable american presence here. there are many u.s. navy bases and many navy families. apparently on the main base they've recreated a mini-america - they even have an applebee's. and of course the consulate is quite the imposing presence, a massive white building on the water, its own little compound, surrounded by carabinieri with machine guns. its hard to describe really, but you feel the american-ness here. mostly alongside, rather than mixed in with, the italian-ness, which is a strange dynamic. like there are pockets of america within this very italian city.

oh, for example, i met two american-italians so far and was shocked both times because i've never met any before. the driver who drove me from the airport was speaking italian with giampaolo in a neapolitan accent and i assumed since he didn't say anything to me that he didnt speak english, although i was struck when i first saw him by how american he looked. and then after a while he said something to me in english in a perfectly native american accent, and i was totally surprised. turns out his father's american and his mother's italian. its a perfectly normal thing, just that i've never met someone who was a natively bilingual speaker of english and italian before and it's pretty neat.

people have a lot of complaints about naples, even the ones who love it. americans and italians. same goes for the state department, really - that is, even the people who love working there have a lot of complaints about it. no matter how i end up feeling about them both, i'm pretty sure it's going to be fascinating here.

the beach near matteo's town

Cagliari

My roommate and our host, Matteo

I'm sorry I haven't been updating this as much as I intended to. And now there's so much I could say that I don't have the time or energy to get it all down. So to briefly summarize the last several weeks: after my exam, I was in Bologna for another week and a half or so and then my roommates (all but one, that is) and I went off to Sardegna to see Matteo's hometown and to meet all his family and friends. Well, I got there a day later since I forgot my passport and thus was forced to miss our initial flight. It was kind of annoying and I felt like kind of an idiot, but I wasn't stressed or upset. By now I'm a seasoned enough traveler that I don't let things like that stress me out. Anyway, it worked out fine and I took the two and a half hour train ride back to Bologna, booked another flight for the next morning, and got to Iglesias (after a flight delay of two hours in northern Sardegna) less than 24 hours after my roommates.

Sardegna was by far the most rewarding travel experience I've had this semester. It was beautiful. I got there Thursday, and we left Monday morning. Iglesias, the town Matteo is from, is pretty small (27,000 inhabitants - just looked it up on Wikipedia) and pretty quiet. It's in the southwestern corner of the island, an hour by train away from Cagliari, the capital and largest city of Sardegna. It was so fun to experience a place from a locals' perspective rather than a tourist perspective, the first time I've gotten to do that here. We hung out in Cagliari for a day, but the rest of the time we decided to fan the museums and the touristy sites just to be in Iglesias and follow Matteo and his friends around.

Matteo's friends were pretty thrilled about the idea of getting to meet Americans, even though they were surprised at us for being less than thrilled with their flirtations. I think Jennie and Dana were slightly taken aback at the beginning at how strongly they were coming on. I was pretty much just amused and fascinated by it. Whatever though, we adjusted and it was all fine. Matteo's closest friend in Iglesias was Alberto, a year younger and therefore in his fifth and last year of high school. He was similar to Matteo, goofy and intelligent and really interested in music and playing the guitar. Then there was Andrea Casulla who seemed like Matteo's polar opposite - kind of thuggish and macho though very sweet and earnest. He's trying to get into the Italian navy though so far he's failed the entrance exam so he's chilling in Iglesias til he gets another chance to try. He was the one Jennie and Dana were slightly put off by at the beginning. All he wanted to talk about were all the crazy, daredevil stunts he's pulled to try to impress us. At one point, he was showing me and Jennie videos on his cell phone of himself fighting against his friends for fun -- of course, he came out on top in all of these play-fights. And then there was the crew Andrea rolled with -- another Andrea and this hilarious little kid with spiky hair and a lisp named Daniele.

Anyway, for me it was fascinating to get a sense of what Sardinian kids were like. Here's this remote, sparsely populated island in the Mediterranean that you never even think about, and a sleepy ex-mining town with twice as many sheep as people. If you didn't speak Italian, and if you didn't know someone from there, you would never meet these people or communicate with them or know they existed. And in the end, they're not that different from kids in my hometown of Novato. For fun they hang out in the town's main piazza and drink and play guitar. Or they go to the beach and hang out and drink some more. In between they like to drive fast and crazy and try to almost kill themselves without actually succeeding. (Both of the Andreas were covered with battle scars from car/ motorino accidents -- and we of course had to look at them all and make the appropriate impressed noises.)

Sardi are I think the most open and friendly and hospitable group of people that I've ever met. Italians in general are open and friendly and hospitable, but sardi more so than any other type of Italian. I was in love with them come gente. Matteo's family was so warm and friendly. They had us over for these big elaborate lunches twice during our long weekend. And we got to meet his 90+ year-old grandparents who were amazingly cute and the hardest Italians ever to understand but I'm pretty sure his grandfather was just making vulgar jokes the whole time we were talking to him. Vulgar jokes are also big among the sardi. (Oh, another cool thing - we got to learn a bunch of new swear words, both in Italian and in sardo, a completely different language. Fun and useful.)

Anyway, I need to go back to Sardegna and see every inch of the island. I would totally live there. In addition to being physically stunning and having the warmest people ever, it's also cool because everyone is politically liberal. (Oh yeah, we also happened to be there over election weekend so we got to talk to everyone about politics and hear about who they voted for and why. Andrea and Alberto voted for the main center-left party, the only liberal party that had a chance of winning. Matteo, on the other hand, voted for the Sardinian independence party, which got a total of I think 100 votes.)

I meant to say a couple of sentences about Sardinia and instead I've written five paragraphs. Oh well. There's way more I could say, too, but in summary it was wonderful and that's all I can really say. I didn't take a whole bunch of photos, in keeping with my I-don't-feel-like-being-a-tourist-anymore attitude. Both Dana and Jennie took a bunch of photos though, including of the whole iglesiani crew, and I've been bugging them to sort through the photos but so far no luck. I will get those photos though, and I'll post a few up here as soon as I do.

After Sardegna, then. We got back to Bologna on a Monday evening and I had essentially two days before I had to leave again for Paris. Two stressful days in which I had to study for an exam, go to class and realize that the exam was actually a take-home exam (I'm not sure he ever told us until the actual day of the exam), and then try to complete it in a frenzy on the train and on the plane on my way to Paris. What a mess. In the end, I submitted it about three hours late and I'm praying the professor accepted it. I still haven't found out for certain, since the prof sent us an email saying that due to his 'international engagements' he won't even be looking at the exams until sometime in may. Whatever, I'm not going to worry about it. That's my new attitude, apparently.

So Paris. I did not feel at all like going. After getting back from Sardegna I was worn out and high on Italy and I did not feel like doing any more traveling, especially not outside of Italy and especially not to Paris, which I'd already been to and felt like I'd seen pretty well. I'd made an agreement with my friend Morena from high school that we were going to get together and see each other at least once while in Europe. (She's studying in Leon, Spain.) Since she's taken a bunch of French, she really wanted to get to France, and I agreed to go and meet her in Paris.

So we decided, since she's trying to spend as little money abroad as she can and since I've already seen all Paris' touristy sites, to just wander around and chill and eat crepes. A very low-key Paris trip. The only way I could have handled Paris at that time, on what felt like my bazillionth travel excursion. And it was nice, our plan. We wandered aimlessly, shopped, looked in the windows of the patisseries at all the pretty pastries and occasionally bought something. I got a second piercing in my ears at a slightly seedy little place, which I was and still am hella excited about. We ran into Morena's friend Elise from home and hung out with her. (She was in Paris thanks to a 28 year-old Peruvian professor and architect named Jorge whom she met once at a club and who then paid for her to come out and visit him for the weekend. I was in awe.) Once again, I took like five pictures. All I wanted was to see Morena and catch up with her and hear about Spain.

Seeing her brought out such a complicated emotional response in me, I can't even describe it. I hadn't been missing home at all -- in fact, especially after being in Sardegna, I was feeling like I wanted to be in Italy forever. And then being with Morena kind of complicated that feeling. She reminded me of all of the little things I miss about the States and about California and Marin and Novato. Not that I'm homesick or that I want to go back. Just that it's complicated, being abroad. Maybe more than making me miss the States she made me crave a kind of attachment that I don't have abroad, and sometimes wonder if I could ever have abroad. Morena seems like she's having a terrific time in Spain, and had so many adventures to recount. She adores Leon but she feels like she's going to be ready to go home. That seems to be a common feeling.

After Paris, I got back to Bologna even more worn out. I was so homesick for Italy by the end of the weekend that I was ready to start following around all the Italians we saw on the metro, just to hear their lovely voices and absorb their glowing obnoxious Italian-ness. Now I'm back in Bologna and I can get up every morning and talk to my roommate in Italian and eat pastacciuta and gelato and admire people's shoes and wait for late trains. I never want to leave.

Soon: I'm adding photos to this entry, and I'll update again on the state of things in the Bo. Promise.

On Friday I had my first oral exam in Italian, for my medieval history class. I've been pretty stressed out about it for the past three weeks, since as I mentioned here before, I had an obscene amount of material to learn and there was never any way I was going to be able to do it. Plus, all of it was so boring that every time I sat down to try to study, I managed to stay focused for about half an hour before I lost interest and got distracted by something else. I only got four hours of sleep the night before with all my stressing out about it, but in the end, it went okay.

It was one of the most nerve-wracking exam experiences I've ever had, though, which is saying a lot because I always stress about exams. And plus, the grades we get here only transfer as pass/fail, so there's no reason to get too concerned about them. Still, the way exams are structured is basically my worst nightmare. The whole class sits around in a big room and waits together for their turn to have the exam. Meanwhile, the professor is sitting at a table in front talking with one student at a time. So when it's your turn, you have to sit there and talk in front of a huge group of people. Everyone can hear what you're saying, so if you're unprepared and totally screw up, everyone in the class knows about it. They can also hear the grade the professor gives you, since the professors deliver you your grade right there on the spot. And if someone doesn't quite catch it, they'll all ask you as soon as it's over.. Italian students always share their grades with each other, something that makes us Americans pretty uncomfortable still.

Anyway, apparently the exams aren't always that way, with the whole class as an audience, and in any case I wasn't expecting it, so it was a bit of a shock when I got there and figured out what was going on. Especially since I entirely expected to fail and was hoping I wouldn't have to make a fool of myself in front of the entire class. I was one of the first people to go, but one of the girls who went before me failed and came back and sat down next to me and burst into tears. And then five or six more girls flocked over to say reassuring things. Everyone else kind of buzzed around anxiously. It was slightly chaotic, to say the least, and I was terribly freaked out.

When I got up there, the professor could tell instantly from my name that I was an exchange student, so she went really easy on me. Instead of asking me specific questions like she did to the Italian students, she just asked me to talk about a few topics that I knew well, and then asked me more probing questions about what I was saying. A lot of the things she asked I didn't know how to respond to, but she helped me out quite a bit. If I had known she was going to do that, I would have prepared just a few topics instead of doing a vague overview of all of the material but having no detailed knowledge of any specific thing, which is what I did do. But oh well, in the end, she gave me a 30 anyway, the highest possible score. I was totally shocked, but it's a big relief to have it over with. By that time, I would have been thrilled just to have passed.

Anyway, I've gotta go. I'm meeting my new friend Giovanni, who's going to make me dinner at his house. It should be good. I still have to update about all of my travels over spring break, and of course post photos. The exam so absorbed my attention over the past week that I've neglected everything else. But I'll update more soon.

I haven't been updating this as much as I'd like, and it's only going to continue like this because I'll be traveling for the next two weeks and probably won't have a chance.

So, to recap the last couple of weeks: a group of friends and I went to Barcelona the weekend before last, which was awesome. The weather was beautiful, the city is fascinating and lively and colorful. I'll upload photos when I can. The trip made me realize a couple of things, though: one, that traveling with a bunch of people with different agendas and different interests can be a little bit hectic, and I think it might be really cool to try traveling by myself. Two, that I need to make sure not to be away from Bologna all the time. As fun as it was, I missed Bologna and I missed being able to communicate with people. Not to mention the fact that I was exhausted from all the trains and planes and buses we had to take to get there... it was a marathon journey given that we only had three days there.

Since then, I've just been in Bologna in classes and not much else. I found out that in my medieval history class we have our first of two oral exams right after spring break, which means I have to read a 500-page textbook in Italian over the next three weeks. The same three weeks of which I'll be mostly away from Bologna.

And tomorrow morning I'm leaving to go on my first solo travel experience, five days between Prague and Budapest. All the planning has been very-last minute, and it's been a bit stressful. It came about when a group of girls in my program started planning a trip to Budapest, Vienna, and Prague. Originally I was interested in going with them but the dates they wanted to go just weren't going to work with my schedule, since I have to meet my parents in London next week. So I decided, well, there's nothing stopping me from going anyway by myself. As it turns out, I'll spending a day and a night with them in Budapest. But the rest of the time I'll be on my own.

I still don't feel sure that it's a good idea... I'm going to be away from Bologna too much, I'm missing out on spending time with my roommates, and why would i go somewhere where it's cold and I don't speak the languages? But, I'm going and it's too late now to change my mind. I think it'll be a good experience to travel by myself. I hope so.

So after that I'll have a day and a half back in Bologna before I leave again for London and Morocco. It's going to be chaotic and now that it's happening I kind of wish I hadn't tried to fit so much in such a short amount of time. Oh well though, I'm going to try to stick to Bologna, or at least Italy, for most of the rest of the semester. I'll check back in as soon as I can.