Oh yeah, I have classes!

    It was my very first day of school at the University of Bologna. I was nervous. I had picked out exactly what to wear: shorts, boots, my favorite shirt, and a scarf. I left an extra fifteen minutes early to make sure I got to class on time. I had even checked where the classroom was the day before. When I finally got there 15 minutes before 9am, the door was locked. I sat on a nearby bench and waited. And waited. And waited. It was the very first lecture of the semester and the professor had forgotten to mention that he wasn't showing up.
 After three weeks in classes, I've started to realize that this is not that unusual when it comes to the Italian University system.  Disorganization seems to be written in the rules of conduct. I would be very surprised if anything was written down in terms of "conduct". All the Italians seem to just go with the flow.
 There is an "unwritten" rule that classes always start 10-20 minutes late. This is to allow students who have a class from 1-3pm and then 3-5pm to get to class on time. I don't know why getting to class on time matters though since no one ever takes attendance. Frequenting lectures is done out of the goodness of your heart, and a scant hope that you'll be able to pick up on something that will be on the exam.
Oh yes, all my exams? They're oral.
So not only do I have to have to interpret the rapid Italian lecture, take notes on it, then study the mess of "italglish" I wrote, but I have to be prepared to answer questions about the material in my still very broken Italian.
And my material can't be bullshit. Italian professors rarely like to hear a students opinion. They are the gods and we are the subjects. We are simply there to absorb as much of the precious history, facts, and professional interpretations as we can.  Class participation, essays, in-class activities: they don't exist. You're sole grade in the course depends on how much you can memorize and repeat in the span of 20-40 minutes.
While I don't agree with this teaching method, the lack of organization does give a lot of freedom to the system. You actually don't have to be a student to go to a lecture. Any person can walk in, sit down and listen. They just won't be taking the exam or getting a grade. In the syllabus for a course there are usually two parts: one that the professor chooses to shape the topic of the course, and one that generally contains a list of books from which the student can pick. So the student gets to study what their interested in. Of course, they may not study at all.
I've heard stories of students walking into an oral exam and having missed every single lecture and having completely neglected to open a book. If they pass, great! They get the credit. If they don't pass, they can try again during the next exam period in a month. Or the month after that. Or after that. You could hypothetically take your exams 20 years after the actual course happened. If the professor is still alive that is...
I, however, go to every single class and attempt to tune in to a complete different channel of my brain. One that can comprehend the Italian lecture on thecomplex symbolic significance of the goat in southern Italian farm life. Ever try reading Dante in Italian? It isn't Italian. At least not the kind I speak.

Here is an overview of my courses for this semester...

Grammar: Based around reading Italian newspapers, this course will hopefully help me master that last real grammatical block I have with Italian: prepositions. I also now know how to several very helpful words including: shoot, bullet, suicide, drug-dealer, wound, robbery, and stab.

Cinema: This is a course offered through my program, so it is much easier to follow that University lectures. Especially because there are only 15 of us instead of 150. We are exploring the post-WWII films of Italy that, so far, are mainly neorealistic. Lots of poverty and social strife. Very uplifting! Rather like reading the news...

Contemporary Italian Literature: I absolutely love the books for this class. At least I think I do. I've only managed to read about half of the first one. And there are eight for the course. Thankfully there is a shortened syllabus for foreign students and I am actually taking only the first half. Which means I'm done with class November 8th!

Italian Literature: The first day of class, the professor (who is also the head of the department) described studying literature as studying how to live (with a very profound emphasis on the connection between letteratura and vita) I was automatically in love with the class. The professor is incredibly passionate and animated, constantly pacing, talking with his hands and inflecting his voice. But with passion comes a slight flaw: fast talking. And a fast-talker is not a good thing for someone new to the language.

I will conclude by saying that while this post may have seemed complain-y, I actually do really like all my courses. So here's to cultural differences! Who really knew, other countries actually do function differently than the United States.

Just doing Italian things...

In dedication to all things wonderfully Italian, here is a picture of me on a scooter.
Yes, I actually rode this scooter (I was more just trying not to fly off the back) and it was so much more fun than even Lizzie McGuire made it look!
Of course, I wasn't actually zooming through the streets of Rome clinging to an Italian man who just minutes ago had fallen in love with me. It's rather more exciting than that. I was running errands! Specifically, I was going to two different electronic stores to replace my camera that is now at the bottom of the ocean. I didn't actually buy a camera yet...but I can now check ride a scooter off of my list of stereotypical things to do while in Italy!

La Costiera Amalfitana

I spent last weekend in one of the most touristy locations in Italy. The Amalfi Coast home to magical towns like Positano, the mystical island of Capri and of course the ancient ruins of Pompeii is more of a Disneyland than a part of the "Italian" coast. I spent most of the weekend talking to older couples from New Jersey or South Carolina than trying to understand the completely foreign napoletano dialect.
But, the funny thing about tourist attractions is that there's a reason they attract tourists.
The Amalfi Coast is absolutely beautiful. Combine sheers cliffs, crashing waves, the bluest blue water you've ever seen and candy-coated houses stacked on top of it all and you have the such sickeningly sweet eye-candy, it's almost dangerous. I went to bed every night with my eyes actually hurting. It was just that pretty.
And, of course, in one of the most beautiful places on earth, I managed to lose my camera. Here's how it happened:

I was walking along Via Krupp with my friend Kelly in Capri. Via Krupp is a famous path on the island carved into the rock face that zigzags down the cliff.  We come upon a gate. It's not really a gate. There's just a frame, and it's begging me to climb through. Past the gate is a dirt "path" that nearly vertically down toward the ocean.
"Kelly, let's go!"
"Yeah right crazy. You can go by yourself."
"Pleeeease come with me"
"You're insane"
So of course I went.
The path clung to rocks and boulders descending down closer and closer to the water. When it finally leveled out, I had to stop in amazement. I had stumbled upon my own paradise. What lay in front of me was a beach composed of sun dried boulders that spread all the way to a grotto in the cliff face. From the beach, I had a perfect view of the Faraglioni rocks (two iconic landmarks of Capri) and bluest water stretching out with no interruption.
But I wasn't the only one on the beach. As I kept walking, what I had mistaken for a pile of debris in the distance slowly starting taking the shape of a beach shack with a roof made of wood planks and rafts, chairs and cushions spilling out of it. A little further and I noticed there was actually a man sitting at a little table inside. I paused as I didn't know if I would be intruding, but he got up and made his way over to me, climbing boulders with a cane in hand.
"Buongiorno" he called out to me.
"Buongiorno" I replied.
(this conversation took place mostly in Italian, but it will be translated here)
"Oh, I'm sorry I mistook you for someone else"
"Oh no, that's fine. This place is amazing"
We both look around at the gloriously empty horizon. And he responds:
"You've found the last paradise of Capri."
We walk to the edge of the boulders to sit and he proceeds to tell me about this paradise. His name is Peppino. He is caprese (from Capri) and him and his friends built the path and the shack here many years ago.
They used to climb down the cliff everyday to swim and enjoy the sun. Sometimes they would let European tourists use the area as a nudist beach. I could only imagine the view from on top of Via Krupp.
He told me of the time they carried an stove top down the cliff and cook pasta with mussels for all the visiting nudists.
He told me about his fisherman friend who discovered underwater grottos hidden between there and the Faraglioni rocks.
He warned me about the grotto on the other side of the beach. Years ago, the mayor's son sat tanning under that cliff. He had his headphones in and didn't hear the warning signs of the rock slide. Boulders cascaded down the cliff burying him in a five foot pile of stone. Peppino had to dig him out and carry his body home.
He told me that he has to pay twice as much in town for a chilo of apples than he would have to in Naples. But he hates going to Naples now because someone once stole 100 euro right out of his pocket.
He told me the economy of Capri is dead. Everyone buys a summer home there then lock it up in the winter, leaving the island empty and useless.
He told me he has a 24 year old son, who never comes to this beach because he's in love with the computer.
He told me that he comes to this beach still, every single day.
For him, it is the last beautiful place on Capri.
After an hour, I knew I had to catch a ferry to get home (and avoid paying the ridiculous 300 euro hotel fee). As I stood up to say goodbye, I felt something slip from my lap. Clunk, clunk, splash..
There is the brilliantly blue water 6 feet below me was my brand new camera.
I stared at it in horror as Peppino hurried to the hut to grab a bucket and rope. I contemplated jumping in after it, but the sea was rough and there was no visible way for me to get out of the water. Instead, I watched the ocean swallow it up. Every photo I had of the most beautiful place on earth staying right where I took them.
Peppino felt so bad for me that he gave me a copy of his CD (he composes his own music) and took a picture of me with his own camera. We exchanged email addresses, and I left the island with rather mixed fillings about what had occurred. All those photos I took went right back where they belonged. I honestly think I'll remember that paradise of Capri better than any photo could. 
Later I found, on the back of the piece of paper with his email, a short note: "To Bernadette, She may have lost her camera, but she didn't lose her happiness."

For the purpose of helping you all understand how beautiful this place was I have stolen some photos from friends:

                                                                  

Places

 It's a strange feeling to travel around Italy and then return to Bologna with an overwhelming sensation of being "home". I have now been living in Bologna for over a month. In this one month, I've done everything from finding an Italian apartment to learning how exactly you're supposed to peel garlic. I still can't understand everything everyone's saying to me, but when I get asked for directions I can usually point in the right direction. And I no longer get toilet paper and paper towels confused while I'm in the grocery store.

I've traveled on the weekends both with my program and with friends and with each place I visit, I realize how grateful I am to be living in Italy. Sometimes I feel like this country is the tourist capital of the world and when I go to other cities, I'm one of them. Yet, when I get back on a train, I am going to a city where I no longer need a map. I can stop by my favorite gelato place on the way back to the apartment and not have to ask for recommendations. I can go home in Italy.

 I took a day trip to Venice the second weekend in to my program. Never have I felt more attracted to and repulsed by the same location. Piazza San Marco was so full of tourists and pigeons that you couldn't walk without jostling something. I paid way more than I should have to see a golden depiction of the apostles that had a very forgettable name. And I opted out of the ridiculously overpriced 100 euro gondola rides. And yet, despite the crowds, the city still pulls you in to its nooks and crannies and doesn't seem to want to let you go. There's a reason it's so crowded in Venice. Once you're lost in its charm, it will never let you go.

 San Luca is a church just outside the walls of Bologna. It's real beauty lies in the fact that you have to hike uphill through over 600 porticoes to see it. This is a part of Bologna that doesn't really feel like Bologna I've come to know. Raised above the graffiti, the coffee and the ridiculous number of bikers, San Luca is a sanctuary from city life. Look in off to one side and all of Bologna lies before you. Look to the other and the hills outside of Bologna roll away into the horizon.

 Ravenna is a city with a strange mix of the Byzantine empire and classic Rome. Known for its gorgeous mosaics, I found this city to be special because it is the location of Dante Alighieri's tomb. It's probably because of Dante that I'm on this program right now. I imagined his appearance to be a little more elaborate in my head. This is the man who hypothetically changed the course of my entire life. But his manifestation was nothing to be remembered. His tomb is modestly small. We stayed there for a grand total of 10 minutes. And I'm not really sure why I even took pictures. I think I liked it better this way. He has a place in my mind that is much more tangible than a box of marble.

Just yesterday, our program took a bus to Urbino. As you can see, this Renaissance town is known for the Palazzo Ducale, which, pretty much, used to be the entire town. We spent about an hour up on this hill looking down at this dominating image. I was amazed at how, the longer I looked, the less strange it seemed. There is a gigantic fairy tale castle right in front of me and it doesn't phase me. I'm not balling my eyes out about how beautiful it all is (which most people who know me would expect me to be doing). I can still see the castle as the dream I once had of its emotionally charged beauty, but now that I'm living in it, it's surprisingly comfortable.