Some Neapolitan slang for ya there... Just thought I'd mix it up ;p
Speaking of slang, here's your Italian history lesson of the day. Although previous civilizations and cultures settled Italy thousands of years ago, and it's been inhabited by Italians for that long, it only technically became a unified country in 1861 (the same year the US civil war broke out so that's how I remember) Before that it was all seperate little kingdoms - each with it's own dialect and customs/ holidays. Flash forward to 1945, and after world war 2 ended, they finally adopted a unified language as well. This is now what we know as standard, modern Italian. However, if you talk to anyone over the age of 65, chances are they only speak the dialect of their native birthplace..... As if communication here couldn't get any more difficult :P
Since I'm in the province of Naples, about every 5th word I learn here is Neo-slang.... Which I'm not going to lie, makes me feel totally bad ass when I use B-)
So, I am taking life here day by day. I'm not focusing on anything but the present, and although I still have no idea what I want to do, at least it makes this whole thing a little easier.
Now, let's talk about something I've mentioned a few times but really deserves it's own blog post.... SCHOOL.
Italian school, as you've probably gathered from my pervious posts, never ceases to amaze me by how insane it is.
Let's use today as an example.
Wednesdays are the "long" day of the week, meaning school goes from about 8:30-2:15. By American standards, that's still shorter than a normal school day, although the way they schedule it and teach makes it feel like 15 hours long. Okay, I'll admit that I'm a bit unenthused with how dirty everything is over here... Don't get me wrong it's not a landfill or anything, but let's just say in general, Liceo Pitagora is worse for wear :P
Today, like always, we spent the entire time learning in the 4B classroom while the teachers rotated around to us.
1st hour was religion, with the professor they call Don Chiro... Not sure if it's first name last name or just Donchiro as the last name, but either way he is a priest (I think?) that comes in and preaches the good catholic word. HA. HA. HA.
Well my opinion on organized religion is for another place and time but anyways, I've been told by fellow classmates that Donchiro doesn't like me very much and has insulted my intelligence to the class in Neapolitan, thanks bro :P It's not like I care what the religion teacher thinks about me, but it just upsets me that a man of the faith has such little tolerance for people from a different culture.... Hehehe ohhhhh the irony!
2nd hour was chimica aka chemistry with the WWOTW (the wicked witch of the west) I'm not trying to be mean, but she just has this super raspy smoker voice and green tint to her skin... Also she wears a lot of horizontal stripes :P Chemistry sucks because I don't understand anything... And the teaching philosophy here is "let's solve the problem on the blackboard with half an explanation as to why that's the answer and then make the students copy it down 8 times so it gets drilled into their brains"
I'm used to my teachers over explaining everything in America - to the point where I'm begging them to stop! Now I definitely have a new appreciation for the CHS teaching staff - you guys totally rock and please keep over explaining :)
Luckily, we switched from chemistry to biology today, which means I can actually follow along now! Again, mad props to D Sonn - my bio teacher last year who drilled DNA synthesis into my brain to the point where I would dream about double helixes... Because I know bio better than the Italians too :) however, our teacher just jumped right into DNA and RNA base coding today as the first lesson... It took us at least 3 months to build up to that last year in America :O
3rd hour was history of Art - which is a zone out and doodle class for me :p All the Italians think American school would be so horrible since it's so long, but in my PA classes we actually do more than just listen to the teacher talk for an hour without a break! We watch movies, we do class work, we have quizzes and tests, it's the lack of diversity in the lesson that is really sucking any possible fun out of schooling here for me :p
Here's where things really get crazy - If a teacher doesn't show up for school or one isn't found for a certain subject your class is studying, you just have an unsupervised free period for that hour :O Today we had a 2 hour block of free time with no supervision whatsoever....
Askedeifndnsdnskskdnd what?!?! In America, it took until 6th grade for us to even be allowed to walk from class to class without adult supervision! We would never just be able to stand around and do nothing!! In addition, since the classroom is more the students than the teacher's, my classmates graffiti and throw chalk out windows and rip off the blinds without a second thought if they are bored... It sort of is exciting but also makes me very uncomfortable! Call me crazy, but I believe in respecting public property :P
Finally we rounded off the day with Physics, I like the teacher, and the basic math I can follow... I just really didn't want to be in 4B anymore by that point so I was fantasizing about pumpkin pie for 45 minutes haha!
During our unsupervised free time, a girl in my class wrote this on the board... She didn't understand why I was so amazed that she could do that!! In America this would be a double detention, easy!! Here, the physics teacher just erased it and started her lesson without even a second glance :P and EVERYONE here knows the F word - so she obviously understood at least that!
Life here is ridiculous, crazy, and hard. By American standards, this country shouldn't work... It seems like half the buildings are one breeze away from crumbling, and half the citizens are one cigarette away from keeling over... Yet against all odds it's a perfectly functioning system of chaos over here. It's so strange and weird to see these people thriving in all of this madness! I don't think they would last a week if they went to America :P
Well, that's about all I have to say for this post... Life here has been pretty calm lately, a lot of down time. I'm obviously still in a fragile state but like I said, day by day I'm getting by.
Thanks for reading and hopefully I can see a spaghetti eating contest or Vesuvius will erupt - something interesting to write about ;P
Ciao ragazzi!
