So I know what you are all probably thinking, do I ever actually study while studying abroad?! And the answer is yes, I do study, but very little… I have class three days a week but, in my defense, they are long days of class. Every so often I have to write papers and I occasionally do some reading. To be honest, what little work I have is extremely easy, and I love it! Last semester was my hardest semester yet and I worked myself to the bone, so I’ve used this semester to recharge and enjoy life, because in the fall I hardly had a life.
I’ve discovered that traveling is the best kind of education, so technically I am studying/learning every weekend that I travel somewhere. For example, I’ve learned how to speak four languages while abroad!! Italian, Spanish, French and even Arabic! Mom, Dad you’d be so proud! You’d even be amazed by my large vocab. I can say “hello” and “thank you” in all four languages, aren’t you impressed?! The best is when you walk into a restaurant and say hello, only to have them rattle off something long and extensive in the same language you just spoke in. That is when I give them my blank I-am-American-and-only-know-how-to-say-hello-in-(insert language) look. Most of the time we continue the conversation in English, but some times I’ve had to resort to hand gestures to get my point across.
Friday through Monday I usually travel and Tuesday through Thursday I’m in school. I have three classes on Tuesday (9am to 5:30pm, it’s a loooong day), one class on Wednesday (3pm-8:30pm) and three on Thursday (9am to 2:45pm). The classes I’m taking are Italian Cinema, Italian Renaissance and Culture, Italian language, Photography and Intro to Marketing. In the beginning I wasn’t a huge fan of all my classes but I’ve grown to really like them, and the teachers! Three out of the five classes I’m in are with all UNC students. For some reason, UNC makes us take these three specific classes in order to study abroad in Florence, so I haven’t met many people outside of UNC, but I’ve gotten close with all the people in my program. It’s like we’ve become one big family of sorts. We do everything together. We all even get sick together!! You should hear the classroom during these times, it’s like a symphony of coughs, sneezes and sniffles.
In my Italian Cinema class we learn about Italian history and culture through Italian films. It has turned out to be a very interesting class that I’ve come to enjoy. At first I hated the class and wasn’t a huge fan of the teacher, but now I really like them both, especially the teacher!! Rossella is the cutest, tiniest little woman who wears a black skirt, black shirt and black boots everyday – it’s like her uniform. She has a short red bob with blunt bangs and she always wears her eyeliner in a fierce cat-eye style. Someone once joked that she looks like Katinka from Zoolander, which is sort of true, but I think Rossella is prettier. Her English isn’t great but it’s gotten much better since the beginning. She tries very hard to be good at it and she often apologizes for her English in class and in emails, it’s really quite cute. I can tell that she cares a lot about her students and is also very passionate about film. She gets excited over the movies we discuss and whenever she plays us clips you can always catch her smiling at the screen.
My Renaissance class and teacher, Cecilia, is also great! It is an intriguing class because we learn about the things that we see every day around Florence. Instead of imagining these cathedrals and paintings that we learn about, we actually get to see them in person, which is pretty cool. We often have field trips to different churches around Florence. The other thing I love about my Renaissance class is the room it is in. It is a cute little classroom with beautiful paintings covering the ceiling. When I’m in that class I really do feel like I’m in Italy.
Now for my Italian language class, where do I begin?! For starters, I absolutely LOVE my Italian teacher Daniele. He is the funniest, spunkiest, coolest, most entertaining teacher I’ve ever had! He is 37 years old, from Italy, wears a diamond earring in one ear and always wears the most stylish outfits (usually complete with a scarf). If you ever took Italian at UNC you may know him too because he did an exchange program at UNC Chapel Hill where he taught Italian for a year. I think this is why he loves us as much as we love him, I can tell that he definitely has an affinity for UNC and the students there. He is always really playful and animated in class but we’ve heard that he isn’t this way with his other non-UNC classes. He comes to class five minutes late every day and when he walks in the door he always says, “Ciao bambini, come va?” which means “Hello children, how are you?” One of his favorite things to do is clap extremely loud, so that the whole room rings from the impact of his hands. It startles me every freaking time. In his class you also better be careful about which language you are speaking because if you accidentally say something in Spanish he will (jokingly) threaten to throw a chair at you, or throw you out the window. Whenever he reaches for a chair we all crack up laughing.
He is an incredible teacher and makes the class go by so quickly, while teaching us so much. He often puts on full acts to explain what words mean. My favorite was when he acted out the Italian word for “gypsy.” We were learning how to say things we like and don’t like and his example was “Non mi piacciono zingari” but none of us knew what a “zingari” was. Instead of explaining in words what it was, he took his scarf, wrapped it around his head and then walked up to each of us with his hand outstretched as if he were begging for money. It was probably one the funniest things ever and he put the entire class in stitches! Another time he acted out the difference between the Italian word for taking a leisurely swim and going for an intense workout swim. That was very amusing as well. If Daniele would go back to UNC I would definitely take more Italian classes with him, just because he is so much fun.
As for my other two classes, photography and marketing, they are fascinating but not as entertaining. I really enjoy my photography class, except I hate that it is five and a half hours long. I never knew they could even make classes last that long!! We have one 30 minute break for dinner, but besides that it’s all photography and Photoshop. It has been incredibly beneficial though and I’ve learned so much more about photos and editing.
Photos from my photography class
My marketing class is a little dry and not as fun as the others, but the teacher is sweet and a little bit quirky, which makes the class interesting. She is an older German woman, with short white hair and one purple highlight. She also wears a skirt every day and sometimes they are a little tighter and shorter than need be, but never overly revealing. The class is two and a half hours long so by the end my attention span is shot.
Overall, I’ve really enjoyed “studying” at Lorenzo de Medici. I don’t think I would change anything about my classes or my teachers. The workload is FANTASTIC (because it hardly exists) and the teachers are awesome. Going pack to the UNC workload in the fall is going to be the struggle of the century. How am I to go from one hour of homework a week to over 40 hours of homework a week?!?!
Well, believe it or not I’ve got to go write a paper for my Renaissance class. It is coming close to the end of the year, which means final papers and presentations. Stay posted for another blog post about how depressed I am about leaving…
Ciao for now!!
When in Florence 