Life on Exchange

Ahh, Italy! I feel so at home here and it's only my 3rd week here. School is good. I can understand my science classes which is really nice. Thank you science world for making translating easy! The challenging classes are history and Italian. Makes sense right? My Italian teacher, gave me a work book last week for learning Italian! I'm so thankful she wants to help. I've started working in it and that plus talking, I can tell that I'm learning a lot. Watching TV helps too. So far my favorite shows have become The OC, some South American teen shows and Once Upon a Time. (Though, I already love that show.)

Saturday, I got to miss school and I went to Grado for the triathlon. It was amazing! I've never been so impressed. It was truly amazing to see how driven the athletes are. Plus they have amazing stamina to do 3 events back to back. While in Grado, I got to hang out with Vicki, a girl from my training, and walk around enjoying the beach. There's a picture of me handing the first place women finisher her shell medal. I don't have it but I'll put it up when I do. We went back on Sunday for the end of summer festival. That was pretty cool too. 

School these past two days has been good. I was invited yesterday to go get Chinese with some kids from my class on Saturday so I might take them up on the offer. Then today, a girl in my class named Julia asked if I wanted to join her and her friends playing Dungeons and Dragons. You're probably thinking the Internet game. Nope! It's a writing thing where we can create our own stories. I was so happy! Not only is it a great way to get to know more people, it's the perfect way to practice my Italian. Everyone here is so helpful in that way. They always ask, can you understand this? And if not, they say it in a simpler version. Plus they bear with my really slow Italian and correct me when it's not right. I'm so happy that they're helping me in anyway they can.

Today, I finally got to go into a bookstore. I ordered City of Bones in Italian to start reading. I love it in English and I know it pretty well so I hope I can understand it in Italian. I guess, I'm just hungry to keep learning. 

So I've figured out why they call it the Rotary 15. If you don't know how to speak the language then when dinner time comes around, you don't know how to say you've had enough. Hence more weight is gained that way. Plus the food here is really good! Not to mention the chocolate. I've had Kinder once or twice in the States but here, chocolate just tastes better. Yesterday, I had sweet bread which is bread with raisins in it. Add nutella and you have the best combination ever!

Sunday, I'm going bowling with both of my host families so I hope that goes well! Ciao!