Sunday was a relatively quiet day. With Raza still in Trieste with his grandparents, I woke up at about 10.15, and finally the storm had subsided, although the weather was nothing special.
After breakfast I did a bit of homework and wrote my blog before deciding to locate the source of the foul smell that had been plaguing the outside of our room for about a week. It turned out to be coming from one of the shoe cupboards that they have in the corridor, and in particular someone had dumped a pair of obscenely smelly socks in the cupboard. Grabbing a bin bag (biodegradable, and it made me feel good that I had bought home items and was now able to utilise them) I put my t-shirt over my mouth stuck my hand in and ran to the bin outside our residence. Although less the smell still lingered…
After mensa I carried on writing my blog for a bit when at about half two Raza burst in (with an extra suitcase) and grabbed his laptop, shouting something about the Man United game, which had started about half an hour ago. I let him take my internet cable when he couldn’t find his, almost out of pity, and he sprinted downstairs to the day room to watch Manchester United beat Liverpool (only just) on some shady Bulgarian website.
Partly because of the smell, partly because of the dust, in the evening we decided clean our room. This consisted of a dustpan and brush wielded by myself, a hoover, wielded by Gabriele, and a mop (obviously after the first two) handled by Raza. Zaid was nowhere to be found.
I bumped into Stefano in the day room as I was checking my emails, and he then asked if I wanted to play poker with his new set from the Hard Rock Café in Venice. So Lorenzo, Stefano, Davide and I ended up playing for a good hour until about 11, when we decided to simply all go all in and then call it a day (by the way, in case you wondering we weren’t using money as we don’t intend to lose it. That’s why we played with chips). Lorenzo won (ish, as really it was just luck on the last hand).
I then decided to further search why there the smell outside the room refused to cease. It turned out that there was another sickeningly odorous pair of socks on top of the cupboard. I also disposed of these.
As has started to become a bit of a tradition for me, I stood at the window for a bit and admired the view. Finally the sky had started to clear up, and the moon was out in all its resplendent glory, reflecting brightly off the sea. The air was also cool and crisp. I tend to find that I can use looking at the sea as a way to find personal space in a place where there is almost none.
I then spoke to mum for a while as she rang late, due to the time difference, but I dint mind. The great thing about Skype is that even if you can’t do computer to computer (free) video calls, you can at least phone or text ridiculously cheaply. We got onto speaking about the language barrier, and I know I have talked about this before, but really it must be so unbelievably difficult to be continually thinking in a different language, not just for talking to people with, but in fact your whole education.
Feeling a bit homesick, I went back to the window, to look at the comforting blinking of the buoys in the sea, and the lighthouse in Trieste, and many miles away across the bay in the tip of Croatia.
After going to the toilet I bumped into Pablito (actually Pablo, but in Mexico family add an ‘ito’ to boys’ names as a sign of affection, and for some reason people at the college call him it), the secondo from Mexico, about his EE and life in general. He also has one of the nicest rooms (in terms of décor).
Annoyingly all hope of eight hours sleep had been vanquished as it was now midnight, although I lay in bed listening to the waves gently lapping the beach at the foot of the cliff (as it turns out the beach is actually private, but if you can get to it it’s normally ok, it’s just the paths down which are either precarious or private. The best way is to go by water, although if you’re swimming you’d do well to watch out for the jellyfish…). As it turned out this noise grow louder until it morphed into the sound of Raza snoring. Grr.
Monday 20th September
Guess why I woke up early today? Yep, Raza. At least the sky was blue, if the temperature a little chilly.
Ironically in the first maths lesson in which I pretty much understood and remembered what we were looking at (coordinate geometry), I finally asked Tim for extra help. He was perfectly understanding and said for me to highlight the areas in the background knowledge booklet, and some time we would go over them (probably after school). Annoyingly I missed the deadline for giving money into the school maths department for GDCs (graphic display calculators – ridiculously expensive) for them to buy one for me, so will have to get hold of one myself. At least I have a debit card… although probably I will persuade my parents to buy it for me and then send it to me. I should just be glad I live relatively near to Italy (and in the EU) so that it isn’t hard to send stuff to me.
Rather annoyingly in Italian I hadn’t done the homework as in the morning I had thought it was day 1 (so that’s why I did my history homework on Sunday), but actually as we have an eight-day cycle, it was day two, so I did indeed have Italian. Oh well. On the positive side, Viviana informed me that there might still be a chance to go to the conference in Tuscany, if I emailed her that afternoon (which I did, in Italian, with corrections from Davide, so I am on the waiting list).
In economics rather strangely, Lydia, my tutor and also English teacher, sat in the lesson as a pupil. We looked at free-market vs centrally planned economies. At break, waiting to get a sandwich, my Britishness got the better of me when I realised that literally there is no real concept of queuing in Italy, unless specifically told to do so (for example in the large supermarket at Emisfero, the shopping centre in Monfalcone, they have signs saying something like ‘you must queue and wait behind other people who were there first’…). Fortunately the Italians were sensitive to this cultural difference, so eventually let me order.
And then English was a bit ‘meh’, to tell the truth. We carried on looking at moon poems, and at least our group had already gone, but people kept coming up with these deep and elaborate interpretations. Now I don’t mind looking a bit into poetry, but what I don’t like is when everybody sees stuff you don’t, making you feel inadequate. I know that a number of people are just making it up (they told me), but it can be depressing when you can barely come up with an impressive interpretation. At least Lydia gave me space when I thought about a biblical connection in the poem Full Moon and Little Freida, by Ted Hughes. For example Josh told me afterwards how he was blown away by the poem, and it’s funny, as I had to reread it before I began to understand it. Although don’t get me wrong, I think it’s great that people can get such pleasure and emotion out of poems so frequently, it just maybe takes more for it to happen to me… I might see about the possibility of switching to Biology higher (as there are only 6 in the class) and moving to English standard (as it happens there are also only five people in that). I’ll give it a bit longer. I also learnt how passionate Lydia is about poetry and literature…
Although I wasn’t intending to go to mensa that lunchtime, I decided to when I looked out of Fore dayroom and saw a few people (mensa is also gloriously quiet at first, when only a few people have free periods in the afternoon) sitting on the wall outside of the canteen in the sunshine, with a beautiful view of the bay. I sat next to Lindo, from Swaziland (most definitely a separate country to South Africa, also where the only UWC in the southern hemisphere is located) and we chatted for a bit about this and that, mainly about subjects and we had also just found out our creative activities – I got Sustainability – so that was pleasant. Esther, seconda from France, then sat next to us and I talked to her about subjects too. She recommends switching to Biology higher and taking English standard. Pablito then arrived, soon followed by Jonathon (primo from Hong Kong) and Salsabeel (prima, Bangladesh) and as the wall filled up, I ended up sitting there for over an hour just talking and basking in the sunlight like lizard.
We then had college life (as Mondays are different to every other day, as you have college organised stuff in the afternoons instead of service or creative or physical activities…) which was actually quite interesting. Simone, who led our group, stood in the middle of the circle and we all wrote on post it notes what we thought of him. Very brave. It also made us think more about how we judge people (luckily everyone was either kind, or not brave enough to put what they really thought). After this we had a slightly rushed tutorial, where we were finally joined by our secondi who are also supposed to be in the tutor group, Gilbert (Uganda) and Costanza (Italy). Although in fairness Gilbert was at least at the first tutorial when we had just arrived…
We had a shortened assembly as we were waiting for a talk after it from a visiting speaker (see below) although it was still quite a while as there are always so many notices from teachers and to a greater extent students. At least we had a seat this time, as we weren’t the last to arrive. The speaker was a fascinating man named Salvatore Cimmino, who lost one leg and who wants to help disabled people achieve equality and wants to change society’s perception of disabled people, and he does this by swimming enormously long distances. He had just finished a long swim in the bay that day before giving us the talk, and in the next few months he’s swimming round Manhattan Island, in places in New Zealand and Australia. Even though a secondo, Emilio, was translating, you could see the passion Salvatore had. Two things he said were: ‘Don’t pity me, enjoy life with me’ and ‘Give people the right love, time and space to express themselves’ and he really had an impact on the people who had decided to stay and listen (of which there were maybe about 90). After, there was a question and answer session, and then he was given a standing ovation, which was certainly very powerful, and as I saw tears in his eyes I actually felt myself almost crying too. Afterwards I went to say that I thought what he was doing was amazing and for the first time in my time in Italy I did that kiss on the cheek thing, and to which my British awkwardness I had to apologise for, ‘mi dispiace, sono inglese’. It sufficed.
The talk had precedent over the philosophy café and choir activities, two of which I might’ve gone to. At eight I then went to a meeting in Ples, which was all about something called ‘Street Performance’. Basically, it’s a unique to UWCAd, student-led initiative where they go to a place and do social service, as well as run activities and sessions to raise the profile of UWCAd. But the main aim is to help other people. In the meeting we discussed possible locations and talked about transport (eg should we fly? Cost of train with cheap flight etc) and also about accommodation (last year they went to Barcelona as one of the students’ – my third year – parents had contacts to get host families for everyone to stay with). It normally takes place on the first week of the four month Christmas break, but this year is on the last week. Although it sounds really interesting I don’t know whether I will go this year or I might wait until next year, just because it would mean missing a week of time with people back home… Regardless, I would absolutely LOVE to bring everyone to Newcastle, as I think it would be a great city to visit, as it’s cheap, the people are (in most cases) friendly and welcoming, and there are plenty of projects we could help with, even if just for one day. The problem would be the cost of getting to Newcastle and/or the time taken (on the train it would be two days and €250 and on the plane it would be less environmentally friendly and also would still require getting the train from London. I know there’s also the option of flying to Birmingham, but that would mean getting the CrossCountry train service. And if anything is the opposite to an ambassador for the good things of Britain, CrossCountry trains are certainly pretty high up on the list…). Also as Britain is not part of the Schengen agreement (basically where everyone in the EU can move between countries without having to show their passport, and in the case of most international students at UWCAd, they have a Schengen visa, which means they can go to any of the Schengen countries in the EU) people would have to get extra visas, and going by the ridiculous prejudice with which the Home Office makes its decisions on people visiting (for example something like 50% of appeals are accepted by judges, the initial rejections were decided by relatively untrained office workers in the Home Office, meaning that if 50% of the rejections by the first stage are incorrect decisions then something is wrong) there would doubtless be problems. Anyway, it would be great if I could work something out for next year…
I then read a really lovely letter from mum, which made me feel a little homesick reading about everything going on back at home but it was lovely to have a physical contact. I then finished watching the film, ‘The Pianist’, which is truly a brilliant film, and really makes you believe in the horrors of WWII. I then looked out at the sea again, something which is becoming a comforting habit, and was pleased by the calmness of the night. After this I spoke to Raza about his life in Mauritius and about his school. Josh then came in for a little chat, something which is becoming a nice little regular thing and we talked for a bit about South Africa and interestingly enough about how where even though he lives in quite a safe and pleasant place, he has still been mugged once or twice and so have his friends, and this is not abnormal. He also avoids going out at night. It makes you appreciate the relative safety of Britain (yes I know we have crime, but can you really imagine it happening in Gosforth, or for that matter anywhere in Newcastle? I know there are rough areas, but I don’t think anywhere is that bad…). I then helped Zaid for a bit with his English (he also finds it very difficult the difference between British English accents and American accents) and then with his EE friend. I have written his letters for his EE friend as partly he wants help to communicate everything, and partly because it makes me feel like I’ve got one too… So anyway we read the latest letter from the second year and started on the reply.
Tuesday 21st September
On Tuesday I was not just woken up early, but woken up ridiculously early. Raza went to the toilet at about 5.50 and then decided to wake up…
In English we started looking at sonnets and the classical form, although my group analysed a more modern one – Acquainted with the Night – and then we were set the task of writing one for the next lesson. I also realised that the sound of the train when it goes past Duino is really loud – whilst I’d noticed it before I had always put in the back of my head…
In Biology we did another practical – this time I did manage to see loads of my cheek lining cells, and I got to measure them.
After lunch at half 2 we had a training session for all the people working in social services with disabled people. The woman leading it was a primary school teacher and she was mainly aiming to help us to know how to work with disabled people – but sometimes the communication barrier made it difficult for people to ask her questions, leading to frustration on the questioner’s behalf. We also looked at the idea of individuals and community, and how we are helping these particular individuals into a community. There was also a role play where she played a very convincing autistic person as Firas tried to engage with her. It made me realise I have a daunting challenge ahead, but a challenge that I’m sure I will eventually be able to pass. If I find it hard (as I’m sure I will) then it can only be good for me, I think, although at the end of the day the main thing is the service. At the end we played a really surreal sort of game where at first we just had to pass a feather to each other, and then after we had to pass it as if it was the most precious thing in the world. All this was done to classical music and at the end we just walked around passing feathers to each other, in silence ourselves but with classical music playing, while the woman blew bubbles into the air. All very fun, although I don’t know quite how much I gained from that particularly game…
At the end Esther, seconda from France, started playing on the piano, and I just thought it was amazing how some people can make such beautiful sounds from instruments, and made me wish I had learnt a musical instrument when I was young (or at least I wish I’d been forced into learning one, thanks mum and dad…) and then I went next door into the computer room to print off a crumpet recipe. I was looking for one as Clara, prima from Belgium, had been talking about crumpets with some of the other Francophones at lunch outside mensa on the balcony overlooking the sea, when I happened to lean out my bedroom window, and she saw me and so asked me to make some crumpets. I settled on the Delia smith recipe (http://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/type-of-dish/sweet/home-made-crumpets.html).
I asked Gabriele to come with me to Tuttidi (the little supermarket next to the school) so I could buy ingredients. Eventually after two extra return trips I had got everything. I didn’t have any of the utensils (no wooden spoon, no mixing bowl, no egg rings in which to fry the crumpets, although luckily we do have this thing instead of a scale where you put in the flour/sugar/milk into this tall glass beaker and it has units on the side) but it didn’t really matter. After mensa I carried on, as before dinner I had mixed everything together to leave it all for 45 minutes, as instructed by wor Delia. Clara and Nancy (prima, Singapore) arrived, so I began to cook, with the help of Clara, and Nancy taking photos. In the end I had to use a small pan about 13cm in diameter, and our adapted crumpet ended up being a bit like a pancake, as we dipped it in sugar. It was said diameter but about 3cm thick, and with butter melted and dipped in sugar it really was delicious. We shared it with various people such as Alex, secondo from Belgium, Hannah, Moritz, Davide, Sana, pretty much anyone I could find to taste a (adapted) British ‘delicacy’.
I then went to write my blog for a bit, and then realised I could get wifi in the room as a mac downstairs in the day room was broadcasting wifi, so after checking facebook I went on skype to see who was online, and low and behold was my good friend Matthew, so I spent a good wee while talking to him. The only problem was that the connection wasn’t fantastic, so occasionally we would cut out, but it meant that I got to show him my room and the view from the window. Both fortunately and unfortunately I had at least 9 facebook conversations on the go with people back home at the same time as this, so I had to cut our conversation short after about half an hour. We agreed to reconvene, and I have been getting other friends’ skype numbers for conversations in the near future, too. Gabriele was then able to Skype with his relatives (aunt, uncle and cousins) and Moritz came and joined us, too, as the wifi didn’t reach his room. He also went on skype and it was great that we were all able to have relatively private conversations, with no background noise. With Moritz the issue of people overhearing conversations doesn’t matter too much anyway, as when he showed me in a facebook conversation, the South Tyrolean dialect is extremely different to normal German. It’s like a cross between Italian and German, as it uses German words but goes for the Italian way of writing the sound of a word and pronouncing every letter (eg in English the word ‘please’ sounds like ‘pleeze’ but if the same word were written in Italian it would roughly be pronounced ‘pleh-ah-zeh’). This was a really nice relaxing time, and then at about quarter to eleven Patrick, the secondo from Canada, came in to our room as I had saved one batch of crumpet mixture (so enough for one) for him to have a try. He commented on our room being bare and showed us his, where they have lots of flags, posters and souvenirs, as well as photos on the wall. I have resolved to decorate more…
Anyway, we went downstairs where I cooked the final of about 4 crumpets that day. Although he was only able to get an eighth, like everyone else, I think he still appreciated it, as did Esther and Hannah, seconda from Malta (but her mum’s British so she knows crumpets well).
At midnight everyone went to the day room as it was Josh’s birthday, and Sana had managed to get people from all over (as in from all the other residences) to come too, breaking curfew in the process (which is apparently quite fun avoiding all the teachers walking their dogs). We all sang Happy Birthday at midnight, and Alli (seconda USA) and Esther even played the cello and violin to the tune. All in all a very nice evening, following an emerging tradition of going to people’s residences for their birthday. The only problem is being tired the next day…
As I was going to bed, having just done my teeth, I bumped into Francesco in the corridor where he asked me if I wanted to go to his house in Torino for the long weekend, which was a lovely idea and one I immediately accepted.
Wednesday 22nd September
I woke up to a very windy Wednesday morning and hastily (as I didn’t have much time) sent Lydia an email about my flight home at the end of term as if I book on the 15th December, one day before the end of term, it is only €17 excluding taxes (so add on another €25) whereas if I get the next flight available, the day after we finish lessons, on the 17th, it’s €50 excluding taxes, so it’s a no-brainer really. Also, with Woodcraft Folk, the youth group I go to (or at least go to whne I am in England) we have our amazing ‘Not-Christmas Weekend’ on the 17th to the 19th December so I don’t want to miss that.
After lessons, I bumped into Shannon, from East Timor, and he asked me if I wanted to go to Emisfero with him and Lindo (primo, Swaziland). I decided to forgo mensa food in favour of going to emisfero and buying some essentials, as well as getting lunch there. There I bought utensils such as a grater, peeler, whisk, and most importantly a mixing bowl. Actually even more importantly was the discovery, on my quest to find ingredients for biscuits, was weetabix, which rather comfortingly had the address ‘Weetabix, Burton Latimer, Kettering’ the town of my dad. After a pizza and Lindo had got a tennis racket, we got the bus back. I spoke with Lindo for a while about his life back in Swaziland and his education there. I checked my pigeonhole when we got back, where I found a note telling me to Luciana’s office to pick up a package. It turned out Sana had already picked it up when she picked up her (as it turned out huge, stuffed with delicious Indian food) packages, and it was waiting for me in my room. It was only my sleeping bag and camera but it was nice to receive them, and also the sleeping bag would be essential (or not quite as I could borrow one) for the Dolomites trip.
I then read Josh’s sonnet, which was really quite impressive, even though not finished. I then went to the library to write mine, and after two hours of thinking and searching I finally finished it, although it is by no means abstract, and it is very much based on our local heritage in the north east of England. In case you want to read it, here it is:
The North.
As the sun slowly falls below the clouds,
Goes with it a culture, a neighbourhood.
There is no society, she cried. But crowds
Will not be deterred. If only they could
Be allowed to work and to play and to
Live how they like. So tall they stand, yet how
Far they fall. Your blood is not red, it’s blue
She cried, as her many long arms struck down
And killed so many lives. Communities,
What are they now? And what of the accent?
A beautiful language, now deceased.
So is she now unable to relent?
As the sun rises, the people are kind
As the sun rises, the people are kind
But never will they overlook her crimes.
I don’t think it’s particularly good, but at least I enjoyed writing it more than I ever could (and Lydia later said it was the first anti-thatcher sonnet she’s ever seen, soo at least I was breaking some new ground) some arty-farty thing about nature and/or the meaning of life. With all due respect I think sonnets are generally overrated.
On the way back to Fore I bumped into Emma (prima, France), who was on her way to the Mid-Autumn Chinese dinner at the Old Offices residence. It turned out that the food wasn’t until later so we decided to go down to Porto to look at the sunset, and I had just got my camera in the post, so wanted to photograph it. It really was beautiful. Down there we bumped into Anna (prima, Canada), and we stayed there chatting for a good half an hour to an hour.
On the way back to Fore I bumped into Emma (prima, France), who was on her way to the Mid-Autumn Chinese dinner at the Old Offices residence. It turned out that the food wasn’t until later so we decided to go down to Porto to look at the sunset, and I had just got my camera in the post, so wanted to photograph it. It really was beautiful. Down there we bumped into Anna (prima, Canada), and we stayed there chatting for a good half an hour to an hour.
When we got back to Fore day room, there was an unusual amount of activity that for once did not involve people sitting on computers. Gabriel, my British secondo, was there, so I went and saw what was going on. It turned out that Alli (seconda, USA and sort of Canada) had brought her aunt and uncle for a quick visit, and they had made a rather tasty Canadian pie, consisting to some extent of raisins, as well as other sweet stuff.
Anyway, in the end I sat there for a good hour, as I sat there talking with everyone (for the record I think it was Theis, Job, Esther, Hannah and one other person). In particular I spent a long time talking with Gabriel and Hannah, who’s actually half British (but also very Maltese), about British stuff and a lot about British TV and comedy. Currently on my list of DVDs are:
-Fawlty Towers
-Vicar of Dibley
-Little Britain before it went bad
-Monty Python and the Holy Grail
-The Thick of It series two and three
-Father Ted
-Blackadder
-Yes (Prime) Minister
We shall have a British comedy evening sometime. Gabriel also informed me of the plan to have a ‘Commonwealth Dinner’. Basically at the college different groups get together, e.g. Francophone, Arabic speakers, Latini, North Americans, Italians etc maybe once every year for a meal. Since there are only two of us (or three if you include Hannah, as culturally she is pretty English), and the Commonwealth is so much bigger, it hopefully means we will have a nice evening, as well as sample some nice food!
All in all it was a lovely time chatting with really friendly people, and I felt really happy to be at UWCAd at this time.
After I wandered to Old Offices, where the Mid-Autumn dinner had not even started, but I was really pleased that I had not missed it. Raymond cooked a delicious noodle egg thing which we all helped ourselves to from a big bowl, nice and hygienically. We were joined by many of the Asian students, as well as quite a few others, like Gabriel and Petra and I felt fully stuffed afterwards. Raymond also let me borrow a Chinese lamp, which I have now hung up on my ceiling.
I came back to the room and decorated a bit, following the inspiration from Patrick’s room the night before. I have now properly put up my black and white striped Newcastle tea towel, as well as another tea towel displaying nice pictures of Newcastle and Gateshead. I have also hung up a Union Jack, but intend to buy a non-polyester one. Also, I’d like to buy a Northumbria one, as well as an Italian ‘peace’ flag. Pace is so much cooler, I think. I also now have plenty of post-it notes with reminders on, as well as my timetable.
Lorenzo (primo, Italia) came and sat in the room for a bit and with Raza the four of us just chatted for a while. I also looked through my photos on the computer, as I am going to go to one of those machines where you can print out photos in Emisfero.
To top a really nice evening off (especially a nice evening as I had felt really bad during the day, probably due to lack of breakfast – although in my defence the bread is now horrible as the baker is on holiday and the cereal is rubbish), Newcastle beat Chelsea 4-3.
Actually, to further top off a nice evening, I got an email from dad telling me that my French GCSE remark had awarded me an A*, when before I had an A.
Thursday 23rd September
After both history and biology for my free block I came back to the day room to christen my weetabix. How glad I was to firstly eat something (no breakfast makes you tired, this much I know. I am fairly sure that of the approximately two people who fall asleep in any of my lessons each day they will not have had breakfast. I would also like to point out that I have not ever been one of those people. Fortunately).
After this I felt like taking out the recycling so went to the recycling bins, laden with our huge amounts of waste from Fore, and put them in the bins. I went the back to fore the way I always do, going through the administration building to check my post-box. Outside I saw a man looking at the UWC mission statement on the plaque by the door. As I was about to go in I said something like ‘are you ok?’ or words to that effect and then he went on to explain how he is a university lecturer visiting the area (he sounded German) so I explained a bit about the college, the age, the intake, the UWC international movement, our UWC specifically compared to the others, etc and then I got a leaflet for him and his friend. It seems that every time I do the recycling something interesting happens.
I then went back to the room to find people finally fixing our ridiculously squeaky door that had been plaguing Gabriele and I’s mornings (to a lesser extent Zaid, but he is a deeper sleeper, and obviously not Raza, as he is the one who makes all the noise with the door in the mornings…).
I then went to print off my sonnet, finding there was no paper, so I printed it off on a page torn from my exercise book. It gave it effect. In English we were looking at contemporary sonnets and the one Nicola (boy, it’s an Italian name) had was XV by Ted Berrigan and was actually really cool, as we only realised right at the end that the poem only made sense if, well actually you read it and then work it out. I’ll tell you in a few days time…
At mensa I spoke to Tim about a meeting so we decided on Monday after school for him to help with my maths. I then ended up speaking to Nancy, prima Singapore, for about an hour about meritocracy (the idea that people are rewarded based on their ability) in Singapore, the schools system there, the poverty gap in both our countries (Apparently it is also increasing rapidly in Singapore) and the two different ideas of welfare, and also about the problems we have in the UK with racism.
I then managed to pack in about twenty minutes for the upcoming trip to the famous Dolomites that all the people in the climbing activity were doing. I got my stuff checked out, got a list of further items to get, and went to look for them. Once I had packed and also put the washing on I managed to watch Newcastle’s goals on some Greek website of the win against Chelsea. Quite a good game.
I then took the stuff to be loaded into the minibuses, and then at 7 my tutorial group met at Lydia’s house for our tutorial dinner. Normally you have tutorial dinner once a month on a Tuesday but this last Tuesday we were going to go to an ozmizza, a very local tradition where the small vineyards open for about two or three weeks a year, giving wine, cheese, meat, bread and other home produced produce. This article shows about it more and incidentally was written by the wife of one of our teachers, apparently: http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/2010/may/01/italy-food-festival-osmica-carso link. On our first Friday the whole school went to an ozmizza, but this time there were none open as they were all preparing for a festival, which happened to be taking place on our upcoming long weekend, on the 2nd and 3rd October. So we decided to go for a pizza on Thursday instead.
At first it was really weird as there was a strange man in the house, as well as everyone else. It turned out to be Simone, the really nice teacher who coordinates the social services, but he had shaved off his long hair. Anyway, we walked to da Ciro, the pizzeria, where all of us had an enjoyable evening chatting and also learning more about each other, as well as the gossip about the school from Lydia and Gilbert (Uganda) and Costanza (Itlay), the second years.
As we walked back we passed the residence, Ples, and I remembered there was a meeting about the 350 degrees campaign (http://www.350.org/), about how the school can raise awareness, of its aim to limit the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million. I have learnt at the college that it is a lot better if even if you are late people are still pleased, in any of the many meetings we have, to see you.
Finding rare time to relax in the evening, I spoke to Moritz for a bit before doing a final recycling, where I bumped into Gabriele, which although is more normal than seeing a German lecturer and explain about UWC, or as happened about a week ago, when I bumped into Francesco and we ended up playing cards with people for about 2 hours, it still carried on the fortune of the recycling. Or something….
Oh yeah and in case you are interested here is a link to the college’s world arts and cultures programme/booklet, which follows the fascinating course that they teach here (almost unique), a fascinating course which incidentally I am not doing… anyway:
Photos:
Trieste's main square on Saturday the 18th (I forgot to include it in the last blog) with the wedding ceremony in the storm.
The ice cream place where we took shelter
A delicious mixture: lampone e crema
My bed (actually slightly different now, will show an updated pic)
The view from our window of the castle at night
Porto in the sunset
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