Today, Amy and I went to the fair!!! It was SO MUCH FUN!!!! Definitely the best day I've had since moving to Europe, but probably the best day of my whole entire life. EEEEEeeeeeeeEEEEEEEeeeeeeeee best day EVERRRRRR!!!
Friday, October 14, 2011
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Imagining the future is a kind of nostalgia
There is no future tense in Italian.
Here's an example of how this can get confusing. Someone asks you che cosa fai? And then you're like crap, do you mean what am I doing right now as you're asking me this or do you mean what am I doing in the future?
Sometimes I misunderstand the context, and say something a long the lines of um, I'm having a conversation with you, duh. Except in my broken Italian it's more like che? parlo con tu. And then the other person is like, I meant tonight! What are you doing later tonight? Except in Italian it's more like, no! Che cosa fai a notte? It can get embarrassing. But it turns out the whole process of learning a language is embarrassing.
As humans, we spend so much time planning for the future, wrapped up in its intricacies. And I can't help but love a country that eschews that state of mind so thoroughly they've evicted it from their vocabulary.
Here's an example of how this can get confusing. Someone asks you che cosa fai? And then you're like crap, do you mean what am I doing right now as you're asking me this or do you mean what am I doing in the future?
Sometimes I misunderstand the context, and say something a long the lines of um, I'm having a conversation with you, duh. Except in my broken Italian it's more like che? parlo con tu. And then the other person is like, I meant tonight! What are you doing later tonight? Except in Italian it's more like, no! Che cosa fai a notte? It can get embarrassing. But it turns out the whole process of learning a language is embarrassing.
As humans, we spend so much time planning for the future, wrapped up in its intricacies. And I can't help but love a country that eschews that state of mind so thoroughly they've evicted it from their vocabulary.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Missing home, secret underground tunnels, and midnight adventures
This summer I got almost crushingly homesick. It's sort of embarrassing to admit (so I'm posting it on the internet). But since it was so bad this summer, I thought I'd used it all up. I mean, I miss Fairbanks, sure. But I'll be back next year.
But on Friday night it hit hard. Living with a million girls can get to be sort of much, and at 1 a.m. I was sitting alone in the living room in tears wondering what on earth I was doing in Italy when everyone I love is in Alaska. It took me ages to fall asleep, and when I woke up I was exhausted and dazed in a homesickness hangover. My eyes had that dry, itchy feeling you get in the morning when you cry yourself to sleep while listening to spoken word poetry podcasts.
To make matters worse when I got on the computer, I immediately got a Skype call from my three best friends. They were all "hi, we miss you so much!" And I was pretty much on the verge of bursting into tears again.
But yesterday, I was in Orvieto which is filled with secret underground tunnels and ruins and hills overlooking the gorgeous Umbrian countryside. And at some point mid-morning the chest-crushing feeling that I'd made a mistake leaving Alaska disappeared and was replaced with a whole lot of enthusiasm for secret underground ruins.
Yesterday? It was perfect. I got lunch in a trattoria, and we ate wild boar which is a specialty of Orvieto. To be honest, it just tasted like lamb. It was a magnificent fall day, with crisp, cool weather and leaves that had just started changing colors. And last night, I went to Fiesole. Six of us squeezed into a tiny European car, and tore through the dark city streets. We climbed up to the top of the town, and stood quiet and awestruck before the sprawling, twinkling metropolis of Florence at midnight.
I don't claim to know the anatomy of missing someone. But I think the cure is climbing to the very top of a hill and star gazing with arms stretched out wide enough to hug the night.
But on Friday night it hit hard. Living with a million girls can get to be sort of much, and at 1 a.m. I was sitting alone in the living room in tears wondering what on earth I was doing in Italy when everyone I love is in Alaska. It took me ages to fall asleep, and when I woke up I was exhausted and dazed in a homesickness hangover. My eyes had that dry, itchy feeling you get in the morning when you cry yourself to sleep while listening to spoken word poetry podcasts.
To make matters worse when I got on the computer, I immediately got a Skype call from my three best friends. They were all "hi, we miss you so much!" And I was pretty much on the verge of bursting into tears again.
But yesterday, I was in Orvieto which is filled with secret underground tunnels and ruins and hills overlooking the gorgeous Umbrian countryside. And at some point mid-morning the chest-crushing feeling that I'd made a mistake leaving Alaska disappeared and was replaced with a whole lot of enthusiasm for secret underground ruins.
Yesterday? It was perfect. I got lunch in a trattoria, and we ate wild boar which is a specialty of Orvieto. To be honest, it just tasted like lamb. It was a magnificent fall day, with crisp, cool weather and leaves that had just started changing colors. And last night, I went to Fiesole. Six of us squeezed into a tiny European car, and tore through the dark city streets. We climbed up to the top of the town, and stood quiet and awestruck before the sprawling, twinkling metropolis of Florence at midnight.
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| from Desh's tumblr |
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