2nd year
Weeks 26 & 27Italian10 days in Italy, 100% immersion
Visited (in chronological order): Milano****, Torino*, Genova***, Lucca*, Firenze****, Bergamo*
(* = first time, *** = third time, **** = fourth time)
Was using: 99,9% Italian, literally zero switching; the only switching has occurred (on my initiative) when I was too tired to remember the Italian word for stamps -
francobolli - I still feel bad because of this.
Occasions for conversations: plenty. In Italy nothing goes without a conversation, even when you're just buying a sandwich there will be at least ten questions to respond (
come lo vuoi? lo mangi qui o lo porti via? ma il caffè lo prendi prima o dopo? te lo metto in un sacchettino? lo riscaldiamo un po’? ...). Everywhere, literally everywhere, people would just show up from nowhere and start to chat:
sciopero dei tassisti (lady waiting for taxi),
ma tu sei francese? (guy in the train),
letteratura africana (Senegalese guy selling books on the street) ...
Read: Paolo Rumiz - E' oriente; Natalia Ginzburg - Le piccole virtu'
(and first 100 pages of Italo Svevo's novel La coscienza di Zeno; I love it very much so far)
Listening: audio guides in most of museums I've visited, including Galleria degli Uffizi in Florence and Museo egizio in Torino
(also some funny Italian TV shows: Striscia la notizia and
Undressed; I don't have any private channels on my TV at home, just Rai 1,2,3, so it was cool to discover something new)
Some thoughts: I need more time for my Italian. But where to find it? Yes, I can continue to read books and watch TV. But is it enough? I need more conversation. (...)
Souvenirs: bag full of books (Italian classics). Btw., Turin is a heaven for book lovers with tons of
bouquinistes all around the centre, almost like Paris.