I shall keep on drumming and drumming...

It's kinda funny how my classes have been affecting me this semester. Fam and gender is fun, but unoriginal for me, though i love it at the same time. econ is challenging but really cool once i figure it out and being stuck on a problem literally controls all my thoughts until i figure it out. italian is a joke, but at the same time every once in a while we get taught something that is genuinely useful in society. and european fascism... i may be way behind in textbook reading, but the novels he's chosen for us to read each week have really affected me. they're powerful novels that i otherwise wouldnt have chosen to read, but now, reading them in this context, on incredibly interesting.

i guess that's the major update on all my classes. I just finished reading The Tin Drum, which was extremely intense, and my brain is pretty blown. we'll see how class goes today, discussing it. got another paper back in fam and gender which i got an A on. she said "while your points and explanations are always very clear, sometimes your prose is less fluent." coming from a woman who doesn't really understand english...... anyway, she's super nice, and i got an A, so whatever haha. finally got some grades back in italian and twas good to know im doing fine in all that too. we also had a very interesting discussion in family and gender today. I hope our teacher lets us write about what we want for the final paper, because i thought of a really cool paper topic today in class... crosses fingers.

last weekend i made a list of everything i have to get done before fall break and slowly but surely things are getting crossed off... my family and gender paper is almost pretty much planned, just gotta do a bit more outside research and the plan is to write that thing (or the majority of it) tomorrow and finish thursday. then the shows on: fascism paper and econ midterm. so i apologize, in advance, if blogs don't happen, or say nothing, because i wont be doing anything but school the next two weeks, minus the opera thursday night, perugia saturday, and my show tomorrow!

yes, my show is tomorrow night at 7 pm (1 pm your time). I'm super excited for it, and also excited for it to be over. Not that it was a huge commitment in the first place, but i really just wanna focus on school. i have worrrrrk. and the ensemble sucks and i hate sitting there for hours just to do my two scenes....which rock (not because of me per se, hehe, but because they're fun). eric says he's going to get it filmed, but for some reason i highly doubt it... ill do my best, but as for all of you back home, im sorry in advance... you prob wont get to see it. :( ill perform over christmas break.

also over christmas break im going to cook for the padres! ive decided and it shall be great. i dont really know what im doing, but everything ive made has been super delicious. I'm thinking Spatitouille (a concoction that to me is a combination of spaghetti and ratatouille :) ) and rosemary, cheese toast and salad. :) so get ready for that! i really wish i couldve been at sarah's white coat ceremony this past weekend, it made me really sad. plus i love Foscoe and mass general store. :) anyway, but yeah that made me really sad. :/ probably the first time ive ever felt homesick before. ever. in life. hehehe.

this semester is going too fast. im just trying to get through midterms and then it's fall break... eleven days of pure awesomeness... then boom boom boom: next weekend dublin/london, next weekend catherine's bday, next weekend barcelona, next weekend paris, and then two weekends and it's finals. WHAT. this is so crazy. why do people only study abroad for a semester???? there's not enough time!

i am angry that school stops before finals, like the friday before. my finals, are going to be similar to my midterms: papers and exams and an oral.... if i dont have school during finals, why do i have to keep doing school and work and hw for midterms? i know this is the way it is everywhere, but it's annoying right now. i always hate when school gets in the way of my studying.

in italian next week i have a 10 minute oral and a written exam as a midterm! JEEEEZ. he said he's going to give us ninety questions and we have to be prepared for any of the them for the oral. It's kinda surprising how much i know in italian i guess.

oh cinque terre! cinque terre was amazing! one of my favorite day trips since we've been here. i recommend to anyone coming to italy (cough, padres, cough ...at least to tuscany anyway) to take a day and do cinque terre. incredible heights, incredible views, gorgeous ocean... there's not really much to do, like florence or rome or venice per se, but that was what was nice about it. i think it was the first day that catherine and i pretty much did nothing, minus the hike between monterosso and vernazza, which was intense. it was just very peaceful and relaxing. for a cute blog about that, see my RG. It was a great day, and the weather was perrrrrfecccct. sunny and about 75 degrees. just lovely. it was a great way to spend the day... before the craziness that is these two weeks.

btw, just for a little bit of explanation, cinque terre is pretty much just five towns connected by hikes along the western coast of italy. we took a two hour train to La spezia, which is a central train station that has small trains going to and from all the towns. We took the train to monterosso, hiked from monterosso to vernazza (1.5 hours straight up a cliff), and then took the train to the fifth town, riomaggiore. We spent the evening in riomaggiore lying on rocks with our feet in the ocean and talking; it was wonderful.

i have another mosquito bite on my face... my chin this time... it's burning so badly right now that id give anything to reach up and itch it furiously... i now have a combination of mosquito bites and scabs all over my body from itching them too much. i killed two more last night.... im losing my patience on this... it's making me say "i cant wait to get back to florida" which makes no sense because florida... is pretty much a marshy wetland....i will never complain about mosquitoes there again, because this is just ridiculous. i dont open my windows or anything anymore either, i dont know where theyre coming from.

i sleep in long sleeves and pants and socks and put my hoodie on my face now... this is because of mosquitoes and also because they don't turn the heat on in our apartments til November 1st, and to be honest, Florence is cooolllllllld. or at least at night and in the mornings. it's gorgeous during the day though, wish it could be like this wherever i live, all the time. so pretty.

im not freaking out about work yet, which is nice. mostly i need to figure out what im doing for my fascism paper and ill feel pretty dang good. i keep craving moes and brownies, which are pretty poor cravings to have in italy. i dont think italians no what cookies or brownies or mexican food are... and i feel very bad for them. haha. there's indian food, and a tiny bit of chinese, but other than that, they dont really have any other besides italian.

that's all for now! i need tea before class.

sorry if im absent for a bit. i have work to do!!!!

con amore,

becca