Uappala!!!

Hello all, sorry for the lack of bloggage. Here's what I've been up to:
So last Wednesday night my host family had dinner at Mietta's house with her family (Mietta, Riccardo, Salvatore and Pinella), Enrico's family (parents and aunt), and the couple from Bergamo. We had a kids table that consisted of Enrico, Mietta, Riki and me. The dinner was the best I've had here so far, but Enrico's a punk and was constantly picking on Riki and showing off for Mietta, and vise versa, so it wasn't all that pleasant. After dinner I helped Mietta cut pictures of Zac Efron out of magazines to add to her walls. Fun. Then I played Monopoli Euro with Riki, which was nice. Except for it got to the point of being past midnight on a school night, so I asked my host parents if we could leave. (top: Mietta, me and Riki. right: Mietta in front of her masterpiece...)

Every day after school last week I went to the Piazza d'Italia with Isabella and Mariaelena, two girls from my class, which was always fun. They're nice. Thursday afternoon I went to Stephanie and Hilary's house, where Tim met us. Us four English speakers decided to explore the streets and walk around for a couple hours until it was time for... drum roll please... Italian lessons!! Whoo!! Every Monday through Saturday for the next 200 days there are these free Italian lessons held in this ex-elementary school in a really sketchy part of town, and all of our host parents banded together and decided to make us suffer for two hours every night. We walk (jog)there with one of the instructors, and it takes about 20 minutes of chasing her through a maze of alleyways with scary Italian boys saying "hey baby, I'll be your ticket to stay here" or "How 'bout I teach you real Italian tonight!" Eeueurgh. Anyway. Everyone else in the class is from Russia or Iran or Brazil. The instructors move soo ridiculously slow, and one of them always stands behind us to make sure we're taking notes. In two full hours (7 to 9pm, and we are hungry), we learned how to say the names of family members (madre/padre. bambino/bambina. signore/signora) and reviewed the verb essere: to be. Awesome. Sooo afterwards I told Anna that I didn't want to go to the lessons anymore because they're too easy, and she said that they're free and the instructor is her friend, so she would like me to continue to attend. Raaaawr. (top: Piazza d'Italia. right: outside the window of Italian lessons. left: street view in the Piazza d'Azuni)

Friday after school Mietta came over and we left for Orosei, which is a little town on the East side of the island. I really had no idea what we were doing. All I was told was to pack a small suitcase with a bathing suit and two casual outfits, and that Mietta was coming. Alas, we arrived at a MASSIVE resort hotel with the biggest freakin' swimming pool to ever grace my presence. (Dad: you can Google Earth the Marina di Orosei and look for a pool as big as the hotel) Mietta and I had our own room with four beds and a sweet balcony. Meals were all buffets so I was stoked to finally choose whatever I wanted, especially for breakfast (eggs! yogurt with bananas and granola! they were soo confused). Mietta and I spent most of Saturday at the pool... and not school. HA! And we totally took the water aerobics course which was pretty much hilarious. After lunch we drove to a sweet beach with supposedly "the finest sand in the world" but that was kind of a drag because it was super windy so it was blowing everywhere. Mostly Mietta and I played with the washed up jellyfish. Then we drove to another town to visit a historic church, and I walked around the streets and took pictures with Enrico's aunt and her fiancee while everyone else went to the sermon. After dinner the staff of the resort but on mini plays, followed by an organized dance where I learned how to cha-cha and foxtrot and jive! SWEET. On the way home Sunday we stopped in Cortes, a small little town where Anna's mom was born. Some sort of festival was going on, but all I really know was that it had something to do with horses. We toured around a bit but never went to the huge plaza where hundreds of people were watching some horse show, so I don't really know why we went... I took more pictures though, hurray! Then we drove home. All in all, it was a super nice and relaxing weekend. :] (top right: hotel. top left: pool. middle right: mietta and me and the beach. bottom left: host dad Salvatore at the beach. bottom right: exploring the streets near the church.)

I'm in Greek right now, so everyone else has to pay attention, mwahaha. They look like they're being punished. How sad.
Anway. School today has been really fun because we had science, which is a joke, so we played verb jeopardy in which Maria would say a verb in English or Italian and we would all say what it meant, and whoever won got a Mentos. Whoo! Fun and educational! Aren't you proud, mom? I hope the other side of the class has as much fun as we do, because they don't get told to be quiet nearly as much. Our French teacher is still in France so we just hung out and talked all period. Miriam invited me to go to Maria's house with them tonight but I told her I couldn't because of Italian lessons. I told her all about how lame and easy they are, and she said that my Italian is way better than learning nonno and nonna and marito and moglie, so she texted Anna and convinced her to not make me go. TRIUMPH! I'm free!
Anywho. PE here is awesome. We jogged (walked) around the mini gym for the first 10 minutes, then we did this running game for the next 10 minutes, and then he busted out the foosball, so he played with the three boys for the rest of the 40 minutes while the girls all sat in a corner and gossiped. Uappala (that was the slogan for the hotel we stayed at. It means nothing whatsoever. But it's fun to say..!) !!

Last night Anna came into the kitchen and I was already halfway through my pizza and had set it all up myself. She was super excited and said I'm finally treating it like my house instead of acting like a guest. Success! I'm also starting to get a feel for the city. When we're walking around I know where the Piazza d'Italia or the school or Anna's studio are in relation to us and I know how to get there. And when we're driving around I know which streets to take to get wherever. Awesome. :]

Oh man, I need to take a picture of the escalator thing at the supermercato the next time we go. Our mothers would die and go to heaven.

I got my computer back! Yes! ....No more Photoshop! No!

Thank you Mrs. Lowder for teaching me physics so well in English so I can answer the questions correctly in Italian. :]

Happy birthday, Mikey!