Right now is my last pomeriggio in Firenze, at least for this trip.
That's the duomo/skyline. Florence is also known for being the capital of Italian Renaissance art, with artists like Raphael, Michelangelo, Giotto, Fra Angelico, da Vinci, Botticelli, etcetera. I took an art history class while I was here so I'd have more opportunities to travel and get to know some stuff about art, since I'm pretty ignorant about it in all aspects. It was difficult - for exams, you had to know the year something was done within 3 years, who made it, the artistic aspects of it, where it is/was, what it's made of, and what it represents. I seriously hate rote memorization, but the class was still cool, and I got a chance to write in it, which I, of course, love.
I got here a few nights ago and went over to Gianna's, my ex host mom's house. She and her appartamento are essatamente how I remembered, i.e. bravissime. She gushed for about 5 minutes about how I was "molto bella!" and "come sta la tua famiglia??" and all of that stuff. It was pretty difficile for me to use Italian for the first hour or so, but then it all came back really naturally, as though all my Italian was stored in some encrypted hardrive of my brain. Strangely enough, my Italian has improved dramatically, which I definitely have to thank for living in Spain for the past 7 months. I can understand everything I hear, too, which I was about cinquanta-cinquanta (50-50) the last time. It's pretty exciting.
Anyway -- Gianna had made me and the other girl who is still at her house, Sarah, some yummy pasta with spinach and then chicken. They always eat two courses here for dinner, and the Italians load your plate with stuff unless you flat out refuse to eat it. I only ate about a third of what she offered me, I restrained myself after my 10-15 pound weight gain from when I studied here! It's hard to resist though...and this time I had her teach me how to make some of her food. After dinner, she showed me how to make espresso and apple streudel while we chatted and watched Italian game shows (a game show she was actually on, a few years ago, called L'eredità). Yesterday I learned how to make some more stuff, including this meat dish wrapped around cheese with artichokes and her fruit salad. She doesn't have any of the recipes, so I just had to watch it and write it down and translate it in my head. Pretty cool.
...I should probably save the rest of my Italy stuff until I get back to Spain. As it is, I still have to post about the rest of my trip to Belgium. Woops.
I'll put up my pictures ASAP. :-D I have some pictures of Cortona, too, which is the city in the movie Under the Tuscan Sun. Yesterday I bought the book translated in Italian, Sotto il Sole della Toscana (which I hope is better than the movie, which is one of the corniest chick flicks of all time).
OK that's it...the girl sitting next to me on Skype in this internet caffè is driving me crazy, so I'm off like a prom dress. Ciao!
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3 comments:
Off like a prom dress?!?!?
The book Under the Tuscan Sun is better than the movie. I didn't actually read it, I listened to it on a book CD. I liked how she (the author) described the food that she made. It sounded scrumptious. I liked her Italian accent also. I believe she spoke phrases of Italian also once in a while. I thought the audio book must have been better than the paper book but I think you'll like it better than the movie.
Dad is insane. The woman who wrote Under the Tuscan Sun in SOUTHERN, not Italian.
I agree with him, though, that the book is much, much better although I like the movie for its corniness.
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