Harriett Studies: The most riveting blog post of the year!

Looking back at my blog, I realized I haven't actually clued you all in into what I'm really doing here. The truth is that I'm in Italy to do more than travel and drink wine and eat gelato. I know, I know, those last three things should definitely be enough to satisfy me.

But, I'm still a junior (3rd-year, clueless, whatever you wanna call it) college student. I think this blog might make it seem like the most interesting moments I have here involve some kind of party or weekend travel. Actually, though, one of the coolest (at least I think so) sides of my life happens right here in Bologna, at the university.

Right now, I'm enrolled in 4 classes. Two are taught at the actual university, and the others are through my exchange program, BCSP. The university classes are in Italian literature and Roman history, while the BCSP classes are in advanced grammar and modern European history. It's ended up being a sweet mix of small and huge, as well as familiar and unfamiliar. The BCSP classes tend to be smaller and somewhat more discussion-based, like they would be in Chicago. They run on a similar schedule too, with regular homework assignments and exams.

UniBo classes are completely different. My literature class is probably the largest lecture I've ever been in. Foreign students have to read 3 books to be prepared for the final exam. I'm reading the Inferno (by which I mean I've read maybe 2 cantos), and I'm hoping to read Machiavelli's The Prince and something by Italo Calvino before the final.

Most university courses here culminate in a final exam given orally, with the professor or a TA. This means that you sit down with them and they ask you a bunch of questions about what you've read or heard in lecture. Then they give you a grade on the spot. That grade is your grade for the whole course. Sounds scary right? It is. The good news is that you can take the exams more than once. In fact, most professors offer the exam monthly or bi-monthly, so if you're not happy with your grade the first time, you can re-take it. Phew.

My literature and my Roman history class work roughly the same way. My Roman history lecture is also humongous, but not in reality. The professor speaks very quietly, the hall has bad acoustics, and his microphone breaks at least once per class, at which point one of us has to run and get the technician from next door to come fix it. As a result of all this, a good half to two-thirds of the students stopped coming to class. But, little nerdy Harriett went diligently to class every day, a method that seemed to reap little reward at first. However, the professor finished talking about Roman history about 3 weeks before the scheduled end of the course. Christianity invaded, the Empire crumbled, the Medieval age had begun. There was nothing left to talk about. So, on Tuesday, the professor turned the collapsing Empire into a democracy and asked us if we would like to end the course the following day. Obviously everyone raised their hands. This is the point where my attendance paid off. The professor took down the names of everyone who had been in regular attendance, and indicated that our attention through all his whispering lectures would be rewarded in the exam.

I told you, riveting.

As terribly exciting as I'm sure it's been to read all about my academic life in Bologna, I should go study for these rapidly approaching final exams. Wish me luck!

Thanks

Ciao tutti,

I hope the month of November has been treating everyone nicely.

In the US of A today is Thanksgiving. Now that I've been here for almost 3 months, I realized it's time for a few thank you's, and today is exactly the perfect day for that.

Last night, I was at a birthday party for my friend Orsolya (try pronouncing that, I dare you.) I met Orshi because she is my American friend Noelle's roommate. Orshi is Hungarian, and the one gift she asked for was a recipe from every person at the party. This turned out to be an excellent idea, because the invitees included Hungarians, Italians, Americans, and even one Japanese girl. So, Orshi's going to leave Italy with a book full of international recipes. That's pretty cool.

Anyways, on with the story. Before heading over to the party, I was trying to figure out what kind of recipe to give Orshi. I don't really cook, and the a lot of the meals I eat regularly in my apartment I learned to cook from my roommate Monica (Thank you, Monica. That's one down!) I tried for a long time to think of something American that I know how to cook. I ended up going with the fluffer-nutter sandwich. I have no idea if Orshi will ever find marshmallow fluff or peanut butter in Europe, but all of this is besides the point.

The point is that ever since coming here, being an American has slowly become more and more important to me. It never mattered that I was an American in the past. I would occasionally get a few patriotic butterflies on holidays like 4th of July but truthfully I never really considered that my nationality could be such a huge part of who I am. Now that I'm here and I regularly meet people from all over the world, my American-ness is the one thing that defines me in their eyes. Just as I think of Orshi as "my Hungarian friend," others probably think of me as their "American friend," (or possibly as "that girl whose name starts with an H so we can't pronounce it.")

I think it's crazy that it took me leaving the country to become aware of my own nationality. Especially on a day like today, where it's a major holiday there but it isn't here, I've been thinking a lot about how much I've started owning, caring about, and occasionally even defending my nationality since I've been here. I might not be proud to be an American every day, but in the end, I'm grateful, and I just thought that today, I should say that.

But let me rewind a little bit. I probably wouldn't be here, experiencing this cheesy, sentimental moment with out the support of my family. So! Mom, Dad, thank you guys so much for making this happen. And to the rest of my American friends and family, especially any of you that helped convince me that this was a really good idea, thank you! And of course, to all my friends and roommates in Bologna, who treat me like family even though we are so totally not related, thank you too.

I hope anyone that reads this has a really good day today. I know I will. Our program is hosting a supposedly traditional Thanksgiving dinner at a fancy restaurant in Bologna. Hopefully you'll see some pictures from it on this blog in the near future.

Alright, last one, I swear. Thanks for reading this if you did.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Trieste

Guess what? I'm still alive! I haven't been run over by a Vespa yet! (I consider this to be my most likely form of death while I'm here.) I know it's been a while since I've been in the blogo-sphere, but it's for good reason. I've been really busy (in a good way.)  I've taken a number of weekend trips, plus classes have really started to pick up. I'll probably write more about all that later. Right now, I'm going to talk about my recent trip to Trieste, which is what inspired me to write another post after such a long hiatus.

Geography lesson. Trieste is here:

It's not even in the boot. It's pretty much directly across the Adriatic from Venice, and I think there are actually ferries that run between the two cities. (We took the train.) Since Trieste is so close to the border of Slovenia, there's a lot of Slavic influence, and it also has a history of belonging to the Hapsburg Empire in Austria. So, it's a pretty unique place. For example, a lot of restaurants serve traditional Italian dishes as well as Hungarian goulash and German sausage.

We decided to go to Trieste (the "we" being me and 4 other American girls) because we had a long weekend, and we found a really decent-looking hostel there. However, in the days leading up to our trip, I checked the weather forecast, which of course was 90% chance of rain. So, I wore my fleece jacket and wool socks and packed a hat and two scarves. My roommates warned me of the high winds in Trieste and wished me luck. Evidently it's not a popular destination in November.

I don't know whether we got lucky or if the bad weather in Trieste was just hype, but it was super sunny and beautiful! If you don't believe me look at these pictures:

Mom look! Rowers!

In Trieste we saw two castles. The first, Castello di San Giusto, was situated on a hill overlooking the city and provided some excellent views of the city like this:

San Giusto also had a museum of war photography artificats and that Noelle (my fellow History major) and I spent a long time looking at. You can also see the ruins from the Roman city of Tergeste:

The second castle, Castello Miramare, was right on the sea. It was originally built for the Hapsburg archduke and later emperor of Mexico Maximilian and his wife, Charlotte. Awesome history aside,  these guys had some sweet digs.

Another highlight of this trip had to be the food. For lunch on Saturday I split the "Piatto di Buongusti" (Plate of good tastes) with Margaret. Somewhere this is documented, but it had a mix of Italian classics like gnocchi and polenta with Hungarian and German dishes like goulash and sauerkraut. Awesome!

One more picture of the water.

And this cat riding a motorcycle.

And this dog in a bandana. 

 
Okay. Over and out.