Sunday and Monday Blues

At day’s end, with my tired body getting comfortable in my crispy old sheets with my scratchy wool blanket tossed aside to avoid dying of heat while sleeping and my mind in some kind of mixture of Avalon and Rome, I realized that not much had happened on this brief Sunday. After sleeping off the Canadian hatred I had acquired the previous day (well, actually, I started hating them after midnight, so I guess I had gotten it Sunday), I went to lunch and found myself irritable and quite discontent with how my day was to pan out. I did some studying and reading and then hated being inside, so I ventured out for a run. The sun was hot as it started to fade from the sky but the heat just fueled my want to run harder and relieve my pissy attitude.
After I thought my lungs would rip open, I walked back to Villa and watched the soccer match going on between the two Villa teams. It was exciting and I loved how seriously they all took it even though they all live together and find no competition against each other otherwise. During the match I went inside to shower and throw in a load of laundry that I needed for the next day. The match ended up being a tie, but was still exciting as it drew to the end. I ate some dinner with a few guys who weren’t apart of the match and then headed out with Antonio and Mario to see Angeli e Demoni (Angels and Demons, except we of course watched it in Italian). This of course is a real plot with complicated twists and turns and not the easy “let’s just make a whole lot of action scenes with some crappy dialogue thrown in” that X-Men was, I really had to pay attention and even so, I only caught a few phrases and a basic understanding of what was going on. Antonio made me recount the plot to him… in Italian. It was really hard.
I came back and watched some soccer and drank some milk with two guys from my floor and I was amazed that we spoke almost the whole time in Italian. I want to say I’m getting better, but then I find myself in conversations where I have no idea what’s going on and can’t respond or understand and then I don’t feel like I’m learning anything. It’s frustrating but I guess I just have to keep chugging along and remembering that I’ve only been here two weeks and that after two months even, my speaking will certainly be better but I should have no fantasies of real fluency. I crashed in bed.
I woke this morning at 7 without the help of my alarm which I had set for 6:30. I looked at the shelf next to my bed and realized that my alarm wasn’t even there. I vaulted out of bed frantically trying to find it so I could know what time it was. Somehow I had apparently heard it go off, grabbed it and turned it off and set it under my pillow… I have no recollection of doing this. I didn’t have time now to hang my clothes on the line, so I dressed quickly, grabbed a bite from the kitchen and headed out the door. Of course since I was rushing I got to school extremely early and the school wasn’t even open yet.
Class went incredibly fast today which was disappointing because I had no desire to return to Villa. This is not because I don’t like Villa, I love Villa, but today was the arrival of the summer study abroad program from UD. I was pretty sure that I wouldn’t know any of them, and in all honesty, I really don’t like the majority of students from UD. But alas, I arrived home and decided to kill as much time as possible before heading for lunch. When I got there it was exactly as I had expected. Not only did I not know anyone, I was glad for it. It’s incredible how fast you can pick out a UD student. Every girl in shorts that no society could ever find an acceptable length with bleach blond hair, guys that put whole tool boxes to shame with pants half way down their butts, slouched in their chairs acting like they own the world and that being American gives them privilege anywhere they go. I wasn’t very hungry so I shoved some pasta down and left quickly. I was almost embarrassed to show my face, not to the students, but to the Villa guys. I hated that I had to be associated with the other UD students.
When I got back to my room I felt a pang of guilt and ended up finding myself in a confused state of emotion. I felt bad that I had such a lofty opinion of myself and that I had any right to hold myself above the other UD students. It’s not as if I’m smarter, more cultured, or better than them. But at the same time, I think in a lot of ways, they are everything I hold them as. Sure, I know they all have their own sets of qualities good and bad just as I or anyone does. But this isn’t an opinion that I was born with or just clandestantly had, I gather this opinion from my own experiences with the students whom I study with. I am not one who goes out drinking every possible moment in the ghetto and I don’t always drink with the sole intention of getting drunk, I don’t walk around flaunting my nationality, I don’t dress like a tool (usually) and most of all, I am here to experience Italy through the eyes of an Italian, not to find America in Italy. There is a section of Rome that not a single Italian lives in because it is unofficially known as “the American district.” There are nothing but American stores, souvenir shops and the only food and drink you can find is at American style bars… full of nothing but Americans. Francesco asked them where they had been so far (they arrived Friday) and the only thing they had seen was that square. Are you kidding? We shall see how it pans out, but at the moment, I’m confused between being disgusted at myself or them or perhaps both.