Friday, June 16th was my last day of Italian class in Italy! When I started on March 26th, the last day seemed so far away but the time went so quickly. I had a bunch of wonderful teachers during the course. Every two weeks you take a test and then advance. Sometimes you get a new teacher at that time and sometimes you might stick with one for another two weeks. At all times you have two different teachers: one for grammar and one for conversation. During my last two weeks I had a teacher named Sara for grammar:
She was very pretty and tall and she couldn't seem to remember my name even though it was the same as hers! She must not have thought that I looked like a Sarah because I know when I can't keep someone's name in my head it is because they just don't resemble their name. She was kind of a wild dresser--one day she wore bright turquoise wide leg pants and a shiny turquoise top complete with shiny big jewelry and turquoise pointy shoes with rhinestones on them. And then she wore it again the next day! The very next day. It was crazy. Those Italians and their fashion sense. Here are some classmates turning in their test on the last day:
Raphael (the guy) was trying to copy me the whole time. He was even whispering to me during the test to ask how to conjugate certain verbs. I just kept shaking my head and saying I didn't know...even though I did. And I got "Ottimo" on my test. Yay! Here is Sara reading from my favorite Italian newspaper (the free one they hand out on the corner), "Leggo":
And here is our class on the last day of school for many of us:
On the left (with the brown hair) is a girl from Brazil, then Bettina from Germany, Jann from Switzerland, a guy from Israel, a guy from Japan, another guy from Israel (the two of them are going to be studying medicine in Italy), then Alice (pronounced Ah-lee-chay) who is Italian by blood but was raised in Germany, Sara the teacher, Raphael from Switzerland and me. And here is my faithful barista making the morning cappuccinos:
During the last few weeks I was in there every day for my chocolate croissant and cappuccino. It's very fun to be a regular at a caffe bar in Firenze. Here is Nicky posing while waiting for her latte:
Nicky was excited that it was her last day of school--she couldn't wait to get home to her Pizza Hut and Taco Bell. No kidding. She's from Texas, it explains a lot. The bar scene:
This poor woman was always so overworked in the morning. Having all of us hover over her bar made her really nervous so she would shoo us off to the tables (normally you have to pay more to sit down). This is the bar:
Here are the boys (Jann and Raphael) getting each other's numbers:
They both live in near Zurich but I can't see them being friends in the future. And here is Jann posing while Nicky takes a picture:
This is the side of the hospital right outside my bar right down the street from my school:
I was trying to take a lot of pictures of the the mundane things that I had become accustomed to seeing on a daily basis. Here is the street that my school is on:
Here is Yoko:
She is such a sweetheart. She ran up to me during the break--she was so excited to catch me, she wasn't sure if she had missed me and she knew it was my last day. She had made me a little origami crane and written me a little note with her email address. She was almost crying--it was really sweet. She is going to be in Firenze until January so she still has a long way to go. Here is the front desk of the school with Patricia (the school manager of sorts) in the middle with the crazy curly hair:
And here is Anna:
She is a teacher at the school but I never had her--but she was in the English class that my friend Marc taught. I was hoping to get together with her to practice but we never got a time worked out before I left. And here are a bunch of my teachers:
Sara is on the left, then Elena (who was really good, I had her in my second session), then a teacher I never had, then Fiorenza (in brown) who was not a good teacher but is very kind and always remembered my name and said hi to me in the halls, and finally Antonella on the right who is a spitfire of a teacher who I can still hear in my head. I only had her for two weeks but it was memorable and I learned a lot! And this is my sweet conversation teacher from my final two weeks:
I forget her name now but it will come to me. She was really sweet and I liked her style of teaching although it didn't seem to work for everyone. So I said all my goodbyes and left Scuola Leonardo da Vinci sadly. Matt and I weren't sure what we wanted to do, it was the last day we were together and the last day I was in Firenze before going to Greece and coming back to Italy as a tourist. We entertained the idea of visiting another Tuscan town like Lucca but decided against it. We were kind of traveled out. So we climbed up the dome. Here is Matt walking up the narrow staircase:
And up the sideways steps that curve on the side of the dome:
And here I am up the stairs:
Matt takes in the view:
Yeah, we made it to the top and nearly to end of our time in Firenze, so bittersweet:
After hiking the dome, we walked Matt's suitcase over to Marc and Amy's apt. Matt was going to Cinque Terre early the next day and I was leaving to go to Rome to fly to Greece, so he couldn't leave his suitcase in my apt. He was going to stay with Marc and Amy on his last night in Firenze and then fly out Sunday. So rather than trek his stuff to Cinque Terre and back, we took it over Friday afternoon. On the way we passed through the park near my house where there was a pick up game of soccer going on:
After dropping off the luggage we headed back to my house to change to go out for apperitivo. Matt hadn't had Italian apperitivo and was eager to figure out what that was all about. So I took him to my favorite spot, Noir:
It was a Friday night and those are kind of slow nights. Thursday is the really big night around here it seems. Thursday and Sunday. Not sure why but that is the way it is. But it was fine that it was not so crowded--we ate all the food we wanted and had a place to sit. Matt testing out his no-teeth smile here:
After eating all we could of the "free" food, we took our drinks outside and sat here on the wall along the river to watch the sunset:
Here we are enjoying another fantastic Florentine sunset:
Wow, I look worn out. Then after apperitivo we went home and met up with Lorena (my roommate) for a drink at the outdoor bar in our piazza:
Lorena was really sad that it was my last real night in Firenze. She was going to be missing me while I was on vacation in Greece. This is the outdoor bar under the colonnade in our square:
Renata and her boyfriend Morgan (totally Italian guy, not so Italian name) joined us at the bar:
They had broken up a few weeks earlier but got back together and are trying to make it work. Renata looked so beautiful. Interesting side note, the tank top she is wearing is one that I gave her when I was unloading clothes that I didn't want to bring home with me. And that isn't the first time that top has been passed on. If I remember right, Sabrina gave it Jennifer, who gave it to me. I enjoyed it and now Renata is enjoying it in the Czech Republic. Kind of the like the sisterhood of the traveling shirt. I hope it lives on happily in Europe. Renata and Sarah:
Renata was my best friend in Italy :). Another interesting side note, my best friend in the world is Michele and she is 100% Czech (born and raised in California) and Renata is 100% Czech from the Czech Republic. Coincidence? Here we are being cute in the street that we used to always walk down to and from school (and the bar is in the background):
Such sweet memories. When Renata gave me a final hug she came in close to my ear and said, "Thank you for friendship". What a sweet thing to say--and something we don't always recognize at home. But I want to be more attune to the people in my life to whom I am thankful for friendship. And I was super thankful for Renata's friendship too.
She was very pretty and tall and she couldn't seem to remember my name even though it was the same as hers! She must not have thought that I looked like a Sarah because I know when I can't keep someone's name in my head it is because they just don't resemble their name. She was kind of a wild dresser--one day she wore bright turquoise wide leg pants and a shiny turquoise top complete with shiny big jewelry and turquoise pointy shoes with rhinestones on them. And then she wore it again the next day! The very next day. It was crazy. Those Italians and their fashion sense. Here are some classmates turning in their test on the last day:
Raphael (the guy) was trying to copy me the whole time. He was even whispering to me during the test to ask how to conjugate certain verbs. I just kept shaking my head and saying I didn't know...even though I did. And I got "Ottimo" on my test. Yay! Here is Sara reading from my favorite Italian newspaper (the free one they hand out on the corner), "Leggo":
And here is our class on the last day of school for many of us:
On the left (with the brown hair) is a girl from Brazil, then Bettina from Germany, Jann from Switzerland, a guy from Israel, a guy from Japan, another guy from Israel (the two of them are going to be studying medicine in Italy), then Alice (pronounced Ah-lee-chay) who is Italian by blood but was raised in Germany, Sara the teacher, Raphael from Switzerland and me. And here is my faithful barista making the morning cappuccinos:
During the last few weeks I was in there every day for my chocolate croissant and cappuccino. It's very fun to be a regular at a caffe bar in Firenze. Here is Nicky posing while waiting for her latte: 
Nicky was excited that it was her last day of school--she couldn't wait to get home to her Pizza Hut and Taco Bell. No kidding. She's from Texas, it explains a lot. The bar scene:
This poor woman was always so overworked in the morning. Having all of us hover over her bar made her really nervous so she would shoo us off to the tables (normally you have to pay more to sit down). This is the bar:
Here are the boys (Jann and Raphael) getting each other's numbers:
They both live in near Zurich but I can't see them being friends in the future. And here is Jann posing while Nicky takes a picture:
This is the side of the hospital right outside my bar right down the street from my school:
I was trying to take a lot of pictures of the the mundane things that I had become accustomed to seeing on a daily basis. Here is the street that my school is on:
Here is Yoko:
She is such a sweetheart. She ran up to me during the break--she was so excited to catch me, she wasn't sure if she had missed me and she knew it was my last day. She had made me a little origami crane and written me a little note with her email address. She was almost crying--it was really sweet. She is going to be in Firenze until January so she still has a long way to go. Here is the front desk of the school with Patricia (the school manager of sorts) in the middle with the crazy curly hair:
And here is Anna:
She is a teacher at the school but I never had her--but she was in the English class that my friend Marc taught. I was hoping to get together with her to practice but we never got a time worked out before I left. And here are a bunch of my teachers:
Sara is on the left, then Elena (who was really good, I had her in my second session), then a teacher I never had, then Fiorenza (in brown) who was not a good teacher but is very kind and always remembered my name and said hi to me in the halls, and finally Antonella on the right who is a spitfire of a teacher who I can still hear in my head. I only had her for two weeks but it was memorable and I learned a lot! And this is my sweet conversation teacher from my final two weeks:
I forget her name now but it will come to me. She was really sweet and I liked her style of teaching although it didn't seem to work for everyone. So I said all my goodbyes and left Scuola Leonardo da Vinci sadly. Matt and I weren't sure what we wanted to do, it was the last day we were together and the last day I was in Firenze before going to Greece and coming back to Italy as a tourist. We entertained the idea of visiting another Tuscan town like Lucca but decided against it. We were kind of traveled out. So we climbed up the dome. Here is Matt walking up the narrow staircase:
And up the sideways steps that curve on the side of the dome:
And here I am up the stairs:
Matt takes in the view:
Yeah, we made it to the top and nearly to end of our time in Firenze, so bittersweet:
After hiking the dome, we walked Matt's suitcase over to Marc and Amy's apt. Matt was going to Cinque Terre early the next day and I was leaving to go to Rome to fly to Greece, so he couldn't leave his suitcase in my apt. He was going to stay with Marc and Amy on his last night in Firenze and then fly out Sunday. So rather than trek his stuff to Cinque Terre and back, we took it over Friday afternoon. On the way we passed through the park near my house where there was a pick up game of soccer going on:
After dropping off the luggage we headed back to my house to change to go out for apperitivo. Matt hadn't had Italian apperitivo and was eager to figure out what that was all about. So I took him to my favorite spot, Noir:
It was a Friday night and those are kind of slow nights. Thursday is the really big night around here it seems. Thursday and Sunday. Not sure why but that is the way it is. But it was fine that it was not so crowded--we ate all the food we wanted and had a place to sit. Matt testing out his no-teeth smile here:
After eating all we could of the "free" food, we took our drinks outside and sat here on the wall along the river to watch the sunset:
Here we are enjoying another fantastic Florentine sunset:
Wow, I look worn out. Then after apperitivo we went home and met up with Lorena (my roommate) for a drink at the outdoor bar in our piazza:
Lorena was really sad that it was my last real night in Firenze. She was going to be missing me while I was on vacation in Greece. This is the outdoor bar under the colonnade in our square:
Renata and her boyfriend Morgan (totally Italian guy, not so Italian name) joined us at the bar:
They had broken up a few weeks earlier but got back together and are trying to make it work. Renata looked so beautiful. Interesting side note, the tank top she is wearing is one that I gave her when I was unloading clothes that I didn't want to bring home with me. And that isn't the first time that top has been passed on. If I remember right, Sabrina gave it Jennifer, who gave it to me. I enjoyed it and now Renata is enjoying it in the Czech Republic. Kind of the like the sisterhood of the traveling shirt. I hope it lives on happily in Europe. Renata and Sarah:
Renata was my best friend in Italy :). Another interesting side note, my best friend in the world is Michele and she is 100% Czech (born and raised in California) and Renata is 100% Czech from the Czech Republic. Coincidence? Here we are being cute in the street that we used to always walk down to and from school (and the bar is in the background):
Such sweet memories. When Renata gave me a final hug she came in close to my ear and said, "Thank you for friendship". What a sweet thing to say--and something we don't always recognize at home. But I want to be more attune to the people in my life to whom I am thankful for friendship. And I was super thankful for Renata's friendship too.
1 comment:
BFF's 4-eva! how cute! it is kind of like high school graduation, with the last day of school and friends-4-ever, but cuter, bc now we are older and life is sweeter!
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