First day of classes

Yay!!! First day of classes are officially complete!! I had 3 classes today...puke! My first class was from 9AM-11:20AM and it was my Italian language class. Oh wow! The Teacher doesn't speak any english to us. She only knows a little bit. So if we ask her what a word means she looks around first to find something to point to, to try to explain what it is. It is pretty difficult but hopefully this will force me to learn it better. Our homework for Wednesday is to learn numbers 1-50, go over example questions from class (like Como si dice? which means 'how do you say?'....i think haha its my first class!), and do 2 activities in our handout. Not too bad though. For my lunch break I went to Vogolio Pizzaria and the lady speaks english and I was telling her how my first class went and she said she wants extra help with english so she would also help me with my Italian. Then she asks in English "how are you?" and I started to replay in english and she hushes me and says "no, no, no, italiano!" so I had to respond in Italian, "bene." It was funny, I will enjoy talking to her!
My second class was my sketchbook class from 11:30-1:30. My professor is German...not Italian...weird haha. He is a really good artist and our materials are really nice for the class. We got a giant sketchbook that is binded very nicely in this very thick black hardback covering and 10 different types of pencils and ink and a pen, and 2 erasers. The studio is beautiful and looks over a great view of Tuscania! Our first assignment was to sketch a still life. He started out with a really tough first sketch but he said he did so on purpose to make us jump right into it. He had all different types of tree branches and trunks and had to draw them from different angles. It felt good to draw again but this was pretty difficult for our first subject but he is also really good at explaining how to fix what we are doing wrong. I think I am really going to enjoy this class! When it gets warmer we will be going outside a lot and also do water colors.
Then I had a little bit of a break before my last class which was Italian Society through Cinema from 3-5:30. It was interesting. The professor is very nice and speaks very good English which is helpful. She first lectures for a while about history then she gives us a 10 minute break and then we watch the movie...well, sorta. She puts in the movie and stops it every few minutes to explain what is going on and then she fast forwards it and stops again. So we don't really get to watch the movie in class. We have to check the DVD out and watch it on our own time. My roommate Sara is in the class with me so we are going to check the movies out every Monday night and watch it together and do the homework early. We have to answer questions every class and do assigned reading before our next class. It only meets once a week so the work is pretty easy to handle. This class could be interesting, we will see!
Overall, school went well today. I think I will like it a lot. It is interesting because the classes only have 2 quizzes each and a midterm and a final, then a paper or two. I can't decide if this is good or not! I think as long as I stay focused I should be okay. I am very excited to start my cooking class and my wine class though! I do not have any classes tomorrow so I get the day off which is nice after having 3 classes today.
After school I went to the supermarket with Sara and we bought a few things. I made my own chicken and pasta for dinner. I am so proud of myself haha. The chicken wasn't very exciting because it is hard to find spices here so I just melted some butter to cook/fry/sear it then I put some salt on it. It was bland but I have missed having some chicken! I didn't realize how many things I take for granted in America. Like microwaves! Oh my gosh!! I miss my microwave, it makes everything so much easier! I miss fresh mex haha, and American cheese slices haha. It is so much harder to make popcorn on the stove too! And if the oven is on then you can't use any other appliance because the energy is so expensive here to use. If ur in the shower you cant use the oven or cant do laundry. The washer is so tiny and we dont have a dryer so we have to hang dry but you have to do it during the day so that the sun can dry the clothes too and the washer takes like an hour and a half and it sounds like a jet plane is trying to take off in our kitchen when it is on! It's a bit scary haha. We make it work though. Also when you are not in a room you need to have the light off since it is so expensive to have it on. It is hard to remember because at home I just leave the light on, no big deal. You can't have a lot of stuff plugged in at one time. If I am charging my computer I can't use my straightener. If im charging my phone, I can't charge my camera. Little things like that take a lot to get used to. Oh! and the thing to flush the toilet is so weird. We have this massive thing above our toilet that is like the size of like 4 notecards and two thirds of it is a big button and the other third is a smaller button. When you take a pee, you press the small one. When you take a poopy, use the bigger one. That way more water is conserved. It is so strange!
We finally found a TV channel that plays in English though! The MTV channel shows the shows in English...well all the "reality" ones, but MTV is mostly reality anyway. The other shows like 'Awkward' or 'Degrassi' are all translated into Italian though as well as all the commercials and MTV News. My roommate Jenny and I were watching MTV News this morning and were making commentary on what we thought they were saying. It was hilarious!! I appreciate hearing English so much though! I never though I would ever say that! They are also very behind in schedule. The show "Friendzone" is behind, like they are showing commercials for episodes that premiered in the US like a few months ago. It is kind of funny, but we can't really complain. We are just glad that we have an English channel. Oh, I miss chicken nuggets too...sorry, random...just saw an Italian commercial for them though! haha Okay, back on track Beener...anyway, tomorrow I am going on a run. Yup, you read that correctly. Beener is going on a run. Please pick ur jaw up from the floor. I was invited, well more like volunteered, by my roommate Sara to go with her tomorrow. It works out perfectly actually. I can still sleep in cause we are going at 10:15 and while we are gone, I will put my laundry in and when we come back it will be ready to hang up. Then later on that night we are going to the school to watch the DVD for the cinema class together with the rest of our class. Oh, thats another thing I forgot! (my mind is all over the place as you can tell!) My class sizes are really small. First class was 6 students, second class was 5 students, and third class was 7 students. All of those include me too! It is so weird, but I kind of like it that way. It is almost like one on one time with the professors. I do not do well in lecture sized classes at all, so I like it.

Now that I have written an entry that is completely all over the place, I think I will stop myself. Super exhausted so I am gonna try to go to bed a little early tonight. (sorry, no pics from today!)

Until next time.........Ciao!