A Lesson Learned

Stay with me people, this is going to be a long post! Ignore what I wrote about changing schools in my last post- it turns out that I won’t be switching after all. On Tuesday I woke up in the morning and took the bus to the linguistic school, where a really nice girl (a friend of one of my classmates) took me in and introduced me to the teachers and students. They showed me their class schedule, and as I looked at it I realized the linguistic school taught the exact same subjects as the scientific school, expect for an extra hour each day of Spanish. Oh well, I thought, at least I get to take Spanish here. But as I was sitting in my desk, quietly listening to the teacher’s lecture, I began to get a bad feeling about changing schools. The more the day progressed, the more I realized that this “linguistic” school was academically almost identical to my old school- but socially it was stricter and more cliquey. The atmosphere was even more rigid and formal, and there was less of a sense of community like I had noticed in my old school. As I looked at the other kids around me I began to miss my former classmates. I thought about the reasons for switching in the first place- to take classes that were more interesting to me- and suddenly I realized that a school change was not going to accomplish that. My problem with the science school was that I sat through 5-6 hours of lectures every day, hardly understanding most of what I was hearing. I was surprised at what teachers used their class time for- they just talked at the students, who sat taking notes for the whole hour. We never did any discussions or activities, and the only time the students were allowed to speak was during “interrogations” (oral tests where one person is interrogated by the teacher in front of the whole class, ant then the teacher tells them their grade and usually gives some harsh feedback). I guess I thought that it was just my old school, and that other schools would be different. Wrong.

The public education system here in Italy is very different. It is much more formal. So far I have gotten in trouble for talking to the person next to me (when the teacher wasn’t talking), stretching my arm, singing (after class), yawning, drinking water, and eating. When a professor enters the room all the students stand up as a sign of respect. Once my classmate was telling a story to her friend and was imitating some character from a movie by talking in a funny voice, when suddenly the teacher walked in the room, saw her talking in a funny voice, and reprimanded her. It seems to me that the teachers demand respect from the students that they do not reciprocate. All of these things I didn’t like, and wanted to get away from- but in fact you can’t escape it because all schools in Italy are like that. My little host brother, who is 10 years old, asked the principal of his school if he could switch classes to be in a class where all of his friends had been placed. The principal said no and told him he was a “spoiled child” for having asked. At the end of that first day at the language school, I went to the secretary and asked to return to my old school, even though there are still things about the science school that I don’t like. But hey, if I’m going to school in Italy for the whole year, I’d much rather it be with my original classmates at the science school, who are so friendly!

So in conclusion to this whole story, yes, it was silly of me to change schools for one day and then switch back. But I’m glad I at least tried the other school, because it has taught me this: sometimes during exchange there are things about my host country (ahem the oppressive public education system in Italy) that I really don’t like. Yes, there are so many amazing things about Italy- the delicious food, the old architecture, the friendly people, the beautiful language- but just like the culture of the US, there are also things I don’t like. I think accepting that is part of living abroad- not just being a tourist, but experiencing everything about the country.

Basta with speculations about exchange. In other news, this weekend we took a fun trip to Cremona for the torrone festival! Torrone is a typical dolce (dessert) of northern Italy, made with a marshmallowy substance and almonds. The festival was beautiful, with a medieval wedding, fire jugglers, dancers, classical music performers, and lots of Italian food. Here are some pictures!

A church in Cremona

Medieval wedding!

With the giant "torrone" 

A giant violin... made of torrone!!

Beautiful view of the city from the tower in centro