Story within a story-more occidental adventures

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Friday, May 27 2005

9:15am school
This morning we were in 5 at school, being a Friday morning as usual. We went over the previous night’s exercises as usual. I had opened the windows and the sparrows were quarreling, the morning light warm and hinting at the day’s heat. Our school at Villa della Quiet is closing here, and translocating to the center of Florence-Piazza Savaronola. They’ve already dismantled our desks and chairs, and have given us substitute mini chairs instead.

The mood is different this morning, and during our ritual homework correction which often takes 1.5 hours, our minds drifted and let tangents lead to other tangents. Our professoressa allowed our minds to drift to concepts other than pronomi, relativi, causali versus finali, periodi ipotetici. Instead our conversation drifted wondering what characteristics defined an amphibian, to determining if crocodile skin accessories have ever been a good idea. Midst these conversations, she drills us with verbal conjugations for “passato remoto” which are my personal enemy. Leggere? Lessi, leggesti, lesse…Fare? Feci, facesti, fece…and then I tell my 4 classmates, (amazed that I am conjugating this heck of a verb, and the Spaniard hypothesizes that I must have skipped dinner last evening to study for this morning), that I remember the from FECE from our English word “FETCH” which means to go and get, an action that helps me to remember the Italian form. Humored by this, the rest of our class is then devoted to conversation on how we memorize and learn, from the difficulties of Spanish and Catalan to the idea of sleep and excercises in memorization, to the challenge of the 4 Japanese alphabets. (One word pronounced is then written four different ways with four different meanings. In fact, they learn 4 different forms of language, ranging from basic characters and communication to a more formal and complex system, including knowledge of Chinese characters as well.)

My Japanese classmates, often quiet in the back row, know their stuff. When we have the opportunity to eat together, they eat slowly and politely. They smile often and the bow/nod of the head is a common gesture when we converse. In class, they rarely volunteer to read, but when called on, are precise. I am learning bits of pieces of a culture within a culture, in a language that to none of us is our own…we are so curious about our Japanese, Spanish, Greek, American classmates, that a good portion each week are questions that we ask in simple curiosity about each other.

8pm-Bonnie and Massimo
Our second potluck dinner (is potluck style truly an American thing?). This time the Italian couple who are neighbors are invited, and bring pasta, a novelty at our usual all-asian-plus-one-american-potluck. I enjoy watching Yuko make sushi, and some others are frying chicken Japanese style with ginger, garlic and oil, while another is serving Chinese style chicken with a delicate white sauce and lots of vegetables. There is also an array of oven-roasted spring rolls made fresh several before dinner by our hostess. We drink wine and chat, sharing stories about how we came and if we are leaving. The Japanese boyfriend of one, a 55 year old professor of opera, sings Napolitano songs in perfect Italian (but can’t speak a word otherwise). Yuka, my tall friend from Osaka, smile at each other as we eagerly take seconds. She is double my height, grew up across the world from me, but in Italian, we somehow have a common understanding-a love of food, a kindness and sincerity that I admire in her and a strong vivacity that she says she admires in me.

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