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Published: September 26th 2016
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Sometimes there are more tutors than camps available, so ACLE puts you ‘on hold’. Luckily, the week they put me on hold, they made an effort to find host families to host us for that week. I was happy, because I was a little panicked trying to find cheap places to go and stay for the week. July and August (especially the second week of August) are the high vacation periods in Italy, and transportation and hostels were really expensive.
So, I arrived to Tarcento to meet my new host family, who lived in Gemona. They were a family of an 11-year-old girl, a 9-year-old girl, and a 20-month-old boy. I was nervous to be staying with a family for an entire week, without camp. I didn’t know if we would click and find ways to stay busy. It couldn’t have gone better.
The older daughter was really eager to learn everything about me, and both girls liked to play board games. They always included me. The mom was off work that week, so she took us on a lot of day/evening trips. The parents, even though their English wasn’t perfect, worked hard to speak
to me, and encouraged their daughters to speak to me. It helped that by then I understood a good bit of Italian, so I could often help with what they wanted to say/ask me.
Fruili has its own regional language that many people still speak--Friulano. For my host parents, it was their first language, and they learned Italian in school. Now, they generally speak Italian to their kids so they don’t get confused in school, but the older daughter can speak Friulano too. They taught me some phrases while I was there, but I couldn’t understand them when they were speaking it to each other.
Gemona was one of my favorite towns. Its location is striking, on the slope of a mountain, and the scenery nearby is great. The rivers and lakes nearby have the clearest, most beautiful water I’ve seen in my life. While I was there, there were a lot of events marking 40 years since earthquakes had devastated the region. Through visiting the town and attending some of the events, I was touched by the struggles they’d been through.
I saw again how diverse Italy is. One evening,
we went to my host grandparents’, and they cooked traditional Friuli food—2 kinds of frico, which can be either fried cheese, or potatoes and cheese; fried polenta; beef stew; cucumber and tomato salad; and zucchini. And you thought it was all pasta and pizza, huh? All of the adults spoke Friulano between themselves.
Another day, we visited the area of Sauris Lake, where there is still a German-speaking population (though of course its German has adapted in its own way, like Pennsylvania Dutch). They’re known for beer in that area. The towns of Sauris Sotto and Sauris Sobra are both very cute mountain villages, which had lots of flowers when we went in the peak of summer. Unfortunately, our trip was interrupted by a thunderstorm, and we also found out that you can’t really access Sauris Lake to walk around it. The best we could do was park near the dam and walk to one lookout point.
I took some other trips that week. We went to Cavazzo Lake, which reminded me of Lake Raystown because it was surrounded by mountains, and some boaters and fishers used the lake.
I went
to northeastern harbor city of Trieste with my host mom and one sister. I had the expectation that it would be the Italian version of Dubrovnik, and while it was interesting, it didn’t have so much beautiful seaside/castle areas. It was more like a blend of Brno/Vienna and Dubrovnik. This strange architectural style is a reflection of its history at the crossroads of lots of different cultures. Even today, it’s very close to the Slovenian border, and inhabitants are proud of their diverse cultural backgrounds. We passed a synagogue, went inside a Serbian Orthodox church, and went inside a Roman Catholic cathedral (San Giusto). Both of the churches we went inside were some of the prettiest I’ve been in, and the Serbian Orthodox church was a cultural experience as well.
On the way back home, we passed Barcola, which is a stretch of coast that Triestinos frequent for sunbathing and swimming. Then we stopped at Miramare, a park which contains a small castle used by Habsburg Empress Sisi. My host mom told me that her fiancé died at sea, so any unmarried couples who visit are cursed. Watch out!
We also stopped in the
town of Palmanova on the way back. It was built inside a fortress shaped like a star. It has a really interesting history related to utopia that you should read up on. Anyway, I didn’t love the town—I don’t know if I saw one tree! It was a like a village on the moon. And in the café we stopped at, the bathroom had neo-Nazi graffiti, which certainly should have been cleaned if they’d cared.
My last day, we went to the nearby town of Venzone. It had also been almost completely destroyed in the earthquakes 40 years earlier. But, because it was smaller, they were able to rebuild it exactly the way it had been (Gemona was rebuilt in a more modern way—I couldn’t really tell, but . . . Oh, another fact is that the church in Gemona was half-destroyed, and even now, the columns inside are visibly tilted). It was a nice town to wander around for a morning. They’re known for lavender—there are at least three different lavender-themed shops!
I sadly said bye to my Gemona family and my week of vacation and moved 12 minutes away to Tarcento to
live with my new host family that would be closer to camp. This family had a 10-year-old daughter and a 6-year-old son, and they were all very quiet. Very friendly, but a contrast from the week before.
It was great because I could walk from their house to camp, and also to the town center. My tutor team, camp directors, and helpers at that camp were all just awesome. We complemented each other, and everything went super-smoothly at camp. We hung out a good bit in the town of Tarcento, which grew on me more and more as camp progressed. It’s not as close to the mountains, but it has a pretty river running through it. Also, the stars there, despite it being populated, were very bright. It was as if we were far from civilization, but we weren’t really.
One day we went to a lake near Austria and hung out. On the way back, we drove through Slovenia. It was my only time in Slovenia, and I’d love to go back and explore—it seems like another beautiful, mountainous country. It also brought back nostalgic memories of Slavic languages. And, I’ve heard that
Slovenians are really friendly.
The big trip I took with my Tarcento host family was to the ancient Roman city of Aquileia. The city apparently had around 100,000 people in the second century, which was hard to imagine. The ruins are free to access. There are also pay museums that we skipped. The best part for me was the basilica, which has a mosaic floor still preserved from the fourth century. The mosaics were incredible. We also walked up a tower nearby which had impressive views of the sea. We didn’t make it to nearby Grado, but my host family told me that it’s a nice seaside town that also has a historical center.
Another evening, I unexpectedly returned to Gemona for a medieval festival. For a few euros, you could gain access to the town center, where lamps were lit and medieval flags were hung. I’d walked around Gemona a lot, but the atmosphere was totally changed, almost magical. There were performances of sword fights, plays, traditional food, and we watched a comical 'alchemy' performance. I felt like a local when I ran into my former host grandparents and their best friend, and
then spoke a mix of Fruilano/Italian/Spanish with them, because they didn't understand English.
I have so many good memories from my three weeks in that region. I hope I can go back to visit again!
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