The Lakes

"Take me to the lakes where all the poets went to die..."

You haven't heard from me since Monday, and the rest of this week wore me out, so I was ready for a lake day by the time today hit! We had our first full day of class on Tuesday, with Kant's Critique of Judgment causing crises for many students (and perhaps some of us teachers, too). That man did not make his writing easy to understand! Our students had a movie screening that afternoon, so I went to buy new sandals, run a couple errands, and pick up Jack's metro card for when he comes to visit. Do you like my pretty new shoes??

I chatted with Anne Tuesday night and then crashed so that I'd be ready for more Kant and more teaching Italian on Wednesday. The first real Italian class went well - my students are excellent, and I so love to teach languages!! I talked with my mom and dad Wednesday night, then - copy and paste - Kant on Thursday! I did my little bit of lesson planning for philosophy discussion section on Monday and called Monn for some more chit chat, after getting gelato at this dog-frequented shop!

My professor has dubbed me his "vice capo", co-boss, a term that has some nice underlying associations with the Mafia... I am very happy to be his right-hand woman, but I wasn't trying to get involved with the mob! This new title comes with lots of responsibilities, the most important of which are making sure the air conditioning is working in his classroom, making many runs to the pharmacy for various products that our students need, and ratting people out when they're acting up!

Today, Friday, was our first field trip. We spent the day at Lago Maggiore, one of the biggest lakes in Italy. Lake days hit different when you've been working this hard, even if you are working in lovely Italy... I sat next to my professor on the bus ride and he leaned over and said to me at one point, "the three boys that look the same, how to tell them apart?" So I helped him out a bit with properly identifying his students. Later, he saw me talking with a student, and, without knowing anything about what I was saying, he walked up and said "trust her, she knows what she's talking about." I don't know where that came from, but I like his blind faith in me! We toured the palace and gardens on Isola Bella (the Beautiful Island), and the highlight was a student seeing a treaty between Italy, France, and Great Britain from 1935 (pictured below) and saying "Huh, I thought Mussolini would have a cooler signature." After evaluating signatures and seeing flowers and albino peacocks, we took a little boat ride over to Isola dei Pescatori (Fishermen's Island) for lunch and wandering. I fit right in over there, as an accomplished fisherwoman...

We got back around 6pm, so I made dinner and did some laundry. I've been eating homemade pasta when I can, and it's been quite fun to have my own little kitchen, so I'm very excited for apartment life in the fall!