Today is a very important day.

On my fourth day of school at Liceo M.G. Agnesi, I can proudly say that I was only totally and completely lost during one class today.

It's a major improvement.

(For the record, it was Spanish, which I'm convincing myself is excusable since they've studied it for years and never-mind-the-fact-that-Spanish-and-Italian-are-as-closely-related-as-two-etymologically-distinct-languages-can-be I haven't studied it before.)

To sum all of the events of the past four days up, I love school in Italy!! Chemistry, physics, and math are all very doable, because the teachers use the blackboard very extensively. And the little that I can understand in Philosophy, Italian, Latin, Religion, and History is interesting enough to make it worth slogging through until I can understand more.

What I still can't figure out how to do is answer questions - no matter how simple (although I think I've mastered "what's your name?") I usually stare at the person dumbly for a few seconds until after an immaginary awkward turtle has floated through the air and kicked me in the head, and I realize that it was question and either blurt out what I think might be the correct response, or wait until the other person feels sorry enough to repeat it. Italian doesn't have a different word order for questions, like in English, so you have to listen to the intonation. On top of that, it helps to be able to understand every word. Which I usually don't.

Anyway. That was a kind of unnecessary tangent.

The teachers at school differ like anywhere else. My favorite is the History of Art teacher, who's very, very funny and enthusiastic. It's a running joke that she replies to everything by saying "ok! ok!" in a comically thick Italian accent. Yesterday everyone in the class urged her on as she worked out how to say "Yoooouuuu aaarrrreeee veryvery niiiccee" in English. The Italian and Latin teacher (the same woman) is very strict and formal (i.e. she embodies Professor McGonagall), and an extremely good teacher. Italian schools have oral examinations (literally "interrogations"), which means that everyone has to be prepared all the time to sit at the teacher's mercy and recant absolutely everything they can possibly remember about the subject, while the teacher and most of the class stares at them. (This is not something I am anticipating with excitement). But it does imply that students tend to be much more on top of readings and homework than at Classical.

Yesterday the class threw a welcome party, and we ate cicerchiata, a sort of fried pastry that's made in Italy only during Carnevale, which is at the end of February. And oh man, since my host dad's family has a bunch of pasticcerias, we've also been eating them at home so if anyone in the US wants some cicerchiata, I've got sources for you.

Saturday night a bunch of girls in my class are going to go out, which should be really fun! They don't know where we're going yet, but usually teenagers go to bars (i.e. cafès) or discotechs, or sometimes to movies or bowling.