And Winter Slams Its Fists Against The Windows (Old post re-posted)

Well, it's me again, coming to you from Isernia (as always). It's Tuesday and I have a lot of studying to do for a test I'm undoubtedly going to fail, and an interogation I'll prolly do okay on. I find interogations to be the lesser of the school evils, since you have lots of time to prepare for them, and it's hardly ever analysis, just rote memorization (which I was known for in elementary school. Those poetry recitals didn't know what hit them). The afformentioned test is for History, and the teacher said she wasn't going to make me do an interogation, just a multiple choice test - on 100 pages of material. 100 pages. In Italian. That, as of Monday morning, I had not read. I trucked through 30 pages last night, and am on course to being psuedo-finished by class on Thursday. But yes, school. School is cold. Ohdio how cold. Schools in southern Italy are in general, not the finest institutes of learning. Graffiti is everywhere and the walls and windows are neglected. And there are old fashioned radiators in ever room, but they're turned on very infrequently, and for some reason some teachers make us open the windows - therefore losing any heat that might have accumulated. I've been building up an assortment of warm, fuzzy layers. Currently the older of my two younger host sisters is in the process of dressing to go to the theater for her lesson. This looks a little something like a monkey trying to put a sweater on a wriggling slug while a tiny bird flies around the house in search of... I don't really know. Maria Claudia (the younger) is in the first year of elementary school, which means she's learning to read. Her sounding out words is one of the funniest things in the entire world. Trust me. This afternoon I've also promised myself I'm going to start christmas shopping, since all of a sudden it is halfway through november and most of my purchases will have to be shipped 6000 miles across the ocean. So yeah, christmas presents for my real family, and a birthday present for my mom, and a birthday present for my brother's girlfriend who's turning 20, plus christmas presents for my host parents and siblings. Whew. Lots to do. I feel like I'm constantly losing time here, which makes everything kind of alarming until you realize that even though it's 5 oclock the stores are just opening and dinner is still three hours away.