mt etna, castello nelson and catania city.

here are a few pics of late. one is of the crator of mt etna, im almost reached the top but being a highly active volcsno we didn't quite reach the top. one's of the veiw from about halfway up mt etna, you can see sicily the med and the bottom of sicilys mainland. Next are som pictures from 'castello nelson' which is an amazing ancient, english style castle out of catania in honour of that nelson man. it was really nice and reminded me of chch in some ways. Then i've added a few pics from 'piazza duomo' which is the cities main square, there's a picture of the cathedral, a bride and groom and one of me and my friend from germany.

gorgeous piazza

So all is currently well. My new school is great. Language is coming etc etc. Anyway I thought I'd tell you all about this amazing piazza I went to the other day for a jewelry and crafts exhibition. anyway it was such a stunning sicilian scene. surrounded my a huge baroque building and the interior took my breathe away. I think its the closest I'll get to versailles for a long time. It was so elaborate and incredible with beautiful old painting and amazing hand painted walls. i wish i'd brought my camera and remembered the name of the place! but I'll definitely return and take pictures. I know it was built for some elite royal Catanese family hundreds of years ago and you can tell! anyway it's been the setting for many movies paintings and pictures in Italy. Anyway I'll update soon hopefully with photos of Mt Etna!

New School

Just a quick update. I began Art school today and it was fantastic i'm so glad I moved. The atmosphere, subjects studied, students, teachers etc etc were so great.

finallly freee

so great news im moving to science school (the one i should have been at from day 1) its looks like it'll be hard but satisfying rather than hard and impossible. anyway i'm very happy thinks seem to be improving.

italian food vs nz food.

ok so italy is known for having great food right? well at the beginning i couldn't have agreed more. every meal was like going to a restaurant and every snack was another delicacy. I knew that the first week the food would be the best because my host mum was making her 'best dishes' and i had to try everything which was typical to sicily. But now i'm soo sick of the food. the same thing every bloody day and no change in flavour, its always got something to do with carbs cheese salt cream tomato and never meat! Italian food is good but I'm bored to death with it and it's made me realise how NZ has a really multicultural and diverse cuisine. Here most people havn't tried sushi or indian or a greek souvlaki, and even though these foods aren't ours they're definitely fast food in NZ. I miss having something different every night! I've even made a list of the food I'm going to eat the day i get back which also proves how stupidly homesick I'm getting. Italians prode themselves on their cuisine but really its only good in small doses. and just because you can boil a pot of water and put pasta in it for the right mount of time doesn't make you a good cook!!!

My host family is quite weird too she's obsessed with adding bread to everything I mean how carb loaded does bread crumbed pasta sound? that was the other nights dinner. And today i came home exhausted and starving after a long hot day at school and lunch was literally mashed fucking bread with garlic oil and tomato in it.

I try and tell people who're feeding me i can't eat too many carbs and must eat breakfast but they can't get it through their thick italian heads! The most common reply is 'the mediterranean diet is the best in the world' yes aspects of it are fish and veges and unproccessed things are but the italian diet isn't. anyway hopefully next update will be a bit more positive i just need to vent!

Camp and School

so last weekend we had a big afs camp somewhere in sicily. it was bloody fun i had a great time but its made me feel really homesick and quite bad a italian because the other 2 nzers were a lot better than me it seemed. anyway the weekend was all about talking about our proooblems and playing hilarious yet childish games. this week at school has been pretty hard im so exhausted. its really tiring doind absolutley nothing! and i really dont understand a thing anybody says its horrible! hopefully everything will get better. im so homesick though i actually spent the other night making a list of the food i'm going to eat when im back in NZ how sad is that?! the people in my class are really nice but at the same time they've been in the same class of 25 since they were 13 so they're all really close i feel like im butting in. anyway nothing else has happened i really need to join a gym i feel so fat and lazy!

Photos of palermo, new beach, church and roman ruins

thought it was about time I'd upload a few more pix from the last post.

So I began school today and I couldn't understand a fucking word! Though my italian is improving i can have convos with people in shops etc just very slowly haha. anyway school was completley different.. first off there were 2000 teenage students secondly it was my first time at a boy girl school since I was 8 thirdly no uniform! There wasn't a laptop in sight no active boards and only 1 15 minute break. Also during the break everyone went out for a fag on the school grounds, no smoking behind the bike sheds for this lot! Anyway the school system in Italia is COMPLETLEY DIFFERENT! School begins at 8am you have 3 classes which run for an hour each then a quick break then another 2 or 3 hours depending on your timetable. at 1.15pm or 2.15pm its back home for lunch and a nana nap. Also you stay with one class in one classroom from when you're 14 until you're 19 doing compulsory subjects. Luckily I get to choose my subjects after a week so i'll get to move around. Anyway there is no time for disscussion in class the teacher just dictates bullshit and the class sit there writing like robots. I got a hell of a lot of doodling done! honestly i dont like school here st margarets is soo fun compared to school here. anyway i'll jsut wait it out i'm sure it will be ok. the majority of my class were really welcoming and nice which was good.

Afs camp this weekend on a beach somewhere in sicily i'm quite excited to see some New Zealanders! ciaoo