Sports and Karaoke

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SPORTS:

As mentioned briefly in a previous post, Laura – the other English assistant at Pacioli – and I taught a two week long seminar, of sorts, on various aspects of American culture. We worked solely with the fifth year students – 65 of them in total – for about 25 hours each week. Most of the time Laura and I would each teach a half of the group separately, but a few times a week all of us would come together for larger activities. One of those included a presentation that I gave on American sports.

Wanting to make the presentation as visually stimulating as possible, I outfitted myself in advance with several different sports-related tops.

For the part about general sports and hobbies in America, therefore, I had my ski patrol sweatshirt on:

For the part about high school sports, I took the sweatshirt off to reveal my Newton South soccer jersey:

And for the part about professional sports, I took my South soccer jersey off to reveal an authentic Red Sox jersey:

It was my first official public striptease, and I think it went well.


One of the objectives of the presentation was to explain to my students the rules of baseball. Having grown up in the States playing a couple years of Little League, as well as watching baseball games frequently both in person and on TV, I take for granted my general knowledge of the sport. For most Italians, however, baseball is a fascinating mystery – something that they see in the occasional American movie but never really figure out. Sort of like Curling for me.

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Trying to explain the rules of the sport, therefore, to a group full of people that didn’t even know what a pitcher was, or the difference between a ball and a strike, foul territory and fair territory, home runs and pop flies… etc… proved more challenging than I had anticipated, because so many of these terms have become common knowledge in the States, even among people who don't ever watch baseball games.

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They students seemed to catch on well enough, though, and so a week after my powerpoint presentation, on the second-to-last day of the two week program, the 65 of us plus Laura and I packed ourselves into Pacioli’s gym for some practical application of what we had talked about the week before. So, while half of the group played American football with the physical education teachers on one side of the gym, the other half played (tennis ball) baseball with me.

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And it was an absolute riot. At one point one of my students came within centimeters of taking my head off when she tried to re-hit – using a real metal bat – a bouncing grounder that I was rushing in to field, but other than that, everything went smoothly, and now about 65 Italian kids understand – at least generally – the rules of our national pastime.


KARAOKE

The day after baseball, in order to celebrate the completion of the two American Weeks, Laura and I offered to meet up with our students for an evening of revelry at a local karaoke bar. Keep in mind that in Italy, the drinking age is 16 but loosely enforced. Many of our students, therefore, have been drinking in the pubs and the discos since they were in middle school. Which means that for them, living in a small town like Crema where everybody who goes out sees everybody else who goes out, the thought of being in a social setting – and drinking, even – with their professors, is normal. It’s not like in the States, where a high school teacher who saw his student drinking would be obligated to report that student to school officials. Here, the youth drinking culture is much more relaxed.

That said, at 10:30pm two Fridays ago, I found myself a few beers deep and on stage at the completely-packed karaoke bar, in front of 35 of my students, singing classic Italian songs. (Songs that fortunately, I had studied in my college Italian classes and knew well.). And I’ll be honest: I was on fire. I was hitting the high notes, holding the low notes, remembering the changes, the guitar solos, the interludes and everything else. My students were singing along with me, dancing, taking pictures, cheering, hollering, whistling, applauding wildly. The night was, without a doubt, as close as I will ever come to feeling like a rock star, narrowly replacing the time I sang as a Japanese nobleman/tea party background singer in Brown Middle School’s 1999 rendition of the Mikado.

The night was so much fun, in fact, that Laura and I decided to return to the karaoke bar this past Friday and try to recreate the mood of the previous week. We didn’t do a good job advertising the event, though, and we had to compete with a bunch of Carnival parties around the city, which led to only about 10 students showing up. When it came time for me to sing, therefore, I could actually hear my voice clearly – something I wouldn’t wish on anybody.

Around 11:00, giving up on what only days earlier I thought would be a promising career as a karaoke DJ, I decided to head out. And so I was putting on my jacket, getting ready to leave, and the guy in charge of the karaoke – who by now knows me by name – came up to me and put his arm on my shoulder.

“Nathan. We’ve gotta talk,” he tells me.
“Ok. What’s up?” I say.
“No. Over here.”

And he pulls me away from the group, towards the bar. At this point, I'm convinced he's going to tell me never, ever to sing again at his bar, because I'm driving away all of the regulars. And I'm humiliated. Getting blacklisted from a karaoke bar?

But in fact, turns out that his daughter is a third-year student at Pacioli, and he just wanted to offer me a beer in exchange for my promise to look out for his kid if I ever have her in class.

Relieved, I thank him for the beer, enjoy it responsibly, and then head off to the concert of one of my students.

Despite the funky lighting, I liked how this photo came out

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Some other pictures from the past week:

New meets old in Milan.

The school's religion teacher, dressed as Jesus; Me as Ted Williams (it's a number 9 jersey); and Laura, wearing a traditional carnival mask that she got the day before in Venice.

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More to come soon, but for now I've got to run to catch a train to Perugia, where I'm heading for the weekend to see a former language school buddy.

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Be well,

d

Nate

Laundry

Two Saturdays ago, for the first time since I’d moved to Crema, I did my laundry.

Although I’m pretty good about making clothes last as long as (sanitarily) possible, the situation had gotten desperate: Not only had I exhausted all of my boxers, but I had also run out of soccer shorts to use as boxer substitutes and thus was actually considering going to school on Monday wearing biking spandex underneath my jeans. So it came to be that late on Saturday morning I was kneeled down in the corner of my room, stuffing a pile of dirty clothes into my big, internal-frame camping backpack.

Once finished stuffing (miraculously, everything fit), I decided to reward myself with a quick lunch before heading down the one and a half kilometers of cobblestone road that stood between me and the washing machines. And although my pesto pasta was satisfying, by the time I’d finished eating and doing the dishes, it was, of course, pouring outside.

Initially, I considered bagging the operation, but then thought better of it. The next day I had to wake up at 5:00am to go skiing and wouldn’t get back until dinner time, which meant that there would be no time before Monday morning to get anything clean. Which meant that unless I wanted to teach commando – which I didn’t – I would be wearing the spandex to school.

Resolved, I hung up my normal winter jacket, grabbed my rain jacket and umbrella, and headed what I think was southwest towards the Laundromat. The journey, although a bit damp, went quickly (I got a few “look at that crazy foreigner backpacking across the city in a rainstorm” stares, but those were to be expected), and soon enough I was inside. Only to found myself surrounded – literally, in all 360 degrees – by Laundromat signs.

There were all sorts of different messages. Some of the signs explained Laundromat rules. Others, washing machine procedures. Drying suggestions. Rates and discounts. Soap descriptions. Vending machine supplier contact information, in case the coffee dispenser stopped working. Looking around, my head started to spin… ahem... sort of like a washing machine. (Pathetic. I know.) All this time, in an effort to improve my Italian, I’ve been studying grammar books, and watching movies, and talking with people on the streets and in the bars and at my soccer practices. What I really should have been doing was coming to the Laundromat, sitting in a swivel chair, and slowly turning around in a circle taking notes from the signs on the walls. It was amazing how much there was to learn inside that room.

But alas, there was no time for academic development – I had a spandex situation that needed avoiding. And so I went to work. 75 minutes, two washer loads, one dryer load, and 12 euro (about 15 dollars… laundry here is no financial joke) later, I had a wonderfully fresh and dry pile of laundry sitting before me on the Laundromat table, waiting to be folded.

And so I started folding. Only to realize that this woman, about 70 years old, was staring at me. I continued folding, and she continued staring. For about five minutes – from the sock pile, to the pants pile, to the boxers pile – I tried to ignore her, but then, arriving at the T-shirt pile, my curiosity got the best of me and I gave her a buona sera (good evening). She paused for a moment, probably to digest my accent, and then said – indicating my piles of folded laundry – ma, sei bravissimo! (You’re really good!)

Never have I been prouder. Italian women, more so than the American women I’ve met in my days, are burdened with the large majority of the housework. Even if they work a fulltime job – which many of them do – they’re responsible for doing a most of the chores. Which include the entire family’s laundry. To be complimented on my laundry folding skills by an older Italian women, therefore, would be like being complemented on your acting skills by Denzel Washington, or your golf skills by Tiger Woods, or your pancake cooking skills by Aunt Jemima. It’s a compliment worth taking seriously.

Once finished folding, I bid my new laundry friend a good evening and then returned home through the rain – grinning the entire time. Although my wallet isn’t looking forward to it, I personally can’t wait to do laundry again.



Other stories to come: singing karaoke with my students, watching a professional soccer game in person, and organizing the first ever Italian prom at my school.



Be well, and stay in touch,


Nate

American slang meets a class of giggly 19-year-old girls

As part of American Weeks, I spent an hour teaching my students a handful of colloquialisms, expressions, and proverbs that they can use to make their English conversations a little more spicy. Below is one of the dialogues -- verbatim -- that ensued:

A: Oh girls, yesterday, Nathan stood me up!
B: Let it go, he is only an awkward.
C. If you ask me, when you see him tomorrow, you have to do puppy-dog eyes and then you will get him back.
D: Yes, he is in big trouble.
B: Exactly! And if he stood you up again, he is a nerd!
A: I couldn't care less of him.
C: Good! Seek and ye shall find!
B: For you, find another boy will be a piece of cake!
D: Look over there! There is Nathan with Maria the ditz!
A: This is the straw that broke the camel's back!

I couldn't stop laughing. Rereading it a day later, I can't decide if I should be flattered or offended, but regardless, I'm proud of the progress they've made.

A note on formality

I just glanced at my last post to make sure that the formatting had worked out okay, only to discover that Google had decided to replace my bullet points with what seem to be cute little snowflakes.

I don't know why Google decided to do this, but know that said snowflakes are entirely out of my control, and entirely not my style. I don't want you, the reader, to think that I'm about to start dotting my Is with hearts, or crossing my Ts with squiggly lines. This is a serious blog about serious travels, with serious ideas and very serious, very official formatting.

That is all.

Formally,

Nathan

Ciao

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Dear patient and forgiving blog-reader,

Let me begin with the important task of thanking you for coming back, despite my months of serious blog neglect (posting photos, I've decided, doesn't count). I won’t make excuses, but I will say that the old correspondence cliché is true – no news really is good news. Sitting down to compose this, I’m realizing just how much I’ve gotten into a comfortable and satisfying routine. And although I don’t find something to write home about around every street corner – the way I did, I suppose, when I first arrived – I’m enjoying myself nonetheless thoroughly.


As I mentioned very briefly at the end of my previous post, I’m no longer living with a family in Castelleone but have instead moved into an apartment in Crema with another one of my program’s American language assistants (named Liz, from San Diego… and no, it’s platonic). Although I do miss having a real and awesome Italian family to hang out with all the time, the independence I’ve gained from living in an apartment is worth the sacrifices that came with ditching Gian, Loretta, Marta, Anna, and Penny. Benefits include:

• No longer taking a rarely punctual train to and from work
• Coming home in the middle of the day for lunch
• Finally to getting to try my hand at cooking epic Italian feasts
• Doing the dishes without fear of getting beaten to a vine-ripened-tomato pulp by Loretta (I used to have to fight her just to get a hold of a sponge)
• Generally being able to do my own thing without worrying about throwing off the rhythm of an entire family

Plus, I’ve been going back to Castelleone to visit everybody there at least once a week, so the relationship, I’m happy to say, is still going strong. In Italian, there’s this ridiculous expression I’ve grown fond of: Non si può avere la botte piena e la moglie ubriaca. “You can’t have the full barrel and the drunk wife.” As lewd as it may sound, this saying appears often in both casual and formal (no joke) discourses as a way to say that you can’t have the best of both worlds, or you can’t have your cake and eat it too. I tell you this not only because it makes me chuckle, but also because living here in Crema, I feel like I’ve succeeded at having both the full barrel and the drunk wife contemporaneously. That is, I’ve got my independence, but I’ve also got this fantastic family only 10 kilometers away that’ll hang out with me whenever I decide that I want to come around. It’s an ideal situation, really, and I’m grateful for it.



On Monday, Laura (the other assistant at my school) and I began teaching this two-week-long American-themed seminar to our fifth-year students. Topics include, in no particular order, literature of the 1930s (Hemingway and Fitzgerald); history of the 1960s (JFK, the Cuban Missile Crisis, Vietnam); Obama’s inauguration ceremony as a reflection of contemporary American life and culture; popular American sports; the U.S. as a Melting Pot; and differences between the U.S. and Italian educational systems. (If you see any sort of continuity between these subjects, feel free to let me know.) Although a bit – okay, ridiculously – all over the place, the different lessons have actually been fascinating to prepare, as I’m both re-learning and from-scratch learning lots of things about my country. For example:

• My oldest brother, Samuel, was born on the 18th anniversary of JFK’s assassination
• The Yo-Yo Ma quartet of Obama’s inauguration day wasn’t playing live music
• In 1963, the U.S. government helped overthrow South Vietnam’s democratic leader Ngo Dinh Diem, and in the process of the coup, both Diem and his brother were killed, which was apparently to JFK’s great disappointment
• Soccer is the most popular youth sport in the United States, but only the fifth most frequently viewed professional sport
• Some parents meet with admissions counselors in order to get their toddlers into top pre-schools

And more. Although my students may find the (mandatory) experience a massive waste of their time, I’m psyched that the school is paying me to learn about my homeland.



Here in Italy, people don’t have a variety of ways to greet each other in passing. They don’t say “what’s up?” or “how’s it going” or “howdy” or “ahoy” or “yo” or “hey good-looking what’s cooking?” or anything else of that nature. They don’t do the subtle head nod thing, or raise their eyebrows, or wink. (Not that we’re really huge into winking either.) They say ciao. And that’s it. For elders, strangers, store-clerks, and people of authority, there are a handful of more-formal greetings, but walking through school between classes, seeing my students, I’ll say the word ciao no fewer than 27 times in the span of three minutes.

The best thing about ciao, I should add, is that it’s not only used for greetings. It’s also used for farewells. So at the end of class, or a dinner party, or a soccer practice, when everybody’s standing around getting ready to leave, you’ll hear this several-minute-long ciao chorus. It’s absurd, yet wonderfully lyrical. As the months have gone bye, I’ve learned to inflect my ciao voice in different ways in order to convey different ciao messages and ciao moods – a skill I like call ciao mastery.

Anyway.

For now, off to go teach about the Bay of Pigs. But know that I’m going to do my damndest from now until June to post a message – even if only a short one – at least once a week. So please, do return.


Thanks for reading, be well, and ciao,


Nate