Pictures...finally.

I don't think I explained it before, but the reason why it took me so long to get my first Italy post up/why it is so long was because the adapter that I had bought didn't work in my room. It was for the new kind of outlet, but my room still has the old outlets. Anyway, the one I had was useless to me. So I marched my bum down to Pam, our friendly neighborhood grocery store, only to find out that they did not have US to Italy adapters...they only had various kinds of Italy adapters. One large question mark, a few tantrums, and one confused clerk later we decided to buy an adapter for the adapter we had, hoping that it would work, which it did! Anyway point being was that I now have pictures of my first few days here for you all.

After reading all of that, I feel it is only proper to give ya'll some links. For the Facebook stalkers (although being Facebooks talkers, you probably have already seen them), you may go here, and for all you other non-stalker types out there, you may go here.

Additioally, we started classes today. First we had Movement with Claudia who is simply fantastic. We focused a lot on how we get down to the ground- down we curve our spines of keep them straight? Is it easier to use hands or not? Where do we place our weight? We also did some partner work where we had to lift each other onto our backs. It was really interesting, because so much of it relied on trust, and this was our first day of class! It went well though. I was actually surprised at how quickly i was able to pick everything up...I guess I was expecting to not be able to do any of it, which is a completely ridiculous thing to think, I know. I also find myself getting worried about doing something really interesting or cool so that the professor will be impressed, which again is a completely ridiculous thing to think. It's not a constant thing, but I know I just need to remind myself and do the best I can with the activities I'm given.

We also worked with Kevin Crawford today, which I have been looking forward to for awhile, partially because I need to take a voice and speech class so I can stop losing my voice and partially becuase he was one of the original members of the Roy Hart Theatre Group. We started out doing some simple breathing while lying on the ground, where we would lift our pelvises and slowly lower them on a sigh. Then we went a little further with that and lifted nearly our entire torso off the ground and slowing drop back to the floor. We also did this with partners, who would touch the parts of our torso which needed to be dropped next. This was rather helpful, since it always felt like we had dropped more than we should have or didn't drop enough, so it was good to know exactly where we were. We then did this with three people, which turned out to look a bit like we were giving birth, which didn't help considering my unnatural and inexplicable fear of pregnany.

We then did this activty where we would jsut wiggle and make whatever sounds would come out. It was a little daunting, becuase I couldn't help but think that I looke dlike an idiot, but then again, we probably all did. ANyway, he would single peopel out and have them do it by themselves, and he had this one girl, Rebecca, do it, and she kept holding this long, high notes, so he ran over to the piano and had her sing more and gradually got her singing higher and higher. It was really thrilling to see and hear, especially because Rebecca tends to be a little quiet and I was relly glad to see her do something that required so much confidence (I don't know if I woul dhave been able to hang onto it!)! Then Kevin taught us this little song that went like this:

'Spirit of the wind, carry me home.
Spirit of the wind, carry me home.
Carry me home to myself.'

He had us running all over the room, and eventually had us split into 3 groups and do it in cannon. He then pulled a few people into the middle and starting soloing with them, which as way cool. We were all dancing around and singing and ahving a good time, but it was really nerwracking to be in the middle soloing- again, the thoughts of "OMG I NEED TO IMPRESS PEOPLE" kept running through my head, but I finally beat them into submission and had fun with it.

I think it was a nice start to our classes. We also had Italian today, which was...well, let's jsut say I need the practice. I'm in the intermiediate class, and our professor only speaks in Italian (very, very FAST Italian) but I can understand most of what she's saying (which is good) but I can never respond (which is bad). I think I just need to get back into the mindset of Italian and look over some vocab and I'll be okay. I hope.

---
He who does not know foreign languages does not know anything about his own.
~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Kunst and Alterthum