The Pope Watching Me Watching Ashton

So my first day of teaching was a complete BUZZ, better than any drugs. Came out completely high, dunno what i was doing in Malaysia, but I feel like a proper teacher now (sorry for any of my old students... what am I saying? This is English! Like you could read it!). I had two Intermediate 15 year old girls first (they love Blue, and the first thing they said to me was 'salve'... sorry jod!) then four 9 year old girls (cute as, but they speak NO English, and with my Italian that made an interesting lesson,we just ran around a lot shouting English words and pretending to be animals. Not sure how this helped their English tho), and then six 20-30 year old students and professionals - including students of fine art and chemistry. So my language grading for the last class was not all it should have been:
"He-llo! My - name - is - Katy. I - am - from - England. Do - you - like - Britney - Spears?"
"Um, I'm Mariantoinetta, from here, Sulmona. I study Chemistry at University... and, no. I don't"
"Oooohkay then! well done. Um, good English you've got there..."
Mentally shoot myself in head / floor swallows me up. And THEN my Advanced students, 4 of them, all mates from University, were better at English / grammar / general knowledge / everything in the world than me too. I was trying to be all professional and pre-teach some, what I thought were difficult, words before a rather hard reading we were gonna do:
"Does anyone know the word for when everything is confused and no one knows whats going on and ...
"chaos"
"YES! well done! and what kind of word is..."
"Is a noun."
"Um, yes, itàs a noun. Ok, um, bit harder now. What's the word for when you can't get through something, or when something is not see through, if you are in a forest thick with trees..."
"Ah! Impenetrable"
"WHAT?!? How in tarnation did you know that? I mean, yes, well done. Ooookay then. Oh I know, um, when something is very worn and not in good condition."
Silence.
(Me gleefully:) "Anyone? Anyone at all? No one knows? This word means it's a bit old and very used and is not very nice."
Silence.
"Ha ha! So no one knows except ME aye?? Well, it's a new slang word we use a lot in England. 'Manky'.
Ha! didn't know that did ya?!! Oh yes, I rock! You suck! Na na na na na! I speak English youuuuu don't!"

Well, maybe I wasn't quite as bad as that, but I do hate teaching people who are cleverer than me, I really, really do.

And I've found I sound very 'What-ho! I'm from England, jolly good, jolly good, nice cup of tea and a cucumber sandwich, what?' when completely immersed in other accents. My flatmate's from Canada and my boss is Italian, and everyone else in the village is Italian, so just stopping short of actually saying 'Oh spiffing!' one is developing a rather large plum in one's mouth.

Oh and one other small thing about Italy. It's fucking freezing!!! And when I swear for emphasis there, I swear for fucking EMPHASIS. I can't believe it. Soooooo cold.
Why the hell did no one tell me that Italy can be cold. Very cold. Seriously, and it's even colder in the houses and schools than outside cos there's no central bloody heating! Oh man, I can't believe it. That's all of my wardrobe apart from 5 items of clothing completely useless, unless I wear them all at once. And bikini's aren't much insulation. Like, I'm not exaggerating. My housemate also moved to Italy cos she thought it was hot and she's been here a year and she says it just gets colder and colder til November, that's when it will snow, then it'll get colder and colder til December and you think it can't get any colder.... but then Jan and Feb will surprise you cos it actually can get colder and does. Maybe in April I'll be able the leave the house without 5 layers. I - am - gutted. At least I'm not the only one who moved here cos I thought it was hot. Mary Ann did too, but she also has family here, and speaks Italian fluently, and has an Italian boyfriend, so is not quite so despondant about the whole weather situation as I am, being my whole reason for picking Italy.

The flat I'm in is amazingly decorated. It was decorated in roughly the 20's era by a fanatically religious old Italian lady (I presume). If it's not Jesus with a bleeding (literally) heart looking down on me from above (the bathroom door) it's Madonna with child looking all beautific in my bedroom, and the Pope himself looking on from the wall in the living room as I watch MTV (the only channel with any English. Thank the lord for Punk'd is all I can say). Seriously, I'm living like an extremely strict and pious 17th century nun at the moment. All I do is read Henry James, and lesson plan. And it's sooo dark in my room at night cos we're in the mountains, I nearly poked mysef in the eye trying to see if I could see my hand moving infront of me. And the house is so cold, I truly believe that if one of the mountains of blankets I have, fell off me in the middle of the night I would wake up purple and probably DEAD from hypothermia (incidentally one of the blankets has large numbers stamped on it in print. Don't they do that in prisons?) I've got no music, hairdryer, straighteners, laptop or curlers cos I only forgot to bring a bloody plug transformer didn't I. So they're all sat there teasing me til I buy one (funnily enough, not that many shops sell English to Italian plug converters here in mountainsville, and trying to explain what one is is a nightmare). So yeah, like a nun, I get up in the morning and wash with fresh mountain water from a porcelain bowl beneath my bed, it really is my 19th century fantasy...
(not really, we have a power shower and radiator in the bathroom, but I can dream).
And the view from the back balconey. Oh - my - god. I nearly cried when I got here and saw it, no I'm not gay, and I wasn't pre-menstrual, it is that beautiful. Like a Cezanne but without the funny shapes. And the walk to school is just phenomenal, 360 degree mountains with clouds rolling down them straight behind the houses, just like Laos. I feel like Mariiiiaaaaaa of a morning.

And the Italians are dead strange. They walk. A lot. I got home from a bike ride (oh yes, clean, pastoral living rocks) at about 7ish and the streets were FULL of the chatter of Italians walking the streets. The shops were shut, there was no festival on, they weren't on their way to church or the pub, weren't drunk. Everyone in the village was just out... walking and chatting. And I saw one young guy in a hoodie walking along chatting to an old man! They're my favourites, the old men. Groups of them stand in the street talking their beautiful language and gesticulating wildly, even in the cold. I'm dying to understand them, cos I'm completely sure that they're discussing the unbearable lightness of being, or the Illiad, they can't be talking of the mundane the way they sound and gesture. Bet they are actually, bet they're comparing their piles or something. Oh, and I finally learnt some Italian, cos I was sick of standing there like a pleb when people mistook me for Italian and came up to ask me for directions, they'd come up and go "Mi scuze, dove esta el scorchio y bella pasta va notte proscuttio michael corleone mi molte bene fettuccini pour favorio mi bambino eh?" (well, that's prolly not quite what they were saying but it may aswell have been for all I understand of Italian) and I'd just stand there looking really vacant trying to think of something to say, but all I knew was "Errr, Molte bene signorina! Buena notte." And then I'd then run away. So now I can say "I'm sorry, I'm English and I don't understand" and they STILL look at me with pity as if to say "Then why the hell are you living here you retard'. Either way I come off looking like a retard.