What a month it was!

I had such a good month for many reasons, all which I am about to share with you. The first one is that today marked the last day of my classes. Now to be honest, this was a mixed blessing (as you all know) as I did not do very well with my Italian classes but loved my photo classes. A smart friend of mine once told me (Thanks Devin for these words of wisdom) ;) that once you get a little older you start to realize what your strengths and weaknesses are. Not all of us are good at the things we wish we could be. This month has taught me many things.

For one, I have learned that photography really is my passion. I may not have been very good at it in the past and still may not the best at it now, but taking this class brought back so many great memories of taking my b&w film class at the UofS. I learned so much during that class and was so sad when it ended. I felt the same way about this class. I have learned about photoshop (just a little but still). I learned more regarding how to use my camera to the best that I can. I also learned through different workshops that we did that when I have my camera on manual I do take some really good pictures. Setting it on Automatic is great for taking tonnes of shots hoping that one will be the best, but when you set your camera on Manual you just know that the shot you are taking you are taking for a reason. You have a goal, a purpose and when it turns out I feel very satisfied. So, with photography on my mind, I think I would really like to try to pursue something along these lines when I get home.

So because I am right brained I had a hell of a time with my language class. I didn't hate the class I just didn't enjoy being in the classroom learning and being criticized when I did it wrong. There has to be another way for me to learn Italian and I am trying to figure that out. Learning a new language... definitely a weakness. I took the recommendation of Mario's gf and I went and bought a book. She thought it was great and it helped her out a lot when she was learning. cross your fingers. :)

This month has also taught me that we as Canadians take for granted what a wonderful place we live in. Like I mentioned before, I am loving being here right now, but boy am I already looking forward to going home (except maybe for the insanely cold winters). lol We take for granted our homes, our food and all of the luxuries that we have everyday. Mario and I were talking the other day about my house and we looked it up on Google Earth so he could see it. BTW, google earth really is one of the coolest inventions... Anyway, I told him what my house looked like, that it was 900sq ft and he got to see the yard. It was funny because to us my house is actually pretty small. A 900sq ft house to us is a "starter home", only good if you only have one kid. lol He thought it was huge! LOL that's right, my little home was a compared to a mansion. I now understand why though. There is just no room here. Only the rich people have living rooms in there apartments/houses.

I have also noticed a HUGE difference with the food. Now, granted I noticed this on day one but in the last few weeks I have been really taking it all in. They don't have much for prepackaged food here. Last week I was trying to find some soup and I couldn't find any. They do not have cans of soup here. I then tried to find some jello (or something similar) and nothing. And really, the list goes on. I still haven't really had any real meats. I eat it on occasion but for the most part I stay clear. There is so much fat on it and everything just looks really weird. Like the fish... they actually just take a fish (skin, head and all) and just slice it up and stick it on a tray that way to sell it. So if I were to buy this fish I would have to skin it, (is that the right terminology? you know, for all the times I have seen it done in my life you think I would know the terminology by now....sorry dad) take out the bones, eyes and everything else before I could cook it. Not really my idea of a fun time. :-0

As for the luxuries, even little things like warm water is sometimes a struggle. Every morning, I hop in the shower and in total I get about 3min of warm water in my luke warm/cold shower. And, this is how it is everywhere here I guess. Mario was telling me that even now down south, when there is a water shortage the city turns off the water and only turns it on for an hour or so each day. So sometimes people have to get up in the middle of the night just to get their water for the day. Isn't that crazy? The water heater for our apartment is actually in our kitchen. You can actually see the bottom of it if you go back to my July 12th post. It is hanging above the tv. There isn't much water in there which is why we have cold showers and wash the dishes in cold water. We also try to wash clothes late at night as to not waste all the hot water.

So this afternoon I experienced another first here in Italy. I went for a hair cut. :-0 Now, although this month has made me a firm believer in the fact that I should never get a perm when I am trying to grow my hair out, it also made me a realize that I needed to get some of the frizz cut off. I had my appointment at 4:30 and I was right on time (the hairdresser's is literally 10steps from my apartment). One of the ladies washed my hair, which wasn't anything to different then home. The sinks were way higher up though so the water ran right down my back and it was huge mess. I went and sat in the chair and none of the ladies spoke any English so it was really hard to figure out what she was asking me. She finally just turned around and asked out loud to everyone in there if anyone spoke any english. This nice lady who was getting her hair colored spoke english very well and turned out to be a life savor as the hair dresser was planning on only cutting the bottom inch of my hair off! lol Could you imagine?!? Anyway, the trim took all of 5min. I understood when she told me my hair was a mess (seriously lady, tell me something I don't already know) and then I couldn't understand what she was asking me next. The nice english speaking lady came to our rescue though and we figured out that she was asking me what I did with my hair for styling. She decided to put some product in it and instead of using a frizz serum of some sort she coated my hair in mousse. The interesting thing though was that she never shook the can of mousse. She just sprayed it out onto her hands and then drenched my hair in it. I just stood up, said thanks, payed and walked out. I was going to go and do some running around but had to go back home just so that I could see what was happening with my hair. I looked at the clock when I got home and it read 4:53. lol My whole trim, trying to figure out what we were talking about and the "style" at the end took ony 23min. quickest haircut ever! Once home I tried to run my fingers through it but it was so sticky with wet mousse that I had no other option but to wet my hair down again. I wish I was kidding but there was so much mousse that it was actually lathered just like shampoo...really very funny.

July, all in all, was a great month to be here. I am looking forward to what August will bring. I have so much planned and it will be so fun to experience everything.

Temp high: 34
Gelato: n/a