Astrofisica

On another note I also attempted to take a biology class today at the University of Florence. However the Italian university system is quite different then the American one and much less organized. Thus the class although listed (and confirmed to exist by the registrar) was not actually taking place today. Therefore I decided to take Fondamentale in Astrofisica (yes fundamentals in astrophysics) with my friend Anna. It turned out to be better then I thought it would be. I loved being surrounded by Italians my age studying science, and I was able to follow along fairly well since radius, pie, and the speed of light are all represented by the same symbols in Italy as they are in America. The universality of science is something I have always liked and for a minute I forgot I was in an Italian classroom, which was nice. It made the world feel a lot smaller.

Rom

This weekend my stylistics professor assigned a really great article about the English Cemetery here in Florence (In Italian this article was really beautifully written and made some interesting comparisons between the Italy and the US with regard to human rights). However, this article is also really about the Rom population and the need for equal rights for everyone here in Italy. Which conveniently for me also ties in with my internship since I will be working with at the Rom camp. Since my professor was also aware of this she assigned me a separate presentation on the Rom population in Italy. Due to this I have been doing some research and have found a some really interesting articles.

A brief summary (however reading the articles will be more informative [click here: 1 2]): The Rom population is made up of mainly Romanians, but also other eastern europeans that have come to Italy and are now living in poverty (also Rom appears to be interchangeable with gypsy). Despite the Rom's deep history in Italy there have been recent movements to expel them and with these movements, as well as before, there has been a lot of violence and racism against Roms and immigrants in Italy.

Oltrarno

I never really know what is going on here. For some reason everything seems more surreal when it is said in Italian, and Tuesday I went to a meeting that greatly contributed to my confusion, but also cleared up a few questions. To start, the meeting occurred because I finally found out more about my internship. Christine and I will be working with the Medici per I Diritti Umani (Doctors for Human Rights). To find out more about the organization and our roles Christine and I were told by Monica to get on a bus, take it across the Arno and get off at the first stop. From here we were told to walk into the bar (although she forgot to mention it was down an alley and in a bad part of town) and ask the person behind the counter where to find the class for doctors. Thus after our adventure through the dark streets of oltrarno Christine and I found a group of people working to help provide health care to the population in Italy that is often ignored. It was a very needed escape from the often fake and overcrowded center of Florence into a more eclectic and real Italy. The group was passionate and well educated, there was even a 25 year old woman who had just passed her exam to be a doctor last Friday. Many of the people in the group were a type of Italian hippie and neither fashion nor art history were mentioned once. I was finally able to step away from the history and art that Florence is known for and into contemporary Florence. I finally saw that Florence is more then its past it is a progressive city and there are things happening here today that warrant as much attention as Italy's relics.

Which brings me to contemporary Italian health care. Italy has the second best healthcare system in the world according to WHO, however many Italians dislike their system and immigrants and homeless are often uninsured due to complicated legalities necessary to access the system. There seems to be limited middle ground, and most people are either frustrated with the system or think it's great. Either way it appears to function better then the system in the US because all citizens have access to the health care they need and no one is forced into bankruptcy because of health issues. This is where my internship comes in. In Italy you need a SSN to be able to receive health care and many immigrants and homeless can not obtain an SSN however there are other options availble to them, sort of. I don't understand the system that well yet but this is a short and slightly dry article explaining how the Italian health care system works. I haven't decided my position yet, but I hope my experience with Medici per i Diritti Umani will shed some light on the issues surrounding Italy's universal health care.

One Month Later

So it has officially been over a month since my arrival in Florence. I am feeling a little more settled now that classes have officially started and the homework is beginning to pile up. The language is also becoming more familiar, although not necessarily easier. Yet I am finding that there are certain phrases in Italian that better express what I am feeling rather then their english equivalent. In a way it is kind of like taking on a second identity because the things I can say are limited, and thus different then what I would say in English, and I can only speak Italian with certain people in my life. For that matter I can also now only speak english with certain people in my life, it is just a larger group. I have also realized that to really feel like I am in Italy I must be speaking in Italian, otherwise the reality of being here is farther away.

In other news this weekend was a fabulous weekend exploring outside of Florence. I went to Pisa, Lucca, and Perugia for a chocolate festival! Pisa was full of tourists, but the leaning tower was fun to see and the accompanying church was beautiful inside. The best part of Pisa was the weird obsession everyone who visits has to take a perspective picture of themselves so they look like they are "holding up" the tower. Thus the fields in front of the tower are speckled with tourists in goofy poses trying to save the tower from it's doom.

Lucca was prettier and less touristy. It is a small city that is still enclosed by its medieval walls that have been turned into a beautiful path circling the city where people walk run and ride bikes. My three friends and I enjoyed a picnic lunch on one of the grassy walls, and after rented bikes for an hour and cruised around them. It was amazing. As we rode we could see the city of Lucca clearly on one side and the mountains on the other. It was a beautiful day and biking was incredibly de-stressing.

As for the chocolate festival, what can I say I was surrounded by blocks and blocks of specialty chocolate. It was pretty amazing, and obviously delicious. Plus I discovered the beauty and steepness of Perugia when my roomate Lenora and I decided to save 2 Euros and walk to the center of town for the festival rather then bus. When we asked locals where the center is they would chuckle and say "up". However because of its height the view from the center was amazing, and the city in general was full of beautiful and old architecture.

Tuscany

Today was an adventure. I did some research on riding in tuscany and I found a little farm named la Fattoria il Poeta located about 30 miles from Florence. So this morning I hopped on a train and arrived in a little town at the bottom of a very large hill in hopes of finding "la fattoria," and Antonetta, a woman I had talked with about going horseback riding. After wandering the dangerously small streets I was found by a kind man in a truck who had spied me from the farm and descended the hill to help me find my way up.

Once I arrived I was greeted by Antonetta, her daughter, Monica and many of their animals.

After a cold glass of water I ascended the hill farther with Antonetta to meet Linda, the lovely brown horse pictured above. Anotonetta explained that Linda is a Bardigianos, a breed of horse that originated in Italy to navigate the steep and rocky hills. I couldn't believe that I was actually in Tuscany with two women who only spoke Italian and a horse whose ancestors were created for the sole purpose of exploring this countryside. Thus we saddled up and began our climb into the bountiful tuscan countryside.

We rode for over two hours without seeing anyone else except one lone farmer loading his truck. However at the top of these steep hills we encountered many little areas housing cows, sheep, olive trees, fig trees and vineyards. The hills were quiet and peaceful yet there were obvious signs of the farmers that lived and worked on them. It was an example of how different farming can be from the factory farms located in the United States. I don't know if all of Italy is free of factory farming, but I know that the farms I saw on this trip were examples of how farmers can have symbiotic relationships with their surroundings.