September 4, 2010

  • Small world...

    I got back to Brescia last night after a lovely two weeks in Trentino. The "working holiday" aspect did work quite well... school in the mornings, a bit of lesson preparation in the afternoons (not much!) but mostly a lot of chilled out afternoons. The downside was not having much money to do anything too exciting, but Will and I (the other teacher who I was staying with) did do a few nice things. On Saturday after I last wrote we moved to Serena's apartment which was reallllly nice! A million times better than the hostel, so we were very happy about the move! (I was probably disproportionately excited about being able to do things like washing and cooking! But after a week in the hostel...). 

    On the Sunday night I was really pleased because FINALLY I was able to see my friend Paolo's band in concert. They, The Rain Storm, were playing at a rock festival called Concentratissimo with several other bands. Great to finally see them live - they were really very good - and obviously to see Paolo again after a long time (last time was in February). I also got a copy of their newly released CD, and it really put a smile on my face to see my name in the thanks from Paolo (because I read through the English lyrics for him) :) . So that was a good night. Will came along later having spent the day in the mountains with his friends, and we had to walk back to Trento from where the concert was (up in the hills) which took us a bit longer than it probably should have done as we didn't know the way! So we arrived back at gone half past midnight, with school the next morning! Worth it though! (Although I'm not sure Will would agree, since had been walking in the mountains for eight hours already!!) 

     The Rain Storm performing at Concentratissimo Rock 2010 - Paolo is on the far right in this photo

    On Tuesday I popped in to see Monica and Don Rodolfo (old friends from my Erasmus year) which was great. It's lovely to be able to see these old familiar faces, even if irregularly. Then on Wednesday we took the opportunity of going to Riva del Garda. Our boss lives there so was driving back every day, and as we were going out all together in the evening it made sense as we could get a lift back with him too. So we headed down and spent the afternoon by Lake Garda, and an hour on a pedalo too. So much fun!!


    Then in the evening we met up with Serena and one of the German teachers for a meal all together at 'Alla Grotta', which always used to be my favourite restaurant to go t in Trento because they do amazingly sized and really good value portions. I was, as I always was in the past too, totally defeated by my tagliatelle and probably ate about a third of it! Nice trip down memory lane being back there again. 

    The last day came round really quickly, and yet although it was only yesterday it seems like so much longer ago! In the morning at school we did a brief show. My class (the youngest) did a little "going shopping" sketch. I think it went better than I thought it was going to, considering how badly rehearsed it was. There was a brief moment of panic when I realised on Friday morning that ALL our carefully made props (which we had spent all morning on Thurs making) had been thrown away because the shopping basket (another of our props) in which I had put them all ready to rehearse with the following day, turned out to be the paper recycling bin... big oops! Just had to laugh really and set about making them all again. At least it meant the last 2 days involved no teaching basically!! So we did the show, said goodbye to the kids and then I went back to get my stuff and say goodbye to Will and to Trento. 
    On the way home I was able to stop off in Verona to go and pick up my CELTA certificate, finally, from the Cambridge School. Bit of a pain to have to lug all my luggage there, but it was worth it as it saves making a special trip down there. And now here I am, back in Brescia....

    The reason for the title "small world" (got there finally!) is that this morning I got a text from Elisa, our boss from Trento's wife (whose school is based in Riva) to say she was coming to Ikea in Brescia and did I want to meet for a coffee. So, I headed over there, and on the way up to meet her I bumped into another old friend from Trento, Bruno. Now I haven't seen Bruno since I left in June 2007. He lives in Riva del Garda too and I had wondered whether I might bump into him the past few times I've been there but didn't. So it was quite a surprise to bump into him with his wife and gorgeous baby in none other than Ikea Brescia!! What made it even more small world-ish was that after a catch up, we went upstairs together and I was just apologising to Elisa for taking longer to come upstairs than expected, explaining that I'd bumped into a friend, and as soon as they saw each other they started laughing and talking and it turns out they know each other well as well! How funny!

    All in all, quite a good couple of weeks for bumping into old friends, and making new ones too.

    Now I'm here in Brescia for those famous 18 days before moving to Udine. Still not quite sure what I'm going to do with myself for the whole time, but first on my list is to finish my book. Currently reading the mammoth 1069 page long Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. I'm about half way through and thoroughly enjoying it. Actually an old friend recommended it to me about 7 years ago when we were doing AS Philosophy, and although I bought it about 6 years ago, it's taken me until now to actually take it off the shelf and read it. I'm glad I finally got round to it! Back to it now!