A New Leaf?

23rd - 25th September 2016

Today is my birthday! I celebrated it by going to eight hours of lectures! (That is a full time job)
No, no, I'm just kidding. Albeit that I did attend all those hours thinking of what I would do after it was over. I have been in an extremely good mood the whole day. I invited a few of my friends (by few I actually mean all of them) to go out for dinner at an elegant restaurant.

Alla Grotta has amazing food! We took some time to find the place as Google Maps and our location was never quite in sync. On the bright side, that gave us all time to talk to each other even more!

The Quattro Formaggio (four cheese) and the Diavola (basically, pepperoni) pizzas were delicious! I wanted to try a risotto since I have eaten so many pizzas of late and to my surprise, it was exquisite!

(^__^)

It's a new beginning, so they say, but I don't feel any different from yesterday. I mean, how can a mere day actually have a physical presence in your life? Time is an illusion to us after all. Just like how you can be waiting for a bus for what seems like an hour (but it has only been ten minutes) but also have been enjoying with a friend (for what seems like an hour) for half a day. Life is dependent on these moments, it brings us closer to who we are. These moments when we realise how far we have come in life and where we want to go. We change everyday, but we don't see these changes; or we just don't have time to introspect ourselves.

I wonder what it is with us humans, we live a life that we want to but we don't realise that we are doing just that. We feel discontent at every turn, we don't see the diamonds on the street.

(^__^) 

There are many dialects in Italy, which I thought was quite reasonable considering that it is such a large country (it is!). But, it turns out that Italians in the north can barely understand the Italians in the south. It is almost like they don't speak the same language anymore!

I wonder how that can change? How do you work around that? When you're speaking the same language but you still don't understand each other?

The funny thing is that I have heard a lot of Italians say "abit" and "eat" when it doesn't make sense. I found out, a little later, that they had meant to say "habit" and "heat" but they got rid of the "h" just like the French! The Italians don't even have an "ABC" song, I feel bad for the kids of Italy; that was the first song I learnt (I think....but it might have been after making my own nonsensical ones first). They said that it was because the letters were too less (21 alphabets); even the Germans have an "ABC" song! (not that I am inciting anything here)

But, I think that my favorite thing about Italians so far is that they use "spaghetti" (the metaphor, not the actual food) to describe tangles. Which I think is right and just and lawful for an Italian to do so.

(^__^)

Fashion show in my honour :D As expected of Italy!

My first unconditional friend in Trento

Everyone wants a Ferrari but they can't have it

Do you see that wedding car?

I cannot believe it

Green rice (VERDE RISO)

The hills are alive, with the sound of music...

With pockets of houses all around

So, I got lost yet again on my way to a supermarket named LIDL. It is a great supermarket and I was so happy to find it in Trento. I took a bus towards LIDL (but I didn't realise that it was simply going in that direction, not LIDL exactly) and I ended up really far away. By far away I mean, I had gone waaaay out of the city and I could only see mountains and fields. There were small pockets of houses but that's about it; Small pockets.

But, since I made it to beautiful fields and mountains, it was a bonus!

The countryside in Italy isn't exactly 'old school', it is organised every bit as much as the city itself. Because the technology is standardised, it is easy to move around even if you're not familiar with the area. 

"Try not to be in some areas" they said, "it will be easy" they said. But every city has a  'bad' area. Most people just ignore it but newcomers need that special information that everyone shies away from (it's like they are ashamed of it so they sweep it under the rug). I found a sketchy park today that apparently has questionable exchanges of goods and information.

Everything seems inviting when you're new in town! But it is true that new people notice far more than people who have lived in town for a long time.

(^__^)

To understand without understanding, that is the ultimate goal. I felt that today when I went shopping. I understand what the products are without actually knowing what they called in Italian (some of them at least). For the rest of them, Google Translate to the rescue!

[I'm having some internet issues that haven't been resolved as yet so I will be posting and updating my posts when I can. Hence, visit my blog often! ;) (see what I did there?) EDIT: I added some photos and some content! Thank you for reading :D]