I hate that I don’t have much to post from the past few days, but with Nick starting school we really have not done much besides hang out around the villa.  I do know that I should be venturing out and sightseeing, but I am still getting used to this no working idea, and emotionally it is taking me some time.  But I know that as we get traveling and school starts back up for myself I will wonder when we are going to slow down.

The students started class on Wednesday and Nick introduced their first project.  It was interesting to hear the silence within the villa after their class.  I asked Nick what this meant, I was confused as to whether or not they were excited about their project – he advised it meant they were thinking!  It has been interesting to see them interact with each other and still weird that they go to my husband, the boy that I met in high school computer class for advice 🙂 

Students set up in studio

After class we walked with Luca to see a potential site where the students might design their final project – just a few steps away was this amazing view of the city down below and the harbor.

The students are all very pleasant and seem to be a good group of kids.  They are all very respectful and seem to get along well with each other.  They are very easy to talk to, which makes it easier for myself, because we all know how much I need human interaction.

On Thursday, Barbara, the Italian Language professor from Clemson arrived and she will be here until Sept 4th to teach us all Italian.  So far it has been interesting and very helpful, but I still do not feel comfortable even telling someone my name – I guess this is because Nick keeps informing me that my accent needs major help!  But I need to learn to just go with it and at least attempt or the locals are going to be fed up with me. 

We have had some delicious lunches and dinners over the past few days.  Going forward I really want to start documenting what we have eaten – but so far my favorites have been the lunches, Cristina made a delicious risotto with zucchini and saffron the other day – it was so delicious that I even warmed it up for dinner that night.  Today for lunch we had meatloaf with what I believe was a homemade pasta with pesto – I am going to make sure that I am doing extra steps on these days 🙂  It has to be fate that I ended up in a city where they are known for their pesto, it is one of my favorite dishes.

I decided to spend today doing our laundry, since I would like to enjoy Nick’s day off tomorrow venturing out and about.  Kristin warned me that laundry takes forever, but you really have to experience it yourself to truely appreciate it – or not appreicate it.  Against her suggestion I attempted to wash a load of whites in the washing machine in our bath within the apartment – bad idea – four-five hours later it finally finished and we had a huge wet mess on the floor in the bathroom.  Lucia, the housekeeper came to look at it, but really had no advice to offer other then to do the laundry downstairs in the garage 🙂  I think after a couple of tries I will have a system mastered and we will be good to go – I will just need to make sure that I am doing it while the students are in class.

Today I translated the settings into English 🙂

I am looking forward to our evening, Luca, one of the Italian professors is going to drive us to Boaccadasse to have pizza with him and his wife.  I have only heard wonderful things about Luca and Anna from Dan and Kristin, so I am very excited to hang out with them and learn more about Genova!

Since we haven’t done much over the past few days I don’t have too many exciting photos to post, but I know in the coming weeks you all will probably get annoyed with all my photos!