Wednesday, May 6th 2009 @ 6:30pm Blog #5

Wednesday, May 6th 2009 @ 6:30pm
Blog #5

What a beautiful day at the spiaggia (beach)! Once again, class was painful as we are learning a tense that doesn’t exist in English called il futuro anteriore where something in the past happens in the future. Crazy Italians. For some reason, I mastered that fairly quickly but I’m still having trouble with yesterday’s lesson of si impersonale vs. si passivante. Unfortunately, most of my homework was wrong for that subject.
After our language class this morning, Bobby and I went to the beach to read our text book (such good students!) with Stefano, who is our personal assistant while we’re in Salerno. He treated us to beers at this little hut and we decided to stay and read in the sun. I usually don’t like Italian beers because they’re typically very light in taste, and I like full-bodied beers, but I found one today that was 12% and on the robust side. So reading, tanning, and good beer….what else can I ask for?
Following this, we had culture class in the afternoon we’re we discussed the Italian government and politics. I think the other students think I’m a little nuts because I was very ‘passionate’ on the subject (down with Berlusconi!). I tried to explain to my professor that the reason why the Italian Republic has fallen over 40 times since 1947 is because the system of checks and balances doesn’t exist, and the Prime Minister has way too much power, especially Berlusconi because of his wealth and various businesses. If they let me, I can solve all their problems…..(that’s what Stefano thinks anyway).

(The photo is of Bobby and me playing with Prof. Maeillaro’s son, Alessandro).