Happy Hump Day!
Last week we started our new month of class! We are taking just another language class this semester from 9am-2pm everyday, next month we will have a language class in the morning and a culture class in the afternoon.

The first two days of classes we were all in a class of about 42 people with "evil Maurizio". My teacher last month was named Maurizio, but he was awesome and we all loved him. This guy was older, his last year before retiring, and we went into with an open mind, even though our Norvegesi friends told us they had him last year and he was the "Evil" one of the two Maurizio's. I did not mind him the first day but the second day we had him was pretty bad....very boring, he lost his patience numerous times and would yell, gave us worksheets to do in groups yet literally 30 seconds was going over it with the whole class and getting pissed because no one was done and was sitting there wondering why we even got into groups. Moral of the story is that the class was divided into 2 seperate groups because of the size. All of the UMass people in that class were moved back to the other university by the train station where we had classes last month, while the rest of the class stayed where we were for those 2 days, approximately 10 minutes from my house as opposed to 25 minutes where I am now but I am happier I don't care! The walk is fine, wakes you up in the morning.

My new teacher's name is Silvia and I really like her. Some of the people in my class last month are in my class now but there are also some people people from Brazil, Greece, Portugal, and USA...one of them goes to school at Mt. Holyoke and the other one Roxy knows so it was kind of funny. Our friend Giovanni from Santiago, Chile is still in our class, he's a clown but I love him. He speaks Italianish....kind of like Spanglish. We thought he was seriously fluent until we realized he speaks half italian and half spanish. Oh well....he always tells my friends I sit with that I speak well and we talk to eachother and understand eachother. It's funny. Then there is Sammi the guy from Saudia Arabia who is friends with Giovanni, he is not too slick with the Italian but he is wicked funny and always smiling. I'll have to get pictures with my class haha.

Last Friday our whole program here went out to a delicious chinese restaurant, Shanghia something, for Kate's birthday that was on Monday. It was increidbly cheap and very good, I liked all the food and the restaurant was nice itself. It was good to be all together, Davide brought some spumante and they chilled it for us and we popped it in the restuarant...it was delish. After dinner we went to the Mini Rez where some people live and hung out and met up with a few of our friends from class. Once everyone was ready we went to the "Gallery" in town. It was our first time there but it was so fun! It's really the only place around here where you can dance...you can't even tell it's there when you are outside on the street. It's pretty big and they have music and lights and sitting areas, I think everyone had fun, I did! I was practicing my italian too so that is always a plus, right? The rest of the weekend I spent with Caitie and Abbey mostly. A few of the girls went to Florence on Saturday to visit friends they have there so we just hung out and took it easy around Siena, always nice.

This week I have just been going to scuola! Monday after school I stopped by COOP with Rox, the big supermercato around here. It is close to our school but far from where we live and I don't usually go there but I'm glad I did, I got some bargains and they have by far the best selection around. Yesterday night Abbey, Caitie, and I went back to the Fortress again to work out. We're gonna go everyday around 6pm, I felt so good last night after running/walking. I'm glad they are into it too, always nice when you have people to motivate you. It is just so beautiful up there I need to take a video or something so you guys can see, I was thinking how lucky we are because if we were in Roma or Firenze etc. we would not have that luxury. Awesome :) Anyways, today I went and checked out the mercato that they have here in Siena on Wednesdays. It was huge!! I just walked around did not buy anything, just tried to take it all in the first time. Reminded me of when I was in Amsterdam. I was talking (IN ITALIAN!) with my roommate Chiara and she was saying it's not as big as the markets in Rome and Florence of course but definitey big enough for us, haha. I want to go back with everyone else for sure.

I was just talking to Abbey and I might go with her and some of the people in her class to a near by town so I am going to head off but I'll try to post more often. Muah!