Spaniards....

Hey all,

Extremely frustrating day in class today. Grammar for two hours in the morning lost me for most of it, and the second two hours of conversation was hopeless – I said to the teacher that I may as well be standing on a street listening to people as they wander by. Was getting angry about it, because the Spanish students in class all rattle on non stop – the vocab is very similar to Italian so the teacher usually knows what they are saying, but they get the grammar wrong – but two hours of this is a complete waste of time for the people in class who only speak English, or Russian, or whatever. Annoying. There was only one point where I thought I understood something, but it turned out to be nothing more than a momentary case of de ja vu. Seriously. If this goes on again tomorrow I will stop her and say something about it, because it is a waste of time for everyone except the amiable but frankly bloody talkative Spaniards. This afternoon was a little better – it is the extra bit, and should be more complicated than the core classes, but isn't because the teacher at least runs you through things slowly enough to get a chance to figure it out. And less Spaniards. Anyway, sorry to bore you all, but a very frustrating day.

Bought myself a George R.R Martin book today. Got it because, firstly, it is aimed at 12 year olds, so I should be able to slowly figure it out a bit, and secondly, it is translated into English. Native speakers use their language in a quirky, not quite proper kind of way – translated literature usually irons that out – translators try not to iron it out if they are dealing with, say, Tolstoy, but when it is a book aimed at kids about a dragon I imagine their aim would be to present clean, easy, kid level Italian. So I might eventually have a hope. That's the theory.

Finally went inside the big church today – the queue's were really short just before closing time. It was a bit disappointing – austere, but not in the warm way that the Michelangelo church in Rome was austere – inside this church just felt barren, almost unfinished. Which is odd, considering how extremely ornate it is on the outside. Will probably make the effort to climb up to top of the dome at some point, but that is a whole other queue...

Photos – inside the church – I don't know if it gives a sense of how barren it feels. Then the dome of the church – for scale, if you look closely you can see some people up there. Stained glass inside the church, which might give a better idea of how hospital-like all the walls are. Then some dude's skull in a box in the archaeological digs under the church itself (and some brown paper (??), I think). They must hold services down here as well as the main church, when they are not charging tourists entry – there is a working organ and a whole bunch of pews. Finally, two shots of a kid's book that I can't read, and another fairly average Capriciossa – in general I do like the way they do pizzas – in Australia a pizza tastes more or less exactly the same in every bite because all the ingredients are shredded and mixed the same way throughout – here it is always a bit different because they don't confuse all the flavours so much.

Later: first paragraph of the kid's book was incomprehensible even with a dictionary. German opera singer laughed at me, said I would have been better with a book for two or four year olds, which is probably true, since he is doing the next course above me and they have only started past imperfect tense. Which is what the first paragraph of my kid's book is full of. For God's sake.

Cheers, B.

PS - the camera is, for the first time, no longer showing full power. According to the meter it is down to two thirds.