5. Not Comfortable!

I have been asked more than once why I chose to learn Italiano and I don’t really have an answer.  A friend was learning it and she downloaded Duolingo on my phone a couple of years ago. At the time, I hadn’t even heard of the App.  

How I’ve ended up in Milazzo, Sicily, at an italiano language school is anyone’s guess.  Put it down to some ADHD and going down a mighty big wormhole. 

(Do I also want to admit I simply chose this school in Milazzo because it rhymed with my home street Palazzo?)

Ironically Duolingo had sent me an email that morning sending congratulations for completing two years of italiano.  It definitely gave me an incorrect sense of comfort and ease.

The day actually started out well.  It was warm and sunny, just like every other day I’ve had since leaving England.  

I walked down to the Duomo and after the third trip I finally had some bearings without relying on google maps.  

I had walked with some teenage school kids on their way to school and I actually felt like a student myself; I even had a bag slung around my back like them.  It was not unlike my first day of school as a five year old, so full of hope and excitement.

Slowly the streets became busier as the sleepy city came to life and I had finally arrived at my destination some 25 minutes later:  Laboling, La Scuola di Italiano in Sicily. 

I Got A Bag

In truth, it was just a door in an unremarkable building and a small sign… I wouldn’t have found it had Melissa not pointed it out to me earlier.

Being my first day, I was super early and as I walked past its front doors, I noticed an older lady outside on her phone.  

Since my arrival in Milazzo, I had been looking for any potential fellow students.  Maybe she could end up as a future amico, I thought hopefully.

I still had 30 minutes before the class began so I continued walking on to the promenade and sat down on the bench seats that faced the sea.  

A Relaxing Start

I was  wearing my Karen Walker striped palazzo pants which were made with a knit fabric.  I almost didn’t bring them but was glad I did because everything else in my pack was as wrinkled as a screwed up piece of paper!

Before I left that morning, I popped a No-Doze tablet, a caffeine-based stimulant as I needed focus.  I had woken up at 2am and hadn’t gone back to sleep as my body clock was still refusing to adjust to Italian time.

Ma ero nervoso.  I was so nervous!  Too nervous for breakfast but Melissa told me to have a granita per pranzo, for lunch, okay?

Oh-Kay-ee is how they say it, every letter is pronounced in their language.  

There wasn’t a breath of wind or barely a cloud in the sky and the stillness had brought me some comfort.  As I looked out to sea, I was reminded that familiarity could be felt in the sea and the sun; that we were just one small world after all.  

A border collie walked past with its owner and a pigeon hopped near in search of food.  These were all familiar things, I told myself.  Starò bene.  I will be fine!

It turned out that I would not be fine!  I left that class shaking in my skin like I’d just walked out of a Russian interrogation. 

I had been very careful to select the bottom class, the beginner’s class and yet couldn’t keep up.  The teacher started with a bang, assuming we would understand his italiano.  

Is there a pre-school? I joked - except I wasn’t joking.  

The class was small; just eight of us, initially.  The teacher purposely only spoke in italiano and ever so fast.  

After the first break, I paid for the course and accommodation.  It was €900 for two weeks.  I felt quite sick at the time realising I might be their worst ever student. She was a KIWI!

While at reception, the Aussie lady - ex journalist - who was sitting next to me, asked, in perfect italiano, if she could be moved up to the intermediate class in the break as our class was too easy for her.  

There were two German ladies in the group who also could understand the teacher and before long they were both conversing with him in italiano like long lost amici.  

There were two young students, one Swiss and one German - I thought this was a 50+ class - who still had brains that worked.  They were fine.  

That left 60 year old Aussie, Geoff, who struggled initially but then kept up, making me feel even worse!

My brain could barely understand what was being asked by the teacher and by the end of the three hour session, I was shaking.  Really shaking.

My heart was racing so fast it could have sprinted out of my chest and far away from the embarrassing brain.

Beautifully Presented Cannoli

Once outside, I wanted to drop to the ground in a fetal position and cry. Instead I went into a nearby pasticciera and ordered two cannoli.  I urgently needed to taste an authentic Sicilian cannoli before my heart abandoned me forever.  

Actually Tasted Great!

There wasn’t one on the shelf but because I asked in my appalling but slightly better italiano thanks to that morning’s lesson (and because I was a turista), she went out the back and must have made it up because it took her ten minutes before she returned with them.  She packaged them up beautifully too.  Only €3.  

I walked back muttering italiano under my breath like a crazed woman, and noticed I was walking with the same school kids I saw in the morning.  They must go home for lunch and have a sleep before returning to class in the late afternoon.  

Certainly I needed a siesta after the brain-burning morning but what I really wanted was to chug back a few heavy shots of Irish whiskey to numb my overloaded brain and quieten my heart.

Before I left the suola, I said an absent-minded Sì to meeting up with the group at a pizzeria at 8pm.  What was I thinking?  The teacher will just talk to us in Italiano and ask questions…  qualsiasi domanda, Kris??? 

Crazy Lady!

That experience felt no different to falling down the precipice of a really angry volcano and getting burnt alive!!!  

NOT COMFORTABLE!

That was in fact a 10 out of 10 for its uncomfortableness!

I would have studied once I got back but my eyes were too dry and dilated to focus.  Instead, I stuffed my face with a cannoli and couldn’t even remember what it tasted like.