Ingles. Italiano. Espanol. Hawaiian

Languages of the world
As I mentioned before my roommate Ornela is from Argentina. She speaks pretty good English but you have to talk to her slowly for her to understand. So she decided that I need to learn Spanish. I took a few years of Spanish in high school and it turns out I remember more Spanish than I thought. Saturday night we went back to our favorite place, Pride, the Irish pub. I spend most of the night learning Italian and Spanish. It turns out they are really similar. Apparently they have the same Latin roots. Who woulda know that the bar is the best place to learn a foreign language. We also learned that if you can drink in Italy you can drink anywhere in the world! When you ask for a mixed drink they will fill the cup 9/10 of the way with alcohol and the rest with juice. And they are pretty big glasses! If you ever come to Italy don't ever order a Long Island!!! According to my roomie Ty from Hawaii the beer here goes down real smooth and she definitely felt the effects the next day! The funniest parts of the night involved Ty. I kept having to remind her that I speak English and that she didn't have to talk slow to me! Earlier in the night one of the Italian players Michela set Ty up. She told Ty to say something to our trainer Silvia in Italian. So Ty confidently walked over to Silvia and say what Michela told her to say. Turns out it was something not so nice and Silvia's jaw dropped to the floor. Ty went on a rant about how she had been set up. Lets just say it was a good night at Pride.

So before a few days ago I didn't know that Hawaiian was a language. There are schools in Hawaii where the entire curriculum is in Hawaiian. Only a small percentage of Hawaiians speak Hawaiian. Ty only knows a few words and she will say them to me like I know what she is talking about. Apparently, within her friends and family they call all females Mary even if that's not your name! So if I happen to hear Mary she is talking to me! Ty is definitely a character! When Ty has to got number 1 she says she has to go shi shi.

Time Change
In the US the time changed in early March. Spring forward. So I though I was done with the time change for spring. I was wrong!! On Saturday the time changed and me and Ty had no idea. On Monday me and Ty were scheduled to get a physical at 2:30pm. So we woke up at 11ish (you know the normal) I went to Conad, our local grocery store and made some breakfast. By that time it was 1:20 and Char shows up to take us to the doctor. She told me that the time changed. So I was thinking they changed the time of our appointment. But no, the actual time changed. The funny part is that we spent all of Sunday an hour behind everybody else and we had no idea. One of our roommates told Ty about the time change but she didn't know what she was talking about because they don't do time change in Hawaii. She has never heard of it. I don't know if I believe her!

English TV
We finally got our Sky!! Sky is a box and dish that gives us channels in English! I felt like a little kid on Christmas day when they came to hook it up. The first show we watched was House. Its funny because they show really old shows like Baywatch! We literally cheered when we found NCAA basketball on ESPN America! It made my heart happy.

Italian Culture

Italian Culture:

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I'm beginning to learn a lot about Italian culture. For instance, everything closes around the city from 12:30 to 3:00. And everything is closed on Thursday. When you go out to eat at a restaurant or bar you don't receive a check. Everything is on the honor system. If you order a drink at a bar you can pay as you go or pay at the end and you keep track of what you got. Here are some words I've learned in Italian.

shortstop- interbase

centerfield- centro

leftfield- sinistra

right field- destra

oufield- esterna

home run- Fouri campo

catcher- receivatore

pitcher- Lanciatore

warm up- scaloaento

ball/s- palla/e

run- punto

home team- casa

bat- mazza

One of my first days here Ty and I were walking down the street exploring the city. We looked up as saw a sign for McDonalds!! I don't even like McDonalds but I got real excited! We followed the sign and searched the city but we came up short. We asked for directions a few times but we couldn't understand what anyone was trying to tell us! As we were searching for the McDonalds we approached an older man that was standing in the door way of a shop. When I got close he stuck his foot out like he was going to trip me and let out the most evil laugh! I guess he was trying to welcome us to Italy. It was pretty funny! It turns out we weren't even close to the McDonalds. One of our teammates took us a few days later and when we first pulled up it looked just like the McDonalds in America we were so excited. Our excitement soon turned to disappointment because it was disgusting! That will be the last time we go to McDonalds in Italy!

I went to the grocery store for the first time. My goal was to find anything that resembled American food. We came to the cereal section and I found some frosted flakes. The only reason i knew it was the good stuff is because Tony the Tiger was on the front of the box! When we got to the section with laundry detergent I had no idea what to do! I grabbed one and hoped it was right. We ran into our coach at the store and he helped us out. It turns out I picked up fabric softener! I got some yogurt, pringles and bread. It was a rough and confusing but good shopping trip.

Everything is Forli is pretty fast paced. Everybody walks fast and drives fast and crazy. Here, pedestrian cross walks don't mean a whole lot so you have to pay attention when you cross the street. We always say Ty is going to be the first person to get hit by a car because that girls does not pay attention.

A few nights ago we went to a restaurant with the team. Me and Ty ordered our meal in Italian and the whole team cheered. We ordered Tagliatelle al Ragu. It is supposedly the closest thing to spaghetti they have in Italy but it had no marinara sauce at all! It was pretty good so I had no complaints. After dinner we went to an Irish pub called Pride. It was a lot of fun. All I know is that those girls get more energy as the night goes on and they know how to have a good time. Our roommate Ornela from Argentina got hit in the eye by a crazy dancing elbow but its ok she didn't remember much the next day.

Our Schedule:

April 4, 2009 Fiorini Forli'

vs Museo d'Arte Nuoro

April 11,2009 Fiorini Forli' vs Amga Legnano

April 17, 2009 Fiorini Forli' vs Cassa Padana Parma

April 25, 2009 Fiorini Forli' vs DES Caserta

May 2,2009 Fiorini Forli' vs Sanotint Bollate

May 9, 2009 Fiorini Forli' vs Europromo San Marino

May 16,2009 Fiorini Forli' vs Mosca Macerata

May 23, 2009 vs Museo d'Arte Nuoro

June 6, 2009 vs Amga Legano

June 13, 2009 vs Cassa Padana Parma

June 20,2009 vs DES Caserta

June 27,2009 vs Sanotint Bollate

July 4, 2009 vs Europromo San Mariono

July 11, 2009 vs Mosca Macerata

The top 4 teams compete in the playoffs and the winner plays in the European Cup. We have a three week break between the regular season and playoffs.

My first Week in Italy!

Hey Everybody,
I decided to start a blog so i can keep everybody updated on my new life in Italy!

I made it, finally! It was a long day of traveling. As soon as i got here i fell in love! The owner and coach are really cool, they really take care of their players here. We got something to eat on the way to the apartment. When we got here he showed me around helped me get settled in and made sure I had everything I needed. The apartment is all set up. The bed is made, there were towels here. Pretty much all i needed to bring with me was my body and some clothes.
Let me tell you about my day of traveling. When i got to the airport yesterday in Houston everything was pretty much smooth sailing. I didn't get charged for my bag being a little overweight. I was excited about that. When we first boarded the plane it was sooo hot!! Apparently the motor that runs the air conditioner was broken! We sat in the heat for 30 mins before they replaced the motor and we could get going! I had sweat running down my back. I sat next to an interesting character. His name was Zach from New Orleans. He was a cool guy and crazy. He asked me a million and one questions than let me know he wasn't hitting on me, he has a fiance. He passed out before the flight took off. Someone tried to wake him up because he dropped his phone but we couldn't get him up!! He snapped out of it after a while and we talked some more. He drank the whole flight!! My flight to London was 8 hours long. I like the international flights. You can have all the free alcohol (I chose not to have any :)) you want and you can watch almost any movie or tv show. I watched Rachel is getting married (its not a chick flick like you think) than I watched P.S. I love you (very much a chick flick). After that i tried to go to sleep but it wasn't happening. I even put on the complementary mask they give us. It might have been a little more comfy if my stupid seat wasn't broken. It wouldn't recline!! Since i couldn't sleep i watched an episode of everybody hates chris, king of queens and friends. By that time, it was time to land. When i got to London I got my stuff and thankfully i found one of the those carts because there is no way i could have carried my stuff to where i had to go. I found the bus station but my ticket was for 8:20 and it was now 9:10am so gate on my ticket meant nothing. I asked around and finally found where i needed to go. When i handed the guy the ticket he told me it wasn't valid anymore and that i need to buy another ticket! (i had no money at this point) Lucky for me another lady looked at it and she was like no the ticket is valid for the day. Phew! I was bout to have an issue. And i had no way of reaching the owner of the team.
I got on the bus and i still hadn't slept at this point. I think it was 4am Houston time. I got to the other London airport checked in and sat there for about 2 hrs until the gate that i needed came up on the monitor. When i landed in Italy the coach and the owner picked me up. They are very nice and seem like they are going to take care of us. My roommate is a Hawaiian girl. She is cool. She is so homesick. She told them she wanted to go home already. I told her to hang in there. She was happy i was here and spoke English! Our other two roommates are from Argentina and The Czech Republic. They call our house the melting pot! Everybody seems pretty cool. I passed out after I took a shower! Oh and everything that comes on the tv is in Italian. MTV is really weird!
This is our car. Its called a rover and it is really small like all of the cars Italy. The cars here have to be small because they still use the same roads they did a 100 years ago and they are all narrow.
Me and the car!








On Thursday I had my first practice with the team. Before every practice we do conditioning and a circuit. Our conditioning is distance running. ughh! I've been avoiding running long distance my whole life! The softball part of practice was good. We had to have one of the girls translate everything the coach said. After practice I had my first Italian pizza and it was amazing. We found out that when you order pepperoni pizza in Italy they will bring you a pizza with peppers! If you want pepperoni the meat you have to order salomy. It was pretty funny all of the girls laughed at me and my roommate Tyleen from Hawaii.

Today it snowed!! Tyleen has never been in anything but perfect weather in Hawaii so she was shocked to see the snow! We stood on our balcony and took pics.









That was my first few days in Italy. Eventful but good!