Being an Exchange Student at Western
Hi! My name is Benedetta (but everyone calls me Benny) and I'm an exchange student from Italy! I came in Ohio on the 11th January after like 13 hours of flight :D. Here I found a wonderful Host family and so many kind people (and I hope to meet more). I would love to talk to you about my life in here so far, but first let me tell you about my life in Italy. Italy is a country in Europe and is divided in 20 regions. I live in the south of Italy, in the island named Sicily (Sicilia in italian), in a city called Agrigento. I live near the sea so all year the weather is pretty warm (compared to the weather here lol), so I've never seen the snow until now
In the past my city was a greek colony so the first thing you will see are the ancient temples, one of my favourite things about it.
Another tourist destination in my city is the Scala dei Turchi that takes its name from the Saracen pirates, called Turks by the local populations, who in the 1500s used to land on this particular rocky formation to plunder the coastal villages such as the modern day Realmonte (Agrigento province). The Scala dei Turchi is the perfect destination for a summer vacation.
Agrigento was founded by Greeks in 580 BC (then called Akragas). The region was home of the goddess Persephone who was thought to have protected Akragas. At the time, Sicily was dominated by Elymians, Phoenecians, Sicani, and Greeks. The city's natural fortification from its hills made it a very desirable location since inhabitants could see their enemies coming from afar. The holy structures that reside here are a pure representation of Sicily’s ancient, classic culture and there are seven temples that comprise this famous landmark in Agrigento.
Now I will tell you about the most beautiful thing about Italy: the food. I LOVE pasta (carbonara pasta is one of my favourite things in the world) and italians eat it everyday (mostly at lunch), but there are plenty of other food that most people don't know about. An example is a sicilian food called Arancino/a (in Sicily with fight about how it's called because east Sicily says arancinO, and west Sicily arancinA): a rice ball stuffed with different things, coated with breadcrumbs and deep-fried. For the desert i like ricotta so my favourite are cannoli: pastries consisting of tube-shaped shells of fried pastry dough, filled with sweet ricotta.
Here some recipes:
Cannoli: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/88849/cannoli/
Arancini: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/57844/arancini/
Carbonara pasta: https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/simple-carbonara
School in Italy is completely different from here. First of all we don't have different classes but the teachers are the ones that have to change class every hour. So I have had the same classmates for 5 years. School starts at 8 a.m and it finishes at 1 p.m (one only one day of the week at 2 p.m), we don't have lunch but we have a break at 11 but it only lasts 15 minutes and we most schools have lessons even on saturday. Unlike here our classes are not the same everyday and we can have two hours of the same subject in a day (for example I can have math on Monday but not on Tuesday). We have different types of school that you can choose between depending on what you want to study: there is the scientific school (where you study a lot of scientific subjects), the humanistic school (where you study lot of literature, ancient Greek and Latin), the language school (where you usually learn 3 different languages) and a lot more.
this is my school (it's not pretty like Western)
Our classes are mostly like that, sad and boring. We can't talk to our teachers informally and we have to stand up every time the teacher enters the room
Being a teenager in Italy is kinda the same as being a teenager in the USA. We go out a lot especially on Saturday and sometimes we go to clubs (even minors can). But in Italy you can't drive till you are 18 and the only thing we can drive are scooters and mini cars. Not being able to drive is really bad because after coming here I notice that having a license is really useful and it can help you to be more independent from your parents. In the summer we go every day to the beach and sometimes we even do lunch there. During the summer there are a lot of concerts so I love to go there even if I'm not a big fan of that singer. The Italian summer is probably my favorite thing in Italy and I can't wait for summer to come (but at the same time and sad because that means that I have to go back and time is passing too fast).
It's been two months since I've been here and I'm so happy that I made the decision to do this experience. At first I was really scared and, being honest, the flight was really stressing, long and it was not easy to do it all alone (and for the first time ever). But now that I'm here the stress is paid. I love the people at western and I found a really good host family here so for now my experience has been one of the most right decisions that I've made.
I made some friends and generally everyone is really kind to me, even the teachers that are always helping me whenever I need to. Well the food part is not easy because I miss some Italian food and, disclaimer, Spaghetti is only the long type of pasta (and they are not called noodles), every pasta has a different name. Another disclaimer, fries on pizza exist and it's the best pizza ever so try it. But I honestly enjoyed everything I ate here and RANCH IS MY NEW FAVORITE SAUCE IN THE WORLD (not on pizza thought).
Time is passing so fast and I know that all of this will end soon. But I'm glad I did this experience and I will never forget it. I learned a lot in only two months and I hope I will learn more in the months to come. For everyone that is thinking to do it just do, don't listen to all the people that will tell you that it's dangerous and that you will find a terrible host family or terrible people around you. That is not true, I mean, it can happen, but I was really afraid too and at the end I'm doing really good and all my fears disappeared.