The human capacity for resilience is absolutely remarkable. Throughout my life I have encountered numerous individuals who have experienced many difficulties in their lifetimes, yet come out on the other side with a renewed sense of optimism and hope for the future. The world is not always a fair place, and although it so easy to use this unfairness as an excuse for cynicism and pessimism, I continue to be surprised and inspired by the individuals who choose to use their struggles as a springboard for personal growth. While I recognized the power of resilience before coming to Italy, it has become increasingly prevalent as a result of the individuals I have met in my study abroad program, at my service site, and at my internship. The people I have met here have been through difficulties that I cannot even begin to imagine, but they continue to live everyday with a smile on their face and kindness in their heart.
One conversation I had with a few of the migrants at my service site a few weeks ago particularly demonstrated their unending sense of resilience. I had noticed that two of the migrants were more quiet than usual that day, and so when it came time for the walk home I decided to inquire about what was wrong. I started with small talk, asking how they were doing, and they immediately admitted that they were both having a bad day. One of them explained to me that he was frustrated with the Italian job market, as he has been trying to find a job for months but no one will hire him. He has received an advanced education back in Africa, with the certificates to prove it, but the Italian businesses will not hire him unless he has certificates from an Italian school. Therefore this educated young man who came to Italy in order to work, send money to his family, and be an active member of Italian society has been pushed to the margins and told that he is undesirable to hire. The other migrant explained to me that he is in a similar situation of being unable to find a job, and feels as though he has not made any progress since he entered Italy one year ago. He has made many Italian friends, joined an Italian soccer league, and mastered the Italian language, but his social and economic standing in Italian society has not faltered. His current housing, provided by Arca Di Noe (the organization I volunteer through), is about to expire in a few months, and so he must secure a job within the coming weeks in order to have enough money to rent an apartment on his own.
Both of these wonderful and inspirational young men are experiencing discrimination, hardship, and frustration in a way that I will most likely never fully understand, but when I expressed my sadness and empathy towards their situation they were quick to respond with a surprising amount of positivity. They eagerly explained to me that no matter what life throws their way, they fully recognize that tomorrow always has the potential to be better. Therefore they must never get too down on themselves during the bad days, keep on smiling and loving others, and continue working towards and hoping for a better tomorrow. They said that life was not meant to be easy, and that they accept all challenges with the recognition that challenge brings about growth and widened perspective. I was genuinely speechless at the uplifting outlook these two young men had on their frustrating situations, while also humbled to be engaging in such a raw and honest conversation about the human condition.
This is just one example of two individuals in the world who embody the concept of resilience. However, we have all had experiences that have pushed and challenged us in ways we never foresaw. We have all found ourselves confused and pissed off at the nature of the world and broken by its unfairness. We have all struggled, because struggle is unfortunately an inherent part of the human experience. But, we have also all come out on the other side of these difficulties. We have continued getting out of bed, smiling at strangers, laughing, loving, and most importantly: living. So, I just want to say congratulations. Congratulations on pushing through the difficult moments that you have encountered in your life thus far. No matter where you are on life’s journey right now, you should be proud of yourself for getting there. There will most likely be more adversity and roadblocks ahead, but you are strong enough and resilient enough to continue working towards and hoping for a better tomorrow. Stay strong, and just keep living.
Sorry that was long and kind of cheesy, but I felt as though it was important to say. The following paragraphs are about my internship, my service site, and some weekend trips I have taken since my last blog post! It is pretty lengthy, though, so I promise I will not be offended if you stop reading here! haha. Thanks for taking a moment out of your day to read my words and understand my jumbled thoughts; I genuinely appreciate it, folks!
My internship has been great these past few weeks, and I am really sad to think about the fact that I only have two more weeks left there. Two weeks ago in the English-Italian Exchange Class we played a game where I would read out a question with a yes or no answer (example: can money buy you happiness?), and then the people would go to either the “yes” or “no” side of the table depending on what their personal opinion was. The two groups would then discuss why they thought they were right, and present their ideas to the other side. It went really well in the beginning and everyone seemed to be enjoying it, but then one of the questions ended up making a woman in the group very emotional. The question was asking if they thought Bologna was the best city in Italy, and this woman initially went to the “yes” side of the table. However, upon talking about her experience growing up in Bologna and living there her whole life, she began to cry. Through her tears she explained that she used to have such a good life in Bologna, as her and her daughter lived in a house, she used to own a coffee bar, and they had enough money to live comfortably. However she is now jobless, experiencing homelessness, and unable to adequately support her daughter. This realization that her situation has changed so drastically for the worse was very difficult for this woman to deal with in that moment, so my supervisor Chiara ended up talking to her separately and calming her down. It was really sad to see her get so emotional though, since she is always so kind and friendly to everyone. Last week we did an activity explaining where we are all from, which was really interesting because there are a wide variety of countries represented in the class (Italians, Nigerians, Morrocans, etc.). We were practicing asing conversational questions about each others’ countries, and we talked about everything from language to economy to resources to environment. It was really great. In the theatre class we finished making our masks, and are now moving on to work on using the masks in preparation for the theatre show they are going to put on later this summer. Last week the theatre class finished early though, so I ended up helping out with the job search clinic. This was a very interesting and difficult experience because joblessness is such a prevalent issue in Italy, especially for migrants. It was evident that many of the individuals in the class were getting frustrated with the process, and the online aspect of job postings nowadays was particularly difficult for one of the men I was working with. He was about 60 years old and from Morocco, and he had little to no experience using computers. I had to explain to him how to use a computer mouse, type on the keyboard, access google, and more, which added an extra layer to the already frustrating task of searching for a job in Italy.
Service the past few weeks has been really enjoyable, and I feel like I am really getting closer with the migrants and Italian students. I actually got coffee a few weeks ago with one of the migrants, which was really fun and intriguing. We talked about our lives, where we come from, difficulties we have encountered, and his experience of coming to and living Italy. I learned a lot about him and life in general from our conversations, and I was happy for the opportunity to have spent quality time with him. Two weeks ago during the afterschool program the kids completed a very cool science activity using microscopes. I told some of the students that I had no idea how to use one, and so they excitedly explained the process of using a microscope and the experiment they were doing. One of the boys was especially sweet about it, trying his best to explain it in english and making sure that I understood what was going on. They had to fill out a worksheet to go along with the activity, and the last question was about how the mass media looks at immigration from a macroscopic level. The teacher asked them to compare this macroscopic perspective to the microscopic experience they are having with the migrants in the class, and their answers were absolutely beautiful. They eloquently explained the ways in which their views on migration have changed for the better since the beginning of the program, using the metaphor of a microscope.
Two weeks ago I went on a day trip to Rome with Kelly, Mike, Ally, Emily, Nayomi, and Gabe (a friend from SLU who was visiting for the weekend). We had a great time, and I was so impressed with all the beauty and history that the city had to offer. Gabe and Mike were also great at explaining some of the history stuff that I didn’t quite understand, so that was super awesome. We first went to the Colosseum, which was stunning. It is crazy to think about the fact that they used to watch people literally die within the walls of such a beautiful building. Next we went to the Forum, which was most definitely my favorite part. For centuries this Forum served as the center of day-to-day life in Rome, and while walking around I could literally imagine what it would have been like to be alive in ancient Rome. It was a huge space filled with many different buildings, ruins, and areas to visit, and it was just really cool to be standing on the actual grounds where people we read about in textbooks (like Julius Caesar) would casually spend their days. We then got lunch at a beautiful restaurant that we found at the bottom of a random ally, and there I ate the best lasagna I have ever eaten. It melted in my mouth, and was made with a creamy vodka sauce instead of a classic tomato sauce!! Such a good idea. Next we walked to the Pantheon which was really beautiful and interesting to learn about. When Mike took Italian in high school his teacher taught him this song about how to get from the Pantheon to the best gelato place in Rome, so we naturally had to sing the song together and find it. We got it on our first try (the song was very straightforward!), and I will admit that it was the best gelato I have had during my time in Italy thus far. After sitting and eating our gelato for a while, we headed towards the river to walk around. It was a beautiful night, and the streets were very lively as well. We saw a bunch of street performers, including an amazing saxophone player and a guy who was using random pots and pans as a drum set. We later had dinner at a place that Emily’s cousin recommended, where we dined on an incredible flat bread and really yummy four-cheese pizza. It was a great atmosphere, and we had a lot of fun laughing, talking, and enjoying eachothers’ company. We finished off the night with one more cup of gelato from the really good place near the Pantheon, and then headed to the bus station in order to catch our bus back to Bologna. The bus we were taking was five hours long and left at midnight (we chose this crazy option because it was the least expensive; a true broke college student move!), and it was a very odd experience. However, I guess we should have expected to encounter some strange characters on an overnight bus. Throughout the course of the bus ride there was a woman whimpering like a dog in her sleep, an aggressive man trying to fight Gabe, a woman who claimed that Emily and Ally were sitting in her seat although there were not assigned seats, and a man kicking my seat for about an hour straight. My personal favorite part of the night though was when the bus pulled over to the side of the road in order to address a mechanical difficulty, and as they were trying to fix the problem they turned on all the lights and started playing “Thriller” by Michael Jackson. I could not stop laughing at how ridiculous of a situation it was, but I also would not have wanted to end my day trip to Rome in any other way.
Last weekend I went to visit my friend Adan, who I met through Hands of Peace. Hands of Peace is an interfaith dialogue program between Israeli, Palestinian, and American teenagers, and Adan and I had participated in the program together three years ago. Therefore we had not seen eachother in three years, and so it was absolutely perfect that we both ended up studying in Italy at the same time! I took a train to Florence on Friday morning, and met up with her at one of the big piazzas. She then gave me a tour of the city, stopping at all of the most important places and sites to see. It was a really comprehensive tour, and I was very impressed that she was able to navigate the city so well after being there for only a few weeks. I had also mentioned to her before I came that I wanted to get a journal while in Florence, so her and her friend Frankie had looked around earlier that week for good places where I could find a journal. This was really sweet of them, and I actually ended up buying the journal that had been one of their favorites they’d found. It is made of brown leather and has some really pretty flower detailings; it is absolutely stunning! Afterwards we headed back to her place where we started preparing dinner for the night. It turns out that her neighbor in the apartment next door was a Palestinian and had also done Hands of Peace, so we were going to have a dinner of traditional Palestinian food with him that night. Adan made a really yummy dish which was basically peppers stuffed with rice and meat, and then boiled in tomato sauce. Her neighbor, Ahmad, made a very similar dish but instead of stuffing the peppers with meat and rice he had stuffed leaves of cabbage. When they both finished cooking we went over to his apartment, and shared a delicious meal with really wonderful conversations. Adan’s friend Frankie, from Switzerland, and her roommate Valentina, from Spain, also joined us for dinner. It was a really interesting mix of people from a variety of differing backgrounds, which made for a unique cultural exchange opportunity. After dinner we got ready to go out, drank some wine, and then headed to a karaoke bar. I sang “breaking free” from high school musical with Valentina, and, not to toot my own horn, but the crowd loved it! haha. We had met up with a bunch of other people from Adan’s class at the karaoke bar, so it was cool to talk and dance with them as well. After a few hours at the karaoke bar we went to a dance club called Babylon, which was really fun and played some awesome Spanish music.
The next day Adan, Frankie, and I went to Arezzo, which a small city near Florence. We arrived by train, and had a great time walking around the city, drinking coffee in fun coffee shops (tea for me though, of course lol), visiting churches, and sitting in a beautiful park. The city was at the top of a huge hill, so the view was absolutely incredible. After a wonderful long day spent in Arezzo, we returned back to Florence and cooked dinner together in Adan’s apartment. We made pasta with meat, cream sauce, garlic, and onions, and it was sooo yummy. We were planning on going out again that night, but ended up deciding to drink wine in her apartment instead. We had a really fun night hanging out, catching up, and reminiscing about our time together in Hands of Peace. On Sunday we woke up to watch the sunrise from Piazzale Michelangelo, which was simply breathtaking. The last night I spent with Adan in Chicago we had watched the sunrise from my friend Grace’s roof, so it was a really great way to come full circle on our visit together. We then walked back to her apartment, took a quick nap, and then ate french toast with Frankie before I had to leave for the train. Frankie made the french toast with garlic and chili peppers, which I was initially super suspicious about. However, it was absolutely DELICIOUS! Yay for trying new foods! Saying goodbye to Adan was really sad, as I recognize that I probably won’t see her again for a few years at the least. However, I am so grateful for the opportunity to have spent the weekend with her.
For my Easter break I went to Cinque Terre, a string of seaside villages on the coast of Italy, with my friend Jenna from SLU. After a long day of travelling by bus, metro, train, and taxi, I finally met her at our hostel on Thursday afternoon. It was really great to see her, and we spent that evening catching up, talking about our time abroad, exchanging stories, and reminiscing on good times with people we missed. We ate some lasagna and homemade bread at the hostel restaurant as well, which was really delicious. After going back to our room and talking for a few more hours, we headed to bed in order to prepare for the long day ahead of us.
Friday morning we woke up, ate breakfast, and hopped on the shuttle to get to Riomaggiore at 9:00 (one of the villages that is a part of Cinque Terre). Our hostel was about 20 minutes away from Cinque Terre, so they offered this shuttle system in order to give us easy access to the cities. There is a really convenient train system that goes between the five villages, so from Riomaggiore we hopped on the train and took it all the way to the furthest village. We did this so that we could work our way back to Riomaggiore by the end of the day in order to take the shuttle bus back to the hostel. So, the first village we went to was Monterosso. Monterosso has a large beach and colorful buildings, and it was a really fun place to walk around. We spent a lot of time looking at cool rocks and other things on the beach, and then did a little bit of hiking up some random trails that we found. After hiking we rewarded ourselves with gelato, which was super yummy. We then walked around the town a little more, put our feet in the water (which was FREEZING but worth it!), and then took the train to the next city. The next place we went was Vernazza, which was also really beautiful. This one did not have a beach, but had a really cool looking port with a bunch of boats. In Vernazza we ate lunch at this realllyyyyy good pizza place where I had pesto pizza, and it was probably one of my favorite things I have ever eaten. Pesto is actually made in Genoa, a city near Cinque Terre, so there was pesto basically everywhere we went; it was AMAZING, and I literally ate it in some form for every meal. After lunch we walked around the city for a while, saw a few churches, and did some hiking near the coast. The views of the city and the sea from the hiking paths were seriously stunning. Next we went to Corniglia, which was probably my favorite city of all the ones we saw that day. Corniglia is located at the top of a hill on the sea, so we had to climb up a bunch of stairs just to get to the city itself. Once we made it to the top we walked around the city, which was really quaint and less touristy than the others we had visited. The whole center of the village was a series of connected allys, and we could really feel the history in the buildings everywhere we went. We also went into a few churches which were beautiful, and hung out on a balcony overlooking the sea for a while. Finally we made our way to the last city of Riomaggiore (we skipped the fourth city so that we could visit it the next day), where we met up with some of our other friends from SLU for dinner. We spent a good amount of time in the city, climbing on rocks and hiking a little bit near the waterfront, and then met them at the train station. We decided to go to a really cute restaurant for dinner, where I ordered pesto pasta (of course). However it took a really long time for us to get our food since it was a busy night, and so Jenna and I ended up having to take it to go in order to make it back to the top of the hill in Riomaggiore for the shuttle back to the hostel. The time we did get to spend with our other friends was wonderful though, and I was very happy it worked out for us to get together. When we got back to the hostel we hung out in our room for a few hours, and then headed to bed.
The next morning we took the shuttle to Riomaggiore again, and from there took a train to Manarola. Manarola was the only city we didn’t have the chance to see the day before, and it was absolutely beautiful. The buildings were all super colorful, and the view of the city from the hiking path was remarkable. We spent a few hours in this city, and actually ended up eating lunch there at a cool little restaurant. Next we hopped on the train to La Spezia, which is actually not part of the 5 villages of Cinque Terre but still very close to them. It is a little bit bigger of a city, with many things to do. In La Spezia we first got gelato, and then walked around a really pretty park for a while. We ended up finding a harbor with many boats, so it was fun to hang out on the docks and walk around that area as well. Finally we went to a modern art museum, which was really interesting and had some great exhibits about poetry, the navy, and more. Each exhibit had a pamphlet with a description in English, which was really helpful in allowing us to understand what we were looking at. Next we went back to Riomaggiore, where we got some reallyyyyy good milkshakes. Jenna and I had both randomly been craving milkshakes, and these ones did not disappoint. The lady working at the shop was really sweet too, and was eager to explain to us the art of creating a perfect milkshake. We walked around the city for a little while longer, and then found a nice little restaurant to eat dinner in. I, of course, ordered pesto, and Jenna ordered carbonara; they were both delicious! Our waiter was also really funny and sassy with us, which I very much appreciated. By the time we were done with dinner, it had started storming. So, Jenna and I had to make the treck up to the top of the hill where the hostel shuttle came to pick us up in pouring rain with aggressive thunder and lightning piercing the sky. We were soaking wet, cold, and tired from a long day of activities, but continued to remain in high spirits despite it all! The shuttle bus ride back to the hostel was absolutely terrifying though, because it was a stick-shift bus driving up narrow winding mountain roads right next to the ocean in heavy rain with a lot of lightning. Jenna and I were honestly terrified to say the least, so to keep ourselves calm we sang some songs (including “sweet caroline” and “little drummer boy” lol). We eventually made it back to the hostel safely, and there we changed into dry clothes and drank some coffee (well, Jenna drank coffee; I ate french fries!) in the hostel restaurant. We hung out there for a little bit, recounting the silly moments of our weekend together, and then facetimed with our friend Andrea who is studying abroad in Vietnam. The wifi was absolutely horrible so the facetime was not super effective, but it was still amazing to see her face and hear her voice after being apart for so many months.
The next morning we woke up really early so that we could make it to Genoa in time to walk around the city for a while before Jenna’s flight back to Amsterdam at 2pm. Genoa was a really cool city, and we spent a bunch of time looking at churches (it was Easter sunday, so they were all packed!), wandering around the downtown area, and hanging out by the waterfront. It was a beautiful sunny day, and it was a great last hurrah for the end of our trip. I walked Jenna to the train station where she caught a cab to the airport, which was a really sad since I most likely won’t see her again until we’re back at school in August. But it was also a pleasant goodbye, as I recognize she is truly thriving in the Netherlands and that is where she needs to be right now. After Jenna and I parted ways, I had about five hours to spend in Genoa on my own. I spent a lot of my time sitting by the waterfront, reading, journaling, drawing, and also just kind of wandering around the city for a bit. It was really fun and relaxing, and I even talked to some girls at the waterfront about art because they had seen me drawing in my journal and inquired about it. I also ended up sitting outside at this really cute restaurant in a random ally in Genoa, where I had the best pesto pasta I had ever eaten in my life (and that is saying a lot because, as aforementioned, I LOVE pesto). A bunch of families were also dining at the same restaurant for their post-easter mass meal, which was cute to see but also made me miss my family a lot. I then walked around the city for a little bit longer, and eventually made my way over to the bus station where my bus back to Bologna was leaving from. Overall it was a really amazing weekend filled with great conversations, beautiful views, delicious food, funny memories, and so much more.
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