what else?

for those who didnt understand the last post: our house in leipzig burned down. it didnt burn in our flat, but it was full of water. seems that today the roof fell down to the 3. floor. we cant get furniture or things out, it will last two weeks until they can get into - through the windows - to get the most important things. so its really fucking shit. and although i think a lot of my flatmates who have a lot more problems than i have now i cant do much. its strange but here everything seems to go on normal.


some days ago i got a lesson in italian bureaucracy, or just call it stupidness. stupido!! i went to the swimmingpool communale to find out how much it is to go swimming. i dont want to loose my muscles, nici admires them so much!
BUT i learned italy is even worse in some things than germany is. in germany you can just go, pay 3 euros, swim and leave again.
here its impossible just to come and swim for myself. i have to join lessons. that means: i have to come when a lesson starts (they told me to come at 12:40 with the adults who cant swim very good. thanks) and that means i have to pay for the lessons. 25 euros once and 25 euros per month to come 3x a week. but thats not all. i have to bring a medical attest and 2 pictures. and if you want to swim, no sorry i mean take lessons on other days, please pay 1,85 each time. is that complicated or no??
so obviously no sports for me here in cagliari, except perhaps extreme-up-the-hill-walking to university.

at least a bird gave me a nice present the same day and dropped a wet peice of bread that fell against my window and let a nice splash of tiny pieces everywhere. first food donation arrived though. thanks.

what else? i found michael endes "neverending story" very cheap and in italiano and started reading it. of course there are many words i dont understand, but its quite ok. and its so strange how i remember certain scenes. as children we had a tape of it and of some parts i still know what the exact german words were and how the voices sounded. other scenes are more difficult to read cause i really dont remember them. does anyone still know how atreju meets fuchur and who ygramul was???

and what else - we, thats joanne, nici, joannes collegue claire and me - went to a salsa cubana dance class yesterday night to have a free lesson. was funny and we are all going to start that class, twice a week. (could i call that sports?)

and tonight we will go to naples - napoli - neapel. we are going to live with nicis aunt and her family for some days, and then perhaps in a small rustical house in a small rustical village in the mountains. we have some days off next week (and take some other daus off) and return friday morning, so it will be nearly one week - and hopefully i am going to meet felix, anna and perhaps christopher again who is also coming to naples this weekend. crazy people i'm cominnnggg :)

brand

http://www.lvz-online.de/aktuell/content/5889.html"

gestern frueh ist unser haus in leipzig abgebrannt. ich hatte mein zimmer zur zwischenmiete vermietet und wollte wieder einziehen. sowas passiert doch normalerweise dem bruder vom freund des nachbarn oder so!??
ich kann das immernoch nicht so wirklich glaube, ich bin so froh das meinen mitbewohnern nichts passiert ist. in unserer wohnung hat es anscheinend auch nicht gebrannt, obwohl ich mir nicht vorstellen kann wie das gesamte treppenhaus brennt und unsere tuer das dann von unserer wohnung abhaelt. mal sehen wie es jetzt weitergeht.

meet my flatmates

i thought maybe someone wants to know who that is i am going to live with for 10 month now. and its interesting and funny people so i just tell you about them.

there is nici 21, from london. her parents are italians and she studies italian and politics. nici is a city girl, and if i say city girl i mean that she goes for a walk in the wilderness in golden shoes. its so funny how different we are. i cant believe she never ever in her whole live walked through a wood like we did on the giara di gesturi, she wonders how i can say whats cowshit and whats horseshit. i wouldnt know how to fill an extra dressing room, she needed a week to choose the necklaces she would bring here. when she comes home and shouts "inaaaa i have a problem" even before the door closed be sure the problem is make-up a make-up-artist put in her face and she didnt like it and had to walk home with it. its forbidden to take pictures of her. her impression of me must be very village-like, cause she was surprised when i told her that also i do like shopping.
although nici is so much a city girl like i dont know any other she never makes a face about things, although she complains about being here (she had to do erasmus) you never have the feeling she complains (if that makes sense..?) she is really friendly and nice and crazy. and she can swear! i am looking forward to see her drunk for the first time cause she says she gets agressive then. haha! i want to see some agressive 7 stones.

then borja, 21, a spanish guy who studies economics in london. i am definately not the crazy person here! borja drove most of the time on our trip and told us afterwards its the first time he drives legal and the first time he drives overland. he sings songs he listens to most times louder than the music plays, no matter who might hear it. he also takes great pictures - and draws great pictures! he can even cook! rita, our landlady, says he is the cock and we are the hens he looks after.... and although he brings lots of girls home to cook them dinner (and noone twice) he is really a nice guy.

joanne is 26 and also from england. she is not a student but an english teacher at a private english school here in cagliari and she has been here for one year, but in a different flat. shes probablz the most adult one of us - her student years are so long ago! but yesterday we got to know her hidden side: she is a talented liar, too. we went on a bus that was so crowded that nobody stamped his ticket as you have to usually. than two conductors (kontrolleure) entered the bus, and joanne said:" we do the english tourists." and then she played the english tourist that doesnt understand any italian word. and even in a crowded bus you dont find anybody who could speak english. so the conductors wanted them to pay and joanne went on: "sorry, i dont understand. pay? but why? i have a ticket, this is my ticket, no?) and pretended she didnt know you have to stamp it. she looked so innocent! and i was laughing my ass off. so talented liar!

to summarize, i am glad i found nice flatmates who talk to you and ask you how your day was and are interested in you. its not gonna be boring - as verena said: normally you have perhaps one crazy person in a flat, but here its at least 2 or 3. that will be fun. we are going to cook honey on rainy sunday afternoons!

but i am not sure if they like me too. first thing that came into nicis mind when she painted me a tattoo is this...

pictures on photobucket

find more pictures of the trip here - and there will be more pictures step by step. at the right side theres a link to "fotos von cagliari", too.

ciao verena!!

das waren wirklich kurze 10 tage! es war schoen dich hier zu haben, auch wenn ich vielleicht manchmal ein bisschen zickig war. du sollst auf jeden fall wiederkommen! guten flug (ihr fliegt bestimmt grade) und dass das wetter in deutschland nicht ganz so schlimm ist heute, damit die umgewoehnung nicht so schrecklich ist... knus knase!


auf dem monte urpino


in chia!

eis auf der bastione - vorgestern!

poetto - gestern, 17. oktober! nur dass du es nicht vergisst :)

fotonachtrag

goats at the plateau "giara di gesturi"

verena at the costa verde

landscape of the costa verde

cave su mannau

borjas pictures will follow.....

the trip

was lange währt, wird endlich gut – hab lange nicht geschrieben, aber ich hatte ja auch besseres zu tun!



this weekend we decided to rent a car to go on a trip in the countryside and to the coast. we were five – my flatmates borja, nici and joan and verena and me, so the car was really cheap. its 80 euros for two days, plus petrol we paid 22 euros each – for such a great trip!!

saturday the weather was bad so we didnt expect much. it started cloudy, but it wasnt cold and the sun came out in the afternoon for some hours.
first we went to su nuraxi, thats an old nuraghe-village near barumini. its sardinias only world-culture-heritage-thing. it was build like 2500 years ago from a former culture. it was nice to see but it didnt excite us so much, so we went away after 15 minutes.
near barumini there is also a plateau called “giari di gesturi” where wild little sardinian horses live, “cavallini sardi”. you can go up by car and then have a walk and with some luck you get to see some, and we went to do horsewatching. this turned to be a walk for some hours through a countryside full of goats, pigs, sheep, cows, some horses, all these animals shit, the smell of the shit and millions of bugs rolling the shit away. (i like that!!) i found some bones for my collection (a horses jar!), in between we lost borja who got totally lost in the macchia and already dreamt of staying there over night, nici found out she is a city girl (surprise!! she went in golden shoes), at the end we saw two or three of the horses and went away happily.

streets in the inland really turned out to be like i thought they would be: always expect sheeps behind the next curve!

next stop was meana sardo, a village in the mountains. we heard there was a festa where the village kind of presents itself and its products and you can try food. we didnt know any more about it but trying food sounded good and so we went there – and it was just unbelievable great.
first we tried honey. we could try all sorts we wanted on little spoons until we were nearly sick. then we went on and got to a place where women in traditional clothes showed how to make “pane e saba”. thats a sweet made of honey, orange and almonds, like a small little bread, and at the end they put it into cooked wine (“saba”). the women where so friendly and forced us to help them prick almonds into the bread. then we also ate it and got some sort of sweet wine, too.
we went on (searching for more food to try and leaving out the houses where they showed traditional stuff, paitings and so on) and found a cheese-place with really really great cheese, pecorino. mmmmmh!
we were kind of an attraction because we werent italians, and everybody was so friendly to us – more than one asked us where we would stay over nigth and when we said we would go back to cagliari they went like, “oh my god, no, you have to stay, tomorrow it will go on!”, and nearly invented us to their houses.
then wine! and there we met our “guides” for the rest of the evening. they took us to another house to show us an original old house, or better two rooms, a kitchen and a bedroom how it was 200 years ago.
and then francesco appeared, a 66 year old italian who has been in germany for 9 years – 35 years ago. he took verenas hand, did not let it go again and started talking to us in really good german. he took us to the house where he was born, showed us where the pigs used to live.... he got really excited and you could really see how happy he was to meet us and to show us his village and explain us things, like how they washed clothes, how they colored wool, how they produced textiles...... it was just great.
later we went into a pizzeria – they invented us, we couldnt do anything – and after that we went home, with a full stomach, happy after a great day and everybody full of images and impressions of this small mountain village and its people. last thing francesco said when we said goodbye: “entschuldigung dass ich so glücklich bin” - “sorry for me being so happy”! he was so excited all the time.
at 11:30 we arrived cagliari and jumped right into the beds. and we didnt spend ANY money that day except for the honey we bought........

sunday we went to the costa verde. thats a region at the west coast of sardinia. you have to go through mountains to get there, there is a beautiful sea and dunes that go kilometres into the countryside. its a lonesome area and turtles come to put their eggs in the sand.....
the weather seemed to be bad when we left cagliari, it even rained a bit, but while we got there it cleared up and there was really nice sunshine. we brought swimming clothes and went into the water and lay on the beach and ate (again...).....
when we left we had to take a “strada bianca”, thats a street without any asphalt. we even had to go through a river (what they call river here) twice! i took a picture of the second time, but the first time was even worse, seemed to be a canadian landscape with a wide but not deep river with round rocks in it – and the punto, brave car, did it!

we went on to a cave near fluminimaggiore then and went into with a guide. also this was really nice and interesting and i turned out to be the translator for verena and some other german tourists. haha! see how good my italian is!
joanne and i would like to return, because you can also do a more intensive guided tour in the caves. this we did was like for tourists, but the cave is 8 kilometers long and you can do a tour really deep inside that takes 5 to 8 hours and you really have to climb down in boots and with a lamp on your hat and can see great stalaktiten and lakes with crystall-clear water. (lisa would that be something for us when you come visit me....?)

after getting the before melted chocolate out of the fridge of the bar again and nici getting some driving lessons on borjas lap (!!??) on the parking place we went on to iglesias, just to have a little walk and to see the city.
from iglesias it was 30 minutes to go back to cagliari.


this was really a great weekend. i am still full of emotions, images, and thoughts. we met so nice people saturday. i always heard the sardinian people wouldnt be very open to strangers, but we had a totally different impression. the landscape is great and i am really looking forward to spring, when everything must be even more green, and thousands of flowers growing under the trees. the countryside reminds me of greece: i think i must have been 4 or 5 when we were there, but i still remember how we walked under olive trees with all these flowers, anemonen, orchideen, and my father taking pictures, and the cave reminded me of a cave i think we also went in in greece with a small boat.... i wonder if the landscape in spring here in sardinia will be as i expect it to.


pictures dont work today, internet is getting on my nerves, its still not fixed on my computer. but there will follow really GREAT pictures borja took, here and on photobucket.

why i chose sardinia

yes, THIS was the reason.

(i took the video out because there was trouble with my sidebar. i want you all to see my lovely face at the top of the blog. the video should be found here)


we went to this beach today, and it was great. we got a sunburn. its october! haha! more images of the trip below.



last two days we did some things here in cagliari, went to the beach near the city, went for a walk in the city, went to a park on a hill to have a nice view, and i had to go to university for some lessons.

i dont write much but i will give you some impressions.


the turtle that lives on the kitchen table.




the view out of my window. its the house of a roman poet called tigelius. i will google that one day.




at monte urpino, a hill in the city surrounded by a huge parc. this is cagliari.





and more impressions of baia chia were we went today. its in the south of sardinia, near the costa del sud. (the images are a little bigger if you click on them.)

olbia-trip

today in german, its too anstrengend to write english today. sorry.


nachdem verenas flug gestern tollerweise verspaetung hatte, mussten wir wirklich eine nacht in olbia verbringen - in adeles bed&breakfast. sehr adrett, hat mich irgendwie sehr an meine oma erinnert, und so ein poliertes nussbaumholzbett habe ich auch noch nie gesehen. ausserdem war adele sehr lieb und hat mich immer amore genannt, waehrend ihr monstroser kater an verenas fuss gekettet hing.

heute sind wir dann mittags mit verenas rollkoffer durch die stadt geirrt, weil es keine gepaeckaufbewahrung gibt. ueberhauot ist das eine stadt von ungefaehr einbeck-groesse, dazu war sonntag und alles zu. naja, ganz huebsch anzusehen immerhin.ausserdem haben wir bekanntschaft mit mario gemacht, einem ungefaehr 65jaehrigen italiener, der in dem zweiminuetigen gespraech als erstes abgecheckt hat, ob wir einen ehemann haben oder verlobt sind, dann wollte er mit uns spazierengehen und hat danach gefragt ob wir einen fotoapparat haben, fuer ein erinnerungsfoto, und nach einem haendedruck der wirklich einer der laecherlichsten war die ich je erlebt habe ist er dann wieder von dannen gezogen. war lustig.

nach 4 stunden zugfahrt sind wir dann am fruehen abend in cagliari angekommen, haben noch ein willkommenseis zu uns genommen, futter gekocht und dann die naechste woche halbswegs geplant. gibt schon viel anzugucken. vielleicht bestuecke ich das hier dann auch bald mal wieder mit fotos. internet geht aber immer noch nicht auf meinem laptop und ich bin su faul hier fotos rumzutransportieren. abgesehen davon, dass ich ausser der schildkroete auch noch nichts fotografiert habe...

i got companions!

yesterday i met giorgio, the cagliarian guy i wrote mails to since may. lisa is afraid i might marry him and stay, and lisa, if he ever asks me to i may do it. :p he was very nice and very good-looking.


today i bought me a plant to have something i can talk to. a baby-philodendron, not the most interesting plant, but it grows fast and i might see a progress. and i could not effort to buy a more expensive one because i also bought a PCMCIA-card to go wireless. who would have thought my cute old little laptop would go wireless one day! but i am not sure how long he will survive, he had a nervous breakdown yesterday and we had to take off the battery to calm him down. (HE must be male.)
anyway, i didnt succeed to install this wireless thing. scheisse.


i also recognized yesterday that there is no heater in my room and no heater anywhere in the flat. the girl from my university who was here last winter told me to get a flat with heater because it can get really cold. too late.
i also planted the basilikum from lisa, finally. very resistant. maybe it survives a cold winter.


tomorrow verena is coming to visit me for 10 days and i have to go to olbia to catch her at the airport. we will have to problem to come back tomorrow night so maybe we will have to stay there....


and i think at the end of this month i will need care packages. please send donations of food and everything else you want to get rid off, like money, clothes or greetings, to the following adress:

my name
c/o rita boero
via carbonazzi 17
09123 cagliari
sardegna
italia

the adventure of building a schedule

yesterday i went to my faculty and tried to find out which courses would be given that are interesting for me. it was not so easy to find the faculty, because there was written "facolta die medicina" on every building and i thought i was totally wrong. a guy sitting in an information office told me that there was something with language too, but he didnt know where... this is what they call information in italy.

i finally found the place the courses hang out what doesnt mean i understood it. there are some notes pinned on the wall, but not on every note is written the beginning of the class so maybe it takes places next year. printed calendars or something like that dont exist. i chose some of the courses i understood and hope that will be enough.

the first started today, and we were 7 erasmus students and 2 italian girls - the course is called history of modern art, and i dont know why the faculty of foreign languages offers a class like that, but perche non!
the second class was more like what i know from leipzig - there is not enough place for everybody so some students stay outside and try to understand something. thats a class called history of the cinema, and we are going to watch stanley kubricks "shining" tomorrow. nice class.


i also picked a german language class which will start in november, a class called germanic filology, a literature course my tutor gives (we will read rafik schami...), and something else i forgot now.

classes do not take place once a week for 2 hours as it is in germany, but 2 or 3 times a week, so its 3 up to 5 hours a week for one subject. also very strange. strange country. strange.

i found a room!

ich bin eben ein gluecksbaerchen.



today i signed in at the students residence where i moved in today. seems that the director of the students residence liked me because i am so nice and cute and talk so good italian - anyway, in the afternoon she invited me to see her house because she also has a flat for students, and i went with her to see it. (dont forget in this student residence are many many students searching for a room - but she asked me!)

after that i had another appointment for a flat. that was also ok, but is not ready to move in yet, and there will be 7 other people i dont know - so i decided to take the first appartment, and voilà.
its quite in the center, in a quiet street - the room is big and nice, the flat has 3 balconies, dsl :) and there live two english girls and a spanish guy (laure, guess his name....), its about 10-15 minutes by feet from my university - and there lives a little turtle on the kitchen table. i guess he will be my special friend, i really feel pity for him in his tiny bowl. but the english girl said they want to buy him a bigger terrarium.
sooooo everything is fine. i will move in tomorrow morning, and i am really looking forward to unpack my luggage in a place i wont have to leave a few days later - i just want to arrive now.



i also went to my tutor today. he is from germany so its easy to talk to him and inform myself. the first thing he said is that in italy, you dont need to go to your classes - you can even take exams in a course you have never been to.
he told me some names of teachers who do interesting courses, and as an erasmus you just need to go there and say you want to take part - you can do everything. so tomorrow i will try to build my schedule.

benvenuto a cagliari!

first: i will try to go on in english, at least most of the times, because my beloved siena company may want to read this. hello to all of you, i miss you already.


i am doing fine, i stayed 2 days with paul, the guy from my university in leipzig now. saturday when i arrived he had a birthday party in his appartment so i was directly introduced to un sacco di friends of him.
yesterday we went to the beach - its still absolutely beach weather here -, and i started to try to find a room, but thats not so easy.

today i went to the university and got informations about the things i have to do now, at least all that concerns university organisation. i still dont know how i should build my schedule or who my tutor is. i will find out.

and i met francesco, my mentor or how they call it who will help me find a room. i also will move to the student hall for a couple of days, that costs 5 euros a night, and in pauls room there is really not much space, another friend of him is there too, and this night poor paul slept without blanket because i didnt bring any sleeping bag.... francesco told me in one week there will be a room guaranteed. mh.

important: i found gratis internet! students can register here and have one hour per day free internet access, quite fast. i think its pretty unlikely that i will find an appartment with internet - many dont even have a fixed phone.


the city is - a city, i dont know if i expected something different or if i am just not used to real cities after siena. its big (well bigger than siena....) and loud and filthy. but i think i will really like it.