We are back in Verona after two years and I have just now caught my breath enough to make an update. The last time we were here, I took Italian lessons for 3-4 hours a day, with minimal homework – a grammar lesson in the morning and a group conversation lesson in the early afternoon. This time, I am doing six hours a day of lessons: two hours of grammar followed by two hours of conversation and two hours of one-on-one tutoring. I am learning much faster, but end up with very little time to do anything besides eat and sleep! Fortunately, these are my two favorite things in the world, so I am having a great time. David is learning with me, taking two hours a day of Italian in the morning, so we get to have a lot of fun conversations about what we are learning.

I am studying to improve my spoken fluency so I can get around easier, but I am focusing on my translation abilities. I am lucky enough to have people at InClasse who are willing to work with me very specifically to achieve my objectives! Gaia reads a 1575 fencing manual with me painstakingly for an hour every day, explaining all the archaic (and not so archaic) words and expressions. To get an idea of the amount of patience this requires, think about reading and explaining the KJV to someone with a pretty shaky grasp of English! It’s working, though, and I’m learning quickly how to read wacky Italian that has sometimes more in common with Latin. It’s exciting to get a translation project underway, and the material I’m working through is fascinating. In brief, it’s a philosophical discussion between historical figures who dispute what is the “most worthy,” arms or letters.

In between lessons, we are finding time to explore and eat. We are staying in a comfortable one-bedroom apartment with air conditioning and a washing machine (this is a big deal for a 5-week stay in the summer!) We are near Piazza Bra, where the Roman Arena is in the historical center of Verona. However, one of my favorite views of the city is still over the Adige from the Castelvecchio bridge:

We miss having our daily commute involve walking over this bridge like it did two years ago, but we are pretty happy to be in a more central location. Now it’s only a five-minute walk to school, seven to Piazza Bra, and fifteen to the nearest supermarket.

We had a lovely anniversary weekend in Venice. Seven years! We took a gondola ride this time. Unfortunately, the few pictures I did take didn’t really come out too well. Here’s one where we leave the gondola wharf near St. Mark’s:

We also took a rare opportunity to take each other’s pictures in the main doorway to St. Mark’s Basilica without a crowd – strangely, because it was a little flooded, there weren’t a bunch of people there in the evening. David made fun of me for getting my feet wet on Friday night, but he caved and did it himself on Saturday

Venice was a lot of fun, and we enjoyed being there when it wasn’t 100+ degrees out (like last time). This time we gravitated more towards walking, eating, and shopping than touring, but it was still a really fun city to be in.

This week in Verona we have been really busy with school, but I think we have adjusted to the time difference, so that at least is easier.

Here is our apartment in Verona:

and the inside:

I’ll put more pictures up later, but for now I need to get back to translating!