Snow!!!!

Hey, guess what?!?
We got snow!!! And the Bora! phew, that's a lot of wind.
Yesterday it got quite cold, and everyone was complaining about the weather. I went to an amazing production in the evening - two men from Paraguay doing a play about one of the men's experience as a political prisoner, how he was tortured physically and psychologically, and how he and his fellow prisoners used theater games and imagination to retain their sanity for 13 years. It was really good, and very moving. I found it disturbing because when they finished and bowed I realized that they hadn't stepped out of their characters and become just people again as normally happens at the end of a play: these horrible experiences had really happened to this person and he would never step out of a role and become "normal". After the performance, they held a Q&A session, which was very interesting. It turns out that he was released partially due to the efforts of Amnesty International and other organizations, and it was surprising and heartening to actually see a person to whom the efforts of a group that I participated in made a difference.
We had Tutorial Dinner afterwards, so my group left a little early. I was expecting the dinner to be subdued, after that performance, but when we got out I felt something touch my cheek...I looked up in disbelief - snowing? In Italy? Before Thanksgiving?? No way. But there they were, few and far between, but very clearly drifting down past the streetlights. Eduardo was amazed - he's never seen snow before (even though they have mountains in Peru...) - and we both ran about like maniacs, catching snow and jumping up and down and hugging each other. So the dinner was fun after all.
Today I had my first encounter with the legendary Bora. I went outside in the morning to go to class and was immediately assaulted by a huge wind. I could hardly get down the stairs, but it was fantastic, I ran all the way to class (well, technically I was late, but I would have run anyway...).
This afternoon we went climbing (our leader, coming most recently from Antarctica, doesn't mind cold) and it was Freezing. The rocks were cold, the wind was cold, we were cold, we had to keep our hands exposed to grip the rock and our feet were squeezed into too-small, thin rubber climbing shoes, and we weren't particularly happy.
But I eventually warmed up, and I'm happy about the cold. Who would have ever guessed it would get cold in Italy?? I'm so glad it did.

Sunsets

I know you have sunsets everywhere, but this one was particularly spectacular, and I wanted to share the joy.

Of course the camera doesn't do it justice, but it's close enough.

EE Show

The second years' Extended Essays are done! And so the first years have, according to UWCAd tradition, put on an EE Show for them. We've been working on it for over a month, and it came off fantastically last night. We did it along the theme of a TV station: EETV with a live studio audience. We had all the secondi dress up as TV characters:
James Bond (and his girlfriend, Bondgirl, my seconda)

The Adams family,

Aladdin and Jasamine, etc.

I was greeting people at the entrance with a camera and autograph book and being a classic fan: "Wow! Isaac! I've always dreamed of meeting you. Your last movie was amazing. My friends are going to be so jealous of me. Y'know, I won this place in the Studio audience by calling into the radio...I never expected to actually come and get to meet you guys... Can I have your picture? Your autograph? Wow..." (thus this picture)

Then we started the show. It was so funny - we had everything from STOMP:
To examples of classic EE Friends (The non-existent eefriend, the competetive eefriend, the eelover, the transgender eefriend, etc.)
To the strip show: note Eilu on the end, our resident firstyear gay guy. (no, Nik (the guy dancing with him) is not gay and Eilu has a boyfriend)

To a great teacher impersonation skit that involved the economics teacher coming up on stage and battling his alter-ego for possession of the name Peter Howe, and the Director of Studies (who's really strict and sort of hard to deal with) dressed up as batwoman.
To the (traditional) strip show:
In between skits there were advertisements like "Super-Cancer-Cigarettes" (Alejandro and Nick smoking and Elad comes in with 10ish cigarettes rubberbanded together and shows off) the slogan was "Everybody gets cancer, why wait?"
Nevin and I did an Arabic song ("Arabian MTV") and it sounded great.
At the end I finally unveiled myself to my EEFriend (Salim) he was so surprised and happy. It was really funny. I gave him Skittles and Milky Way as a final EE present (Thank you Anne!!!) and then everyone went to Micky's (local bar) to party.
Such fun...

why war?

You probably haven't heard about this, because it came out here, (but BBC managed to get it. funny, I wonder if that says anything about American media... ) but Rai, (Italian TV) broadcasted a documentary on the US army's use of white phosphorus (aka Napalm) in the battle of Fallujah against civilians.
If you're into scary sights and Italian, (I haven't had the courage to watch it yet, but my rooma has, says it's really disturbing) you can watch it.
http://www.rainews24.rai.it/ran24/inchiesta/default_02112005.asp
I find it hard to fathom...I had a difficult conversation with my roommates last night, trying to understand how people like the Americans I knew (some of them in the army) could do something like this. I can understand Nevin's friends doing cruel and seemingly insane things in war, or Samari (from Sudan) because they've been brought up in an environment conducive to that sort of thing.
but Americans? god, I'm so naive... How can people do that?

Croatia

I've added two new countries to my list now. Slovenia and Croatia. Technically I never really set foot in Slovenia, but I got the stamp in my passport (which, by the way, I like a lot now, seeing as it gets me everywhere and people like Nevin and Vanessa and Tara can only go to certain countries with theirs) so that sort of counts.
Croatia was fun though, we spent two days there, wandering around. isn't this weird? They live in the house, but it's half broken down.
we found a nice black kitty and befriended it. Toni apparently really likes cats.
and the 2nd biggest amphitheater in Europe. Interesting to see a normal street dissolve into this - a conflict of eras.
And then I got back to Duino and went trick-or-treating around my residence. Most of the time I had to explain what it was and half the time I got hugs instead of candy, but it was fun, and I got some chocolate and oranges and cookies and gum. A far cry from the hundreds I used to get, but whatever. It's the thought/act that counts.
And long weekend is almost over, a wonderful and relaxing weekend.