New season, new job, new experiences. Fall is here in Rome! Gone are the days of camping out in front of the portable air conditioner, multiple daily cold showers, and (sadly) sunbathing. October has brought in some chilly weather, and I have unearthed what little warm clothing I packed when I left Chicago in July (which is not much - what was I thinking?). Though winter was a distant, far-off thought when I first arrived in Rome, it is steadily creeping towards us now. While I have have packed away the sandals and begun wearing a light jacket, the Italians are in full winter-survival mode: massive puffy coats, hats, scarves, gloves and boots are the standard already. I'd like to see an Italian survive a week in a Chicago winter...there woudn't be enough shiny puffy coats in the world to see them through!
Anyhow, for those who follow my blog, I apologize for my prolonged absence. It has been a very busy two months, but I feel like things are finally settling down a little bit, and I have many updates to come! The craziness began in the last week of August, as I had submitted applications to several teacher training programs in Rome, in hopes of gaining my certification to teach English as a Second Language. On one ridiculously hot Wednesday afternoon, as I was at the sweltering gym (again, what was I thinking?) I received a call from one of the schools, asking me to come in for an interview. They had, like everything else in Rome, shut down for the month of August. The program was to begin in less than a week, but if I could make it in for an interview that afternoon, they could squeeze me in as a last-minute addition to the course. All went well, and a few days later, I found myself sitting in a room with the small group of people who were to become, basically, the only faces I would see for the next 30 days. The Trinity CertTESOL program is designed to get you ready to be a teacher in a month, and in signing up for that, you agree to all it entails: 9 hours a day, 5 days a week, of classes and practice teaching, followed by whatever frantic dinner you can get down when you arrive home, followed by lesson planning and paper writing until about 2AM, and a few hours of sleep per night...if you're lucky! The program was run by two women, who could not have been more different. One taught teaching methodology, and the other taught grammar. Methodology was taught by an English woman named Vicky, who was an ideal teacher in almost every way. Funny, interesting, supportive, experienced and easygoing. When, as seemed to happen often in our group, one of my classmates seemed near to a nervous breakdown, she was usually the calming voice of reason to restore order/sanity where needed. Her counterpart was Ester: a half-Italian, half-New Yorker who was loud, challenging, and refused to handle anyone with kid-gloves. I actually really liked her. When she wasn't swearing like a sailor or or chain-smoking on the patio, she was an excellent teacher - I learned more grammar from her in a month than I learned in all of my school education growing up. In their own ways, both of these women were fantastic teachers, and I have to give them a lot of credit and respect for running such an intense program...I'm pretty sure they worked almost as hard as we did to make it through the month (minus the coffee-fueled, 2AM, furious typing in the dark trying to finish two papers and lesson plan for the next morning - pretty sure that was just us).
Anyhow, in the end, I made it through. I now hold a certification which will allow me to teach English pretty much anywhere in the world (except the U.S., of course!). The payoff for all my hard work is that I was able to begin working only a few days after I finished my program. I have found a job with a school which contracts out teachers to families and individuals for private or small group lessons, which are held in their homes or offices. In a nutshell, this means I travel EVERYWHERE...where I used to be wary of the bus system in Rome, and avoided it at all costs, it now feels like a comfortable old friend who I know inside and out. I'm getting to know the city and it's outlying areas pretty well, and interacting with a lot of people in my broken Italian, which I will admit is improving little by little as I am forced to speak to the parents of the children I teach in Italian. This, on day one, was incredibly terrifying to me. Italians, if you don't know them personally, can be quite scary - loud, fast-talking, gesticulating creatures, who look down their noses at you for daring to not be Italian, not to speak Italian, or be wearing something other than sequins or Louis Vuitton or shiny puffy coats (or some combination of the three). However, I scraped up all of the bravery I could muster, memorized a few key phrases (for the parents: Pardon my Italian, I'm just learning. For the kids: Look! Listen! Write!) and rang that first doorbell. And, in the end, it wasn't so bad. The families are mostly sweet, and happy I'm there. They bring trays of snacks into the lessons, flutter around making sure I'm comfortable, adjusting lights, windows, etc, until they are satisfied they have been gracious hosts. The kids, while often challenging, are loveable as well. I usually get hugs when I arrive and leave, and with the rare exception, they seem to enjoy our lessons. I'm enjoying teaching this way, and find it more rewarding than I think I would teaching in a big class where I would not get to make as much of a connection with the students or see results quite so easily. I plan on sticking with this school for a while, so hopefully things continue to go well.
I promise to be back soon with more updates...ciao!
