Genova and My first week of classes

October 22-26, 2007 Monday through Friday

My first week of school. Class starts at 10am and ends at 1:30pm (with a 20 minute break from 11:40 to 12:00). There are 3 people in class: Liz from Atlanta, Vidir Sigurdsson from Reykjavik, Iceland, and me. The teacher name is Nazarena, a very stylish, young Italian woman living in Genova. She’s studying French and English.

Liz started classes a week ago, so she’s gone over the material in the first week once already. I’ve picked up some Italian over the years, and had 10 2-hour classes last October near home. Vidir has no Italian at all—zip. He speaks pretty good English, but he’s at a disadvantage since all the explanations are given in English, but he has to make sense out of them in Icelandic. Apparently Icelandic is very close to old Norse (the language the Vikings used). Anyway, he’s struggling.

The first week covered about the same material as the 10 classes I took last October (which I’d mostly forgotten). This included the conjugations for present tense for the verbs “to be” (essere), “to have” (avere), and the regular verb conjugations (of which Italian has 4 ending in –are, -ere, and -ire with 2 variations).

Life in Genova. At first, I was disappointed with Genova, but now, it’s growing on me. The apartment I’m in is in the “centro storico” or historic center of Genova. Genova has the largest medieval city center in Europe. The “streets” I walk between apartment and school have been here since the 13^th century. I say “streets” because many of them are only about 5-6 feet wide and are more alleys than streets. Here they are called “vicoli” (or “vicolo” for one). No cars are allowed in the centro storico during the day and only some vicoli can accommodate cars, even at night. The harbor is about 200 yards away from my front door (although I can’t see it from my apartment or the front door).

This all has certain ramifications. If there are no cars (or trucks) allowed, or even possible in a lot of cases, then what? How do they pick up garbage? Well, it turns out that everyone has to carry their garbage to pick-up points either on the edge of the historic center, or on one of the few wider vicoli that can accommodate a specially constructed narrow garbage truck.

In medieval times, the areas around the port or harbor were not the nicest areas in a town (and often were the worst). This still applies in Genova. There are no more warehouses or bars with drunken sailors. But the historic center is still populated with prostitutes and druggers.

One vicolo, which is one of the main routes I use, has LOTS of ladies working the street. Some of them are quite old (60+). The story is that they have had the same clients for decades, which is how they survive. And there's drugs. I was out with some people from school at a nearby bar and we stopped at an intersection to get our bearings before we headed off in different directions. I noticed a couple of boys snorting coke over to one side--I guess we interrupted them 'cause they took off after they finished their "line".

But "everyone" says "it's not dangerous", meaning you might get pickpocketed, but you won't get physically hurt in the process. And if they recognize you as a "local" you're probably safe from pickpockets. Hopefully by now, they recognize me. It's impossible to go anywhere (without going a LONG way around and WAY up the hill) and avoid the area with the prostitutes and "scary" looking crowd, so you just go through, look like you have a purpose, and make eye contact without looking scared (or like you’re "looking" for something). My usual rule to figure out how safe an area is: watch the little old ladies. If they clutch their purses tightly, then you better watch your pockets. If not, then things are okay. If the little old ladies don't even come out at night, then beware! I haven't seen any little old ladies out after the shops close. Hmmm.

At first I was very disappointed in Genova. And not just because the old city center that I thought was going to be cool turned out to be rather unpleasant. Genova is known to have hundreds of piazzas. The historic center is loaded with them. But they’re almost all tiny little things that have 4-5 story buildings on all sides—so there’s little sun except right at mid-day. Many of them are less than 20 feet on a side. But I’ve discovered other parts of Genova than the historic center. Outside the historic center there are piazzas that are worthy of the name, with caffes and a reasonable amount of sun. And shops that stay open all afternoon (and even some on Sunday).