Skyping with Hugo

Last tuesday Valentina and I tried to speak with Hugo about politics and the health care system in the United States. I wrote "tried" because Hugo was extremely tired and had some difficulty in following our conversation. I tried to ask why he was so tired but it seemed he didn't want to tell exactly what he did. He only told us he went to bed at four in the morning! Therefore the flow of the conversation was very slow and this was also due to the fact that Hugo had no questions to ask us. So we tried to talk a little bit about the health care system in the States. I told him that some time ago I saw Michael Moore's movie called "Sicko" and that I was really impressed by the story of a man who cut two of his fingers while he was woodworking. When he went to the hospital he had to decide which finger he wanted to be put back in its place because his medical insurance couldn't pay for both. Hugo told us that if you don't have a good job or if you are a student and you have a car crash or something like that, it could be a very serious problem. They would take you to the hospital but if you are not insured they could either let you die or decide to operate you. In this case, you may have to pay debts for the rest of your life.
Then we had to stop our conversation because there were some technical problems with our headphones and we let Hugo go back to sleep, since he had no classes that day.
I think that the topic of health care could be a good subject matter for our final project, since it has been a very debated issue in the States, especially during this period of political campaign.

Skype again!

Last tuesday I had an interesting discussion talking to Ann on our third Skype meeting (actually it was the second with Ann). She immediately started asking questions about Berlusconi, because they had a class about politics in Italy with their Italian teacher. Her first qustion was about what we think of him and how we feel towards his political program. I told her that he's not one of my favourites and I explained to her what his political campaign is about. She asked me how come he's one of the richest people in Europe (I think he's the third) and Alessia and I told her that he's good at business and he built up his own commercial empire through industries, television and soccer.

Then I asked her if she had seen the Obama girl video and what she thought of it. She hadn't seen it yet but she knew what it was about and asked us if there is something like that here in Italy. She said that Obama during his campaign is visiting lots of cities including Dickinson but I didn't understand if he went there in person or sent some representatives. We all agree about the importance of these kind of actions that brings politicians to common people and which contribute to create a better image of a candidate. The hope is that all this will turn someday in pragmatic facts and that their beutiful words aren't only virtual promises. We also asked her if she preferes Obama or Hillary. She said she hopes that Obama will win the elections because she thinks that he's a very "down to the ground" person. She also hopes that someday it will be possible also for a women to be elected but she doesn't think Hillary is the right person to be head of state. She said that lots of people are going to vote for her just because she's a woman and not because they really believe in her political program. Then Alessia asked her what she would do if she was elected president. The first thing she said was the universal health care for everybody but we couldn't going much deeper in the matter because the time for our conversation was up. I think this will be an interesting starting point for the next skype meeting.

Image from United States Senate

Second Skype Meeting

Today is the fifth anniversary of the Iraq war and yesterday Alessia, Ann and I talked about terrorism and politics in Italy and America. We started making some questions to Ann about how she feels about terrorism and what has changed in the United States after 9/11. She told us that security measures have generally increased everywhere, above all in the airports. She went back home for the spring break and she had to arrive at the airport three hours early because of all security controls. Another consequence of this situation is represented by the creation of bad stereotypes regarding muslim people and Arabian in general. This happens not only in America but also here in Italy and in Europe in general, I think, because we know that religious extremists of the Middle East hate the western part of the world for various reasons. Then she asked us if we knew other types of terrorism existing in Europe and we told her about the "anni di piombo" in Italy during the seventies and about ETA in Spain.

Then we started talking about elections and politics in general and we expressed our feelings about the present situation. Many politicians here are corrupted and sentenced to prison but they keep their positions thanks to their privileges and this is not fair. Some time ago the governor of New York Elliot Spitzer was caught in a sex scandal and he resigned. Ann told that he was always talking about morality and family but his actions prove that he was not who people tought he was; we vote for people we trust but most times they leave us disappointed.

This skype meeting was more useful to me than the last because I could speak more in English; Ann was very nice and in spite of our topic of conversation we laughed a lot. She had some difficulties with Italian language but I hope she could understand most of the things Alessia and I said. This exchange is becoming more and more interesting and I think I will have learnt lots of thing from my American peers by the end of this academic year.

Questionnaires

I think that the questionnaires were an interesting way to provoke useful discussions about different topics. Through word association and sentence completion you can see what people from different cultures think about the world, people, politics and other contemporary issues. In some cases there are clear differences but sometimes we seem to have a lot of things in common. The first example I can think of regards the answers about "people from the south". Many of us said that they are cheerful and hospitable but there were also negative comment saying that they don't like to work and are more relaxed. Americans in their responses seem to be very worried not to give stereotyped definitions but in many cases their answers coincide with Italians'. Another field in which we seem to have pretty much the same ideas is politics. Negative words strongly prevail over positive ones.

It is also interesting to see what they think about us and our lifestyle: we appear very similar to their people from the south (relaxed, take it easy), but I think that this image is mainly influenced by the fact that Italians depicted through movies and TV series are people from the south. Personally, I think that Italian people from the north are very different from the stereotyped image Americans have.

I think that through next conversations on skype we will come to know other things about American culture and we will have the possibility to deepen our discussion about stereotypes and false beliefs about each other's culture and way of life.

Skype!

Last tuesday we did our first Skype session and I have to say that it was really fun. Unfortunately I couldn't speak English a lot because in the first half of the lesson I didn't have the password to login, and I could join the conversation between Marina and Michelle when they started to speak Italian. However there were some words and expressions Michelle couldn't remember and I spoke English in order to help her. We talked about our lessons, parents, movies and our plans for the next future. It was exciting because I had never talked on the phone with an American girl before and I was happy to because I could understand everything she said. It could seem a banal thing but when I watch a movie in English, for example, I always check the actors' mouth movements but on the phone it's obviously impossible! That's why I'm looking forward to do another skype exchange because I want to speak more in English and test my listening skills, learning interesting things about culture and life from our colleagues on the other side of the ocean.

Back to everyday life :-(

Hi everibody! I just came back from my holidays in Egypt and I'm so depressed. After a week of sun and sea it was awful to see the rain again. Not to mention the fact that the exams are approaching. Well, that's life and there is nothing we can do about it. Here there are some photos showing how wonderful it was!

PL...what?

PLE is our last task to complete before Christmas Holidays and I must admit that it will be good not to have to work on my computer for a while! I'm not good at creating mindmaps and I had never thought I could make one about my learning environment. What Sarah said last week made me reflect on the fact that if we don't continue to use everyday what we learn we will forget many things. As long as we are students we keep on practicing but after our final degree we'll have to keep on learning in some different ways.

These are the steps that took me to my PLE map's creation:

• First, I thought of my experiences with English language outside school and university. So, I started to think in what occasions I had to put in practice what I learnt in theory. My thesis on translation helped me reflecting on many aspects of English and Italian and part of my work consisted in suggesting my translation of a filmscript. Secondly, I thought of some situations in which I had to speak English in a foreign country, using it as a "contact language" between different cultures. A similar experience was to teach Italian to a Thai girl who has lived near my house for some time. Last but not least, I put the achievement of a Cambridge certificate.

• Then come all the sources from which I have been gathering information: school, university, teachers, websites, conferences and so on.
  
• An important part of my learning environent is made by all the things that allow me to learn something enjoying myself because when you learn this way it is easier for you to remember things. Watching TV series and films in English are two of the things I like most.


• The last part of my map represents the importance of sharing information because when you share you create a sort of virtuous circle. Nevertheless is always important to remember that information has to be filtered.

When our experience at university is over, we'll have to keep on learning using as many devices as possible and we'll have to try to enlarge our PLE, otherwise we'll lose many of the things and skills we have been learning so far.