Forza Viola!

February 22nd 2020: Go team! My uncle arrived Friday evening and after a quick stop for gelato, we were off to the races! With 3 Koff’s in town, the Florentines had no chance! Saturday night was the big game! Fiorentina against AC Milan…(be prepared, going full soccer nerd) Obviously we are HUGE Fiorentina fans, and not just because they have the prettiest purple uniforms! For anyone who isn’t a follower of the Serie A, Fiorentina has not been doing so great lately. And Milan has one of the biggest soccer names in the world: Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Getting to see him play in person was pretty incredible, he doesn’t run or move much at all but still dominates the field. His ability to obliterate Florentine players with three steps was both awesome and terrifying! For some reason, my conversation class at school didn’t fully prepare me for the game. New words and songs reverberated through the stadium directed at the away fans who are walled in with plexiglass. The final score was 1-1 despite the game being pretty terrible for both sides. Zlatan scored in the first half but a controversial VAR call reversed the decision…still waiting for Hartford to invest in this technology! The photo above is Nonna and I prior to the game. She was too angry for a photo after but not to fear, she expressed her feelings loudly and clearly to the opposing fans!

February 23rd 2020: The excitement of Saturday night spilled into Sunday. I was literally thrown into the deep end with my Italian AND I survived! My uncle was here for the weekend and we went to lunch with some of his friends and dinner with others. The conversation around me was all in Italian and I was able to understand a lot of it! The two topics that were easiest for me, no surprise here, were American politics and soccer. I could piece together what was being said and even formulate a response! Most of the other topics I could understand but lacked the vocabulary to respond. Dinner was at an Egyptian-Italian Pizzeria and I got a risotto with tomato and burrata that was amazing!!

In other news, at school today my class made the instagram so that was exciting!