Una famiglia romana a Milano

Looking at the Matterhorn and the Swiss/French border from Champoluc

 I MADE IT! It was a long trip that I took a week ago from Minneapolis to New York to Roma to Milano, but I made it safe and sound.

My famiglia here in Milano consists of the mother and father, Giovanna and Livio, their eldest daughter, Ginevra aka Ginni, and their two twins, Gaia and Giulia plus the two adopted family members of their maid, Belli, and their tata, or nanny, Giosi. Yes, it was strange to me too that I came as a quasi Au Pair but they kept their nanny as well, but then I learned that she has been with the famiglia since their eldest, Ginni, was a year old and is now truly a part of their family.

Living room area

I'm going to language classes Monday-Friday until noon then have the afternoons to myself until I meet up with the girls when they finish school at 4pm. Usually I accompany Ginni to her activities which include dance class, swimming, and catechism in preparation for her Confirmation. Fortunately all her activities are very close by so I can actually get there and back without getting lost!

My room

One of the main reasons I am here is to help the girls, especially Ginni, in developing some English speaking skills. This has been a challenge for me because it makes it hard to get to know the girls and win their confidence when you can't really have a consistent conversation. There runs the risk of having them associate you with having to work hard, which is definitely not what I want. I just need to keep thinking and keep being creative with how I can make hanging out with me and speaking English fun!


My language classes thus far seem to be a good level of Italian for me. There's no really new grammar but rather refreshing what I've learned and going deeper into it. It's also been a really neat opportunity to meet people from all different countries while keeping our common language Italian so there's no danger of reverting back to English. The countries thus far represented in my class are the Philippines, Latvia, Ireland, Brazil, Mexico, and Turkey. Interesting enough they are all girls at this point too, most of which have Italian boyfriends/fiances/husbands.

My first weekend with the
family, I went with them to their condo in the mountains. It's located at Champoluc, a ski town in the Valle d'Aosta region of Italia on the Swiss/French/Italian border. The girls each had their own short lesson to go to for an hour or so, but all in all the skiing only lasted a couple of hours or so. Although I was a bit disappointed to only get a little ski time in, I was really just happy to have gotten to stay with them and see how skiing in Italia is different than what I'm used to. I'm excited to get more opportunities to go back as the season goes on!

Giulia

Gaia at the mountain house