Finally, after the misfortunes of the visa, I landed in Chicago and then to South Bend and Notre Dame. A first week full but very linear. I bought the boots to tackle the snow and rain (even though many girls are using the flip-flops, that is the FlipFlops, which has its own reason: it's raining, you flip-flops, a towel and quickly solve everything, without being forced / aa drive you around and especially shoes stockings, socks, wet ghosts: this also allows to show the color that Mabellini NY last thought for the nails of your feet). The Life is really short here, but there is little wonder, in short, mica or speak Maldives Malindi (the place preferred by clients of the agency where I did my low cost). The sky is leaden, at least until February, when the campus is deserted, late of examinations, and people dedicated to decorate their homes for Christmas. And here divides the preparation for Christmas.
As you can see by the following examples: Some of you ask what they mean the film, inspired by the book by Grisham, Christmas with the Kranks. Well. Nothing anti-Christian or atheist, simply run away from those $ 8,000 you need to decorate with lights, Babb birth (Santas) and so is your home, inside and out. Thus, during the Sunday Mass, the priest said that one of his followers had prepared better Christmas this year ... unity because he bought a backup for the lights of his house: as they say in Italian? Already I have no words ...
The background is an incredible number of different versions of the usual Christmas songs, performed by Jennifer Lopez, Mariah Carey, Bill Clinton, Robert De Niro, Diana Krall (which, if you want my advice, really deserves), Bing Crosby , Tony Bennett, etc., In different styles, jazz, funk, bebop, rap, R & B. .. crucial to your soundtrack is to put American Greensleeves from the Peanuts Christmas CD. The soundtrack accompanies the party, shopping at the mall, walking on campus, life at home, use of internet, there's a whistle that Christmas ends up becoming part of you and so little by little become even Christmas you.
But there are also nativity scenes, Advent and everything else, say the substance. Even if it is to marry the American spirit, and in the splendid if a little 'kitsch Basilica (pronounced Bezsilika) University, in the chancel stands a clock with the countdown The minute I have to say that I felt some anxiety in the last stanza of the final song, when the clock was at -17 and has managed to stay within just one second.
to church, but a bit 'all over the world, love is expressed through hugs (hugs), which become softer with the passage of time: you have no idea what a year can fatten a forty, I can say at first person, but that is not me talking here ... had with what you eat and shake ... But at least it's good, compared to the Italian imitations, so in the USA USA and you eat enough.
Tips to imagine the American spirit in this period: see Christmas with the Kranks, as mentioned above, and the first of two Mother Alone!, which contain the near-perfect balance of the spiritual and the consumerism of Christmas, along with the basic song to enter the mood. For the rest, if you have the opportunity to read chronologically the period from November to March of the Complete Peanuts, yet to be published and Baldini Castoldi Dalai PaniniComics and, in different editions, but just with chronological order, you'll know what is the background this period in most of the States: a common uniform and a bit 'boring, which sees the end of football season, sliding the Christmas period, starting the second semester or the new calendar year working, and slowly extend until Charlie Brown goes back on the springboard and reorganizes his squad for the baseball season.
At this time, the most watched TV show is Lost, in his first season in Italy, here from February to the third, the second already on DVD, so that those who did not see it can catch up, keep up before the end of winter. There is a beautiful film about the life of Johnny Cash, Walk the Line (there are more and more American movies, I noticed that we import in Italy, put it another way ... in English! So the confusion is not complete ... really know what you saw and what you have not seen. However, in general the film Americans love their singers Ray ... for example last year.
There then a big boost in the study of Pop Culture in all its forms, from TV series architecture, comics, music, design. I would refer you to The Atlas of the emotions of Giuliana Bruno, published at Harvard and soon translated into Italian, but watch out for upcoming Manual Antonio Monda on American cinema.
Well, what are you doing there, you ask? Well, philosophy is a blog designed to be more engaged, you will find here basically costume then what makes you truly understand everything else and allows you to do philosophy ...
I decided to blog, and not for the newsletter, so messages will not arrive full of photos, which I consider necessary to tell the story ... although this time there are no photos.
What does it encounters a zero opti? But what a beautiful belt you've bought for Christmas ... American humor here ... with which I leave you tonight, while outside there are six degrees and in Italy, at 4 under 10, there are 17.
way, a little note on time. And 'this happened. Indiana has reconsidered the time zone. And it was decided to give each county, we say to each municipality, authority to decide on the time zone, if one of the Midwest (-7) or the Far East (-6): result, chaos, a kind of time to patchy in a territory as large as half of Italy. Then the federal law (one day we will cover the laws) has established a division in the middle more or less fair, which led to South Bend in part in New York, which is 15 hours away by car and has stolen in Chicago, which is an hour from here. So, if you take the car and go to the Big Apple at normal speed it takes you fifteen hours, if you go to Chicago and forced a little 'time, you can leave and arrive at the same time as starting at seven by seven to get to Milan and turin ... which makes me think that with this trick you can always earn an hour and never get old, if you stay in the car at constant speed. But I think at some point encounter the Great Wall of China (which is why the year built, the rest had their clocks mysteriously as long as 5000 years ago).
Okay, this is stupid but what remains true is that Indiana is the only country in the world that keeps the same hours all year round, no DST. Frankly, I must say that I think almost always dark, at any time, and very often I get confused with the time, for some strange mechanisms, Italy and the United States are approaching the times of meals and then leave the rest of the day. What gives a lot of psychological satisfaction, because I do not know, is that when you go to the campus or read the email from Italy, you have the idea that people have already worked for you ... must make better use of the idea.
Good Night and Good Luck
Marco
Image: Kevin Huizenga, Glenn Ganges: Travellers of Time.
