Thursday, March 14, 2013

Last Day of Greek Class


Zach Wasielewski
Last Day of Greek Class
3/6/13
            When I woke this morning, I realized today was the last day of our Greek language class.  When I thought about this I had mixed feelings. I was pretty excited for it to be over because the class was a lot of work, but I am going to miss the time we spent learning this new language.   I can understand why we needed to spend time in the classroom when we first arrived.  Being able to speak even a little Greek has been beneficial. Now that I am a little proficient in the language, I am looking forward to travelling the countryside with Professor Roth. 
Our final presentation was due today and while walking to class I took the time to review and prepare my thoughts.  During class we presented our families, mom, dad, and siblings.  Perre found our presentations to be excellent and she was extremely happy for all of us.    When our presentations were complete, we spent the remainder of the class taking pictures of famous people and writing a description in Greek.  The last part of class was spent reading these descriptions to our classmates. Our instructor Perre expressed her pleasure in having us as a class and the group decided that we should celebrate by taking her to lunch on Thursday.  It will be nice to have one more day to talk with her and show her how much we learned in her Greek language class.
            We have been in Greece a month, and I have enjoyed all of the new challenges and activities.  In Ioanna’s class we are learning the history of Greece by going to museums.  This helped me understand the subject matter quicker because I am a more visual learner.  Being lectured in a classroom sets the groundwork, but spending time with the actual sculptures and art work brings the history to life. For me, I could see the true beauty of the history of Greece.  Traveling with Ioanna is my favorite part of the trip because we travel to places that most people will not have the opportunity to visit.  One of my favorites was staying at the monastery.
The weather over the past month has been on the colder side and all of us are looking forward to warmer weather.  The biggest complaint with the weather has been the rain. I can’t believe how much it rains and how badly it affects the roads.  The roads overflow and are like rivers running through the streets of Athens.  The food over the past month has been different but quite an experience.  My favorite has been the lamb, but I also enjoyed the pork and chicken gyros. 
            One night we had Professor Roth and his two daughters over for dinner.   Carol and Katie did the cooking.  We had a nice dinner with everyone to celebrate the completion of our two Greek classes.  It was nice to have a “family” dinner and talk about everything that has been going on in the first month.  We also discussed our plans for spring break which is coming up this Friday.  The group is getting excited.  Pat, Chryssie, Hayley, and I are going to Dublin, Amsterdam, and Barcelona for our spring break.  Katie, Lauren, and Carol are going to Prague, Paris, and Barcelona for their spring break.  Ashley will be spending the entire break in Barcelona.  Our group will all be together in Spain and we are excited to spend the end of spring break exploring Barcelona.  Hopefully one of us can speak a little Spanish.

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