La Mia Famiglia

My host family is wonderful. Cristina, my host mom, is a lawyer and so so kind. She also cooks fabulous meals and I'm always stuffed after dinner.

Our first dinner:















penne pesto, zucchine con pomodoro, carne (it was kind of like a meat loaf wrap?), insalata, pane

Cristina's friend Alessandro, an economics professor at a university in Rome, joined us for dinner the first night. His English is great, which helped us communicate with Cristina. We talked about a number of things that night, including Cristina's love for India (she has paintings of Krishna and carpets from India in her living room and is planning to go this Christmas) and her strong distaste for Berlusconi, the current Prime Minister. "He is not Obama, bell'Obama. I wouldn't mind if Obama divorced Michelle and married me instead" (translation). Here they are, as we ate a crostata and the Sees Candies I brought for Cristina from home.


Cristina has an 18-year-old son named Rodolfo, or Rudy for short. He is in his last year of high school, studying for his university entrance exams. Today he didn't go to school because he didn't feel like it, but he said his mom doesn't mind since he studies hard. He loves sports, especially soccer (he doesn't think Italy will do too well in the World Cup this year) and basketball (he likes Shaq, Paul Pierce, and KG). I'll post a photo of him sometime.

Here's a look at my room:

Bigger than my room at home!



The view from my balcony

I'll probably do a photo post later tonight. I'm off to see the Pantheon now.