Beatrice Moioli: From Bergamo to the Usa with Intercultura – 1st Quarter

Beatrice’s story: from Bergamo to the USA for a year, with Intercultura and the support of the Pesenti Foundation.

 
 

1st Quarter: 2017, September 

2nd Quarter: 2017, December

3rd Quarter; 2018, March

 
 
 
 


 
 

Me and my suitcase–which I erroneously believed was too small–were so sure of everything. I thought I was self-aware. I thought I was a person with well-defined characteristics and I expected everything but not getting here and starting to reconsider my positions and my ideas. Uncertainty allows you to defrost your daily routine and your life, and to look at them from a new point of view: new perspectives, new words, new people, new cultures.

 
 


 
 

50 days ago, I left with a few words, but endless thoughts, towards what I had dreamt about so much.

 
 


 
 

 
 


 
 

If I think back to those certainties that made me so proud just 50 days ago, now I cannot help but consider them as useless expectations. Nothing of what I imagined has happened. Every second, every moment of this special life keeps surprising me with a disarming force.

I look back and time seems to have flown away. I have done so many things, I have felt so many emotions that I wish every future day could be like these. I have learned to wake up in the morning with the desire of discovering more and more.

I left convinced that I would not miss my family. I was wrong. Staying in touch 24 hours a day with a new family–when you still feel like a stranger, a guest–seeing what seemed normal and you took for granted before makes you appreciate and makes you more aware of what you had and what you have. You realize that you have looked and looked, but never admired. Here in the US, 9000 km far from my beloved Bergamo (I am rediscovering how magnificent it is), I have found some wonderful people and I am immensely grateful to my host family that is one of the most beautiful gifts I have ever received.

 
 


 
 

Once accepting the cultural differences that at first made me feel out of place, I started to open my heart and–despite some moments of concern that are always around the corner, when I feel a strong desire to run away back to Italy–I feel happy to consider myself part of my American family.

 
 


 
 

I have a host mother who is the sweetest, most caring and quietest person in the world, a host father who is a child in the body of a giant, a host sister who’s never still for a moment, and host grandparents who shower me with unconditional love.

Thank you, immensely. Thank you.

 
 


 
 

 
 


 
 

The US, and Seattle in particular, with its multiculturalism, its diversity, and its variety is showing me a completely new way of life.

From Monday to Friday I wake up at 5.30 and travel to the other side of town for a swim before school. I think this journey from north to south of my Emerald City (Seattle’s nickname coming directly from its greenery) is a metaphor of the United States. My daily electric-car journey starts from a quiet and friendly neighborhood with green and flowery backyard gardens, through a downtown area full of contrasts, where magnificent, perfect skyscrapers alternate with always new construction sites, until the highway to avoid the morning traffic of the south side of town; all this in 20 minutes, in one single town, talking about time, politics and travel in English with my host mother.

 
 


 
 

Here you can find anything you want. It’s a country enemy of waiting and patience. A country where spaces are large, but times are short.

 
 


 
 

The truth is that little or nothing is like it is in the movies that affect us so much. I learned to judge less and learn more.

 
 


 
 

 
 


 
 

Going to school is the most important part of my day.  School starts at 8:45am and ends at 3:35pm: six lessons, a mid-morning break and a lunch-break; advanced physics, mathematics, humanities–a combination of courses including literature, history and philosophy–environmental sciences and journalism.

The possibilities are endless, each student can choose what he considers the best for himself and for his career and life, within the standards established by the National Education Association.

I had to dispel the popular misconception that the American school system is easy and enjoyable: it is up to each student to choose among different alternatives ranging from simple to more complex courses.

A big difference between Italian and American school system is that the American students are encouraged to work together and build not just a group of friends, but a future community based on mutual support and mutual respect.

I’ve been here for 50 days and I find myself feeling emotions that I’ve never felt before, varying from moments of happiness and excitement to moments of despair and nostalgia, as if on a carousel of life.

I have friends who come from India, Turkey, Germany, Brazil, Mexico, Vietnam, Japan and other wonderful places around the world that one day, I am sure, I will visit.

Every single thing I see and try is an encouragement to explore a world of new experiences. Right now, I’m facing the challenge of living without a cell phone for 30 days—a challenge laid down by my Humanities Professor—that I would never have had the courage to meet in Italy.

On Sundays, my host family and I get up and have a typical American breakfast with pancakes, eggs, bacon and other hot delicious food. During the week I eat Chinese (chicken Teriyaki is absolutely amazing), Japanese (my host dad is perfecting his skills in the preparation of sushi), Mexican, Indian, Italian (I cooked Italian food several times and my hosts went crazy: their favorite dish is pasta with olive oil and parmesan, obviously entirely manufactured in Italy) and inevitably American food.

I will never forget the feeling of being at home in a town and a country where you were not born or bred, the capability of orienting myself in a metropolis after using Google Maps for a few days (in Italy we underestimate the potential of this app: do you know it can tell you if buses are late or early?), the joy of feeling part of something so very special and new, the awareness of doing what your heart, mind and body really want makes you feel so free.

 
 


 
 

 
 


 
 

 
 


 
 

Beatrice Moioli 

From Bergamo to the Usa for a year

with Intercultura and the support of the Pesenti Foundation

www.intercultura.it
 
 


 
 

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