Winter 2003

Departments

Exchange

Around the Pond

Extended Family

Great Sport

North 40

Arts

Books

Freeze-frame

Features

All my best friends are here

One giant molecule

I learnt to dream of Sicily

The Landscape Beautiful

Feature

SICILY: Excerpts from student journals

I MISS THE WINE AT dinner, the Italian fashion, the wheat fields, small alleys, the laundry hanging from balconies, the Italian language, waking up for the sunrise in Cefalu. I look at my watch and think of what time it is in Sicily. –Katy Loconte DRIVING THROUGH THE MOUNTAINS – sun was out all day, casting shadows on rocks and houses and hills – perfect since yesterday’s photography lesson was about light. – Taryn Scott ’02 RIDING THROUGH THE COUNTRYSIDE AND seeing views to die for that peasants wake up to every day, I realized that while my education can make me knowledgeable, only experience will make me worldly. This is the first step. – Randall Lapierre ’03 I CAN'T BELIEVE HOW THEY shop here. To the market every day? A fresh, open, crowded market. Silver rolled fish, a live octopus and barrels of blood oranges. People push and shove, and holler and yell. With my camera around my neck, I walk into the mob. On to eggplant and pineapples. I love the smell in the air! – Heather Johnson ’03 TAORMINA – A MASSIVE COLISEUM as far as the eye can see. Greens and rusty reds and oranges riddle the hilly countryside. Ancient Greeks and Romans put on plays and opera here? A far cry from watching Tommy Boy on my cramped futon. – Alison Katinger ’03 MONDELLO – ELISA, JENNIFER, JUDITH and I walk around simply absorbing the warmth of the late afternoon sun and the cool Mediterranean breeze. On the side of the fountain in front of us, a bunch of schoolchildren, mostly girls, sit with their backpacks strewn about in front of them. They keep sneaking glances at us and I happen to overhear part of what they’re whispering. It’s in English. “Um, how…uh…are you?” “Where…are you from?” I realize that they are practicing their English phrases on one another. Eventually a few of them come over to us and begin to ask us questions. We exchange small talk: where we’re from, how old we are, why we are here. Suddenly their teacher calls for them, telling them it’s time to leave.…One girl starts running back toward us. She runs up to us, hugs us and gives each of us a kiss on the cheek. Suddenly the entire group follows suit and the four of us are bombarded by about 25 kids. “Ciao! Ciao!” they say to us, all smiles. They walk off and the four of us are left in awe.… – Alison Katinger ’03 IT'S TUESDAY AND WE ARE in a tiny village way up in the mountains. The only sounds are the clucking of chickens and the click-pause-click of a laboriously slow old man caning his way down a nearby hill.… – Jesse Hirsch ’03 For those interested in travel post-degree, Rick Newton also will be leading a UMass alumni trip to Sicily in February 2004. For more information on this trip, e-mail Newton at rnewton@tei.umass.edu

[top of page]

I learnt to dream of Sicily

SICILY: More images

SICILY: Excerpts from student journals