Hello, I'm Mauro Baron.

I'm at the last year of Civil Engineering; my specialization is Trasportation.

I'm 26 years old and I like fishing and gardening. Sometimes I play tennis, table tennis or volleyball with my friends.

I live in Covolo; it's a small village (there are fewer than 2000 inhabitants) located in the Province of Treviso on the river Piave.

The river Piave is famous for the First World War, and if you come in Covolo, you can still see the caves where soldiers fought.

The river Piave is also where I usually fish.

There are four people in my family: my parents, my grandmother and me.

 

 

Week 2. Famiglia e passatempi

29th January 2008

 

Today was the first time that I spoke with Skype.

I thought it would be more difficult, instead it's quite easy.

I'm in a couple with Antonio. Today first we spoke with Katarina but it was a mistake: Antonio and I are in a group with Chris.

Chris doesn't know Prosecco and he doesn't like wine: I think it's strange.

The all of a sudden we had a black-out and so we had to restart our computers.

Today we had an amusing hour.

 

 

Week 3. L'ambiente/Il riciclaggio

 

In my zone there is a type of differential waste disposal called "porta a porta" (door to door): rubbish is placed in front of houses, on the sidewalk and in prearranged mornings they bring away rubbish.

There are five types of waste: dry, damp, paper, glass and cans, plastic. For each type there is an specific container.

"Dry" is the waste that it can't be recycled, "damp" is the perishable waste. Some families, like mine, put the "damp" waste into their personal places on their gardens and so they can have a discount on rubbish's fee.

In this way we can recycle more than 60-70% of our rubbish.

Moreover there are "ecologic centres" where you can free leave big objects like old television or computer, and other polluting things like medicines, oil, batteries.

The situation is totally different to Naples, we don't have that kind of problems.

But at about 10 Km from my village, there is a cement factory which burns tires and by-products of petroleum and the air isn't much clean.

 

 

12th February 2008

 

Today there weren't Antonio so I spoke only with Chris.

We spoke about tresh, water, cars. There gasoline costs less than a dollar for litre, wery less!

In Tulane they recycle only glass, plastic and paper because the storm destroyed everything so they have few money.

I think he understood me when I spoke in English but I understood few when he spoke English, at the same way, I think, he didn't understand so much when I spoke Italian but I understood him when he spoke Italian.

 

 

Week 4 Gli spettacoli / Cinema e teatro

19th February 2008

 

Today we spoke about cinema, music and theatre.

Chris doesn't like theatre, he think it's too boring.

In New Orleans there are few discos and young people goes to the bars.

Chris likes rock music, he likes Led Zeppelin and U2, I like U2 too; he doesn't like rap, me too.

He saw "La dolce vita" di Fellini, but although I'm Italian I've never see it.

Then we spoke about cars. I told him that here most cars have an engine under 1,500 cm3. He told me that there, cars have engines of 5,000-6,000 cm3, he thinks it's too much.

I told him that italians never respect speed's limits. He told me that also americans (but only on the higways) don't respect speed's limits. It makes me happy: it doesn't happens only in Italy!

 

 

Week 5 La politica / il governo / le elezioni

26th February 2008

 

Today we were Chris, Antonio and I.

We spoke about politics and taxes. Antonio and me tried to explain to Chris the differences between President of Republic and President of Government and how many rich people in Italy don't pay taxes.

He told us that America's President remains in office for 4 years and nobody can "send" him at home.

Senators instead remains in office for 6 years.

Only senators can change President's decisions but they are almost 2/3.

Rappresentatives propose new laws and they are less powerful than senators.

In U.S., if you pay few taxes, the State refunds that you pay, if you pay many taxes the State refunds nothing.

I found difficult to spoke about theese topics.

 

 

Week 6 La società multiculturale

4th March 2008

 

Most immigrants who lives in U.S.A. are from Carribean, Mexico and South America. Most of them are illegal.

Chris said that most immigrants use drugs but they are poor so they stole to find money to buy drugs. Chris said that also happens in New Orleans.

Chris said that there are many problems with hispanics during the elections because they want more rights while Americans dont'like that.

At last Antonio said that his drug is salami, so we finish to spoke about salami. Chris said, he thinks, that Italian salami is different from American salami.

Today I understood more than other times: I hope my listening is improving. 

 

 

Week 7 Video Skype

11th March 2008

 

Today we had the webcams, so we can saw the other students. It was a funny experience but it will be better, if each person have a webcam, so we can speak more and see each other (someone like my friend Chris was behind the webcam and I saw him only for few seconds). American students likes a bit timid, but maybe it was early mornig.

It will be beautiful if in the future we can continue to skype with them but I think it's very difficult. I have to buy headphones!

I'm sad because the experience is finish, it was fun and useful. Now I feel myself less embarassed when I speak in English but is still difficult to understand what they say.

 

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