Word of the day - gia - already

L'ho conosco gia.
I already knew that.

So yesterday I had my midterm review.  And I didn't really learn too much that I didn't already know.  The jurors gave me some good advice, but it was advice that I already knew.  They were highly critical of the parts of my project that I had not focused much on (because I was in a time crunch).  So everything they said was absolutely true, and something that I had expected, no real surprises.

Today is Friday and there was Kent's "Forum on the City".  Each year Kent picks a city to talk about.  They invite people from the city, experts on the city, and famous people from the city to speak about the city.  This year Kent chose Genova and invited many architects, faculty from the University of Genova, and other prominent people.  One of the speakers was Riccardo Garrone, the owner of Sampdoria, one of Genova's soccer teams.  He was an old italian guy who used a translator, but really had a presence about him.  Somehow, he commanded everybody's attention.  It was pretty cool.  A lot of the speakers today did not speak english.  There was some australian bimbo who couldn't really translate.  The person would say something that would take 5 minutes and she would translate it into 2 sentences.  I felt cheated sometimes.  Recently there have been many prominent architects coming out of Genova.  The forum wanted to explain what the city of Genova is really like, and then they discussed if there is a "genova school" of architecture.  Why does Genova produce good architects?  Is there something in the water?  Eventually the general consensus was that Genova is so complex and has so many layers that it creates an environment of exploration and creativity.  I would generally agree with that.  Genova has the mountains, the sea, the medieval section, palazzo's, the ridiculously wealthy bankers, the port workers and sailors, old industries, new design, a little bit of everything.  I feel like each time I go to Genova I find out something else.  There isn't one single thing that could define Genova.  And to me, that's whats so exciting about it.  It's got so many layers, and yet somehow they're all great.

Tomorrow I'm going to Dublin!  I have never been there and I'm super excited.  We have class in Rotterdam on Monday.  So I'll go to the Jamison distillery, the Guinness factory, maybe the Gaol, Christ Church, St. Patrick's church, a few pubs in between and then off to the low countries.  Our class will be in Rotterdam for 2 days and then Amsterdam for 4 more days and then that's it.  So I'm pretty excited about that.