I signed up to be in the Italian apartment for a few reasons. Initially I was torn between living with a host family versus living with Dickinson students. I really wanted to make the most of my time in Italy and speak as much Italian as possible, so a home stay seemed like a great way to immerse myself in the language and have a unique cultural experience as well. On the other hand, I wanted to be around peers closer to my age at the end of the day (as a personal preference of mine). At the same time though, I didn’t want to spend my time abroad in the “Dickinson bubble”, speaking English and being surrounded by other American college students.

When I heard about the Italian apartment option, it seemed like a perfect fit, and it truly was. Before officially moving in, we all agreed that we would only speak Italian in the house. To be honest, I wasn’t sure if this would actually happen, and I figured that as time went on we would speak less and less Italian around the house. But, to my amazement, the exact opposite happened. We spoke Italian (approximately) 97.8% of the time. I would attribute a great part of this to the native Italian living with us. He took the “no English” rule very seriously, and spoke to us only in Italian- and he would sternly (but lovingly) reprimand us if he caught anyone speaking English. If we didn’t know a word or how to phrase a certain sentence, he would always help us (he’s a very patient and effective teacher). With his help, our apartment was truly an Italian apartment.

Also all four of us American students were very into speaking Italian since we were all minors/majors who went abroad to really grasp the language, and we took it pretty seriously with one another. Basically, if someone spoke in Italian, they would always answer in Italian. In addition, it was nice to practice around people that were more or less the same language level as you, but also having masters like a native Italian to challenge us and help us improve. We occasionally spoke English, but this only happened if we had guests in the house that didn’t speak Italian or if we were feeling lazy at the end of a long day.

Living in the apartment was a huge success for me. I wouldn’t change a thing. I liked that the Italian apartment wasn’t in the building on Via Marsala where the Dickinson Center is along with several “American” apartments. I feel like if I had lots of American neighbors, I would’ve been a lot more tempted to break the rule and revert to English. So I think its current location on Via Todaro was perfect.

More importantly, living in the Italian apartment improved my language skills by 1000%. I was practicing Italian virtually 24/7. After the first 3 weeks, I was speaking the best Italian I’ve ever spoken, and I continued to improve as the semester went on. I noticed it, our native Italian noticed it, and, not to brag, but Italians that I went to UniBo with and interacted with daily noticed it. Italians were shocked by my proficiency in Italian, along with the fact that I had only been studying the language for 3 years. “Lui parla bene” was a common sentence (ok, now I’m bragging). I felt more confident in the UniBo classroom, at the bars, and with both friends and strangers. I even made some really great friends using only my Italian to communicate and express myself.