At the start of the year I decided to do Italian beginners’ as part of year 2 of my degree, and advanced French just for the hell of it. And am I glad I chose to take them that way round. Five minutes of my French presentation "L’obésité chez les jeunes et <<la malbouffe>>" disappeared, I was so excited I garbled through everything I could remember and left the rest out. Left the room feeling like a bit of a dope - God bless my teacher for being the smiliest man in the world.
My Italian oral assessment took place at 10 o’clock today and I’m pleased to say that I came out with a secure "1st". I’m not pleased to say that halfway through my beautifully sculpted presentation ("Che cosa conta nella vita, veramente?") my teacher stopped the tape and told me to be quiet because I was fine, I’d got 75% and not to be a diva about it and go away. I presented him with a copy of the presentation that I’d still been writing at 2 a.m. He told me "You are doing very well and picking up the vocabulary very quickly" - he has no idea how quickly!
Aaah so glad that’s over. Realised yesterday that most of my exam revision will have to be done in Budapest whilst my other half is in his conference. Suppose I’ll have to sit in a café somewhere and strike an intellectual pose. Although I don’t think "The waterfall method in Information Systems Design" would give quite the same effect as a copy of Sartre’s "La philosophie du possible".
