From September 13th to September 20th I left for Winchester for the P.LE.A.S.E. project with some schoolmates of mine and, guided by the TELS guide Carlo Salamone and by our teachers prof Messedaglia, prof Lombardo and prof Blosio, we spent a week learning how to adapt to the British lifestyle. During the week we had language lessons, took part in social skills workshops and learned how to hold a public speech, but the most important thing was the chance to live with a British family and learn plenty of things about their way of living and their attitudes.

A full English Breakfast

A delicious Fish and Chips

One of the main obstacles for us Italian students was without any doubt the food. British families have a completely different approach to food compared to us, they usually eat more for breakfast and dinner and have a light lunch around noon. Not only the quantities but also the kind of food they eat is really different, we had the opportunity to try some typical British dishes such as fish and chips or shepherd pie, but we noticed that people in the UK eat a lot of ethnic food and that they absolutely love fast food, you could find many different fast food restaurant and indian, greek, or mexican places around the city both in Winchester and London (where we spent the day on September 15th).

Bangers and mash: a typical pub dinner

The best places to eat typical british food are for sure pubs, the atmosphere inside of pubs is simply amazing, both for the very particular wooden furniture and the football fans drinking beer together watching any match the tv screen is showing at that moment holding their breath like it’s the most important match of their lives, and the food was not bad at all, but it was nothing compared to a good pizza here in Italy.

Walking through a graveyard

Apart from food, we noticed some other differences between Italian and British culture, something that surprised us was the fact that you could find graves in public parks and people relaxing, eating and studying next to tombstones isn’t something you see every day in Italy. Another key difference was the attention british people had in keeping the streets clean, in Winchester it was almost impossible to find litter on the side of the road, while here in italy is quite common, our guides also told us that in the UK fines are way higher than in Italy if you’re caught by the police leaving trash on the ground so we had to be extra careful not to leave anything around.

Spending time playing with our families

Living in a family we also had the chance to see how people live their everyday life, we chatted a lot with our host families and learned plenty of things about the British school system, cuisine, traditions, sports and hobbies. For example David, our host family dad, had a motorbike and we spent an entire evening talking about bikes and cars, he also explained to me how they acquire the motorbike driving license in England which is a little different than in Italy. Our host family also enjoyed doing things together like watching movies, sports matches, cooking and playing pool and we had lots of fun spending time with them and their children.

I’d like to finish my article with a thought about the name of the project that brought us to Winchester: the P.LE.A.S.E. Project, P.LE.A.S.E. ss an acronym which stands for Project for Learning And Supporting Elegance, during this week we actually had the chance to improve our elegance, our social skills and, of course, our use of English, and I’m incredibly grateful for having this opportunity promoted by our school because I feel way more confident and a little more ready for my future life.

Luca Frignocca, classe 5BLS