LOTE

The Language faculty is preparing to finish off another exciting year, which saw the continuation of initiatives started in previous years. A number of our Italian students took part in the return trip to Montalcino, Tuscany with a group of teachers lead by Mrs L. Russo while another French group headed for Rennes in Brittany, France accompanied by Mrs Di Giacomo and myself. As these lines are being printed, we are planning the return trip from Rennes. We are expecting a fairly big group of about 22 students who will need to be accommodated at De La Salle and possibly another school for a handful of girls. We are grateful for the generosity of our school community in accepting these young people from France in the knowledge that your sons will benefit from a similar treatment during our next visit to the “Lycee De La Salle’ in Rennes. In these turbulent times, it is comforting to see how travel exchanges promote the best values in our young and help them grow with a wider view of the world. Once again, all our French students took part in the Alliance Française Poetry and VCE Competitions and the Dante Alighieri society assessed our Year 9 and 10 students in the Italian competition. They all distinguished themselves and an impressive number were awarded certificates for their efforts. Richard Buckley won the 3rd prize at state level for the Alliance Francaise Poetry Recitation Competition (Berthe Mouchette Competition). Our VCE Indonesian students are preparing to make their way to the University of Melbourne for the launch of the Essay Writing Competition under the auspices of the Asia Institute. I am confident next year will provide its fair share of excitement for all our language students and we will again see students making the most of the opportunities offered to them. Mr Thierry Moran and the Language faculty. Tour of France

In March, a group of 12 French students from Years 9, 10 and 11, Ms DiGiacomo and Mr Moran went to France. After about 24 hours of travelling, we arrived in Paris, unpacked, and went for breakfast in a completely magical city. We took the train (Metro) to Notre Dame. It exceeded our expectations. It was big and the detailed designs on the walls inside were amazing. As it had started raining we were unable to go to the top so we pressed on. We walked from Notre Dame to the Arc de Triomphe which is in the middle of one of the busiest roundabouts in the world. We had to take the ramp that led underneath this snarl of traffic. We visited the splendour of Versailles, the massive palace where the lords or Versailles stayed in 1038. The garden of Versailles was one of the highlights of the trip. My favourite day was visiting the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre. Going up the Eiffel Tower was scary. It was windy and it was a long, long way down to the bottom. The Louvre was even better. We had lunch there first and then went on to look at magnificent art. Everyone was just interested in the Mona Lisa, but that ended up to be a disappointment as it was nothing as we all expected. It is really quite small and the viewing area was about 20 metres away from the actual painting! We took a bus to Rennes which is a large town about four hours away from Paris. This is where we would meet our host families and go to school. Meeting my host family for the first time was a daunting experience. I was bombarded with questions about Australia and my language skills were tested! School was interesting because no one knew quite what was happening, what they were saying and what we were trying to tell them. We were asked a lot of questions and made a lot of really good friends. Home made dinners were one of the best aspects of the trip, but not compared to Mont Saint-Michel. It is a very famous castle about 30 minutes from Rennes. Mont Saint-Michel was used in the sixth and seventh centuries as an Armorican stronghold of RomanoBreton culture and power. What makes it so special it that it is on an island surrounded by water and the tide rises at night and the castle is lit up. “Soyer toutes oreilles!”

David Simon

Italian Exchange and Tour of Italy

In March, 18 students, 3 teachers and many sad parents waited at Melbourne International Airport. It was the day of our long awaited departure to Italy. All the students involved were in Years 9–11 and had been studying Italian since Year 7. As we said goodbye to our parents we boarded the aeroplane and arrived in Italy 22 hours later. Tired but excited, we travelled by tram to the centre of Milan and visited Il Duomo, La Galleria, Il Castello, and drank hot chocolate and Espresso’s while listening to piano accordion. We also saw Leonardo Da Vinci’s famous ‘Last Supper’. We were then off to Lake Garda, which was unbelievable. The reflections in the water, and the cruise were fantastic. There was a slight delay before we took the cruise as we had to wait for the captain to finish his pasta! A few tips for travelling in Venice. Arriving at 6:00 pm in the darkness is not a good idea. Venice is not suitcase friendly, and there can be two streets with the same name (we found this out the hard way). Despite these hiccups we were happy to be in Venice and we all had a lot of laughs and jokes in the hotel, and one student even had his bed temporarily removed. The next morning we were off to two famous islands: Murano and Burano. At Murano we attended a glass-blowing presentation and bought many hand-made glass objects. The following day we went to St Mark’s Square which was filled with tourists, con artists and pigeons, and we loved every minute of it. At night we went for a walk back to the square and it looked even more beautiful. Before we knew it, we were on the bus again and off to the town of Maranello where the Ferrari Museum is located, and being from a boys school it was a ‘must-see’. The showroom was filled with many cars from the first models to the most recent. We set out for Montalcino and the home-stay. As we travelled on the bus and it slowly grew dark outside we were nervous and excited. The time had now come when we would embrace Italian culture in every sense with families we had never met. The bus pulled up and we saw faces peering through the bus windows. There were hugs for the boys who had hosted their Italian friends the previous October. The home-stay formed many happy memories, especially as we had the joy of spending Easter with our exchange families. We also experienced some bitterly cold weather and snow which complemented the stunning vistas of the mediaeval town of Montalcino. There were excursions to Florence where we toured the magnificent Palazzo Vecchio and il Duomo with its beautiful art works and fascinating history. Of course we enjoyed the market of San Lorenzo where we enjoyed the bargain hunting for beautiful scarves, silk ties and leather goods. There were tours to Siena and many other towns and wineries. We also experienced school at the Liceo Linguistico ‘R. Lambruschini’ and were actually welcomed by the local mayor. Everyone enjoyed our farewell dinner which was truly an Italian affair and all the host families were involved in making and serving their delicious homemade pasta, roasts and desserts. It was now time to leave and everyone was quite sad. There were again many hugs and tears as we realized that we might never see our host families again. The last leg of the journey was three nights in Rome, with a day in Pompeii. There was so much to see, with the Colosseum, The Arch, The Vatican and the Vatican Museum. Watching the Romans drive was very amusing. Pompeii was remarkable — no history textbook could do it credit. Our journey home on the plane was quite full of excitement and commotion, as we repeatedly asked Mr Di Ciccio whether we should declare this and notthat. He took the barrage of questions with characteristic good humour. Even though we loved Italy it was a great feeling to be back home and welcomed by our parents. On behalf of all the students who took part in the exchange, I would like to thank the L.O.T.E. faculty, especially Mrs Russo, Mrs Webster and Mr Di Ciccio, for making the trip possible, eventful and enjoyable. Luke McShane