"It was explained to us," said Marco Amadori, "that where we would (be), you could not wear shorts because there are flies that in Italy we don't see - flies the size of helicopters!"
Amadori admits he was scared, and truth is, the sight of a grasshopper will send some of the students fleeing briefly. But still, a week into their 12-day stay in America, 15 high school students from Bologna feel right at home in Montana.
Here to learn about native language programs for Indians - they visited the Nkwusm Salish language immersion school in Arlee on Thursday morning - the teenagers are also discovering rodeos, Grizzly football and Flathead Lake.
It's a world apart from Bologna, a city of 400,000 in northern Italy known for its culture, cuisine, red-tiled roofs, tall towers and narrow streets. The city traces its history to 1200 B.C., and Bologna University is the oldest in Europe, founded in 1088.
There are 24 miles of covered sidewalks, or arcades, in Bologna, created when enrollment at the university (which is more than 90,000) surged. Buildings were extended out over the sidewalks to create more lodging space.
"When you go in stores here, and then you go out, you look up at the sky, and you realize you are in Montana," said Vittorio Bozzoli. "Big Sky country - it is so nice to see the sky."
The Bologna visitors, all students at Liceo Galvani - liceo means high school - wound up in Montana when Tony Mattina, an anthropology professor at the University of Montana, answered a request for information in a newsletter.
Stefano Rovinetti Brazzi, the students' teacher, told the Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of the Americas he was interested in bringing a group of teenagers to America to study native languages.
"I was intrigued that they wanted to know more about this, and agreed to help them," said Mattina, who organized trips to reservations in Montana and Washington and lined up host families.
"I've always been interested in different cultures," said Bozzoli. "As I began to travel through Europe I discovered the German culture, and then the French. Last year I needed to discover another culture, but it had to be totally different, so I decided to take part in this trip."
What's stuck with him most, after visits to the Blackfeet and Flathead reservations in Montana, and the Colville Indian Reservation in Washington, is that, "Everywhere we've gone, the tribes have told me that without our language, we are nothing," Bozzoli said. "Knowing English is the first thing to finding a job in the world today. But other cultures are important. Knowing their language may not be important to finding a job. But it is important."
"The most interesting thing I've found is Indians preserving their language through programs, books, DVDs and tapes," said Chiara Comunale. "It is interesting to see kids 5 and 4 years old speaking their native language in a world that is completely English and Western. They have to live in a modern world, but they all speak very well two languages."
For Amadori, who has visited the United States before, touring both the East and West coasts and spending a month in Chicago, the trip has still been a new experience.
"There is no connection between (the Indians') culture and our culture," he said. "There is no comparison between the way they think and the way we think. It's another conception of life, and it has to be respected. Praying together, wanting to stay together, preserving their language ... you don't find that in Europe or the U.S."
Weekdays have been filled with trips to reservations. Weekends, the students have gotten tastes of Missoula and the rest of Montana.
Some watched Montana defeat Maine 27-20 in the Grizzlies' football opener last week. While the spectacle was fun, the popularity of the game itself left some puzzled.
"I don't like American football," said Enrico Cantoni. "In Italy, soccer is such a natural sport. It's fun, it's alive. American football and baseball are so slow. I studied the rules about what players can and can't do, and I find I really prefer rugby. I don't see why Americans invented another sport when we already had rugby."
Amadori, meantime, might be the only Italian who could not care less about soccer.
"Everyone talks about it all the time - 'Did you see this? Did you see that?' - they can go on until noon and I can say nothing, because I don't watch it. I like basketballs, volleyballs - I like action. I don't like people standing around on a field."
But he saw similarities between Americans and their football.
"The players think for one or two seconds, and then they have a goal, whether it's the first or last quarter," Amadori said. "Your goal is to go, whatever the result is, you go. The goal is to go and strike. If your aim is right you'll have a touchdown, and if you lose, you can at least say you tried. That's true of American football, and it might be true of American life."
Reporter Vince Devlin can be reached at 523-5260 or at vdevlin@missoulian.com
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