“I’m gonna get another beer.  Five’s”  I said as I headed over to the bar to pick up another Peroni.  Luckily I had exact change so I didn’t have to wait long.  Upon my return a classmate was sitting on my jacket in my seat.

“Yo, your in my seat, give it up.”  I told him as I put my beer on the table.

“You didn’t call five’s, I’m not moving” he said affirmatively.

“Yea I did, ask Chris.”

“Well Chris isn’t here right now, so you don’t have any witnesses.  Fuck you I’m not moving.”  He then proceeded to grab my ice cold beverage.

“What the hell do you think your doing?” as I snatched it out of his hand and returned it to the its spot on the bar table.  Again I asked him to move a little ticked off now.

“I’m not moving for you, what the fuck you going to do about it?” He antagonized with an elbow shove.  This exchange went back and forth a couple more times before I took the high road.

“Fine take the God damn seat, but give me my jacket.”

“No you don’t need it, I’ll fucking give it to you when you leave”  He snarled through his fake boston accent.

“Ok I’m leaving then give it to me.”

“Fine go outside I’ll bring it to you, but you better fuckin leave.”

“No fuck you give me my jacket” I reached for it and grabbed it by the sleeve and tugged.  It started to come loose, slowly but surely.  Inadvertently, I caught a piece of his sweatshirt as I pulled.

“Yo that’s my fuckin jacket.  Get the fuck away from me”  With his next push, my jacket was free and in my hand.  I turned around to walk to the next table with some actual friends, but he continued.

“Watch what your fucking doing, I’ll knock you out.”

“Yea man, act tough”

“I’m serious yo, step the fuck away”

“You know dude, keep fronting.  Keep thinking your tough.  You can’t do shit.”

All of a sudden, I was two feet back from where I was originally standing and a little lower.  Then a fist size shape on the back of my head felt warm.  Then my cheek, and finally my jaw, but there was no pain.  At this point my arm was up blocking the unrelenting attacks.  I stood up to full height dropped my beer and instantly was back in water polo mode.  (This is weird, I was standing, there was no water around, nothing to keep the punches hidden, no where to discreetly retaliate.)  The next 30 seconds happened so fast.  I had him in a head lock and one connected to his temple.  Then security was there and he was taken by two guys out the door.  I got pushed out by another two guys, and my friend who came to help got escorted as well.  Once outside, he started to walk back.  The manager and bouncer asked what the hell just happened.  I explained the situation and told him that’s the same kid you kicked out last week.  He recognized him at that point and said that we were fine.  He told him, “get the hell out of here and don’t ever come back, you won’t get in.”

Once we got back in the bar, I had a chance to recover and assess the damage, which came out to 2 buttons gone and a hole in of my shirt and the lost beer.  The night changed tones after that and instead of going out and having a good time.  I went home with the early group to get some rest.

It was the stupidest experience of my life and one that has really changed my perspective on some subjects.  That was the first altercation that I’d ever gotten into outside of sports.  I’ve never liked fighting or fights and to be frank, I think I was slightly afraid of getting into one.  But once that first punch was thrown and I realized that it hurts way less than a guy knocking your teeth out in a water polo game or a hard foul in a pick up basketball game.  Now I know at this point it seems like I’m gonna say that fighting is fine and I like them but I hate them more.  Getting that fight out of the way, has let me look on the true barbaric nature of them.  There is no reason that that argument needed to get physical.  Does that fellow student think he is cooler now?  Did that increase his confidence?

I in no way was hurt from the altercation.  Upset by my ripped shirt and my ruined beer, but was physically fine.  It should make for an interesting couple of weeks.  There has been lots of drama of here and up until this incident I had stayed away from all of it.  I’m here to be in Rome and have fun, not be bogged down by gossip and drama.  Somehow it always seems to find all of us…

Grandma and Grandpa, Gaga and Paka, I’m sorry that I wrote about this.  I really debated if this was something that I wanted to share with anyone on this blog, but realized that this blog isn’t about what I want to happen.  It is about what happens over here and how I feel about them.  And for that reason, I could not omit it.  It was this experience that made me homesick.  It was not the situation that bothered me, but the fact that I wasn’t home in comfort to think it over.  At home, I would have been around people that I wanted to be and been comfortable.  I didn’t think I would get homesick on this trip, but this knocked it into me.  I miss my family and friends, but most of all familiarity.  It’s the background scenes that I miss.  Looking at the ocean while I talked with a friend, or the sound of a golf club meeting ball as I hung out with the family.  Adam comes next weekend, which will be a nice refresher.