Saturday,
December 01, 2007
Student Life Abroad - Study or Hedonism ??
The
ANNOTICO Report RE The
Amanda Knox Rape and Killing
For
many college students, a year abroad is an experience of a lifetime - an
opportunity to learn a new language and live in a new culture. But it's often
just as much about partying in a place where the age drinking level is 18 years
rather than the 21years, as in the
The
headlines in
The
chief suspect, Amanda Marie Knox, is not a very sympathetic person.
The
victim, Meredith Kercher, at times seems very focused and responsibility, and at other times rather
irresponsible, like her My Space page antics, her dancing at a bar. Knox was
also described as a flirtatious girl who was intensely jealous of Kercher,.providing a different
side to what the Italian press calls her "angel face."
Now, the murder
of a 21-year-old Briton studying in this picturesque Italian city is throwing a
light on the wild life of college kids abroad.
Meredith Kercher was sexually assaulted and stabbed to death Nov. 1
in the apartment she shared with her American roommate, Amanda Marie Knox, who
is in custody along with two other people in connection with the death.
The gruesome tale
of sex, drugs and murder has gripped
Knox, 20, and her
one-time boyfriend and Italian co-defendant, 23-year-old Raffaele Sollecito, are due in court Friday for a hearing on whether
they should remain in jail while the probe continues.
A third suspect,
Rudy Hermann Guede, a native of
The case, and
particularly Knox's alleged role, has made headlines in
By all
indications, Knox was a bright and eager student proficient enough in languages
to read Harry Potter in German.
She grew up in
Last spring, she
made the dean's list at the
Before arriving
in
Yet, Knox also
comes across as irresponsible: She walked off her Bundestag job after just a
few days because, she wrote, she had nothing to do.
Her MySpace page, in which she calls herself "Foxy Knoxy," includes images of her drunk and acting silly
in a video, and she referred several times to drug use and nights spent working
and dancing at Lumumba's bar - providing a different side to what
the Italian press calls her "angel face."
Lumumba said
after his release from jail that Knox was a flirtatious girl who was intensely
jealous of Kercher.
"Amanda
hated Meredith because people loved her more than they did Amanda,"
In a Nov. 9
ruling ordering the suspects jailed, a judge wrote that Knox, in her statement
to prosecutors, had accused Lumumba of killing Kercher
while she was in another room, saying that at one point she covered her ears to
drown out her roommate's screams.
The judge said
Knox's memories were confused since she had smoked hashish earlier in the day.
Knox's parents,
William Knox and Edda Mellas,
have traveled to
In many European
capitals, the close-knit world of foreign students is hard to miss.
Groups of rowdy,
mostly English-speaking students are routinely seen staggering through central
squares, like
But
With its steep
medieval streets and heavy presence of European students attending its
University for Foreigners,
"Here,
foreign students tend to live in apartments with international roommates, buy
food, interact with locals," although the foreign community still has
their own pubs and meeting points, she said.
The students who
come to
But alcohol and
drugs are certainly available, said Esteban Garcia Pascual, an Argentine whose bar "La Tana dell'Orso" is a top
destination for foreign students in
"
Not all students
come to Perugia or go on study
abroad programs just to have fun
with other Americans, said Zachary Nowak, a 30-year-old New Yorker who fell in
love with Perugia during a study abroad program and never left.
"They are
really integrated," he said of the foreign students. "There's no
Campo dei Fiori here, they
have to make an effort. If they want to order a margarita in English in a bar,
they'd go to
The
ANNOTICO Reports Can be Viewed (and are Archived) on:
Italia
Italia
Mia: http://www.ItaliaMia.com (3 years)
Annotico
Email: annotico@earthlink.net