Venice, Turkey, Sienna & Perugia

 4/14/11

     It’s been over a month since I last posted. Let’s rewind to around March 5th, my birthday. I dubbed the week leading up to March 5th “Birthday Week” in order to excuse my eating out every day, going out at night and demanding everyone be nicer to me.

     The morning of my birthday, we got up early to catch a bus to Venice. It took about four hours to get there, but was well worth it. Venice was a stunning sight. On top of the surreal beauty of the city, it was Carnivale, which meant the streets were packed with people in crazy costumes. In the spirit of Carnivale and my birthday, I bought two masks, a handmade leather mask and a red glittery porcelain mask with a large burgundy colored feather attached to it. We spent most of the day walking around looking at the city and shopping for masks, we then went back to our hotel for a nap. When we went back out, it was time to celebrate my birthday! We met up with my friend Eva, who was also in Venice, and found a place to eat dinner. I had three very clear goals for my birthday night: a gondola ride, a good meal and a free shot. 

     Our dinner was quite good, which surprised me because the restaurant seemed quite touristy (Venice does not have a good reputation for food). Carnivale at night was glorious! It was a giant celebration! Walking through the city, there were bars set up in the street and music playing from all directions. At one point we were walking and I made eye contact with a bartender. He pointed to a shot he had just poured, then pointed to me. There was no way he knew it was my birthday, but he gave me my free shot! I had two of my three goals accomplished...

     I just needed the gondola ride... The gondola ride was going to cost us around $17 euro each, which didn’t seem like that much to me, but some of my friends were less enthusiastic about it. It took a lot of convincing, but I managed to get them to go on the gondola. It was divine! I can’t imagine a better way to turn 20! The next day we went to the small islands of Murano, famous for glass and the colorful Burano, famous for lace. The weather was sunny and we had a lovely time.

     The next weekend Jocie’s three friends were in town. We had a great time showing them around Florence. On Saterday, I went to see Afrika Bambaataa, a famous American DJ, with Eva and Chelsea. It was my favorite night out I’ve had so far. We enjoyed observing the Florence hip-hop community. Afrika Bambaataa and his Zulu crew (who are from New York), would yell out to the crowd stuff like “now scream if you’re a lady!” and everyone would scream, because the audience did not understand English. It was hilarious. Afrika Bambaataa did not perform his famous songs, but he did a really amazing DJ set, probably the best DJ set, I’ve ever heard.

     The next Friday, I left for my Spring Break in Turkey. I went alone, and met up with a student tour group. There were six other girls on the tour and a tour guide. We started out in Istanbul, saw Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque and the Iznik Mosque.

     The first night we went to a gypsy rock music club. The second night we went to a hookah bar and Turkish bath. The Turkish bath was unlike anything I had ever experienced. At the Turkish bath you lie on a hot stone until a woman comes to scrub you down, washes your hair, then sends you to soak in the hot pool. I don’t think any of us were used to being scrubbed down by strangers, but it was relaxing and felt like a sisterly experience.

     We then went to the city of Bursa, where we saw a traditional Turkish shadow puppet show and a Whirling Durbesh ceremony. The Whriling Durbesh ceremony was one of the most beautiful/inspiring things I’ve ever seen, and it was the highlight of my trip by far. Maybe even the highlight of my whole time in Europe! There are truly no words that can do the experience justice, but it was beautiful and spiritual, even to watch!

     We then went to Selcuk to see Epheses, then on to Cappadocia. Cappadocia is famous for it’s towering rock formations and caves. We got to ride ATV’s through the valleys of rock formations and watched the sun set. We then took a train back to Istanbul for our last day. I then flew back to Florence. I had originally wanted to go somewhere with my roommate, but for spring break we could not agree on where to go. When I read the itinerary for Turkey, I knew I had to go, even if it meant going by alone. It was a gift I gave to myself and will remain as a precious memory.

     My mom came to visit Florence the day after I returned from Turkey. I was so excited to see her! My dad could not come with her, so she invited her friend and her friend’s husband. I enjoyed showing them around and taking them to delicious restaurants. Halfway through their visit, I got sick and had to stop and rest. It was nice to have my mom around while I was sick to take care of me, but I really wish I could have been healthy to show her around more.

     That next weekend I had planned to go to Paris to visit my friend Jordan, but because of being sick I stayed in Florence. Kira’s friend Evans was visiting Florence and we had a blast showing her around. My goal of that weekend was to do everything in Florence that I had wanted to do, but hadn’t. I FINALLY got to see David and Santa Maria Novella. The weather was perfect and it was an amazing weekend.

     This past Friday Jordan and her friend came to visit Florence. I took them to a favorite gelato place and to a restaurant. Kira and I had been to this restaurant before and had a great experience, but this time was different. The service was horrible. In Italy, things are usually slower, but it took them thirty minutes just to bring us our menus. When we got our food the portions were TINY! Not what I had remembered at all. The food was still really delicious, but where was the rest of it? When we got our check, they had added 14 euro worth of food we did not order. I loved seeing Jordan and meeting her friend, but this dining experience was a fluke.

     The next day I went to Sienna. It was very beautiful there and I had an amazing meal of handmade pasta. After wandering around Sienna for four hours, my friends and i went to a spa and relaxed in a sulfur water pool.

     The next day we went to Perugia, famous for chocolate. We first went to buy chocolate, then to explore. We went inside of their Duomo, but it gave me a weird vibe. I told that to my friend Kira and she told me she felt the same and it was actually making her feel sick! We left shortly after. For lunch I had more amazing handmade pasta, then we boarded our bus to Chianti for a Wine tasting. We went to the Verrazzano winery and had a delightful time tasting their wines. After the wine tasting we headed back to Florence! Genova and Torino this weekend! 

 Venice Carnivale

 

 Turkey!

 Chianti in Chianti

Rome and Milan

 3/8/11

     It’s been about three weeks since I posted a blog entry. At first I just got distracted and forgot to post, then the longer I went without posting, the more I wanted to post, and the more intimidated I got about having to write a big long blog entry. I’ll just keep it pretty simple.

    
      Three weekends ago we went to Rome. It was quite the sensory overload, beautiful things to see in every direction, cars coming at you from every direction, delicious scents coming from beautiful restaurants in every direction. After an excruciating bus ride sitting behind a clan of obnoxious party girls still drunk from the night before, we had a walking tour of the Spanish steps, Pantheon, Trevi Fountain and so many more fantastic places. I got a pizza Panini for lunch that was killer, then we checked into our hotel. We sipped “grancaffes” at famous coffee bar and walked around the Coliseum area. Kira had found out about an Indian Restaurant online that was supposed to be the “best restaurant” in all of Rome. It took us about 30 minutes to walk there, but in our “lets go places, and eat things” mentality, we trucked through. The food was delicious, maybe not the best Indian food I’ve had in my life, but close. The true highlight of dinner was when I noticed that the sitar music in the background was actually a sitar cover of The Door’s Light my Fire. 

     The next day we woke up early to go to a visit a famous church, got Rome's best gelato, then met up with our tour group and went to the Vatican. St. Peter’s Basilica was very large and impressive. There was a lot of really interesting information we could have been learning from our tour guide, but members of our tour group were more interested in asking about movies that had taken place in the Vatican and clarifying as to what mosaics are. After St Peter’s we went to the Vatican Museum, you know, another place dedicated to showing off the Vatican’s wealth. They had many pieces of art and decorated rooms that literally made my jaw drop. The School of Athens, a fresco by Raphael was truly amazing in person. After seeing that Kira and I, who had been separated from our other roommates, thought we were close to the Sistene Chapel, but instead entered the Vatican’s Modern and Contemporary Art section. Kira and I were discussing that in any other context, their Modern and Contemporary Art collection would be very impressive, but when about to enter the Sistene Chapel, who cares?!

     We spent hours in the Sistene Chapel. We were there until it closed. My mind turned off completely, and I was just staring at the ceiling. It was an experience that I cannot explain and won’t even try to, but I will say that it was divine. I left the Sistine Chapel with a sadness like I had just gotten on an airplane and was flying miles and miles away from a loved one. I couldn’t understand why I was leaving. When we finally got out of the Vatican Museum, we just sat outside for a while and processed what had just happened to us in the Sistine Chapel. We were Sistine Chapel stoned. It sounds utterly bizarre and even a little cliché, but we came out changed. We then sat in the plaza of St. Peters for a while and went out to eat dinner even though it was 6:30, very early to be eating dinner in Italy. We went to a traditional style roman restaurant where I tried to order the traditional dish of Spaghetti Carbonara, Spaghetti with eggs, cheese and bacon, without the bacon, but they yelled at me telling me it wasn’t Roman and they wouldn’t make it. I got another pasta dish with mushrooms. We then met up with the rest of our roommates and went to an exhibit on Van Gough. It was truly inspiring and I had never seen so many Van Goughs in the same place. 

     On our last day in Rome the roomies and I went to a Sunday Market that was kind of a bust, so Kira and I returned to the awesome gelato place where I got cinnamon gelato that was the best gelato I had ever had. We then met up with our tour group and got an inside tour of the coliseum. Magnificent! I wonder if there will be guided tours of LA’s Staple Center in 1,000 years? We then got a bus tour to see the outside walls of Rome, then we were off! Back to Firenze! I did love Rome, but it was so much more crowded than Florence and the cars there are crazy. There aren’t really a lot of crosswalks, so crossing the street is difficult. I am very happy I live in Florence.

     I didn’t do anything terribly exciting during the week because I didn’t want to spend any money. On Friday a few friends and I went to the beautiful Piazza Michelangelo where you can see the best view of Florence. I had been around there earlier in the week for class, but I couldn’t wait to return because it’s so beautiful, probably my favorite place in all of Florence. On Saturday, Joice, Kelly, our friend Katie and I went to Milan. We went with a student tour agency because they included transportation, tours of the area and events for Fashion Week for a price cheaper than a train ticket to Milan. We arrived and walked around the Duomo area. The inside of the Duomo was absolutely beautiful. We went during Milan Fashion Week, so there were a lot of fashion events going on and fashionable people around. We saw one fashion show that was open to the public and got invited to another fashion show (probably because Jocie has an impressive looking camera), but couldn’t because we had to go to our tour of La Scala Opera House. La Scala was very beautiful and it meant a lot to me to be there because my grandmother had always wanted to go there.

      When searching for a place to get lunch, we found a place with a HUGE line going out way into the street. Because we had some time to kill we figured it would be the best place to get lunch. This place sold Panzerotti, which is like a fried calzone most commonly filled with mozzarella and tomato sauce. Definitely within the top five best things I’ve ever eaten. It was very very tasty and I didn’t want it to end. We walked around the streets with the high fashion stores and drooled. We learned that the French term for “window shopping”, actually translates to “kiss the window.” And I’ve never wanted to kiss so many windows in my life. I’ve been to Rodeo Dr. and seen many designer stores in San Francisco and New York, but these ones were bigger and seemed to have more stuff. We were told we could get into another fashion show and sit in the extra seats if we waited around outside of the tent. There were a lot of people there, we waited and waited, but we couldn’t get in. We then went to a fancy department store and drooled around, then got back on the bus and the tour company took us to a famous Gelatoria. We made sure to get off of the bus first, so we wouldn’t have to wait behind the long line of all the students on the tour. I got chocolate chip Gelato on top of a nutella crepe and it was very tasty. Overall, it was a very nice trip to Milan. 

 Coffee in Rome

 Duomo in Milan

Week 3: Blake, the Hair, and Assisi

2/13/11    

     I never realize how much I’ve done during the week until I sit down to write this silly blog. I am always so busy that by the end of the week, it feels as if three weeks have past. I thought this week would be low key because we are more settled into our lives here. We have a favorite grocery store and are going to classes, but to my surprise it was a very eventful week. Two friends of mine from Simon’s Rock, Blake and Elana came to visit and we went to Assisi.

     Blake is spending this school year studying in Lebanon and for whatever reason has a really long intersession that he’s been spending traveling around Europe. I heard from my friend Eva, who is also a Simon’s Rocker studying in Florence, that Blake was coming to Florence. When I asked him about it late last week he said he was going to be in Florence in two days and expected Eva and I to show him around. I would have been surprised at the short notice, but I wasn't because this is Blake we’re talking about. During the day Blake was being shown around Florence by his Grandmother’s high school boyfriend who is in his 90’s, “racist” and lives here. Blake and I met up on Monday night and I showed him around a few historical sights. He bought a six Euro gelato that was massive and posed with the famous boar statue. He seemed more taken with Florentine puppies than some of the most famous sights in the world. We met up with Eva and went to one of my favorite bars. I got the bar’s signature passion fruit martini, which I thought was just a flavored martini, but was actually a martini that came with a Passion fruit to eat and a shot of Champagne. It was a bit too showy for my liking, but the Martini itself was good. Blake was unimpressed with the bar, and when we went out again the next night, Blake was still underwhelmed.

     On the third night Eva, Blake and my roommate Jocie decided to try a popular club called Full Up. When we got there, there were a ton of Americans outside and a cover to get in. We had pretty much decided not to go in, but turned around to see Blake entering the club. Not wanting to go in and pay a cover, we waited outside for a few minutes to see if Blake noticed we didn’t follow him and join us outside, but he didn't. The three of us girls went to another bar, but Eva left shortly after because she was tired. After an awkward conversation with non-English speaking Italians, Jocie and I left to meet up with one of Jocie’s friends. Jocie’s friend took us back to Full Up where she had VIP passes so we could get in for free. The club was absolutely ridiculous and I did not hear one sentence of Italian. American party girls were all over the place. Now, I’m sure it’s a totally awesome place if that’s what your into, but I’m more of a “enjoy a drink at bar, listen to live music and have a good conversation” kind of person. We didn’t stay long and Blake was nowhere to be found. On our way back to our apartment we ran into Blake, apparently it took him a long time to realize we weren’t in the club and he ended up having fun there, but left before we arrived.

     Blake left on Thursday, just as my friend Elana arrived. Elana graduated from Simon’s Rock last year and is currently traveling around Europe. Unfortunately I could only hang out with her a little on Thursday because I had class and tickets to the circus. The circus show ended up being more of a theatre show with some circus arts integrated into it. It was focused around themes of humans conquering nature and global warming. I support people spreading those messages through art, but they made it too depressing, and they could have been empowering people to want to make changes. On the bus back from the circus show there was a drunk American girl who was describing her revelation about how Italian men didn’t like her, they just liked “the hair”, referring to her long blonde hair. She just kept repeating “It’s the hair!”, and I couldn’t help but to encourage her by asking “what is it?” “It’s the hair!” “ Oh, the hair! Of course!” This girl had NO idea how hilarious she was being.

     I showed Elana around on Friday and took her to my favorite Pizza place and the chocolate festival. We went into a little leather shop where I bought a pair of handmade leather boots and although the woman working there spoke very little English we were able a good conversation. She told me to come back there and practice my Italian. It was really nice to hang out with Elana. I really admire how she is traveling around Europe by herself. I’d like to start doing more traveling independently.

      On Saturday the roomies and I took a train to Assisi. I was surprised we all woke up early enough to even make the train. In fact we almost didn’t, we were really slow in getting our tickets and Kelly and Kira had to run for it while I was standing in the doorway yelling “Rally! Rally! Rally!” Assisi was absolutely gorgeous. Assisi is famous for being the home of St. Francis and St. Clare. St. Francis and St. Clare both lead lives devoid of material things or excess. We visited three amazing churches beautifully decorated with frescos and sculptures, had an amazing lunch followed by amazing cannolis, but my favorite part of visiting Assisi was really just being reminded the messages St. Francis and St. Clare lived their lives by. Material wealth means nothing, if you are privileged, use your money to help those in need and not indulge in meaningless excess. A little silly that all these churches in Assisi dedicated to St. Francis and St. Clare were so embellished don’t you think?

      Today was the last day of the chocolate festival. It was really sad to see them pack up the tents. Going to the chocolate festival became a part of our routine. Hopefully we find something else to fill that chocolatey void. 

Blake, the boar and I.

Week 2: I live here.

2/6/11

     My classes are awesome. On Monday I had my Mysteries and Sacred Knowledge in Architecture class. Amazing. I sat in the front and geeked out HARDCORE. There were about twenty-five students in my class and nobody said anything when the teacher asked questions, so I talked A LOT. I couldn't help it, I might want to research this stuff as a career, symbols, sacred knowledge and intuition, it's all so fascinating. I did make an effort to not talk so much, but no one was saying anything and I had an opinion about almost everything... I even brought up stuff about Australia and Aboriginal people. At the end of class a bunch of the students were mumbling about how tired they were and about how long that class was and I could not relate at all. I felt energized and I thought class went by really quickly. I'm sure everyone thought I was super annoying and talked too much, but I really couldn't help myself.

     On Tuesday I had Sustainable Food, Anthropology of Fashion & Desirability and Italian. We mostly went over our syllabus in Sustainable Food, but I think the class will be great. When I was studying sustainability in Australia, we mostly learned about sustainable food by visiting farms and talking to people who work in the industry. I honestly feel like I missed out on a lot of the theory of sustainable agriculture. I think this class will be a great opportunity to re-learn that and gain a better understanding of what I just did in Australia. Anthropology of Fashion class was awesome. I'm not used to being around other students that take fashion seriously, and it was nice. I've always been interested in fashion, but never really had anyone to talk to about it. I thought this class was good because it seems to go beyond the superficial nature of fashion and examine how clothing is used culturally and individually to express an identity along with stuff more related to high fashion. I'm excited to see what I'll learn. Italian class was fun, I liked the other students in my class.

     Wednesday I had Fresco Painting & Restoration class. I was pretty exhausted and the teacher's English was difficult to understand. Although I was excited for actually starting to paint frescos, watching the teacher's demonstrations was really tiring. We had a forty minute break and I was not looking foreword to coming back to class. when I did come back from the break, our teacher surprised us with a field trip! We walked around the Corner to The Medici Chapel and our teacher guided us to a back room. In this room was a staircase hidden by a weird door on the floor. He told us to go down the stairs, and everyone looked a bit confused, but I felt brave so I went down first. Down this stairway was a hallway with a bunch of huge sketches drawn all over the walls. Mostly sketches of figures, but some horses as well. As it turns out those sketches were drawn by MICHELANGELO around the same time he was working on the Sistene Chapel in the 1400's. This room is not open to the public and the only reason we got to go there was because our teacher helped restore the room. It was truly amazing. I was walking inside of Michaelangelo's sketchbook. I still can't believe I got to go there.

     I went to the Ferragamo Shoe Museum on Thursday with Jocie. It was small, but very well put together. There were lots of videos about how they hand-make their shoes and many beautiful shoes on display. They had this one interactive table where you take a shoe, place it on the table, and a description of the shoe's history would appear on the table. My favorite shoe on the table was a beautiful red velvet peep toe pump worn by Nicole Kidman in the move Australia, go figure. It was gorgeous, I wanted to try it on, but that would have been weird... The next day I wasn't sure what to do, I really wanted to go to the Ufizzi, but knew I wouldn't have enough time to enjoy it because I had this safety workshop later in the afternoon, so Kelly and I decided to climb to the top of the Duomo! It cost eight Euro, but was worth it. At first we were saying we were on top of the world, but then we realized we were on top of the Duomo and domes represent Heaven, therefore we were on top of heaven! It was beautiful, I could have spent all day up there.

    Later in day, we had a safety workshop where some martial artists taught us some basic self defense. At first they had a powerpoint presentation where they showed us reasons to know how to defend ourselves. The soundtrack was very dramatic, synthesizers playing a similar riff to the The Final Countdown and the reasons would pop up in time with the music "To prevent Rape." It was unintentionally hilarious. The martial artist guy was also truly silly. He was very enthusiastic and wearing very short shorts. He told us "Use your fists like hammers, your knees like knifes and your elbows like axes!" We could not stop laughing.

     Saturday Morning we all slept in. When we were all awake and in the kitchen I demanded that it was Mimosa time, so we made Mimosas and went upstairs to our terrace. After we were finished with our Mimosas, Kira and I danced around on our terrace to Ben Kweller and Andrew Bird. Later in the day we went to The Florence Chocolate Festival. It was right in front of the beautiful San Croce Church. There was chocolate everywhere, every kind, in every consistency. It was marvelous. A stall in the back was selling fresh made on the spot Focaccia bread. I knew I wanted to try it because the line was long and full of Italians. Kira and I both got Focaccia with pesto and cheese on it. We sat on the steps of San Croce and could not believe how good it was. We both agreed that it might have been the best thing we've ever eaten. We had Allison take our picture in front of San Croce to document where we had the best food of our lives. I spent about thirteen Euro on amazing chocolate. When I got back to the apartment, I was truly exhausted, and very pregnant with a food baby.

      Today I finally made it to the Ufizzi. I went there when I was twelve and it was even better than I remembered. Even though it is cliche, the Botticelli room was my favorite. He just captures the essence of women magnificently. I didn't see all of the Ufizzi today, but I plan on returning soon. We went back to the chocolate festival to get more focaccia for lunch. It wasn't as good today, but we had a good time walking around the San Croce area anyway. I can't believe I live here!

 

On Top of the Duomo!

 Chocolate Festival

 Next to Michaelangelo fresco

Week 1: My life is a cartoon.

1/30/11
    I spent winter break missing Australia and helping out my family. I cleaned, I cooked, I cried... When the time came to get on my plane to Florence, I was READY. I switched flights in Germany and introduced myself to some girls I could tell were in my program. They were all really nervous, and this being my second time studying abroad, I couldn't relate. I just felt really tired.

     There must have been over forty students from my program at the airport and we all got picked up on a huge charter bus. The program staff was organized and friendly. I felt i was in safe hands. We checked into our hotel, a surprisingly fancy hotel with beautiful architecture and two very small elevators. Two Italian bellhops, both in fancy green uniforms, one short and fat, one tall and skinny, had to organize how all of our luggage would get up the tiny elevators to our rooms. They were yelling at each other in Italian and shoving bags and students into elevators- and that's when I knew my life was turning into a cartoon.

     My roommate was in the hotel room when I arrived. We got along right away and decided to venture off to explore the city. We decided to walk to the Duomo because it was easy to find (you can see it anywhere in the city). It was breathtaking, I couldn't believe where I was. Even though it sounds cliche, It felt like a dream. On the way back we got lost and were stressed we wouldn't make it to the welcome dinner on time. We made it back to the hotel within ten minutes of dinner. All four hundred students in our program walked over to a conference center and had our first orientation presentation before dinner. During this presentation I started to feel sick... really sick. It must have been from all the traveling and not drinking enough water. I felt dangerously close to vomiting. There was no bathroom in sight and I was scared. I was going to be "that girl who vomited the first night" and you just can't bounce back from that. I could not pay any attention to the presentation, I was too busy PRAYING not to vomit. Luckily, I did not vomit. I made it through the presentation and ate my first Italian dinner: a salad, oranges and water. Not the beautiful pizza and pasta I had envisioned.

     The next day of orientation was nice, a walking tour and more presentations. The following day we moved into our apartments. The program was preparing us for a tiny apartment with possibly no oven, a tiny refrigerator, no microwave, not much of a living room, pretty much a shit hole apartment. What we ended up with was insane. Really spacious, big dining room, big bedrooms, three bathrooms, an upstairs loft and terrace with a view of the DUOMO! We were shocked. We joke that it's the MTV Real World Florence apartment. It's on the top floor, so we also refer to it as "the penthouse."

     We spent the next few days getting to know the city and going to more orientation presentations. We live a block away from the central market so we started doing our grocery shopping there. The vendors don't speak English, so it can be challenging to get what you want in the quantity you want it. We are still figuring it out, but have gotten much better. One of the women from our program taught us how to order breakfast in Italian and I did it successfully at a famous cafe where the Futurists would hang out. It was a really cool cafe with Futurist art everywhere and I think the guy who worked there was very impressed with me because it is such a touristy spot and lots of people in my position would have used English. We're really just getting into the swing of things, starting to know the area better.

     The food I was eating was just average and overpriced and I was starting to feel disappointed, I'm in ITALY after all... but then I went to Pizzaiolo. Best pizza of my life. I think the key to good eating here is just to go far far away from the touristy parts, which is out of the way for us because our apartment is three blocks from the Duomo. That pizza rocked my world. I had a pizza hangover the next morning and slept in until two.

     The next night (last night) my roomie Jocie and I went out to get a drink with some other girls from our program. The bar we had planned on going to was out of business so we found another one. We were intimidated to go in because all the people smoking outside looked really cool, but there was no cover charge and it was raining outside, so we went in. After we all got a drink, one of the girls waved over a group of five really cute Italian guys. Only one of them spoke English so he acted as a translator. We had a really fun time chatting with them. When Jocie told them she had a boyfriend they told her "right now, he is with another girl", I said "her boyfriend is not Italian", and they told us "all men are the same everywhere." True, but Jocie's is a keeper. Jocie told them off in Italian. The mood was light, it was fun. They were really sweet guys, not the Italian creepers everyone warns you about. Jocie using her Italian and our new friend Duccio, the boy who spoke English, created some funny scenarios. Jocie told Duccio that I liked his friend, and Duccio told me that his friend liked me and that he could teach me "the art of sex." Oh Italians! We all had a good laugh. The boys left to go to a dance club, then Jocie and I went home shortly after.

     This morning I by accidently slept in until two again and missed my chance to go to the Ufizzi Gallery (home of The Birth of Venus), so instead I went to Ikea with the roomies. We had a really difficult time navigating the busses, but we finally got there and bought warm blankets (apartment gets COLD at night). Tomorrow we start class!

Roomies

The people are so animated, the architecture is so stylistic, and people sing and whistle ALL the time. I live in a cartoon.

Caio!

Johanna