A funny thing happened on my way home from the art show...

So, Thursday night, the last night of classes, I had a final art show at a restaurant in downtown Florence. Mauro ended up going with Christy and I to view our work. The show went great, and it meant alot that Mauro could come and share this experience with us. BUT. On the way home, Mauro asked us to wait outside a shop because he wanted to go inside and buy some chocolates because that particular shop had the "best chocolates in Florence" (he was right...) Anyways, so Christy and I are sitting on a bench, all dressed up and bundled up in our nice overcoats, just waiting. A man walks up and kind of gives me a strange look, which I happen to see out of the corner of my eye, but I just ignore him, because that's just Florence. Well, he starts digging through his wallet, and I assume he's looking for money to go buy some chocolate. Instead, once he finds what he is looking for, he walks up to me, and without saying a word presses a small coin into my hand, closes my hand around it, and walks away around the corner. I look at Christy, astonished. When I look, I realize he has given me a 20 Euro cent coin. Why? I have no idea. Was it a down payment? Did I look homeless? Was it a complement? I may never know. But, it made me sit and wonder for the rest of the night what this could possibly mean. I think I might start doing this in America. because, regardless of the meaning behind it all, it makes people think and wonder. And I kind of like that! :)

San Gimignano…FINALLY!!

So, this weekend was the grossest weather ever! And unfortunately, this weather has carried over into this week. It’s rainy and COLD, and I wish it would just snow. It really wants to, and it is snowing everywhere but Florence. But anyways, on Friday, despite the bad weather we went to Siena, a small Tuscan medieval town. It’s one of the best preserved medieval towns in the area. It was pretty cool to see all the old stone buildings with giant towers and fortresses. However, at the same time, it’s cool because the rest of the town, the more modern buildings have just sprung up around the ancient buildings, so it’s a very interesting mixture of medieval and modern. It was pouring down rain unfortunately, because from many places in the town you can look out into the Tuscan countryside, which is beautiful, even in the rain. I got sick, yet again, because it was so cold and rainy, so now I have a gross cold. Bummer. But, I have been wanting to see Siena for a while now. It’s so close to Florence, it’s one of those towns I would have been disappointed if I hadn’t gotten to see it before I left. And, since that night was one of the last nights Christy’s friends were in town, we went to fabulous restaurant across the river called Cambi and all the boys had giant Fiorentina steaks, which were amazing. They cook them for a short time on either side and then they stand the steak up on it’s bone and let the heat of the bone cook the inside. It’s pretty interesting, just to watch.
Finally on Sunday I got my second chance to tackle San Gimignano. Some of you may have read my post about trying to get there before, and if you haven’t, you probably should, because it’s quite comical and gives a little more insight as to why this trip was equally as ridiculous… Anyways, this trip was equally as disastrous, except this time we actually made it the town we wanted to see. So, we start off the day getting to the train station late, but it didn’t matter because our train ended up being 40 minutes late. You have to love the Italian trains. Actually, I really do love being able to travel by train, but the Italians can’t organize anything! Anyways, once we finally get on the train and get to Poggibonsi, we actually know what to do to get to San Gimignano this time, but since our train was late, we missed our bus and ended up having an hour and half wait in Poggibonsi. So, once again we found ourselves wasting time in this tiny town where everything is always closed! But, the bus finally came, so we get on it, with three other people and we haven’t even gone three blocks before a car hits our bus!! We barely even felt it because were in a huge charter bus thing, but this little Italian car felt it!! It really wasn’t bad, but there was a ton of paperwork to do, of course. So, that delays us even further. And, I would like to point out that these things would never happen to anyone but Christy and me!! But, we FINALLY get to San Gimignano, and it is worth all the fuss and trouble and wait to get there. This is probably one of my top favorite places in Italy now! It’s a tiny (we’re talking TINY) town on top of a hill that is still surrounded by its original medieval walls, and something like eight of the original medieval towers still exist. It was so cool to walk through this town and around this town and all over it because it’s so small… But it was like stepping in a time machine because every part of this town is original and it hasn’t grown outside of it’s original walls (atleast not much). So, as we are wandering around we find signs for La Casa de Babo Natale (Santa’s House). And, of course, we have to go in. So, we enter this courtyard and it’s decorated with lights in the trees and Christmas-y things everywhere, including a sleight and wooden reindeer. And then, Babo Natale’s house was in the corner and it turns out it was like an arts-n-crafts hut for children, so we thought we would leave it to the children, but it was fun to see. Plus, we found a tower in this courtyard that you could climb up and get the best 360º view of the city ever! Christy and I just sat up there in awe of the beauty of the scenery. I could have stayed there forever and been content. You could see Tuscan countryside for miles: miles of wine country and olive groves and the bright oranges and reds and greens that are made! It was really cool. So, despite the fact that Christy and I almost never actually made it San Gimignano, it was definitely worth the hassle!!

An American Thanksgiving…in Italy

Thanksgiving abroad was an interesting experience. Christy had some friends come in from Indiana for the week, so Mauro and Loriana invited them to Thanksgiving dinner. It turns out there was five of them, two of us, and Mauro and Loriana. If you have been to the Biliotti’s house (mom, dad, and Rach) you know this house is not outfitted for this many people. AKA it’s an apartment (above Gucci…just sayin…) in Italy. So, we set up extra tables and there were people EVERYWHERE! But, in that way it seemed more like my family’s Thankgivings. We started cooking the second I got out of class about 3:00 and didn’t stop until all the food was on the table about 8:00 (early for dinner by Italian standards. They usually eat at 9-ish…) So, Mauro and Loriana put us in charge of cooking them an authentic American Thanksgiving dinner, and that we did! Neither one of us had ever cooked a turkey before and everyone that we talked to gave us different instructions for cooking it (who knew there were so many different ways to cook a turkey?!) So, we kind of mashed everyone’s directions together and made it up as we went along. We cut slits in the skin and put butter in to keep it moist, then we covered it in olive oil and rosemary. It ended up pretty good. It was a little dry because we cooked the crap out of it because they didn’t have a meat thermometer and we were worried about it being too undercooked. But, it looked pretty and the juices made a darn good gravy. I would like to point out that we even made gravy…points for us? So, we had the giant turkey, which Mauro kept calling an ostrich because it was freaking huge!! (5 Kg to be exact…) And then we prepared mashed potatoes, my grandma’s stuffing recipe (which was a giant hit!! Loriana had like seven helpings of it!), buttermilk biscuits, and corn on the cob. Then for desert, Loriana made the best tiramisu EVER! And Christy made a darn good apple crisp, but it was most definitely shown up by Lori. So, it was really cool to be able to share this American holiday with friends and with my Italian family. We have had turkey in every form since that day…turkey loaf, turkey meatballs, turkey ribolitta…it never stops!! But, the holiday was the best I could ask for being abroad! And, now we get to listen to Christmas music and enjoy all the Christmas decorations that started after Halloween here! Plus, the guy who sits outside playing Christmas music on his flute (which is apparently called a flautist…who knew?!) is finally actually playing for the right season considering we can hear him from our window and he has been playing Christmas music since we got here…in August…

Venezia

Venice, in a word, was amazing, incredible, perfect, beautiful, pristine, a little dreary, and all around wonderful. Who am I kidding? I can’t describe Venice in one word! Last weekend, Christy, Patricia, David, and I all took a train up to Venice. The train ride was about two and half hours, but it went by quickly because the views were beautiful from the train and because we were sitting next to Fernando, a good looking Spaniard who was making us practice our Spanish for once instead of our Italian. It kind of sucks that since I have been here speaking Italian this whole time that I can no longer find the words for things in Spanish, only Italian. I have heard that it is very hard to be able to speak both languages, and I agree, they are just too similar. Anyways, we got to Venice mid morning, and I immediately loved everything about it! We went on a bit of a dreary, cold, foggy day, but that worked to our advantage because there were hardly any tourists there. I had heard that Venice was smelly, dirty, crowded, and gross. But I never saw any of that. There was hardly any trash around (this might because I am used to Florence which can get pretty dirty…), it didn’t smell at all, and the water was a beautiful color of blueish green. I think I was expecting something more like the river walk where there is brown trashy water. But, this was no San Antonio, this was Venice!!! We decided to first visit St. Mark’s Square, which happened to be on the complete opposite side of town. We could have taken a gondola ride, but it was just too expensive! They jack up the prices because it’s such a “tourist” thing to do now and Europe likes to take tourists for all they have… So, we found our way walking around the city, over bridges, and through some of the tiniest allies I have ever seen!! It was actually quite easy to get around town by foot, although the streets are a joke there because they were built around the canal system. If you ever see a map of Venice, you will know what I am talking about. There are bridges that just stop at someone’s front door step and streets that start out of the middle of no where. It’s quite comical to try to walk in a direct route anywhere in Venice. But, we made it to St Mark’s and got to see a large portion of the city in the process. St. Mark’s was absolutely beautiful. The flying rats (pigeons) that cover the piazza: not so beautiful. The pigeons there are absolutely crazy!! I thought Florence had a problem with flying rats. Nope, Venice has a bigger one. People think it’s fun to feed these gross things, so they constantly fly up to you and land on you and are really brave little suckers. I just ran through them all and watched them fly away, that was my fun for the day. But, the church was absolutely amazing, inside and out. Inside, the ceilings and floors are covered in elaborate mosaics. The floor mosaics are made out marble and the ceilings are done in gold teseri. I doubt it’s real gold, but maybe...it is Venice after all. After we saw St. Mark’s square we did a little more walking around and found a pizzeria that made us a special margarita pizza (because we are awesome…just kidding, I don’t know why.) But it was a darn good pizza. It made me like Venice even a little more. Then we some how found our way back to the other side of the city, to the harbor (although the whole city is basically a harbor…) and we took a water taxi (which is really just like a giant ferry) over to the islands of Murano and Burano. Murano is where the famous Murano blown glass is from (hence the name…) and Burano is famous for their lace. We only stopped very briefly in Murano because it has gotten very touristy since they became known for their glass. However, since Burano is a little more out of the way, it was basically deserted! This was an incredible island! It used to be a very successful and popular fishing town inhabiting over 22,000 people. Now less than 6,000 people live there. (I will one day make it 6,001…) This island was beautiful though. All the houses are painted in bright colors so that when the fishermen come home in the fog or dark, they can still find their house. (So the old story goes…) But it was like being in Venice, because everything was still navigated by canals, but the houses and buildings were painted absurd colors! It was so beautiful and we ended up staying there until dark. If I didn’t find lace so tacky, I probably would have purchased some because their lace working skills were quite incredible! After we came back on the water taxi, we had just enough time to do a little souvenir shopping before we embarked on what became a nightmare of a trip home. We bought cheaper tickets on way home because we didn’t have any place to be and therefore could take a little bit longer. But cheaper tickets meant we had to switch trains in Bologna. Well, that turned out to be a slight issue seeing as how there was a train wreck and all the incoming trains were four hours late. At this point it was already 10 PM (or 22:00 if you’re from Italy) so I was exhausted! We finally, after talking to about twenty different conductors, found the only train that was going to Florence and hopped on it. It turned out to be a sleeper train, so we had to move around to five different cars until we finally found seats. The final part of the journey was that the train didn’t stop at the right train station and we missed the last train to the other station (which is literally two blocks from home). So, we got to walk for an hour before our journey finally came to an end. So, basically, it was a little stressful at the end, to say the least, but I wouldn’t trade those experiences for the world!!!

London Calling...

London was one of the best trips I have taken since I have been here. Although I guess I start every blog with that. We left way too early on Friday morning, but it was good because it got us to London by 9, so we could start our day. The first day we were there we took a walking tour of the downtown area, which might as well be called Times Square. It’s all modern architecture with a giant bright screen that flash advertisements just like New York City. But, after we walked around downtown, we went to Covent Garden Market, a really cool market with very expensive stores. Well, everything is very expensive there because the dollar to pound ratio is a bit ridiculous! But, this was a great market because there are street performers everywhere. Some were really good – doing amazing magic tricks like making melons appear out of no where. But some were quite awful cross dressing comedians who didn’t happen to be funny, but happened to have hairy stomachs shown off by their belly shirts. So, it was great for people watching and absorbing some of the funky culture of the area. That evening, we went and had dinner at a great pub, The Coal Hole, (recommended by my friend Damien!) in down town London. I had a fabulous wild mushroom and asparagus pie. London’s famous for their pies. Afterwards, we headed down to the “hip” area, where all the night life is. We got to see some half naked transvestites pole dancing. Highlight of my night. Haha. We hung out with a friend of mine’s cousin, who was studying abroad in London this semester, so she was able to show us around some. But we were too tired to really stay out that late.
Saturday was my favorite day of the trip. We started off (too early…) at the National Gallery. This was possibly one of the best painting collections in the world. Every room you went into had famous names splashed over every wall. There were whole rooms dedicated to some of the best painters in the world: Botticelli, da Vinci, Michelangelo, Rapheal, Titian, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Caravaggio, Monet, Seurat, Cezanne, Van Gogh…the list goes on and on and there were about 70 rooms of these paintings. I probably could have spent a good week and half just in the museum. We also got to see The British Museum, which was great and full of everything England has stolen in the past thousands of years. Including one of the crystal skulls that the new Indiana Jones was written about. (Who knew that didn’t just jump out of George Lucas’s head??) After the museums, we took a stroll through St. James’s park. This was such a beautiful area! However, there were nasty geese/pigeons/ducks everywhere! (And, no, I don’t mean that they were mutant animals, just that there were all of those birds everywhere.) St. James’s park is one of the only areas in London where it’s legal to feed the birds, so they sort of flock there. There was even an old man feeding squirrels out of his hand. But, St. James’s ends at Buckingham Palace (with the flag raised which meant the queen was actually there…) where we got to watch the changing of the guards. This was a cool experience, but a little over the top if you ask me. I mean, twice a day there’s a huge parade all because the soldiers were going off duty. I hope there’s a parade every day for me when I get off work. Anyways, it was a cool experience. After the changing of the guards, we headed to the Tower of London. We got to go inside and do the full tour of the whole tower and castle. Got to see the crown jewels, the ancient weapons, crowns, and armory of the past kings and queens, as well as great views of The London Bridge (which, oddly enough, was NOT falling down…sad day.) and the modern architecture of London. After the tower tour, we went back to the main square to figure out what we were going to do for the evening. We wanted to get Mamma Mia! tickets, but they were all sold out, I’m assuming because the movie made it a bit more popular. But, it ended up working out for the best, because we got tickets to see Wicked instead. This was definitely my favorite part of the trip! We had a hell of a time actually getting to the theatre, because our bus stopped half way there and we were told it was only going to take 20 minutes to walk there when in reality it took 45 minutes to jog there. However, we made it, a little late, but we still got to see the show! This is seriously one of the best musicals I have ever seen! The costumes are incredible, the set is even more impressive, and the two female leads have voices that give you goose bumps every time they opened their mouths!! It was “London’s number 1 musical,” so our little gay ticket seller told us, and I can totally see why! I unfortunately asked the stupid question of “do you think when you see it in the states, the actors all have British accents?” Apparently the answer to that was no. I guess I was just thinking of Spamalot…
Sunday was a short day because we had to get to the nightmare that was the London airport in the afternoon. However, we were still able to cram in so much! We got to see Westminster Abby, Big Ben, and the London Eye, because they are all like a block from each other, who knew, right? And then we got to go up to Camden Road Market, which was an incredible open air market that had everything from things for hippies, goth, and punk rockers, as well as antiques. There was a huge area with foods from every country. (Vietnamese, Thai, Chinese, Argentinean, Brazilian, Jamaican, Turkish, etc. etc.) It was a really cool place to go people watch, but it was also a great place to shop because the prices were really reasonable (even for the pound!) Plus it was cool because most of the stuff was hand made and all the artists and artisans just sat around making their products all day long.
So, the trip was amazing. The weather held off quite well. It was very cold (yes, I’m from Texas…) the whole time, but it only rained a little bit on Sunday, and we were basically in the airport by that time. I think the best thing about the trip was the people. Everyone in London was so happy, helpful, and just plain kind. Even the people who in America are total jerks, like security guards, policemen, and airport workers, were insanely nice and wanting to be as helpful as possible. It’s a nice change from Italy where people are a bit more hostile and definitely an amazing change from America! I think we should take a note from the Brits and start going out of our way to be friendly!

Calcio

Last Wednesday, me and a few friends finally went to a soccer game here in Florence. It was quite the experience, to say the least. We bought the cheapest tickets possible, because that’s how I roll, but it ended up being really good. We ended up on the first row, separated from the field by only a thin sheet of glass. The entire crowd, including us, was in purple (Fiorentina’s color!), except for a small portion wearing red (Munich’s color…BOO). Munich was the team they were playing and they actually had a large portion of fans in their section, which had to be sectioned off by glass as well, and then guarded by a ton of police in hurt-your-eyes yellow vests, making sure no fights broke out. Apparently, we went to a good game, because Munich is a big rival of Fiorentina, and there were really good yelling matches between the two teams. When we arrived, my favorite player, Mutu, ended up scoring the first goal within the first ten minutes. That’s why he’s my favorite. Well, that, and the fact that he’s ridiculously good looking. So, the rest of the game was a little bit boring, besides the man standing behind us yelling obscenities in Italian. I swear even the worst and ugliest of words sound amazing in Italian. The man standing behind us was constantly yelling “Vaffanculo!” (Pronounced va-fawn-coo-lo) And, this sounded so beautiful, regardless of the fact that he was yelling the worst obscenity that exists in the Italian language. Well, in the last twenty minutes of the game, Munich ended up scoring on a cheap shot (I’m not biased at all…) so the game got pretty intense. But, it ended up being a tie, so all was good and everyone went home happy-ish. So, that was my Italian soccer experience. Despite what some think, there was no cheating. Italians don’t cheat at soccer. Haha. There were quite a few obscenities yelled, lots of purple, lots of really great soccer, and a really good time had by all.

Americans in Italy for Obama

Last night, Christy and I went to a theatre outside of Florence called Sachall.  There was an all night election party going on for anyone who wanted to go.  It was put on by the Tuscan American Association.  Yes, apparently that exists.  We arrived after dinner (which is like 10:30 here because they don't eat until 8:30 or 9) but it was really interesting!  There were hundreds of people at this event!  Students, ex-pats, older couples on vacation, Florentines, and other Europeans.  It was so not what I was expecting.  I guess I just didn't realize how many people are wrapped up in the decisions that our country is making.  There was a ton of free food.  Crappy American food like McDonalds and donuts, but hey, it was free.  There was also free wine, because, duh, we're in Italy!   Live country and western bands played all evening until the race started getting intense, because apparently that's the most "American" music they could think of.  And there were lots of raffles with the grand prize being an all expensive paid trip to America.  But, before the race started, they took an electronic vote of who you wanted to win and 85% of both Americans and Europeans said Obama.  There were shirts and buttons being past out that said "Americans in Italy for Obama," and poor John McCain didn't even have a booth.  I'm pretty sure all his supporters left when they saw the odds were against them.  But, it was surreal to be in a foreign country and seeing how much everyone cares for my country and just how much one decision mattered.  Whenever they would show Obama winning a state the entire room would burst into applause and cheering.  But when they showed McCain everyone booed and flicked off the monitors.  (I didn't ever say the Florentines were classy...)  It was so funny, and a really great experience.  Unfortunately everyone got kicked out at 4 AM because the party had to end before the final results came in, but it was such a fun night!  Or morning...   had a blast and hope that things can start changing in America.  Or else I'm moving here.  :)

Il Tanto

This past week has been exhausting and exciting and perfect! My family met me here in Florence last Sunday afternoon (well, some of them didn't actually make it here until Monday. Damn the French. It wasn't their fault, but I feel as though I need to blame them for everything now.) We hit the ground running and never actually stopped moving until they were safely on the airplane home. They visited me for a week, but it only seemed like a few short days because the time flew by so quickly.

The first few days we had time in Florence to do a little sightseeing. Oh, did I say a little? Opps. Basically we saw almost everything Florence had to offer in two/three days... We had a guided tour of the Accademia (definitely even cooler once you know what everything in the museum is) went to Santa Croce, Santa Spirito, Piazza le Michelangelo, Palazzo Vecchio, Ponte Vecchio, and alot of other places that I can't really remember right now...

Then we went to Chianty. We got a tour of the vineyards from our private guide Guido. Whose name means "guide" in English. Coincidence? I think not. The vineyard was beautiful, despite the rain, and we got to have a fabulous meal of cingàle (wild boar) and lots of vine. Then we got to go into the wine tasting room and taste even MORE wine, grappa (a very strong liquor made from the skins of the grapes), homemade olive oil and the best tasting balsamic vinegar that they make at the vineyard. It takes something like 7 years to make balsamic vinegar right. (I wasn't really listening to that part...I think Colleen and I were distracting each other...) We then left that vineyard and visited a town called Montefiori (Mountain Flower) that only has something like 100 residents. It was an ancient medieval town with the original stone walls still surrounding it. We went inside a small wineshop and I attempted to converse in Italian with the cutest little old man who owned the store and made his own wine with his sons. We got free tastings of three of his wines from 2004 and 2005. I was definitely a fan of these wines, but it may have had something to do with the little old man serving them. After we drank wine he handed me his card and then started telling me to look him up on facebook. Yes, a tiny mountain village in Italy with only 100 people living in, and this old man tells me to find him on facebook. Priceless.

On Thursday we went to Rome, which was possibly one of my favorite days. We started at six in the morning and didn't stop again until we were back on the train at eight thirty that evening. We received a guided tour through the Vatican by Brenda, a former American who now lives in Rome and does research for the Vatican about Christianity and some other big words I didn't really understand. But, she was incredible and so knowledgeable! We got to see the Vatican museums, the Sistine Chapel, (which I may or may not have taken an illegal photo of...) and St. Peters. It was such a great tour! Then we left Brenda and was shown around the rest of the town by Julio (pronounced 'jew-lee-o', NOT 'who-lee-o' like my dad kept trying to call him...) I was not so impressed by Julio because he kept telling me the things I had learned in class was wrong. And I think I might believe Jeff Fontana who has a degree in the subject rather than this tour guide who writes fiction novels... But, anyways. We got to see the Pantheon, the Colosseum, Trevee Fountain (which I still don't know how to spell...) and the Spanish steps. I saw everything I wanted to see in Rome except for a few art museums that I might have to go back for later, but somehow we did it all in a day!!

On Saturday, my mom's birthday, we went to Cinque Terre. The five villages along the west coast of Italy that is now a National Park. It was so beautiful! These villages are very tiny, with only a few houses, restaurants, hotels, and shops, with narrow winding roads that connect them together. Each town is a little different than the next, but they are all right on the coast and all painted brightly to stand out among the dark stone cliffs. There are also hiking trails that connect them all together, but unfortunately the rain that had hit Florence all the previous week had made the trails too dangerous, so they were closed. However, we were able to drive to three of the five and explore the towns, take a ton of photos, have a FANTASTIC lunch of pesto pasta and pizza, (since these towns are known as the birth place of pesto) and toast to my mom's birthday with some lemoncello on the beach.

The week was so amazing and flew by entirely too fast! I miss my family alot, but I realize I only have less than two months left to see everything else I haven't gotten to see and to make some of the best memories I will ever remember! I am so thankful my family was able to come visit me and I hope they had an equally good time!!

Christy and Megan should not be allowed to travel alone…

So, these past two weekends have been incredible! But, seriously, Christy and I should not be able to travel together. Last weekend we went to Perugia to attend Eurochocolate 2008, the chocolate festival of Europe. (if you didn’t catch onto that one…) The school was sponsoring a trip, but we decided we would save money and make the trip by ourselves. Mistake number 1. We talked our good friend Ben into making the trip with us. First problem, we got to the train station too early. (or maybe late…) We thought there was a nine o’clock train, but it turns out there was only an eight o’clock train and an eleven o’clock train. So, when we finally got on the train, it took about two hours to get to Perugia. Once we reached Perugia, we realized there was another problem. We had no idea where the chocolate festival was taking place in the city, or how to get there. I guess we just expected to step off the train and have there be chocolate everywhere. Well, our friend Kellen was at the train station going to the festival too, but he got on a bus before us and told us just to get on a bus that looked like the one he got on. So, the next time a “coach-like” bus drove by, we hopped on. The only problem? This bus was actually heading to another town. We asked a young boy sitting next to us if the bus was going to the chocolate festival and he just laughed. So, we got off at the next stop, which happened to literally be in the Italian countryside in the middle of nowhere! So, we wandered around the Italian countryside for a while until we found another bus stop going the opposite way and only had to wait about twenty minutes for the next bus, but it was a stressful and all around hilarious situation, and even more funny that it happened to Christy and me. When we finally got to the chocolate festival (about three and half hours after we were expecting to) it was worth it! If I don’t have to look at chocolate for a good long while, I will be happy!! But, there were booths from all over Europe. The Swiss chocolate was probably my favorite. We got a lot of free samples, and I ended up buying some chocolate covered hazelnuts, which happen to be my new favorite nut since it is used in everything here!! There were really cool booths with chocolate everything, like a giant life-sized chess game with the pieces made out of solid white and dark chocolate! It was a very cool festival! Once we finally got there!

This weekend, we decided to visit San Gimingiano because we didn’t have too much time to take an entire day trip, since Christy needed to be back to cook dinner for our host parents. San Gimingiano is a small town on the top of a hill about an hour outside of Florence. So, we took the train there and got off in a little cute town. We hiked around a town and through the woods around old fortress walls and walked all around an ancient castle. It was a really cool hike and it was surrounded by beautiful views of the Italian countryside. But, as we were leaving, we realized that we had not actually made it to the town of San Gimingiano because you cannot reach that town by train. Only buses can go to San Gimingiano. Therefore, we had been walking around the town of Poggibonsi all day not realizing where we were or what we were doing. This is why Christy and Megan are not aloud to travel together. I might find some time to head back to see San Gimingiano, because I still do want to actually see the town someday.
On a different note, my parents are getting here this weekend!!!!! And not only my parents, but my mom, dad, Rachel, Aunt Anne, Uncle Tim, and Aunt Colleen!! Let the fun begin! I can’t wait to share my cute little town with all of them!!

Capri…Italian for the most perfect place on Earth!

This past weekend I spent three days along the coast of Amalfi. I traveled, along with 45 other students down to the Southwest coast of Italy. The trip took about six hours each way, so there was a lot of down time to say the least. On the way down we stopped in Napoli (Naples). I was thoroughly unimpressed with Napoli. Naples is the third largest city in Italy, only to Milan and Rome. It is also the place where the mafia supposedly currently resides. (Although I think that’s supposed to be a secret. If I don’t make it back to America, we’ll know why…) However, it also happens to be the place where pizza was invented. Their pizza is fabulous!!! But, their city was very dirty because they are attempting to get over a trash strike, and there is so much crime there, I constantly felt on edge. Thankfully we only had a few hours there. Just enough time to eat a pizza, meet the prime minister, and have our first look at the ocean. Then we continued on into Maori, where we would spend the next two nights. Maori is a small coastal town, which is very hard to reach by land. We drove along side of a cliff in a giant coach bus all along the switchbacks of the Italian coast line. Every time we rounded a corner our driver would lay on the horn to announce to the world that a big ass bus was coming around the corner. And, if another car ever drove up at the same time, they were basically screwed because the one lane road didn’t really allow for large buses. So, that was an intense drive, but it was worth it! The coast line is the most breathtaking site to witness in person. These pictures will not even come close to doing it justice! Each small town that we drove through on the way in was more beautiful than the last. Our hotel was right on the beach and my room faced the ocean, so in the mornings I was able to watch the sun rise over the ocean…PERFECTO!! By the time we got to Maori on Friday, the sun had already set, so we only had enough time to run to the ocean and dip our feet in before dinner. However, after dinner, we went back down to the ocean with a bottle of wine to watch the moon reflect off the ocean. My friends Julia, Emily, and I ended up going swimming in our underwear. It was kind of cold, but the water was so clear you could see all the way to the bottom – even when it was too deep to touch and even only in the moon light. The whole swimming in the underwear thing sounded like a good idea until we realized that we had no towel and it was really cold outside.

During the day, the ocean was so brilliantly aqua marine, it was indescribable. We had to be awake at 7 AM, but that gave me an excuse to watch the sunrise! We first had to take a small boat along the coast to Amalfi, and then we got on a larger ferry that took us out to the island of Capri. Capri is literally in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea with very few islands surrounding it, so it took forever to get to it, but it was worth the two hour boat ride because this was the most beautiful island ever. The second we got there, we got on another boat that took us to the Blue Grotto. This is a cave that when the sunlight hits the water, it reflects up onto the top of the cave, making the whole thing the most brilliant blue you will ever see. When we reached the entrance of the cave, it was not at all what I thought it was going to be. They moved us all from the boat we were in, into tiny canoes. I got crammed, along with seven other people, into a tiny canoe that I had to lay down in. The entrance to the Grotto was so tiny that our gondolier literally had to lay down on top of us to get into the cave. It was such a cool experience though because once you went through the tiny opening, the cave opened up into a huge room, where our tour guide bega

n singing to show us all how well it echoes in the cave. We didn’t get to spend enough time in the Grotto in my opinion, but it was an unforgettable experience! After the Blue Grotto we hiked to the top of the island and back down the opposite side so we could go to the

beach. It was so surreal to see the rich blue ocean meet with the tallest cliffs without any kind of transition or beach. While on the beach we went cliff diving, which was actually kind of scary, because the water was so clear that it didn’t look like it was deep enough to jump, let alone dive into the ocean. But, in reality, the water was about thirty feet deep! It was a crazy experience. I have never seen water that clear in my life! After swimming, we hiked around the mountains some more taking pictures and taking in the views. After Capri, we boarded the boat again, made a short stop in Amalfi to see their Duomo and crash a wedding, and then headed back to our hotel. In the evening, our teachers set up a beach party for us complete with a bonfire, tunes, and booze. (You have to love European’s ideas of schooling!)

The next morning, we boarded the bus entirely too early to go visit Pompeii. I was pretty impressed with the site, but for some reason I wasn’t expecting it to be so huge! We spent almost three hours inside and I still felt like there was a lot more I could have seen. It was very interesting to learn about Pompeii because I was so unaware about everything before. Silly me, I thought that the lava got the town, but no. Lava never ever reached the town seeing as how it is 10 or 12 kilometers away from Mt. Vesuvius. It was actually the toxic volcanic gases that suffocated the villagers, and the 12 feet of volcanic ash that buried the city. It was so interesting to see the town and all the people who were so unaware of what was going on. It was a little depressing to see. There was a dog that’s apparently famous, but it was tied up outside someone’s house, so it was all curled up in an awful position.

So, that was my weekend. Full of memories I will never forget, and sites I will probably never see anything like again. The absolute perfect weekend!!!

I cannot believe it’s already a week into October!! Where has the time gone?? I sill can’t come to grips with the reality that I am living in another country. I’ve heard that you finally get comfortable with everything about a week before you leave. Sounds about right. This weekend I was supposed to be in Venice, but a train strike stopped that plan. Thanks train workers, you probably should have asked me before you did that one…just saying. But, it worked out ok, because I got to see a lot of “tourist” spots in Florence that I have been dying to see.

On Thursday (and actually, again on Friday and Saturday) there was mini Oktoberfest in the piazza below our school. The school smelled delicious for three days!! They had a ton of booths from Germany and Switzerland, and a few from France. There was lots of German beer (of course!) and the best giant pretzels in the world, and giant wheels of cheese (that actually smelled gross…I know, blasphemy for a McCarty to say…) and a whole pig on a spit, LOTS of wiener schnitzel and sauerkraut, and really awkward booths that sold wooden porcupines. But, it was really fun to go walk around and smell everything and see all the fun, crazy drunk people dancing to German music.

The rest of the weekend we spent time hitting all the hot spots. We finally finished seeing the Accademia (David is one big nude dude…), finished the Uffizzi (Which I probably could spend four more days in and still not be able to take everything in), the Medici Chapel, and San Lorenzo Church. We wanted to go out to the Medici Villas on the outskirts of town, but we didn’t really know what bus to get on and we were not brave enough to just jump on a random one. Plus it was a dreary, rainy weekend, and I wanted to take pictures because it’s so beautiful out there. There are still a ton of churches that I want to see, since that’s where a lot of the most famous Italian Renaissance art is located. You have to pay to go into them, and our card that gets us into all the museums for free doesn’t get us into the churches. But, we have discovered that if you go to mass there, they can’t charge you money. It might be a little blasphemous to only go to mass to admire the art, but it is very interesting to sit in on mass in Italian. I love that they end all the services with “Andiamo in Pace” (Go in Peace). I feel like it sounds so much more elegant in Italian. Well, really, I think everything sounds better with an Italian accent. Even the Italian men who yell, “Hello, kiss me!” in the markets. They don’t really mess around anymore; they go straight for the direct pick up lines.

Next weekend is the Amalfi Coast, which I am so excited about!! I will have to add a ton of pictures to my blog from it. I hope the weather is good. We have been having a bout of nasty weather here. I hear November if ever worse…boo. It has gotten very cold here. Well, cold for a Texan, my Indiana roommate makes fun of me leaving the house in my giant coat every day. During the day it’s not bad because the sun is usually out, but in the mornings and at night it gets pretty chilly. This weekend was especially bad though because the rain came in as well.

My host parents invited us to have dinner with them on Saturday (because we don’t eat with them on the weekends usually) and we were supposed to make a desert for them. So, we chose to make banana bread because they both have “a little bit of diabetes,” as they like to say. It came out really good, considering we weren’t really sure if the ingredients we were putting in were actually right considering the writing on the boxes was in Italian. They have been fattening me up good! The other night they had to go to a dinner party, so they left us a “cold dinner,” which I didn’t think sounded good and was actually kind of scared of. But, this was seriously the best salad I have ever had in my life. It had a layer of proscuto, then a layer of lettuce (but not the normal Italian lettuce, because this had small, sweet leaves, and usually the Italians use arugola…haha Rach) then a layer of corn, then some cheese (of course, because we are in the land of cheese), then it was topped with olive oil and lemon. The most perfect salad on the face of the planet!! Then they fed us these unidentifiable fruits. They are green, with a leafy stem. But you eat them like an apple, and they taste awful!! We have been trying to figure out what they are, but there’s no translation in the dictionary, so I’m pretty sure they don’t exist in America.





Oh...and here's a photo of Mauro...

Under the Tuscan Sun

Saturday was possibly one of the best days I have had since I got here!  I am a total wine snob now.  Especially when it comes to the red wines.  In fact, like the Italians, I won’t even bother with white wines any more! J  I learned so much about how to taste wine, how to describe the tastes, how to smell, how to see the alcohol content of the wine…ect. ect.  We first went to Montecino, a small town North of Siena, about two hours from Florence by bus.  We were first able to tour the ancient Renaissance castle, which the main part is now used for wine tasting.  Then we got to taste our first wine of the day, a Brunello.  

Apparently this is the most famous of the Tuscan wines…I really had a lot to learn considering I had not even heard of this.  We had a 2003 vintage, which I liked, but didn’t happen to be my favorite of the day.  Although I shouldn’t put this wine down because it is possibly o

ne of the best wines I have ever tasted.  Apparently, 2001 was the best year for Tuscan wines and 2002 is “absolute piss,” as Mossimo, our guide told us.  After that, we went to Montepulciano.  Apparently, these two towns have a rivalry going with which one produces the best wine.  I think Montepulciano was best, but I got to taste more wines from the region, so maybe that had something to do with it.  We had lunch in a small restaurant that Jack Nicholson apparently frequents. (so says the restaurant, considering there are large photos of him on the outside…heck, maybe the owner just really loves Jack, who knows…)  We had a huge four course lunch with a different wine pairing for each course.  (Now should be the time to mention that wine tasting in Italy is a little different from in the states.  Instead of getting a sip which you taste and then spit out, the Italians fill your glass and expect you to taste the wine as you drink it.  All of it.)  Needless to say, it was a rowdy bus ride home! J  I had to try chicken liver 

pâté for an appetizer.  It was pretty darn gross.  (And to top that one off, tonight, Monday, Mauro prepared this delicacy for Christy and me as part of our dinner…I just can’t escape the pâté!)  For a first course we had Pici Bolognese, which is basically fat spaghetti, almost worm-like, but it was some of the best pasta ever! For a main course we had pork in a plum sauce.  And for desert, we had the best tiramisu on the face of the planet!!  I think my favorite wine pairing was the pasta course. 

Although I am still not educated enough to know why I liked that pairing more than the others.  After lunch we stumbled on out to the vineyards, where the wine we drank came from.  We got to walk through the vineyards, taste the grapes right off the vine, see all the casks (both metal and oak), and taste their special reserve label wine.  That was actually my favorite wine, but it also happened to be the most expensive.  What can I say, I have expensive tastes…  

But it was cool because the reserve label wines had the photography of a famous photographer from the area.  (Think Jones Soda labels to the extreme…)  The grapes from the vineyard were fantastic.  They were different from a normal grape.  They had very thick skins, which they end up using later to make a liquor called grappa.  And they are possibly the juiciest little morsels ever.  “They even tasted purple.”  Our last stop on the tour was Piensa, where the famous pecorino cheese is made.  The entire town smelled of cheese, which was actually not as good as it sounds.  But it was fantastic to sit, eating fresh cheese, watching the sun go down over the vineyards.  If possible, I will one day own a villa there.  It will happen; I just have to get famous first.  This was definitely one of the best Italy days.  When I pictured Italy in my head, this is exactly the type of day I pictured.

Sunday morning I participated in ‘Corri la Vita,’ ‘Run for Life,’ which was a run/walk supporting beast cancer.  (Well, supporting finding a cure for breast cancer… atleast I don’t think it was in favor of it…)  But it was a 5k that went up over the hill of Piazza le Michelangelo, through the woods, and back down over the Arno river.  It was a very beautiful run!  And such a fabulous way to start a Sunday morning.  Plus, we got free pot holders for participating.  We then ran into a parade on our walk home.  There were lots of men in hats with feathers, wearing plaid.  I thought it was their version of the masons, but no such luck.  Two men saw that Christy and I were dressed the same and still had our numbers on…so they struck up a conversation with us starting off with asking if we won the race.  (No, but thanks for rubbing it in some more…)  but they told us that it was a parade of the Alpini Soldiers.  These are the men (Well, these old fat men were obviously retired) that protect the Italian border of the Alps.  Apparently it’s a big deal, which we happened to know nothing about.  But the old men were cute and they took pictures of us and we got pictures of them…

We probably have the most interesting Sunday nights here.  Last Sunday night we went to Piazza Santo Spiritu, which we renamed Piazza della Hippie.  We had dinner and ended up staying for a concert because he heard the band warming up, and they sounded incredible and the lead singer spoke perfect English.  The bad played a lot of blues stuff like Blues Brothers, some Aretha, etc.  It turns out the lead singer was from New Jersey.  She was so funny because she was announcing all the members of the band, in perfect Italian, saying “on sax, Francesco… on piano, Luca…” and then she said “Mi chiamo SUSAN.”  Whitest name ever! Christy, Kellen, and I just looked at each other and said in unison, “Yup, American”… But we went and talked to her after the concert and she was a really cool woman.  She was a student here like us, over 16 years ago, and she ended up back here and hasn’t left.  I would love to one day have a story like that!  She was such a great sport through the whole concert too because there were lots of people there that were obviously very high or drunk or on something, or needed to be on something.  For some reason there were also quite a few people of questionable gender there as well.  We played a fun game called ‘Man or Woman?’  But there was one woman, who actually liked to be called a man, it turns out, who kept getting up on stage and asking Susan to dance with him.  It was hilarious!  Susan looked a little thrown off, but just kept on singing, until the person took the microphone from here to tell everyone that Susan is a lying American woman.  Possibly the funniest concert ever.  Finally the ‘man’ was thrown out of the free concert, but not before getting angry and throwing chairs.  Oh, Italy.  As Lindsey tells us, “This country is peaceful, but the people here sure have a lot of anger in them!”

Well, then, last night, we decided we needed to have a picnic up on Piazza le Michelangelo and watch the sunset.  So, we are sitting on a blanket enjoying our cheese and crackers, and a German couple walks up and notices that John, a guy in our group has brought his guitar with him.  The man asks if he can play it, and just starts busting out some Simon & Garfunkle, Bob Dylan, John Denver, and basically just puts on a little concert for us all.  His wife buys use three bottles of wine, which they consumed most of, and we just hung out having a picnic with the German hippies.  The guy looked a little like Willie Nelson, but his name was Axil, and his wife was Sabina, who had the longest blondest hair on the planet.  By the end of the night they were both pretty drunk and all the more entertaining.  Sabina kept asking John to play the Rolling Stones’s song Angie because Axil would never play it for her and she just loved that song so much!  She must have asked him like four different times.  Pretty darn entertaining!!  They were apparently camping up there with lots of other hippies.  Apparently that’s hippie central too.  We do know where to find them now!