Last Week of Teenagerdom!

AHHHHH ohmygosh so much to be planned, so much to be done!
Right now I'm in the midst of planning my summer, which is somewhat of an ordeal, since I have several different people to coordinate with. GAH. But right now the most important thing is the last few weeks, in which I will be, supposedly, on my own. So rather than wandering around Europe by myself for a few weeks, I think I'm going to WWOOF. What is this strange acronym, you ask? WWOOF stands for World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms.  Basically, you join and get access to the contact information for a bunch of different farms, and the idea is that you go work on the farm for however long and they give you free room and board. I think that coming back to Italy and working on a farm (preferably in the south) would be a nice way to round out my trip and continue learning and practicing Italian language skills. And it's a good way to have a MUCH cheaper yet still fun and fulfilling end of the trip. Plus I can try out my second grade dream of being a chicken farmer! Yep,  when I was seven I wanted to farm chickens. Go figure. Anyways, people I know who have done it in different countries seem to like it, and this is again something that kind of scares me. But like I said, terror is the spice of life, all things worth doing will probably be scary at some point or another. So I did it. I signed up and paid the 25 euro membership fee. I figure worst case scenario I don't up doing it and I have donated 25 euros to a nonprofit. Not so bad, if you ask me. But I think I will, provided I can get dates straightened out. And hey, what doesn't sound fun about harvesting wild herbs and milking sheep on a beautiful Sicilian farm? So hopefully this works out. And hopefully it will be good for my bank account, since I'm really not counting on having money left my the end of the summer. Which is totally fine as long as I can get my butt to the airport in Rome on June 30th.
Prior to this particular adventure of the summer, though, I will be traveling quite a bit. Immediately after the program ends at the end of April, Krissy and I want to go to Greece, Rome, and possibly Croatia, and then Simon and I will do at the very least England but probably more, and then at the end May Julia shows up for a few weeks and we'll go to Portugal, Spain, France, Germany, and Ireland. If any of you eager readers have suggestions of places to go (including favorite cities in Italy) I would love to hear them! I honestly don't really know what I'm doing, I'll have to invest in a Rick Steves guide book sometime soon. Allora!

In other news, this is my VERY LAST week as a teenager! That's right, I'm twenty in one week. Weeeeeird. I suppose I should be angsty and sulk and get into trouble over the next week so I can be sure to have taken full advantage of the "stupid teenager" excuse. When I get back to the states I'll have to do grown up stuff, like find a place to live and hopefully get a job. Dio mio, what tasks. Ah well, those things I will happily leave for future Robin to deal with, the poor sucker. Anyways, I don't really have any plans for my birthday, although I know that my host mommy will be making me tiramisu! And I have a test and a short (very short) paper due on the 8th, so it will probably be relatively low key, but we shall see. The 8th is also (aside from Rachel's 21st birthday, she is very excited and so are we!) the festival of women here in Italy. I'm not quite sure what that means or entails, but I will let you know once I found out.

OH and while I'm here I'll share with you how well English teaching went today with my first graders! It was shapes and colors day, so we played bingo! I  made out some card with shapes on the different boxes (only 3x3) and had the color each shape whatever color they wanted, and then called out a shape and a color. They seemed to have a good time, and I felt accomplished for having filled up the hour and kept their interest. Next week will be animals and numbers, so again, any suggestions for favorite games or song are welcome.

Allora. I think that's all for now. Spring break planning is also underway (Naples, Sorrento, Palermo, and the Amalfi Coast, among various day trips), and this weekend will be full. Friday will probably be Assissi with Krissy, followed  by a Cheese farm visit on Saturday and a Carnivale festival trip on Sunday. I'll keep you posted!

And, should any of you want to send me a cool birthday card or anything (hint hint), here's my address once again:
Robin Boedecker
c/o Siena Italian Studies
Fontebranda 69
53100 Siena, Italy

And, if you only have enough stamps to send within the states, it can always be forwarded to me!
Robin Boedecker
113 Jefferson Dr
Tiburon, CA
94920


Should you be so inclined....

Cultural Adventuring

OK, this will just be a short post because not a whole lots has happened between San Gimi-jays and now, but last night the school took us the the opera in Florence! The show was Manon Lescaut, composed by Pucicni. There was, of course, lots of deception and loud singing in old Italian and Manon died in the end. It was a fun cultural experience, but I think opera is the kind of thing you have to ease into, since it was about 3 hours total, which is very long to sit and listen if you're new to opera.
Other than that, it's been nice out lately but today is rainy and gloomy. I've heard it's snowing in Portland, and everyone is all excited about it, but I'm not too sad to be missing snow. It sounds cold. Plus I got my share of snow in the Alps, which, if you ask me, is WAY cooler. Every now and then I think about what I might be missing back on campus, but then I think: Hey wait, I'm in Italy! This is way better!
There are some silly little thing I miss about the states, though, things that I never would have thought about while I was living there. Like sauce on sandwiches. Y'all already know how I feel about Tuscan bread, and the sandwiches suck. They're literally just sucky bread and a thin slice of meat or two. Dry. Very dry. Mi non piace.
Also, to go cups. While it's nice to sit and drink coffee and relax and enjoy in a cafe, which we do often, I can't deny the American in me. Sometimes it's nice to multitask and take coffee to go. And bagels. They have never heard of bagels here. I actually had a dream about going to the grocery store and buying bagels. Mmmmm... Oh, and raw vegetables. We get plenty of veggies with dinner at home, but they are all cooked to death. Those of you who know me well know how I love raw vegetables. I couple times I've gone to the store and bought some to snack on, but it has to be a clandestine mission, since implying that I'm not being fed enough (which is not true) would be rather offensive.
And of course, there are lots of things I'll miss about here but I'll be happy to return to these small things after all my time abroad.

A day in San Gimi-Jams

Since on Fridays we only have one class that ends at eleven, yesterday we decided to spend the rest of the day in San Gimignano, which is another small Tuscan hilltop town about 45 minutes away. We hopped on a bus and got there a little after noon.

San Gimignano is a lovely place to go for the day, since it was gorgeous and calm, but I have to say, the lovely sleepy town thing would be difficult to live in, at least for students like us. But for the day it was great! Calm and relaxing with great views of the country side. The first thing we did when we got off the bus was find a cafe for lunch where we could sit outside in the sun. There was really only one that was easily found, because it seemed like a lot of places were closed down for winter months (January and February) since the tourist count was low.
Next we got tickets for the small musuem there and the Basilica, and all together for students the tickets were only 2.50, which is always nice. I really like the frescos in the Basilica there because the story was very accessible. One side of the church was old testament and one was new. As much as I've enjoyed seeing all the religious art I have to say, there has been plenty that I don't totally follow. Maybe it's just because I've seen so much and have been learning to recognize things, like John the Baptist always dressed in hair, but still, it was nice to have something laid out in a way that I understood well.
We also spent some time wandering around nears the walls of the town and enjoying the views. It was a nice enough day, and since San Gimignano is famous for it's white wine we bought a couple bottles and lounged in the grass as the sun went down. It was very Tuscan and picturesque!
When we got back to Siena around 8 I was just in time to make it a string quartet concert in town that I hid signed up to go to. It only cost 4 euros and was pretty and relaxing.

All in all, it was a lovely relaxing Tuscan Friday.

Soup Kitchens and Stray Puppies

So far this week has been tiring but good! Let's see, Monday I went to the Liceo (highschool) with a few other Americans and went to the classes to help out with English. Basically what that means is that we get into groups with the kids and speak English with them so that they can practice speaking. They seem to be pretty good at it but some are better than others, of course, and some are shy. It's fun though, and I do get to speak a little Italian when we have to translate. This week they gave us a list of American/Italian stereotypes and we talked about which were true. There were things like "Italy=Mafia" and "Americans eat hamburgers all the time". When we were talking about the mafia, which is mostly in the south but they said there is some everywhere, just not as intense as the movies make it seem. I told them about the bloods and the crips, and told them not to wear red or blue if they went to LA. They think I'm super cool since I'm from California, too. I think part of the point is to make them think more realistically about America, but man, they think I'm totally living the life. I told them about Melissa Armstrong's house with the pool and the movie theater, and I told them I lived near Robin Williams and George Lucas. The girls were also super jealous of high school proms, since I guess they don't have them here. They're nice kids, and some of them invited us to go out to a discotech with them sometime, which would be funny but fun, so we might go in a week or two.
After that I had Italian class, which I was late for but also had to leave early to go to teach the bambini.
I wasn't totally prepared for my first real day of teaching but the teacher was really nice, and it was not problem at all. She had asked me to bring in a day of the week song, so I taught them a simple one that was just the days of the week to the tune of "oh my darling clementine" but I also taught them the happy days song just for fun. I asked which they liked better and they said tutti i due!
I wasn't totally sure what to do for the next part because I thought that the teacher wanted me to teach out of the workbook they had, but it's a very odd workbook. It had words like "robot" and "hamburger" and "wave." Why 1st graders need to know these is beyond me, I told the teacher that "penso che questo libro e un po' strano" and it turns out she doesn't like it either but because it's a public school she had to stick with that one. We flipped through the book together and I figured out what she wanted me to accomplish and I said I'd bring in different activities. I get to do shapes, animals, colors, and things like that, which should be fun.
Tuesday was busy with  class, but my Cultural Anthropology class took us "trekking" around Siena and into the Palazza pubblico again, which I liked. We sat on some steps that our teacher said that Dante probably sat on, so that's pretty cool.  And afterward Simon and I got pizza...mmmmmm.
Today was also a very long day. On Wednesdays I don't actually have class until 4:30, so I decided to fill my time by working at the local soup kitchen. I actually took this on because last week I approached Mike about participating in something where I would have to speak more Italian, since sometimes I have frustratingly few opportunities in a day to really practice. Mike recommended the soup kitechen because it's laid back and the people are nice but it's really all in Italian. So today I went, da solo. It was overwhelming for the first day because I had to figure out how everything worked, and I wasn't given many instructions, and of course, being overwhelmed I forgot a lot of Italian. It was pretty awkward at time since I wasn't sure what to do, but everyone was very nice. The soup kitchens here aren't caferteria style, it's restaurant style, where people sit down and are served (two courses, of course). Since it was my first day I handed out bread. I got really good at asking, "pane? uno o due?". I'm going back again next week, and I think it will be a lot easier now that I understand better how it works. A couple of the people I served were very friendly, one came up to me and kept telling me "Fai modella, per favore! Sei bella!" which was very nice, but she also was talking about Serbia and bombs and the politics of the world for a while, and I was definitely faking my way through that conversation. Also, they gave me lunch there after, again nice but will be much better next time when I actually remember how to speak Italian.
Then in the afternoon before class I had coffee with Simon and Karen Gross, our LC trip leader, who's super sweet and interesting. We talked about rhetoric and my comm major some and hopefully we'll have more of a chance to elaborate on that.
Finally, after class we met our assigned "language partners." I think it's supposed to be both for us to practice Italian and for them to practice English. Mine is nice, his name is Gennaro (which my host mom tells me is a name very common in Napoli, where his parents are from), he's very tall and just got a degree in Biochem, and is now pursuing a phd. I was surprised at how easy it was to speak Italian to him. Granted, the subjects were not super deep but it was a good conversation. I think his English is probably close to or a little better than my Italian level, so hopefully we can help each other out. He said that it's best to get a groups of all us partners together and go out, which sounds fun. From here on out it's up to us to meet up, the school only organizes the intial meeting, so we exchanged numbers and hopefully we'll all hang out soon.
When I came home for dinner what did I find, but a puppy! My host mom had taken a stray dog from her friend's farm, and I think they're trying to get Edoardo's girlfriend's family to take it. It was so cute, but it needed a bath!

Edoardo, his girlfriend Chiarra and the Canelino (little dog)

Anyways, my next task is to plan my spring break trip and then the summer. For spring break I want to go south, to Napoli, Sicily, Amoffi Coast and Sardegna, so I'll have to coordinate with various people. Then for the summer, Krissy and I are talking about going to Greece, the Czech Republic, and maybe Croatia right after school gets out, and Julia Black is coming, at the end of May, so we'll do Portugal, Spain, France, Germany and Ireland together. I bought my eurorail pass today so I should be good to go! I might be on my own for a bit once Julia leaves, so if that's the case I might try to organize a coupld weeks of WWOOFing back in Italy, but we'll see how it all pans out. I'm excited, but I'm not to crazy about the planning!

Rome

Rome! It's going to be quite a tesk to recount everything, but we'll see what I can do.

Our Hotel

We left Siena for Rome at 7:38 Friday morning, and arrived around ten (we is Kate, Krissy, Simon, Alexa, Paige, Julian, Cooper and me). The first thing we did was find a metro station and get ourselves to the part of town where the hotel that Kate had booked for herself, Simon, Krissy and me-the others were winging it, but they found a nice hotel close to ours for the same price. First, let me say how nice it is to travel with people who like to plan. Krissy and Kate like to plan, and made good use of the assistance offered by one Mr. Rick Steves. Rick rocks. Kate found a lovely hotel for only 60 euros each for two nights in an excellent
location; within walking distance of Trevi Fountain, the Spanish steps and the Borghese, among other cool things. Krissy, with the help of Rick's 3 day in Roma plan made out a schedule with all the cool stuff planned out and made us a reservation at the Borghese Gallery. And I nodded and smiled. It was great. And one of the most useful things that Rick told us about was the Roma pass. This pass costs 25 euro and gets you into 2 museums free, works for all buses and metro, and gets other various discounts. Awesome. So once we picked us up a few of those at the closest tabbacheria we headed to the Colosseum.

Lion Taming

Friday was a wonderful day to be at the Colosseum. Wonderful. When we left Siena it was raining but in Rome we abandoned our layer and I was comfortable in a tank top. Plus, the Roma pass allowed us to skip the entire line, and admission was covered in the pass. I think one of the reasons I liked it so much was definitely being outside in the sun, but it was also huge and interesting to see the underground part where they kept the lions and gladiators and whatnot. We also saw the Arch of  Costantine (since it's right next to it), but we skipped the Palatine forums because we're going back to see that later with our art history class.

Arch or Constantine

Where they Kept the Lions

After meeting up with the other four, we found a place to get some pizza (mmmmmm) and then made our way to Pantheon. The Pantheon was huge and crowded, and lovely of course but I have to say, I would have loved to see it with all the pagan statues and gods, before Pope Boniface IV had to go and turn it all Christian. Seriously. I cannot tell you how many Madonna e Bambino paintings and statues I have seen. They're all gorgeous, but still. Still. OH and it was kind of cool to see Raphael's tomb. A bit creepy, but cool.

Feast!

After the Pantheon we stopped by Trevi fountain, but not for long since it was teaming with tourists. Now let's get one thing straight: it's February. February. I can only imagine what it will be like in the summer. Needless to say, this is not somewhere I will be going then. Next we found a supermercato and rounded up some cheese, olives, tomatoes, wine, gin and tonic for a pre-dinner cocktail feast. This was just what we needed after a full day of traveling and culture-ing. When we were all rested up and ready to go we met up with the other four (who had gone back to their own hotel) for dinner. We went to a place we had seen by the supermercato, which turned out to be delicious. We split some appetizers, carciofo (artichoke) and also some cheesy eggplant things, and for my main course I had roast chicken. Yes. So good. After we went to the Campo dei Fiori, which is where all the American students go to bars. We checked it out but in the end were tired and unimpressed so we headed back and happily got into bed.

Inside Vatican City

The next day we woke up to breakfast served to us in our room (since the hotel lacked a common dining area) and then headed out to Vatican city with all eight. Luckily for us, Julian had made a reservation so we didn't have to wait in line at all. The first place we went to was the pincoteca which was full of amazing relisous art. I honestly could tell you very little about exactly what I saw there was so much but it was absolutely beautiful. There was some Bernini, some Raphael, some Crespi. All lovely.
And of course, we had to see the Sistine Chapel. This is another place I would hate to be in the summer, based on how crowded it was this weekend. The Sistine Chapel was cool to see, but I have to say, it was quite different than I imagined. A little dimmer, and the God giving life to Adam frame was smaller than you would have though. It was still all very cool, of course, but as Michealangelo goes I'm still going to have to say that David is my favorite. The panels of the Chapel that no one talks about I liked a lot, especially the ones with Moses (although admittedly and understandably I understood those panels more easily than the new testament ones).
One thing that did not disappoint was Raphael's School of Athens fresco. I love frescos, I really do. And I loved that this one shows figures I study as a communications (rhetoric) major. Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Pythagoras, the whole gang. And I love how Raphael painted himself into it looking straight at you. Clever boy.

School of Athens

Finally we had to go to St. Peter's Basilica, mostly to see Michelangelo's Pieta. Lovley. Kate told us it was controversial because Mary looked so young and beautiful, and it was now behind glass because someone crazy had tried to attack it (according to wikepedia it was a geogolgist with a geologist's hammer yelling "I am Jesus Christ) and so the nose is chipped. Wikepedia also says it's the only work Michelangelo ever signed, but later regretted his outburst of pride. The line outside The Basilica looked monstrous, but it moved very quickly since it was just security, and so getting in was no problem. And since it was early evening it turned out to be just the right time to be there because we got to see mass beginning. I have to say, I feel a little unconfortable in those grand churches, not necessarily because I'm not christian but because I have a hard time feeling comfortable with religeon in such grand places, I think I would feel insignificant there. It just strikes me as rather inaccessable, I don't know if I could identify with the grandeur of it all. But I suppose that's very Jewish of me, to think of religion as more personal than grand. Allora.
We stopped briefly by the Spanish steps but those were crowded. So crowded that I could barely see the steps themselves. I'm sure they would be AWESOME if there was no where around, but as it was we were tired and not particularly inclined to stick around. 
Eventually we returned to finish the cocktails and wine from yesterday, watched a bit of The Princess Bride on TV in Italian (Il mio nome é Ingio Mentoya.  Hai ucceso il mio pradre. Preparti morire), and headed out for another dinner.

Me and Simon at the Borghese Gardens

The last day of the trip was Borghese day. Strolling though the Villa Borghese I swear I could have been in Golden Gate Park of somewhere in Portland. Compared to the tourist filled parts of Rome this was (quite literally) a walk in the park. Lovely trees and wide, pleasant path. I felt very relaxed and at home. Our reservation at the Gallery was at 11, and once again the admission was covered by the Roma pass (thanks again, Rick). The Borghese reminded me alot of the Barnes museum in Philadelphia, what with it being a converted mansion and the laminated cards that told you about the ceilings and the paintings and things in each room.  I have to of course mention Bernini's Apollo and Diana, another lovely marble statue. After all the religous art it always fun and refreshing to see some pagan art too. They had an exhibit of Lucas Cranach, which I loved. I like how he would do several different verisons of the same scene, such as Judith and Hoferous, Salome and John the Baptist's head, and the suicide of Lucrezia. It was fun to see them all side by side. I also had some time to sit outside the museum for a while on my own and enjoy the sunday laze. We also checked out the garden and fountain behind the Borgehese, again incredibly pleasant, before settling down outside of a restaurant for luch (risotto Milanese. yes.). We walked around a bit more and grabbed some coffee before finally catching our bus back to Siena at five. On the bus it was dark and rainy so it was fun to pretend for a while that we were driving through

Borghese Fountain

the bay area, because the lights in the distance looked just like lights across the bay.
Overall, I liked Rome way, way better than Florence, but I'm glad that I got those two cities out of the way during the off season because I liked the art much more than the cities themselves, and I wouldn't want to go deal with even bigger crowds. Once again, I was happy to return home to Siena.

First Week of School, First Week of School!

Since the intensive italian weeks have finally come to an end, this week it was time to begin our other classes. Long story short, this will probably the easiest semester ever. For example, 15% percent of our grade in Art History is a 300 word paper on what we think about a painting. Not very stressful. It's cool though because we get to see things first hand and I can tell we'll learn a lot, we just wont have any stressful homework or anything. The other class I'm taking (aside from Italian language, of course), is cultural anthropolgy, but I don't have any strong thoughts on that as of yet.
I also started my volunteering teaching  on monday... well, sort of. I was supposed to be there at 2:30, but since Mike was running late dropping everyone of at their different schools I got there way late and only had time to say hi, really. They're cute, although originally I was assigned to 4th graders and it turns out I'm actually teaching 1st graders, which means they know waaaay less english. The teacher wants me to use their english workbook, so hopefully I can figure out how to use it well.
And today it rained. It simultaneously made me miss Portland, since it rains all the time there, and made me miss California, where it's warm. Allora.  
Other than school, this week I've just been trying to get comfortable being here. It's wearing to be constantly out of my element. Also, it's odd that things look familiar but it still isn't my territory. It's impossible to feel completely comfortable not knowing the language, and it's surprisingly hard to practice, since we're always with Americans. It's an odd situation because being with Americans makes it hard to talk to Italians but without someone else it's hard to do anything. It's odd. I also have a hard time understanding how people can become completely fluent in another language. There's such an incredible amount of nuances to know, it seems impossible to remember everything. I'm definately not going to come back fluent in Italian, but it's nice to know that already I know more than enough to get around successfully. I know I'll learn more but again, I think we're all a bit hindered by the fact that this is in the end an American program. And that's fine with me, I'm just going to focus on learning what I can, of course as much Italian as I can, but I also recognize that that's not the most important thing for me this trip. It would be nice to know Italian well but even if I don't I know I'll have picked up other more important (and honestly, more useful) things.

I like Aosta the Mosta (not really, Siena is still best but still)

Just returned from the Alps yesterday! And it wasn't even as cold as I thought it would be, but then, what do I know about the snow.
We set out on Wednesday and had to be on the bus for way longer than promised, but since I've been on Wheels several hours on a bus is no big deal for me. We finally made it to  Torino, where we went to the Cinema Museum, which they told us was pretty important for film. Being a comm major I probably should've been more interested, but film isn't really my area, I'm more of a rhetoric girl. Also, I think it was pretty bad planning to have us go from a hot stuffy crowded bus to a hot stuffy crowded museum. It was fun to see the famous movie posters in Italian, but it was also frustrating that we didn't get time to see the city at all before being shuttled onto the bus.

Wade and Heather on the bus and ready to go

We finally got to our hotel in Aosta a couple of hours later, just in time for dinner. The food at the hotel was unimpressive, but at least the bread had salt in it. That's kind of a big deal. Not much happened that night since we were pretty worn out from all the travel.
The next morning we got up with the intention of snow shoeing, but were told that there would be a guided tour the next day, so we held off on that. We still took the lift up to mountain and looked around, and of course the gondola ride and being up on the mountain was gorgeous. We also found a little caffe to get some coffee in before heading back down.

Me and Some Mountains

Julian and Maya Skiing

Bus Station in Aosta-Ready for France!

Then in the afternoon we decided to mosey on over the border to France, since it was right there and all. We had to buy bus tickets that would take us to Courmayeur, which is still in Italy, and then change buses to get to Chamonix, France. There were seven of us total (me, Rachel, Krissy, Megan, Libby, Marli and Fiona). On the bus we ended up meeting an English guy named Tim, who was traveling around and going ice climbing, which to me sounds very very cold. As I pointed out later, of course the strange European man we befriend was the one with the ice picks strapped to his backpack.   He was fun to talk to, and he hung out with us in Courmayeur and showed us a good sandwich place once we got to Chamonix. At one point we made Rachel do an English accent so that we could get him to do an American accent for us. Both were classy renditions.

My New Look

The bus was mostly a pretty ride, except for the part where we went under Mont Blanc to get to France. It was cool to be under such an epic mountain, except it really it just looked like a long-ass tunnel. Outside  of the tunnel it really looked like we we were driving through Disney's Beauty and the Beast. The snow was lovely, but like I said, not super cold at all. Awesome mcpossum.

French French Fries!

Chamonix and Me

Rachel and I were sad to have to leave France

Chamonix was lovely, too. There we didn't have any plan in particular aside from just going to France, so we just walked around and enjoyed the small town, and we really only had a few hours anyways. Just being surrounded by those mountains was incredible, chilling under Mont Blanc is kind of a big deal. It was also nice to be out of Italy for a while and see everything written in French instead. I really like being here, of course, but being away for few hours, even just being over the border made me realize how much Italy overload it really is, so it was refreshing to see something in a different style for a bit. I think the trip to France is probably best summed up in the pretty pictures, because I don't really have much else to say about it. Oooh, although Rachel did get some really good Brie at a grocery store (sooo good, sooo cheap) which we enjoyed later that night after dinner. Another night that wasn't super eventful, except for our epic adventure trying to open a bottle of wine Heather had bought before the trip. In the end we got a bottle opener, and the wine tasted like manichewitz anyways. It was quite the triumph in the end, though.

Castello di Sarre

The next morning we got up to go check out a castle that was only about a 10 minute walk from the hotel, called Castello Sarre. The guy at the hotel said that this one wasn't was cool as the Fenice castle, which was too far to go, so we weren't sure what to expect,  but it ended up being a really cool castle. As it turns out it belonged to Regina (Queen) Margherita and Re (king) Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy. NO BIG DEAL.  So that was bad ass. And it turns out that old Victor was quite the hunter, and decided to show it off by decorating his hallway and game room with horns of animals he shot. And I don't mean like a few here and there, I'm talkin' 3,612 horns. It was cool but also creepy. We also got a tour that was included in the admission (which as only 3,50 to begin with). It was in Italian but we had our friend Julian translate. That worked out because we all could understand a lot of the tour but Julian filled in the gaps. Very handy.

Snow Shoes

Krissy, future Olympic snow shoer

After that we grabbed lunch at a place next to the hotel before Kirssy, Julian and I set out snowshoeing! It turned out Heather was coming too, which was cool. We almost missed the bus, actually, but since it was a super small group (the four of us plus one other NY student and a bunch of the staff) they came back to pick us up. We went snowshoeing in Gran Paradiso, which, as we'd learned earlier in the castle tour, used to be Victor Emmanuel II's private hunting ground. One of his son's later donated it to the public because he liked fishing instead. The foresty park kind of reminded me of Yosemite, only snowier and more mountainous. Snowshoeing was kind of like hiking but with silly shoes, but I have to admit, I may have accidentally almost fallen over a couple times. I didn't though, but still. Skillzzzz.

Add caption

After snowshoeing the four of us hitched a ride in the city (on the bus that was going to pick up the skiers) and found the brewery/beer bar in Aosta. That was fun, especially beer isn't really a big thing here. We had quite the adventure getting back though, since they had told us it wasn't far to walk. Long story short, it was, plus we kinda went the wrong way for a bit. We almost missed dinner but eventually made it back though.

Italian Gorgonzola!

The next morning we piled on the bus again and once again stopped in Torino, this time to go to the Egypt Museum. This is the museum that has all of the stuff that Napoleon took from Egypt but didn't want to drag over the Alps, so he left it all in Italy. And man, it was a lot of stuff. I was a little frustrated because they put me in the tour group that was in Italian only without the translation. I understand lots if Italian but I really would've appreciated it more in English. A couple of us ended up breaking away from the tour anyways and just wandering around on our own. Grabbed some lunch and filed back onto the bus for the rest of the long ride.

Lunch in Torino

And now, back in Siena! I liked Aosta and the mountains a lot, definitely better than Florence, but I'm still happy to be in Siena.

Also, you'd all better be reading this, because updating after long weekends is quite a task. So thanks for reading, e'rebody. 

Art. Lots and Lots of Art. Famous Art. Florentine Art.

This is about to be a pretty epic post, just 'cause I haven't written anything since before the weekend. Allora. Thursday and Friday were normal school days (although our last day of intensive Italian is Tuesday yay! It's been really helpful but we're all rather Italian-ed out), except at the end of the day Friday they took us to Siena's Palazza Pubblico, which was the old government builing, and is filled with art. For example, Ambrogio Lorenzetti's Allegory of Good and Bad Government. Bad. Ass. I liked being in this museum a lot because it was fun to see more of the political art rather than just the religious stuff.  I love that these old important buildings are made so lovely and intricate If I were one of Siena's council of nine, meeting in the good/bad government room would definitely remind me to think very carefully about important decisions. I think I was the last student from our program in the museum because I wanted to take some time to be on my own and get a chance to appreciate and think about everything. It was also nice because I haven't had a huge amount of alone time, so it was fun to be on my own for a while. The balcony on the backside of the Palazza overlooks a part of Siena outside the city walls, and I wandered out there right during magic hour. I had the whole grand balcony and view to myself.

View from Palazza Pubblico

Later on Friday afternoon I went for some wine with Rachel and Kate at Zest bar, which we've become regulars at because it's always calm and pleasant and has free internet, and the guy who owns it knows us now. This is always fun, although I think that my host family could probably tell I was a little buzzed when I returned home for dinner since I spoke rather emphatic Italian. I wasn't drunk or anything but it does tend to be a little easier to speak less self consciously after a glass of wine because it's relaxing. Friday night dinner was also fun because Julia had left for Florence earlier in the day, so I had the family to myself. It's great having Julia there but this was the first time I'd had dinner with them on my  own and it was a nice little change of routine.
After dinner, I went out with Madisen, Megan, and Maya, to a bar near where Madisen lives, in a neighborhood called Vico Alto. Usually when we go out at night we go to the center of Siena, around the Campo, because that tends to be where the night life is, and we know which bars we like and they're all pretty close togeather, but Mike, one of the program directors, had told Madisen that this one near her house was cool. I liked the bar itself, although we ended up just hanging out for a while until Madisen (who is rather outgoing) made friends with some Italian guys that we ended up hanging out with for a bit, and I spoke to them in Italian the whole time! There were no deep conversation topics, of course, but we talked about school and being in Siena and things like that. It was a very successful Italian language adventure. At the end of the night, we had to get a taxi but the phone numbers we had and that we got from the bar tender weren't working, so they even ended up giving us a ride back to our neighborhood, Acqua Calda. We were all a bit skeptical and made sure not to leave any one of us alone in the car with them (I walked Megan home), but I don't think that was even necessary because they were perfectly nice and gentlemanly. Everyone warns us about Italian men hitting on us (which is why we're always careful to stay in groups and keep an eye on one another) but they were never hitting on us or anything, we were the ones who talked to them because we wanted to practice our Italian. It worked out well, though, but of course we're definitely going to continue being careful and sticking together when we go out.

Our Hostel Room

The next day we had to wake up fairly early to catch the bus to Florence, where decided to spend one of few free weekends. A few  of us (who tend to be more enthusiastic about art and history) were eager to get the Uffizi, even though they're taking us as a group later in the semester. When we got off the bus in Florence we first headed to the hostel we had booked, which was a bit of an adventure in itself considering how difficult Italian streets and numbers can be. We finally found it though and got all checked in. The hostel was only 12 euros each for the night, and the room we were in was huge, with 3 large beds and one twin. It was nothing fancy, of course, but very clean and warm and served our purposes perfectly.

PIZZA

After we dropped off our stuff there we went out to wander I bit and a got a slice of pizza that was delicious, and closer to American pizza than the pizza I'd had previously. After that, we finally headed over to the Uffizi! We didn't need a reservation because it's the off season and wasn't super crowded, and it was only 6,50 which is much cheaper than I expected. Honestly, I would pay a lot more money to see that art. It was really nice also to know that we'd be coming back, so we didn't feel rushed to see everything.

Me at the Top of the Uffizi with a Dome for a Hat. WHAT UP.

The art in there was, of course, amazing. I loved the Adoration of the Magi by Gentile da Fabriano, the detail on that is incredible. Kate, who's an art history major, says that Gentile gets forgotten more than he should, since he was a contemporary of Simone Martini, who tends to overshadow him. It's too bad, I really loved seeing that. We saw so much in the Uffizi it's hard to remember it all, but of course we saw Boticelli's Birth of Venus and La Primavera, which were, of course, incredible.
I can't imagine being the commissioner of those paintings and just having them hanging in my house. I would invite people over all the time just to make them sit and stare at then. Which we did, for quite a while. I also found a few different Leda and Swan paintings, which I always think are lovely. My favorite Leda and the Swan I saw in Philadelphia, at the Barnes Museum. That one is by Cezanne, and I think it's one of my favorite paintings overall, because the form and brush strokes I find very captivating. The last super memorable painting I saw was in the baroque area downstairs: Judith Slaying Holofernes by Artesemia Gentileschi. It's a tad violent  but the light and drama of it is stunning. And I can't help liking that it was done by a woman.  We saw lots of other art of course, and I'm looking forward to going back again and hopefully being able to record my thoughts on more of them.

Me and the David Replica

After our couple hours in the Uffizi we got some gelato and meandered over the the Academia to see Michalangelo's David. This was definitely a highlight of the weekend. I didn't think that I would be so impressed with it, since I've seen pictures a billion times and we had seen the replica outside of Piazza Vecchio by the Uffizi, but boy was I wrong. There is absolutely no comparison to the real thing. Something about the marble and detail and form, it really looks like he's about to up and do something. I was very happy we went. The other thing in the Academia that I like seeing was Michealangelo's unfinished statues. The way the forms we're emerging from the unpolished marble looked almost surreal. It gave me more of an idea of exactly how those sculptures are sculpted. And it reminded me, of course, of Michealangelo's quote about chipping away at everything that wasn't David. A very obvious connection, of course,  but I think I got a better idea of how that was accomplished.

The Florentine Duomo

Later we headed out for dinner, and I had ravioli with butter and sage that was delicious. After that we headed out to look for a bar or something, and ended up wandering around the city until some Italian men, who I was really not very fond of, showed us an area that had more going on. We got rid of them pretty quickly, luckily, and eventually met up with some friends at a bar near the Duomo. Soon Krissy came by with one of her friends who was studying in Florence and some of her friends who were visiting, and we all went out to dance club discotech sort of thing. Krissy's friends were nice and the guys that were visiting were from Holland and they were fun to talk to.  That was funny, certainly the most euro-trashy thing we've seen yet. We met a few people inside who were fun to talk to, including a french guy who named all the songs  off of my favorite Velvet Underground album, and we talked about our favorite Bob Dylan song, Tangled up in Blue (he told me "a flash was going though his heart." It was quite funny). They were fun to talk to for a while, but eventually headed back to the hostel and finally got some sleep.

Me at Dante's Door Step

Today we had to check out of the hostel by 10, and we were planning on checking out a couple more things, but since we were pretty worn out and a lot of things were closed on sunday we just made our way back to the train station and went back to Siena. We did stop at Dante's house though, and even though we could only look at the door from the outside we were happy to find it. If I were Dante I would have been dramatic and above the door I would put an "abandon all hope all ye who enter sign" just for funsies. Probably would get many visitors though.
Traveling around Italy is fun, but it really makes me  appreciate that we get to live in Siena. It's prettier and the people seem to be nicer, and its also a better place to learn Italian. Florence had some cool stuff to see but everyone speaks English, so I'm not sure I would actually be able to learn the language there. Also, the big city thing isn't as much my style, Siena suits me better. I think that we're all starting to feel very at home here, and we're always happy to return.

Oil and I Have a Love/Hate Relationship

It's delicious. So delicious. And they put it on EVERYTHING. However, it also get on everything, including things that are not food. It's just annoying. Also, I don't know if this is an Italian thing or just my host family, but they don't seem to put their napkins in the laps at dinner, which I do automatically, but of course the few nights that I try to fit in and not, I drop pasta on my lap. Certo. Ah well.
Today was another regular day at school, pleasant but nothing new.
However, next week I begin my community service project, which is teaching English in an elementary school for an hour a week. The reason I decided to do this project is because the idea of it terrifies me. TERRIFIES. And I figure when things seem that impossible and scary, it probably means it's worth doing. I'm assigned to a class of fourth graders, I believe. And Mike, one of the program directors who organizes this project, said that there's really no way to do it wrong, as long as we don't show up with porn or anything weird like that. It's also supposed to be good for learning Italian because the kids will bombard us with Italian, even though we're supposed to be speaking Italian. So that'll be on Monday.

And finally, to counter the last post's really bad picture of me, here's a really cute one of me and my host mommy and brother:

Alessandra, me, and Edoardo