i've never been so alive...

Long Time No See: Last Part of Fall Semester

2009-01-16T00:43:00.000-08:00

So the latter half of the semester is mainly dedicated to the crazy politics that were going on (and my obsession with them) as well as the difficult essays that I was writing for some of my classes. And also, of course, Thanksgiving!

So, in case you didn't already know, I am a huge Obama fan. I was a huge Hillary fan, and a moderate Obama supporter, but his performances with the debates and throughout the campaign have really bolstered my faith in him. So I was steadily watching polls, gritting my teeth, and praying that the pollsters were all correct.

A couple weeks before the election (maybe even more than that?) Joe Biden came to Tacoma to rally support for Chris Gregoire, the incumbant running for governor here in Washington. The Washington election was within a few hundred votes last time, and Dino Rossi was running against her again. It was the most contested gubernatorial race in the country. So Biden came to supprt her and some other candidates, but boy did Tacoma give him a welcome.

He drew thousands of people (his biggest campaign stop of the entire season!!) and it was amazing to see him. He is the first big politician that I have ever seen.

Jaime and I in the crowds.

It was a lot of fun and a great experience to get up super early and wait in line for hours! So worth it.

On election night I had a lot of homework to do, so I stayed up in my room and watched the polls on CNN.com as they rolled in. Here's me watching his acceptance speech:

I'll never forget that night. I felt really proud to be an American.

So after the elections were over and I could breathe again, I needed to get a little crazy. I stumbled into some All Time Low tickets and went all by myself. Now, I didn't quite realize how big All Time Low (ATL for short) has been getting. When I got there, I realized that I was the only person there without their parent! I was in line between two moms and their kids and their kids' friends and their kids younger siblings.... It was really awkward. Once we got in--and out of the rain--I went to the back of the pit because I stood out like a sore thumb. Everyone there was shorter than me!!

The first acts were good, but, luckily, once the 3rd act (Mayday Parade) came on, for some reason the crowd began to fill up with older people (some even men in the 30s and 40s?) and I didn't feel quite so silly. By the time ATL came on stage, the crowd was going CRAZY. So many people (of all different ages and heights!) were moshing and it was an AMAZING experience. So fun.

Here are some pictures of All Time Low, my almost favorite band of all time:

The last major event of the fall was Thanksgiving. I stayed up in Washington again and got together with a bunch of friends to celebrate. I made cranberry sauce and apple crisp and OH MAN was the food good. We had everything: turkey, potatoes, cassaroles, macaroni and cheese, salads, stuffing....sooooo good. And also the expensive wine!

Some pictures!

I was SOOOOOOOO full.

So yeah, that's my second-to-last semester. It was a blast, and I hope that this next semester is not only a bit easier academically, but also twice as fun!

AHH! My last semester of school EVER. Here we go.....

Long Time No See: First Half of the Fall

2009-01-13T21:28:00.000-08:00

So Perspectives is the name of UPS' Orientation program that I do every year. I have been a leader for the past three years and this year I was also the Skit Director. Perspectives is always a great time--lots of hard, long days though. We welcome the freshmen onto campus and take them on community service projects. It's awesome.

A few pictures of Perspectives:

Christina and I soaking up the sun:

Jenny (my new housemate) and I posing glamorously:

Alicia and me hanging out!

Travis and me. This is the guy I drove up and down with for winter break.

My friend Jaime (who I went to Rome with) and Magan.

Later that night Jaime insisted on making eggs for us....

Didn't turn out too well...

After Perspectives, the next major event was the AIDS Walk on September 6. It was a crazy day. After spending months trying to get it organized, asking people to donate, forming teams, making tons of phone calls, and a lot more physical labor than I would have expected, it all paid off. We raised over $100,000 for the foundation and all in all it was a very rewarding event. I slept well that night.

I designed these posters and ALSO secured funding for them. SUHWEET, eh?

Nani and me!

My friend Emily and me!

The AIDS Walk team, Rachelle, me, and Meghan. Great work guys!

The beautiful building in downtown Tacoma where I work, Old City Hall.

Well, that concludes the first part of my semester. Great times, a lot accomplished.

Long Time No See: Summer 2008

2009-01-13T21:10:00.000-08:00

Okay, so, as part of a New Years resolution, I am going to attempt to blog more steadily. I want to talk about my experiences over the last five months and some of the more exciting parts of my second-to-last semester of college. Here we go!

I spent this summer in Tacoma, WA, where my college is located. I wanted to take a bunch of pictures of Tacoma during the summer, but that will have to wait for the spring, I think. I lived up here in a house with a bunch of my friends, and in general it was a really exciting summer. I am working at the Pierce County AIDS Foundation all year (starting in June) as an Development Asst, which basically means that I am planning events and such. It's been really rewarding. I spent the entire summer planning the AIDS Walk (which we'll get to in a couple posts).

I met a bunch of new people as well (made some friends from PLU) and I just enjoyed myself and lived life to the fullest. It was definitely one of the better summers.

At the end of the summer my friend Lucinda and I went down to visit our friend Ryan Fish in Portland. Here is some proof:

Lucinda and I in my Chevy Malibu driving south on a sunny day!

Once we got down to Portland we met Ryan and we all went to dinner at a yummy Thai restaurant.

His friend works on a submarine and we got to go down and see the TORPEDOES! Super cool.

Lucinda and me at another restaurant. This was the night that Phelps won his medals!

Ryan and me

We're playing TANKS on his Wii.

Group picture.

That trip was really fun! Anyway, that's it for my summer.

Discovery Bay with the Family

2008-07-10T20:39:00.000-07:00

And thus, summer begins! A couple weeks ago my family drove up from California to visit me in Washington and to go on a week-long vacation in western Washington. I was really excited to see them and they got to see where I am living until December. So fun!

Anyway, so after spending a night and visiting with my aunt Connie and family, we got up "early" on Saturday morning to begin our journey west!

Almost right away when we got to our resort condo place, we made a new friend!

I am convinced that the raccoon was rabid, but my mom nevertheless fed it bread so it kept coming back throughout the week.

A day into our vacation we went to a small island and all the way to the very tip. It was an island that juts out into the Puget Sound. Also an old military base.

In these old bunkers we found a long passageway that was completely dark -- I and a couple others came from one end and the rest from the other and we couldn't see a thing except for when out cameras flashed.

An old light bunker.

Along the route in Port Angeles we found the Tall Ships that would later come to Tacoma for the Fourth of July festival.

And we kept going all the way to the Pacific Ocean. We passed through many Indian reservations and eventually we found a beach the jut quite a way out of the bay. The rocky islands around the inlet were quite beautiful.

The next day the family and I stayed inland and we gamboled (sometimes literally) around the forest and through hiking paths, past waterfalls, and rivers. It was SO gorgeous and perfect weather. Amazing.

My mom pretended to be a flower bush so that a butterfly could land on it. Weird, eh?

A little restaurant that we got ice cream at (I got a banana split with dark chocolate and old-fashioned vanilla). It sat on Discovery Bay -- very picturesque.

A couple days later (and lots of tennis and movies and video games) our mom set us off on an adventure past the town of Sequim and to a game farm -- basically an open-range zoo with tons of cool animals. We drove through the farm and it was a lot of fun feeding the animals bread (whole wheat, of course).

Crazy-horned rhino!

Hello bear!

Caribou!

Caribou are HUGE!

Here are some pictures around the resort area:

Here are some pictures that Lacy took -- I especially like the ones of our family and our SWEET baby second-cousins!

All in all it was a great week apart from work and it was nice to spend some time with the family! It was time I didn't really get to spend with them before cause they were in school and I was sick almost the whole time! This time we were all healthy and had a bunch of fun sleeping in and playing tennis. Score!

The Beginning of Summer 2008

2008-06-16T17:36:00.000-07:00

Well, Italy is over and done with and it's time for me to start blogging about the rest of my life, even though there really isn't too much to tell or show right now. When I got home from Italy I was SUPER tired, and after I flew up to UPS to visit friends, I went back to Cali where I got sick. Like, really sick. I had these symptoms:

103 degree fever
chills
body aches
head aches
nausea
loss of apetite
sore throat
coughs

It sucked. So that put me into bed for four days while I got better. Meanwhile, I noticed that my upper teeth were beginning to move, so I freaked out and told my mom to schedule a wisdom tooth removal ASAP. Somehow we managed to transfer my insurance in a day and come Saturday morning I had all four teeth out. So that put me in bed for another 2 or 3 days. Then I got sick again. It was weird because I would wake up sick every morning and feel better every night.

At any rate, that pushed back my leave date quite a few days and after I was all better I set off on a Thursday for the beautiful state of WASHINGTON. I drove for like 10 hours all the way to Portland the first day. It was beautiful and pretty fun just to be on the road and on my way. I took some pictures along the way:

It was gorgeous!!!! NorCal and most of Oregon are so beautiful. I spent the night at a friends house in Portland and then got up hellsa early the next morning and finished the drive to Tacoma, WA where I had a beautiful little house in North Tacoma waiting for me. It felt and still feels good to be up here -- it's finally getting to be beautiful and sunny!

While up here I am working at the Pierce County AIDS Foundation planning the AIDS Walk. It's pretty much a 9-5 job that won't get me rich but will pay the rent. I am enjoying it and hopefully will take some trips to Canada or something like that. Good fun.

Also noteworthy is that it was my cats' birthday while I was home and my little sister Callie took some cool pics. Here's one of them:

We gave them these scratching boxes with catnip on them. It was funny to watch because they like roll in it and slobber everywhere. Crazy.

The Last Few Days in Italy

2008-06-08T16:37:00.001-07:00

On April 26 I flew from Berlin, Germany back to Rome where I took the bus and metro into the city and met my friends at their apartment. I was relieved to be back in a country where I could at least understand the language a little -- it felt good to be back in the city I had been living in for the last three and a half months. But it wasn't the same....

I had moved out of my apartment -- I couldn't go back to it. And almost all of my friends were gone on their own travels or back in the US. There wasn't much holding me in Rome anymore, except for the fact that I had come to love the Eternal City.

I spent the night at my friends' apartment (they had rented it all on their own and were staying for an extra month) and in the morning I got up really early, packed very lightly, and was soon out the door and on my way to Termini, the main train station, where I caught a 7:30 AM train headed for Sicily. I was going to Taormina, a little beach town on the eastern coast of the island.

The ride was absolutely breathtaking -- we ducked in and out of valleys as the train passed through tunnels. We literally at time were on the coastline, hugging the tracks that were suspended above rocks and the crashing waves. Another woman was in my compartment -- a middle-aged woman with maroon-dyed hair, cut short and spikey. At one point in the ride she brought out a sandwich and it reminded me how hungry I was and how stupid for not packing food. She offered it to me and I accepted it, reluctantly because I hate to impose on people. The sandwich had tomatoes in it, which I also hate, but I sucked it up and ate them anyway so as not to offend her or seem picky, even though I am.

Later on the ride a little boy came into the compartment driving his dump truck -- his mom and older sister were close behind, and the little boy spent the rest of the ride with the lady and me, going between us and looking out the window and such.

The older sister asked me what I was reading and the older lady spoke up and said, "lui e Americano." I smiled and stumbled over something that resembled, "Io leggo The Autograph Man."

When we arrived in Taormina, we all got off the train and the woman said goodbye and I replied, "Grazie mille per il panino," (Thanks a thousand for the sandwich!)

At this point I had no idea where I was but luckily I saw a sign for my hostel pointing in one direction so I walked...and walked...and walked...and two hours and a mountain later I arrived at the hostel only to find that it wasn't open and a Swiss girl named Sophie had been waiting for an hour or so after the hostel staff said they'd be back. Turned out the office staff was one American girl who started a week before and had graduated from college the year before. It was goofy.

At this point I began to explore Taormina and I spent the next day on the beach, working on a somewhat pleasant sunburn....

Mt. Etna, the largest volcano in Europe!

Cat!!

Beautiful beaches....

And Italian streets....

The train station where I spent hours waiting....

I took an overnight train on the 28th back to Rome. The ride was miserable and involved a full cart of myself, two other Italian kids my age, and an old man all trying to sleep while not touching each other. Also there was a cocaine bust...we were in Sicily, so, I guess go figure?

Arriving in Rome was the biggest relief, and I decided to take the metro to the Colosseum and walk from there to the school where my bags were being stored. It was my last walk through the beautiful streets of Roma....

I spent that afternoon and night with my friends at their apartment. We went out for an amazing Italian dinner where I went all out and got the full two course meal which was ABSOLUTELY breathtakingly yummy. Not that I needed any convincing, but I decided that Italian food is the best food in the world. Or at least all of the world that I've been to.

At any rate, that was that. I woke up early the next morning, careful not to wake anyone up, finished packing, and was soon out of their apartment, walking down the Roman streets with a huge suitcase with broken wheels and a backpack and a duffel bag and a messenger bag. I brought all this down the stairs at the metro and back up the stairs in Termini where I caught a train to Fiumcino airport. I got my plane to Frankfurt, Germany where I caught a 11.5 hour plane all the way back home to San Francisco. I arrived at 4 pm and Tess and Callie were waiting to greet me.

I am going to miss everyone I met in Europe, from the Americans and Italians, to Australians, Swiss, New Zealanders, and the Brits. Rome is by far my favorite city in the world.

But it felt good to be home....

Berlin!!!

2008-05-19T13:48:00.000-07:00

Finally!! I decided to take the train straight from Vienna to Berlin (and skip Prague, even though we actually went straight through it) because I just wanted to get to Germany! My friend Maddy is studying in Berlin and I stayed with her and her host mothers at their apartment -- it was sooo cool! But when I got off the train and found my way through the station I met Maddy and we began what would be an amazing three and a half days!

The first night we really just strolled around. She took me to the Holocaust memorial:

But the next day I set off on my own to check out some museums and such.

Berlin's mascot is the bear and they have this exhibit of bears from around the world. Here is the United States bear!

Here is the Brandenburg Gate, which can be found on their euro coins and is on the edge of east and west Berlin.

I visited the Reichstag, the German House of Parliament. This building is in west Berlin and was the center of the movement to unify Berlin and Germany:

I went to Checkpoint Charlie, a checkpoint that divided the American and Soviet sectors of Berlin. A museum is now there:

Romanian rebel flag with the crest torn out (this is now the official Romanian flag except the middle is all yellow, symbolizing the absence of oppression by the Soviets):

Reconstruction of Checkpoint Charlie:

Later that same day I met up with Maddy and we explored down the Berlin wall:

After that it was off to the Altes Museum where I found a world-class Egyptian collection:

and then the Pergamon:

I was all museumed out for the day so we got some dinner and went to sleep. The plans were to wake up early(ish) the next day and trek out to the zoo! On the way we found this church, bombed out from World War 2:

And then the zoo!

silly turtle:

My last day in Berlin was my birthday actually and Maddy and I spent it by going to the store, buying a bunch of food, and then going to a park and sitting by the water and pigging out/lying in the sun. It was amazing!

Berlin was definitely one of my favorite stops! It was so cool to see Maddy (and hear her speak German!) and just actually relax and get to know a city. Whew! That night I was back off to Rome where I spent the night at a friend's apartment only to wake up the next morning and board a train for Sicily!

A Half-Day Excursion to Vienna

2008-05-11T11:00:00.000-07:00

That's all I got to spend in Vienna. Isn't that ridiculous!!! But, sometimes it can be surprising how much one can get done in a day. As usual, I got completely lost getting to my hostel (you'd think I would be good with directions at this point...). But I was soon able to explore the inner city and I took the metro there. First I visited a church right off the metro stop -- it was beautiful!

I walked down the main shopping thoroughfare and I found this goofy old man with the pigeons, so I took a picture.

I continued walking around until I came to the Hofburg Imperial Palace grounds where I found the Albertina art museum, a beautiful museum with a bunch of famous works by Monet, Ernst, Miro, Rothko, Kandinsky, Munch, Chagall, Picasso, Bacon, and Rubens. Very beautiful museum -- I wish I had spent more time in there because the art museum I went in later -- the Museum of Modern Art (MOMAK or something) was mostly a disappointment, with boring geometry pieces (like cubes and stuff) and then some really weird records of "happenings" in which people were mutilated, painted and all other types of weird stuff. Didn't really like the MOMAK except for one floor which had some of Yoko Ono's work:

As well as that one famous LOVE painting with the LO above the VE. That was cool to see. But anyway, here's the Albertina:

Something I found interesting about Vienna is just how many statues were EVERYWHERE.

I believe this is Atlas, holding up the world:

I also was happy to see this exhibit right outside the Imperial Palace:

Roman ruins!! It's cool to think that the Romans made it all the way out here too! (and farther!)

By this point, the Austrian sky was getting quite dim and it began to thunderstorm, with lightning visible throughout the city.

So, after the MOMAK I took a tram to the Opera house where I found a coffee shop and waited until 6:30 rolled around. The entire time I was in the coffee house it POURED rain and I just barely missed it. I sipped on my hot chocolate until 6:30 at which point I ran over to the Opera House to wait in line to get tickets for the 8:30 showing of Salome. SCORE!!!

The Opera house was packed by the time the show started and it was a beautiful show!!! I had never read or seen Salome before and it was really cool.

After the show I took a tram ride around the center of the city to see it at night (it had stopped raining at this point).

Beautiful. I went to sleep after a not-so-tiring day and I made the decision to skip Prague and go straight to Berlin -- I couldn't wait to see my friend Maddy and just BE in Berlin for a few days, where I could relax, settle down, and take things slowly. The train ride there the next morning was absolutely beautiful! I had heard about the train ride in between Prague (which, ironically, we passed through on our way to Berlin) and Dresden in Germany. It was absolutely gorgeous!

I took a few pictures, but there were hard to get:

Just imagine woods and rivers and mountains and valleys all green with a blue sky and billowing clouds. PERFETTO! I was happy to be on my way to Berlin!

My feet hurt!!

2008-05-09T17:51:00.000-07:00

That was the theme for all of Budapest because, well, my feet hurt A LOT! All I did in Budapest all day long was walk and walk and walk. I got kind of lost getting to the hostel, but once I did I took a shower, got ready, and headed out for an adventure in Hungary with my Hungarian Forints (10,000 Forints is about $62 USD). So, with 10,000 Forints in my pockets, I set out, first for the Great Market Hall.

It was cool, but a lot of food and stuff, which I wasn't looking for, although there were some crazy fruits. But I kept on exploring....

I basically climbed a mountain on my way through a park. Somehow I made it to the top, tired as hell after climbing stairs and paths through bum-laden territory. I felt a lot safer here than I ever did in Bucharest. I had already seen a few tourist groups. Documentation of my climb up the mountain:

Statue at the top:

And a view of Parliament across the river:

I ventured down the hill and through a residential area (which was beautiful and people were out, watering/mowing lawns, walking dogs and kids -- it was nice). Through another park and some streets I came upon an elevator. Yes, an elevator. I looked up to a massive cliff face on top of which I knew was Castle Hill. At first I told myself no way was I going to pay for an elevator when I could walk. But then I remembered that I could barely walk, and paying 200 Forints ($1.20 ish) didn't sound that bad.

On top of Castle Hill all of the museums were closed (Mondays.....) so I basically just walked around for a couple hours:

That's the hill I climbed

There were these guys dressed up funny with their hawks:

That part was real touristy.

Walking back across the river...

By this point I was SUPER tired and all I wanted to do was sit down or something. THEN I remembered that Budapest is built over a complex system of hot water springs. What this meant for me is that scattered throughout the city are public baths (pools, basically) that are naturally heated by the springs underground. I wanted to be in one of those at that very moment. I checked my bag and realized that I had forgotten my "swimsuit" (gym shorts) at the hostel, which was far away. So I set out to find a real swimsuit.

An hour and a half later, after I had given up twice, I actually found one. It was small and very European, but I settled because I just wanted to swim. Badly.

On the way to the pools I saw this:

Happy to know the Hungarians like Spongebob!

At the baths I changed into my suit, took a rinse off shower, and got into the warm, clean baths. I sat there for over three hours and it was AMAZING!!! Just what I needed for my feet and for my tiredness. It was beautiful. On my way back home I came across the Heroes' Plaza.

Which is a huge circular plaza of columns, kind of like St. Peter's Square only not as big. Or with a church. At any rate, I got home, met this cool New Zealander and a French couple, and then happily fell asleep as it began to thunderstorm and rain outside. A nice end to a nice day....

The trip to Vienna the next morning was gorgeous: rolling meadows and plains, wildflowers, deer and rabbits, and these wind generators actually made it more picturesque:

I was excited to get to Austria, be back on the euro (except for the whole more expensive thing) and see Vienna, a city I have heard a lot about.

What did I get myself into....

2008-05-07T12:38:00.000-07:00

That's the first thing I thought when I stepped out of the airport at 11:00 AM. I looked around me and I saw a congested highway, police everywhere, a completely flat terrain, no marked bus stops, and about a hundred people just milling about. I must have stuck out like a sore thumb. I was the only English-speaker on my flight from Rome and when I handed the customs officer my American passport he asked me why I was there. Was I staying with a friend? Nope. Did I know someone? Nope. Why'd you come here? I didn't really know. Haha. At any rate...I embarrassed myself numerous times on the way to the hostel, meeting only one person (a college student) who could speak English and would actually help me. I am still amazed I made it. Ha.

The hostel, however, was nice and a comfort because I would (later that night) meet two Aussies and two Canadians there. We all became friends and hung out for awhile, which was awesome. But during the day I set out to explore the capital of Romania: Bucharest.

Now, I have heard Bucharest be described as "The Unknown Gem of Eastern Europe." Well. It surely is UNKNOWN. Don't know about the gem part though. Granted, the city did have its beautiful parts, and I was REALLY tired/my wisdom tooth was hurting like never before. But still....

My first stop was the art museum, which was actually pretty cool, especially the building it was housed in (and the one across the street).

While I was walking around I found this:

And it gave me some comfort that the Romanians watch Family Guy. :)

I continued exploring and found myself in a park. The park was nice. The islands of grass were encircled with benches (I could only imagine what this place looked like when all the benches were full, because there were definitely hundreds and hundreds in a very small area). I sat next to an old couple and almost fell asleep -- luckily I didn't and I decided to walk around before I did.

Another recommended site was the Palace of the People, a HUGE building where I imagine the NATO summit was held with all of the world leaders. I never walked all the way up to it (I didn't really make it that far) but instead sat/lied down on the grass about halfway.

A friend I made:

Unfortunately, I actually did fall asleep here. I was really nervous cause I thought I would be robbed if I fell asleep. I woke up in a hot, sleepy, tooth-aching daze and I practically ran back to the hostel so I could just lie down, get some non-bubbly water (I had bought it accidentally twice already that day and I HATE bubbly water), and just be cool.

I slept well that night.

But I slept too much, so I couldn't follow my original plan of taking a train deep into Transylvania (YES. TRAN-SYL-VAN-IA!) and visiting the "real" Dracula's castle. Instead, I opted for the not-so-long train ride into Transylvania to a town called Sinaia which boasts a cool church of sorts and a 19th century castle.

The ride there was beautiful...

And when I got there I first bought my overnight train ticket to Budapest and then I began to explore!

The architecture here was so beautiful -- much like I would expect of a mountain Swiss village.

Someone lives here:

I got artsy with some ruined chess boards in the park:

And here is the interesting church:

Very unique architecture.

I continued climbing into the hills of Sinaia, passing a large outdoor market (meant for tourists, which actually relieved me a bit to be around other tourists - I had seen maybe 3 or 4 English-speakers in Bucharest aside from the people at my hostel).

Eventually I turned the bend and this appeared:

Such a beautiful castle!!

Who knew Transylvania had snow-capped mountains?

And rolling meadows:

Unfortunately, the castle was closing just as I reached the front gates, so I wasn't able to go inside, but that's okay because I went back into town, got some dinner, and then people-watched in the park before my overnight train left for Budapest, the capital city of Hungary.

Waiting at the Sinaia train station

Overall, Romania is a beautiful country, but also a very poor one, and one that is definitely not for the vulnerable tourists, if that makes sense. But I am glad I went there, mostly because Sinaia was GORGEOUS and the perfect and I met some really interesting people.

Back to Business: My Last Week in Rome

2008-05-05T16:26:00.000-07:00

Here I am folks -- my laptop is up and running again and now I can post some pictures! Woo!

This post chronicles my last week in Rome before I embarked on my magnificent Behind the Iron Curtain tour. Here we go....

At this point in my semester I began to scramble to get things done. First I went to the Castel Sant Angelo, a castle that the Pope hides in at times of war. There is an underground passage that connects the Vatican with the castle. It was a pretty cool place and here is a picture of the outside:

A few days later my friends and I decided to explore the Jewish quarter of Rome, a part that used to be the Jewish ghetto during World War 2. It was actually a beautiful area.

The Theatre of Marcella can be found here as well:

And a cool fountain that we dubbed "Falling Turtles"

Eventually we got tired and decided to bunker down in a pigeon-filled park:

These are my friends Alicia and Dani:

And these are a bunch of goofy German tourists who we watched for awhile:

We continued to explore down to the Circus Maximus and across the road to the Baths of Caracalla. Before we got there, we stumbled upon a field and track day at a track. We were shocked cause we didn't think Italians exercised at all!

We also couldn't get over how ridiculous some of them were dressed, especially Blue Pants down below.

And then on to the Baths of Caracalla, an elaborate set of public baths built by the Emperor Caracalla.

There actually weren't that many ruins, so instead we spent our time relaxing in the meadows. It was crazy how the sounds of the city around us were just silenced by the walls and ruins around us and how picturesque it was in the middle of Rome. Also, there was a cat, so that made it so much more awesome.

That was a good day! The next day on Sunday I went exploring a bit by myself (after buying some cool shades at an open-air market) and I ended up in a small piazza where I bunkered down and people watched. In the piazza there was a neat fountain:

And here's me:

On Monday of my last week living in Rome (I left for Romania on that Saturday) I went to a church called St. Giovanni in Laterno. It was immense and beautiful! I loved it! The main hall was ringed with 12 of the most important saints, including Matthew, Peter, and Paul. Here is the statue of St. Peter:

Right across the street from St. Giovanni is another church that houses an important religious relic: the actual stairs that Jesus Christ is said to have walked up on his way to receive his sentence at his trial. They actually took the stairs from Israel (or the land that is now Israel) over 400 years ago and reassembled them here. Millions of people come every year just to see and "walk" up these steps. Only they don't walk -- they kneel up each step praying as they go. And a lot of people come here. When I was there for all of 15 minutes at least 4 German tour groups came in, all of 20 or more people. It was chaos, but I managed to snag a blurry picture:

And on my way to school after that I decided to take a picture of the Roman metro system:

Beautiful, eh?

The next day (Tuesday the 14th) I wanted to check off one of the most important Roman sites: the world-renowned Vatican museums. AND THEY WERE AMAZING! Here are some highlights:

Sculptures, sculptures everywhere!

One of the most famous ancient statues -- Emperor Caesar Augustus!

And Raphael's School of Athens:

There were also a bunch of pieces of modern art, one of my favorites was a Salvador Dali painting:

Details:

And...here we go! You're not allowed to take pictures of this. But, well, I snuck a few!

Yeah, that's the Sistine Chapel!

And here's the Laocoon, the statue detailing a scene when Laocoon tried to warn the Trojans about the Trojan horse and the Greeks inside it. Poseidon sent a sea serpent to kill him and his two sons before he could warn the ill-fated Trojans.

The courtyard of the Vatican Museums:

The museums were amazing. That Friday I decided to embark on a little last adventure to the Via Appia Antica or, the Appian Way, a lifeline of ancient Rome. It was unexpectedly congested and not beautiful, save certain parts of it that were amazingly cobblestoned and quiet. Here's a picture of one:

Well, that's my last week living in Rome. There was a farewell pizza party that Friday night where I had to say good-bye to all of my friends. The next morning I woke up really early, said bye to my roommates, a friend who decided to wake up hella early to see me out, and I said bye to the Residence Medaglie d'Oro where I had lived for the last 3.5 months. It was a beautiful morning and I was on my way to a completely different country: Romania.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't sad - or scared!

Home Again, Home Again

2008-05-01T15:53:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone! I am back home in Novato, safe and sound, after 10 days of travelling and four months of living in Rome, Italy. CRAZY, huh?

At any rate, my computer cord has decided to die on me and I had to buy another one, so until I get that I won't be able to post pictures and stuff, so I will wait for that then catch-up and all the weird and crazy experiences i had in Italy, Romania, Hungary, Austria, and Berlin! Until then, A PRESTO!

Here I go...off on an adventure!

2008-04-18T07:42:00.000-07:00

I've spent the last two weeks in Rome, partying and hanging out and realizing how much I am going to miss Italy and all the people I have met here. It is going to be hard.

With that said, I should let you know that my computer cord has ceased to work and so I cannot use my laptop and thus I cannot put any pictures up, so that's why I haven't posted in a while.

Also, today is my last day here with everyone. I fly out tomorrow for Bucharest, Romania. I am going at it alone -- it'll be exciting and scary and probably very tiring. Whatevs. I am excited and I can't wait to get home on the 30th of April so I can see everyone again. Basically, this whole traveling after the program thing is very bittersweet because I want to be home so badly, but I know I should get out there a bit more and explore Eastern Europe. Anyway...here's my itinerary (subject to change):

19 Roma -> Bucharest, Romania
20 Transylvania
21 Budapest
22 Vienna
23 Vienna/Bratislava
24 Berlin
25 Berlin
26 Berlin -> back to Romaa
27 Roma -> Sicily
28 Sicily
29 Sicily -> Roma
30 Roma -> Frankfurt -> California

It is going to be a whirlwind probably, and I may not even remember it, but wish me LUCK!!!

Love and miss you all -- I'll be rocking Cali in 12 days!

So this weekend I slept in a tower...

2008-04-08T14:21:00.000-07:00

The tower was 500s years old and, as far as we were concerned, definitely haunted. But that's beside the point.

My friends Lydie, Megan, Mikelle, and I got on a train to (once again) Naples this last Saturday morning and from there we took a metro-train to Sorrento, a picturesque ocean cliff town south of Naples. We didn't spend much time there. We did some exploring and shopping, and some picture-taking:

And as you can see it's gorgeous, but we had another place to go: Nettuno.

Nettuno is about an hour bus ride out of Sorrento and it was the windiest, most beautiful bus trip I've taken. We round through small mountain roads and warm olive groves until we finely began to descend into a valley set between two sets of high cliffs. From the top we could see the place where we were spending the night: our beautiful 500 year old tower!

Once down there, we discovered it was so cool!

Inside looked like a real tower too!

(not really)

View from our balcony:

We quickly put our stuff down and ran down the hill to go take in what little sun was left of the day!

Exploring back up to our castle:

goofy little car

Imagine waking up to this every morning:

Megan in the window:

So that morning we departed from Nettuno, said good-bye to our little tower and headed back to Sorrento where we picked up a ferry for none other than the island of Capri!

Here's the main port of Capri

And we decided to take a little tour around the island and here's what we saw:

It was so beautiful!!!

Megan and I:

And then we climbed way way way up to the actual town of Capri and these views unfolded before us:

I've never seen water so blue in all of Italy and I can see why Capri is talked about so much.

All in all, a relaxing weekend full of beauty and quiet hours and fun times!

it's time to be a tourist in roma

2008-04-04T13:59:00.000-07:00

, So I realized about a week ago that despite my having lived in Rome for three months now I had not done the following:

The Colosseum
Palatine Hill
St. Peter's Basilica
The Vatican (Museums, Sistine Chapel)
Trevi Fountain
Spanish Steps (I've seen them, but never really taken pictures or anything)
any church at all
..and the list goes on with a bunch of smaller, random sites.

AH!

So I can cross those first three off the list tonight cause this week I got busy. On Tuesday I went to the Colosseum, Thursday afternoon to Palatine Hill (and one last walk through the forum) and today I leisurely went into St. Peter's. Here are a few pictures!

The Colosseum!

It was very neat to actually walk through these walls and arches and imagine an arena where over 40,000 Romans watched the games take place. Crazy!

Palatine Hill one of the most important hills of ancient Rome. It is where emperors lived as well as people such as Cicero and Catullus. It is also the legendary birthplace of Romulus and Remus and the first settlements of Rome have been traced back to the 8th century BC on the Palatine. Oh yeah, and it's also beautiful and the day was sunny! (Spring is finally here)

This is kind of an artsy shot. There were a bunch of places on the Palatine where they just store all of the pottery and fragments.

And one last stroll through the Forum:

View of the Colosseum from Palatine

This is where Julius Caesar's body was carried after he was killed. Romans still bring flowers to this site on the ides of March and also throughout the year on holidays.

And then today's adventure to St. Peter's Basilica!

View of St. Peter's square from the dome (you can climb all the way up!)

You can also see my neighborhood from up top. All the area below the green hill is my home turf. I live somewhere on the left edge of the photo below the hill. Sweet!

So yeah, that's pretty much been my week. It's been great, but I still have a lot of work to do (gotta get busy and savor as much Rome as I can because, well, I have less than 13 days left in the city and less than 26 in Europe. AH!

Tomorrow I leave for Sorrento, a town south of Naples that is supposed to be absolutely gorgeous!

I Feel Like Produce in a Fruit Truck...

2008-03-31T13:22:00.000-07:00

That's what my friend Lydie said when we got in a taxi on the island of Ischia in the bay of Naples.

This last weekend was SOOO amazing! I had the best time ever and it really made me realize why I am going to miss Italy. Let's begin.

So my friends Lee, Lydie, Kelsey, and Breanna decided to go to Naples and Ischia for Friday and Saturday and then I met my friend Dani in Naples on Saturday night and we went to Pompeii and the Museum of Archeology in Naples.

The 5 of us woke up hella early on Friday (5:30 to be precise) and I met them at 6:30 and we all walked/metroed to the train station. At Termini we boarded a train headed for Napoli (Naples) and we got there after 2.5 hours of fun-filled/sleepy chatting and joke-making. It was great fun!

When we got close to Naples Centrale we saw the remnants of a trash strike that the mafia staged (because the mafia controls trash pick-up in Naples) and we saw images like these several times:

We explored Naples for a little while, but just made our way to the docks where we would board our ferry for Ischia. By 13:55 we were on board the ferry and on our way!

That is Mt. Vesuvius, the still-active volcano that buried ancient Pompeii and Herculaneum in ashes and poisonous gas in AD 79.

Also notice the beautiful cliffs and blue water of the Bay of Naples!

We eventually docked into Ischia city:

And, because the taxi driver lied to us that a bus didn't run from the docks, we took a taxi. Or...more like a fruit truck... See it for yourself:

Somehow we fit 5 people and the driver in this TINY car. PS that is Lee and Kelsey in the above picture. It could barely get up the hills (there were times we all literally feared for our lives) and it was just completely ridiculous...

He dropped us off and, after trying to cheat us out of 5 euros, we left him and his little truck to go drag some more tourists up a mountain.

We got into our HOTEL (!!) and the owner's son, Giuseppe, told us that his "mommy" who can't speak english would be glad to cook us dinner that night. He showed us to our rooms and to our utter amazement this is what we saw:

And outside on the balcony:

After freaking out at how amazing our place was, we decided to explore the town a bit (we were now in Foria). We walked through the little streets, some of the only tourists on the entire island. We got some stares, but for the most part felt very comfortable. People were SO nice (a lot nicer than anyone in Rome) and it was a lot of fun just to walk around (in short sleeves too!).

We got to the beach eventually and immediately we walked down it.

After picking up some peaches at a fruit stand we made our way back up the mountain (getting lost I might add). By the time we got there the sun was beginning to set!

After watching the sunset and sipping on some wine we went down to dinner where we were absolutely ecstatic to discover that on the menu was pesto gnocchi with yummy bread and salad with buffalo mozzarella. YUM! It was probably one of the best dishes I have had so far in Italy.

We went to sleep satisfied and woke up to none other than THIS view:

Saturday was the day reserved SOLELY to finding the beach and subsequent sunbathing. And we did just that. We got on the bus and it took us around the island a bit. We were trying to find these hot springs that we heard about. We found them, with a lot of help from two older Italians on the bus and one man sitting and sipping on a Peroni on a sidestreet. Also on our way an ancient, short lady dressed in sweaters and a gown saw us and greeted us with a loud "Biongiorno!" We all replied, "Biongiorno" and then she looked up, waved her hands around and said, "Sole! Sole!" (Sun! Sun!) We laughed a lot and agreed that this is the best place in the world.

The hike down to the hot springs was REALLY intense! Lots of steeps hills and stairs, but we made it eventually:

And it was beautiful....

We goofed off, played in the hot springs, reclined on the rocks and sunbathed ALL day (I got a bit sunburned, but not as bad as Breanna who forgot to turn onto her back). It was absolutely perfect and I was so content it was ridiculous....

Then we began the climb back up and, THANK GOD, got picked up by this guy who saw us struggling. We fit the 5 of us in a car almost as small as the fruit truck (ridiculous again!) and it actually turned out that the guy is a musician who knows the dean of Temple Rome and he's coming to Rome on 8 April for a concert. NUTS! Such a small world....

He took us to a bus stop and we picked up a bus back to Foria and eventually found the pizzeria that the guy recommended to us. Here is our meal:

I got my usual (tonno e cipolli! or, tuna and onions) and it was absolutely amazing. After pizza we got gelato (I got kiwi, frutti di boca, and limone which translates to, well, kiwi, raspberry, and lemon). It hit the spot and we caught another bus back to the port and another ferry back to Naples. Our short ferry ride ended with another sunset....

A great end to a great day and a half on Ischia...absolutely amazing!

Now comes part 2!

I said good-bye to those four and called up Dani (who had been exploring Naples for the day). We met up at the hostel, went and got dinner, and went to sleep cause we were gonna have a big day tomorrow!

We got up early and set off for no other place other than POMPEII!!!!!!!!!

Unfortunately, it took us like 2 hours to get there cause some Neapolitan told us to get on the completely wrong train, but we set it right eventually and got to Pompeii in okay time. We got in free (cause it's cultural week in Italy) and began to explore the city....

That's the Vesuv (Mt. Vesuvius) in the back!

Ancient amphitheatre (with a bunch of tourists!)

an amazingly beautiful street:

This is an old lunch vendor. In every hole was a different dish and, because Romans hardly ever ate lunch at home, they would come here and try out all the foods!

There were some beautiful villas...

And here are the plaster casts of the people who died in AD 79:

It's amazing to me that some of these paintings still survive. Absolutely amazing. This is about 2000 years old:

The baths of Pompeii:

And Dani and I on our way out of Pompeii, tired and hungry.

Next stop, after taking the right train back to Naples, was the Archeology Museum of Naples which houses most of the artifact from Pompeii and also the Farnese statue collection.

Marcus Aurilleus, a great emperor of Rome and the old emperor who is murdered in Gladiator

Crazy eyes:

This painting I saw every day during Latin class cause it's on front of Wheelock's Latin:

A painting of what life in Pompeii used to be like:

A super-elaborate mosaic found in Pompeii:

And the Farnese Bull, a gigantic statue:

Anyway, this was definitely one of the best weekends and, although I came out of it sunburned, sleep-deprived, feet-hurting, hand-sliced (I cut it on a rock, no biggie), and smelly (I didn't shower at all), it was absolutely worth it and it's put me back in my groove! Wooo!

Italy rocks man and I am crossing my fingers that Spring is finally here!

A couple weeks in Rome will do a lot of good!

2008-03-24T09:24:00.000-07:00

So I spent the last two weeks here in Rome, working at school and homework during the week and then going to cool places in Rome on the weekend. Here's a rundown:

Last Thursday (over a week ago) I went to the Villa Borghese, the largest park in Rome. It used to be a patrician's villa until it was garnered by the city and now is a beautiful hub of life and recreation:

A cool fountain:

Some park:

An old lady feeding the geese:

And a lake in the middle with a temple to Aesclepius, Apollo's son and the god of healing:

The next day (last friday) my friends Charlotte and Liz and I went to south Rome and explored a little, going into a museum of the leftover Capitoline pieces. Right by the stop is the pyramid of Caius Cestius, who built the pyramid as a tomb for himself in 1 BC. He built it cause he was obsessed with all of the Cleopatra scandals going on at the time.

And here's a Roman water fountain:

Charlotte and Liz:

After the pyramid we walked to the Circus Maximus, where all of the races were held in ancient Rome. The dirt path is the track.

There were bugs so Charlotte tried to hit them.

I split off from the girls and explored a bit of my own. I found Augustus Caesar's forum:

And also Trajan's Markets, built by the emperor Trajan, one of the 5 Good Emperors of Rome:

a CAT lives there!

Another day (I think sunday) I went to the Via Appia Antica (the ancient Appian Way) where a bunch of ruins of aqueducts still stand:

I didn't do much all week or this weekend. Maggie came to visit this weekend which was super exciting and we just explored Rome (amid lots and lots of rain, hail, and thunderstorms). But on easter morning I got up hella early and made it to St. Peter's Square just in time...for it to rain... alot!! We were soaked by the end of the service and it was ridiculous but still worth it cause I got to see the pope and be in St. Peter's with thousands of other people on easter!

He's the one in the middle (you can barely see...lol)

Pictures from the video screen

WELL! Those are my two weeks in Rome. We'll see what I do this week before I take off either for Sicily or Switzerland. Have a great week everyone!

someone once told me Portugal was amazing...

2008-03-15T06:53:00.000-07:00

...and I would have to agree. When I studied abroad in Dublin last spring, one of my housemates went to Lisbon in Portugal for a weekend. He came back raving and ever since then Portugal has sparked my curiosity.

Since then a number of people have told me how amazing the country is and Jaime and I bought our tickets a couple weeks after we got here to Italy and we went last weekend!

So we left Thursday night (getting to the airport was ridiculous and we made some mistakes, but we got there safe and sound, somehow....) and got on a plane to Portugal. Now, a couple months ago, it seemed like a great idea to take the cheaper flights by spending the night in the airport. Well, it was cheaper, but...I don't know if it was worth it. Having done it, I can say that it is completely safe and totally doable, only staying up all night or trying to sleep is absolutely miserable. But Jaime and I kept ourselves company and we got through the night. The next morning we got on another plane (we flew from Rome to Barcelona on Thursday night and then Friday morning to Lisbon). Flying in was absolutely gorgeous. I woke up just in time to watch us soar down through the clouds, over the cliffs and white coastline and into the Atlantic a bit and then back around over Lisbon. We flew right over the 25 de Abril bridge, a sister bridge to the Golden Gate, and also over the Christ the King monument. Here are pictures I took later of both:

Anyway, so we got off the plane, took the bus into the city, and found our hostel easily, and, can I say, it is probably one of the best hostels I have ever been in! I loved it so much and we spent a lot of time there hanging out with Portuguese, Australians, Romanians and the like! So cool. But then we decided to explore down the streets of Lisbon and make our way to the castle which overlooks the whole city.

Main shopping district (notice the sun!):

And some rooftops:

It took us a long time to find the castle, but we finally did and upon entrance discovered that peacocks lived there!

We left the castle after exploring some and decided to walk down to the water, on which journey we found some trolleys!

By the end of our walk we were sooo tired cause we hadn't slept all night, so we went back to the hostel and napped forever, then we went out to a restaurant with traditional Fado music and it was soo beautiful. We got a great Portuguese dinner (beef with potatoes and the best carrots I've ever had!) and ended the night with that.

The next day (Saturday) we embarked for the beach, to a small town called Cascais (pronounced KusKaish) and when we got there we didn't find a beach but beautiful cliffs and such. We bought picnic food and explored...

They had some small beaches that we found:

(yeah, I need a haircut I know)

Then we went to a town called Belem where there are parks and museums and it's right on the water.

This is where we waited for the train:

Upon getting back to Lisbon we discovered this:

It was International Women's Day and, according to a guy at our hostel, they were celebrating women or something. However, I think it was something different because there was definitely a protest feel to it. Police were everywhere and lots of people seemed angry. Oh well...

The next and last day we spent in Lisbon was amazing! We went to the beautiful town of Sintra (which came highly recommended by 3 or 4 people spontaneously when I wrote that I was going to Lisbon on my facebook) and Jaime and were not let down.

We took a train about 40 minutes into the countryside and through the suburbs of Lisbon. When we got to Sintra we began to explore and, well, the pictures will tell it all....

Puppy by a church

Jaime and I in a WHITE telephone booth!

In a park there was a greenhouse and I got a little artsy...

Neat doorknockers!

In Sintra there are two main sights: a Moorish Castle and the Pena Palace. In order to get to them, Jaime and literally walked up a mountain road to the top. It took forever but, at the top, aside from the castle and palace, were a bunch of cats!

kitten that guarded the entrance to the castle

Pictures of the castle:

Jaime on a stone sofa:

It overlooked the surrounding towns and forests:

And then on to the palace, which was on another, higher peak of the mountain:

The palace was SO neat! It has the moorish architecture, but unlike any I have seen before. We felt like we were walking through a fairy tale or something:

Crazy gargoyles!

This stood over a doorway into the palace....i don't know how to explain it.

Sintra was so beautiful!! After this Jaime and I had to rush down the mountain, through Sintra, to Lisbon on the train, through Lisbon, to the bus stop, to the airport and then we got on our plane home. YAY PORTUGAL!!

On other notes, I am doing great. Spending this and next weekend in Rome and then, after that, I will probably be off to Sicily and then Switzerland! Should be neat!

le tired of travelling

2008-03-12T03:52:00.000-07:00

Ciao ragazzi. So I have been going non-stop for the least three weeks with midterms then spring break then a ridiculous trip to portugal and i am TIRED! haha, but it was all oh so amazing. I am spending the next two weekends in Roma and going to take day trips (Naples? Pompeii? Tivoli?) and it should be amazing cause I really haven't been able to relax here for awhile.

Anyway, just letting everyone know that I am still here and I am in the process of uploading some more pictures and I'm going to write about my weekend in Lisbon by the end of the week. Miss you all and have a great couple days before you hear back from me again!

Ciao belli!

also, PS, Hi Robin and HAPPY BIRTHDAY Bill!

back home to Ireland and onwards to Edinburgh

2008-03-02T05:33:00.000-08:00

Wow...so, last week was spring break and, well, it was absolutely amazing. So much crazy stuff happened and we had so much fun that it's not even possible for me to put it all down here, but I will do a brief overview and a few pictures, cause I took way to many!!

We left for Dublin pretty early (our flight left at 9:30) and, as I have realized is usual, Jaime woke up late!

On the way to Dublin, we passed over one of the most amazing things I have ever seen!

So we started off our trip crazy and got into Dublin!

OH MY GOD! BEING IN DUBLIN AGAIN WAS A MINDTRIP!!

We walked down the streets I used to frequent, strolled through St Stephen's Green, got some chips off O'Connell, people-watched on Grafton. I walked the familiar streets home - a second nature....

When we turn the corner of MtPleasant I freaked out. I never thought that I would be walking this street again to my house, where I had spent so many days last year!

At any rate, we met up with Maggie and starting exploring the city, again!

Then we stopped at Maggie's favorite cafe to get drinks:

And a couple mornings later we were on a bus to SLIGO!!

We walked back the way I went almost a year ago to try and find the tombs that I missed. Here is the journey we took through the wind, rain, and cold:

This is where Jarrod, Renee, Morgan, and I hiked off trail a year ago!

Same cows were bothered by us!

Which way?

Also, remember we are in a sheep pasture!

Soooooo cold and windy and wet!!

The three of us trying to smile despite the cold:

Annnnnnd I found the tombs! Or at least one of them. The top of the mountain (which I literally sprinted up and fell like, three times, getting all muddy) was so windy and so wet and so cold that we only sat by the first tomb we saw and then ran right back down, making the long trek to a pub where we could warm up!

Luckily, Maggie brought some sweatpants i could wear cause mine were soaked through!

Here's me in front of my old house!

And that was our Dublin/Sligo adventure -- the first half of spring break. It was so fun to see Maggie in Dublin! Ahh! I miss the city already!

Anyway, on to Edinburgh!

We had to wake up at 3:50am to catch our 6:30 plane to Edinburgh and we were successful! Edinburgh was beautiful! The sun was shining and welcoming us in!

Jaime being silly on the bus to Waverly Train station in Edinburgh.

And, us being silly in a phone booth:

And, beautiful, sunny Edinburgh!

The first day we did a lot of exploring and some of that exploring led us to the Museum of Childhood where they had a bunch of creepy dolls. Now look at them!

Aren't they disgusting?!

Edinburgh....

We also got hella adventurous and decided to climb the Salisbury Cliffs which overlook Edinburgh:

Here's us at the top:

View of the city with Edinburgh castle and St. Giles

We were all the way up there!

Also, at the top of another hill in Edinburgh (Edinburgh is a pretty hilly city), there was this roman temple!

And Jaime and I took cool pictures with it:

Jaime:

Another day, after we met up with Justin the night after and were really excited to hang out with him, we went to the Royal Museum where none other than DOLLY THE SHEEP resides!

Or at least her body...she lives in a spinning glass case...

Apparently she was cloned in Edinburgh...

After the museum we also went to the Elephant House which is...

And, finally, on the day that we left, which was yesterday, Justin, Jaime and I all went to Edinburgh Castle which is situated on a hill in the middle of the city.

Lots of cool weapons!

I will end with a picture of the unique and beautiful architecture of Edinburgh because that is what stood out the most to me.

Such a gorgeous city!

Sorry for the brief post but I have a lot of homework, laundry, and other things to get done!! I needed to be brief cause otherwise I could've written forever! Hope you liked the pictures!

Today it snowed...in southern Italy?

2008-02-18T14:22:00.000-08:00

So last weekend I went to this place called Lecce. It a good-sized city on the heel of Italy.

Note: I didn't plan this trip, I just tagged along. It was marketed to me as a city right on the beach where the weather will be warm and we'll just live in swimsuits and go swimming, relaxing the warm sands.

The reality was far from it...but we still had so much fun!

So we took an overnight train from Roma to Lecce. It left Thursday night around 21:30 and it was hell getting there on time and picking up our tickets, but we managed and were all separated in different compartments until we found each other and then the fun began. We basically just chilled late into the night, playing games and such, until we all fell asleep which, unfortunately, was late enough and at 8 or 9 we were told to get off the train because, well, it had stopped in Lecce.

Immediately we all noticed the beautiful SUN! But we also noticed how cold it was. We brushed it off, blaming it on the early morning....

The other goofy thing about this trip was the fact that only six people had gotten a hostel and 2 of us (namely myself and my roomie Brian) had no place to stay. We planned on just bunking with everyone else, but we had to sneak in, and around, the hostel owners. They ended up putting all 8 of us in one apartment style room. That ended up being really fun cause both rooms were huge with and we basically had 5 beds for 8 people, so it got cozy, but still SO much fun!

Basically we just set right out to explore our new surroundings. After they asked the hostel owners where the beach was, we learned that Lecce was at least 10km from the beach and there was no way we would make it out there. They also told us that there was no reason to go and, well, we were all right with not being on the beach later.

Lecce is a city famous for its architecture and, I hope, these pictures can give you a sense of what it's like:

First, a Roman amphitheater in the middle of downtown:

And here is one of the major sights:

A close up on the gargoyles up there:

So many of the buildings were elaborate like this church.

Also, beautiful domes:

And lots of cool doorknockers:

And some REALLY sweet puppies were chillin in a yard that we stood near for awhile:

Some more architecture and don't let the blue skies fool you. It's absolutely freezing!

At one point we came across the remnants of a wedding (there was rice and flowers all over the place and a basket containing both) and I got artsy:

And then, as we were walking, all of a sudden the sun broke through the clouds...

Also, at this point, it just plain started snowing. We were walking and I saw a snowflake and I was like....guys?!?! I think it's snowing. We looked up and before we knew it all around us snowflakes were falling. We just looked at each other and started bursting out laughing and dancing around. It was hilarious!

It was THIS cold:

And...then we were lost, so Chris looked at the map some:

and then, because he's a funny and weird guy (this is after he started singing The Lion King), he picked up a palm tree frond (which are everywhere in Lecce) and started to clean the street:

It was a really goofy trip where nothing went as planned, but we made the best of it and had an amazing time!!

Also, I should really talk about what we spent most of our time doing: eating!

We ate three dinners and they were so amazing! Italian food is so good. I had all kinds of food: a special steak from specific to Lecce; cooked string beans and cauliflower with goat cheese; pasta with beans, ham, tomato and onion in this really yummy sauce; limone (lemon) and fragola (strawberry) gelato; patate al forno (roasted potatoes); and tonno e cipolla pizza (tuna and onion). Overall, I don't think I have ever eaten so well, especially since every meal also came with the best bread ever and I dipped it in SO much balsamic vinaigrette and olive oil!

Anyway, food was amazing, weather was not, but Lecce and friends are awesome!

Next week is spring break and I am so excited cause I am going BACK to DUBLIN!!! and then onwards to SCOTLAND! woo! Anyway, I will end with this picture cause I like it:

A Day in Rome

2008-02-14T05:02:00.000-08:00

So, not much has happened lately. I have pretty much just been chillin' at my residence everyday and I haven't gone anywhere. But, that's okay. It has been a very relaxing, homework-filled week. I thought I might go through a typical day of my life to give you a sense of what my life is like here.

I wake up, if I am not doing anything special, anywhere from 10:30 to 11:30 and I always get ready slowly. The first thing I do is turn on MTV (pronounced emmay-tee-voo) so that I can watch the newest hits from both America and Italia. MTV shows mostly American artists (from Linkin Park to Ben's Brother to Janet Jackson). They also show many Italian artists. At any rate, it's just nice to listen to music since my laptop speakers are broken :(

Then I go to school. Boring. Usually I take the metro to school, but sometimes I also walk. Its about a 30 minute walk, but that is slowed down depending on how busy the markets are. I have to walk through fish markets and wine markets and pasta markets and all people selling all kinds of things. It's actually pretty cool, but the Italians walk so slow that it's difficult to get through.

At school I usually jus chill in the computer lab or the biblioteca (library) but sometimes I will venture out and walk down Via del Corso, the main shopping area, or I get a sandwich at our local panino shop. Lately all I have been getting is salame and mozzarella.

FRESH MOZZARELLA IS SOOOO GOOOD!

At home I have been cooking my own dinner every night and, not to brag, but I have been doing very well. I cook either rice or pasta but I always do stir fry veggies (potatoes, carrots, red bell peppers, garlic, and lots and lots of onions) with balsamic vinegar or red vinegar or wine or olive oil or all of the above with lots of rosemary, basil, and hot pepper! Oh man....it's always sooooo good.

Then we just chill, hanging out in one of our rooms or go to a local pub and order some gelato or patitine fritte (french fries)! At any rate, it's the life.

I have also been eating a large amount of fruits: bananas, apples, oranges, and kiwis! About half of my oranges end up being blood oranges. Blood oranges taste more like tropical punch than oranges and they are sooooo good! They are called blood oranges because, even though they look like reg. oranges on the outside, they are completely red and "bloody" on the inside. SO cool and good!

Anyway, I leave tonight for Lecce which is in the southern region of Puglia. It is supposed to be close to the beach and I am hoping that we can make it there!

But seriously, Rome is awesome. Ciao!

Running through ruins has never been better

2008-02-09T05:49:00.001-08:00

Okay. So. I woke up on Friday morning later than I wanted (definitely not due to staying out really late Thursday night. No, that couldn't be it...) and I basically got up, got ready, and walked out my door without really knowing where I was going. I knew that I wanted to go to this town called Ostia and I knew it was off the Piramide (Pyramid -- yeah, there's a pyramid in Rome) Metro stop. So...I kind of just got on the metro and took it there. Then I saw a train and I got on to see where it was going.

Luckily, it was going to Ostia Antica: Ancient Ostia. That's where I wanted to go!

So it took me about an hour to get there (longer than I expected) and I arrived at 12:30ish which was what I thought would be enough time. BOY WAS I WRONG.

After I paid the 6,50 euro to get in, I walked through the gates and realized that I was in one of the neatest places I have ever been. There's one main road that goes through Ostia Antica, but I immediately ran off it into the ancient city of Ostia -- the great port of Rome.

If you've ever been able to run freely through the ancient ruins of an entire city, you'll know how I felt yesterday. If you haven't then, well, I can only really explain it as being exciting, overwhelming (emotionally, physically, mentally, and metaphysically), and absolutely tranquilizing. I felt like one part of my body was pulling me to run around and see absolutely everything, and the other part was pulling me to sit down and just like, touch a pillar or a wall for hours and imagine what the people were like who lived there thousands of years ago.

I was pulled in both directions while also trying to both simply record what I was seeing and create artistic shots. I was so drained after I had to leave at 16:30 when it closed that I didn't know what to do with myself.

Okay, so, Ostia was the ancient port of Rome. At the time, it was right on the ocean but now it is 3 km away because of the changing coastal line. It had huge basilicas, temples, a coliseum (which is still standing) and just beautiful apartment complexes, villas, estates, and a forum. Ugh...it was so overwhelming. I should go back sometime....

PICTURES!!

This will give you a sense of what the houses looked like. Of course, there were very few roofs left and you can tell that there used to be other stories cause very often the stairs lead to nowhere. I liked this house a lot cause of all the nooks.

There were lots of letters and words stuck in random places and I couldn't ever really translate it because they were all fragments or hard to read. This was the most impressive tablet I saw.

ALSO, probably one of the cooler things about Ostia are the amazingly intact mosaic floors. Because Ostia was a sea-side town, you can tell that they definitely worshiped Neptune (god of the ocean) and Venus (goddess of beauty and love, but she was born from the sea in one myth). Below you can clearly see Venus' son Cupid (or Eros in Greek), who was also everywhere.

There were lots of random sea creatures, like this one below which looks half-deer or gazelle and half-fish. There were also some mermaids/mermen and such.

Here's a SEA-LION (haha......)

I stood in the middle of that temple (you can see the ring of columns):

And to give you an idea of what all of the streets looked like:

Now, there were three of these goofy/scary heads. I don't know who they are, but they could be the three brothers Pluto, Jupiter, and Neptune (or Hades, Zeus, and Poseidon). I don't really know. Here's one of them:

And here is their coliseum!

When you walked to the top you could see all over the place and this a very beautiful glade of statues and columns:

Also, I saw these columns and I really wanted to explore over there, but I never got a chance:

Artsy picture of columns:

And it was also pretty neat to be able to recognize Romulus and Remus:

That was on a frieze below one of the ancient statues.

Outside of the coliseum.

This house was probably the most intact that I saw. It still had two beautiful columns and its marble floor and some marble still on the walls. Notice the beautiful colors in the floor and also how spacious these rooms are:

This huge building was the center of the town where all of the hub-bub went down. Very near to it was the Curia (senate-house), the forum, republican's residence, a temple to Venus (I think), and also a temple dedicated to both Rome and Ceasar Augustus. NEAT!

Sometimes a house had a few of its amenities still intact. Here's some of the items an ancient Ostian would use:

The family nook:

A nice counter on which to prepare food:

And you always need a table to eat the food on:

And a bath anyone?

And perhaps a place to pray to Cupid (with his g/f Psyche) or your household gods, also known as Panates:

Now other statues were scattered throughout the ruins, some of which were in impressive condition:

More mosaics

And one interesting one is of a woman that looks pretty familiar:

I am going to research who it might be...I am thinking Minerva (ie, Athena). Don't know though. Maybe Antiphrote, Neptune's wife.

Here's a higher view of just a small part of the city:

And one more artsy picture:

It was such a beautiful day and I can't say that I have ever experienced anything like it before. At any rate, today is going to be a relaxing day. Right now I am listening to my new favorite band, Finley. They are an Italian band and, even though I can't understand the words, they are still amazing!

Ciao!

Capitoline Museums

2008-02-06T02:30:00.000-08:00

So one of our projects for Mythology is to go to a museum and identify three mythological characters and write about them. So, yesterday morning, my friends and I embarked on a quest for the Capitoline Museums on Capitoline Hill, one of the two most important places in Ancient Rome.

The Capitoline Hill (as you'll see later) overlooks the Forum and directly across from it is the other important hill, the Palatine Hill.

The Capitoline Museums house some of the most amazing pieces of ancient sculpture and also some modern pieces.

One of the modern pieces is Bernini's Medusa which, as you'll see, has the hair of the hideous gorgon but is portrayed as a "beautiful" woman and not a toothed, scary monster.

Also, the museums have some remnants of gigantic statues:

That is just the head -- it was huge!!!

Now, my job was to look at these sculptures and decipher what god, goddess, or creature was being depicted. Let's see if you can do it!

If you guessed Satyr, then you're RIGHT!

This is an impressive statue of Poseidon, god of the sea

This little guy is none other than Cupid or Eros.

And the mysterious Artemis/Diana.

Also, for you Latin/Greek buffs, here are the original busts of some of our heroes!!

Socrates!

Plato!

and none other than CICERO!

The plaza that the museums are in was designed by Michelangelo and, as you can see, when viewed from above, the white marble pattern makes a cool design.

Now, earlier I said that the museums overlook the Forum and probably the highlight of my entire trip to the museums was the fantastic view of the Forum on such a beautiful day!

It was a gorgeous day and I spent the rest (when I wasn't in class) of it walking down Via del Corso, the main shopping street in all of Rome and I people watched.

When I was walking into Piazza del Popolo I realized how much I love this city and how much I love Italian and just being here. It is such a cool place and the juxtaposition of history and future is overwhelming!

But yeah, the museums excursion was one of many activities I plan on doing from now on before class (which starts at 13:00 ie, 1 pm).

Also, just as an fyi, I am beginning to plan my after program extravaganza and I have decided on going to Eastern Europe. Here is what my trip looks like right now (in my head):

Bucharest/Brasov in Romania
Budapest in Hungary
Vienna in Austria
Berlin/Frankfurt in Germany

Sounds cool, no? I am hella excited. At any rate, gotta go study for my Mythology test and such. Ciao!

Carnivale in Venice!

2008-02-04T02:01:00.000-08:00

Ciao! So...Sunday night I got back from Venice. And....guess what? It has to be one of the most beautiful cities in the entire world.

I went with Jaime, but we met a bunch of other people there and also piggybacked on another girl's trains tickets. So...here's the story about my weekend in Venice:

It started at 6 AM. My room phone was ringing and and I jumped out of bed to answer it and Jaime was on the other line.

"Clay, did you wake up already?"

OOOOPS!!! I had slept through my alarm. We were supposed to meet our friend Jessie (with our tickets) outside at 6 and Jaime had just woken up!! AHH!! Jaime and I agreed to meet outside in 15 minutes and we hung up. I quickly called Jessie to tell her to go on ahead to Termini (Train Station) without us just in case we missed the train. So then it started!

I ran around my apartment, actually took a 2.5 minute shower, packed food, clothes etc and was done by 6:17. I called Jaime to get her to come down and then I took the elevator up so it'd be up there for her. She came stumbling out of her apartment and we slowly took the elevator down....laughing.

We sprang out of the apartment complex at 6:20 down the dark Roman streets. No one else was out yet, so there was no embarrassment as we ran with our backpacks flopping around and such.

We reached the metro stop and literally narrowly made it as the doors shut on us. Whew! The first leg of our journey began.

We reached Termini at 6:40 (about 7 stops down the Metro line) and then we sprinted up the escalators and stairs until we reached the actual train station above ground. Now it was 6:45 and we looked at the departing train boards. The train going straight to Venice left at 6:50!!! So we rushed to Platform 4 and I called Jessie to tell her to sprint to the platform. We found her and, again, sprinted down the train. We were in coach 11 and each coach is hella long.

We got on the train early and it took forever for us to walk down to coach 11, but we made it and, oddly enough, found some Italians in our assigned seat. We just sat down in some empty seats, breathed a sigh of relief, and were happy to be in the train, on our way to Venice.

The train pulled out and we got to talking about our morning. Then Jessie remarked that it was weird that we were on a train that left 5 minutes earlier than what the ticket said. We pulled out our tickets and looked at them and, very quickly, we put 2 and 2 together and realized we were on the wrong train....

UGH!

We decided just to be proactive about it and Jessie went to talk to the train people. They told us we could get off in Florence, take a train to another close station, and then wait for our real train because it was a lot slower than the one we were on. That's exactly what we did and it was pretty stressful at some points, but we weren't too worried cause no matter what happened, we were still in ITALY!

So, after we took our slower train to Venice, and took the looong bus to our hostel, we realized how weird the hostel actually was.

We booked a place called the Plus Alba d'Oro Campground. And, while it was a campground, it was also a hostel with a hundred cookie cutter mini-houses. It was surreal to walk around, and almost everyone there was American. It was soooo weird. At any rate, Jaime and I got settled, met up with two of our other friends (Joli and Christie) and decided that, hey, we should actually head into Venice. You see, the hostel is actually like, 30 minutes outside of Venice because the city is basically a bunch of islands. We were in Mestre, a city designed to house tourists for travel to Venice. Too bad our hostel was completely in the boonies, but whatever.

So we the four of us took the buses into VENICE! Joli had been there already, so she knew her way around a little, but basically we just began by exploring, getting lost on the city sidestreets and walking through empty plazas and next to canals.

Here's a taste of cold, rainy, beautiful venice!

As we explored, we noticed that so many of the streets and plazas were completely empty.

Once we got closer into town, the shops opened up and the Venetian masks were soon everywhere!

To save some money, we bunkered up in an alleyway and the girls put on their own face paint

And I explored the alley and took this picture which came out surprisingly well.

We continued on our path to the main plaza, St Marco's. Gondolas dotted the canal side.

We stayed out really late and walked around for a long time, chilling in the square, watching street performers and concerts, gazing at people in their elaborate costumes and such. It was a great night!

Our friend Joli knows some Italians who live in Venice, so they showed us around and, because it was so difficult to get back to our hostel, we stayed at their place for the night. Here is Venice in the morning:

And then the next morning we went back to the hostel to sleep some more, then around 3pm we got BACK up to go back to Venice. While waiting for one of the buses to take us there we took these:

Jaime, Christie, Joli, and me!

And here is a great picture of Jaime:

To repay Francesco and Leonardo for letting us stay at their apartment we decided to make them dinner. It was so chill. We went shopping and made risotto with chicken stir fry with bell peppers, onions, tomatoes, and broccoli. Then I made some apple crisp, which was SOO GOOD! It was also neat cause Leo and Francesco host their apartment for couchsurfing and they were having a couple of people from San Diego.

The Californians, whose names are Summer and Dave (?), were pretty neat and they also enjoyed our dinner. Couchsurfing is a really cool system. It's a website where people make profiles and they either host people to sleep on their couch or they themselves go and sleep on other people's couches around the world. It's a free way to get a place to sleep for the night and people rate you on how nice you are and all other kinds of things. I might try it sometime....

At any rate, here's the table:

And here is Francesco and Leonardo:

They were really great guys and meeting them, practicing my Italian, and being able to go up on their roof and look around Venice at night. Such an amazing experience!

Here is me, Jaime, and Francesco:

That night we went back to the hostel and decided to get up the next morning and explore Venice for the final time! By the way, all of the streets of Italy are basically window shops and each shop displays their goods for everyone to see.

It is really hard to resist THIS:

and THIS:

And...more Venice:

And here is the trail of costumed people through Venice:

And St Marco's Square

St. Marco's square is famous not only for its gorgeous basilica in the square, but also the PIGEONS!

And...the costumes begin!

COSTUMED BREAKDANCERS!!!!

As you can see, the costumes were amazingly gorgeous, elaborate, and awesome.

Just like Venice....

Florence, an Unusual Tower, and an oddly "Pacific" Sea

2008-01-30T12:18:00.000-08:00

Ciao amici e familia. Come stai? Che cosa fo a Roma? Studio...e viaggio...e visito Firenze, Pisa, e Viareggio!

Hey friends and family! How are you? What am I doing in Rome? I study...and travel...and visit Florence, Pisa, and Viareggio!

That's right! This past weekend I made the long (hour) journey via train to Florence, one of the most beautiful cities in Italia. Ready for pictures? Well there's plenty!

This is a weird one to start with, but it is one of the fountains we found in the streets of Florence. It was just too weird not to photograph.

And one of the major landmarks of Florence is the Duomo, a massive church, beautifully decorated around the outside and with a magnificent painting inside.

You can see the crazy walls are like, painted or something. It was beautiful!

This is just the front face of the church.

We walked inside to find a huge cathedral and, at the end of it, a vaulted ceiling with this painting at the top. I really don't get how artists got up there to paint it, as it stood a hundred feet or more above our heads.

This is just an artistic shot I took inside:

Then we left the church and began to walk down the picturesque streets of Florence. We walked past corner shops and sandwich shops and leather goods shops. Something that is always amazing to me is that, even in the most touristy areas, regular Italians still stroll about in the cool air.

We continued on our random tour (our ultimate destination being Michelangelo's Plaza on the other side of the Arno River). All of a sudden, a legit castle came into view:

In front of this castle stood one of the most magnificent collection of statues I have ever seen. Some of the most famous statues were in the plaza, namely a copy of Michelangelo's the David (which I saw the real one earlier in the Academic Gallery), a copy of The Rape of the Sabine Women, and statues featuring Hercules and Perseus. Very cool: here they are:

After we spent some time strolling around the statues, figuring out who all the characters were and such, we continued on our way, passing the art museum called the Uffizi, and then we came onto the river.

Vespas and smart cars were zooming past as we crossed the street to reach the Arno, and once we did we could see straight down it into Florence. The famous bridge was the closest, and we stood around for awhile, enjoying the air and taking pictures.

Once we got on the bridge, I was appalled to discover that every single inch of the famous bridge was COVERED in gold jewelry shops. Like, there must've been 30 gold jewelry shops on this bridge, every one more extravagant than the other. You would think they'd try to have some kind of shop for everyone so that more people would come to it to shop -- the girls looked at it for awhile, but knowing that the prices and gaudiness were all above us, we continued on. From the bridge I took this photo of the side of the river we were on.

The colors are amazing. And, there actually was one stand on the bridge NOT selling gold jewelry, and I looked at it for awhile:

I thought of buying a mask for Carnivale in Venice this weekend, but decided to hold out.

Once across the river, we continued to our destination of Michelangelo's Plaza. The problem with the plaza is that it is high above the city in a park kind of far away. So we walked kind of far, stopping to get some snacks on the way. We hiked up a steep set of stairs, past the city walls and a cat sanctuary. Then, as we were halfway up, we turned around to enjoy this view:

It kept us going up the steps and hill. At the top, I rewarded myself with a tasty bowl of gelato (by the way, people have all been right: gelato is the best thing ever!). I had raspberry and it was soooo good. We continued around the plaza and sat down on another set of steps to enjoy and take in the city.....

That dome in the above picture is the Duomo -- gives you an idea of how grand the cathedral is.

And this bridge is the famous one with all the gold shops:

Liz and I on the steps:

And, as I wanted, we hit the Plaza just around a good time to watch the sunset....

The reason the plaza is called Michelangelo's Plaza is because there is another David at the top: this time a bronze one (now turned green with its patina) and just as magnificent as the real one

That was our Friday. We went out that night to a cool Irish pub and had a blast.

Next morning, we woke up early-ish and set off for none other than...PISA! Perche? A leaning tower...

Here is me:

and here is the mean cat that hung out with us:

The tower was somewhat anti-climactic. VERY touristy and that is about all there is to do in Pisa. So we basically made a straight shot for the tour, hung out for an hour or so, and then turned straight around and walked back.

On our way back, we saw a grandfather teaching a kid how to ride a bike:

After we got back to the train station, the four of us split. Nora and Liz went back to Florence to shop and stuff and Jaime and I went to this small beach town called Viareggio.

We got off the train and immediately walked to a street where we could see all the way down. At the end of the street, it merely tapered off into light -- we knew the ocean was close. Jaime and I could barely contain ourselves as we walked down the street to the ocean.

The entire town was decked out for Carnivale:

And then there was the beach...

After we chilled in the sand for an hour or so, we decided to trek into town and walk up the beach front, where all of the celebrations were going on!

It was a beautiful experience and the town was gorgeous. It was cool to touch the Mediterranean for the first time (I saw it once before when I was in Barcelona).

We boarded a train back to Florence just in time for a late dinner with Nora and Liz. The next morning we explored the town some more until our train brought us back to Roma.

I'll leave you with this picture:

A Wall Walk and a Day in the Forum

2008-01-24T11:53:00.000-08:00

Ciao amici! Come stai? Io sono benissimo. Perche? Abito a Roma!!!

Now, how does one get around Rome? Well, there is walking, a bus, the tram AND the metro. Jaime, Liz, and I took the metro the other day on our way to the train station to get some tickets and, on our way back, we were serenaded by a violinist:

And here is a picture of us:

On Sunday, our school organized something called the Wall Walk where a professor takes the program on the tour around the ancient walls of Rome.

I was excited to do it (even though it was at 8 in the morning). However, like many things about the way this program is set-up, I was very disappointed. I imagined that, like other city walls, we would be able to walk along the walls of Rome. It was not the case. Moreover, the group was of over a hundred Americans and most of the tour was spent walking through busy intersections and along sections of the wall that were, to say the least, boring and unimpressive. My favorite parts were seeing a Roman aqueduct:

This building (which, I might add, I could see anytime because it is in a really central area):

And when we walked along the Tiber (which I also could've done any time, haha):

Also, at one point we reached a cool vantage point of Rome and had a cool aerial view of the city:

We also walked through some early carnival celebrations. Carnivale here in Italy is comparable not to our Mardi Gras, but to our Halloween. All the kids were in costumes (from princesses to superheroes and even Native Americans) and it is tradition here to unload billions of little pieces of paper onto the streets. It looks pretty cool, but it's pretty wasteful.

There was one incident a couple weeks ago when Jaime and I were walking to the GS (that is the actual name of the grocery store, like Safeway or Lucky, only it conveniently stands for the inglese (English) "Grocery Store") we saw a little girl put her hand into her GIANT bag of confetti and put it on the ground. Her mother quickly scolded her, and Jaime and I laughed to ourselves. However, our laughter grew when, as we walked the next five minutes to the GS every ten feet another little pile of confetti was sitting on the ground. The little girl had, upon exiting the store, immediately opened her bag of confetti and continued to drop the paper. It was a nice little trail about a city block long. It was funny.

At any rate, that was our wall walk. We left early because it was, to say the least, stupid and a waste of time. There are better ways to experience Rome instead of being herded around in a huge group of Americans....

An awesome experience, however, was the next morning where about half of my Classical Mythology class met at the forum for our professor to give us a tour.

I took some sweet pictures while we were there:

Here is a statue or Zeus I believe:

And this building is extremely interesting. You have to look kind of hard to make sense of it, but here is what happened. The pillars you see are ancient -- from the glory days of Rome thousands of years ago. The door and church you see behind it are not ancient, but still old -- probably 300-700 years old. The funny thing is that the green door you see is floating above the ground level. That is because, when the church was built, that is where the ground level was. Yeah, over a 1/3 of the columns (and most of the rest of the forum) were completely underground just because of natural erosion. The Italians, when they built the church, thought that the emerging pillars would act as a nice entry way into their church, so they just built one there and incorporated the pillars and ancient temple into the church. The architecture is quite fascinating and, when scientists excavated the Forum a century ago, they dug down to the original ground level where a massive staircase leads up to the ancient temple. Pretty cool.

Here it is:

Okay, this next part is weird. Our teacher is like, crazy, because she spends all her time at the forum and, I think, has grown so accustomed to it that she just goes where ever she wants. There was this one part where she was showing us an ANCIENT basilica and she wanted us to see one part of it, way beyond the fence. So, she proceeded to tell all of us to go under the bars and look at this frieze across the way. So here we have seventeen or so American students, led by their crazy teacher, running and ducking through ancient ruins to see this small frieze (that was only a copy anyway). It was nervewracking, but also extremely cool. How many people can say that they jumped the fence of the Forum and walked amid the ancient ruins?

Here are my classmates and the tourists staring at us.

You can see the remains of the basilica behind me.

Anyway, that was completely nuts. But the tour was really interesting. Still enjoying myself a ton!! Rome is a gorgeous city and I can't wait for it to stop being so COLD and it to start getting WARM so I can explore some more.

I am going to Firenze (Florence) this weekend, and I AM EXCITED!!!

Just an Update

2008-01-22T16:20:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone. Thought I would just update for a second.

The last week or so not much has happened, just chilling and exploring Roma, doing homework and such. I have some pictures that hopefully I'll get up today or tomorrow. BUT, I have also been spending a lot of time planning other trips. So far, here is the breakdown:

This weekend: Florence (Firenze) and Pisa
Next Weekend: Venice (Veneto) for CARNAVALE!!!!!
22 Feb-Mar 1: Ireland (for a visit!) and then on to Edinburgh in Scotland
8 Mar-11 Mar: Lisbon, Portugal

Other places I definitely want to visit:
Switzerland
Naples and Pompeii
Siena
Sicily
Berlin, Munich, Hamburgh

I am also looking at Athens, Amsterdam, and Oslo, but those are some stretches.

I am so excited!!! Anyway, I'll update again soon.

Pace!! (Pah-che)

A Day in St. Peter's Square

2008-01-18T10:30:00.000-08:00

This morning I got up ready to go out into the city and experience a little bit of Rome. So, after getting ready and eating my daily kiwi and bread with cheese, I walked out of my residence and headed in the general direction of St. Peter's Basilica, the dome of which I could see in the distance. I reached the Vatican walls fairly soon, after about ten minutes of walking slowly as I window shopped.

We had explored this far before, but we didn't venture farther. So, being the DARING and ADVENTUROUS soul that I am, I forged on ahead alone. After passing under an ancient double arch, I saw some pillars ahead and frankly, I was really confused.

I thought that maybe I had wandered into some ancient ruins or something, because the pillars were massive and stretched high, blocking the sun that tried to break through their maze. I stepped into the pillared walkway, my hands brushing against their cold stone, until I saw the stony expanse in front of me.

The sun was beating down pretty hard, so I had to block it when I stepped out of the columns. I looked behind me at the top of the pillars and saw the circle of saints all around me. I literally stopped where I was and did a 360.

I was standing in one of the most amazing places I think I have ever stood.

St. Peter's Square:

I was in the Vatican! Wooo!

I just sat on the cold pavement for a couple hours, talking to strangers and watching people feed the birds. At one point a HUGE group of Italian kids came and started a bird frenzy:

Here is the dome of St. Peter's Basilica:

A bride and groom came at one point (you can see them in the first picture too)

I can't wait to go back and explore the Vatican some more!!

Rome is beautiful.

Classes

2008-01-16T08:28:00.000-08:00

I thought that I would write a little bit about how my classes are going and what they are like.

First, I begin every school day (M-Th) here at 1pm (after a 40 minute walk from my residence through busy streets and an open-air market) with Italian 101.

Italian 101

The Professeressa is pretty neat. She immediately began speaking Italian and rarely uses any Inglese, relying on signs and hand motions to give us the jist of what she is talking about. So far we have learned greetings, name, city, school that sort of stuff. Basically how to introduce ourselves to someone and tell them where we come from. For example:

- Ciao, Maria!
- Ciao, Clay! Tu di dove sei?
- Io sono di San Francisco, e tu?
- Anche io! Di quale universita sei negli uniti stati?
- Io sono di l’universita di Puget Sound.
- Di dove sei?
- Tacoma, Washington.
- Va bene. E come sei l’universita Puget Sound?
- O, piccola.
- Bella o brutta?
- O, molto bella e pulita, ma un po’ noiosa. Di quale universita sei?
- Io sono di l’universita di Tampa. Universita e molto sporca e brutta.
- Piacere, Maria.
- Molto piacere, Clay. Ciao!
- Ciao!

That's a conversation I wrote for Italian for tomorrow. I am really enjoying the class. I have neevr taken a language that is spoken before and now I regret ever taking Latin (kind of, not really, but speaking languages is so much cooler!).

It is kind of nerve wracking sometimes because she will single us out and have us ask her questions and stuff like that. It's fun though -- it's nice being able to immediately use it outside the classroom.

Classical Mythology

The Professor for this class is bouncy and really neat. She is a retired teacher who spends half her year in Roma teaching at Temple Rome and the other half with her family in New York. Sounds like a great life to me! She knows so much about myths and a lot of history about Greeks and Romans, but what is the coolest is how she integrates slideshows and little youtube videos and stuff like that into her teaching. This is another class I think I am going to enjoy, despite the somewhat dry readings.

Rome in Film

The professor for this class is boring and weird. BUT it's a film class!! I enjoyed the first film we watched (Cabiria) even though it was in black and white, and silent, and made in 1914. As usual, I think I am going to have the upper hand in this class considering I have taken about 6 other film classes in my college career. I can't wait til we watch Gladiator!!

The class should be good though -- a nice intro to Italian film and the history of Rome.

Italian Literature

Now, this class is going to be very reading heavy. We have to read eight books and I am pretty excited to read some of them, especially Primo Levi's If This is a Man. I have heard a lot about it and the subject matter (an Italian jew who survives through the concentration camps) should also prove interesting.

At any rate, the professor seems cool enough and my other classmates are cool as well, so it really should be an all-around decent class. As with the other ones, I am excited to get a good grasp of Italian history and culture in the 20th century by reading these novels.

Anyway, thats my schedule. On Mondays I don't get out of class til 9pm, but the rest of the days it is 4:30, 7:30, and 4:30 again, so not too bad. And the fact that I don't have school on fridays is well worth it! Ciao, amici!

I Remembered Why I Love Travelling...

2008-01-15T08:27:00.000-08:00

Walking alone.

I think sometimes I am closest with wherever I am when I walk out alone. When I was in Ireland I did two trips completely by myself and some of my favorite memories are ones just walking by the ocean, hiking on a cliff trail, seeing the sights and not having to worry about someone behind me or in front of me, or getting back, or the multitude of other things.

Yesterday, the day was bella! In between classes (I have a couple hours) I went to the bookstore to buy some of my Italian books and a dictionary and afterwards I walked slowly back to school, stopping in a bar (they call sandwich/pizza shops here "bars") to pick up some 2 euro potato pizza and I snacked on it as I walked back to the Piazza de Popolo (sp?). The sun was setting, so I decided to venture higher to get a view of the city. I had to climb through some woods and walk up a bunch of steps and with each climb the city came more and more into view. At the top, these images awaited me:

This is looking down on the Piazza de Popolo as Romans walk, arm in arm, for their evening stroll:

It is custom here, after the three hour sieste from 1-4, for Romans to pour out onto the street and walk, often arm in arm. Old and young people, several generations all on the streets window shopping, picking up gelatto, and just taking in the night air.

Here is the tip of the obelisk statue in the center of the Piazza de Popolo:

And here is Rome, with St. Peter's Basilica jutting out over the busy citta (chita, or city):

It was a neat night and soon I shall update everyone on all of my classes. I like them all, especially Italian 101. I realize now that the only reason I detested Latin was because I couldn't speak it. Speaking another language is the coolest thing that has ever happened to me!!!

Arrivederci!

A Trip to Todi

2008-01-13T11:38:00.000-08:00

Waking up at 6:30 in the morning is difficult. I haven't had to do that for a while. Oh well. It was worth it.

The past couple of days it has been raining, at times intensely, here in Roma. Yesterday thunder even dotted the erratic downpours. At any rate, this morning we got up really early for our orientation excursion that everyone has been looking forward to all week long. It didn't really disappoint, but it wasn't ideal.

BUT, it was a nice excursion and, if it had been sunny, the day would've approached perfect.

Here is Todi:

As you can see, hill town isn't an exaggeration. The town is literally high up on a hill jutting out in the lower landscape (but still hilly). The morning was freezing and rainy and we got there after a two-hour miserable bus ride in which the driver had to put on the air conditioning to keep the windows from fogging up. Needless to say, once we got there, I was glad to get out of the bus. Todi itself is a very picturesque town and classically Italian, with its small streets:

And it's remarkably colored buildings and landscapes:

We goofed around a bit, perhaps to warm up or because we were bored:

This is me with my friend Jaime. She is the girl who also goes to UPS

And here are a couple of our other buddies, Gwen and Liz (Jaime is supposed to be in the picture but, sometimes my picture skills aren't as good as I'd like them to be):

And here is an Italian man that talked to us (and by us I mean Gwen cause she is the only one who knows any Italian):

I think he talked to us about the city, some of the buildings in the area, and stuff like that.

He pointed us in the direction of this church in Todi's piazza de popalo:

Inside was a gorgeous copy of The Last Judgment.

Here are some more images of Todi:

Neat colored building:

Another church with a REAL monk or friar dude walking down the zigzagging steps:

And cool stones:

After making it back down the steep, muddy hill from Todi back down to the buses, we all piled in and made our way to another city, Titignano. Here, we knew to expect a huge meal. We got a good meal and it included:

onion/pizza/rosemary bread (yum!!)
salami, ham, and some other weird "cold-cuts" meat
liver mush (yuck)
cheese pie stuff
egg/pepper mix on bread
mushroom mush on bread (yuck)
asparagus rice stuff (risotto?)
cooked spinach (yuck!)
pollo (chicken)
noodles and wild boar (yum!!)
tiramisu (yuck!)
bruschetta
red and white wine
cooked potatoes (yum!)

Surprisingly, I wasn't really full at all, which is because of the amount of time in between courses. But most of the food was really good.

After we finished dinner, we reluctantly went back outside into the rain and cold.

HOWEVER! we were greeted with this:

And as the sun set, we drove home on a relaxing bus ride....

I listened to my iPod as we drove the 2 hour-ish ride back home to Roma where, right now, I am sitting in the lobby of my residence in the freezing cold because the internet does not work anywhere in my apartment. LAME. Oh well.

Hope you enjoyed the pictures. I start classes tomorrow, which should be cool. It will be nice to get into a schedule and routine.

Anyway, peace for now, I'll let you know ho my classes go.

Finally, I Feel Like I'm in Rome

2008-01-10T13:20:00.000-08:00

That pretty much sums up today. Today was filled with a bunch of sightseeing and LOTS of walking (my feet hurt so much!). We started the day with walking tours provided by full-year students here at Temple Rome. We split up into groups and they took us all around Rome, from the famous piazzas (plazas) all the way to the Tiber river and a gargantuan monument to Emmanuel II, the uniter of Italy.

The weather today was pretty nice -- very comfortable and I spent most of my time in short sleeves. It rained a little later on, but overall the day was beautiful and we even saw the sun every now and then.

At first I wasn't planning on taking any pictures today, cause I figured that I would come back and do the picture thing another day. That all went down the drain when, out of nowhere around a corner, we stumbled upon this...

This is the Pantheon, the best preserved Roman temple -- a temple dedicated to the entire pantheon of gods. If it looks magnificent on the outside, wait until I went in....

It almost all looked like it was painted or fake, but the detail in the ceiling was amazing...

Also, I am excited to come back here when it's raining because that hole in the ceiling is open to the sky, so the rain just pours in a cylinder down to the marble floor. The building was breathtaking.

We continued through the piazzas until we came to the piazza navona where these intricate fountains were:

Just walking through the cobblestone streets of Rome, we passed the Tiber river and quaint alleys:

At one point we came across a fenced in area filled with ruins of all sorts. Our tour guides told us that the area was actually a sanctuary for cats and, upon a second glance, we noticed a hundred or so cats just hanging out amid the ruins:

We continued our tour and, I soon learned that if the pantheon was magnificent to appear so sharply out of nowhere, this building shocked us all:

That is the monument to Emmanuel II who was the first king of a united Italy. It was built in the early 1900s.

At this point, the tour group split apart, and Jaime and I decided to keep going (when everyone else went back to the residence to take a nap!?). It was well worth it. First, we stumbled upon the Roman Forum:

Ruins of the Temple of the Vestal Virgins:

THEN, as we exited the forum, and turned ANOTHER corner, there appeared one of the greatest architectural masterpieces of Ancient Rome: The Colosseum!

It's amazing to think that this was built circa 72 AD and that thousands upon thousands of animals and gladiators died within those walls.

Jaime and I, by this point, were absolutely exhausted and our feet hurt (a lot) so we decided we had covered enough for one day and headed back to the residence. On the way, we found a statue of our favorite Iulius (Julius) Ceasar

It was a fun-filled day and now, after visiting ancient Rome, I really feel like I am in this city. I saw the real rome today, and it was breathtaking!

Also, I have gotten a much better idea of the city and its layout. Yay for exploring!

When in Rome...

2008-01-09T11:39:00.000-08:00

Ciao bello! Clay is in Roma! So...yeah. Rome is pretty neat. I arrived here on time and really tired after two exhausting flights from SFO to Frankfurt and then from Frankfurt to Rome. The last flight was late, but not too bad. Both flights were really boring (especially the 11 hour one) but that is okay now that I am here. Also, we flew straight over the Alps. It was one of the most amazing views I have ever seen. Endless miles of jagged, snowcapped rock. The pointed mountains went as far as the eye could see and, because their elevation is so high, we came pretty close to the behemoth mountain range. It was so beautiful.

When I got to Roma a person from Temple Rome was there to meet me and she got me and five other students in a van taxi to get into the city. It was fast and cheap (only diciotto euros or eighteen euros). My roommates were already taking naps, so I tried not to disturb them, but it was inevitable. Their names are Mike and Brian and so far they seem pretty cool, but we haven't really spent any time together.

Also last night Temple Rome put on a pizza party (I had potato pizza!) and I got to meet some other students, so all is going well!

The facilities at Temple look neat -- they have an art gallery and beautiful ceilings and such -- it's a very nice building a 40 minute walk away through open-air markets (which should be really fun to walk through every day on my way to class). Today we had a couple hours of orientation junk, but the rest of the day I spent walking around with my friend Jaime and another person named Gwen. We walked by the Vatican wall (couldn't really find the entrance) and we got some gelatto (ice cream). Mine was ananas-flavored (pineapple). We also got some ham and cheese calzones. The night life is really interesting -- the siestas shut everything down from 1-4, but then everything opens up again and all the people just stroll around.

The city itself is very much a big and hectic city -- little cars are everywhere and theres always a hoard of vespas leading the pack. The weather is also really comfortable, so far.

At any rate, I am safely in Rome with all my luggage and that is the important thing. I hope to take some pictures soon and when I do hopefully I can post them, but the internet here is REALLY unreliable and also REALLY ridiculously slow, so that might take longer than I hope. We'll see.

Arrivederci! (Goodbye!)

Study Abroad: An Overview

2008-01-01T14:02:00.000-08:00

On 7 January, I will be boarding a plane in San Francisco, CA headed straight for Europe. In case you didn't already know, I will be studying abroad in Italy this next Spring semester. I thought I would run through some of the specifics about where I will be living, what I'll be studying, etc. etc.

Italy is a country in mainland Europe with a population of about 60 million people. I will be living in Rome, located in the region of Lazio. In Rome, I will be living in an apartment complex type-building in a suite with one bedroom (for three people!), a kitchen, bathroom, and I am assuming a living area of some sort.

My building is located only ten minutes from the Vatican, a separate and independent city-state ruled by the Catholic church and the Pope. My program also tells me that I will live minutes within a food market, metro station, and other important establishments.

The program I am going on is sponsored by Temple University in Philadelphia. Temple has a campus in Rome (as well as in London and Tokyo) and that is where I will be studying. The campus is (I am assuming) more like a program center where I'll be taking classes in English from Italian or American professors. The classes I am taking are:

Classical Mythology: MW at 3pm
Italian Language 101: MTWTh at 1pm
Italian Literature: TTh at 3pm
Representations of Rome in Film: MW at 6pm

I am pretty psyched to be only taking four classes (compared to the five I took in Dublin last spring), to be starting at 1pm every day, and the awesomeness in general of these classes. They should be good. Also, I have no classes on Fridays! The only thing that sucks is that the campus is literally a 40 minute walk away from where I'll be living. But oh well! I was planning on doing a lot of walking anyway.

I will be living with both Italians and Americans (although I don't know who my roommates will be yet) and I only know one other person going on the program, although there will be a lot of people from UPS in Rome on other programs as well, like IES.

I am pretty excited to study abroad and travel again -- I can't wait to visit some of my other friends in other countries. I have friends studying in Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Dublin, Paris, Granada, and Lancaster (in England). Hopefully I can make it to some of those. We'll see though -- there is so much that I want to see in Italy as well that it is going to be difficult balancing them all.

At any rate, hope that helped clarify a bit about exactly what I'll be doing next semester. If you have any questions leave a comment and I will respond (I promise).

Getting Ready

2007-12-31T22:00:00.000-08:00

It's New Years Eve and I am not doing very much at all. After recovering from my stint with World of Warcraft (yes, I relapsed after almost two years!), I have been listening to my punk playlist (the one with 2605 of the best songs ever written!) and it's been absolutely amazing. I haven't been doing much else. I've hung out a little bit with friends, touched base here and there, but nothing really substantial. Most of my time has been spent watching my own movies, from Alien and Constantine to Lord of the Rings and X-Men 2. But, this next week should be a lot more jampacked with stuff.

I say "jampacked" because that's what I really need to do: pack!

I need to pack for four more months abroad. In case you didn't know, I am leaving for Italy on Monday. I fly out at 1 pm for a flight straight from SF to Frankfurt, then a flight from Frankfurt to Rome Fiumcino and I will be arriving there at 1pm. I am really-REALLY-excited. It should be a cool semester.

Hope everyone had a great holiday season, but I need to cut mine short -- got some shopping to do and, well, a plane to catch!!! The next post should be from Italy, unless I post omw ["on my way" for those not updated on the IM lexicon] to Rome. We'll see.