Homeward bound

I only have 13 days left in Europe, 3 of which will be spent in Paris, France. I'm feeling really bittersweet about the idea of coming home. There is so much about Europe (about Italy specifically) that I love and want to continue to have in my life. But at the same time, there is a LOT of unfinished business waiting for me at home. It's hard to not think about the problems that are waiting for me when I get home, but I'm consciously trying to focus on my time here and enjoy this sort of limbo-land freedom I have while I am here.

I've changed a lot in the last three months. I haven't written frequently enough for it to be seen in this blog, but my personal journal entries and my emails to people at home show it. I'm glad to have changed, I needed to grow up. Regardless of whether or not I've changed for the better, I spent three months abroad. I lived in a foreign country. Every now and then I wonder what kind of person I'll be when I get home. It's hard to be stuck over here and just waiting to see what will happen when I get back. I have to focus on the present and enjoy the fact that I'm in Italy, and worry about what happens when I get home when I actually get home.

I think the past three years of my life made me afraid of being alone. I had become dependent on one person for my happiness, and the idea of not having someone to make me happy terrified me. Being here has taught me that I can be alone. Although I do have friends and a host-family here, I am mostly on my own. I don't have a special someone to hug or hold, or to share my personal stories with or help me make decisions. I have myself, and last night I realized that that's enough. I don't know if there's one person for everyone out there, I don't know if some people are meant to be alone for their whole lives. I do know that now I'm capable making a clear decision about my relationships based on what I want in a realtionship, and not based on the fear of not having a relationship at all. I'd rather be alone and happy with myself than unsure and in a relationship because of fear.

I'm almost too tired to fill you in on our trip to Rome. It was a whirlwind of events. We got into Rome around 11, dropped our bags off at the hotel and immediately left to meet our tour guide to walk through the remains of ancient Rome. We saw the Coliseum, the Roman Forum, Capitoline Hill, the Trevi Fountain and the Spanish steps. That evening I went to dinner with four friends and had a nice, slow meal that lasted about two hours. We wandered back to the hotel and had a chocolate sampling festival with different flavors such as orange, champagne, jamacan pepper and curry.

The next morning we got up early to meet a second tour guide to stand in line at the Vatacan Museum. After waiting for two hours we finally got inside where our guide whisked us through the various exhibits including Raphael rooms and the Sistine chapel. It was difficult to hear what he was saying through our headsets and his thick accent. We barely stopped for thirty seconds at each site before we were off and running to the next site. ALthough the Sistine Chapel was incredible, it was probably the worst experience I had in Rome. For some unexplained reason they would let unlimited people into the room but weren't letting people out. So we stood bunched up with about 500 other tourists pushing into us for 15 minutes until we finally squeezed our way out.

That evening I went to St. Peter's basilica which was breathtaking. I'm not really religious as of late, but being in that building was a moving experience. Sadly I kept thinking of Dan Brown's books. We walked through that building for about an hour, listening to Mass being held and admiring the artwork. Then we headed back to the hotel for a late dinner and a movie.

The next morning we got up early to see the Pantheon and a few of the Piazzas around the city, finishing up with hearing the Pope's Benediction. As we were waiting for the Pope to appear in his little window it started raining. Not having an umbrella, I was worried that the experience would be ruined. But about 2 minutes into the Pope's speech the rain stopped, the clouds opened and the sun started shining. I don't know if I believe that it was necessarily God, but it was creepy nonetheless. We then hopped on the bus to head back home to Florence where we had class the next day.

Overall, it was a beautiful weekend and I had a fun time. I had been complaining about the days time moving slowly last week, but it just flew by this weekend. Being back at school things are slowing down a bit, but I'm off to Paris this Thursday night for my second-to-last weekend here in Italy.

Sicilia

My friend (and sorority sister) Valentina wants to be an Italian teacher, so when she graduated from Ursinus last spring she moved to Italy to live in Sicily for a year. Definitely a bold move, something I'm not sure I could do. Three of my friends (and also sorority sisters) came to Italy on their fall break, and after a two-day visit in Florence the four of us traveled down to Sicily to visit Val. It was really nice to see people I'm actually friends with. Don't get me wrong, the people who have been in Florence this whole time are all wonderful and I think we all get along really well. I've especially enjoyed getting to know a handful of people better and making friends. But there's something to be said for people who already know a lot about you and have already declared that they love you the way you are. And that's the feeling I get from these four girls.

Sicily seemed like another country. Sicilian is nothing like Italian, so I couldn't communicate with locals at all. The surroundings reminded me of Florida: lots of palm trees and tropical flowers, and the ocean and mountains within eyesight almost anywhere you go. It rained for a bit every day, but it was also sunny. Looking straigh ahead, you could see dark storm clouds. Looking behind, there'd be bright blue sky with fluffly white clouds. I saw three rainbows during our stay there!

Our first day in Sicily was bizarre (in the words of Kate, like a scene from "Moulin Rouge"). We started our day at 4:30 a.m. en route to the airport; we landed in Palermo around 8 a.m. and found a taxi, asking if he knew how to get to our address. He assured us that he did and we all got into the car. What should have been a ten-minute ride according to Val took at least 30 minutes with this driver. Every three minutes he would beep his horn and slow down to ask someone on the side of the road if they knew how to get to our address. They would make big hand gestures and say "No, I've never heard of it." He even got out of the car at one point to go into a pizzeria and ask for directions. Meanwhile, our cab fare was climbing at a rate of .30 Euro every 5 seconds. We also nearly killed someone in the road about ten times.

At last, we arrived at Val's nonna's house with a cabfare 40 Euro and ill stomachs. We dropped off our bags and Val's nonna asked if we wanted coffee. We said yes and she told us to get out the American coffee we brought for Val; she then explained (in Sicilian which we didn't understand) that we would take that coffee outside of the house and make it somewhere else. We had no idea what she meant but we followed her out of the door and down the street. About two houses down, she opens a separate door. Apparently, Val's nonna owns two houses on the same block: one is just a kitchen with a bathroom and a closet, the other is a kitchen with living room, dining room and bedrooms. She doesn't want to give up the extra house, however, because they only get water for four hours every other day. Why this is was never really made clear, I think the city just decided it was a good idea to conserve water.

So, Nonna makes us Val's American coffee and puts a salt shaker on the table, saying "This is sugar for your coffee." Megan puts a tidbit in her cup and drinks. Kate puts some in her cup, smells it, and it doesn't smell sweet, so she puts a lot more in. I break off part of a piece of biscotti, dunk it in Kate's coffee, take a bite, and nearly vomit. It was not, in fact, sugar--but actual SALT. We didn't want to say anything because we didn't want to embarass the nonna but it was impossible to drink that. So we just said "oh, we've had enough, thanks" and dumped it out. Val was still at school, and the four of us were exhausted from our 4:30 wake up time so we went upstairs to take a nap.

I'll interrupt here to say that the day before we left fo Sicily, they showed a movie at my school in Florence about the Sicilian mafia. It was about a man who protested the mafia with the radio and megaphones. As we were drifting off to sleep, we suddenly hear a man YELLING about something in Sicilian through a megaphone in the street. I immediately thought there was some Mafia scandal and got a little worried. Turns out, in this neighborhood there are men who drive around in trucks selling different things. So one man will drive by, saying "I've got potatoes! I've got potatoes and salt!" and another will yell about fruit or toilet paper, etc. If you live on a top floor and want whatever they're selling, you yell down to them and send down a rope, which they use to send up a bucket with your stuff. Definitely a smart idea, but made for terrible naps during our stay there.

On Saturday the group of us headed into Palermo for some sightseeing and city adventures. Unfortunately, none of us knew anything about the city and no one had a guidebook. We debated taking one of those tacky double-decker tour-buses but it was 20 Euro per person and we're all cheap college students, so we took their free map and wandered on our own instead. We got lost in some sketchy areas; like any city, there are parts of Palermo that are much like a dump. But all in all, it was a nice day, LOTS of walking but the weather was gorgeous. We visited the botanical gardens (where the top picture was taken) and had a great time just being together and enjoying Italy. Seeing those girls and travelling on my own at the end energized me even more for the rest of my stay here.

I'm glad that I'll be home in 35 days; I miss my family and my friends and the standard comforts at home. But at the same time, I'll hate not living in Florence. I've really grown to love this city and consider it home. I just hope I can stay aware of the reverse-culture shock and ease back into the home life slowly.

Fall Break

Mom and Sarah came to visit me for my fall break, but it wasn't easy for them to get here. As soon as they got in, we went to my home at Rosanna's where she had dinner waiting for us. I'm glad Mom got to taste what every meal is like for me, so now she can a) stop worrying about me being well-fed and b) be extremely jealous. We headed to our hotel via taxi around 10 p.m., and upon arriving the man at the front desk informed us that "there was a problem with the bathroom in your room so we booked you at another hotel." We walked the five blocks to that hotel, handled all the passport-exchanging business, settled into our room and then went to sleep. I was feeling consciously stressed out about trying to entertain Mom and Sarah, not having a hotel for that night, not knowing what our travel plans were--essentially, a general sense of not-knowing what was going on. Although I was feeling stressed, I knew at the same time that the experiences we were going to have trying to find hotels and deciding where to travel would help me learn to be more relaxed. And they did.

We left Florence for Como and Belaggio, via train to Milan. There we basically drank wine, enjoyed the view and talked to an Australian couple sitting next to us. Dinner that night was awful. I had lumps of fatty beef in melted hard cheese. We spent the night in the hotel and woke pu the next morning to head to Venice.

Venice is truly magical. Everyone knows they have water instead of roads, but you can't appreciate how different and almost bizarre it is until you see it for yourself. We spent an evening sitting in St. Mark's square, enjoying cocktails at the first cafe to serve coffee in Italy, listening to the competeing orchestras and watching people dance romantically in the square. That night we had dinner on the water, and it besides the waiter trying to convince Mom that the 12% service charge was in fact a "food tax", it was a lovely evening. The next morning started off with me realizing I left my medication in the hotel in Como, so we spent a few hours calling around to see how I could get it back. Once they guaranteed that they could mail it to our hotel inFlorence, I was relieved and able to appreciate being in Venice again.

The hotel clerk told us we got a free boat ride to Murano, where the infamous Murano glass is made. The boat would pick us up right at the hotel and take us down the Grand Canal, giving us on a tour of Murano and explaining how the glass is made. Well, the boat did pick us up. And it did take us to Murano. But once we were there, we were shuffled through 8 different show rooms where an older man explained to us the prices and value of items for sale. I certainly couldn't afford a 110 Euro pair of earrings, so we snuck out behind their scowls and eventually found our way to the boat that would take us back to Venice, a ride that took at least 45 minutes. When we went to visit "Doge's Palace", we discovered it was closed because the survellience team was on strike. After these bad experiences, however, we did find a nice older man who sold hand-made Murano glass items and had a lovely chat with him about America and democracy and many other important things.

From Venice, we returned to Florence to stay in a great hotel near the Arno where we were served a breakfast buffet and the staff was extra-accomodating. The rest of our vacation consisted of leisurely mornings in our hotel, day trips to places near Florence like Siena, Assisi and Greve, and relaxing evenings at restaurants in Florence. It was all slow-paced and enjoyable; exactly what I needed.

Recounting everything that happened in our ten days together would take more than one post, and I am much too lazy to devote that much time. I will say it was a much-needed break, and especially much-needed time with family and best friend. I've been having a hard time with some personal issues here, and getting to talk to them and think out loud made all the difference in my outlook for the next month and a half. Even though I was sad that they left, the next day I felt energized and excited about being here.

Oktoberfest

Haven't been able to post because I haven't had a steady internet connection for more than 15 minutes at a time. Now, however, I'll try to catch up on many of the places I've been.

About three weeks ago I went up to Munich, Germany, for Oktoberfest. The week before we were supposed to leave I debated dropping out because I was so tired from our trip to Sorrento and Capri, and I thought another weekend traveling would wipe me out. Instead, I decided to tough it out and take the trip, and I'm glad I did! It was great experience travelling into another country. We took an 8-hour train that left at midnight, so we crossed into Germany around 6 a.m. the next day. It was difficult to sleep in a 6-passenger car with 5 people, but I managed to get comfortable for about 30 minutes at a time. I knew we were crossing borders because my Italian cellphone sent me about 10 text messages saying "You are now in Germany" and policemen woke us up to check our passports. It was all very unofficial; all we had to do was flash our passport at them, they didn't even look inside.

In Germany we stayed with a family my friend Anjali knew of through her cousin because he stayed there last year. They were beyond wonderful. There were four of us travelling together, we each had a bed, we got free breakfast and dinner and they had a yellow lab. The man of the house, Roman, was actually born in New York but moved to Germany when he was 13, so he was fluent in both languages. His wife and son gave us advice on taking the subway and where to go around town. We then headed out to the subway to go straight to the main event. Coming out of the subway tunnel, we were bombarded by flashing lights and mobs of people, Oktoberfest was right there waiting for us.

We made our way into one of the tents and wandered around helplessly looking for a table until we found a group of what I assumed were Americans and asked them how they got a table. They let us scoot in next to them and there we stayed for three hours. There were a few men from Ireland and a few from other parts of Germany, and we all chatted and drank and ate. Drinking from those 1-liter beer steins is definitely an experience worth having.

For the rest of the stay, Anjali and I wandered around downtown Munich, taking photos of the beautiful buildings and appreciating a different culture. We also stopped in an art museum where we saw lots of Raphael, Rubens and even the first-known Da Vinci painting. We were scheduled to head back to Florence Saturday at midnight. But that happened to be the night that the Italian trains went on strike, so Anjali and I headed to the train station with Roman to negotiate our tickets for the next night, and then got to enjoy one more night at Oktoberfest. I had the world's best bratwurst the size of my torso.

I think the best part of going to Munich was coming back to Florence. Even hearing people speaking Italian was a relief. This place is finally starting to feel like home.

This past weekend I traveled with a few friends by train to Sorrento and the island of Capri nearby. To think I almost didn't go! It was by far the best experience I've had in Italy yet. Photos and words cannot describe how absolutely breathtaking the water is.

We had some interesting experiences with waiters while we were there. Our waiter for lunch randomly told us we were all feminists and explained why feminism will never work. He told Anjali she should know about the state of feminism in India. He then tried to explain that "When a man asks a woman to spend time, she think he want to go to bed. But I do not want to go to sleep." He wanted to ask Rachael to spend the evening with him, but we managed to pay the bill and leave before he got the chance. We went to an English pub for dinner for a change of pace, and I wanted to get something I'd never had before so I ordered a "Chips Butty" sandwich: fried potatoes on white bread:Our waiter told me that the beer I ordered would make me "feel like a bull", and proceeded to grope Rachael's pony tail every time passed our table, exclaiming "lovely, lovely!" Not to mention there was some Italian movie on the t.v. next to our table where a woman kept having sex with a poltergeist--not easy to ignore while you're trying to make conversation.The next day in Capri, however, more than made up for the awkward experiences in Sorrento. We started off by taking the 10 Euro motor boat to the Blue Grotto. When we got there, we saw tons of smaller row boats just floating outside the cave, waiting to pick people up and take them in. We then transferred from our larger motor boat to a small row boat in groups of four, rowed over to a different boat to pay the 9 Euro for the entrance to the cave, and sat outside the three-foot wide entrance until the waves died down and our boatman pulled us in on a chain attached to the wall. Once inside, the sight was unbelievable. The water literally glows a neon blue color from below: "This is due to another opening to the grotto, completely submerged, and the limestone bottom. It allows in sunlight to truly light the water from below" (wikipedia). Everything inside is pitch black except for the breathtaking glow of the water.

Then some of the boatmen start singing in Italian, which echoes off the walls and adds to the overall experience. Once out of the Grotto we took the boat back to Capri and had lunch next to the chairlift (thanks to a recommendation from Rick Steves).

Four of us then paid about 7 Euro to take a chair lift up to the top of Annacapri. On the ride up, I remember thinking "This probably won't be worth the money. It'll probably just be similar to Cinque Terre: a lot of pretty buildings surronding by nice cliffs and coastlines, and that's it." But when we got to the top, all four of us were speechless. The water by itself was stunning. You can't get a more perfect definition of blue than the water there:

So we spent a good 25 minutes up there just saying "wow" over and over again and taking a ton of pictures from different angles. Then we headed back down and waited an hour and 15 minutes for the bus (which never came), took the fenicular down to Capri, took the motor boat back to Sorrento and took the bus back to our hotel. I feel like I should be a star in "Planes, Trains and Automobiles."

It's taken me two days to try and complete this post so I'm going to cut it off here. Hopefully soon I'll be willing to write more about my personal experiences at home and dealing with culture shock. No promises, though.

Sunday I took a group trip into Cinque Terre, the five towns that hug the northwest coast of Italy. It was beautiful, but exhausting. I find it interesting that some of the most beautiful locations in the world are mostly beautiful because of the buildings.

I wish I had more to write about the history or culture of Cinque Terre, but the tour guide we paid for wasn't much of a guide. He led us on the path and got us onto the ferry, but didn't tell us anything about the area. The 38 Euro we all paid for the day trip seemed not to be worth it, but we did get a free 3 hour train ride both ways and entrance to the National Park.

Yesterday morning I dropped my perfume onto the marble floor; it shattered and bits of broken glass and Clinque perfume went everywhere. Rosanna simply got a broom and a cloth and started cleaning up after me. Then I got on the bus packed like a sardine can, and had nowhere to hold onto (which, if you've ever taken public transportation in Italy, you know is essential) so I wrapped my hand around a bar next to the door. When we stopped at the next stop, the door tried to open but couldn't because my hand was in the way! The person waiting outside had to go to another door while I cursed out loud and tried to pull my hand out. The rest of the day went pretty much like that.

The days are getting long for me. I'm not exactly homesick; I don't want to go home yet. But I find I have to force myself to go out at night and explore the city, or make plans to travel on the weekend. I always enjoy myself when I do, but it is something I have to push myself into doing. Next weekend I'm going to Sorrento and Capri with a few girls from Ursinus, and I'm actually looking forward to that. When we first got here I thought I'd be able to beat the usual symptoms of culture shock. Although I am doing better than the textbook definition of culture shock, I'm still not symptom-less. I'm confident that by the end of the three months I'll be telling a different story.

Parlei, Parlez?

Since I've been in Italy, my capacity for speaking French has come rushing back. I'll reach for a French word more often than the word in English. It's kind of cool, but also kind of sad. I loved learning and speaking french in high school; Madame Beard was probably my favorite teacher. But I dropped French second semester freshman year of college because the professor was unbearable. I regret dropping it, not only because it means I still have to make up my language requirement, but also because I've lost that ability and passion for French. But being in Italy and learning Italian has made me realize how much I enjoyed learning a new language and even moreso speaking it.

With each passing year that I've been at college, I've felt more and more incompetent compared to the people around me. At least as far as worldly knowledge goes. Geography, politics, literature, science... I know so little about so many different things. I'm not trying to say I'm stupid or anything, just that I feel like I can't talk about as much as other kids my age. But one thing I enjoy and I think I'm moderately good at is memorizing things. And language is something I especially enjoy memorizing. I've only been here two weeks and already I can have a somewhat decent conversation with my host mother, Rosanna. I'm starting to think I'd like to take up French again and possibly pursue a career in language. Translator, teacher, tour guide... there's a high job demand for people who are multi-lingual, right?

I heard that English is the hardest language to learn. In French or Italian, when you have to learn the masculine and feminine and then the different agreements you think "How can this be easier than English?" But those languages at least make sense, they're methodical. English is completely random, I think. The word for "grapefruit" in Italian is "arancia rossa", which literally means "red orange". That makes sense! It's actually an orange that's red. "Grapefruit" on the otherhand makes no sense. It's not anything like grapes. Italian makes the most sense of any language I've learned. I love the pronunciation. But French holds a soft spot in my heart because it was my first love, and it will always be more beautiful to me.

Arno tour

CAPA advertised a classic river boat tour of the Arno this week, so I went with a few friends last night after school let out. I forget the name of it, but we went in the same boat they used during the Roman period to drag sand from the bottom of the river to use in making the buildings in Florence. We set out around 6:45 P.M., just as the sun was setting; it was the perfect time of day to be on the water at the Ponte Vecchio.

This is the Uffizi Gallery, a large art museum in Florence. "Uffizi" in Italian means "offices." This building used to be the offices for the Medici family. It was nice to see it from the water, since we walk past it almost every day.

The square windows with the grates covering them run along the Medici corridors which run from the Uffizi, over the Ponte Vecchio and to the Boboli Gardens. The Medici family had these corridors built so they could travel safely around the city in tumultuous times.

These are the only remaining original houses on the Arno next to the Ponte Vecchio; the rest were destroyed in the bombings of WWII.

I forget the name of this tower, but it stands in "Piazza Purgato" where they used to bury children (hence the name). This can only be seen from the Arno because of the buildings surrounding it on three sides.
These are the only remaining original houses along the Arno next to the Ponte Vecchio; the others were destroyed in the bombings of WWII.

This little guy was looking down over the side of the bridge as we went under. Cosimo de Medici wanted the animals on this bridge to be a ram because he was a Capricorn. As you can see, this is a little creepy and/or scary. Legend has it that the Ram on the East side of the bridge is angry and upset because he can see the flood coming, whereas the one on the other side is more at peace because he can't. The angry one was definitely more difficult to pass under without getting the heebie-jeebies.

I apologize for the crappy formatting. As you can tell I'm new to blogger so I'm still getting the hang of things. And it's time for me to head on home for the day, so I'm just going to post this in its incomplete state.

Getting started

Simply posting this first entry to get the blog up and running. Will write more when I have something significant to say.