Going to Florence? Maybe.. yeah okay why not

On our field trip on Tuesday, Emily tried to point out the ridiculousness that is inherently part of the program here.

“You guys. We’re sitting next to an ancient temple, eating lunch of hollow bread while we look over the most beautiful view of the seacoast.. and tell pirate jokes.”

We were at the hilltop site of Cosa, a word which happily enough means “what?” in Italian, leading into a great many “who’s on first” type jokes if you ever tell an Italian that is where you plan to go. Cosa was a colony of Rome which was eventually ended when it was sacked by pirates.

But how did the pirates scale the wall? I asked this question in earnest but the others thought I was setting up my next joke.

The Cosa trip was fabulous, not least because I got to swim in the Mediterranean Sea for the first time after we were done exploring the hilltop.

The rest of the week was brutal, if by brutal I mean we went on field trips every day. This is only brutal in the capacity that you do a lot of walking and looking and have less time than usual to complete the little things we do on the side like Latin or Greek, or Italian for that matter. At the same time, projects are starting to pop up here and there, so extra work is coming along the way all the while.

Simultaneous to this is “free museum weekend” in Florence, this weekend in fact. A large group has already left on the EuroStar train for Florence. Why, you may wonder, did I not go with them? Because I’m a stubborn girl who doesn’t like to make decisions, mostly.

I have become convinced that no train in Italy really requires booking in advance. And hostels either. We’ll see how this works out. I’ll be flying by the seat of my pants, so to speak. Taking the slow train because I want to be difficult—I mean, different, plus I’m cheap and willing to spend an extra hour or so looking at scenery to save like twenty euro.

Hope today’s bus strike is over early tomorrow morning! How else will I get to Termini station?

Happy Birthday Augustus

Kirsten just woke me up and saved my afternoon from a Nap of Death. I was getting sleepy doing the reading for class so I thought I had earned a little nap. Usually I don’t even need an alarm to sleep almost exactly forty minutes which is a primo napping time. Unfortunately, there are times when you slip into groggy half-dream infested states of confusion, and you wake up hours later, disoriented, grouchy, confused, and still sleepy. This is the Nap of Death to which I admittedly fell a little bit victim this afternoon.

Good naps make you feel refreshed, but Naps of Death do no such thing.

So I thought instead of trying to jump right into Italian homework, I should perhaps warm up my logy brain with an exercise in writing!

It’s Sunday again. This time, the corner closest to where I live has been roped off from cars and kids are playing there on bikes, and people are selling organic honey. It is less noisy than last week, hence the nap.

Our Tuesday field trip was to Lavinium, where we trekked across a farmer’s field to take a look at a hero shrine of Aeneas and thirteen altars all set up next to each other at different times in history. It started raining while we were there, and got pretty chilly. In my infinite wisdom I had packed an umbrella at the last minute and so was somewhat shielded, although the wind was pretty fierce (or so I thought. I hadn’t seen anything yet when it comes to wind).

Heroon: Hero shrine

Thirteen altars all in a row

Then we went to the Museum of Ships at Nemi, which has inspired a new life plan (live at Nemi; step one: learn to speak Italian…). The mountain town around the lake is almost as beautiful as the lake itself.

Outside ship museum

It’s called the Museum of Ships because it houses reconstructions and materials from the ancient pleasure boats (omg, cruise!) sailed by Nero and Caligula and the like. It also has material from a nearby grove sacred to Diana.

Ship stuff

Nemi was gorgeous, but unfortunately also home to some bees that are haters. Some time during lunch, one of them stung Professor Collantoni and she had to be whisked off to the hospital by a man in a black sedan (because there were no ambulances available?). She is, apparently, allergic. But I figure anyone would hate life a little bit if they got stung in the face. I learned that Professor Roman (yeah that is his real name) is allergic as well and carries an epipen, so I know who to sprint to in case of stinging mishap.

Lunch!

After this, we went on to Tusculum, another hilltop. This is the place where Cicero had his favorite villa. We endured a lecture in super-force winds, taking notes to the best of our abilities, then were set free to explore the area. The ruins were pretty neat, but we were all much more impressed by the windy hilltop area itself. We climbed around and explored. I formed a team with Mike and Genvieve, and together we found the summit and some caves.

Me on the summit, striking a pose.

I was pretty tired on Wednesday because I’d been a little bit sick Tuesday night (indigestion? I guess..) and it kept me awake more than I would have wanted. We were supposed to have no field trip Wednesday, but Franco found out that the Forum workers (we were scheduled to visit Thursday) were planning a strike Thursday, so we moved the visit to Wednesday morning. But then Franco found out they were also striking Wednesday morning too. Not to be outdone, we switched our morning and afternoon schedules (Greek and Latin morning this time.. Forum in the afternoon) and moved off for the Forum Romanum around 2:30.

We got to see the mysterious Lapis Niger, a black rock that the Romans avoided stepping on out of respect even though they didn’t know why, or what was underneath it. There is apparently some kind of altar down there, and an inscribed thingy that says not to walk on it. After that we looked at the Comitium (the Lapis Niger is kind of inside the Comitium) where the Romans used to have assemblies and vote on things, and then speculated about the location of the Tarpeian rock (whence they threw criminals condemned to die).

Don't step on the black rock or you'll be cursed!

Then, as is policy, we were turned loose and told to explore the forum and get a better grasp of its layout, so Genvieve, Derek, and I wandered around for a while until we found ourselves off the ancient-guidebook map and near the Coliseum. We grabbed a bus home.

After this, I had almost no class to speak of on Thursday, save Italian (and the quiz that comes with it), which went fine. Thursday night, I decided to try finding karaoke in the city of Rome, which is no easy task. Once again accompanied by Genvieve and Ashley, we found Pub Julius Caesar pretty easily. It was too early for it to be full of people at that time, and we discovered that they sadly did not have karoke.

We set off for Pirati, but actually walked right past it when we got off the bus because it was closed. Getting home was difficult and took a long time. I enjoyed it in the terms of “we’re having an adventure” but “we found karaoke” it was not. Because I had been so hoping to, I started us up singing Journey on the bus home. One of the buses home, that is.. the third one of the night.

Friday there was a Wine Symposium in the centro where a certified wine expert came to teach us how to drink wine correctly. Friday night I spent doing my hand-laundry I thought I was going to do last week. It takes a long time to wash things that way.

Wine Symposium advice

I’ve been exploring the nearby park a little at a time, but I’ve decided it should get its own entire entry. It is that large and that cool.

Last night I hung out with Emily G (one of the centro’s many Emilys). We went into Rome to buy supplies for a mission of ours. Then we went on a postcard hunt which yielded no results, but did yield a delightful restaurant entirely by accident off to one side of the Coliseum (Collosseum?).

I got back and was fairly tired and the plan was to go to bed around 12, when I heard some people in the garden singing happy birthday to Brooke. I was going to just go down and tell her happy birthday, and then go to bed, but she encouraged me to go with them to a club to celebrate her birthday. I considered the fact that my only night-out experience that weekend had been getting lost in the middle of nowhere off-the-map section of town finding Pirati, so I consented. We got as far as the club itself and stood in line for a little while before a group of three of us (Chris, Genvieve, and I) all decided we didn’t want to wait in line anymore, it was 1:50am, and we would rather be in bed than waiting to pay a cover charge for what looked like a really crowded place.

Plus, I wanted to go to the “gypsy market” Sunday morning. Now that it looked like that wasn’t happening, I still preferred to leave.

I did manage to get to the gypsy market this morning, and it was a very intense experience. Some things are so out there. Some are priced really well, too. Still, that place, like every crowded bus I’ve been on, like la Notte Bianca’s crowded streets reminded me again and again of a line from a song.

It’s called SpeedStick. It’s not expensive. I kept saying it to the two Emilys that joined me in the trip to the market. They concur. But it seems that anywhere that large crowds converge, there will always be just too little deodorant to go around.

I should now be doing my homework or even doing something about my individual site report/research paper stuff.. I spent more time this weekend planning a trip to Vienna

Late Sunday Afternoon

It’s Sunday afternoon and there’s a happy bustle going on in the courtyard garden below my window. The nuns are having a party, so we aren’t supposed to go in there right now. Last night we had our own party, since we have to find our own food on weekends, more than half the students pitched in and we had a garden bbq. It was pretty fun. We even had a ‘dance party’ after we ate.

Part of what I am enjoying most here is getting to know the little things. Today I’m going to hand wash some of my laundry. I’ve never done that before, to any extent. But apparently, Italian washing machines are beasts and cannot be trusted with clothing of any delicacy whatsoever. And I haven’t used the dryer because I’m a cheapskate and it costs like 1.50 euro to do so. Please. There are thousands of drying racks on the terrace. I’ll manage.. and I did. My socks required about sixty clothespins (again, I exaggerate). But hey, it’s Rome, and there’s something cool about taking the time to do things like that with your own hands.

I like that I’m starting to know what buses to take where, and how to get back again. I even set out on my own to track down Harry Potter 6 yesterday and not only found a bookstore in a sort of mall thing, but went to the information desk and asked “Where is the books in English?” in Italian! Yeah, not grammatically correct, but totally got my point across. So she pointed a direction and said a bunch of stuff in Italian I didn’t understand and I thanked her and just wandered in the right direction.

The European covers are awesome.

On this same trip I ordered a gelato cone with such success (and even whined that they didn’t have ciocollato.. yeah chocolate..) that the guy behind the counter spoke to me in all Italian (so I have no idea what he said, except that he offered me nutella gelato instead, which I had and it was delicious).. and I know most gelato counter guys speak English.. and this place was right next to the Trevi fountain, home of tourists apparently 24/7.

It's like this even at night.

Speaking of Nutella? They are absolutely obsessed. There are individual packets of it at breakfast which the students sometimes horde. Every bar (what we call a bar in the US is what they call a pub.. a bar is actually just any place that serves food, pastries, drinks (especially coffee), gelato, etc) has an enormous canister of it with a pump on top for mass-topping. Everywhere you go there is hazelnut this and chocolate-hazelnut that. It’s lovely.

Nectar. Of. The. Gods.

I really thought my friends were kidding when they said I would get hit on by random strangers, but this too has occurred. Three times now, I’ve been complimented, mostly on the basis of my extremely pale skin, I think. Yesterday when I was on my way into the park, the guy on the black scooter was like “I like white skinned girls.” He asked if I wanted to get a ride to wherever I was going on his scooter. No thanks! Just out for a stroll.. It happens more often when alone than when in groups.

Ciao.

Italy happens to sell a particular kind of cracker I had been looking for since my trip to Spain with Dean. It is apparently a British product, the digestive cracker. These things are freakin’ delicious. I might have to stock up and declare forty pounds of them on my way home. Coffee is extremely strong, and wine is extremely cheap, since a lot of it is so local. Some of the students have been having fun buying stuff like Cerveteri wine, since we passed vineyards in the bus on the way home from there.

Pizza is sold by weight and is pretty much both ubiquitous (though not as much as gelato!) and delicious everywhere. Italians love exact change and get cross when you try to pay them with a ten. Or a twenty. They stammer and stare if you hand over a fifty.

The only time I’ve seen a one or two cent piece euro was because I found them on the ground. Most things cost an even ten cent ending. And sales tax is always just included.. if it’s charged at all, I’m not really sure.

Italians all have dogs which they all love very much and take off the leash regularly. But since there are so many and they all do it, it seems like all the dogs are really well socialized and they don’t fight with other dogs or run off too far, or wander up to strangers. The only problem this causes at all is an abundance of dog crap in the park, so you have to watch your step.

I think the nuns got a live singer. They are really rockin’ it out there. There are nuns and monks around, too, you just see them hanging out in their full attire, on the bus and all over town. All kinds of nationalities, too.. I’ve seen Asian nuns and pale nuns as well as the possibly-Italian nuns. This city is kind of a big deal when it comes to Catholicism though.

Saints, especially Mary, are everywhere. And there are literally shrines to Mary in the sides of walls just along the street here and there. And like nine hundred or so churches in Rome. I went to church this morning, since one of the other students found an English mass. But of course the church is beautiful and every inch of the inside is painted, and apparently the remains of Saint Susanna are beneath the church. I’ve never been to a service in a church with that kind of history!

I think I want to go use the last few hours of daylight to walk around and stretch out my legs. They are legitimately pissed off that I spent so little of yesterday NOT forcing them into labor, but I figure if I go for a walk, maybe they won’t ache so much.

I’m kind of sleepy because I never go to bed as early as I hope to, and often wake up earlier than I would at home because the city really shuts down at noon on Sundays, if.. a place opens at all. Today it was to go to church, but even just in general. There is also a Sunday morning flea market which I want to attend next week. Bargaining is lots of fun.

I’ve begun the city-wide search for the best postcards for the cheapest price. When the search concludes.. you will know. You might have to leave a “comment” with your address though. I didn’t take my address box.

Week One: Tomb Raiding

Tuesday, being our main field trip day, brought the usual amazement and excitement to the week. Starting bright and early, all the centristi (centro students) piled on our big bus with which we rule the streets of Rome, filled as it is with scooters and tiny smartcars.

Our first stop was a museum in Tarquinia, at which we could sadly not take photos. It was filled with ancient Etruscan stuff, the Etruscans being the people who lived near Rome and in Tuscany back in the 700s-300s BC or so. There were just.. sarcophagi sitting around arranged in the rooms, with no glass or anything to keep you off of them, just trust. This is an example of one which is actually in the museum but we couldn’t see him because he was closed for restoration:

Laris Pulena: The very picture of a 'fat and happy' Etruscan.

We also saw a lot of early burial stuff, like biconical urns for ashes (some of them had helmets at the top part of the urn) or hut shaped urns, as homes for the dead. I had seen photos of them before, but what struck me was how large they were. You can’t really tell with just a photo in a classroom that the hut urn is about a foot wide.

okay so this is a drawing, but you get the idea.

We didn’t really have a lot of time in the museum, because you really could spend many hours there. We had about one. I got to see lots of terracotta sculptures and stuff carved out of stone, and some cool other stuff like a reconstruction of a tomb with painted walls.

But wait.. our next stop was the location of the real thing! The painted tombs were all behind glass sealed doors so you could see in, but the climate wouldn’t affect the ancient paintings and cause them to deteriorate. For that reason, I don’t really have photos of that either. But the countryside around the hill where this was is amazing:

Danger. Do not go down hill. Bees.

Also, these stone basin things were what used to contain the ash urns.

stone mushrooms

After our terribly British narrator gave us the tour of the painted tombs and lunch, we were off to Banditaccia, the necropolis of Old Caere (Cerveteri). This was extremely cool. The city of the dead was completely open to our access, meaning we could climb on it and into the tombs themselves.

They're even decorated with stripes.

The giant mounds are called tumuli, and there are family “homes” carved into the very rock underneath. Often there are several rooms in one ‘home’ and can even been several ‘homes’ in one earth mound, presumably extended family members in the same hill. Other tombs were just cut separately square into the hillside like “condos” our professor said. All in all, it felt very adventurous to be scurrying up and down the paths in the sprawling city filled with chambers cut right from the rock. We were divided into groups, so here’s me with mine inside one of the tombs:

We, raiders of tombs

Our bus stopped at the beach so we could relax for a few before heading back to the centro.

Black volcanic sand.

With barely a breather of one day in between (used for reading, Greek, Latin, and Italian for us centristi).. we were off again this morning headed for Veii, one of the closest Etruscan towns to Rome and Rome’s earliest enemy. There are the ruins of an old temple to Minerva (or maybe Apollo) there, from which come some really famous terra cotta statues of Apollo, Hercules, and a female usually thought to be Latona (Apollo’s mom). The temple foundations remain and have poles set up on them to show where the rest of the structure went. There is a ritual pool next to the temple. We were allowed to basically roam around here too.

Foundations only.

The reason being, all the goods from all the places like Ceveteri and the temple had been moved off to museums all over the place, and our next stop was the Villa Giulia, which houses a good many of them. No photos, again, except in the courtyard, but rows upon rows of Greek vases (imports from back in the day), bronze work, pieces of temples, and of course the lovely terra cottas from Veii. This is what the Apollo looks like:

I wish internet photos were prettier.

He is similar in style to the famous couple sarcophagus which was also in the museum:

Etruscans.

The museum also had the three gold tablets from Pyrgi which have inscriptions in Phonecian and in Etruscan. No one can reeallly read Etruscan, so these tablets are kind of a big deal in the language department. I thought, once again based on photos in class back at Vandy that I’d seen, that they were huge. They’re actually like eight inches tall each, maybe. I have photos of these, but they are saved in the wrong format (from class last year).

After that, we went to see a piece of one of Rome’s oldest walls, called the “Servian” wall after one of the kings of Rome (pre-Republic, and pre-empire) from around 600BC (so it’s claimed, but the materials are more like 400 BC).

Yeah ancient walls made of tufa blocks.

So far.. that’s all. But it’s all so, so cool!

The White Night

Since my obelisk hunt, I’d been hanging around the centro, going to the park, and poking around the immediate neighborhood, and attending classes. We had obelisk presentations Thursday, so we spent most of Wednesday putting all that together. I’ve also accompanied many a group on trips to the nearby market (where for many, being able to buy wine is a novelty) and bank. And there’s a gelato place just across the street..

Italian class is going fairly well. I volunteered to be called “Mily” since there are way too many people with the same name in that class. Our teacher had doled out names, Amelia, Emily, Emi… I got Emily originally, and way more people call me “Emi” than “Mily” but I figured I would go different.

This weekend has been quite a whirlwind! I managed through my classes into Thursday afternoon. Or, Thriday if you will, since that is my last official working day each week. Some other girls were going out to a bar, and I elected to go with them on the why-not whim. It was an evening of ridiculousness, but I am glad I went. The bartender was Irish and spoke English, and we danced with Italians and Germans.

I tried to do homework Friday but was often “too tired” and thought that was a reasonable excuse not to be productive. Naps ensued after lunch in the garden. So I would do a nominal amount while sitting in the entryway to the centro, waiting to see if anyone was going out somewhere. The weather has been phenomenally good to my taste.

It didn’t take long for a small group to be passing through, looking for a place to buy tea. Score! So I went with them and we got lost and found the mausoleum of Hadrian instead, near the river. I didn’t have my camera, I regret to say. But we did find a few tea shops, and gelato too. The Piazza Navona is sadly under construction. But there are still tons of people milling around the area.

After that we had dinner back at the centro again, and that night was something called “waiting for la notte bianca” or waiting for white night. Check out www.lanottebianca.it, because it’s pretty awesome in general. White Night is a yearly festival, a Saturday night in which people stay up very late, some until morning.

We went to see an aerial ballet, which was accomplished with mirrors and a water-covered stage. Dancers slid across it doing flips and turns and also made designs with one another with their bodies. They looked naked, but weren’t actually. It took us forever to find that place, though, where it was being shown. Previous to this we wandered around the ancient areas, as someone had put mirrors and lights in the Forum artistically. We also saw that the Circus Maximus was filled with glowing orbs, but we only passed it by bus.

"You guys! It's the forum! It's still cool!"

For the second night in a row, I went to bed rather late and my legs and feet completely stricken with tiredness! Saturday came bright and clear, and I attempted to accomplish much more work than before.. with some success. I tried very hard to focus on reading for class because I knew that I would be up again Saturday for the actual White Night itself.

I had lunch at a delicious nearby falafel place for like 3.50 euro, which pleases me. When a group formed (a group in which I was interested in being included.. there are some people I’d rather be with than others even by this point) to go to dinner, I wasn’t really hungry yet, but I went anyway. The restaurant wasn’t open because it was too early, though, so we went to the park again instead. It was more full of people than I’ve ever seen it. Families and kids, and still the regular joggers and runners.

We walked through it and someone finally showed me where the pond is, so I finally know. I got to know some people a little better through all of these wandering trips. After the park, we went to dinner and I split a great pizza with Linda, and then we all went back to the centro to get ready. I meant to take a ‘disco nap’ before going out that night, but instead I went to the la notte bianca website which is overwhelming with stuff to see and do.

I had hoped to plan a route or at least a few things to see, but in the end I figured I’d be best served by just wandering around with little expectation or aim to see what there was to see. We amassed a group of about fifteen and got on a bus.

First stop, Circus Maximus. The glowing orb thing was absolutely sweet.

They change colors too! Each orb is roughly the size of a human head.

Circus Maximus is large ("maximus")

We promptly lost three group members in the shuffle and were forced to move on from there.

We wandered toward the Colosseum, and paused by the Arch of Constantine. There was an enormous golden praying mantis on wheels, surrounded and topped with people in intense costumes and facepaint. The people on top had guitars and other instruments.. so I thought it was a strange band show.

Yeah, okay.

They seemed to be preparing for something, so we waited a little while. Then a giant queen strode up (a woman also with elaborate costume and awesome stilts). I decided to wander from the group all the way around the mantis to take photos, and then it happened.

On the hill to the right of us there was a red flare and what looked like monkeys were leaping down the hillside in our direction. The queen was watching them and music had started. They ended up being people with awesome costumes and painted faces on pogo-stick stilts. They bounded toward our golden insect setting off fireworks as they went, holding flares and sparklers, bouncing around like mad. It made me think of my brother, to be honest.

They cleared an area by stalking around and making movements at us the crowd. I was somehow right up front behind some kids. Then the pogo dudes began juggling bars that the queen passed out to them. The band played on top of the insect’s back.

Then the mantis raised its head high and a hoop was hanging from its face, and a little woman all in gold did acrobatics up in the hoop to my utter amazement. I was totally petrified that she would fall and hit the cobblestone below, but she was awesome and really strong, and didn’t.

A bit blurry because it's hard to take night phots. But man. Mad. Skillz.

After her part, for which the expression on my face must have been priceless and even worth being asked “are you fifteen?” at the airport, the pogo men came back and did some more juggling and bouncing. Then they began to clear another path through where I was standing. The small woman was now sitting in the raised face of the mantis, and the golden insect began to move. The pogo men were setting off fireworks and bounding along beside it, and the queen was striding with self assurance. The little woman turned the mantis face side to side to look at the crowd as they moved past.

There's nothing I can say to make this photo NOT creepy as hell.

The whole thing was awesome and cirque-du-soleil ish to me, and was basically the most awesome thing that happened that night. I was completely amazed the whole time. I love random strange happenings like that, especially when they involve wild costumes and even gigantic insects painted gold.

We walked on after that, finding a dead end on the Via Sacra, and moseyed on, stopped briefly to hear a singer perform songs by Paul Simon and James Taylor. I began to sing Journey to myself and we moved slowly across a main square. It was jam packed with people. Amazing. Like Mardi Gras or something. We worked our way up to the Pantheon and sat down on some grass (grass in dirt in boxes, that is..). Grabbed some pastry in a nearby place (since they were all open all night for this event) and pondered what to do next. I wanted to go back to Termini for the naked ballet, but the longer we sat the more I wanted to go home. It was 2:10 anyway, and by the time we managed to maneuver to Termini it would be way too late (last show at 2:30).

Yeah self-taken photos. You can just see the grass below where we're sitting. And everyone looks that manic at 2 am.

Instead we fought our way home, which in itself was a massive undertaking. We had to fight crowds all the way to Argentina and the cat sanctuary. To “save time” and “be more comfortable” I thought we might take the tram, but it was a big mistake as it was the most packed anything has been. I wanted to get a picture of it, but could not really move to get into my backpack. No I did not get pickpocketed. Emily and I had to literally bust through a wall of people to get off the tram at our desired stop. Really we just wanted to get out of there.

From there we did find a relatively uncrowded bus to take us home. 3am. End of weekend nights.

Today I have homework to keep me busy all day. Happily there is a lot of sunshine in the garden and I will do my reading there, I think. Ypa!

So in "ancient ruins" class...

I still haven't had a real class day yet. Our schedule is something like:

Monday: Breakfast, morning lecture on city ruins, lunch, Latin (for those that have it), then Greek (for me), and then Italian (also one of mine), then dinner
Tuesday: Breakfast, all day field trip for the ruins course, ending sometime before dinner
Wednesday: Breakfast, ruins field trip half day, lunch back at Centro, and the afternoon schedule of language classes and dinner
Thursday: Breakfast, ruins field trip half day, lunch, and Baroque art history (for those who have it) and Italian (for me) just until four (Italian is normally 6-7). Dinner is 7:30 as usual...
Friday: Art history field trip in the morning. For those who have it. Unlike me, who has no class after like four on Thursday.

This Monday was orientation, but we did have Italian at 6. Our entire class is conducted in the language. No I did not sign up for advanced; it's the beginning class. Sensei didn't even attempt anything like that until deep into our second year and the result was more of a cluster outside the classroom after we escaped with various intonations of "okay did anyone understand what our homework is supposed to be?"

But I'm not complaining. I understood almost all of what she said because she has a fair pace. I'm not saying I could re-create any of it or say it without prompting, but my listening skillz are not so bad.

Tuesday was a sort of self guided field trip, as we were assigned to groups of three and sent into the city on a hunt for various assigned obelisks. We were armed with our bus passes and maps, and a bag lunch, and my group did indeed find our assignments (one of which we have to give a fifteen minute report on, Thursday morning). We found some more besides. At our second bus stop there were some random ruins just sort of.. being there. And next to our obelisk was the freaking Pantheon. That's the ancient temple to all the gods. Inside it's been converted to a Catholic church, which is cool too, but not the way I kept picturing it before I saw it, since I have seen all kinds of classical diagrams and stuff.

So then we did a lot of walking to get to our second assigned obelisk and on the way we ended up passing, oh, you know, Trajan's market, and his forum, and column, and the freaking Colosseum, etc. I was wigging, since I recognized so much. My group members were a little less impressed or a little more composed. I mean, statues of Augustus in Primaporta style? Come on people. It seems that my art-hist prof taught me too well.

Augustus is the man. I got so excited and had to take this photo. Since I seemed to know something they didn't, several nearby tourists began to do the same.

So I'm about to have my first Greek class. And I seriously don't remember any Greek. Like, do they use the Russian alphabet? I forget...

Day One and Growing

I think Rome is growing on me. Yesterday it seemed okay, but yesterday I was tired and basically just ragged from traveling all day. I went to bed early because at about 9:15 I couldn't keep my fuzzy brain on Harry Potter anymore, and was asleep almost immediately.

This morning I woke up at 6:30 with the alarm my roommate had set. She went running in the nearby park. I got up and dressed and went to the park myself. It seems enormous, as I wasn't even able to explore close to all of it.

Random gates.. to make you THINK the park is over. But it goes on.

In Nashville we have a Parthenon in our park. In Rome, we have mini churches.

Breakfast was delicious, and then we had an orientation meeting. After the meeting we all had walking tours of the immediate neighborhood area.

The weather in Rome is amazing. Imagine the best, most comfortable temperature ever. Okay, now add like five degrees. That's it, and it's perfect for me because I prefer the warm.

The Centro has small rooms since it used to be a convent until the 70s or so. Meals are served "family style" which actually means they put big bowls of stuff on your table and you help yourself, or the lady comes around and puts it on your plate if you say "si" to what she carries. Breakfast is half self-serve though.

There's a lot of stuff in easy walking distance, including a supermarket. There's a bbq pit in the garden which we are allowed to use on weekends since they don't provide meals then. The garden is spectacular because it has tables and chairs, and two fountains that trickle into fishponds. There's also an outdoor terrace thing overlooking the garden which is right outside my (barred) window. The window is open now and the open door at the other end of the room gives it a good breeze moving through a lot of the time.

There are trees and lots of shade in the garden, and I think that is where we will have dinner tonight as part of our 'welcome day' which is nice. Yesterday was kind of loose.. a little bit of being on our own, which is fine, and I found food with my roommate and some other girls. It was cheap and pretty good as pizza goes.

I wish I spoke more Italian! Sometimes I feel like this place is still a convent since the program is full of girls this semester. I think there are seriously ten males and 26 females. It's ridiculous, but not a travesty.

I've also been told we will have access to the American Academy's library, in addition to our bus passes and other perks of being here. There is also a phone on which we can recieve calls, and I'll post the number sometime or send it to my mom.

I think I'm ready for school to start, even though I kind of had school-type work to do all summer. It's what I know how to do, you know?

I might take a short nap before my personal classes orientation meeting..

My computer says it’s 2:21am, but I know better. It’s the ripe hour of EIGHT twenty-one, and I’ve got some time before my flight begins boarding. I should have worn my hall “Royalty” t-shirt, because I’ve been treated like it. Sort of. But I knew if I carried my two pieces of ‘handgepaeck’ around any more they would compress my spine or something. So the director man told me to go get a coffee or something. But I’ma sit here a minute first.

So we met the sun on the other side of the sea for one of my life’s shortest days. I was afraid I would be assigned an aisle seat next to a big man who overflowed only slightly into my space and would make me stand up every few hours so someone could get past me. Flashbacks of the Spain trip, I guess. I expected to sleep without aid that time. Right.

This time I was better prepared and luckier! I was assigned the aisle seat, but either the other seat was never assigned or its occupant didn’t show. Result? Score. This means I get double pillows and blankets for one thing, and a place to throw all my crap for another. Plus I can skip the whole “hey where are you from?” bit and get right to the part where I sleep.

I set my watch for Italy time while I was in the car on the way to the airport. Catie told me to get on their schedule as soon as possible and I wasn’t going to mess around. But I couldn’t so easily convince myself that it was 11:30 at night when my body knew very well it was 5:30. But that’s okay. Mom gave me sleep drugs which did in fact make me sleepy.

Then dinner was served. I drowsed through it and slept, if not extremely well, for most of the flight. It was probably the least miserable I’ve ever been traveling overnight (I’m recalling not only Spain, but also the DC bus trip). I think lowered expectations had something to do with it as well. The less you care, the less you stress.

I woke up and pulled the darkness mask off my face at six or so to discover I had somehow obtained another blanket and another pillow to add to my nest of CD-player, Harry Potter book goodness.

The windows showed a sea of rippled clouds. Lovely. And below them, the overcast German countryside looked like something I’ve seen before, but not.

And then it was time to be thankful that Johannes taught me how to say and understand numbers in German. I wandered around trying to find my way, using signs (correct) and directions from a passport official (incorrect) until I stopped to ask some guy who was obviously part of a group carrying US passports if he knew how to get to A18. His party was headed in the same direction and they temporarily adopted me.

Which was sweet, considering they were running a bit late for their flight, were pulled to the front of the passport line, and put on a little zippy cart to be driven across the airport in style. No spine-compression for me, seeing as how I was just considered another part of the group.

And now I know it’s going to be one of those days. I woke up way too early and got too little sleep for my usual standard of operation. But that doesn’t matter because the adventure has begun. No photos yet although I considered taking one of myself on the plane, drugged smug look and all, but forgot or fell asleep before doing so. I also wanted to take a picture of the exit sign because, like Spain, they have a picture of a little man positively running away toward the door. But unlike Spain they are translated as “exit” and not “way out”. Way out where?

Addendum: In Italy they are translated "way out" as well.

Pre-Departure

Currently just trying to make sure I've done all the stuff I needed to do before I left... Starting this blog was one of them. I'll post airport stories once I have them. As for now, I'm as packed as I can be (yeah, that was fun) and my bags are under weight limit (one just barely) and I have twelve dollars in my pocket. In an hour and a half I have to relinquish my cell phone. That makes me sad.