This is your Brain on Michelangelo: A Trip to Florence

This past Wednesday, we headed off to Florence (Firenze).  Departure itself was rather exciting, because we had to be at the train station at 6:20 AM.  I had assumed we would walk, which takes about 15 minutes, but my roommates found a bus that would get us there at 6:10.  This would be excellent, except that we had a few delays as we tried to head out, and ended up arriving to the bus stop at the same time as the bus was pulling up and running, hoping he would stop long enough for us to get on, and he did.  We reached the train station only to find our classmates, Filiberto and a delayed train. 

Several hours and three trains later… we get into Firenze.  The first thing that I notice is that it is touristy, there is a Mc Donalds in the station, and one just outside the door.  There are also a lot of signs in English.  Filiberto takes us into a little underpass, and at this point I am just hoping that the hotel is as close as he says it was.  When we surface we are in a piazza with a gorgeous church,  Santa Maria Novella.

We make it to the hotel, and Chelsea, Lisa and I got the keys to our room.  I wish I had remembered to take pictures of the hotel lobby, because it was pretty awesome.  There was the area with the desk, and then separated by a couple of pillars and situated under a barrel vault, there was as mall sitting area.  But the lobby also appeared like a split level, because  there was another small sitting area above that opened up to face the lobby.  The steps wound through the center of the hotel, and our room was on the Italian second floor, which is the third floor to my American brain. 

After a few minutes in the room to refresh ourselves after our train ride, Lisa and I set out to explore, while Chelsea decided to stay back and rest before going on our first tour with Filiberto in a couple hours.  Lisa and I discovered a little café with great sandwiches, and continued on our walk.  We saw some gorgeous shop windows, and found the Disney store, which of course you have to go into, no questions asked.  And then completely by accident, we found the Duomo, Santa Maria die Fiori, the most famous churches in Florence.  The work of so many great Renaissance architects and artists squeezed onto 3 buildings, the cathedral, its bell tower and baptistery.  We stood in complete awe, took a few pictures and then had to meet up with the group.  Ironically the duomo was on our tour for the day, but certainly I didn’t mind going more than once.

We got back to the hotel and set off like a bunch of ducklings behind Filiberto.  As we walked through the city I was just so amazed by the beauty of it.  But I also tried not to get too distracted by how beautiful it was, because the vespas, bikes and taxis don’t care if you think it is your turn to cross the street.  Filiberto took us through the city, stopping periodically to point out a statue here, and beautiful Renaissance window there,  Back at the duomo, he begins to explain to us what makes this particular cathedral so spectacular.  First the baptistery, with its beautiful doors, and interior with a ceiling covered in gold mosaics.  The portrait to Christ on the ceiling has him seated with his hands out to the side.  One hand has the palm facing forward welcoming his children, while the second has his palm facing back, pushing evil away.  The bell tower, done primarily in white marble with amazing detailing, from top to bottom, soared up into the perfect blue sky.  I could not have asked for a better day if I had tried.  The crown jewel of the project, however, is the dome, completed by an architect by the name of Brunelleschi in 1401.  The primary design for the church was already done, and called for a massive dome, bigger than any other in the world at the time.  It was discovered though, that there was not enough lumber in Italy as a whole to even build the scaffolding  to build the dome… and so the Florentines were in a bit of pickle.  Brunelleshi figured out that if he built  a smaller dome, and used it to support the larger dome while also making some modifications to the supporting structure of the church, it would work. 

Historians mark the completion of the dome in 1401 as the start of the Renaissance.  But here’s the best part, you can climb it.  It takes 463 stairs, a couple of really tight spiral staircases, some strangely shaped places, a lot of patience, and endurance but you can do it.  The path takes you on a walk through the interior around the edge of the dome, with great bird’s eye views of the church below, and close ups of the frescos on the ceiling by Giorgio Vasari. 

I would just like to take a moment to note that Filiberto does not like these frescoes, he like Vasari’s other works, but not these frescos.  They are not my favorites that I have seen, but I would not have said they are terrible, that being said, one of Filiberto’s theories was that Vasari was influenced by Michelangelo, and tried too hard to imitate him, which lead Gina to gesture at the ceiling and state, “This is your brain on Michelangelo.” I found this to be a perfect summary of my time in Florence. 

So to continue on, the views from the top of the dome were spectacular.  The city spreads out for miles, with the bell towers and domes rising above their residential neighbors in all corners.  Not only that, but no detail was left unfinished.   The white marble curled around flowers and looked like it was given just as much attention as  the tiles in the floor and the carvings in the façade.  I doubt that Brunelleshi expected hundreds of tourists to be climbing to the top of his dome  on a daily basis, making their way steadily to the top.  The most incredible part of it for me was not that  we climbed it, or how amazing the view was, but it was that I was standing at the top of a creation that is now credited with being the start of a new historical era.  An era that didn’t just impact art, but science, philosophy, literature, and every aspect of daily life. 

We also visited the basilica of Santa Croce, a Fransiscan church.  The façade here was also beautiful, with its contrasting dark and light marble.  Santa croce’s interior is particularly remarkable because it is lined for its entire length in crypts and memorials.  Gallileo, Machiavelli, and Michelangelo are all buried in this church, along with several other important figures in Italian history and culture.  

One thing is certain, I would have an entirely different perspective on this city if I had not already taken my sculpture class in Alma.  In that class, I made my own feeble attempts at carving stone,  I recognize that comparing a first attempt to a masterpiece is rather unfair, but the hours I spent working on a form that is so incredibly simple in comparison make me fear for the number of hours Renaissance artists spent with their chisels and hammers, bringing out faces, flowing hair, and truly “sculpted” muscles. 

Thanks to daylight savings, and the very early sunsets, we got to walk through the city at night.  We walked along the river and to the Ponte Vecchio, a very old and famous bridge over the Arno River.  What was cool about the bridge to me is that it actually has houses and shops built on it.  Most of the shops are jewelry shops, so that was quite exciting to walk through. 

Our first night, we had dinner as a group at a little restaurant not too far from the hotel.  They brought out three different pasta dishes, one of which was cinghiale, a classic Tuscan dish with wide noodles and wild boar meat, which is actually quite good.  Then there were platters of chicken and potatoes, and a tiramisu for dessert.  It was quite delicious.  After the meal we walked out of the restaurant and we kind of gathering in the street as we all tried to decide whether we wanted to explore further or just head back to the hotel.  At this point, within a few seconds of each other, various parts of the group were almost taken out be moving vehicles from three directions.  This hastened the decision making process a bit. 

On Thanksgiving day, we walked along the river again.   I saw Michelangelo’s David, I kind of expected to cry at that moment, but I really just felt detached from myself, like this could not possibly be real life.  The David is kept in a museum, and at the end of a long room, lit from above…I really didn’t notice anything else about the room, except that Filiberto thought that he could lecture about things that were in the length of space leading up to The David, and that I would remember them.  No, my brain was still trying to wrap itself around a few fairly simple concepts, like the fact that I was standing in Florence, Italy staring at one of the most famous pieces of artwork in the world.   I have such a pure respect and admiration for Michelangelo and all his colleagues, the fact that The David has veins in his forearms, wrinkles in his knuckles, and curls in his hair.  It is beyond incredible. 

Then we got some lunch at a “self service” pasta bar, which is basically your standard cafeteria style serving, but with pretty decent pasta.  That afternoon we toured another church.  *Insert details when journal is present*  And then we headed to the market. 

We also visited a museum with collection of  antique musical instruments, and by antique I mean some of the 1400’s vintage.  All of the instruments were collected by the Medici family, a very powerful Florentine family throughout history.  The collection even includes one original Stradivarius tenor viola.  Stradivari was a violin builder, and his violins have become mythical because they are supposed to be some of the best made instruments in the world.  Very few of them remain, there are a few that are complete, and some parts of his instruments were recycled and placed on others, but to have a whole original Stradivarius is incredibly rare.  It was amazing to me how little the shape of a string instrument has changed in the last few centuries, at first glance, I could not tell you what vintage any violin in that room was, and really without further study I don’t think that I could tell you even after close examination, but it was still incredibly cool.  I also saw one of the original upright pianos (which apparently came around in the early 1700s)  but there were a lot of mechanical issues with them, and they were more a of novelty than an effective instrument.

Friday, we went to the Uffizi Gallery, which was originally intended to be an office building, when it was built a couple hundred years ago, and it now holds some of the most important pieces in art history.  We saw works by Pierro della Francesca, Da Vinci, and Michelangelo.  We also saw the Birth of Venus and Rite of Spring or La Primavera by Botticelli.  These two were absolutely my favorites; worth everything it took to get me there.  I could feel the wind in their hair, and feel the mist coming off the sea.  The paintings felt so incredibly alive, and open and inviting, as if you could just step into them (the guards really frown on that… probably worse than trying to snap a picture) The flowers in Primavera were what really caught my attention: they were actually slightly 3 dimensional, and so much more wonderful.   We saw Michelangelo’s Holy Family, and Da Vinci’s Annunciation.  I feel like the Uffizi is museum that you have to visit multiple times in order to fully appreciate it, because after a while, you will stop seeing all the wonderful parts of each painting, and just stare.  And each one deserves more attention that a normal human being can really give in 98a day.

Florence has a couple of pretty awesome open air markets that are open every day until about 7.   We wandered up and down the street, going in an out of the shops looking at leather bound journals, purses, beautiful leather coats, and bits of Murano glass jewelry.  All of that was interspersed with your standard touristy paraphernalia.  The streets of Florence were a bit of culture shock to compared to the streets of Macerata.  First of all, the vendors speak English.  Secondly, many of them live up to the reputation of Italian men being shameless flirts.  Walking through Macerata I have received the occasional cat call or some such nonsense, but I could probably count the occurrences on one hand.  Not the case with Florence.  One vendor started talking to a friend of mine, by saying that he would give her a free leather coat to match her jacket… by the end of their interaction he had stated that they were going to get married in the church up the road and have 7 babies… It wasn’t until we were back in Macerata that I realized how pure my Italian experience has been.  Florence is an amazing city, but it has been almost three months since I have been within a fifty foot radius of a Mc Donalds, and it has been a long time since I felt my brain almost slipping out of Italian mode.  I actually caught myself saying “Vorrei questo panino please.”  Which if you translate the part that I didn’t screw up is, “I would like that sandwich please.”  When we first got to Florence and we heard people not only speaking English, but American English in the streets, we were so excited, and it felt so strange.  There are very few other people in Macerata that speak English as a first language… a couple Irish and Australian exchange students that I know of… but beyond that I am fairly certain that it is just us. 

1)   The original item used to pluck the strings on a harpsichord was the feather of a crow.

2)   Until the year 1700, small members of the violin family were played against the shoulder, not the neck.

3)   The English Horn was actually called the “corne anglée” in French, and which means “angled horn,” but it was misconstrued as “corne anglais” which is pronounced the same, but means English horn.

4)   A unicorn symbolizes spousal fidelity in Renaissance painting.

5)   A pelican can sometimes symbolize Christ, but it often used to symbolize someone that gives their life for a child. 

Florence was amazing.  I would love to go back someday, so that I can just live and breathe the city some more.  All the artwork, right there in front of you is so much more alive than in pictures.  Walking through the churches and the galleries and streets, you can feel the energy of all these artists coming together to create this beautiful city.  I see their marble statues and feel the blood sweat and tears it took to bring those figures out of the rock. One of my favorite places thus far.

Rome tomorrow!
19 days until I head Home!

Mama and Me :)

A wonderful weekend, and on to an equally amazing week, although in a completely different way.  Thursday night, almost as planned, Mom made it to Macerata.  She ended up catching a later train, after experiencing more than her fair share of travel chaos.  So… while I waited, I cleaned up a little (but forgot to dust…), arranged for a taxi to meet us at the train station, and made up some potatoes, carrots and celery for her to eat when she got here.  Then I walked down to the train station and waited… for a while, because her train was 10 minutes late and I was 10 minutes early.  Finally, though, her train pulled up, and she got off, and we hugged each other and cried for a few minutes. 

We walked through the station and hopped into our taxi.  I showed her a little bit of the city all lit up with its night time lights and things.  We got to the hotel, and the little city streets inside the walls were just packed with people as they often are at that hour.  We sat and chatted, I gave her a bottle of water, and her potatoes, which were not exactly warm anymore, but they were indeed “real food.”  After that little bit of nourishment, we determined that the proper next step was coffee and gelato.  So we headed out once again into the streets to get some…but this time, there was almost no one out.  It is a fascinating little phenomenon where around 7 PM you can hardly move in the streets, and by 9 PM they are deserted. 

Mom’s first gelato was chocolate, and in my opinion from one of the best gelato places in town.  After that delicious little snack, we headed up to my apartment, for a mini tour.  I feel like I should have her as a “guest writer” so that she can describe her own experiences  to you… I feel a bit silly telling you how much she loved her gelato, and how she loved our apartment. 

Friday, I let her sleep in, but turns out she woke up earlier than I expected.  So we went out for cappuccino and cornettos (croissants).  We went to a little place called Pathos, that I really love (even though it is the place where I ended up with warm milk instead of tea recently…)  The tables in the restaurant have literary quotes printed on them and they also sell books. The books are more of a side item, but it still gives it that classic coffee house feel.  Mom was so excited about her cappuccino’s taste and price (half the price they were in Amsterdam in February) that she wanted a second!

After coffee, we walked over to the cathedral and the small basilica next to it.  I gave her short versions of Filiberto’s lectures on each place, pointed out various art and architectural elements and so forth.  Then we sat in the Piazza and waited for the bells to chime.   Mom and I share a love for church bells. 

That afternoon, we wanted to convert some American dollars to Euros… which  turned into quite an adventure.   We started at a bank, and they told us to go away, that the only place to do that was the post office.  So we headed down to the post office.  I was a bit nervous that they would not be open, because it was getting close to the hours of afternoon “riposo” but we got lucky and they were still open.  Then we waited in “line” or until someone appeared available and open to helping us. 

So I told the woman, in Italian what we were trying to do.  She didn’t seem pleased initially, and after conferring with a coworker handed me a form, this seemed to be a good start.  I began to fill out this form, and she took our “documents” mom had her passport, but I did not, but I did have my Italian Government Issue permit of stay card, and this seemed to satisfy her. I thought maybe we were going to make it out of there just fine. Wrong.  The woman looks at me and says, “Carta fiscale.”  And I do not understand what she means, and so I ask her to repeat.  She repats, and I still don’t quite get it.  She hands the form back to us with an X next to the place where the official is supposed to sign, and point to this line and ask her if we are supposed to sign again.  She does not really answer, so mom signs again, and we hand the form back.  Now the postal worker I getting irritated, she says “Carta Fiscale, dove la scrive?”  Now she wants to know where we wrote it, hard to do when you don’t know what it is.  She looks back at us demanding this item, and I whip out my dictionary, and I ask her to write it for me so I can look it up easier… she does not, I ask again, this time with a little pantomime, and then I tell her that I do not know what it means.  This is nearly the end of all of us as she declares (her volume has been increasing throughout this interaction) that “Carta Fiscale è carta fiscale!!!”  Thank you, ever so much for clearing that up for me.  Once upon a time my 3^rd grade teacher told us not to use the word in the definition (I’m assuming that also applies to not using it for the definition)  Finally, another customer notices our plight, takes pity, and with his little bit of English explains to us that this is a card given to Italians at birth, and that we don’t have something like it in the USA.  He then tells this to the postal worker who is not at all pleased.  In the end, we gave her our driver’s licenses… she gave us our money, and we RAN. 

After such an ordeal, it was time for a  walk in the park.  We tried to find a little hidden café that I have been wanting to go to, but we couldn’t find it… so we just wandered for a while.

Saturday, we went to Assisi-and thanks to me-had to run to the bus station.  I woke up 5 minutes before we were planning to meet to walk to the bus, so we rushed.  But we made it!   One very long, warm bus ride later we were dropped off in Assisi, but not in the city center or really anywhere near it, so then we had to call a cab.  But once we finally got there, it was just as beautiful as I remembered, and mom loved it too.   We walked through the basilica of San Francesco, and then did some shopping in the town.  There were lots of shops with beautiful lace, some with pottery and ceramics, and some really interesting clothing shops.  And then there were also multitudes of shops with little prizes related to San Franceso, of course.

Saturday night we went out for a nice dinner, and split it in what is a classic style for my friends and I.  One person orders a “primi piatti” which is the first course, basically pasta.   And the other person orders a “secondi piatti” which is a meat dish, and you each eat half and trade.  That way you can each get your balanced meal at half the price and without needing to be rolled out of the restaurant.  I took her to a little place that I had eaten before with the best risotto known to mankind.  It is an herbed risotto with flower petals, thyme and marjoram.  Profoundly delicious.  We also got a pork chop to share that had a very gentle sweet flavor to it. 

To round our Saturday night, we had a little sleepover at the hotel.  We stayed up late gabbing (which we did a few of the other nights as well, but returned to our own respective beds)  Being able to just talk to someone without worrying about losing my internet connection is definitely something that I miss.

Sunday, we went to Civitanova for the beach, no good Michigan girl could come this close to a body of water without touching it.  And she did.  She went in up to her ankles, but it wasa bit too chilly to go farther than that.  But the beach in Civitanova is full of really cool stones and beach glass, and so we spent a very long time there sifting through.  After a while though, the coastal wind did start to chill us, and so we headed into town to find a little something warm to drink.  On the way however, we got distracted by a pretty storefront… and we went in.  As soon as we walked in we both gasped when we saw a rack, but for different reasons.  I was shocked to see a little sign in pink highlighter announcing that the items on the rack were 50 % off, they do not do enough sales in this country, and so I get incredibly excited when I find one.  But what mom saw, I also saw a moment later.  A beautiful coat, on that very sale rack… and I was in love, so of course I had to try it on.  And it fit, and so, now it is in my closet behind me.  We may have set a record for not being a mission shopping, finding something, trying it on and buying it.  Fairly certain it was less than 10 minutes. 

Sunday night we met Giulia, my language partner at Maga Cacao.  Because mom could not possibly come and go from the country without having had Maga Cacao and met Giulia.  Mom got a basic milk chocolate hot chocolate, “con la pana”  which basically means, with a mountain of delicious whipped cream above your pure chocolatey goodness.  We talked with Giulia for a couple hours, and it was all quite lovely, and we covered a wide variety of topics.  Mom even let Giulia and I have our little Italian lesson that is supposed to be part of the Tandem partner deal. 

Monday morning, I had class, so mom took herself out for a cappuccino.  Then we met up when I was done and ate some lunch.  We had a while then to wander and shop, which seemed like a brilliant plan until I remembered the number of stores that are closed on Mondays, period, and the fact that there is riposo from basically 1-4.  However, we did get a cup of gelato, and managed to wander around until it was more stores were open, and had some fun shopping.  After shopping, I had class again, and then we had Thanksgiving dinner.  Delicious.  The entire group went, plus all of our teachers, and a couple other people connected with the program and the university.  We sat at a table with a few other girls from the program, and Professor Antonio Zampa.  He is very cool, and fun to talk with.  I don’t have him for class though sadly.  But I did find out that he once came to Michigan to play Italian folk music on guitar and came through Alma, didn’t stop in at the college though.  But it was funny to find someone on this side of the world that had actually been to our little town. 

Today, after class, mom and I went out for one last little lunch together.  We each had a plate of spaghetti alla carbonara, and a tiramisu.  There were three things that I felt she absolutely had to eat before she left: 1) Maga Cacao (check) 2) Tiramisu (check) and 3) a Kinder Bar (bought at a vending machine, and given as a train snack).  Kinder bars are similar to Kit Kats, but lighter, better, and with hazelnut cream inside.  After our lovely lunch, I had class again, but then we called for our taxi and headed down to the train station.  We got the ticket for Roma Termini, and then I helped her onto the train and double checked with the conductor that it was going where we wanted, you can never be too careful with these Italian trains.

To finish off my night, I went out for a great dinner with the other four Michigan students.  We talked about proper hand geography, and hometown favorites, over really great food (ravioli with prosciutto for me)

But now I should really get to bed!   Early train to FLORENCE tomorrow!!!!!

Home in less than a month!!!  Crazy how time flies!

Settled in my Italian town.

It is still amazing to me the way that time works.   One day I was sitting in my room thinking about something, and I was literally thinking that I had been gone since last Christmas… no not quite dear, just since Labor day weekend, same difference right?  Some days are so incredibly full of adventures that they feel like they lasted a week when I get to the end of them, yet while I am going through them, they feel so fast.  Its fascinating to me…  But all in all, I feel very comfortable and settled here in Macerata, It took a while, and I think I have been settled for a while, but I just didn't notice.  It just kind of snuck up on me.  And even if I am "settled"  I still love to try to find new places (which is really quite easy) And, believe it or not, I miss snow.  Like a lot.  I think it might be because it is still a bit chilly in the apartment, and its chilly outside, and everyday I wake up thinking that it will have snowed, and it hasn’t.

So some of the things that have been filling my week lately, I had another cooking class at Gina and Marc’s.  This time we learned to make gniocchi.  This stuff will change your life.  It is a potato pasta, but basically it is just a little ball of delicious carbs, that you then gently coat (not smother) in some sort of sauce, like a pesto or various others.  We made had it with a gorgonzola cream sauce, and I got the opportunity to show off that I can really be a bottomless pit if I want to… There was gniocchi left (we made a lot… ) and Marc proclaimed that he did not have the intention of throwing any away, and with the sauce on it, it really wouldn’t keep well… so obviously I had to be kind and help out.  It was completely worth it. 

We have been learning all sorts of new verb tenses in Italian, before our break I felt kind of like we had hit a wall and weren’t really getting all that much new material, but now it’s flying at us.  But I love learning it, and being able to have real conversations with people.  I don’t always understand everything that is being thrown at me (they talk so fast, and I am pretty sure a 4 year old has a wider vocabulary than I do, but at least I can conjugate my verbs…?)  but I do have the ablity to speak and respond if I can get someone to slow down for me!  And I can almost understand the choruses for a couple of Italian songs that I have downloaded!  Progress, even if it's small

Thursday night I went to a little concert at a theater here. It had a gorgeous neo classical ceiling, with winged victories in the corners.  (Fun fact, the greek word for victory is “nike”)  It was a quintet: piano, cello, violin, flute, and clarinet.  They played an assortment of modern “classical” music.  The theatre we were in was fascinating.  Like so many buildings in this city, it was bigger inside than should be physically possible.  It is like walking into the wardrobe or wonderland sometimes as you walk into a little door, and all of the sudden you are in this huge space that you swear based on your knowledge of he surrounding city “block”  should not be physically possible. (I don’t know what else to call the “blocks,” but I feel like the term block gives the impression of regular geometric organization and that just does not exist)  But the concert was quite cool, a few pieces leaned more toward “interesting”  and after a few minutes I had had my taste and was ready to move on, but the rest of the concert was wonderful.  For me, if you have flute, cello and piano in the same song, it can be quite hard to go wrong (perhaps I am a bit biased towards the aforementioned instruments… but you never really know…)

Friday we went to Loretto, just a short bus ride away, and home to an absolutely astounding church.  Legend states that in the year 1297, a small house was deposited on a public road near Loretto, and that house was said to be the childhood home of the Virgin Mary.  It was in this very place that the angel appeared to her and told her she would have a Son.  Word spread, and pilgrims began to flock to Loretto to leave treasures for the Virgin as offerings of thanks for her intercessions on their behalf.  This treasure began to grow, and soon a fortress was needed to protect it from thieves.  Later, a church was built around that fortress, and it is incredibly beautiful.  I actually got tears in my eyes walking in.  There are small chapels on the sides for different countries where a priest or monk will wait to hear confession in various languages.  Each chapel has its own unique décor, and the church as a whole is just filled with color from floor to soaring ceiling.  Filiberto then took us on a little walk around the walls of the city, and we all kind of wondered why… they didn’t seem all that special, however, we soon found out that the same architect that designed them designed the palace where we have class, and this makes them highly significant.

Sunday, I went to mass, and I was quite proud of myself because I figured out that the priest was speaking on the parable of the talents, I was not really sure what his take on the story was, except that he got much more impassioned than last week... but I was proud that I could at least make out what story it was!  That night Chelsea, Lisa and I made pancakes and home fries.  Our interesting kitchen situations, and the lack of utensils created what I thought was a dilemma when it came to flipping though…no spatula.  But, luckily for us, Chelsea is a certified hands free pancake flipper.  I am not kidding.  I don’t care if she has the actual piece of paper or not (but I trust her that this exists…for whatever reason)  But she is awesome at flipping the pancakes in the skillet with just a flick of the wrist. 

I also wandered around the monthly flea market and saw several accordions, I might just add that to my list of instruments to learn, so far that list really only has harp and piano (at least a bit more proficiency) so I think there is definitely room for one more.  But the flea market has tons of really cool antiques and things if you are patient and dig around a bit.  It felt like one of my wonderful weekends wandering East Town antique shops and then going to Global Infusion, except no chai tea here (not any where that I can find, and trust me, I have looked)

Fun facts for the week:
1) there is a brand of canned vegetables here called “Annalisa”  I plan to buy a can of them and save the label.

2) It took 3000 oil lamps and 3000 candles to light the theatre of Versailles for one show.  One candle was approximately equal to the wages of 1 blue collar worker for a week.  Aren’t you glad we have light bulbs?

3) The magic of a Stradavarius violin is actually mostly myth. 

4) There is nothing like a fair trade chocolate festival and a flea market full of antiques to remind me of home.

5) Thursday evening (early afternoon in Michigan) I will be waiting at the train station for my mom, and I cannot wait.

I can't think of a witty title this week....

This last week has been pretty relaxed, but having 2 days of holiday helps with that.  I spent the weekend hanging out, having a movie marathon with a couple of friends, and snuggling under blankets for warmth since we weren’t allowed to turn our heat on until November 1^st.  It was fantastic.  Monday, my roommates got back from Paris, and it was nice to have some company around the apartment again.  It was incredibly quiet bouncing around here by myself. 

Tuesday, November 1, is a national holiday in Italy, all saints day.  Everything is closed.  (with the exception of a few tabacchi shops, which is basically like 7-11, but with a little less selection…)  Now I knew that there was a holiday weekend coming, so I bought a little extra food, and had enough to make it through the day, not in any way that was grandiose, but I did have some sources of nourishment.  Erin and Carlye had very little… so we stood around in the kitchen taking inventory of what was there, and how we could possibly spin it into something edible.  We also had not figured out HOW to turn our heat on yet…  so with inventory taken we came to the obvious conclusion that instead of making lunch, which would have been: pasta, olive oil and a little bit of fresh grated parmesean… we should make cookies!

Erin in Carlye had stayed in a house of family friend’s in France, and so had access to a real kitchen (complete with measuring cups, a vital tool ours lacks) and they made soft, chewy cookies, which we wanted to try to make because our last batch was a bit crunchier than we would have liked.  But… we didn’t have all the ingredients, and actually, we didn’t really have all the ingredients for my family’s chocolate chip cookies… so what did we decide to do?  Cut our losses and make egg free cookie dough. Brilliant.  This process took much of lunch time, and then we ate it… and so lunch was just kind of glossed over in sugary goodness for the day.  But it was a holiday, so obviously this was just fine.

Wednesday we finally started classes again!   It was great to see everyone and hear about their adventures.  And Wednesday night we had another cooking class “Taglietelli con cavolfiore e fughi”  Which is a pasta with cauliflower and mushrooms, and it was delicious.   Yes, I did just admit that a dish with mushrooms was delicious.  Ironically, Marc does not like cauliflower, and this is the only recipe he has found where he can tolerate it, and I do not like mushrooms and this is one of the first recipes I have ever tasted where I found them palatable.  Incredible.  But I didn’t really get to eat much, just a little sample because I had to run to dance class.  I am actually starting to understand many of the dance words in Italian, and I am loving class.  We are learning a bit of choreography to a fun song called “Betty” by Brooke Fraser.  There are 2 other girls from my program in the class, and we work on the dance together outside of class sometimes as well. 

Thursday, we had our professors, Marc and Gina, over to our house for dinner.  It was a little intimidating because Marc is such a good cook, but it turned out great!  Carlye and Erin made a risotto all Milanese, which is a risotto flavored with saffron, and lots of parmesean.  We also had some broccoli and carrots, a little caprese salad (cherry tomatoes cut in half with apiece of mozzerella and some fresh basil, I like it because it looks like the Italian flag…)  And then we served some clementines for dessert.  It was lots of fun to sit around and chat with them over delicious food.

Friday, we had a three hour Italian class to make up for the holiday earlier in the week… and then there was an excursion to Tolentino, a small town near here.  However, Thursday I was feeling the precursors to a cold… and by Friday, I definitely had one.  Although I never checked it, I am fairly certain in hindsight I was also running a bit of a fever.  After Italian class, I came home, made a little soup, and was going to lay down for a little while.  I asked my roommates to check on me a little bit before it was time to go on the excursion.  When they came in I decided it would be best if I just stayed home.  I proceeded to sleep for 4.5-5 hours.   I continued to mainline clementines, Emergen-C, and I boiled the Clementine peels to make a tea that is also high in vitamin C for the next couple days, and today I feel much better. 

Sunday, Lisa, Lindsay and I walked to a church that is outside the city walls a ways, and I loved it.  It is the first church I have been to where there is actually music. A couple of the songs had some nice easy "Alleluia" and "Hosanna" type choruses that I could actually catch on to. Also, there were lots of families with adorable young children, and the priest spoke clearly and slowly enough that I could actually understand every 4^th word or so.  I am planning to go to that one more now, it is about a 20 minute walk, but its an easy walk (until I get back to the walls and have to climb back to the top of the hill) but it’s worth it.

Counting down the days until I get to show my mom the Italian Experience!!!  11.

Also, here is the link to the pictures of my trip.  Enjoy!

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150906521470705.751729.703125704&type=1&l=ca089c223c

Buonagiornata and Stay Healthy!