First day of field trips :)

I've always had a special place in my heart for museums and Rome, as one big giant museum, is no exception. We had our first field trip to various museums in Rome today. Ruggero and Claudio took us to the Capitoline museums. We had a guided tour of two of the three museums and the statues and art inside were absolutely gorgeous. I took AP Art History in high school and it is so cool seeing the stuff in person that I learned about then. Look for pictures on Facebook. I got a little obsessed with taking pictures of the art today. I love looking at the statues that are Roman copies of Greek statues of Greek Gods. It's fun trying to figure out who each one is based on what they're wearing, holding, etc. After the tour they told us we could go do whatever we wanted for 2 hours until class starts so Irma and I decided to walk around the museums some more. We ended up walking into the 3rd museum which turned out to be a museum of Italian heritage and culture in the memorial of Vittorio Emmanuelle (also known as the "wedding cake building"). There were tons of really cool old Italian flags and this building also is home to Italy's "Tomb of the Unknown Soldier" which was very beautiful. After that Irma and I wandered on back to the Campo de Fiori for class.
Class today was super interesting. In Culture we learned about the Lateran Treaty between the city of Rome and Vatican City. Prior to this treaty the Pope and the Vatican did not recognize Rome as the capital of Italy or even Italy as an independent nation. This treaty established the Vatican City as it's own sovereign state, and the Pope in return recognized Rome as capital of Italy and Italy as a country. It was really interesting to learn how that all came about! I'm totally a history addict. After that class we had our first class of History of Ancient Rome. Ruggero lectured about il Foro Romano, il Palatino, e il Colosseo which we're going to visit tomorrow. He knows so much about Roman history. It's fun to listen to him lecture.
So tomorrow we go the Coliseum, the Palatine Hills and the Roman Forum. After that we're walking to the train station. Ruggero believes our train to Florence won't be cancelled, and at worst will just be delayed. If all works out, we'll be off to Florence! I'm not taking my computer because a) it's heavy and b) I don't trust it at a youth hostel so don't expect any more updates until Sunday. Until then, Ciao i miei amici!

Infamous Zara

Only one class today, which made it rather relaxing! After class we walked back to the apartment had lunch and then decided to explore Rome some more and do a little shopping this time! We walked from our apartment past the Pantheon to go to the infamous Zara. The store was gigantic. 4 floors: 3 for women, 1 for men. Bright colors apparently are very in right now. My favorite part was the brightly colored shoes. There were some bright green pumps that were just to die for! Along with some very stunning sparkly silver heels. Gorgeous. I ended up buying a bright green skirt and a cute cream top to go with it. For being such a fancy store, the prices were quite fantastic. When we walked to Zara the temperature was really hot, but as soon as we got inside there was thunder, rain and hail storm! The second we left the store it stopped. Totally crazy. We then meandered on home until we came to a gelateria where they sold probably 50 flavors of gelato. Every flavor you can imagine. They also sold highly amusing lollipops. They had the Pope's face on them. It would be funny to just be able to lick the Pope's face whenever you felt like it! :P
Bad news today though. We bought our train tickets to Florence last night for Friday and then today it was announced that all of Rome's public transportation is going on strike that same day at the exact time we're supposed to leave. Uh oh. I hope it won't screw with our travel plans too much. It's our first weekend to travel and already it's messed up. :( Hopefully it will all work out though.

Aimless Wanderings

Today  we didn't have class until 2 pm so we decided to utilize the morning for wandering. We wandered from il Vaticano through the historic district to the Piazza Navona, la Fontana di Trevi, and the Pantheon before stopping for a nice lunch along the way back to school. I love wandering around Rome! I see more on foot than I ever could by taking a bus or car everywhere, plus it's fun to just soak up the sights around me. I threw a coin in the Fontana di Trevi! The legend goes that if you throw one coin in then you will return to Rome someday, if you throw 2 coins in then you will find new love and if you throw 3 in you will either get a marriage or a divorce. I threw a coin in it when I was here in July and I guess it worked because I did return! Much sooner than I ever expected too. I'm not sure if the one I threw in today counts as a second coin since I've thrown one in before or if it counts as another first. Either way I'm happy with the prospects! I had my first espresso today when we stopped for lunch. It was fantastic! And the espresso glass was like a baby mug. The entire thing could fit easily in the palm of my hand. So adorable. Class today was rather interesting. In 103 we learned about the "impersonal" verb tense. Like how to say "One often sees tourists at the Trevi Fountain", "Si vedono spesso i turisti a la Fontana di Trevi". Then we had our first Italian Culture class. Ruggero taught us about the different newspapers in Rome: where they originated, how old they are, what political stance they take, etc. It was really interesting to learn that there is even a newspaper published called "Il Manifesto" that's anti-capitalist and still very pro-communist even though that is no longer a legitimate political party in Italy any more. After class two of the girls and I decided to wander from il Campo de Fiori to Trastevere and wander from there home. Trastevere is a really cool neighborhood filled with cool restaurants and shops. It was very quiet and peaceful while we were there and it was a very relaxing walk. On the way back home we decided to walk actually down below the roads on the walkway that follows along beside the Tevere river. That was cool too. A whole new way to see Rome from down below. There were a bunch of runners down there too, which is the first I've seen of people actually exercising here besides walking!  I officially love living in Rome, but it still feels surreal. I want to be able to get up every day and just go walk through the square in front of the Vatican and meander along the river, just soaking up the beautiful sun and enjoying life. This is definitely going to be a great quarter. :)

First day of class!

Today was our official first day of class. We walked from our apartment to the Camp de Fiori, stopped for fresh apples for breakfast in the open air market and headed to class. Class was just review of things we were unsure of and the rest was us just asking Ruggero questions about Rome. We asked him how to tell the obnoxious boys to go away. "Lasciami in pace" (Leave me in peace) apparently is the polite way to say it. "Sparisci" is the more impolite yet effective "get out of my sight". Then we wandered around the area until it was time for our orientation meeting. Which was boring. The lady in charge could barely get her words out as if she couldn't think of them. Very strange. She told us there is a creepy old man who lives in the same building as the school. Apparently he'll tell girls every day that it's his birthday and that he needs a kiss. I think he sounds like a silly old man. We came back to the apartment and chilled for a few hours (I read my favorite book to relax!)and then went to the market to buy food for snacks, breakfast and dinner. Bought a bottle of Spumante for 1 euro. Then we came back and ate amusingly shaped pasta for dinner (some of the girls had bought penis shaped pasta in the market today). We were making ridiculous jokes for the rest of the night. We found out today we have the nicest class schedule ever! Here it is:
Mondays: Italian 103 (grammar) 11:30-12:30
Tuesdays: Field trip 8:30-12, Italian Culture 2-4, Italian 103 4-5
Wednesdays: Italian 103 11:30-12:30
Thursdays: Field trip 8:30-12, Italian Culture 2-4, Ancient Rome History 4-5
Fridays: Field trip

We also have no daily homework, just a weekly journal entry about our life in Rome and no weekly quizzes! Yay! Totally psyched for the rest of the quarter.  :)

Giorni 4

Wow today was a crazy day. I got up early and went to breakfast around the Vatican and it was packed today! Apparently, every Sunday the Pope reads a prayer and sings at noon from his little bedroom window. It was cool to see my new neighbor. :) Plus, it was the Pope. After that the girls and I walked up to a little Italian grocery store and got food. Grocery shopping in Italian is an interesting experience to say the least. It's hard to figure out exactly what you want like what is 1% milk and such. Then we went on an epic walk trying to walk from our apartment to a Sunday market in Trastevere. According to our map it looked very short, but it ended up taking 2 hours to get down there. The map does not account for all of the hills and twisty turny scenic roads. It was a beautiful walk but by the time we made it to the market it had closed! Then we walked back up to the Vatican on the old city side of the river and stopped in the Campo de Fiori for gelato along the way. It was the perfect snack after such a long walk. By the time we came back to though apartment though, 4 hours had passed and we were all exhausted. I realized that I've pretty much been walking nonstop for the last 3 days in a row. And my feet are very angry with me for this fact. I struggled to not take a nap this evening because I knew then I wouldn't sleep tonight. Then we had bread, cheese, and mimosas for dinner. Definitely a good way to end the evening. My pictures are going up on Facebook today too!

Giorni 3 e Notte 1

Today marked the first night I had slept in my apartment. It's such a nice apartment and the bed is really comfortable. I'll post pictures soon of it. I walked all over Rome today from the Vatican to the Coliseum to the Fontana di Trevi, Pantheon, Piazza Navona, Campo dei Fiori and back to the Vatican. A ton of walking, but I saw so many cool parts of the city. Already I feel like I know my way around the main areas. I had pizza with prosciutto for dinner and it was fabulous and had two cups of gelato. :) I love italian food! After I got back to the apartment the girls all wanted to go out on the town so tonight we got all dolled up, met up with the other apartment of girls and walked to the Campo dei Fiori. It was packed there at 10:30 at night! But most of the people there appeared to be High School age and younger. Very strange. Three of us got separated from the group near the beginning (we were buying crepes instead of drinks. Whoops!) and we ended up walking around the Campo and two separate times we got hit on by 17 year old italian boys who could barely speak English. They were cute, but way too young. Then we went to a bar in the square and I had my first Bellini which was molto delicioso. It tasted like peaches mixed with Prosecco. Yum. :) Randomly found the other girls at another bar when we were wandering around the square, got hit on numerous times by many creepers. I swear they start to swarm in packs around any group of Americans. We ended up at a bar where there were American boys playing beer pong, the bar was blasting frat music, and they were giving away free pitchers of beer. I felt like I'd never left UW behind. Totally strange. I got everyone home safe and sound at the end! I'm glad I'd walked all over earlier that day because I knew my way home really directly. Well it's daylights savings here and now 3 am so off to bed for me! Buonanotte

Giorni #2

Ciao Amici!
Today I finally moved into my apartment! Went to the UW Rome Center and checked in, got my keys and then found out my apartment is 3 miles away from the RC (which is in the Campo dei Fiori if anyone is interested) to my apartment which is next to the Vatican. I can see the dome of St. Peter's Basilica from my room! I'm sharing my apartment with 9 other girls. 2 bathrooms, 3 rooms, 10 girls. These are going to be some crazy 5 weeks here in Rome! One of the girls I'm living with, Casey, was already here and so we went over and toured the Vatican museums and St. Peter's together. It was so cool! The Sistine Chapel is absolutely gorgeous and we had an awesome tour guide who had studied Theology and Art History in college so he knew everything about the Vatican. It was totally cool. Then we came back and a bunch of the girls came with us out to dinner. Our apartment is surrounded by restaurants and gelaterias. I'm sure I'm going to be fat from all the pasta and ice cream when I get home because it's all just so delicious!! I love italian food. I'll be putting pictures up soon of my apartment and the surrounding area so look for those on Facebook tomorrow! Goodnight for now!

Arrivo a Roma! Giorno #1

(Me at the UW Rome Center. I found it after much searching. Welcome to my new home!)

Day 1 in Roma! After flying for about 15 hours we finally landed in Rome and it was a beautiful sunny day, probably 65 degrees. A fantastic way to start my trip (plus I did enjoy finishing two books, a magazine, and three movies on the flight over). But now I'm completely exhausted. Almost 30 hours without sleep and I can hardly think straight! This time difference is absolutely crazy!We wandered from our hotel the Trilussa around Rome all the way up to where I'm going to be taking classes for the next 5 weeks at the UW Rome Center. It's off this beautiful piazza called the Campo Dei Fiori and all of the little sidestreets around it are filled with great shopping. :) I know I'm in trouble now! We managed to find a Vodaphone (the Italian version of Verizon) and I got my self a cheap Italian phone. Only problem is, all the directions are in Italian! I know just enough to at least get it set up, but I'm still hopelessly confused about parts of it. Hopefully, I'll figure that out soon. I'm so ridiculously excited to move in to my apartment tomorrow and start this new chapter of my life. It's going to be so different from my life back in Spokane and Seattle and I am ready to embrace it. Well I gotta go catch up on all my sleep now so I can be well rested for tomorrow's adventures. Buonanotte!

Arrivederci!

In just a couple days I will be flying off to the wonderful country of Italia for the next 3 months. Somebody (*cough cough, Natalie Downs) gave me the fabulous idea of blogging while I’m over there to a) share with all of you my daily adventures and b) have a record of everything so I can read it at the end and remember everything! So this is my new blog. I will be posting it on Facebook and passing it around to the family so you all can keep up with me and my crazy adventures! 

Oh! On another note, in my crazy adventures I may sometimes forget to stay in close contact with everybody. So if at any point any of you are feeling rather annoyed you haven’t heard directly from me in a while just send me a note by Facebook or email saying hi and I promise to respond! I will have a phone with me, but I’m turning it off for the most part so I don’t get insane roaming charges and I’m just going to use it to call my immediate family. But! I do have Skype and Facetime. If anybody ever wants to Skype with me just let me know! My Skype name is: n.parrish 

Now I have to get back to packing. Unpacking from college and repacking for Italy is turning out to be a rather overwhelming project, as evidence by my living room where you can no longer see the floor because of the piles of stuff everywhere.