"Leave the gun, but take the cannoli"- The Godfather

Thursday-
Thursday morning we got to sleep in because we didn't have class until 2. Yahoo! We just chilled, ate breakfast, and headed to the Rome Center in time for class. Class was interesting because we talked more about the roles of women in Italian society and how that has affected italian law. Only recently were laws abolished that stated 1. If you caught your wife, sister, or daughter in an illicit relationship and you killed her, you could only serve up to 7 years maximum in prison because you were defending your family honor. 2. A woman that got caught by her husband in an affair could be sent to jail for 1-2 years. 3. If a man raped a woman, in order to "restore" the family honor he could offer to marry the woman. If she accepts, all honor is restored and life moves on. If she refuses than shame and abuse was heaped upon her for being a) dishonorable to her family and b)no longer pure because of the rape. Crazy stuff, I'm telling ya. After class I walked to the grocery store to buy some food and then went back to the apartment to make dinner and then got ready to go out for the night. There was a "Ladies Night Out Pub Crawl". This was quite an interesting experience. We went to two bars and one club and then got a free t-shirt. The bars were fun because we got to meet a bunch of foreign exchange students from Australia, Germany and England. After the bars though we went to a club that was just awful. It was packed with people, everyone kept stepping on my toes, smoking was allowed inside and I swear a guy almost lit my hair on fire when he was lighting his cigarette. Then a guy came up and danced with me and I kept having to push his hands off me and then he grabbed my face and tried to force me to kiss him which is when I just walked away. So gross. Then another guy came and danced with me who was absolutely terrible at dancing which is always a buzz kill for me. After that we decided we were done with the night out and we wanted to go home. We went and grabbed our pink "Ladies Night Out" free t-shirts and hopped a taxi for home.


Friday-
We had to wake up early on Friday (today) which meant we got an average of 4 hours of sleep from going out the night before. We rolled out of bed on time though and headed to class, downing some capuccinos along the way. Today's tours were of 4 churches in Rome near the Rome Center; 3 Baroque churches and the only Gothic church in Rome: Santa Maria Sopra Minerva. The first two churches we went to were the two first Jesuit churches in Rome and they were incredibly ornate and decorative, very much in the baroque style. I liked Santa Maria Sopra Minerva the best because it was a Gothic church, which happen to be my favorite style. I like the tall ceilings with flying buttresses and lots of stained glass windows. This church also happened to have the body of St. Catherine which was cool to see. Then we saw a french church that housed some Caravaggio paintings and finished our morning tour. After that we were all hungry so went and grabbed a quick lunch of pasta. Then we went back to the boys apartment to chill until 3 pm, when we had a movie day in the Rome Center watching the Godfather. I had never seen the Godfather before and boy was it an interesting experience. I can definitely see though, why it has received so many accolades because it is a very well made film. After that we went to get dinner and then tried to go to the Coliseum where the Pope was putting on a torchlight processional for Good Friday. We got there a little late though and it was completely packed so we ended up being so far away that we were able to see nothing but a burning cross they had placed on a hill across from us. That was cool, but we got cold after a while and headed back to the boys apartment to grab our stuff from earlier. This ended up with us staying at the boys apartment for another hour or so playing the childhood game Mafia (which is actually a very fun game). Then we caught the bus home to pack for Assisi tomorrow since it's rise and shine in just a couple hours so we can be at the train station by 7AM. Oh joy. I'll write when I get back on Monday.