Wine Journal

Yesterday was a very sad day.  We had planned to go to the gelato place in town, and it was closed.  Instead, we went on a walk and watched the boys plays soccer with two little local boys, which was entertaining.  It drew a pretty good crowd for a while, I imagine all the locals were just laughing at how bad the Americans were. 

It was also a sad day because we had to start classes.  We had History of Science and Technology, which is taught by an Italian named Giavonni.  I think all Italian men are named Giavonni.  Anyways, I think many of our field trips actually deal with this history class.  On Wednesday we're going to Florence, to a Galileo Museum.  We are actually having class in a conference room there, and then I believe we will be touring around and learning lots of wonderful historical scientific technological information. 

We were supposed to have our Jewelry and Bronze class yesterday too, but apparently the art classes aren't until next week.  Hence, more sadness.

Fortunately the evening ended with a delicious dinner (where we had to sit with people we didn't know - lame), and by watching The Godfather I, which I fell asleep during because I watched it the week before I left the states.  I did get a great night's sleep though, went to bed right after the horse's head gets cut off!

Side note - for lunch there were pigs in a blanket and for dinner there were french fries.  Apparently the ladies in the kitchen get really worried if we don't get seconds for both courses.  They wonder what is wrong with their food.  I think they are just messing with us now, seeing how we eat American food.  I wonder if we are just guinea pigs being used for some Italian food experiment? 

Today we had an early studio class, from 8:30am-noon.  It consisted of nobody knowing what is going on....I guess that's what comes with putting a professional architect (non-professor) and a landscape architect in charge of a bunch of architecture and interior architecture students....

Then we had lunch. Benissimo.

Then we had a seminar class.  There is a lot I could say about this class, but I will keep it simple.  We are studying materials in Italy, but we have no schedule or plan for the semester....leaves the door pretty wide open, so open we feel like it is a cliff we are falling off.

Time out. One of the Colorado artsy students just walked through the room with bare feet. Moving on...

On the topic of the Colorado students....they are the only non-architecture students at the college - art majors.  I have heard multiple art majors talking about how they just want to "play baseball" which they are, of course, referring to using an  illegal substance. How baseball relates to that we aren't sure, but we're thinking of organizing a pick-up baseball game and see how many Colorado kids show up.

Anyways, once we shove past all the vagueness that is our course load, we find that choosing our own studio projects will be very interesting (for those of us that have figured out what to do).  Kelsey and I are going to research a local vineyard.  It is called La Pievuccia and is owned by Riccardo Papini, and is located about 2 miles from the study center in the valley below Castiglion Fiorentino.  The wine that is sold in the bar in the study center comes from that vineyard.  If you look it up online, you will see that this isn't just a vineyard, it is a full-blown resort.  You can rent apartments or rooms, there is a pool, horse-back riding, wine and olive picking, product tasting (honey, wine, olive oil), tour the vineyard and beehives, and much more.  There is mountain biking and cooking classes and painting classes. Our project for the semester would involve researching how the vineyard works, what is successful, what needs improvement, and we would re-design a wine tasting area, wine bottles, and work on wine labels and signage and branding.  So we're pretty much the coolest project ever.  Our professors want to visit the site with us.  Here is the website of the resort:  http://www.lapievuccia.it/english/affitto_appartamenti.html.

After studio and seminar I went to a Gelateria with some people, but it was a hoax! It was yogurt, not gelato, so it was merely decent.  I had nutella yogurt.  I was also in line behind a young Italian couple who couldn't seem to let go of eachother.  There is definately no sense of PDA being an issue in this country...

Then dinner was a swirly-noodle pasta with pesto sauce, Kelsey had three helpings, and some chicken that had an excessive amount of bones in it but was tasty. 

Tomorrow we head to Florence as previously mentioned.  How EXCITING???  We'll be vistiting a Galileo Museum that has lots of historical stuff, like telescopes made or altered by Galileo.  This weekend I am especially stoked for because the girls in Orvieto will be making their way to the SC!!  We will be meeting them in Arezzo for the antique fair (check it out --> http://www.petrolo.it/events.html ) and then bringing them back to the study center for some home-cooked Italian.

I'm exhausted from a long day of living life so I'll be heading to bed now!

Ciao amici!

Cara Marie

After I hit "Post" I realized I titled this "Wine Journal" and didn't talk about that at all!

Kelsey and I have decided to keep wine journals, and today was our first entry!  Every time we drink wine, we will turn the empty glass upside down into a sketch book and make an imprint of the glass with the wine drops.  After the print dries, we put the date, where we had it, and what kind it was. Very exciting and adorable!  The End. Finito.