Exciting Day in Florence.

Today I was wrong about a few things, like it isn’t our last trip to Florence, and we didn’t see the David statue, and it wasn’t mostly sunny in the morning.  It was, however, a wonderful day!  We slowly made our way to the Uffizi Gallery, Kelsey bought a Swatch on the way (everyone is getting these new watches that wrap around your wrist twice – hers is teal, of course).  We met with our tour guide, Laura, and waited in line to go through security.  This is when the first exciting thing of the day happened.

First of all, a giant tourist group tried to cut us in line, but Laura caught it just in time, and she yelled a little in Italian, but they moved to the back of the line.  Then we finally got to the metal detectors, and I was one of the first ones in line, so I saw how there was another group of students – Italian high schoolers.  They had all jammed their bags onto the tiny bag scanner at once, and as it went through they huddled around the other end to grab theirs.  Unfortunately, one girl remained behind, and we soon caught on that her bag was stuck inside the scanner.  Laura kept asking if we could go through, since some of us don’t have bags, but the security man kept saying no.  We stood and watched as they tried to figure out what to do.  We college-educated people didn’t understand what the problem was, seeing as the scanner was about 4 feet long, and they could have reached in to grab the bag.  They all stood around for a bit, yelled at the girl, and then brought in other security guards to figure out what to do.  They finally had one come to our side of the scanner and look into the machine.  The bag was right inside the rubber flaps.  He poked it with a buzzy thing, and then began to pull it out.  Laura finally had us go through some offices to get to another security point as they were just starting to yank the poor girl’s bag out.  The strap looked like it was tearing, so I’m assuming it didn’t turn out well for the girl.  We all made sure our straps were wrapped around our bags and set each one slowly down in the middle of the conveyor belt.

We went through the Uffizi and saw lots of art, starting with some Byzantine stuff, leading to some early Leonardo da Vinci and ending with some morbid Caravaggio.  We didn’t see the David statue – apparently it’s in the Accademia, not the Uffizi.  We left the Uffizi filled with knowledge and hungry for a sandwich.  The sun had come out and it was almost hot outside.  We all met at our favorite little hole-in-the-wall, I Fratellini.  I had ham and cheese.  Then we got gelato from our favorite place, where I had the best combination known to man, chocolate and raspberry.  We strolled along the main street in Florence and soaked up the wonderful sunshine.  How could this day get any better you ask?  Well, first of all we saw some guys getting arrested for selling posters (tax-free).  Always entertaining.

We walked to an open market where they had everything you could imagine.  I got a beautiful sparkly blue and gold scarf for 5 euro, looked at lots of leather purses, wallets and key chains, and finally purchased a sparkly purple and silver mask for the masquerade! It’s very K-State Couture.  After wrapping up the shopping we headed to the Galileo Museum for class.  We talked about…I fell asleep and had a dream I was paying attention, but don’t remember anything.  After class I went to the book store and got my favorite nerds (daddy and Eric) a special gift.  Then we began a leisurely walk to the train station. 

On our way to the station, we walked past all the horse-drawn carriages you can take rides in.  We had noticed earlier how tourist season was beginning – there were 5 times the people in the piazza and there were triple the amount of horses as there had been in previous trips.  We walked past all the horses, and almost made it through the piazza before we turned around when we heard a loud commotion.  One of the horses, carriage attached, was going nuts in the middle of the piazza!  The horse charged through a group of people, but being blocked in by the stores made a sharp turn back to the piazza.  The carriage started tipping over, a man tried to stop the horse, the whole mess was quickly running into an outdoor restaurant, knocking over tables and causing people to run in all directions.  The man that was trying to stop the horse soon ended up underneath its feet – I was terrified it was going to trample him to death!  Luckily the carriage finally tipped over (onto a hostess stand for the restaurant) and the man escaped being crushed.  The horse kept bucking and trying to run as it headed for the center of the piazza again, with the carriage dragging behind.  Somehow the horse was finally stopped by several men, and they worked quickly to calm it down and get the carriage off.

Two times the horse headed to the center of the piazza space, and people started running and screaming, not helping the matter any.  Being nosy human beings, there was a huge group of people in a circle around the horse.  I will admit I was part of the problem, but this just doesn’t happen every day!  We had watched the whole thing unfold, and I felt like I was part of a movie.  I kept getting frustrated when new people would walk into my movie – somehow they didn’t notice the huge disaster on the ground, police trying to pick things up and keep people back, and they just strolled right on through.  It’s crazy how little people pay attention to their surroundings. 

They finally calmed the horse down enough to walk it to a metal stand.  Right in front of the Chanel store.  Probably the most interesting situation I’ve ever seen.  Now we have a crazed horse, tied down but still kicking and stomping on the ground, with merely a sidewalk separating it from the display windows of the Chanel store.  The faces on the workers from Chanel were priceless.  At first they were freaking out, watching carefully that the horse was under control.  Then they started to try and help the situation – they sent out a small bowl of water.  The police taped off the sidewalk and started to block an area off in front of the store with officers and vehicles.  We left to catch our train, but I do wish I could watch the news because I’m sure that made the cut.  Imagine if it had busted through the Chanel windows – that would have gone international!

As we walked to the train station we went in front of the Duomo, where I was ambushed by horse-drawn carriage after horse-drawn carriage.   It was a terrifying experience.  I will never ride in a horse-drawn carriage, what if there had been people in that?!

Anyways, made it home safe and sound and tomorrow brings a visit to La Pievuccia.  Riccardo, owner of the vineyard I’m working with for studio, told us he will be bottling the wine all day tomorrow, so we plan on walking down there and checking it all out. 

Cara Marie

Home Sweet Sort-of Home

So I’m lying in my bed in Santa Chiara, it’s almost 7pm, and I have successfully not done anything today.  We woke up with high hopes of accomplishing a lot, but after we ate lunch in our room, we couldn’t help but postpone laundry and take a nap.  We agreed on doing laundry after dinner, but we’ll see how that works out.  Spring break was an exhausting experience.  The days we spent at the beach were my favorites, but it would have been better if the temperature was just a bit warmer.  We had highs in the 60s and lows in the mid-40s.  At least this is better than Kansas’s snow, I guess!  In a couple weeks we’ll be taking a girl trip to the famous Cinque Terre for Kelsey’s birthday, on April 16th.  We should be able to lounge on the beach all weekend by then. 
We got back home yesterday evening, showered and went to get a pizza at our favorite place, Pirate Bar.  We hung out and exchanged spring break stories with everyone for a while, and then headed back to our room and passed out.  I even slept under the sheets for the first time this semester! After all the hostel experiences I had in the past two weeks, I am finally comfortable with Santa Chiara’s level of cleanliness.  I’d say that’s quite an accomplishment. 
This week brings our last trip to Florence for the semester on Wednesday, and a trip to a vineyard on Friday.  On Saturday we discussed having a masquerade in Orvieto, since most of us bought masks from Carnivale.  Since the Castiglion F.no kiddos will have to pay to get there, the Orvietians have discussed feeding us! Yay!  Some of the other things we talked about include a soccer game between the two schools, and then an apartment crawl, where we would eat a bit at one apartment, and then move to the next apartment, etc., until we head to the previously discussed Beer House.  I’m excited, but I have to get a mask because I was too picky when we were in Venice.  That’s on the to-do list for Florence.

Cara Marie

Hostels

As we were leaving the hostel in Barcelona, I was reflecting on all the various hostels we’ve stayed at.  Some of them are small, some are really big.  Some are in the ghetto, some are right off the main streets.  Some have a lot of amenities, some have none.  Some are modern, some are falling apart.  Some are clean, most are dirty.  Usually they have a decent balance of pro's and con's.

This particular one was more like a bar with places you could sleep.  It seemed like a good choice when we first arrived.  There was a high level of security, lots of activities on the main floor, and lots of young people out and about.  We got all checked in, and from then on it seemed to only go downhill. 

As for the level of security, we were each given a magnetic key with our room number and bed number written on it.  We went to the elevator and pressed the button.  It wouldn’t light up.  We noticed that there was a place to put the magnetic key above the button, so we put a key in and pressed the button.  The elevator arrived and we all filed inside.  Once inside the elevator, we found that using the key to get the elevator was not enough.  We had to insert the key to select a floor, and if your key didn’t match the floor it didn’t work.  So every time there were multiple people in the elevator with different floors, you had to put that particular key in, press the button for that floor, and so on.  Once on the floor, you had to use it to open your door, and once inside the room you had to use it to lock and unlock your assigned locker.  As Kelsey put it, “if you had a pace-maker you wouldn’t be able to stay here!”  We questioned if you needed the key to start the shower, too.

We had been told that they had free dinner as long as the food lasted.  We met on the main floor and decided to check it out, and if it was a bust we’d go back to the Mexican restaurant.  There was a huge line, and only Kirk was in line from our group.  He was going to get a piece of pizza.  I motioned for him to get me one, but he held up his key.  I gave him a confused look, and he said, “You have to have a key to get one piece.” It was absolutely ridiculous. What if you lost the key? You wouldn’t be able to go downstairs to tell them!  Kelsey was surprised you don’t need it to flush the toilet.

We went to get Mexican.  When we got back we found out that the hostel had an organized pub crawl.  It started at 1:45am.  It was a little awkward getting ready for bed while groups of girls were getting ready to go out.  There was a bar on the main floor, so there were drinking games going on before they left.  We went to bed, most everybody else left, and at 4 in the morning we were woken up by people running through the halls screaming, multiple people coming in and out of our room, and new roommates flipping the light on without hesitation and moving in.  We had to be out by 6am to catch a train to the airport, so while we were getting ready to leave, people were filing back in from the clubs. 

Lesson learned: sometimes you pay 18 euro for just a bed and locker.  This was probably the worst hostel we’ve stayed in, but I’m sure if we were 19 years old, in a country we could drink in, and not architecture graduate students, it would have been a blast.  Unfortunately we seem to act more mature than the 26-year-olds we’ve run into.  We just want to see architecture, relax, and go to bed for another big day.  I don’t know how many times our roommates have pulled the, “You’re only in Spain once!” phrase.  Yeah, and we just want to see Gaudi and Calatrava – so what?! 

Missing my bed and clean house like crazy.  Oh, and family and friends too.

Cara Marie

Last Day of Spring Break

Friday

Today didn’t start out so hot.  Last night I got sick, and I didn’t sleep at all and felt sick all morning. I don’t know if it was from something I ate or maybe I picked up a flu bug in the hostel.  I slept most of the train ride back to Barcelona which was nice, but was very slow moving until the afternoon.  We got Subway for lunch, walked to a pier to eat, and after I finally finished my sandwich I layed down on the pier and napped while watching some fish.  I took a Pepcid tablet, which tasted like powdered toothpaste in my mouth.  I started feeling better, especially after I fell asleep on the beach.  My face is a nice rosy color, except around my eyes – a reminder to always put on sunscreen BEFORE falling asleep with sunglasses on.

We played on the beach for a few hours, which included seeing boys playing soccer in tidy whities and a man completely naked strolling up and down the beach.  We were all impressed with the level of confidence he had – he would slowly stroll through the groups of people, stop at one end of the beach, stand facing the sun with his hands on his hips, and then slowly walk back to the other side.  We buried Jake in the sand and Rachel attempted a back-handspring into the sea.  We decided we should head back to the real world when it started getting chilly.  Four of us girls went to tour Casa Batllo – thanks to my student I.D. I saved 4 euro, audio guide included!  I’m really glad I spent the money to tour Casa Batllo, because I have studied so many aspects of it and it’s the best display of Gaudi’s work.  Pictures will be uploaded this weekend, since I’ll be back at Santa Chiara!

After touring Casa Batllo we went to dinner at the first Mexican restaurant we ate at in Barcelona.  I had an amazing cheese and veggie quesadilla.  Since it was our second time there in one week, they remembered us, and all our food came out beautifully displayed – some of the drinks even had flowers in them!  We peeked in some tourist shops on the way home, and now I’m sitting in my little bed watching our roommate refill his beer.  His name is Ray and he’s from California.  He’s super cool because he introduced himself as “Ray, like Ray Charles, Ray-Ban, or Ray of sunshine.”  He also bought a shirt in London that lights up according to what music is playing.  It’s his clubbing shirt.  He is a grad student that studied in London for six months and is now just traveling around Europe “writing his thesis.” 

We have an early morning tomorrow, but I am SO ready to be back in Castiglion F.no.  Plane leaves bright and early, and then we have a train from Rome.  Spring break was a nice vacation within a vacation, but I’m ready to not live out of a backpack!  It’s sad, but the thing I’m most excited for is to do my laundry!

Cara Marie

Calatrava

Thursday morning we slowly made our way through the shopping district to the Calatrava buildings on the shore.  We wanted to go to an IMAX movie about sea monsters, but ended up seeing the Arabia one instead.  (They only show certain shows at certain times).  We got to go inside the eye ball building for the movie.  All the other buildings were museums, so we didn’t pay to go inside those, and the aquarium was too expensive.  We went back to the hostel where we made a big group dinner of homemade paella and fruit salad. 

Tomorrow we are going back to Barcelona for one more night, and our train leaves at 7am.  We’ll see how great everybody’s moods are tomorrow!

Cara Marie

Valencia

Wednesday brought us an early morning and a train to Valencia.  We had dreamed of spending a relaxing couple of days on the beach, but arrived to a rainy and windy few days.  Very depressing, but Valencia was a bust.  We went to the Rio, which is a dried up river turned into a huge winding park.  Rachel and I explored a little and played on some of the contraptions they call toys.  We couldn’t figure out how to use some of them!  There were lots of spinning and climbing things.  We went back to the hostel where Kelsey was napping, trying to get over a cold, and we walked to a grocery store to get some cheap dinner.  We made some sandwiches and salad and played card games that evening. 

Spill of the day was a crime scene of a mess.  I was going to set a glass on a coffee table, but my hand decided it didn’t want to hold it anymore and just dropped it on the ground.  It was only about a 6 inch drop, but the glass shattered into a million pieces, and the glass shards spread out creating a firework shape.  After I swept it all up I noticed a couple pieces I missed, and when I went to grab them I poked my finger.  I didn’t think it was that bad, but Alex pointed out to me I was dripping blood on the ground – woops!  In the time it took the front desk to find a band-aid it stopped bleeding on its own, there were no casualties.

Cara Marie

Wind Blew my Pictures Away

Tuesday brought us to the Olympic park, where the 1992 summer Olympics were held.  It was up on a hill, so the wind made it freezing cold.  We spent as little time as we could there, but got some pictures of where the torch was and various plazas.  We walked down to Mies Van Der Rohe’s Barcelona Pavilion and took bunches of pictures of us jumping by the reflection pool.  Unfortunately all my pictures from this day got deleted due to human error.  Very sad.

Cara Marie

Church + Club = Perfect Monday

On Monday, Rachel, Kelsey and I toured Sagrada Familia.  We went on the roof and saw the construction under way.  There have been a couple different estimated dates for when it will be finished, each ten or twenty years away.  I would definitely love to come back and see the final product!  We got lunch at Subway because we are having serious veggie withdrawals, and ate it on a bench in the park in front of Sagrada Familia, no big deal.  We walked to Casa Mila, another one of Gaudi’s works, and toured the inside.  As we were making our way to the roof we ran into the rest of the group, took some cute pictures and then went shopping.  For dinner Andres asked a local girl our age where we should eat, and she directed us to a buffet.  The boys were thrilled.  It was alright, but I made the mistake of trying pasta after living in Italy for a month and a half…Spain just doesn’t have the recipe down.  It tasted like bland salsa on noodles.

After dinner most of us decided to go to a dance club that was near our hostel.  I had never been to a club before, so I was excited for the experience, and it ended up being a blast!  We had a big group so we dominated the dance floor, singing Katy Perry and Justin Timberlake at the top of our lungs.  Our guys were our body guards, and we had fewer creeps than Tubby’s on a Monday night.  We left at 2am although I wanted to stay and dance longer – they close at 4am.

Cara Marie

Beach Day!

On Sunday we went to Mass at Sagrada Familia.  It was consecrated last October, but they don’t have Mass in the main part of the church yet, it’s just a tourist attraction while they’re still building.  During Mass people that were visiting the main part of the church (above us) were taking pictures of us – it was very distracting.  I think if I went to Mass in the main part I would just be staring at all the crazy details the whole time.  After Mass we looked around the chapel, saw Gaudi’s tomb and then started our stroll to the beach.

It was a beautiful day, so we took our time making our way to the meeting point with the non-Catholics.  We walked past lots of shops and busy streets, ran into a park that had a lot of things going on (ping pong tournament, marathon of little kids, singers on a stage, carnival), and then meandered our way to the beach.  We spent the afternoon lounging in the sand, watching random people try to sell various items and services.  There were people walking around with scarves, beers, and our favorite – “fresh” coconut slices.  At first we thought the coconut slices looked pretty good, until we were sitting by the showers, had a man try and sell us fresh coconut slices, and when we said no he walked to the shower, turned it on, and rinsed the coconut off.  It made it look super fresh, with water dripping off of it, the little trickster.  The kicker is he tried to sell it to us again, after he did that right in front of us!  We saw a little boy talk his mom into buying him a slice, and he took one bite, made a sour face and threw it away.

At the end of the afternoon we were all napping on the beach, and Kelsey was being our watchdog (although she is currently requesting FBI agent and CIA material).  She had us all hold our belongings closer to us when some creepy men came and sat in front of us.  They kept looking back at us, and talking to each other.  Eventually when Kelsey was turning around, they got up and snatched a bag of a couple next to us.  The guy turned around and they dropped the bag and walked off.  There was a big commotion and confusion, and when everyone around saw what happened a group of big men in leather (unassociated with the couple) wanted the snatcher to come back and fight!  The snatcher went back, and I filmed it in hopes of seeing a beat down, but they just yelled at each other and then the snatcher walked off.  As we were leaving the beach, the snatcher walked past us, knowing that we were watching him, and in Spanish he said, “Nothing happened!” He laughed and walked off. What a meanie!

We walked along the board walk to see Frank Gehry’s fish sculpture, and then met the boys for dinner.  We went to an awesome Mexican restaurant in the ghetto – we filled up the tiny restaurant and spent a couple hours at dinner.  It was a lot of fun, and we made our way home and passed out from an exhausting day at the beach.

Cara Marie

Arrival in Barcelona!

On Saturday we woke up at the crack of dawn to get to the airport for our flight to Barcelona.  When we left our hotel, Venice was completely dead and had a thick fog you had to practically wade through.  I was half expecting a zombie to come around a corner.  We got to the bus station, and when our bus for the airport arrived we had to fight to get on it.  The Italians were extremely rude!  We all made it on the bus, and arrived at the airport two hours prior to departure.  We sat around for a while, and the airport was fairly calm.  When we found out where our terminal was, we walked to it, only to find MASS CHAOS.  We had heard that RyanAir flights are really sketch and seats are first-come-first-serve, but this was crazy!  There was a line of people pushing and shoving, waiting to board their flight.  After we saw that, we made a plan to get to the front of the line – as they were boarding we were at the end of the line moving up with them.  Another group of Americans were there with us, and naturally they were wearing a ton of red and blue.  I spotted a KU hat and told my group the bad news.  We talked to them for a bit, some went to STA, they’re studying in Paderno, and then they cut us in line.  Rude!  Other Italians fought their way into the line, but we made it on the plane and got ready to go to Spain!

We flew over the Swiss Alps, France, and the Mediterranean Sea, and circled around over the ocean for a while before we were able to land.  I was looking for sharks and dolphins, but didn’t see any.  We found our hostel and five of us girls are in one room, two in another.  I am in the room of five, and when we moved into the room there were men’s shoes neatly in a line under one of the beds, and clothes folded in a perfect stack on the bed.  Lucky guy (or maybe unlucky), in a room with five girls!  We looked at all his stuff and evaluated him to be a clean cut American (with American Eagle flip flops), but didn’t meet him until later in the evening – he is a Spanish teacher in Boston, currently teaching/studying in London on his two week vacation from a private school.  He’s in his late 20s and gave us lots of pointers on what to see, and for the most part leaves the room whenever we are getting ready or going to bed.

We met up with the boys, who have to stay in a different hostel because this one filled up, and fought over where to eat for lunch.  So we ditched them, went to a quick place, ate on a bench and headed to the Gaudi park, Parque Guell.  We didn’t realize how long the walk was, so after about an hour we had made a list of shops to go to (we found the shopping district) and got to know the city a little.  Barcelona is a huge city, with wide sidewalks and huge 6-lane streets, which is a nice change of pace from the tiny paver streets of almost all Italian cities.  People have the right-of-way here, which is a different experience, and there is grass and trees built into the streets.  There are more shops here than I saw even in Milan, and I’m a little concerned for my bank account.

We finally arrived at the park (after hiking up a steep hill that made me feel like I was back at Castiglion Fiorentino).  There was a beautiful view of the city in the park, and we roamed around for a while, searching out different Gaudi pieces or architecture and design.  Interesting things we saw at the park include a crazy man in a leopard leotard “singing” by one of the viewpoints – I wanted to pay him to stop.  Video will be uploaded sometime.  There were illegal merchants selling illegal jewelry, purses, sunglasses, and we saw them all running when there was a police man supposedly in the area.  We went down to a lower part of the park and saw a man getting chased, almost tackled, and then taken away for selling illegal merchandise. 

Just as we were leaving we ran into the boys again, and on the metro home they decided to see if they could get tickets to a soccer game that night.  We rested in the hostel for a bit, freshened up and went to search out some dinner on Las Ramblas.  We went to a side street to find something less expensive, and ended at a restaurant where me, Kelsey, Beth and Annie tried paella.  It was basically rice, chicken and sea food.  And by sea food I mean little creatures in my dinner, complete with tentacles and eyeballs.  I am proud to say that I tried calamari (squid!), giant shrimp with the head still on, and even a baby oyster, which was chewy and crunchy at the same time.  We went back to the hostel and went to bed, because we were exhausted.  On the way we got a glimpse of the night life in Barcelona – everyone is out in the cool spring evening shopping and eating and hanging out in all the public spaces, it’s going to be a great week!

Tomorrow we are going to Mass at Sagrada Familia and then grabbing food for a picnic on the beach! It’s going to be 60 degrees and sunny all day!

Cara Marie

Venezia!

Tuesday

Today we got up bright and early and traveled to Venice.  We took a fancy train so it only took 5 hours or so, and our seats reclined and we had trays to play card games on!  We stepped out of the train station and got on a ferry that would take us to the hotel in Lido.  We aren’t staying on the main islands because everything shuts down at night, we’re in a more residential area and it’s just lovely besides the smell of mildew in my room.  I’m sharing a bed with Kelsey as always (yes, our beds are still pushed together back at Santa Chiara, hope the cleaning ladies have fun with that).  The weather in Venice is what I would call extremely confused.  There was a fog so thick we couldn’t see any of the scenery from the boat, like we were cruising right into a horror film.  It wasn’t raining, but rather there was a constant mist on us, not enough for an umbrella, but enough to curl my hair and keep my jacket damp.  Tomorrow I am busting out the bright coral rain jacket I stole from my mom – watch out fashionable Italians! Here comes American tourist!

Speaking of American tourists, there have been a lot more in Venice than in any other place in Italy so far.  I assume that is because of how close we are to Spring Break.  Usually it’s British tourists that are still halfway fashionable.  Andres and I started a new game today, it’s called “American or not.”  We target people we think are tourists and ask each other, “American, or not?”  Usually it’s the ones with a tacky baseball cap and an oversized sweatshirt on, or ones with ridiculous travel gear.  After we make a decision, we walk towards them and listen to how they speak.  It gets pretty entertaining.  Now that I’ve been here for a month, I can pick out a tourist, in particular an American one, in a split second.  On a side note, do NOT wear a clingy dress that is above your mid-thigh in the middle of February (especially if you are an overweight mother of an 8 year old), and do not have 3 suitcases while trying to get off a regional train.  I was embarrassed to be an American when I saw those two things happen in the same situation.

Anyways, back to Venice.  We saw St. Mark’s Square and the Doge’s Palace today.  We toured the inside of the Doge’s Palace, more artwork and politics talk.  Then we toured around Venice.  We went through all the winding streets of shops, and it was very difficult to not leave our tour guide and go shopping.  Rick Steves told me to get lost in Venice, because it is an island and there’s only so far you can go, and I plan to do just that sometime this week.  We went to a bridge and took pictures and saw some gondolas and saw a water taxi get pulled over by a police boat.  We saw the building that they filmed Casino Royale at, the one that gets demolished at the end.  It’s still standing.

We were released from our tour guide and we went shopping a bit and saw lots of sparkly things, like masks and jewels and Murano glass everything.  Then we headed back to our island, Lido, which is actually the biggest one in Venice.  Look at a map, it’s quite surprising!  We went to a Chinese restaurant for dinner – don’t judge me.  We found out that our TV gets CNN in English so the rest of the evening was spent watching news and relaxing.

Tomorrow we go to Murano in the morning to see all this glass blowing business!  In the afternoon I think we go inside St. Mark’s.  Woo hoo!

Wednesday

Today we got up early, ate a huge breakfast provided by Hotel Riviera, and then went to Murano.  I’m sure you have heard about Murano glass.  As soon as we arrived, we were directed to a warehouse where they were blowing glass.  Pretty sure it was super sketch and a tourist trap, but it was pouring rain so we went where they sent us.  We saw our first official Murano glass blowing, and there was a show room with lots of pretty things! Plus all the jewelry was half off! We went to other shops and in most of them you could see the glass blowing happening in the back of the show rooms! 

After we went to Murano we had to go back to the main islands for a tour of San Marco.  It was lots of art history and no pictures allowed, so not much to talk about. Saw some cool models of the church and some original sculptures and went on a balcony and saw some mosaics and sparkly walls and stuff.  I think I was a little disappointed by the church because it was completely set up for tourism.  You couldn’t wander around like most churches, this one had a path you had to follow – I felt like a cow in a fence being herded around.  By the time we got out of the church the rain had cleared up, and we walked around Venice and went through lots of little streets and saw lots of beautiful views even though it was really overcast. 

Then we had two hours before we had a concert to get to, so a few of us girls went to eat at a little restaurant where you will be proud to hear I tried a salmon penne pasta and fish.  It was super tasty!  Then we got some gelato and shopped in the Murano glass shops before grabbing a boat to the concert.  Unfortunately, one of the boats that we were going to take was shut down for the night due to high tides, so we had to take the boat that stops at every stop and we barely showed up just in time for the concert.  The concert we went to was a classical strings concert, and it was really cool! It wasn’t quite Devil Went Down to Georgia but it was a neat experience, and it was in a church which made it even better. 

When we got out of the concert, the water was almost up to the level of the streets, and the docks were floating as high as is capable for them.  We made it back to our island safely and hung out at a bar across the street from our hotel for a while before heading to bed to prepare for another day in Venice.

Thursday

Kelsey and I slept in a bit today, and met up with Heather and Marissa to go to a place called Ca’ d’Oro (House of Gold).  You can Google this house if you want to learn about it, because I don’t remember it from history class.  We got in for free because today is the 150^th anniversary of the uniting of Italy!  Everyone had their flags flying out their windows and there were tons of Italians out because most museums let them in free.  The Ca’ d’Oro has been turned into a museum of historical art, which we didn’t know before going to it.  We skipped most of the art and had a photo shoot on the balconies, and a man working inside let us open the 1000-year-old windows to take pictures from. 

After the Ca’ d’Oro, we grabbed some lunch to go and looked around in the shops.  We went to the Peggy Guggenheim museum to meet up with the group for our afternoon tour.  The museum was mostly modern art with a lot of inappropriate topics.  I really enjoyed it, which surprised me because I’m usually more interested in the history of things.  We saw some Picaso’s, and other famous people I don’t remember.  We went to the garden after we were done with the museum tour where we found Peggy’s grave, right next to the grave of her 17 dogs, right next to a wish tree!  I wrote a wish on a receipt and stuck it to a branch, so I guess now I just wait for Peggy’s ghost to make it come true?

Since today is St. Patrick’s Day, we made plans with the other K-State group from Orvieto to go to an Irish Pub.  We tracked them down (after an hour and a half of terrible directions) and then split up to shop a bit with plans to meet at “The Irish Pub” later that evening.  Well, we made our way to an Irish pub, but apparently Italians love the Irish because there are multiple “Irish Pubs.”  The one we went to had green beer, so we couldn’t resist celebrating our Irish heritage, and each of us got a small green beer to-go.  We began walking to the other Irish pub, and finally found a huge obnoxious group of loud Americans with ridiculous green hats on.  We had fun finally catching up with them and hanging out, and then we spent a couple hours making our way back to our island. 

Forgot to mention that somewhere in that mini pub crawl of ours, we came to a spot where we needed to get to a boat stop a couple buildings over.  We could see the boat stop, but there was one spot in the sidewalk blocked off by rod iron gates.  We could have walked all the way around the buildings and back tracked for a few minutes, which would have been fine, but we opted to step off the sidewalk, hold on to the rod iron fence, and shimmy across the other side of it before hopping back onto the sidewalk.  The second one we came to posed a bit of a problem, seeing as the sidewalk jutted out and the fence left no room on the other side to step onto.  So, we held on to the fence and slowly each of us made our way to the boat stop, hanging over the Grand Canal on our way. 

I feel like I probably should have left that out to let my mom sleep easier, but this long post needs a little spicing up.  Tomorrow we check out at 10:30 am, and then we are free for spring break! We will be spending one more night in Venice, and plans for tomorrow include climbing the tower of San Marco, lunch with Orvieto people, and shopping!  I’m on a mission for a sparkly Venetian mask.

Friday

Today we checked out of our hotel and headed to our new hotel for our extra night in Venice.  We took a nice long boat ride around the islands and soaked up some Venetian sunshine.  I don’t know how we lucked out on such good weather the last two days, considering it was supposed to be heavy rain or fog the whole time we were here.  We got off the boat and searched in all the tiny alleys (they call streets) for our new hotel.  It took us a while, but we finally found the main office where we were supposed to check in. 

When we got to the office it wasn’t like a normal hotel, but instead one small room with a desk and some cabinets.  She took us outside to the door next to the office, where there was an empty foyer area and a stair case.  We climbed up the stairs with all our baggage to the top floor (gasping for air after the first flight) where she typed in a code and let us inside.  Our hotel rooms are two of four rooms in an apartment, where we share a bathroom with two other rooms, and there is a full kitchen with snacks supplied.  For 25 euro a night, I’d say we lucked out! We’re the only ones here (3 guys and 5 girls), and there was a cleaning lady here when we showed up so everything is nice and fresh.  The bathroom is the nicest one we’ve seen (complete with a rotating seat cover), no mold in sight and a bidet as a bonus!  Speaking of bidets, tonight we spent half an hour learning how to use one (thanks to WikiHOW and its step-by-step instruction and informational video). 

The bedrooms are much nicer than the rooms at hostels, obviously, and each have their own sink, desk and armoire.  The girl room has two twin beds pushed together, a couch turned into a bed, and a cot with a foam pad as a mattress (not fun for Beth but she might use some couch cushions to add some padding).  Kelsey and I have been cuddling for weeks now, so we got the big bed. 

After we took a breather and lightened our load, we went to Piazza San Marco to go to the top of the tower.  We stood in line for a good while, and then crammed into an elevator to go up (the stairs are no longer used).  When we got to the top, we looked at the sites and took lots of pictures.  After we had been up there for a while, we heard another bell tower going off.  Just as Sarah was saying, “I wonder which tower that is,”  the tower we were in started shaking and a loud booming sound went off directly above our heads.  I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me that we were going to a bell tower just before noon, but with all the natural disasters going on, for a good few seconds I thought there was an earthquake or something.  The bells in Italy ring all the time, with no particular melody and no particular number of times, so I lost some of my hearing ability while I was about 6 feet from the huge bell going off. 

We took the elevator back down and went to the Hard Rock Café for lunch.  I have no guilt in going to an American restaurant in Venice, because it was the most delicious grilled chicken and bacon sandwich I have ever had.  (It wasn’t until about 10pm that I realized it was Friday, sorry Jesus).  We got free water WITH ICE, which is a luxury here, you have no idea.  After lunch, we realized we had lost a few hours somewhere because all of a sudden it was 4pm.  The boys have gotten tired of us complaining about how terrible they are at planning things, so today they let us lead the way.  We went shopping.  I marked some things off my list of wants/needs, including an ADORABLE pair of coral flats that have a big flower on them, and a cute red skirt with bows on the pockets.  As I am typing this I just realized I forgot to buy a mask while here…bummer.

It began to get dark and shops started to shut down so we went back to our hotel.  The boys went and got dinner for everyone, one giant cheese pizza.  We sat in the kitchen area of our apartment/hotel and played card games for a while before everyone headed to bed.  We have a really early morning to get a boat to catch a bus to the airport to catch our plane in time, so I must go to bed now!  Flight around 10:30am to Barcelona.  Farewell Venice!

Cara Marie

Totally forgot to mention a new gelato flavor I tried: Dark Chocolate and Caramel. Success!

Also, no spills recently, although my sandwich today did completely fall apart and I looked like a barbarian eating it.

Orvieto Weekend

This weekend Kelsey and I took a trip to visit our friends in the lovely town of Orvieto.  We met up with them at the top of the hill, and we strolled through the quaint little streets to the girls’ house.  Seeing how I live in a room the size of a large closet, it was quite shocking to walk into their “apartment” and find a huge living room, multiple bathrooms, and three bedrooms with lots of space in between everything.  These girls are so spoiled! (Besides the fact there is a slight mold problem).  For dinner a “baby chef” (chef in training in Orvieto) made us a delicious dinner!  There are several chefs that actually cook at the restaurants in town and are from America, so they befriend all the K-Staters.

We had lots of fun getting together with all the people in Orvieto, and went to a bar called Beer House the first night we were there.  There was a live band and Rachel told me if we sat there long enough they would serve us free food.  Didn’t get any free food, so next time I’m in Orvieto I am just going to go to Beer House, take a seat and wait. 

We did some shopping and found leather shops and olive wood shops, both very cool!  The leather shop had purses, wallets, key chains, bracelets (that he could fit to your wrist right there), and even earrings.  The olive wood shops had beautiful products, anything from a mini chess board to serving spoons.  One of the olive wood stores had a man in the back building things, and you could watch him as he showed off his mad wood-working skills.  We eventually stumbled upon an alley that led to a small store, and we weren’t sure if it was a shop or a restaurant at first.  The lady asked if we wanted to do a free tasting, and we quickly agreed to.  She poured us each a glass of wine and water, and then toasted up some bread and spread olive oil on it, with a sprinkle of salt to top it off.  It was delicious!  We also tried olive paste, and olive and truffle paste.  The olive paste tasted like smashed olives on toast, and the truffle taste was very strong in the second one, but I did purchase some adorable little tins of olive oil to bring home.

We relaxed at the girls’ apartment, and in the morning we slept in long enough to be woken up by the front door flying open. It was Jordan!  She had been traveling around Italy with her boyfriend, and had just celebrated her birthday on Saturday in Rome.  It was just our luck to get to see her!  We hung out on the futon all morning, made some left-over pasta for lunch, and then headed to the train station. 

Today is Monday and we have tonight to turn in some homework (yes, I wrote a paper!), pack for two weeks and be ready to leave for Venice at 07:00 tomorrow morning.  I will be traveling around Italy and Spain, so I'll list my plans for the following two weeks below:

Tuesday:

7:00 am - leave for Venice

11:33 am - arrive in Venice, check into hotel (in Lido), and grab some lunch

2:00 am - meet for a tour

Wednesday:

8:30 am - breakfast, morning is free

3:00 pm - meet for tour of St. Marks with our tour guide Martino

8:00 pm - we will be going to a classical concert as a group!

Thursday:

7:30 am - breakfast, morning is free

3:00 pm - meet for tour of the Peggy Guggenheim

SAINT PATRICK'S DAY!

Friday:

7:30 am - breakfast, packing for Spain!

10:30 am - check out of hotel, move to another hotel for the night

Saturday:

Fly to Barcelona, Spain

--SPRING BREAK!--

Be in Barcelona for 4 days

Train to Valencia

Be in Valencia for 3 days

Train back to Barcelona

Be in Barcelona for one more day before flying to Rome and heading back to Castiglion Fiorentino!

Now that you can stalk me, I must get some things packed and papers turned in!  Oh, and since I gave you that schedule I hope you can see that I will be updating my blog much less, and there will probably be one VERY long post in two weeks.  Get your reading glasses ready!

Cara Marie

Words Italians Can't Pronounce:
Today in History class Giovanni gave us a couple more words: castle, emphasis on the "t;" and our new favorite, monks, pronounced "monkeys." 

Spill of the Day:
I'm sorry to say I've been a bit boring lately, all I've spilt is a pepperoni in my lap at a Pizzeria Charlie's in Orvieto.  And nobody even saw, so it was hardly a catastrophe.  Tonight at dinner Marissa completely overshot her glass when refilling it with water and it dribbled around her cup, that's about as good as it gets.

Assisi

Yesterday we went to Assisi, Italy, the home of St. Francis and St. Clare.  The first thing I noticed about Assisi was the lack of modern clutter.  It might have been because it was Ash Wednesday and many shops were closed, but there was no graffiti, and the white and pink limestone made the town seem pristine.

We began at the Basilica of St. Francis.  You'll be able to see from the outside that there is a lower basilica and an upper basilica, each built at different times.  We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but each was filled with frescoes of the life of St. Francis.  There is a piazza outside the lower basilica, and inside that part of the church is where they hid the body of St. Francis for many years.  I can imagine it being quite a surprise when they found it in the altar.  It is when they found the body that they built the upper basilica.  They also dug underneath the altar and created a crypt for St. Francis, which was closed while we were there, but that is where they celebrate daily Mass in honor of SFA. 

Enclosed in the basilica is a cloister, where there is a lovely little courtyard.  Other churches we went to include Santa Chiara (St. Clare) and the Duomo of Assisi.  Santa Chiara looks massive from the outside, but the inside is actually quite small, compared to other basilicas we've seen.  We went to a small chapel first and sat in quiet for a few minutes.  That was a really nice change of pace compared to other tours that are go-go-go, where we hardly get a chance to look at something before we've moved on to the next thing.  Then we went to the main part of the church, where most of the frescoes have been lost due to collapsing arches and cleaning.  There was a little nun running a booth with holy cards, and instead of a small ash cross on her forehead, it looked like they had dumped the rest of the ashes on the top of her habit. She must be extra holy.

The Duomo of Assisi is very old, and is built on top of Roman ruins.  There are voids in the paving that are covered with glass where you can see the Roman road below, and in the church you can see an original Roman cistern.  This Duomo is where Sts. Francis and Clare were baptized, and we saw the baptismal font they used.  This church has also lost most of the frescoes, due to cleaning, so there were ornate carvings next to white walls.  To the right of the pews is a small door, and when we went into it we found a hallways with paintings of Pope JPII.  They each portrayed a different aspect of him, from meditation to joy.  It is a permanent display according to the plaque, and was a nice little surprise since the church was so plain.

After our morning of tours, we said goodbye to our tour guide Mara, who all the boys are in love with, and we headed to lunch.  All 100 of us were eating at the same restaurant, and before we had gone to Assisi we were asked who would want a fish plate.  Being the good little Catholic that I am, I said I would take the meatless plate.  When we got to the restaurant, all the "fish eaters" had to sit at a different table.  So I got segregated from all my meat eating friends and sat with the vegans and Catholics.  Luckily I had a couple friends with me, Sarah and Andres, and I sat by a girl named Erica who has a gluten intolerance and is really nice. 

It was a very odd situation, seeing as we were in Italy and they had trouble figuring out what we could eat.  On a couple occasions they tried to serve us meats.  They finally brought out our main course - an egg.  Is that not a chicken? What is wrong with Italy? Anyways, I filled up on pasta and garlic potatoes and a yummy slice of cheese.  Then we headed to the castle at the top of the hill.

We were already pretty far north, so the walk to the castle was very short.  We tried to make it more interesting by climbing up the hill instead of going around it on the street.  We stopped outside the wall and lounged in the sun for a couple hours.  We had 4 hours of free time, and since most shops were closed we figured this was a perfect way to spend our time.  We finally got up and Kelsey and I walked around the wall, where we saw the people that had gone inside the castle up on a tower.  We stood below it and looked over the valley some more, and I serenaded everyone with The Sound of Music. 

We wandered down the medieval streets to some shops and ended a perfect day with some gelato.  I slept on the bus home and we ate dinner, lounged a bit, and went to bed.  What a perfect day.

Word of the day: beard.  Mara said it correct at first, but she paused after to see if we reacted, and then she said, "Is that correct? Beer-d? Not Bear-d?" Yes, Mara. St. Francis did not have a bear-d.

Spill of the day: water out of the pitcher at lunch, but I spilled it by Andres' plate so it looked like it was his fault.  Once again, dexterity is going but aim is improving.

Sorry there are no pictures, I've been trying to upload them but they keep failing.  Just look through my Facebook albums while you read this and it will all go together wonderfully.

Cara Marie

Mardi Gras

I'm going to make this one short and sweet, because my computer is about to die and I don't want to walk up the four flights of stairs to get my cord...

Tuesday was Mardi Gras, and we went to the Velvet to celebrate for a bit.  After we had been there for half an hour or so, Italians started coming in wearing masks.  We assumed this was because of Carnivale, and we weren't surprised, but then a nurse costume came in, then the Ninja Turtles, then all sorts of crazy costumes, including some Scottish warriors.  Apparently, Mardi Gras is equivalent to Halloween in the states! We were all very disappointed that we didn't come prepared, especially since we had all been in togas during dinner.  Don't ask why, it was just Toga Tuesday.  I wanted to wear mine out but my roommates wouldn't let me.

So for all the people going to Italy in the spring, remember to bring your Halloween costume.  We asked our RA's why they didn't tell us, and they said they had no idea.  They showed up on Halloween in full costume, while all the Italians just stared at them. 

Computer dying, will update on Assisi tomorrow!

Cara Marie

Rachel Comes to Cast Flo

So I haven’t updated my blog in a while, which means another long post. I’m currently sitting in our courtyard watching people throw a football around.  The weather is beautiful!  It’s about 50 degrees with a very light breeze, and the clouds are clear and the sun is shining!  On Thursday Kelsey and I were going to do our laundry, but we took a nap instead.  Miss Rachel Cooper showed up that evening, and we showed her around Santa Chiara and Castiglion Fiorentino.  We snuck her into dinner, and I think she ate a horse’s helping of pasta.  One spill-of-the-day occurred during dinner, although it wasn’t a real spill on me.  I have no idea how it happened, but when I was passing on of the platters of food, the serving tongs fell off the platter, directly into the water jug.  A couple minutes after dropping the tongs in the water, I decided it was a bad idea to have a bottle of olive oil on the table without a lid.  While I was trying to put the lid on the oil, my hands forgot how to work and I dropped the lid into Rachel’s glass of wine.  I had terrible dexterity but great aim at dinner Thursday night.

Right after dinner we freshened up and went to the sketchiest bar in town, the “Rab.”  If you’ve not read about the Rab before, we call it Rab Bar because when we walk up to it, the letters “B-A-R” are facing the opposite way, so to us it‘s “R-A-B.”  We hung out with Santino, the bartender that wears a lab coat, and then shortly after headed to the Velvet Undergound.  At the Velvet there was a live band playing, and it was happy hour, so it was a lot of fun.  By the end of the night all the K-State Americans were right in front of the band dancing and singing along.  We headed back to Santa Chiara and slept like babies on our giant play-pen bed. 

The next day we woke up with a giant crack between the beds, so we were all sinking between the mattresses and had to keep pushing the beds back together.  Kelsey was sleeping in the middle, so Rachel and I flanked her on either side, curled up in balls at the top of our bed trying to avoid the great divide.  It wasn’t for a good hour or so that I realized Kelsey was laying perfectly straight in the middle of us.  I asked her to move to the other mattress and she replied with, “No thanks, I’m comfortable.”  Oh, Kelsey…

 We got out of bed in time for lunch, where Rachel ate her weight in food, again.  After lunch we had to go do our laundry.  We packed our laundry in our roll-y suitcases and hiked down to Speedy Wash.  We played hearts while we waited for our clothes to get clean, and even though I paid about 12 euro for laundry it was a much better experience than hand washing.  We rolled our suitcases up the steep hill, unpacked our laundry, and then participated in the siesta.  We re-did our giant bed so that the blankets held the two mattresses together, and I think Kelsey and I are going to leave it like that for the rest of the semester.

Four hours later we woke up for dinner.  Woops.  We stopped into studio before dinner to check up on our Wildcats, and were thrilled to get another win! Yay cats!  Dinner was delicious, and I may have spilled a little bit of salad and balsamic vinaigrette in my lap, but Rachel took the cake by knocking over her entire glass of wine, freshly refilled.  That night we stayed in and played P&A with just a few friends.  It was lots of fun, and we slept much better on our fixed play-pen bed.

Saturday we woke up and went to Arezzo for the monthly antique fair.  This was by far the coolest thing I have ever been to.  It was an entire district of closed-off streets filled with stands of various antiques, from furniture to jewelry to art work.  Kelsey and I got some stones to put in our jewelry, mine is a ruby!  We saw lots of cool stuff, and only made it down a couple streets before it was time to meet the group for lunch.  We have been planning to eat at a Chinese restaurant for weeks.  Some people had heard about a buffet for 11 euro, but most of us just ordered fried rice and a meat of some kind to save some money.  Our food was delicious and filled that crappy American food void we’ve been suffering from. 

The people that ordered buffet found out that “buffet” to a Chinese-Italian means you sit at a certain table with a little skillet in the middle, and cook your own food.  I was happy with my decision to have them cook my food.

We took a train home and ate dinner and then just hung out at Santa Chiara that evening.  A serious spill of the day occured while I was pouring Rachel some water.  I completely mis-gauged how much water was in the jug and how much room was in Rachel's cup, and I just kept pouring and pouring until I was at the point of no return and the water started overflowing out of her cup. I have no idea what is wrong with me some times. Again, I think it was a dexterity issue. Maybe a bit of slow reflexes...

Today we went to lunch at Café Roggi and then we basked in the sun while the boys played football.  We’re about to go get gelato and watch the boys play soccer, and then Rachey has to go back to Orvieto.  Good news is we’ll probably be going to Orvieto this next weekend.  After that it’s tons of traveling for two weeks.

Gotta go get gelato, I’m getting yelled at!

Cara Marie

Perugia

To begin today’s post I would like to share an ingenious moment of Kelsey Tayler Fagan.  I was kindly letting her use my phone to write an e-mail.  She began typing but stopped abruptly, handed me the phone and said, “Oh! This is on T-9!”  I took it from her and looked at her confused…”Kelsey, it’s a full keyboard.”  If you don’t get the joke ask someone under the age of 20.  FYI Kelsey hates typing in T-9.

Today we went to Perugia, which is about an hour bus ride from Santa Chiara.  We arrived a little early and had to wait around the bus station.  While we were inside the station, an older man came up to us, muttered something in Italian, pointed at a man sleeping on a bench, and then laughed and shoved Kelsey.  We had no idea what he was saying, but after a while another Italian started yelling at him, and we roughly translated it as “Leave the Americans alone.”  As we quickly started to filter out (not quick enough), the younger man that was defending us started to yell at the old guy, and the old guy put his fist up, and apparently took a swing!  I walked out while they were yelling at each other in Italian, and when I looked back at the door as we were walking away the young guy was outside having a smoke.  That was our first impression of Perugia.

We went down an escalator and then up some stairs and then down some stairs and then up an escalator and ended up in a tunnel.  We soon found out that we were in a medieval town, perfectly preserved.  As our tour guide Mara (from Orvieto) told us, this was once the town of Perugia, and where there was a barrel vault in the ceiling now there had once been a clear view to the sky.  There were different rooms where shops had been, streets and paths, but it was completely vacant.  Long story short, Pope Paul III moved into town, wanted to shut down the wealthy family that ran the town, so he built a castle on top of the city, and then they hated him. 

We went to a garden with lots of benches and homeless people.  It had a beautiful view of the Umbrian valley, and we could see Assisi from the park.  We went to the Galleria Nazionale dell’Umbria, where we saw artwork and artifacts from the 1400s-1900s.  I’m sure it was all really cool and historically important, but we were all still exhausted from the two weeks of traveling we had just gotten back from, so everyone was in a mummy-like phase as we went through the museum.  All I remember is Saint Francis was important, and there were a lot of chubby baby Jesus’s.  Oh, and either Raphael or Michaelangelo was a pedophile.  (I think she used the wrong word).

For lunch we went to a place recommended by Geoff Ekey (who we call Ja-fee-key, one word).  It was called Dal Mi’ Cocco, and was a restaurant where you pay a certain amount for wine, water, bread, pasta, meat, dessert and coffee.  There are a lot of restaurants like this in Italy, but usually they cost a lot more than this one did.  They were very friendly here and it was all very fancy, and we had a great time stuffing ourselves with delicious food.  We loosened our pants and wandered around Perugia during our free time in the afternoon, stopping in some shops and a bank where we saw more frescoes, until we finally took the bus back to Cast F.no. 

When we got home, it was almost dinner time, but we were all still full from lunch.  It’s sad that my biggest problem is having too much delicious food.  On a political note, I’m upset with the world for hating America for not feeding Africa.  It’s become clear to me that Italy is the country taking all the food and eating it without giving any to their neighbor to the south. 

To update you on spills of the day, I have been very good at not getting anything on myself.  The tables I have sat at, however, have a lot of evidence.  I have yet to master this family style dining, where I have to serve myself pasta without the noodles dragging on the table or missing my plate.

Words that Italians have trouble with…

Thought – One of our tour guides was translating a very deep quote, and ended it with, “my mind is full of tots.”
Revolution - Revo-low-tion, low like plow
Knife - often pronounce the K, but then again so does my mom.

Cara Marie