Wow, so much to write about! I really need to blog more often...
On October 7th I went to LONDON! I left my last class 30 minutes early, walked very quickly to Largo Argentina, waited about ten minutes for the bus (which seemed like a lot longer) which took me to Termini, where I literally ran to the Terravision shuttle station- it was about 5 minutes before the shuttle was supposed to leave and I couldn't find the place, so I was frantically going around until I saw the bus and then I started running! Whew... so after that panic, I waited like 15 minutes for the bus to leave (...) and about an hour later arrived at Ciampino airport. It's a tiny airport, so I just wandered around until about an hour before the flight took off. I flew Ryanair, so I waited the last hour in line just to make sure I got on (and got a good seat!) I sat by the window and had a spectacular view of Rome at night. The flight was only about 2 hours, and when I arrived in London, I ran to my second shuttle in a panic (deja vu?) which took me to Baker Street! I got there a little early, so I waited a couple minutes until I saw Andrew walking down the street! :) We took a double decker bus- a good first thing to do in London!
Friday morning, we went to Trafalgar Square, where we took uber touristy pictures with the huge lions; Westminster (which has Big Ben, the Thames River, Parliament, and the London Eye), where we took pictures of a couple from the US who forgot their camera and is now going to send us a copy of their book when they get home; Leicester Square, which isn't pronounced how you'd think; Chinatown, where we took way too many pictures because of Andrew's new camera lens; Piccadilly Circus, which isn't a circus but a circle to us Americans; and University College London, the beautiful college where Andrew is studying this semester. For dinner we went to an Italian restaurant. Yes, Italian. I seriously will never get tired of Italian food. I eat pasta in Johns Creek, I eat pasta in Roma, and I eat pasta in London. After dinner we went back to Westminster, which was really cool because at night it was all lit up, and for some reason that night Parliament and Big Ben were lit with colored lights.
On Saturday, we saw Portobello Market, the beautiful Kensington Gardens, V&A, Buckingham Palace, and St. Paul's Cathedral. After dinner we went to the Globe theater and saw Henry IV Part II! While not exactly the most thrilling, understandable play this century, we got to be groundlings and lean right up against the stage, and we definitely had some good laughs. It was so cool to see Shakespeare performed in London, in the Globe, with accents and all! We stood for more than three hours, and there was a closing bit since we went on closing night- we were very lucky because they added shows that season- it was so worth it!
Sunday we were again very busy! We went to the Monument, where we climbed 311 spiral steps up inside the huge Doric column for an awesome view of London, and Greenwich, where the Prime Meridian is located. We went to the British museum with about an hour before it closed, so we saw the main attractions of the museum, such as the Rosetta Stone and pieces from the Parthenon. When the museum closed we went to King's Cross Station, where we dorkily asked a security guard where Platform 9 and 3/4 was! He was confused, so we specified, "like, in Harry Potter?" He wasn't sure where it was and we couldn't find it- we found Platform 9, and Platform 10, but no 9 and 3/4! It was pretty funny, though, and I think he thought we were crazy. Those Americans.
Monday morning Andrew had class, so I started working on a paper for my own class. Afterward we walked around and had lunch at a nice cafe before I had to get on the shuttle to London Stansted. The journey back was relatively uneventful- I had a great view again from my window seat.
I hope I didn't make that too long- I tried to keep it relatively short! It was great getting to see Andrew and as much of London as possible in one weekend! :) I can't wait for him to come to Rome!
The next weekend, I went to Florence with my roommates on an excursion with our program, API. We went on a tour of the city and saw the Duomo, the Medici family house, and Ponte Vecchio. Afterward we spent a lot of time around the markets and had some fun looking at jewelry worth hundreds/thousands of euros! For dinner we went to a small ristorante, which was delizioso.
Saturday morning we met for breakfast at 7:45 and then headed to the Duomo, the huge cathedral that Florence is famous for. It is covered with beautiful colored marbles, and we were there at 8:30am sharp when they opened the doors so we could climb the almost 500 stairs up to the top. We had to meet with the rest of API at 10:30 to go to the museum, so we wanted to do it before the museum to avoid the long line to go up. At the top, it was an absolutely beautiful view. It was a clear, cool morning- perfect weather. After climbing back down, we went to the museum where we saw the David by Michelangelo. I'm not going to pretend to be an art expert or anything, it just looked pretty impressive to me! I've seen pictures of it, but I've never noticed how expressive his face is before. Or how big his head and hands are...
On Sunday, Claudia and I went to the Circus Maximus where a bunch of Ancient Roman reenactment groups were doing performances. There were soldiers, gladiators, and dancers, and the whole place looked like a Roman military camp. It was a lot of (geeky) fun! We saw soldiers demonstrate military tactics and a lot of costumed people do a full Roman wedding, which was very colorful- people think of the Romans as all wearing white, but that's not the case.
Midterm week can be summed up pretty quickly. Study sick study stress study still sick study midterm study stress next midterm study tissues last midterm DONE. I survived, and I think I did pretty well?
Friday I went to the tour of the Vatican Museum with API and got to see many famous things, such as the statue of Laocoon and the Sistine Chapel! Also, among the not-as-famous things, I saw the Borgia room- the tour guide talked about how corrupt they were, and I was just standing there like hehe possibly my ancestors.... on Saturday, I went to the Villa Borghese Gardens, which was very pretty, and Sunday I took a walk to Palazzo Spada, where I saw the really neat illusion by Bernini- it's a corridor that was made to look much longer than it actually is, and the statue at the end looks life-sized when it's actually about 3 feet tall! After I left, I people-watched in a piazza for a little while and had fun understanding pieces of the Italian that people were saying.
Photo albums!
Tarquinia
Marino Wine Festival
London
Florence
Vatican Museum and Villa Borghese Gardens
Monday, October 25, 2010
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Roma-Roma-ma-ah!
Just so you know, it's October. CRAZY.
Let's see, I'll just start with some highlights since the last post.
I did my oral report on the Theater of Pompey for my Ancient Rome and its Monuments class... I think it went all right- I can't remember the last time I had to do an oral report!
On Thursday I visited Villa Farnesina. It was on the list my architecture teacher gave us of places to see, so I thought I'd check it out. I enjoyed it a lot more than I expected to! The villa was built in the 1500s and the interior walls are covered with incredibly ornate frescoes by painters such as Raphael. The frescoes all depict scenes and characters from Greco-Roman mythology and I had a lot of fun figuring out what everything was. When I was about to leave, I found a book by the entrance of the descriptions of what the frescoes were, and I was happy to see that I guessed most things correctly- I'm such a dork! Afterward I had some time between when the villa closed and my first class, so I had a had a snack at Piazza Trilussa and people-watched.
Friday I went to Tarquinia with API. I didn't get to go with my roommates (kind of complicated story having to do with a single make-up class) but it was still really fun. We biked through the medieval town of Tarquinia, which also has strong Etruscan roots, and made stops along the way to see churches and beautiful views of the countryside. For lunch we ate at an agriturismo, which is a farm that serves the food it grows to tourists vacationing there. It was dee-licious! After the lunch, I somehow got started talking with the wine connoisseur who talked for a really long time about wine tasting, and I told him my family was from Italy. He asked for the last name and where they were from, and I said Borgia and Cavallo, from Colliano. It's so funny telling people here Borgia- it always gets a good reaction!
I walked around with Claudia and Liat on Saturday, which was nice. We were heading toward the Crypt of the Capuchin monks, which was cool yet eerie- it's a crypt with several rooms decorated entirely of the bones of the monks from 1500-1800. I wasn't allowed to take pictures, but I'm sure Google has some.
On Sunday, I went to the Marino Wine Festival and hung out mostly with Catherine and Liat. I wasn't planning on going, but that morning, right before my run, I decided I might as well, so I ran, quickly showered, and went out the door to the metro station. We took the metro to Termini, then figured out our train tickets and took the train to Marino. As soon as we climbed all the steps to get to the town, the atmosphere was like bam, FESTIVAL! People were dancing in the streets, singing in Italian along with the loudspeakers everywhere, wearing inflatable crowns... there was a parade and then at 4:00 wine was supposed to flow out of the fountains, so I went with Catherine and Liat because they wanted to get a spot by the fountain early. Turns out so did everyone else- we were packed in a mob of people all crowding around the fountain, and I seriously couldn't move. It was crazy! When the fountain finally started spouting wine, I was trying to get AWAY from the fountain, but everyone else was trying to get TO the fountain, and no one could get anywhere! We finally made it out of the crowd alive, then walked around more and hung out on some steps in the main piazza, talking and people-watching. About a half hour before our train was supposed to leave, we went down to the train station and waited. There was much confusion about which tracks the train was going to come on. When the train finally did come, it was even more madness. I looked down the length of the side of the train and saw about four people's feet sticking out of the windows- people inside and outside the train were lifting/pushing lots of people through the windows, many of whom didn't even have tickets. Catherine, Liat, and I got crushed against the train and couldn't get to the door, so we actually missed the train and had to wait 50 minutes for the next one! So chaotic. We finally did make it back to Rome on the next train! It was crazy and fun and we were all very glad we went!
Video of the madness:
Also, I am going to London this weekend!! I am leaving my last class on Thursday 30 mins early, walking and taking the bus to Termini, finding the Terravision shuttle, taking the shuttle to Ciampino airport, flying to London-Stansted on Ryanair, finding the bus, then ending up wherever Andrew is! Whew! So excited!
Another Rome album!
Let's see, I'll just start with some highlights since the last post.
I did my oral report on the Theater of Pompey for my Ancient Rome and its Monuments class... I think it went all right- I can't remember the last time I had to do an oral report!
On Thursday I visited Villa Farnesina. It was on the list my architecture teacher gave us of places to see, so I thought I'd check it out. I enjoyed it a lot more than I expected to! The villa was built in the 1500s and the interior walls are covered with incredibly ornate frescoes by painters such as Raphael. The frescoes all depict scenes and characters from Greco-Roman mythology and I had a lot of fun figuring out what everything was. When I was about to leave, I found a book by the entrance of the descriptions of what the frescoes were, and I was happy to see that I guessed most things correctly- I'm such a dork! Afterward I had some time between when the villa closed and my first class, so I had a had a snack at Piazza Trilussa and people-watched.
Friday I went to Tarquinia with API. I didn't get to go with my roommates (kind of complicated story having to do with a single make-up class) but it was still really fun. We biked through the medieval town of Tarquinia, which also has strong Etruscan roots, and made stops along the way to see churches and beautiful views of the countryside. For lunch we ate at an agriturismo, which is a farm that serves the food it grows to tourists vacationing there. It was dee-licious! After the lunch, I somehow got started talking with the wine connoisseur who talked for a really long time about wine tasting, and I told him my family was from Italy. He asked for the last name and where they were from, and I said Borgia and Cavallo, from Colliano. It's so funny telling people here Borgia- it always gets a good reaction!
I walked around with Claudia and Liat on Saturday, which was nice. We were heading toward the Crypt of the Capuchin monks, which was cool yet eerie- it's a crypt with several rooms decorated entirely of the bones of the monks from 1500-1800. I wasn't allowed to take pictures, but I'm sure Google has some.
On Sunday, I went to the Marino Wine Festival and hung out mostly with Catherine and Liat. I wasn't planning on going, but that morning, right before my run, I decided I might as well, so I ran, quickly showered, and went out the door to the metro station. We took the metro to Termini, then figured out our train tickets and took the train to Marino. As soon as we climbed all the steps to get to the town, the atmosphere was like bam, FESTIVAL! People were dancing in the streets, singing in Italian along with the loudspeakers everywhere, wearing inflatable crowns... there was a parade and then at 4:00 wine was supposed to flow out of the fountains, so I went with Catherine and Liat because they wanted to get a spot by the fountain early. Turns out so did everyone else- we were packed in a mob of people all crowding around the fountain, and I seriously couldn't move. It was crazy! When the fountain finally started spouting wine, I was trying to get AWAY from the fountain, but everyone else was trying to get TO the fountain, and no one could get anywhere! We finally made it out of the crowd alive, then walked around more and hung out on some steps in the main piazza, talking and people-watching. About a half hour before our train was supposed to leave, we went down to the train station and waited. There was much confusion about which tracks the train was going to come on. When the train finally did come, it was even more madness. I looked down the length of the side of the train and saw about four people's feet sticking out of the windows- people inside and outside the train were lifting/pushing lots of people through the windows, many of whom didn't even have tickets. Catherine, Liat, and I got crushed against the train and couldn't get to the door, so we actually missed the train and had to wait 50 minutes for the next one! So chaotic. We finally did make it back to Rome on the next train! It was crazy and fun and we were all very glad we went!
Video of the madness:
Also, I am going to London this weekend!! I am leaving my last class on Thursday 30 mins early, walking and taking the bus to Termini, finding the Terravision shuttle, taking the shuttle to Ciampino airport, flying to London-Stansted on Ryanair, finding the bus, then ending up wherever Andrew is! Whew! So excited!
Another Rome album!
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