Well my friends, it’s official. I suck at keeping up with my blog. I think it’s been a whole week and a half since I wrote you last. A lot has happened since then, but I can only keep you updated with so much.
Moral of the day: Karma (don’t be an asshole)
We went to Perusia today for Eurochocolate: a huge chocolate festival that draws people from all over Europe. All my friend were going to go to this festival today and they had booked through this company that will take care of all details for daytrips for you. They plan travel to and from, and get you access to any events you need access to. It was 38 euros for the day: this included roundtrip travel expense, (18-20 euro value) a Eurochocolate card that got us free chocolate tastings at a few stands at discounts at many more, (5 euro value) bus fare between the train station and the festival (2 euro value) and a team of guides to help us with the traveling. So when you do the math, it adds up to 25 euros, which miraculously leaves you maximum 13 euros short of the price I paid. I was reluctant to buy this because of this 13 euro gap, but with the insane amount of school work I had recently accumulated, I didn’t have time to look into train and bus tickets and all of the details. It turns out that as part of the guided traveling, they also reserve us two entire train cars (yes there were that many students going on this trip). After our day of immersion in chocolate, we were waiting at the station when we ran into some schoolmates of ours who ridiculed us mercilessly for booking through this travel company. They told us how stupid we were and what a waste of money the entire program is. This isn’t a very nice thing to say. I explained to them the cost break down and let them know that it was really only 11-13 euros that we end up paying for the labor of booking the trip and taking care of all the details so that all we had to do was show up. This seems reasonable to me. They ignored my argument and we boarded the train. They ended up sitting in our reserved train car and when we got there, our trip leaders told them they had to move. They refused. They made our trip leaders track down the paperwork saying we had the cars reserved (which we really did) and made a big fuss about it. As they were leaving disgruntled, I commented loudly to my friend, Stephanie that 38 euros sure WAS an awful lot of money. Oh well, at least I have these lovely seats to sit in. It was great. I think they just went and found other seats, but I kind of hope they had to stand for part of the journey. Karma. Gotta love it.
The chocolate festival itself was lovely. We got pudding and truffles and chocolate bars and hot chocolate and chocolate pastries and watched chocolate chess played with huge chocolate pieces. List of chocolate consumed:
+ Milk chocolate bar
+ Chocolate truffle
+hot chocolate
+chocolate pudding
+ vanilla pudding (I needed a break)
+88% dark chocolate square
+ some unknown chocolate truffle-looking thing with delicious gooeyness inside
+ Grand Marnier sample w/ chocolate square
+1/2 white chocolate-covered apple
+chocolate cookie w/ chocolate gooeyness inside
+ What looked like a sweet hotdog bun filled with chocolate and topped with whipped cream
Now I have a tummy ache
I would say it was worth the money I spent.
In other news, I did about 15 hours of research this last week for a 20-minute women’s studies presentation. I was so thorough that it ended up being closer to around 35 minutes, with interjections from the professor and discussion with the rest of the class. It went better than I could have possibly hoped for. The topic, you might ask? The changes in the styles of secular, painted wedding chests and birth trays in 16th century Europe. Riveting, I know. It was actually a lot of fun, and I would love to present my powerpoint to anyone when I see them next.
This week is midterms and I’m going to be positively swamped with work. I have three finals, another powerpoint presentation for women’s studies and a take home research/analysis essay for women’s studies. It sucks. But then, I’ll be off to London, Paris and Amsterdam for the fall break where all sorts of fun will ensue.
In brief, this is likely the last blog that will come for the next two/ two and a half weeks. Try to contain you disappointment: it’s overwhelming. I love the feedback on the blog. Thanks to all who read. Hopefully I’ll survive the next two weeks and have some wicked awesome stories. Until later, my friends.
-AJC
Monday, October 20, 2008
Friday, October 10, 2008
Yom Kippur and more
I came to Italy to have a lot of first time experiences. Well today, I bled out of my nipple for the first time that I’ve noticed. I’ve played three soccer games and had 3 hours of basketball practice in the last four days. My nips chaffed through and I was bleeding out of my nipple. Never thought I’d be able to say that.
Also, today being Yom Kippur (Jewish holiday where we don’t eat or drink anything for 24 hours), I discovered that Italy is probably the worst place to be when you are unable to eat anything. Conversely, it’s the best place to be when you’re breaking the fast and eating again for the first time. I was walking downtown in the afternoon to check out the public library. I almost started crying when I walked by a pastry shop with the tastiest-looking pastries you’ve ever seen. The window was festively lit and people were laughing and having a great time over their pastries. It was awful. They also had delicious-looking pizza. Just thinking about that makes me hungry again, even though it’s past midnight and the fast is over. For dinner this evening, my roommate was a few minutes late, so I had to sit at the table and stare at the bowl of fresh pasta sitting in front of me. Then we had spaghetti, goat cheese spread on bread, and what I identified as spanikopita, but Giovanna says it’s Italian and it’s called something else in Italian, but it was identical to spanikopita. So tasty-good. We had a pineapple cake she made from scratch: dolce di ananas. There’s still some left too for tomorrow! I said it once and I’ll say it again, this woman knows how to make deserts. My Italian is coming along nicely. I’m the best at Italian out of the five students from our program who are on my basketball team. I talk to the guys who don’t speak English and one of the guys said today that I spoke very well! Ha! I’ve also started trying to read the newspapers and am slowly understanding more: Obama looked more impressive than McCain in the second presidential debate. They said Obama won (as if it were a game), but I’m assuming that just meant he spoke well. Don’t know.
Other news: we won the first game of the soccer playoffs. We barely beat this really good team from a school here in town. They had a player named Fabriccio, who was filthy good. Somehow I got roped into staying for the second team’s game and we have five players and lost 3-7, but I scored a goal! We played the final 5 minutes of the game with four players. It was wicked exhausting. They had a student on their team who was a semi-pro, whatever that means. Well, actually what that means is that he is unstoppable. He scored all seven of their goals. I felt less bad about the loss after I learned that.
As far as women are concerned, there is nothing and there is nothing on the horizon. I get on the bus and find women that I am in love with. It happens two or three times a day that I see the most beautiful girl I have ever seen. Absurd. I don’t think I can ever leave this country. When they drive the scooters… that’s it for me. I’m sore. And tired. But not very hungry. Life is good.
-AJC
Also, today being Yom Kippur (Jewish holiday where we don’t eat or drink anything for 24 hours), I discovered that Italy is probably the worst place to be when you are unable to eat anything. Conversely, it’s the best place to be when you’re breaking the fast and eating again for the first time. I was walking downtown in the afternoon to check out the public library. I almost started crying when I walked by a pastry shop with the tastiest-looking pastries you’ve ever seen. The window was festively lit and people were laughing and having a great time over their pastries. It was awful. They also had delicious-looking pizza. Just thinking about that makes me hungry again, even though it’s past midnight and the fast is over. For dinner this evening, my roommate was a few minutes late, so I had to sit at the table and stare at the bowl of fresh pasta sitting in front of me. Then we had spaghetti, goat cheese spread on bread, and what I identified as spanikopita, but Giovanna says it’s Italian and it’s called something else in Italian, but it was identical to spanikopita. So tasty-good. We had a pineapple cake she made from scratch: dolce di ananas. There’s still some left too for tomorrow! I said it once and I’ll say it again, this woman knows how to make deserts. My Italian is coming along nicely. I’m the best at Italian out of the five students from our program who are on my basketball team. I talk to the guys who don’t speak English and one of the guys said today that I spoke very well! Ha! I’ve also started trying to read the newspapers and am slowly understanding more: Obama looked more impressive than McCain in the second presidential debate. They said Obama won (as if it were a game), but I’m assuming that just meant he spoke well. Don’t know.
Other news: we won the first game of the soccer playoffs. We barely beat this really good team from a school here in town. They had a player named Fabriccio, who was filthy good. Somehow I got roped into staying for the second team’s game and we have five players and lost 3-7, but I scored a goal! We played the final 5 minutes of the game with four players. It was wicked exhausting. They had a student on their team who was a semi-pro, whatever that means. Well, actually what that means is that he is unstoppable. He scored all seven of their goals. I felt less bad about the loss after I learned that.
As far as women are concerned, there is nothing and there is nothing on the horizon. I get on the bus and find women that I am in love with. It happens two or three times a day that I see the most beautiful girl I have ever seen. Absurd. I don’t think I can ever leave this country. When they drive the scooters… that’s it for me. I’m sore. And tired. But not very hungry. Life is good.
-AJC
Monday, October 6, 2008
Aloooora
1. Introduction
2. The night of terror
3. calcetto/ big family dinner
So yesterday was a little bit absurd. The night before, Giovanna had made us amazing couscous with carrots, potatoes and fish. We also ate tomatoes with fresh mozzarella and olive oil. I’m not sure exactly what triggered the next series of events, but I was faced with the arduous task of trying not to bleed all over the white carpet (seriously, who puts a white carpet in a bathroom?) as well as trying to keep my vomit in the toilet. You see, I had skinned my knee pretty badly playing soccer earlier that day and I was going to clean it in the shower that night, but before I could, a wave of nausea hit me and I tried to go to sleep before I could vomit. That’s the “go-to” move in college. It turns out that when unrelated to drinking, that tactic doesn’t work. The last time I vomited, George Bush senior was the president, the Soviet Union was still together and the Trail blazers were vying for basketball championships. It was odd to experience that whole thing again. Not at all very fun. I would really have rather not partaken. When I was finished, I crawled into bed and decided to leave the damage report for the morning.
When I woke up, I had three hours until class, which left plenty of time to study for the quiz that I was unable to prepare for the night before. I cleaned the blood off the previously white carpet and discovered that the toilet was fine. I breakfasted, packed my bag, was headed out the door when I realized I didn’t have my keys. I went back to my room, and found nothing. I searched and searched and when I was fairly sure they weren’t in my room, I told Giovanna and she thought that maybe I had left them in the door. Since they weren’t still in the door, that could mean someone had taken them and now had the key to our apartment. If this were the case, we would need to have the apartment re-keyed as soon as possible. The keys to the doors in Florence look like the keys to medieval dungeons (Fiorentines don’t mess around with security). The long and the short of it is that I reaaally didn’t want to have to pay to have the apartment re-keyed. So after about 95 minutes of searching, I had about 30 minutes until class time and I decided to go. I grabbed my bag to check it one more time, and of course found the keys in a pouch of the bag that I didn’t know existed until this morning. I am a big genius. I was relieved and booked it to the bus to head to class. I showed up to Italian class about 10 minutes late, shared with the class that I vomited (ho vomitato ieri sera) and promptly bombed the quiz that between the vomiting, bleeding and loss of keys, I astonishingly didn’t have time to study for. I’m so upset with life at this point, that when I get to my next class where we had about 80 pages of reading that I didn’t do, I sort of shut down.
After all of that, we had our final soccer game, where I head-butted a guy going for the ball in a heart-breaking 3-4 loss. I then booked it home to try to be presentable for a dinner both of Giovanna’s sons and her oldest son’s wife and two children. They all spoke Italian and had a great time while my roommate and I sat there grinning stupidly and trying to eat whatever was put in front of us. Among the most exciting things were Chicken liver pate, fish-butter (that’s as good as it sounds), squid tentacles, spinach salad with raw fish and prosciuto on bread. I didn’t eat most of it because it wasn’t kosher, but also because my stomach was still a little upset with me from the night before and the frantic key search and the head-butting. Desert was an amazing flan served with fresh kiwi, pear, grapes, apples and tangerines. I had two servings of that and went and split a bottle of wine with a bunch of friends in front of Palazzo Pitti. It was a nice end to one of the worst days of my life!
2. The night of terror
3. calcetto/ big family dinner
So yesterday was a little bit absurd. The night before, Giovanna had made us amazing couscous with carrots, potatoes and fish. We also ate tomatoes with fresh mozzarella and olive oil. I’m not sure exactly what triggered the next series of events, but I was faced with the arduous task of trying not to bleed all over the white carpet (seriously, who puts a white carpet in a bathroom?) as well as trying to keep my vomit in the toilet. You see, I had skinned my knee pretty badly playing soccer earlier that day and I was going to clean it in the shower that night, but before I could, a wave of nausea hit me and I tried to go to sleep before I could vomit. That’s the “go-to” move in college. It turns out that when unrelated to drinking, that tactic doesn’t work. The last time I vomited, George Bush senior was the president, the Soviet Union was still together and the Trail blazers were vying for basketball championships. It was odd to experience that whole thing again. Not at all very fun. I would really have rather not partaken. When I was finished, I crawled into bed and decided to leave the damage report for the morning.
When I woke up, I had three hours until class, which left plenty of time to study for the quiz that I was unable to prepare for the night before. I cleaned the blood off the previously white carpet and discovered that the toilet was fine. I breakfasted, packed my bag, was headed out the door when I realized I didn’t have my keys. I went back to my room, and found nothing. I searched and searched and when I was fairly sure they weren’t in my room, I told Giovanna and she thought that maybe I had left them in the door. Since they weren’t still in the door, that could mean someone had taken them and now had the key to our apartment. If this were the case, we would need to have the apartment re-keyed as soon as possible. The keys to the doors in Florence look like the keys to medieval dungeons (Fiorentines don’t mess around with security). The long and the short of it is that I reaaally didn’t want to have to pay to have the apartment re-keyed. So after about 95 minutes of searching, I had about 30 minutes until class time and I decided to go. I grabbed my bag to check it one more time, and of course found the keys in a pouch of the bag that I didn’t know existed until this morning. I am a big genius. I was relieved and booked it to the bus to head to class. I showed up to Italian class about 10 minutes late, shared with the class that I vomited (ho vomitato ieri sera) and promptly bombed the quiz that between the vomiting, bleeding and loss of keys, I astonishingly didn’t have time to study for. I’m so upset with life at this point, that when I get to my next class where we had about 80 pages of reading that I didn’t do, I sort of shut down.
After all of that, we had our final soccer game, where I head-butted a guy going for the ball in a heart-breaking 3-4 loss. I then booked it home to try to be presentable for a dinner both of Giovanna’s sons and her oldest son’s wife and two children. They all spoke Italian and had a great time while my roommate and I sat there grinning stupidly and trying to eat whatever was put in front of us. Among the most exciting things were Chicken liver pate, fish-butter (that’s as good as it sounds), squid tentacles, spinach salad with raw fish and prosciuto on bread. I didn’t eat most of it because it wasn’t kosher, but also because my stomach was still a little upset with me from the night before and the frantic key search and the head-butting. Desert was an amazing flan served with fresh kiwi, pear, grapes, apples and tangerines. I had two servings of that and went and split a bottle of wine with a bunch of friends in front of Palazzo Pitti. It was a nice end to one of the worst days of my life!
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