Everyday Life

It's a cozy Friday afternoon, and I am procrastinating packing everything needed for a 9 day vacation into my backpack (packing efficiently has never been my forte). So before I leave for my grand adventure, I thought I'd give you a little insight into my everyday life in Florence.

I'm taking four classes, all of which I actually like.

Italian is very interesting to learn and I am slowly picking up on vocab and grammar. It's similar to Spanish, which I know a little of and it's been helpful to have a background in Latin (although I don't remember much).

Psychology of crime is absolutely fascinating. Last year and this past summer I watched a lot of the TV show "Criminal Minds," and therefore I find the material of Psych of crime very interesting. We discuss lots of different theories of criminal behavior and victimization, and we also discuss major controversial issues within the field such as the death penalty. Recently, we went on a field trip to the serial killer museum here in Florence.

Fashion design has proved to be my hardest class, although seeing my hard work pay off has been very rewarding. The first thing my teacher made us do on the first day of class was draw a model in our favorite outfit. Not let me tell you, I can NOT draw. I have good handwriting and I love to color, but I absolutely positively can NOT draw. So I was literally laughing out loud at my little first day drawing. However, we recently handed in our mid-term project and I was pretty proud of mine. Let me show you the results of many, many hours of work for my fashion design mid-term:

The instructions for the mid-term were to create a moodboard and three outfits inspired by the Gothic Lolita style. The Gothic Lolita style is basically a combination of Victorian and Gothic. This is my moodboard, which is basically a visual representation of the style you are being inspired by. It's your way of communicating to other people what your inspiration is.

These are my three outfits. My favorite is the last one. In fact, if someone made this dress for me, I would wear it. I was very proud of how they turned out, and I a newfound appreciation for animation artists.

My last class, Food and Wine pairing, is my absolute favorite. Essentially we learn about food, then cook it and pair it with wine. At the end of every class, we eat the food we've cooked and drink wine. We make some incredible food too. Last week was my favorite because we made all sorts of seafood, which is my favorite food:

As an appetizer, we made slices of croutons with smoked salmon on top. On top of the smoked salmon we added a little piece of lemon and drizzled melted butter on top.

The next course was pasta with clams and tomatoes.

The main course was fried seafood. We fried some anchovies, calamari and shrimp. I had never had anchovies, but they were actually really good! I also learned that anchovies are in caesar salad dressing.

When I'm not in class, I'm usually on some sort of adventure with one or more of my lovely roommates:

This is Katie, aka Kmc (pronounced "Kay-mick"). She is my direct roommate, so when we go to bed at the same time, we have pillow talk. Katie is a gentle spirit and really loves her dog, so we talk about our dogs a lot. She is studying art and is incredible at anything requiring artistic talent, although she will always be modest about it. She is also a vegetarian, which has really fascinated the other three of us who are big meat-lovers.

This is Sam, aka "Dallas Diva." Although actually from Austin, Sam is the definition of sweet and sassy, and I mean this is the most positive sense. Sam is studying interior design and is really struggling with the fact that we can't decorate our apartment. Sam and I share intense loves of Starbucks, Ryan Reynolds, chocolate and Diet Coke (Coke Zero for the Diva). Sam is always keeping us updated on celebrity gossip and new movie releases.

This is Kristen, aka "Tewks." She hails from Tewskbury, which is near Boston and has the best accent, although she will always deny it. One time she tried to tell someone she was from Florida, and they told her that she was absolutely not because her accent is so strong. Tewks is like rays of sunshine and the minute she comes into the living room we are laughing because she is so funny. She is always keeping our apartment lively with some "jams" (music).

I love all three of my roommates, and we often talk about how lucky we are to be living together because we've heard of other people who have some rough rooming situations.

Tomorrow morning, Katie, Sam and I are leaving on our big fall break adventure. We are very sad that Tewks is not coming with, but she is going to Morocco, which will also be awesome. Tomorrow we take a train to Milan where we will stay for a day. Sunday we fly to Prague for a day, then to Paris for two days, London for three days, and Edinburgh for a day. We are very very excited for all the fun we will have, and also for Starbucks. Prayers for safe travels are much appreciated, with the recent travel alerts. I will have lots of pictures and stories to post when I return!

Ciao,

Sarah

Venice

Sunday morning we headed to Venice. Now I have seen a lot of things in the two months I've been here, but I have never seen any city in my life as unique as Venice. First of all, in order to get to Venice you have to take a boat. Venice is built on an archipelago of 117 islands formed by 177 canals in a shallow lagoon. The islands are all connected by 409 adorable little bridges:

Because of this, all transportation is by foot or boat. The classic Venetian boat is the gondola, which we took full advantage of:

Some of the Reparata girls on the gondola! It was very romantic.

One of the most interesting things about Venice is that it is actually sinking. Recent research shows that it may not be sinking anymore, but that has not be officially confirmed. The city is still sometimes threatened by frequent low-level floods, however. In fact, when we were visiting it rained the whole day. I purchased an umbrella, which was destroyed within the first five minutes of our tour due to the wind. However, regardless of the weather, Venice was incredible and may even be my favorite place we've visited:

One of the churches in Venice.

A view from one of the bridges.

Piazza San Marco

Mozart's house!

The view from Piazza San Marco.

Another unique thing about Venice is the plethora of masks that exist:

The reason that there are so many masks is because there is a huge carnival in Venice every year from two weeks before Ash Wednesday through Mardi Gras. The carnival initially started started as a time of celebration through all social classes, as the masks hid any form of identity between social classes. Now the carnival is mainly held to bring back the culture and history of Venice.

Isn't this a good look for me?

As we were heading back to the boat, we found all these pigeons in Piazza San Marco. One of my friends had a granola bar, so we used it to feed the pigeons and one of them jumped on my hand!

Overall, Venice was absolutely beautiful and I want to go back as soon as possible.

Ciao,

Sarah

Verona

Early Saturday morning started our third excursion with our program to Verona and Venice. We spent Saturday morning and early afternoon in Verona, which is a beautiful town. At risk of being really repetitive with my pictures, I am going to show you the most unique things about Verona.

This building is an excellent example of how all the buildings in Verona used to look. The whole outside of the building is painted with frescoes. In Roman times, the entire outside and inside of buildings were painted with frescoes.

Some of an original road in Verona. It was actually true that "all roads led to Rome," and if I remember correctly this was a major road that led from Verona to Rome.

Verona is probably most well-known as the setting for Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet." We learned that although Romeo and Juliet never actually existed in Verona, their families or families similar to the ones in the story did exist. This is what they say is the entrance to Romeo's house.

This is one of the walls of the pathway that lead's to Juliet's house. People used to be able to leave letters on Juliet's wall asking questions about love. If you've seen "Letters to Juliet," it was similar to what happens in the movie. This is no longer allowed, but you can write something on either side of the pathway that leads to Juliet's house.

Juliet's famous balcony.

Legend has it that if you touch Juliet's golden breast, you and your lover will happy forever.

This is a huge theatre in Verona. It is like a smaller version of the Colosseum.

In the late afternoon, we went a little outside of Verona to a quaint little vineyard and had wine tasting:

We tried three different red wines, including one sweet red wine which was delicious. I have never liked red wine very much, but since being here it has really grown on me. The host had some delicious cheese with jam on top to serve with the wine. It was so classy.

After the wine tasting, we took a tour of the vineyard and learned a little bit about the process of making wine. The process of making wine begins with the harvest of the grapes:

The beautiful vineyard.

They take only the best grapes from the vines. The rest are left for tourists like us to taste :)

The grapes are then places in wooden crates so that they can dry out:

As the grapes dry out, the sugar concentration increases in the grape which increases the alcohol content.

After the grapes are dried, they are all mashed up in this big machine:

Once the grapes are all mashed up, the chemicals and spices are added and the mixture is placed in large metal containers to initiate the fermentation process. Once the mixture has fermented, the wine is placed into wooden barrels to allow them to age:

Once the wine has aged the specified amount of time, the owners bottle it to sell:

Just like with the balsamic vinegar experience, this was another experience that was very non-touristy. Verona and the vineyard was another wonderful Italian Saturday :)

Ciao,

Sarah

Eurochocolate

Last weekend was quite eventful. In order to tell you everything that I want to, I'm going to split up the weekend into three different blog posts. So bright and early Friday morning started this very eventful weekend. My food and wine class took a field trip to the one and only:

Eurochocolate festival!!!! How cute is this sign?

The Eurochocolate festival is held every year in Perugia, Italy which is not far from Florence. Although we had to get up very early, the other girls in my class and I were super excited to experience the festival... what girl doesn't love chocolate? So we rode a bus to a parking lot and then took this absolutely adorable little tram to Perugia, which is situated high up on a hill:

We talked about how cute these little trams are for like ten minutes. Such girls.

Although smaller than I expected, the chocolate festival was everything I expected- everything you could imagine in chocolate. We tasted samples of hot chocolate (which was literally like liquid chocolate it was so thick), milk chocolate, dark chocolate, chocolate liquore, and my favorite the chocolate covered cherries. Now normally I don't like chocolate covered cherries, but these cherries were so small and so sweet it was hard not to love them. We walked around the entire festival, browsing all the options for chocolate purchases:

The standard chocolate bar.

Chocolate pizzas. You could even order just a slice!

They even had chocolate-like products for dogs! I almost made a purchase for Bennett, but then decided to save my money knowing he would never appreciate it fully.

I clearly made some purchases. My first purchase was dark-chocolate covered almonds, which were so delicious I ate them before I could even take a picture! I also bought three little chocolate bars:

The one on the left is lavender flavored, the middle one is berry flavored and the one on the right has chili pepper flakes on it.

Getting up close and personal with my dark chocolate berry-flavored chocolate bar. So delicious!

Overall, the Eurochocolate festival was a wonderful time. It was nice to get to know the girls in my food and wine class a little better and I obviously enjoyed the plethora of chocolate.

Ciao,

Sarah

Boboli Gardens

A couple weeks ago, I was feeling very anxious. I was talking to the girls down the street and they suggested that we go to the Boboli Gardens here in Florence. I had wanted to go for a while, especially since we have these special passes that let us go for free. So we spent one afternoon at these beautiful gardens behind the Pitti Palace across the river.

The Pitti Palace was the main seat of the Medici grand dukes of Tuscany at Florence and the gardens are located behind the Pitti Palace. The gardens were initially made for the wife of Cosimo I de'Medici, Eleonora di Toledo. She felt restricted in the Palace and wanted a place where she could walk around freely.

Spending the afternoon in the gardens was wonderful. Not only are they absolutely beautiful, but something about being in wide open spaces feels soothing to me. My anxiousness came to rest and I felt much more at ease.

I am hoping you are all enjoying your fall. Fall, especially October, is one of my favorite times of year. I even made my sister send me pictures of the trees in our yard that turn from a bold green to vibrant oranges and reds every year. I am definitely missing the changing of the leaves. I am also missing Starbucks' Pumpkin Spice latte, which is one of my favs. But most of all, I missing all of you :)

Ciao,

Sarah

A Weekend in Florence

So I've realized that I am always writing about things that happened about ten days ago, and I am really going to try and get better at that. I also want to try and write more often, so that you can have a few more details of the fabulous things I am doing! But for now, let me recap a couple weekends ago.

It was my first weekend actually IN Florence since the first weekend we arrived. I felt like I could finally catch my breath. Don't get me wrong, all the traveling was exciting and adventurous, but it was starting to get exhausting as well. However, I did not want to waste my precious time that I had in the city that I am actually living in, so the weekend was packed with fun activities.

The weekend started with a climb to the top of the Duomo. A friend, Kristen, and I started by just walking into the Duomo and looking around:

While the whole exterior and interior of this building is absolutely breath-taking, my favorite part of the inside is the ceiling of the dome-shaped part:

After looking around, Kristen and I paid our 8 euro and began the trek to the top. We made a quick stop along the way to get a birds eye view of inside the Duomo:

En route to the very top, I thought about all the things that I have climbed to the top of while being in Europe. I think there is just something about a landscape view that gives you such great perspective on how big and beautiful the world we live in is. This view did not disappoint:

Worth every step of the climb!

After we climbed back down, we met up with a few other friends to head somewhere that I can't even remember. The reason I can't remember is because I was so concerned that I had broken my second pair of shoes. My mother will be the first to tell you that I am incredibly accident-prone (at one time in my life, I was given the nickname "Crip" by my dad because I was crippled from so many accidents) and these cobblestone roads have not helped me one bit. So I have now broken two pairs of perfectly good shoes, simply from tripping over them so much. How embarrassing.

Saturday morning, we got up bright and early for a little excursion to the lovely town of Bologna:

Now the very first thing I noticed about Bologna is how many arches there are! They are everywhere:

We took a little tour of the city, which included Europe's first university, the University of Bologna (it began in 1088):

We got to look inside the anatomy room, which was incredibly interesting. They would lay cadavers out on this table in the middle of the room:

Since, at the time, there was no way to preserve the bodies, anatomy labs lasted 24 hours. The teacher would stand up at a podium and tell the student what to do. For those 24 hours, the student was not allowed to sit down or eat. Thank goodness science has advanced!

We also got to see a marble replica of the Holy Sepulchre that is in Jerusalem:

The rest of our tour took us through little streets, many of which displayed tortellini and mortadella (bologna), two specialties of Bologna:

Delicious!

Can I just bring to your attention how massive this piece of mortadella (bologna) is?

After our tour ended, we caught the end of a little medieval parade that was going on in the city center:

These are the Firenze drumline men.

Later in the afternoon we headed to a town right outside of Bologna to a balsamic vinegar vineyard. We were so lucky to have beautiful weather, as the vineyard was so beautiful itself:

I never knew that the process of making balsamic vinegar was so involved and specific! It's very similar to the making of wine. First, beautiful grapes are harvested from the vineyard:

The most delicious grapes I've ever had!

The juice of the grapes is boiled in these huge boilers until the juice becomes a thick syrup:

Once the juice becomes a thick syrup, it is transfered to wooden barrels to begin the aging process:

Bacteria is added to oxidize the syrup and turn it into vinegar. As the vinegar is aged longer, it becomes thicker and sweeter. The type of wood that the barrel is made out of has an effect on the taste of the vinegar as well. We tasted vinegar that had been aged for 7, 17, 30 and even 50 years! You can absolutely taste how thick and rich the vinegar is the longer it is aged. The owners of the vineyard laid out a spread of all sorts of snacks to try the balsamic vinegar on- it included quiche, foccacia bread, cheese and meat samples, bruschetta and even brownies! Everything was absolutely delicious and I was thrilled to have experienced something very non-touristy.

Over this entire weekend, there was a huge market being held in front of Santa Croce. It included food, jewelry and chocolate from all different European countries. We made multiple trips to the market, but Sunday's visit was by far my favorite. I have noticed that Italians don't eat a lot of meat, and most meat they do eat is fine meat (prosciutto, salami, etc). As much as I love my carbohydrates, I am a huge meat-eater as well (not to mention I was convinced that my iron levels were dropping rapidly), so when I noticed the large bratwursts at the market, I knew I had to get one:

Everything on the menu happened to be in a different language, so Kristen and I thought we ordered the bratwurst, but we came to find out that we had ordered this dish of cow intestines! We begged them to change our order and they graciously gave us our bratwurst. It was absolutely delicious with some sauerkraut and ketchup on top.

We then headed with our program to our very first Italian futbol game! We had so much fun getting all dressed up in purple (Firenze's colors are purple and white) and cheering on our team!:

Now I thought people were really intense about sports in America, but people are out of control here. In fact, it is required that there be a line of security people in between the Firenze fans and the opposing team's fans because people get so heated.

We unfortunately ended up losing 2-1, but it was a really fun thing to experience. Overall, the weekend was a lot of fun and very eventful!

Ciao,

Sarah