Weekend Update: 9/24-9/29

This post is a quick study break for me just to get caught up on everything. I last posted on Friday afternoon before going to run some errands…

Jeff Koons in Piazza della Signoria: there is one piece out in the Piazza, and one piece inside Palazzo Vecchio (that requires paid admission). The outdoor piece, titled Pluto and Proserpina, is very shiny and seems a bit out of place, but it looks super cool. It totally juxtaposes itself in between the classical statues surrounding it, with the backdrop of the Palazzo Vecchio.

Friday afternoon we went back to Piazza SS Annunziata for the French pop-up market. We would later return both Saturday and Sunday… Needless to say, we’ve had plenty of delicious pastries and some delicious baguettes (finally bread with salt!). We definitely spoiled ourselves and now the piazza is empty and sad looking. This time they had eclairs! I got a chocolate one and even though it wasn’t super fresh, it was absolutely delicious and definitely the best (first too?) eclair I’ve ever had.

As we were leaving, some of my friends called and said they were at the top of the Duomo. I knew they were going up that afternoon so I brought my camera and was able to get some really cool pictures of them at the top — from the ground! I didn’t even have to go up the bell tower (though that would’ve made for a bit cooler pictures). I’ll post one below.

Friday night we tried to go out for aperitivo but the place that was recommended to us was too far, and by the time we got there (which was almost 40 minutes!) we couldn’t even get a table. We ended up at a pizza place nearby that was pretty good. We were pretty far East on the other side of the river, so not a tourist or other American in sight.

Saturday morning I went with a few friends to the grand opening of the Apple Store in Piazza della Repubblica. There were probably 300-400 people in line by 9:55am when we arrived. We had no real need to go inside, so after seeing the applause and camera flashes, we headed over to the French market for some breakfast pastries.

Saturday night we tried out a Chinese place that came straight from our beloved Girl in Florence’s blog (not sure if I mentioned it before, but we’ve started to befriend her/see her around town, so we need to take advantage of having her “celebrity” connection — I’m also meeting another blogger next week who I’m trying to do some photo work for. More on that when it happens). Rosticceria Cinese Xing Wang (Chinese Restaurant Xing Wang) is a very short walk from our apartment and even closer to Piazza SS Annunziata (hellooooo French market!) The prices are insanely cheap and they deliver for 2,50-Euros! This will for sure be our go-to for lazy nights in. We averaged about 4,50-Euros per person for an entree and a rice dish! The portions weren’t huge, but big enough to share, and cheap enough that you can’t order too many dishes. Let’s be real here, nobody ever complains about having leftover Chinese food in the fridge.

Sunday morning was Corri La Vita, the local breast cancer walk. According to the internet later, there were 30,000 of us who participated. It started at the Duomo and was pretty chaotic, with masses of people unsure where to go — some were running 13k, and others (myself included) were only walking 5k. When it finally began, the crowd moved so painfully slow that it was difficult to enjoy. It was a brisky morning and we all had our matching pink shirts on. We heard almost no English the whole time, which is always cool, meaning that it was a mostly local Italian crowd. We did see a few NYU students at one point — their program gives them nice baseball hats.

The walk took us down to the river, at which point it became a free for all. Some people crossed the Ponte Vecchio. Others crossed the next bridge over — Santa Trinita — and the official route  was to cross even farther at one more bridge west. We crossed Ponte Santa Trinita. Instead of getting sucked back into the slow masses, we just decided to do our own thing, which wasn’t really a problem. All over Oltrarno (the neighborhood on the other side of the river) were groups of people clad in pink. We walked South a bit before reconnecting with the official route at the entrance to the Pitti Palace.

The Palace was open for free on Sunday, as were any gardens, villas, and museums along the route. At this point, it was no longer an organized 5k and more of a “stop and look around, explore the city” type of vibe, which was super awesome. We got to explore the outside of the Pitti Palace, the Boboli Gardens, and Fort Belvedere (where Kim Kardashian and Kanye West got married.) Eventually we made it back to the route, which led us down to the river and across Ponte alle Grazie (right by our apartment.) We finished the route, through the Uffizi entranceway and into Piazza della Signoria, where we got some free water, tea, lemonade, bananas, and oranges. It was really neat to be a part of and we got some cool shirts for only 10-Euros.

Sunday afternoon found us once again at the French market, this time buying all three remaining baguettes. They had just come out fresh and we managed to snag them before the crowd could get their hands on them — in reality we were incredibly lucky, the service was horribly slow and we managed to overhear “tre minuti per baguettes” and it worked out perfectly. We later made fantastic garlic bread and a delicious pasta salad.

Monday morning was my group’s oral presentation in class. The first group to go was very funny. The second group’s wasn’t bad. And then we finished up strong. I played the David statue (wearing a David apron — yes, featuring the penis), and had to show the other two girls around Florence. Everyone seemed to enjoy it and it went surprisingly well considering we only rehearsed twice on Monday morning; both of my partners had been out of town all weekend.

Last night I had some friends over to make dinner. My housemate David used to run a few restaurants at home in Tijuana (he took a few years off before going to UC Santa Cruz, he’s 25) and is a very talented chef. We make dinners together probably 3-5 times a week and they’re always delicious. Last night our friends Annie and Lara came over for meatballs and green beans.

In Italy, meatballs don’t go with pasta. They go with sauce and that’s it. Meat does not go on pasta here in large amounts — only in small chunks (a la Bolognese sauce.) At this point, I’ve gotten pretty perfect at making fresh tomato sauces (chop fresh tomatoes, saute garlic and and then add the tomatoes, add some tomato pasta, salt, pepper, a bit of sugar, a little Oregano and a bit of basil at the end if we have any.) Last night’s was absolutely incredible, probably due to the delicious meatballs cooking in it for nearly an hour. It was absolutely delicious and the green beans were fantastic too (I’ve recently gotten really into green beans.)

Oh, also today we went back to the Chinese place for lunch. 4,50 per person and we got about 6 dishes (including pot stickers and fried rice!) and split it all. Absolutely delicious and worth it.

Jeff Koons in Piazza della Signoria

French market eclair

Apple Store opening

Corri La Vitta Starting Line

Me and two of my housemates at Corri La Vita

Along the river during Corri La Vita

Palazzo Pitti during Corri La Vita

Homemade meatballs with a fresh sauce and some green beans

Pasta salad with some phenomenal garlic bread

Friends on the Duomo

Dreaming of Gelato: 9/23

Wednesday night was pretty much a dream. I got to go behind the counter at my favorite gelateria and scoop for two hours! Scooping was surprisingly easy and incredibly fun. I would happily do it again.

It all started a few weeks back. We were hanging out at My Sugar and asked if they ever needed any help and they mentioned there was an event on the 23rd. Turns out, The Florentine, the English newspaper here, was putting on a free tasting event. They asked if we could come help out and translate, since their English is pretty minimal.

So this past Wednesday night, my friends Annie, Rachel and I headed over to My Sugar a little after 5ish to get ready for the event from 6-8pm. We were greeted by Julia, who came around and greeted us the proper Italian way, with a kiss on each side. She took us out and around through the building entrance — conveniently next door to the shop — and behind a few locked doors into the store! Behind the counter… behind the sinks and scoopers… behind the containers with all the cups and spoons… behind the big freezer. Later on, I got to view what I referred to as “Alberto’s secret lab” upstairs, with the actual gelato machines and his test kitchen.

Side note: the compost movement hasn’t really picked up here, so everyone still uses the same paper ice cream cups — not the cool compostable ones that are everywhere in the Bay Area. However, there isn’t any styrofoam, at all. But the Italians are far more resourceful. “Zip loc” bags, which don’t really exist, are re used. You get a bag of little plastic bags and TIES, they don’t zip! In America, we trash them after one use. Here? You wash it with a little soap and reuse it! On a similar note, most places don’t have dryers. Luckily we have a nice drying rack to hang our clothes on, otherwise they’d be clipped to a string out the window!

Allora (next), they told us how the night would go down. They had three new special flavors (chocolate rum, Greek yogurt with honey and sesame, and melacota — this one isn’t actually new — but it’s ricotta cheese with apples and cinnamon). Each person would taste them all and then they had to try to guess what they got! They would get a piece of paper to write their guesses on, and after submitting it, they got a coupon for a free scoop next time. In addition, every entry (right or wrong guesses!) was eligible for a raffle every 30 minutes for a prize. We didn’t end up getting to see what the prizes were since they did the raffles outside on the street. It was a busy night. There was so much foot traffic for awhile that it even blocked the road!

Our role was to scoop. Alberto would hang out with us and Julia was out in front meeting people and running the contest (her English is much better than his.) A little before 6, The Florentine people (a photographer and one or two head people) came by and started to set up some signage and an abundance of free newspapers. Customers started coming in and we would explain how it would work, give them their cup, and then try to get them to move out of the way so we could serve the next person. This last part proved difficult, as people liked to just stand there for awhile and ponder what they were tasting. Very few people guessed right.

Sadly, very few of our friends made it, even though we had told countless people and sent even more an invite on Facebook. All of the UC program had a big test the next morning and most people didn’t want to leave for free gelato. My Sugar isn’t super close to most of the student apartments, so unfortunately most people didn’t make it. My four housemates came though, which was really nice.

After a very fun, and busy, two hours, we closed down the shop. We took off our aprons and said goodbye to the behind-the-scenes tour of My Sugar. They told us they had made a reservation for apertivo nearby. One of our favorite bloggers here, Girl in Florence, had been hanging out for most of the evening with her dog and her fiance. They were there until the end, and we all hung out in front of the shop for a few minutes. Then we headed up the street two blocks to Kitsch.

Aperitivo traditionally is just a before-dinner drink and some light snacks. Now it’s become a whole ordeal, and if the food is good enough, or there is enough variety, it’s very easy to make a full dinner out of it. It’s also usually cheap. This place Kitsch is known for having some of the best aperitivo in town. We all ordered a drink and then went to the buffet in the back. It was HUGE. There were so many options, all delicious. I had a massive plate with a few types of pasta, some chicken, I think some fish, a bit of a potato dish, some veggies, some more veggies, and a few onion rings on top. I skipped over the hot dogs.

As the night went on, we started getting a little nervous because it was so late. Annie was more nervous than Rachel and I, but having a long dinner only in Italian is far better studying than going through flashcards of vocab or verb conjugations. We ended up at Kitsch for almost two hours! We left just after 10ish.

Speaking solely in Italian wasn’t easy, but I could definitely understand almost all of what they were saying. I’m at the point now where I can usually say what I want, or ask the right questions, but the verb tense and grammar isn’t perfect. Most of the time, it’s fine! People are very appreciative of the effort to speak, and a smile doesn’t hurt either. Most people are happy to help when I can’t finish a sentence and have to ask “come se dice…?”

We learned that they aren’t married… yet! But they’ve been together for five years and are hopefully getting married next summer — once in Korea for her family, and once in Italy for his. Maybe we’ll get an invite, just so I have an excuse to come back to Florence so soon.

They also invited us over for lunch one day. Julia said she’d make us Korean BBQ, which they don’t have here in Florence! We’ll have to wait until November though, when they will start closing on Sundays. Right now they’re working a full seven days each week. Also, this week Julia leaves for Korea for two weeks, leaving Alberto flying solo. He’s going to a bachelor party in Spain for a few days, but the rest he’ll be working alone. Maybe this will be a good time to try to work a few nights or learn from him on the weekends. In return, we told them we’d have them over for a Hanukkah party, as well as maybe Thanksgiving too. Overall, the aperitivo was delicious, and the conversation flowed well throughout the two hours, something I initially was nervous about. We had plenty to talk about and were able to communicate well for most of the night. There weren’t any awkward silences, instead there were selfies.

Wednesday night was great. We got to scoop gelato, get in a bunch of people’s pictures (of a very crowded store!), go out for aperitivo (they paid too!), all while hanging out with Italians! This is why we study abroad — not to go to American bars, not to hang out with other students from California — to get involved in the culture and make friends here.

A busy night at My Sugar

Behind the counter in our uniforms

Out at aperitivo with Julia and Alberto

Me scooping my very first scoop of gelato, my favorite flavor Caffè

After a successful two hours

Week 4: 9/21-9/25

Like last week, this week got off to a slower start. Monday was pretty uneventful. After class, I saw a doctor about my ear. He confirmed what I had suspected — it’s probably nothing, but just in case there is a minor infection, I might as well take antibiotics for a week than risk travelling soon and making it worse. I also asked him what to do about all of the mosquito bites we’ve been getting. He laughed and said “welcome to Florence.”

Tuesday was a big day: my art history class was scheduled to climb the Duomo. This has been a fear of mine since November 2010, when I first came to Florence with my family and didn’t make it all the way up. The days leading up to class were filled with lots of mental training, meditation, and confidence building. Tuesday afternoon I put on my good Nikes, some shorts, threw my camera in my backpack and put on some extra deodorant. I even brought my AriZona Tea hat and crew neck, hoping to get some good content for them when they eventually expand to Italy (right now they’re only in a few European countries, but I figure I’ll get a head start and create some stuff for them while I’m here.)

Our class met at The Baptistry, where we had a brief lecture inside the absolutely beautiful building. From the outside, which is currently covered in scaffolding, you would have no idea that on the inside it’s actually all one big room! After the lecture, we went outside to view Ghiberti’s North and East gates (the East ones are the famous Gates of Paradise), followed by a brief lecture across the street about the construction of the Duomo itself.

Disclaimer: while for the sake of simplicity (and you, the reader), I refer to the actual dome of the Cathedral itself as the Duomo, this is incorrect. In Italian, duomo means cathedral, so the Duomo is the massive Cathedral in the center of Florence. The cupola is the actual dome on top of the Cathedral, which was completed 150 years after the rest of the Duomo.

At this point, my teacher told us that our tickets were good to climb the Duomo for the next 24 hours, which she told us was optional, but highly recommended. We walked over and unfortunately found a massive line (not surprising, as it was a nice Tuesday afternoon in September). After asking the people at the front of the line, we determined that we didn’t want to stand in line for over an hour, when we could come back in mid-November and have zero wait.

Instead, a few of us chose to go climb the Bell Tower, officially known as Giotto’s Campanile. There was no line for this, and I figured I would have no problem with the climb since there wasn’t a big open area inside, like at the base of the cupola (where I had to turn back down in 2010.) The beginning of the climb was easy — a relatively wide stairwell, fully enclosed. I can do that easy. Once we got the to first open-air observation area, that’s where I started feeling a little uneasy.

Alas, we kept going, and made it to the top. The fact that it was a windy afternoon really didn’t help either. Every step I took, I had to hold on to the railings on both sides (it’s a pretty narrow walkway around the top) and when we would stop, I would plant my feet pretty wide and completely block off the walkway. Honestly, I barely remember the views and didn’t even take that many pictures. I got a few pictures of me wearing my AriZona gear, none of which are usable unfortunately, thanks to the large wire enclosure around the top of the Campanile.

There was one cool moment though — our apartment actually has a nice view of the Campanile and the Duomo, and I brought my 55-300mm zoom lens up with me. I climbed up with one of my housemates, Evan, and two friends from our art history class, Becky and Alex. Evan and I went to the Southeast corner of the Campanile and very quickly were able to locate the apartment. It helped that our housemate David had left a big white towel flying out of the window too. I called my roommate Andrew and told him to go stand in the window and wave to us. Sure enough, I spotted him instantly on the camera! Check out the picture below, it’s pretty freaking cool.

The top of the Campanile yields an excellent view of the Duomo. I had the brilliant idea to take pictures of people at the top of the Duomo! I figured that if I was ever going to go up the Duomo, I would hire a friend to go up the bell tower and get a picture of me from across the way. Though the idea doesn’t seem super original, I’ve yet to find any examples of this. After our climb Tuesday though, I’m not sure I’ll be making it up the Duomo anytime soon. Instead, I decided that I would sacrifice being in the picture, and when I have friends go up the Duomo, I’ll go up the bell tower (assuming I convince someone to come with me) and will get some truly incredible pictures of them atop the Duomo. Everyone has pictures up there — from there — but to get a picture of yourself atop the Duomo from somewhere else! Now that would be cool.

Wednesday we were greeted with a gnarly thunderstorm on our way out of class. The hot and sunny morning gave way to a nearly hour long wild thunderstorm. We took shelter in Osteria Santo Spirito, across the Piazza from where we have class, and wrote our oral presentation for class there. Details will come later on that, but I can guarantee it will be the funniest in the class.

Wednesday night was one of my favorites so far this semester, so special in fact that it will be getting its own blog post after this. Spoiler alert: I get to live out a slight fantasy of mine and get to go behind the counter and work at a real gelateria artigianale. Stay tuned for that post.

Thursday morning we had our first big Italian test. It was way easier than any of us had expected, even though I didn’t study nearly as much as I wanted to (thanks to Wednesday’s excitement). The first part of the test was a listening comprehension, which unfortunately meant us listening to a short three person dialogue from the CD-Book, played through crappy speakers in our room with very high ceilings. The echo and poor sound quality made it almost impossible to comprehend anything that was said. Unfortunately, or fortunately I guess, this part of the test was only 5 questions worth a total of 7.5% of the whole test. I’m confident that I got maybe 1 out of 5 right… so sadly that could be my downfall of this test. Whatever.

Thursday afternoon we walked over to Piazza SS Annunziata, about 10 minutes Northeast of the Duomo. This week there is a pop up French market, with some phenomenal pastries and beautiful spices. We waited in a big line for paella, which definitely isn’t French, but it looked good and the long line seemed to be a clue that it would be amazing. Sadly, it wasn’t. And it was very overpriced. But the French baguette we got made up for it (FINALLY bread with salt in it!) We also bought a few other pastries that were heavenly.

It started to rain on my way back, where I then changed into my joggers (so so comfy) and proceeded to take a well earned nap. Finally I could take a nap this week and not have to set an alarm of when to get up. I stayed in and made a fantastic tomato sauce (I’m getting great at tomato sauces and vinaigrettes from scratch now) and had an easy night to myself. I also spent a few hours looking into things to do in Berlin and Paris. I’m super excited for Berlin. Because of the antibiotics, I can’t drink any alcohol (they told me not even a glass of wine) so it wasn’t worth it to go out for apertivo with everyone.

Today is a gloomy Friday. I slept in late and made myself an omelette and just had my leftover pasta for a late lunch.  After posting this I’m off to go register for Corri La Vita on Sunday (the local breast cancer walk) and then I want to stop by our coffee place for a quick espresso (I’m learning to like coffee now!) Two large works by Jeff Koons were just unveiled in Piazza della Signoria this morning, so I’ll have to stop by there as well. After I might go by the French market again just for a few pastries or a baguette.

Tomorrow morning the Apple Store opens here. It’s a pretty big deal, it’s the first/only one in all of Tuscany I believe. Assuming I can wake up early, I’d like to be there for the big 10am grand entrance and see the buzz. The new iPhones came out today as well, so there go my plans of stopping by Vodafone to renew my cell service and try to get their help activating my free year of Spotify Premium that comes with my plan.

Stay tuned later this afternoon for my post about Wednesday’s gelato adventures!

My roommate Andrew, as seen from the top of the Campanile

Campanile

Campanile

My macchiato con coco latte (coconut milk). The shop was playing Simon & Garfunkel on vinyl and it was raining outside. It was very tranquil

Apple Store opening sign

French market pastries

French market paella

French market with a view

Milan Trip: 9/17-9/19

Thursday after class — nearly right after class, the hour and half between class ending and our train departure went by way faster than we expected — we hopped on the FrecciaRossa to Milano. The FrecciaRossa is the fastest of TrenItalia’s fleet and is far nicer than the regional trains. I clocked us going 185mph on the way back. In total there were 4 of us — me and my friends Ross, Rachel and Annie (who I actually know from camp).

After navigating the wildly complex Milano Centrale station, we were on the M2 line of the Metro headed to our AirBnb, just 15 minutes outside of the city center. The apartment was about an 8 minute walk from the Udine stop and on the 5th floor of a pretty decent building. The inside of the apartment was far nicer than the outside of the building would suggest. It had AC — thank god — 2 good sized bedrooms, a nice bathroom, a nice kitchen, and a very comfortable living room. It did not however, have the dryer that we were promised; I had even brought a few pairs of jeans to wash and dry. We explored the neighborhood for a bit and found nothing exciting besides a huge (and cheap) grocery store just around the corner, called Coop. We’re not sure if it’s “co-op” or “coop” but there’s one in Florence and we love it, even though it’s about twice as far as the other main grocery store here, Conad. We found pancake mix (!!!), something we hadn’t been able to find in Florence, and stocked up some fresh berries for breakfast as well.

We headed back into the city for an 8:30pm reservation at Wang Jaio, a highly regarded local Chinese place with a few locations in and around Milan. The decor was unique but nice — I never expected cinderblocks to function so well as both pretty and a functional space divider. We knew we picked a good place by the sheer lack of tourists in the restaurant (and overall neighborhood.) The wait staff was all Chinese and we heard two languages when we walked in: Italian, and Chinese. The menu was entirely in Italian and we were a bit confused why everything was “spaghetti” or “tagliatelli” or various types of pasta. We quickly figured out that they are not actually different pasta dishes, but they are different noodle dishes, some with thin glass noodles (very delicious!) or others with thicker chow mein noodles. “Ravioli” was actually dumplings and I very much enjoyed our “Ravioli gamberi di vapore” which means “steamed shrimp dumplings.”

The rest of the dinner was very good, though Ross — who is Japanese, not Chinese — has very high Bay Area standards for Chinese food and wasn’t impressed. Either way, it was great considering we were in Italy and it was priced very well. At the end of the meal, we were brought two cut chunks of a yellow canary melon. It was so sweet and delicious; I’d never had one before and instantly was in love. There is currently one in our fridge that needs to ripen a bit more before I cut it. We asked for seconds, which seemed to appall the wait staff. They obliged, but charged us a whopping 6-Euros for two more slices.

After dinner we walked up a few blocks to grab some gelato and call an Uber to get us to the concert, which was outside the city center and next to the Linate airport. In Milan they only had Uber Black, so we received a very overly fancy Mercedes van. Unfortunately we took a bit too long with dinner and missed the first couple of songs at the concert, but the rest of the show was amazing. Leon Bridges is fantastic live, as well as very candid and humble in his banter with the crowd. Hearing people scream out for song requests with Italian accents was far funnier than one would imagine. The venue was outdoors and tiny — it was sold out too, with maybe 250-300 people there. We were able to sneak our way up to almost the very front.

When his set finished, we ran up and managed to get two setlists. After a few minutes, some of the band members came out and we talked to his incredible sax player for awhile. He told us to hang tight and that Leon would be out soon. A line started to form at the merch table and a crowd gathered as he walked out. We were able to talk to him for a solid few minutes — you could tell it was nice to be able to speak to fans that actually could understand English — and he signed our set lists and even came out from behind the merch table to take a picture with us.

The next morning, Annie got up early and left to go try to get us tickets to see The Last Supper, which we had seen online were both expensive and sold out. Neither seemed to be the case, as she was able to get us tickets for 5pm for only 6-Euros each. She went on her own and explored every possible area of the city. Rachel, Ross and I, on the other hand, had a delicious pancake breakfast and didn’t get to the city until noon. We walked around the Cathedral for a few minutes and headed over to the main shopping areas. How could we not spend a couple hours shopping in the fashion capitol of the world? I’m proud to say I bought only three pairs of pants — one maroon joggers (which are so comfortable I don’t think I’ll ever take them off), and two lightweight skinny pants, one gray and one khaki. After spending way too long at Bershka (the aforementioned shop), we went to a nice shoe store where Ross dropped 90-Euros on a nice pair of shoes before we had a quick lunch at Eataly.

Post lunch, we went to Porta Ticinese, where all three rivers in Milan meet. It was absolutely beautiful and it turns out Leonardo DaVinci designed the surrounding canals. Unfortunately we didn’t have a ton of time there as we head to get to the Church of Santa Maria delle Grazie to see The Last Supper. It was a very strictly regulated process to get in: the whole group enters one area, the door seals, then we go into the next sealed room, etc. After three of these, we were let into the Refectory (dining hall — where all Last Supper paintings are) and had 15 minutes exactly to look at the painting. I was surprised at how good of a condition the painting was in. I was expecting something tiny and enclosed, like the Mona Lisa is in Paris. This was far from that. I’d estimate it was about 20’ x 10’ and it was absolutely beautiful. The vast renovations were fantastic and the painting was truly astonishing to see in person. If you’re in Milan, it’s an absolute must.

After The Last Supper, we walked over to the Sforzesco Castle to walk around for a bit and grab a coffee in the cafe. Next to the castle is a beautiful huge park, full of runners, people on slack lines, people walking dogs, biking, relaxing, etc etc. It was this gorgeous park that we all wished we had in the center of Florence. After that we headed over to Mercato Municipale to meet with some of Rachel’s friends that did an exchange program with her high school. This place was so far off the beaten path for tourists. Everyone there was local and spoke little English (which is what we want!) There were a million options, from grilled chicken to fried chicken to fish to pizza, all sorts of vendors everywhere with not nearly enough seating for a crowded 9pm Friday night crowd. We opted for the most popular option — fried calamari and shrimp. It was absolutely delicious. After a quick gelato, we took the Metro back, which seemed to take forever after we had walked a whopping 13 miles in the day.

Saturday morning we split up; Ross and Rachel went to an American bakery for bagels and shopping while Annie and I went to the Fondazione Prada, just outside the city. It was well worth it. The Prada Foundation turned old industrial warehouses into modern art galleries, complete with a massive golden structure that was being used as a “haunted house.” I put haunted house in quotes because it’s a straight up misnomer. Some of the art in there was eerie, but it was by no means a haunted house of any sorts.

Unfortunately we had not even two hours to explore the Fondazione, even though we could have spent a solid four hours there. We ended our time at the Bar Luce in the complex, designed by Wes Anderson, the filmmaker, as a place that he “would want to sit to write a movie.” It felt exactly like the lobby of The Grand Budapest Hotel. It was great. We sat and relaxed for a few and I had a fantastic coffee — a marocchino — which is an espresso shot with cocoa dust and frothy milk. It was delicious.

After a silly decision to grab some sushi nearby, we had to run back to the Metro station and take a painfully slow 10-minute ride back to Milano Centrale. We ran through the main station; I almost knocked over a small child at one point. With just under 10 minutes to spare, we met up with Ross and Rachel and boarded the train back.

The train back was quick and effortless. The 1 hr 40 min ride felt like not even an hour and quickly we were back in the nice and humid city of Florence. It’s a bummer that we don’t have such a nice rail system in America. The ride through Tuscany was mostly through tunnels unfortunately — the Bologna station (the only stop on the way to Milan) is all underground. Actually after a quick Google search, only the high speed trains go underground, everything else is upstairs and outside. But overall the trip was great. We didn’t spend too much on meals or shopping, and got to see a very unique city.

Milan however, did not feel like Italy. It was so modern and new. The architecture was largely French — it like we were in Paris, even though I’ve never even been to Paris. But the city was great and I would definitely go back, maybe even this semester.

Milan Cathedral

Milan

Bar Luce at the Fondazione Prada, designed by Wes Anderson

The Last Supper, amazing in person

Navigli area of Milan Part 2

Navigli area of Milan

Fried rice at Wang Jaio in Milan

Ravioli gamberi di vapore (Shrimp dumplings) from Wang Jaio

Leon Bridges

Milan Duomo

Our homemade breakfast in Milan

Us with Leon Bridges

Nike store in Milan, this one’s for you Mom

Milan

Snails in Milan at Porta Ticinese, an ancient gate to the city

Fondazione Prada

Alberto Giacometti at Fondazione Prada

Fondazione Prada

Fondazione Prada

My marocchino at Bar Luce at Fondazione Prada

Bar Luce at Fondazione Prada

Wes Anderson designed bathroom entrance at Bar Luce at Fondazione Prada

Week 3: 9/14-9/17

So I guess I need to write more often because I honestly can’t remember what we did last week. Using photographic evidence, let’s see if I can piece together the week.

Monday:

A selfie from My Sugar reveals that Monday night we went out for gelato. I finally made it on their Instagram page. See selfie below. Now you know how cute they are. Very excited to hang out with them outside of the gelato shop on Wednesday night for a quick drink before I have to get back and study for a test Thursday morning.

Tuesday:

Tuesday was my first art history class on site — conveniently located at Basilica Santa Croce, right across the street from our apartment! I’ve been making fun of tour groups that use the radio headsets for weeks now but it turns out the joke’s on me because for this class we have to wear them. Every. Single. Site visit. That way the teacher can talk to all 22 of us without yelling in churches. Effective yet dorky.

In this church lies (lay?) the tombs of Michelangelo, Galileo, and Dante. Three hugely important people to both Florence and the Renaissance in general. Our nearly three-hour lecture was incredibly interesting and full of facts, almost too many facts. Overall though, the class was super cool and I’m excited for our future site visits — except this week, we’re climbing the Duomo. In 2010 I made it halfway up the Duomo and had to turn back due to my fear of heights. I was saving it for my last week this semester, in mid December, as a nice way to end my time here… climb the Duomo, get some pictures, pat myself on the back. But my plans were thrown out the window when we received the syllabus last week and here we are, week number three in Florence, and I don’t have a choice but to climb the Duomo. Personally I think it’s too early in the semester (not just due to my own fears) but it’s still tourist season and Tuesday afternoon at 2pm will have massive lines, as well as be incredibly toasty out. Needless to say, I’m not looking forward to this week.

After class on Tuesday, some friends and I went to a photo-walk put on by a blogger here, someone whose advice we take very seriously in deciding where to go and what to do. The meetup started at our favorite coffee place down the street, Ditta Artigianale, where we were treated to free espressos. This was my first real coffee drink in Italy (I don’t count a few caffe latte freddos) and I didn’t love it. But with a bit of sugar it was pretty good and the caffeine kicked in quick, which I needed after a three-hour art history walking tour. We went into the tour knowing we didn’t have time to stay for the whole thing and aperitivo after, but we walked along for the first part and got to see the San Niccolo neighborhood, just across the river and super close to us. San Niccolo is beautiful. Quiet. Semi-secluded. Mostly just locals. Not so many students and tourists. Exactly my kind of environment. Plus, one of my favorite street artists here, Clet (see: https://www.facebook.com/CLET-108974755823172/timeline/), has a studio there that’s open to the public. He wasn’t there but it was really neat to see what he’s been working on and I’ll definitely get some stickers or postcards from there before I leave. He’s the guy that does all the street signs — you’d recognize his work instantly. Any stop sign with a person on it, or a funny face, it’s all him.

We left the walking tour at big arch/gate, one of the few remaining parts of the Florentine city wall that was torn down a few centuries ago. We ended up climbing the San Niccolo Tower. Apparently we snuck in — the entrance was open and there was no one there. But when we got up to the top we were informed we had to pay 4-Euro. However, they gave us a ticket good for unlimited re-entry until 2020… now I’m not planning to go back anytime soon, but it’s nice to have I guess.

Wednesday:

I have zero recollection of Wednesday. I also didn’t take any pictures at all on Wednesday so I’m going to assume it was uneventful.

Thursday:

After a way-easier-than-expected Italian quiz in the morning, we came home to quickly pack up and head off to Milan! To read all about our Milan adventures, stay tuned for the next blog post coming right up. Fun fact: I can now cross off “use a bathroom designed by Wes Anderson” from my bucket list, not that it ever was on there.

Santa Croce: Michelangelo’s tomb

Santa Croce: convent garden

Santa Croce, literally across the street

Clet’s studio

San Niccolo Tower

My Sugar selfie

School Trip to Siena & San Gimignano: 9/12

Yesterday we had a mandatory school trip to Siena and San Gimignano, two cities that I’d been to in 2010. A departure time from the train station (on busses of course) at 8am meant we didn’t have to leave here until 7:20am to give us time to get there at a relaxed pace.

After barely an hour, we arrived in Siena, where were sent in groups on guided walking tours of the city. We learned very early on that public restrooms cost money here! Yesterday I spent a whopping 1-Euro just to pee twice during the day. Unlike our walking tour in Florence, which was incredibly interesting and useful, I didn’t find the tour in Siena to be so exciting. We spent forever at the main Cathedral, along with about a million other tourists, and then way too long in the Civico Centro (Town Hall). By the time the tour was over, we barely had an hour to do lunch before making the trek to the bus on the outskirts of town.

While the Cathedral was beautiful, it just seemed like we spent forever there. I would’ve rather seen it on my own and been able to go through it quicker.

For lunch we ate a school recommended place from the 5-10 Euro category — of which our meal cost more than that… My friend Ross and I split an avocado and mint gazpacho and linguini with clams. The gazpacho was a huge portion (isn’t the point of a nice gazpacho that you don’t get more than a few bites?) and tasted mostly like hummus, but it was nice to have fresh ripe avocado. The linguini was much better. I was able to get some incredible pictures with my new 35mm f/1.8 lens — which means that it has a huge aperture, opening up the lens massively and giving a super narrow depth of field, which is why only the first few noodles are in focus.

After a quick nap (our second of the day) on the bus, we arrived in San Gimignano, where we had a full two hours to explore and relax. We made our way to the gelato place, Gelateria Dondoli, which has won numerous awards and been called the best gelato in the world. It was absolutely incredible. I had a cup with white chocolate, tiramisu, and coffee (as always). It lasted maybe five minutes. Again, I got some super gnarly pictures with the new lens. It’s great for food close-ups but not much else. I’m bringing it to a concert Thursday (assuming I get a photo pass) so we’ll see how that goes.

We enjoyed our gelato in the square before heading out to the panoramic viewpoint (the same place we had been in 2010. We sat there for a good half an hour, just relaxing, taking pictures, and enjoying the beautiful views of Tuscany and wine country. With just under an hour left before bus call time, we figured we might as well walk around and explore the tiny town. What I loved about San Gimignano was the real sense of the old age of the buildings. The bricks looked weather and their color truly reflected how old they were. Compared to many of the rebuilt newer buildings of Florence, San Gimignano really felt authentic and ollldddddd.

There was also a wedding going on! I followed around the bride and groom for a minute, running in front to try and get a cute picture. They totally noticed but didn’t seem to care, though I didn’t manage to get a good picture unfortunately. The whole wedding party was dressed so so nice — the men all had great shoes, perfectly trimmed suits. I’d love to be able to dress like that and walk around a beautiful old Italian town. In the big town square outside of the cathedral, there was a 1960s yellow VW Beetle convertible with some white flowers on the mirror. We assume it was for the bride and groom on their way out.

On the way out to the bus, we ran into a huuuuge chunk of our group at the wine shop right by the exit of the town (a little arch that is seemingly one of the only ways to get into town). Everyone was getting identical 4,50-Euro bottles of the famous local white Casale wine. Though we weren’t technically allowed to drink on a school trip (which we did not), they didn’t seem to mind half of us showing up to the bus with a bottle or two.

The bus ride back was barely 40-45 minutes and we walked home at a far slower pace than we did getting there, considering we were exhausted from so much walking.

On the way back I stopped at our local vino sfuso to visit Christian, our wine guy. This time however, I was not there to purchase wine. His speciality is fresh homemade pasta, made by him daily. I asked for a 2-person serving of fettucini. He took out a small chunk of dough, ran it through the roller a few times to thin it out, then threw it in another machine that sliced it. Next, he grabbed a huge handful of flour and tossed the pasta in it, covering the beautiful fresh pasta. He wrapped it up and handed it to me, all for 2-Euros!

We made a delicious fresh tomato sauce to go with it — the pasta cooked nice and al dente in just under 3 minutes. It wasn’t the world’s best pasta, but it just tasted so fresh. And at only 2-Euros for two people, it was totally worth it. No more boxed pasta for me!

Side note: grocery shopping here is super fun. For produce, you’re supposed to wear plastic gloves before touching everything (like us Americans love to do), and then you place the produce in a little plastic bag. Next, you take it to a little machine, you enter the item number (large and easily located on a sign with each section of produce), it weighs it and prints out a label for you. Thus, it prevents the cashier from having to memorize hundreds of item numbers. It speeds up the process a lot. Also, they don’t bag for you. You bring your own bags, you pay, and then you bag it all yourself. While the grocery stores take credit, if you are paying in cash (anywhere, not just grocery stores) they will literally wait an hour for you to pay in exact coins. That’s pretty unheard of in America.

We’ve also been making some travel plans finally. This Thursday afternoon we’re taking the train to Milan to see Leon Bridges, a musician I’ve become obsessed with and need to see live immediately. We’ll be in Milan until Saturday. Our plan was to go to the EXPO on Friday but tickets aren’t cheap and I’m not sure we want to spend our whole time in Milan at the EXPO. Tickets to see Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper are sold out through November (and are also 26-Euros for 15-minutes) so that’s out. Then we come back Saturday morning. We also booked our trip to Amsterdam for our long weekend. We have to take the train to Milan (not cheap), then fly to Amsterdam (costs the same as the train pretty much), we have a few days in the area to explore, then we come back Sunday afternoon. I’m hoping to get off in Bologna (30 min from Florence, on the way to Milan) to see a concert that night and explore Bologna on Monday morning before coming back to class Tuesday.

Streets of Siena

Siena Cathedral ceiling

Fried calamari and zucchini in Siena

Linguini with clams in Siena

Gelateria Dondoli in San Gimignano

Gelato in San Gimignano

San Gimignano

San Gimignano

Tuscany from San Gimignano

VW Bug in San Gimignano

San Gimignano

San Gimignano Wedding

Cinque Terre and Week 2: 9/6-9/11

Oops. I’ve been meaning to write all week but just haven’t had the time. I had some computer issues Wednesday night that unfortunately cost me a solid draft of this post, but so is life.

Saturday night we had a fantastic dinner at La Menagere, a hip new restaurant in the San Lorenzo area. Up until about a decade ago, it was a high end home store, dating back to 1896, when it served as a part of a royal house of sorts. The main dining room is huge, with one massive table (I believe 18m long) and is in the “garage” quarters of sorts. It’s a beautiful space that nearly everyone who walks by takes pictures of (see my pix below).

We started with a “gift from the chef,” which we soon noticed every guest received. It was a delicious tomato gazpacho with “cucumber tartare.” By tartare, they meant finely chopped. I’m not sure if that fits the traditional American definition of tartare (ie salmon tartare), but it was nonetheless delicious. This first antipasti was served in a huge bowl with an incredibly tiny portion. Initially we joked about it, but found it to be a perfectly acceptable serving size. The rest of the dishes were equally tiny but equally delicious, and equally filling. Most dishes we split — so we could each get a primi and secondi piatti — and they were all fantastic. For primi piatti, we had a honey glazed salmon, gourmet mac and cheese, a “gnocchi” of fried potato, and other things that I can’t remember now a week later. For piatti secondi, we had some delicious cod with onions grilled in port wine, a nice steak, and other things I still can’t remember. The meal was delicious and we had an excellent bottle of Chianti for the table. At 19 Euros for the bottle, it was by far the most expensive wine we’ve had so far. But also with 10 people at dinner, we each only got a small glass.

Afterwards we went to the basement of the restaurant which now serves as a super cool jazz venue. Called “The Jazz Experience,” the Saturday-through-Monday night shows are set to continue again this weekend, albeit with new musicians. Last weekend we were graced by the wonderful drummer Marvin Bugalu Smith. His energy and skill were unparalleled. We went back Monday night just to see him. Sadly, a miscommunication between the restaurant and the jazz club led to us being asked to buy (more) drinks, even after we spent an enormous amount on dinner for the 10 of us. We decided to call it for the night, as we had to be up super early the next morning for our trek to Cinque Terre.

With a 6:45am call time for departure, we left the apartment at about 6:20am to head to the train station. As soon as we boarded the busses (we went with a student travel group called Bus2Alps), we quickly fell asleep and woke up nearly two hours later at the train station in La Spezia. Once on board the train, we were a quick 20 minutes from Cinque Terre. We got off at Town #2: Manarola. We walked around for a few minutes and took lots of pictures (see below). While it was absolutely beautiful, it looks nothing like the pictures. The colors are more pastel than vivid, and it was different than we all expected.

We made it back to the Manarola train station to take the 11:22 train to Town #4: Vernazza. Being a Sunday in late summer, the whole area was packed with tourists. We weren’t even close to fitting on the train and were stuck with a nearly hour-long wait on the very hot platform in the sun for the next one. Vernazza was similar to Manarola — a beautiful little town with one main “road” that leads out to the water, and a bunch of touristy restaurants along the way. Vernazza is the town that most would recognize from pictures. What you wouldn’t know however, is that to get that view (and those pictures) requires an intense uphill hike to the 5th town. Due to time constraints, we didn’t make the hike. Instead, we spent nearly an hour in line for a Seafood Cone — quite literally, a cone filled with french fries and “fritto misto.” It was delicious and absolutely worth the wait and the 12-Euros for a large.

Before we could even start eating our seafood cones, we sprinted back to the train station to catch the 1:40pm train. We made it by literally seconds. We hopped off at Town #5: Monterosso. Monterosso is the one with the big beaches and cute umbrellas, though be warned, they run from 10-25 Euros to get a chair and umbrella. We opted to spend our money on cold drinks and combined our bags into a huge pile on a few towels on the fiercely populated free beach. As beautiful as it was, the sand was full of little rocks that aren’t so pleasant to step on when the waves knock you over; the sea was pretty choppy that day so we didn’t get to rent a small paddle boat as planned. The water was warmer than back home and I actually went out pretty far on multiple occasions. The trip MVP was definitely all of the GoPros capturing some great pictures from the day.

The trip back wasn’t as pleasant as the way there — due to train issues all morning, Bus2Alps pushed back the return trip about 30 minutes. Once on the busses though, Bus #2 was billowing out smoke, requiring us all to pull over at a gas station literally 10 minutes into the trip. After taking on some of Bus #2, literally sitting in our aisles, we were off. We decided the better plan was not to sleep, as we wanted to actually sleep when we got home. We briefly stopped along the way to drop off the extra passengers at a new bus that was waiting for them. Some girls that were squeezed in next to us decided to get on the new bus — a huge mistake, as that bus then turned around to pick up the rest of Bus #2 (apparently Bus #1’s driver wasn’t comfortable driving with people sitting in the aisle, thus keeping them immobile for nearly three hours). We got back to Florence at about 9:30pm and walked home and went to bed almost immediately.

Monday night was a really neat local festival called Rificolona, a paper lantern festival. It dates back hundreds of years to when farmers would bring their harvest into nearby villages solely by the light of these paper lanterns that they would carry. Now it’s become a huge parade with children decorating and carrying lanterns along with a marching band and hundreds of people (myself included) following along. We followed along for about 30 minutes and I found a very cute girl with a really cool lantern and was able to snap an adorable picture of her (see below). Afterwards, we went over to my favorite gelato place, My Sugar. We’re now good friends with the owners and follow each other on personal and professional Instagrams and Facebooks — more on this later in the week.

After our delicious gelato, I had chocolate pear (chocolate with cinnamon covered pear chunks — delicious) and te latte (milk tea — also delicious) we walked down the street to La Menagere for another fantastic night of jazz and red wine. We stayed for about an hour but unfortunately had to head back because we had class Tuesday.

Class is progressively getting harder each day. We’re finally learning useful things and I’m proudly a part of the group that actually makes an effort to speak it outside of class. Each day I learn a new word or two just by speaking with someone at the grocery store or wherever. It’s not particularly difficult and I really enjoy speaking it. Most of the Italians are very nice and appreciative and offer to help. I’ve gotten great at making phone reservations in Italian too. The only problem is when they say something long and very fast after I mention there will be 12 of us. Then I’m stuck with “non capisco” and they instantly resort to English. But I do make the effort as much as I can, and usually it pays off.

Tuesday was a long and not very exciting day. After 3 hours of Italian, we had just over an hour to grab lunch before my first art history class. The professor is a nice Italian woman in her 50s named Cecilia (Che-chee-lee-yah). The best part of the class is that over the course of the next 15 weeks, we have exactly 1 lecture. Every other single class (besides midterm and review days) are on site around town. Next week’s class meeting point? Santa Croce Church. Approximately 200 feet maybe from our apartment. Needless to say, I’m excited for this class.

Tuesday night was our only plan-less night of the week, thus, the uneventful day. Wednesday night we had a school sponsored aperitivo at a beautiful garden on the hills of Oltrarno (the neighborhood South of the Arno river, literally meaning “on the other side of the Arno”). Due to it being school sponsored, there was no wine, which is pretty much the point of an aperitivo. While the views were gorgeous, the snacks weren’t so great and there was only one or two staff members, no professors or people who we actually would’ve liked to share a snack and converse with. Ultimately it was a disappointing event. On the way back home we briefly tried a Mexican place down the street. It was awful as expected.

Thursday night was the opening of the Creative Collective, a permanent gallery space for a group I’ve joined called “Creative People in Florence.” The event was pretty crowded and we met a lot of really neat people — many of whom were former study abroad students who fell in love with Florence and couldn’t stay away for long. I could absolutely see that happening to me in a few years, returning to Florence for a year (or more).

After a few glasses of wine and lots of schmoozing with strangers, we trekked over to My Sugar. This time we sat on the stools outside and talked with the owners (Julia and Alberto) while we ate. We learned of their cat, Leopold, a frequent feature of Alberto’s Instagram page. After finishing my cup of Loacker (wafer cookies) and Caffe (Thursday was the first day of their new coffee recipe, which was absolutely delicious), I noticed a few other flavors I had yet to try. Julia told me to “try everything!” and Alberto walked out from the back with three little cups and said “a gift to you!” and proceeded to give us all extra scoops for free. They’re both such nice people and it’s so cute how they look at each other and try to figure out how to respond in English to some of our questions.

We asked if they ever needed help around the store, as we’d love to help out. It turns out, on September 23rd, The Florentine, an English newspaper here, is hosting a tasting event with free scoops. They asked us to help out as translators (and scoopers). We happily obliged and I’m excited to report that in just a few weeks I will be behind the counter with a very cool My Sugar t-shirt on, explaining to a bunch of Americans just how good this gelato is.

Friday morning I woke up at about 4:30am with a horrible pain in my left upper jaw/ear. I wasn’t able to get back to sleep and by the time my alarm went off at 7:20am I was feeling horrible. I ended up taking an Advil, but at that point had emailed my teacher that I wouldn’t be in class and had already made an appointment with a local dentist. The final consensus? I had slept funny; it was an off night. All symptoms were gone pretty quick and the dentist even complimented my Italian skills. I ended up returning my new pillow — I didn’t love it anyways, and it potentially has been bothering my neck and face.

Friday night we had a reservation for 12 at 4 Leoni — a reservation I proudly made (in person) solely speaking Italian. This was my absolute favorite meal of our 2010 Italy trip and I’ve been dreaming of it for the past five years. I set the bar for our expectations incredibly high, and they were all met. Between the 12 of us, there were 7 orders of pear ravioli (I can’t stress how incredible this was), 1 bruschetta pomodoro, 1 insalata, 1 spada alla griglia (grilled sword fish), multiple orders of calamari, some delicious chicken, some fantastic potato-filled ravioli with a meat sauce (mine), and a few liters of the house red. We nearly broke 300-Euros. We’ve figured out that we’re great at finding really delicious expensive restaurants. So we need to work on finding some cheaper places. 4 Leoni was easily the best meal we’ve had here so far (a very close second is last Saturday’s La Menagere) but it’s unlikely we’ll return more than once with such a high price tag — though we all agreed we could eat that pear ravioli every single day. Our 8pm reservation led us outside right at 9:30pm in Piazza della Passera (a tiny, beautiful little piazza) where there were about 300 people gathered to watch some jazz.

We’ve gotten very into live jazz lately and it’s been incredible to watch and enjoy it in this beautiful city. There have been some fascinating events the past two weeks and it’s great to actually be apart of the local culture here. Friday night’s music concluded the Settembre in Piazza della Passera festivities (an annual week-long celebration with live music, poetry readings, and art) and I’m proud to say that we were in the minority there as Americans. It was a wonderful end to a delicious night.

We haven’t even been here two weeks but it’s amazing how much we’ve gotten involved in the local community, between meeting and befriending locals (helloooo Christian — our wine guy — and Francesco — the world famous master barista at a fantastic cafe down the street), attending gallery openings, participating in centuries-old traditions, or just being able to get around the city without a map and finding our way around. I’m absolutely in love with this city and don’t think I’ll be leaving any time soon.

(As always, you can click on the pictures to view them larger)

Manarola, Cinque Terre

Cinque Terre

Seafood Cone at Vernazza

Beach at Monterosso, Cinque Terre

Ponte Alle Grazie at night

Rificolona

My Sugar — Chocolate Pear and Milk Tea

Marvin at La Menagere

Caffe latte freddo at Ditta Artigianale, our favorite coffee place close by

La Menagere dining room

Tomato gazpacho at La Menagere

Salmon at La Menagere

Maddie with her favorite food ever — the gnocchi at La Menagere

La Menagere

La Menagere

Vernazza, Cinque Terre

Monterosso, Cinque Terre

Monterosso, Cinque Terre

Seafood cone

Focaccia at Monterosso

Monterosso

Aperitivo in the garden

All’Antico Vinaio

Calamari at 4 Leoni

Jazz in Piazza della Passera

La Menagere Group

Pear Ravioli at 4 Leoni

First Week: 9/2-9/4

Wow! A lot has happened since I last wrote. And I’ve got plenty of time to write it all down — I’m waiting for the laundry to finish before I can go out and get some groceries. The laundry cycles here are MUCH longer and we’ve yet to figure out the right setting for ours. Currently it’s been over an hour and my first load isn’t done yet. The machine is also incredibly tiny, so my five days worth of clothes is taking two loads.

I last wrote Wednesday afternoon before we went out for dinner at Del Fagioli, which means “of the bean.” We did try some fettunta — a crostini with beans — but none of us really cared for it. The restaurant didn’t love us because we only ordered appetizers and primi piatti (first courses) and they rushed us out. We actually were brought the check, which is unheard of in Italy. However, the food, of which we ordered three homemade pastas, was absolutely delicious. The house wine was also phenomenal. We split a liter between the six of us. We’ll be back there at some point, but we’ll have to order more food. The place was great and filled with lots of locals, not tourists, always a good sign.

On our way home we noticed a large event being set up in Piazza Santa Croce. While we still have yet to figure out what is still being set up, we did find that an orchestra was preparing to perform on the steps of the church. We ended our last night of summer sitting in the Piazza watching the orchestra play until nearly 11pm. It was a wonderful and relaxing evening.

Wednesday morning we had a language placement test and then even more orientation. It’s not that the speakers are boring or the information isn’t useful, but they just go so slow and go over every possible option for each scenario. It’s too much.

After orientation, we went back to our favorite sandwich place, All’Antico Venaio. I had a great little exchange in Italian with some of the workers when they brought out the fresh focaccia.

Me: Che bella (how pretty!)

Worker behind counter (who wasn’t bringing out the bread): Che bella? Lui non e bella, lui e gordo (How pretty? He isn’t pretty, he is fat)

Me: No, lui non e bella. Il pane e bella! (No, he isn’t pretty. The bread is pretty)

And they all cracked up.

Thursday morning was our first day of class. I’m in one of four Italian Level 1 classes and I have quite a few friends in our small class of 2 guys and 15 girls. Our professoressa is named Marcella and so far we really like her. While it’s been helpful and we’ve learned a lot, it hasn’t been particularly useful yet. I can’t ask our waiter “quando e tuo compleanno” (when is your birthday?) but we’re moving quickly so hopefully it will get more practical soon.

We’re also learning a lot of language outside the classroom, as we should be. It’s easy enough to make an effort to try to speak Italian at every store/restaurant/shop/etc and it’s always appreciated. The Italians always are happy to help translate (come se dice?) and genuinely seem to like that we can speak it. Making a dinner reservation on the phone was a different story though. I was able to get a time and number of people, but not “can I make a reservation for tomorrow night?” Speaking of — we’ve got a reservation at this super cool new place called La Menagere for tonight at 7:30p. Live jazz doesn’t start till 9 so we might need to push it back.

After our very long first morning of class (we have Italian for 3 hours every morning), we walked back and took some pictures along the bridge. We’re trying to figure out the best route home that doesn’t involve us getting stuck in crowds of tourists. We made a huge mistake Wednesday crossing the Ponte Vecchio at 1pm and got caught in a mob on Asian tourists taking pictures of the Caribinieri and their motorcycles, as if they’ve never seen a cop before.

We found a great restaurant nearby that has excellent margherita pizzas to-go for only 5-Euros each. Thursday afternoon, we split 4 pizzas for 8 of us. Friday afternoon we went back and each got our own pizza.

Thursday afternoon we booked a trip this Sunday to Cinque Terre. We leave bright and early Sunday morning — we have to be at the train station to catch our bus at 6:45am. Even though it’s only our first weekend, Cinque Terre won’t be warm and pretty much longer, so we figured let’s go sooner rather than later and get it crossed off the list. We’re trying to make a bucket list of things we need to this semester besides seeing all the landmarks and the usual tourist things, but we’re getting there slowly but surely.

After that we went grocery shopping again. The 99-cent-Euro store is next door to the Conad supermarket and is great because unlike in America, everything actually is only 99-cents. We decided that we would have everyone over at our apartment and make dinner. At the 99-cent store I picked up some water color paint and brushes and decided after dinner we would have a painting party, where everyone has to try to paint the same thing.

We made a nice chicken salad with a light vinaigrette. We decided no carbs, no bread, no nothing. Just some lemon-garlic chicken and a light salad. It was exactly what we needed. Plus about four bottles of wine. The painting party was wonderful. We decided we would each paint each other. This was no easy task, thanks to most of our lack of watercolor talent, as well as all of the wine. See pix below. Our second painting task was open to any landscape. Upon naming our paintings, we came up with the title/hashtag for everything related to our Sunday Trip: #KinkyTerre.

After our painting we went out to a few bars but ended up being too early for most of the crowd — even at 11:30pm! People tend to go out much later here, even though they are mostly American.

Friday morning we had class again. Nothing special to report. Friday afternoon we walked back over a different bridge, Ponte Santa Trinita. There are three arches under the bridge, meaning there are two beams/supports? On this bridge they are huge and extend out pretty far and wide. You can also hop over the railing and sit on them, eat a snack, have a glass of wine. We hopped over and got some nice pictures.

After that we picked up more pizza from the same place and took some individual time to relax at our own places and enjoy the food. At 3pm we had a mandatory walking tour provided by the school. They hired guides and it was one of those radio tours — where everyone gets a walkie talkie and a headset so you can listen to the guide no matter how far you are. It’s a great system but incredibly embarrassing to be seen using. Though it was embarrassing, the 2.5 hour tour was very interesting and we learned a LOT. Our guide was great as well.

[Update: after nearly 2 hours, my first load of laundry has just finished and is now on a drying rack in the living room. Thankfully we don’t have to hang our clothes outside on a line, but we’re thinking about it just for fun.]

Last night we had a late dinner at the trattoria just across the street. Unfortunately the service was crap and the food just wasn’t that good. Bummer, because we could’ve been there once a week. After that we had to run to get to my gelato place before they closed at 11pm. I sent them a message on Instagram that I was bringing a big group over and we’d be there right at 11.

We ran in at about 11:01 — they stayed open for us! They were so nice and excited to see us all. We got to practice our very poor Italian skills with them and everyone tried a bunch of flavors. They actually gave me a sample of their new sweet potato, even though it’s still “an experiment” and not yet ready for public consumption! It’s nice being able to go into a place and in less than a week we’re already on a first name basis and they’re just so cute and friendly.

After our delicious gelato, we walked back home at a much slower place. The weather is finally cooling down and My Sugar is sadly pretty far away. It didn’t matter though, it was so nice out. The streets were still crowded and it was a really nice environment. We came back to our place again (our apartment has become the hangout thanks to our location between all of our friend group, also because of our friends that live right below us) and hung out in the living room for awhile sharing stories and whatnot. It’s amazing that we all have these crazy mutual friend connections. I’m one of two or three people in our group NOT from UCSB, but nobody else knew each other before the program — with the exception of three of the girls.

The night ended with a guitar-song session — one of my housemates bought both a guitar and a bike yesterday. We all sat on the beds singing until 1:30 in the morning and we were way too tired to keep going. It was a really nice night.

Today is a recovery/relax/laundry day. We’ve got to be up super early tomorrow and we all needed the extra sleep today for sure.

Delicious homemade pasta from Del Fagioli

All 3 pastas we ordered at Del Fagioli

Orchestra performance at Basilica Santa Croce, across the street from us

My classroom

Walking home from our first day of classes

We found a great restaurant just up the street from us. Their margherita pizzas are only 5-Euros each and on both Thursday and Friday we each devoured one for lunch

Vivoli Gelato — one of the most famous places — is 30 feet from our door step

Tiramisa e sttracciatella at My Sugar

A piece near our school by a local street artist who goes by Exit/Enter. His/her work is visible throughout the city

All of us with the portraits created of us

On the bridge supports at the Ponte Santa Trinita. They are just slightly lower than the walking path and you can hop the fence and sit on them

Walking back from Day Two of class

Move in: 8/31-9/2

Ciao ciao! This is my new greeting everywhere we go. It’s also a common way to say goodbye. I picked this up on Monday running around the city trying to find a fan for the apartment — it’s still 80+ out and our 5th floor apartment gets HOT. Thankfully, walking around the city usually isn’t horrible because everything is so tall which means lots of shade.

Right now it’s Wednesday afternoon. We moved in Monday morning. In my apartment on Via Torta (Cake St., also it means “curb” — this is one of the few streets in the city with an actual curb, not a sidewalk), there are 5 of us: 2 from UCSB, 2 from UCSC, and me. 3 are 5th year seniors and will graduate upon returning from this program. My roommate is the same as me — a junior who’s also from San Diego.

Monday was pretty relaxed in terms of programmed events. Lots of walking around, finding meals, getting the apartment set up and getting Italian SIM cards — I’ve set up my old iPhone 5 to work with both my American and Italian numbers, just don’t call me, use Facetime.

Yesterday we slept in till past noon and grabbed lunch at All’Antico Vinaio, an unbelievable sandwich place. It’s always packed with 10+ people out the door and it’s so popular that they have a location on both sides of the street! Everything is incredibly fresh, home-made, and sliced to order (even the tomatoes!) After that we had a looooong orientation. As with this morning’s orientation(s), it’s not that the information isn’t useful or that the speakers are boring, but they could cut the presentations in half easily.

After orientation yesterday we found a “vino sfuso” just a few blocks from our place. Vino sfusos are places with barrels full of wine, where you taste a bunch, and then fill your own bottle with however much you like. It’s usually cheaper and better quality. Normally, if you buy a 3-Euro bottle, almost half of that is bottling/packaging, but at a vino sfuso, a 3-Euro/liter wine means 3-Euro quality one, not 1.5-Euro quality, so it’s better stuff. Last night after our welcome dinner we went with some friends to Piazza Santa Croce (literally 200 feet from our door) and sat outside and enjoyed the wine late into the night. Italy, and most of Europe I believe, has no open container laws, meaning you can drink whatever, whenever, wherever.

Our street corner for some reason seems to be famous. There are constantly large tour groups walking by, many stopping. Some turn right to Basilica Santa Croce, some go straight. We’re also on THE route home for loud, drunk Americans late into the night. They’re out and about, and very noisy, until well after 2am.

We found out that some girls from our program live in the apartment directly below us. We’ve since become friends with them and can just lean out our living room window to talk down to their kitchen. So far it’s been a good system. Even though they’re in the same building as us, we each have different entrances, house numbers, and stairwells to get up to our apartments, so we can’t just walk down a floor and knock on their door.

Most of the people on the program are from UCSB, over 60 actually, which means over half of the 110 total. Few are from Berkeley, I’ve yet to meet any. There are a LOT of Jews and most people are from LA.

Today we finally went house/grocery shopping since we ran out of toilet paper and hotel shampoo. There’s a pretty big grocery store a few blocks away and there are little mercados everywhere with fresh fruit. We’ve stopped at the same place two days in a row now on the way to the study center. Each time I’ve gotten a very delicious, and fresh, pear for only 70 cents.

Tonight we’ve got a reservation at a place called Del Fagioli. We walked in the other night and couldn’t get a table, but everything looked and smelled so good — and the place was packed with locals — so we made a reservation to come back tonight.

Last night I went back to My Sugar, the gelato place. The owners were excited to see me and were incredibly friendly. I’m going to keep up the friendship.

I’ll get more apartment pictures and descriptions in the next post. We’ve got lots of weird pop art and not so nice furniture. We bought a Brita because the water tasted too metallic. The kitchen is pretty decent but we’re realizing every day that we’re missing certain items. Stay tuned for more riveting details.

Making my roast beef sandwich at All’Antico Vinaoi

My roast beef sandwich along with my roommate’s spicy salami. Fresh bread, fresh meat, fresh tomatoes.

Caffe e Pan De Stelle (biscotti cookies) from My Sugar

The view from my bedroom/kitchen/bathroom. The other 2 bedrooms don’t have a Duomo view — it paid off being the first one here Monday morning

My bedroom in our 3 bed, 2 bath apartment