Started  February 22, 2006

[this is incredibly long for no good reason, so I presume that the only people that will actually read this whole thing are my mother and father.]

I just got back from London last night.  It was amazing—I will live there one day.  i spent about a week and a half there because I have a two week break for the Olympics.  I was supposed to go to paris the second week, but I didn’t because I was sick so I just came back to Viterbo; not the greatest place in the world, but all my stuff is here and I wasn’t living out of a bag.

Here’s a mini low down on what I did:

Last Saturday:  left my house at 7 am.  Took three trains to stop in torino for a few hours.  Amazing city.  It was just completely awesome and packed full of people from all around the world because it was the day after the opening ceremonies of the Olympics.  I would live there if I had a chance.  Took a bus to the airport, took a plane to London stansted airport.  I got there at midnight or something, went through customs and all that then took a taxi to this little bed and breakfast (I didn’t want to try and find a hostel or hotel that late at night by myself).  I spent the night in a beautiful perfectly English house.  They let me sleep in the next day because they didn’t have anyone coming in or something.  I woke up late, watched English television, and then the guy that ran the hotel made me breakfast and coffee.  Afterwards, he took me to a bus/train station to go into Central London.  That day was what one would automatically think of as English weather.  It was rainy, drizzling really and just kind of gloomy.  It was just kind of misty all day, not even enough for an umbrella, but you still got wet.  But all of the trees and grass still seemed to be green even though it was February.  I somehow made it to the hostel after buying a 9 pound ticket that didn’t work for everywhere I needed to go despite what I had been told.  A little bit after I arrived at the hostel another new girl came into my room.  We were  talking to this other 40 year old American lady who had been living there for a month or two.  I didn’t think people actually lived in hostels, but at this hostel everyone I met lived there.  This new girl, Nadia her name was, which I found out later, was from Buenos Aires, Argentina.  We decided to go out into London and just walk around and eat dinner (since by this time, 6 pm, I hadn’t eaten all day).  we decided to take the bus so that we could see where we were going.  We didn’t really have anywhere to go so we just took a bunch of buses and asked people where to go.  one guy, when nadia asked him where the bus was taking us simply told us he wouldn’t tell us where we were going.  We finally talked to an Australian guy who told us where to go and how to get back.  We got off somewhere called angel (I don’t know if that was a street or what).  We walked around a bit and finally decided to go to this Indian restaurant which was amazing. 

The next day I went out with Nadia and her friend Fernando from Brazil.  That night nadia wasn’t supposed to have a bed at the hostel so she needed to find a place to go.  we walked around a lot of London.  We saw Kensington palace, hyde park (where there were swans), stopped by a theater to see what was playing, went to some sort of earth/science museum.  After that we went into another museum where we saw some kids getting their faces painted with animals and spidermans.  So we decided to get out faces painted as well.  We saw st. paul’s cathedral at night all lit up, however it was closed, so we didn’t get to go in.  we just walked around a lot basically.  We saw a red carpet from the opening of a heath ledger film, stopped into an 80’s bar (that was AWESOME) I so wanted to go back, but couldn’t find it ever, stopped at a pub for a drink.

The next day was Tuesday.  I woke up a little late and took the tube into the central part of London.  I did a little shopping, sat at a coffee place for a while, then walked around for a while.  I got asked for a lot of directions while I was walking, too, which I didn’t get because I looked like such a tourist. 

On Wednesday I was told to take the tube to Westminster and see all the sights there: the river Thames, Big Ben, etc.  I walked up the stairs from the tube station and immediately saw the river, which was so pretty.  I took some pictures of the river, saw a couple kiosks which were selling pancakes and touristy things.  I went up some more stairs and looked up and Big Ben was right across the street.  I didn’t even know it was that close!  It was awesome.  I walked around Big Ben and crossed the street.  We were all stopped by police and across the street was not only the houses of parliament but a _____ against the war in iraq and tony blair.  Apparently the street was blocked off because tony blair was coming through so i apparently saw him, but I don’t really know.  I saw great anne’s cathedral.  I then I found the river thames and decided I needed to find the bridge in Love Actually.  Three hours and several pictures of other bridges later I found it and took lots of pictures of it.  later that afternoon, I took a bus up to Leeds to visit Jovanna.  Apparently, however, I am stupid and told her that I was taking a train instead of a bus. So she was waiting for me at the train station while I arrived at the bus station on the other side of town.  After a while when she wasn’t there, I got her phone number off my facebook messages on a computer in the waiting place (thank god for facebook, haha).  After she arrived we walked back to her dorm.  What’s really cool and awesome about her study abroad is that she gets to take classes and live with all the brits and other international students; whereas me and the other Americans here are secluded into one big group by ourselves (mostly because 40/45 of us don’t know how to speak or read Italian).  The University of Leeds was like going back to Iowa City—like finally being back in a college town.  They have a ped mall which we walked through briefly that night.  We saw a bunch of brits going to the bar—actually coming back from the bar at 10 pm.  Some were even dressed up, which jovanna said was normal.  They have themed nights that everyone somehow knows about.  While we walked to her dorm her mom called and asked if I wanted her to call my mom, which she did.  We also stopped at a subway (since there was nothing else open) because I had had nothing to eat all afternoon—and it was nice to eat a turkey sandwich (one of the few things I miss being in italy, turkey sandwiches and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches).  We spent the rest of the night talking and catching up since we hadn’t really talked for a while and hadn’t seen each other since the fourth grade.  We spent a lot of time reminiscing over things that happened in elementary school and it was really nice since I don’t get to do that much—brought back a lot of memories about school, girl scouts, and our friends.

Thursday – we woke up and I went with jovanna to her two classes of the day.  it was great being back in a classroom lecture.  Her classes were really very interesting and it was nice being in a normal class for once this semester.  Then we went to a little pub for lunch and ate really dry hamburgers.  I had a really bad cold by this time, so we went to their ped mall looking for medicine and things.  We went shopping to a few places: to an indoor market type thing, which was awesome, a small mall that had an H&M, then to another mall place that had these really neat, small privately owned stores.  I found a bunch of gifts in there and had a couple interesting encounters.  By then it was late into the afternoon and all the stores were closing.  We stopped by the super market to grab a few things (like Kleenex, since I can not find it anywhere in italy) and went back to jovanna’s room where we hung out the rest of the night.  I spent a while on her computer trying to make her dvd player work, but to no avail (she had the fourth season of Gilmore girls—of which we are both huuuuge fans, so we wanted to watch it).

The next day, Friday, we slept in late because she didn’t have class and I didn’t have to leave until 1 pm.  By the time we both got ready, though, I missed my bus back to London.  i had to buy a new ticket for the next bus which didn’t leave till 3 or something.  So we sat in the bus station, ate some breakfast/lunch and chatted a bit before I had to leave.  When I got back to London I took the tube back to my hostel off of Kensal green and back to the same room with the same girls.  It was nice having some people to go back to, even though I had just met them a week before.  Three of the girls actually lived there, so they had a tv which was cool.  We spent the night watching sex and the city.

Saturday I went out all day with an Australian girl named Kelly (the only other girl in our room who didn’t actually live at the hostel).  She had lived in leeds the previous three months and just arrived in London because she got a new job so she was staying there for a few days until she found a flat.  We didn’t really have anything planned for the day except to get my credit card fixed.  We went to this awesome store called the top shop which was like 6 stories.  They had any kind of clothing, accessories, and shoes you could ever want; and they were at reasonable prices (except not really for me, since a pound is almost twice as much as a dollar, but if you lived there, then yes it was very reasonable).  I found these really awesome pair of red heels, which I’ve been looking for forever.  We were in there for a few hours.  We also spent a few hours trying to call the credit card company.  We had some really good Chinese food, too.  By the end of the day, I had to call my mom who had to call the credit card company and she got me another number to call to get my card fixed.  That night I got a plane ticket back to Rome so I could get to viterbo that Tuesday.

( Pictures of Roma!! Yay! I figured out how to do it! )

Directly copied from my written diary.  Might have lots of mistakes.  I’ve done no editing and I’m sorry for that.  Really.  (plus the sentences are really short and not that informative. Oh well, maybe more later.)

First written journal entry, I’ve been using my computer.  Which is better?  I have no idea.

Well…

Yesterday we went to Rome.  It was nice.  Actually, I really liked it.  No; loved the bigness of it.   It was: loud, refreshing, expensive… and a plethora of other things.  It was big.  There were so many people.  It wasn’t quiet.  The only thing I didn’t like was that there was too much English around.  NOone would speak to us in Italian—even if we spoke to them in Italian.  Very frustrating, to say the least.  How am I supposed to learn Italian if you’re just going to use English all the time?  At least in Viterbo there are people who don’t speak English so I can only use my Italian (and French, too).

Nonetheless, I realized how much I miss being in the city… or a city… with people around.  It makes being here all alone a little bit better (even though I was in rome with a bunch of Americans), to hear people talking all the time, see people all the time.  Don’t get me wrong, I do like the quiet, but here it’s always quiet and it freaks me out.  Makes me more scared than I need to be.

Anyways… here’s what we did while in Rome:

-Saw the outside of the coliseum—it was, of course, beautiful.  However, we did not get the chance to go inside.

-Saw a bunch of other ruins which were ruined by all the tourists being around (and there were surprisingly a whole bunch of French people… very cool).

-Saw the Spanish Steps.  But… what exactly are they? (besides a kind of pretty staircase).  What is so important about them?  We didn’t know, but went anyway.  They were not impressive.

-Went to a little outdoor caffe where they sold hamburgers and French fries—I had a dry martini at 2 pm.

-Went to get some gelato and paid 9.50 euro for a bunch of junk (although it was good, definitely not worth the 10 dollars).

-Went to an English/Anglo Saxon book store.  Very cool.  They had those really high bookshelves with the ladders I want.  It was not organized very well, however, so I had to leave as it gave me a headache (this is how OCD I am).

-Walked around.  Saw the biggest Prada or Fendi store in the world.  Didn’t go in.  Went to the Guess? Store.

-Took a subway for the first time ever.

All in all… good trip.  I want to go back just to look at things.  I didn’t think I’d like it that much… but I did.  However, would never study there, or live there, probably.

Here are some random things I miss from ‘home’:

--Easy internet access

--Coffee.  Long coffee they call it here.

--Driving.  Even though I definitely don’t need to.  I miss my little purple car.

--Heat in the house.  I’ve come to the conclusion that I am used to far more extremes than there are here.  For instance, outside I am not cold while everyone else freezes; but inside, I believe it to be frigid.  Furthermore, the heat is turned off at night.

--My shoes (I know, how frivolous of me, but I really wish I would have brought my boots and my black pumps)

--My double bed.  This bed is so tiny I almost fall off every night.

--Knowing how go get places by myself without having to ask a million times (although, I suppose this might get better with time… hopefully anyways).

--Having a shower that’s bigger than two feet by two feet and hot water that lasts more than 9 minutes.

--My books (four is never enough, especially because they put me in stupid classes).

--Having all of my music.

And, the other day I got my lady (Senora, the lady I live with… but I’ve grown accustomed to calling her my lady for some reason) to listen to Fiona Apple and she loves her.  It’s awesome.

Pictures of Rome to come as soon as I figure out how to put them on here.  Any one wanna give me a couple tips?  Grazie!

Ciao tutti,

So, im here and safe and have been getting used to this for almost about two weeks already (even though it feels like months). here are some of the main things that hvae happened in the last little two weeks:

Plane Ride Here: was okay. verrry long. but i flew through airfrance so i got to use my french!! (finally). and all of the flight attendants said i spoke really well. i missed flight from paris to rome, so i took a later one... no big deal.

im living with a lady whose name is raffaella. she speaks italian (obviously), english, and french which is great for me because if i dont know the word i want, i can say it in french. we live in an appartment outside the walls of the main city of viterbo (really, like a five minute walk to the city).

the city of viterbo is an old medieval city... everything is soooo old. there are no paved streets in the centro (in the walls). the city is not on a grid... all the streets go every which way... reallllly annoying. because if i dont get lost enough in a gridded city, this is terrible. usually i just walk aimlessly around until i find where i need to go... but i am getting better at knowing my landmarks and things. the first week here we took a large tour of the city.  we went to a couple different churchs, saw a museum.

my italian is going really well. i get asked for directions a couple times a day. been asked if im italian many many times. been asked if i was english.

ummm...

last week classes started. for the first five weeks we're doing an intensive period. im in the intermediate and composition classes and italian culture.  well see how they go. im only supposed to be in the composition class, but they're making me take the intermediate as well (along with everyone else whose in composition).

this weekend we're going to rome. leaving early. shall be fun.

last weekend, me and a couple girls took a trip to a neighboring town of viterbo... which is actually halfway to rome called Bracciano. as soon as we got off the train we found the american bar. we went shopping at this really small negoziio of clothes and i bought a bronze sequiny purse.  we walked around... went to a little store that sold hand made pasta and the girls bought ravioli. it was a cute little town (still all cobblestone) and we got there kinda late in the afternoon, so didnt have time to walk all the way around it and such.  we went to dinner at a little pizzeria. met a guy that was half italian and half american (from cali). took the train back home. and i know now that i should always carry dramemine with me whereever i go.

so thats about all ive been doing... been really busy, just settling in, getting to know everyone, classes (that last four hours long), etc, etc.

hope everyone is doing well! talk to ya later!