The Obligatory Blog

I hate to go into writing this blog entry with the only thought in my head being: “I have to write this quick!” but there is no other way at this juncture. I thought this week would be easy, being that midterms are over and it’s the first week after break. Boy was I wrong. I had a paper due Tuesday, a pop quiz (test? it was REALLY long), a research project to start and a thousand miscellaneous tasks to do. I also have to register for next semester’s classes tomorrow. Eep.

But nothing bad about this week could put a damper on the incredible time I had last week in Italy. Let me see if I can break the visit down into easy-to-read, bullet-pointed sections!

Travel:

~ Getting to Italy was quite an adventure. Here’s how it went: I left my flat to catch my bus to the train station. From there I caught the train to the airport, where I caught my plane to Bologna. Once there, I got on the bus to the train station, then took the train to Ferrara, where I met Megan at the station to take the bus to her apartment. Surprisingly easy, but a VERY long journey. Coming back was the exact same thing in reverse.

~ From Ferrara, Megan and I took day trips to Bologna and Verona by train.

~ Have I mentioned how much I LOVE TRAINS?

~ Bologna was lovely. It was really nice weather and we spent the day traipsing around, taking pictures, going to see free things (my favorite type of things), eating gnocchi and gelato, and just generally having an amazing time.

~ Verona was indescribably beautiful. Megan said at one point “it’s almost painful, it’s so pretty.” It really is. Really clean, and the weather was PERFECT. Seeing Verona made me almost wish I had studied in Italy instead of England. After taking our time walking through the city, we walked up this huge hill (upon recommendation from one of her Italian roommates) where you could see the entire city. It was breathtaking. I only got pictures from the first third of the day, because I was dumb and didn’t charge my camera, but those will be up soon.

Daily Life:

~ Megan still had school that week, so she occasionally had to abandon me to go to class. It was never for very long, and I pretty much spent that time working on school stuff, emailing/Skyping people, or sleeping. I also went to class with her once. I did spend part of the time really trying to understand what the professor was saying, but I will admit that a good portion of the class was spent drawing pictures.

~ I loved being able to really experience life in Italy. Most people spent their semester breaks seeing as much of Europe as they possibly could in one week. Instead of being a tourist extraordinaire, I got to really LIVE in Italy for 10 days. Some of the things I loved the most were the simplest things: learning to make espresso, making dinner with Megan, biking around Ferrara, and getting to know the friends she’s made (Italian or otherwise).

~ One of the things I’ve learned about myself this semester is that I much prefer good company to a good setting. I first realized this when I was in Paris. I had so much more fun being with my friends and enjoying cheap wine, food and good conversation than I would have if I had spent the whole time ‘seeing the sights.’ If you go to see The Eiffel Tower, and go home and someone asks you how it was, what can you say? “Oh yeah, it was pretty, I guess.” But if you spend the time doing something with friends, you have an endless number of stories and jokes. This all sounds really cheesy, but it’s been on my mind for a couple weeks now. In Italy, I had so much more fun hanging out in the piazza, going to Zuni, or dressing up for a Halloween party than I would have had going clubbing in Berlin (without my wonderful friend Megan :( ).

Food and Drink:

~ CURSE YOU MEGAN! For getting me addicted to espresso. I had successfully shook myself of my dependence on coffee until last week. Luckily, I don’t crave espresso for the caffeine, I crave it because I love the taste of coffee. And espresso is coffee in its absolute purest form. I fell so much in love with it that I bought a single cup espresso maker when I got back.

~ Boxed wine. Enough said.

~ But seriously, I am actually getting a taste for what types of wine I like, and I find it a bit annoying that I have to go back to the states and wait an entire year before I can order a glass of wine with dinner.

~ We ate some seriously delicious food. Including but not limited to: gnocchi, pumpkin risotto with white truffle shavings, fresh made fettuccine with sausage, ALL gelato, kebab piadinas, and all the delicious things Megan (and I helped occasionally) made. AND SPALMELLA. I don’t care what anybody says. It tastes the same as Nutella, but it’s CHEAPER. Yummmmmm savings.

Fun Things:

~ We went to a Halloween party and dressed up, trying to represent the states. NONE of the other Americans dressed up. Oh well. I was very proud of us. I had brought NO clothes worthy of costumes, so I bought plastic bags, some balloons, and some ribbon, and went as a bag of jelly beans. Megan fashioned herself an adorable hat and bought a plastic watering pot and went as a garden gnome.

~ Some of the other things we saw in Ferrara include: The Castello (you can see all of Ferrara from the tower, it was SO pretty), the city walls, the crazy huge city cemetery, a pretty park, and a dude playing a flute on the street.

~ We got to do this cooking class thing on Tuesday night… Basically, we paid €15, they taught us how to make really authentic eggplant parmesan, we helped make it, had apertivi (appetizer type stuff and drinks), then a HUGE dinner. This dinner started with the eggplant parmesan, then they served us the pumpkin risotto with white truffle that I mentioned earlier, then an egg dish, then apple strudel. All with bottomless wine. It. Was. AMAZING.

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So I have really got to get to sleep. I have a really ludicrous number of things on my to do list for tomorrow, and being sleep deprived will not help anything. I’ll post pictures if I can. If not tomorrow, then be patient! They will appear soon.

To see more wonderful Italian stuff, go check out Megan’s blog at: http://italiannoodles.tumblr.com/

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