Rules of the [Italian] Road

1. Pedestrians are to be regarded as pigeons; thus, they are totally expendable.
2. If cars are the kings of the road, vespas are the renegade princes with superiority complexes.
3. While cars generally remain on their assigned side of a two-way road, it is not uncommon to see them parked facing one another on the side of a street.
4. The word 'bus' is code for 'death trap.'
5. Crosswalks exist only in the imaginations of Japanese and American tourists.
6. Green means go; red means hesitate before going.
7. If the bus driver realizes he missed a turn, while midway through an intersection, it is perfectly acceptible to reverse through the intersection and force cross-traffic to wait.
8. The buses are never too full.

Confessions of a Gelatoholic

I have a love/hate relationship with Italia, meaning that it makes me seething just about every day and nearly every however; however, the same country also has the ability to make me blissfully happy in a matter of minutes. At least, it proves that I have seen the real Italia, not the glittering, prepackaged tourist version.

Italian buses may be the epitome of public transportation hell, but the trains, which can carry you to Pisa, Sienna, or a number of beaches in just over an hour make up for it. I haven't been to Pisa, yet, but Sienna was wonderful. The centre of the city is closed off to cars and the city offers a smaller, more peaceful, medieval version of Firenze. We spent the day checking out churches and walking around. (Because that is virtually all there is to do here). However, they have a fantastic piazza around which there is a biannual horse race.

Italian parks make up for the frustrating streets. There is a wonderful one, which is very close to our school that we have eaten lunch in.
My host mother Anna doesn't speak any English. I kept waiting for the English to come but, alas, no. It is frustrating but gives me motivation to pay attention in Italian class. When the language barrier is too much, though, Heidi and I just look at one another and laugh and sometimes Anna will dig out her weathered Italian/English dictionary. The hardest part, though, is eating breakfast when our host-mom is home. The kitchen will be obscenely bright, the Italian version of talk radio will be berating Berlusconi, and Anna will be blabbering on and on expecting us to understand, when it's impossible for me to comprehend Italian before lunch. Heidi and I rate the quality of dinner conversations by the number of times we use the past tense. (extra points if you conjugate it with essere)

It, in fact, takes two Italians to change a light bulb. We met Anna's ex-husband (who we thought lived in Padua) when he came over to change the light bulb in the kitchen. Plus, the event involved both people on chairs trying to figure out the inner workings of the lamp. Now the new bulb gives of an unfriendly florescent glow.

There are too many mysteries within my house for me to comprehend. Again, we just nod and smile. Anna makes up for the confusion by being ridiculously quirky. She will find the humor of certain commercials distasteful and then crack up at the Italian version of candid camera. Plus, she is an opinionated left-wing supporter who is one of the few Italians to realize Berlusconi’s incompetence. (He is their version of George Bush) Lastly, she teaches young children and has more books than I can count, one of which is a huge volume of Emily Dickinson. (English on one page, Italian on the opposite)

Gelato is a wonderful creation. I believe it is one of the only things that keeps me sane in this twilight zone. My favorite is fondente con fragola. (dark chocolate with strawberry) mmm.

CaRRying the ToRCh

Well, I've finally finished the Harry Potter book that I intended to leave in London. Now my baggage will be .5 kilo lighter! Other than that, my time in Barcelona has been wonderful. The weather is warm and we are just trying to approach our time here with a leisurely pace. The hostel that we are staying in is nice, clean, and sits right on the beach. Plus, even though our room is for 7 people, my friends and I take up 5 of those beds. The other two people are young teachers, one from Australia and the other from New Zealand. Both are very nice. The only bizarre thing about the hostel is that the side walls to our room don't go all the way up to the ceiling! I think it might be for ventilation but we have such loud neighbors. Amanda almost climbed through the hole near the ceiling early this morning to yell at them.

Once we had gotten over the restless night, though, we set out for a sight seeing adventure. Maggie loves the Olympics just as much as I do (We have plans for London in 2012) and so seeing the old stadium and park etc. were at the top of our list. However, we didn't realize how long it would take to walk there. On our way, we first went down the street called Las Ramblas. It was filled with a lot of tourist shops and numerous human statues. The best part was the market, though. I've heard that it is one of the largest open-air markets in Europe. The fruits and vegetables and especially the candy was so beautiful. Everything looked delicious and Emily and I split one kilo of the reddest strawberries I've ever seen. After we had gotten our fill of the market, we started following the map in search of Olympic-ness. Eventually this meant heading up a fairly steep hill -that never seemed to end. We saw dozens of tour buses and eventually followed signs but it was not an easy climb. The planning committee must have taken Mt. Olympus to heart. Eventually we reached the top and were able to look around. We walked into the stadium and saw the torch that held the flame after the archer shot the flaming arrow. We also collapsed in the park's grass and looked at the pool from above. Our adventure was not over, though. We attempted to take the easy way back down via an air tram car. However, it took us in the wrong direction and left us even higher up on the mountain. Luckily, Amanda was able to find a shortcut which meant our walk back was less than 2 hours. After finally making it home, we all took part in the siesta tradition and then headed off to dinner at 10. How quickly we have come accustomed to the Spanish lifestyle.

crazy weather and hectic flights

Too much has happened over the last two weeks to simplify into a few paragraphs, but I'll try. The last week of our stay in London was hectic to say the least. Each student had to do a final paper for each class on a topic of his/her choosing. For John, I picked a purely academic topic - the analyzation of rebellious children in the plays we'd seen, using The Woman Hater, The Homecoming, and Henry IV, Part 1. However, in my other paper, I wrote about the development of Leicester (pronounced Lester) Square. Both were pretty interesting to write, but typing on my computer wasn't exactly my dream for the final days. Then, there were the tests. The theatre test was the traditional pick 2 essays from a suggested list, but Sarah's final was a monster. There was a section of random multiple choice questions, three brief essays, the identification of two church floorplans, and an entire page full of items (i.e. corinthian order, pedimental sculpture, and stippling) and our objective was to say where in London they could be found (Chiswick House, British Museum, Wilton Diptych). It definitely wasn't easy but everyone seemed pretty surpised at what they were able to remember. Afterward, we had a few hours to relax before meeting at the Prince of Tech, a local restaurant for a little end of the course celebrating.

We were all very relieved to have the semester over on that Wednesday, and even more glad to have two free days in London. On Wednesday, we took our second trip to the Cheshire Cheese, which is one of the oldest pubs in London, I think. It was converted from an old monestary. I'm not really sure on the history. It has a Wickepedia page, though.

We spent the last two days relaxing and packing, for the most part. Friday, was the busiest though. We caught luch at the Borough Market and I bought what is probably my last bottle of delicious apple juice from fruit grown in Kent. Then, we did the tour of the Tower of London. Forgetting it was Easter weekend, though, we were confronted by an excessive amount of tourists. Terrible. Otherwise, the tour was interesting and our Beefeater tour guide was funny. The weather was a different story, though. Even though it had been nice for the entire day, it started sprinkling after we got our tickets and then rained off and on throughout our whole tour. Then, when we were waiting int the unbelievably long queue to see the crown jewels, it started to hail. It was so miserable. Finally, Maggie and I warmed up with a trip to Harrods with Heidi. It was more elaborate than I could have imagined and wished I wasn't so tired when I went. The last part of our evening was a trip to the Stockpot which is a nice, plain English restaurant with really delicious food.

Saturday meant leaving London behind, though. We were all sad but excited for Amsterdam. We toured the Ann Frank House, visited the Van Gough Museum, took a canal boat tour, stopped inside the church with the largest nave in The Netherlands (which is no Christopher Wren by the way) and got an eye-blistering veiw of the red light district. It was so nice to be in a country where I didn't have to feel guilty for speeking English. The people were very nice and the city was beautiful except for one thing. SNOW, oh yeah, and HAIL. I guess I have nothing to complain about to everyone in WI but it was pretty painful having left my winter coat in London. Luckily I brought my wool hat and scarf. Sadly, I didn't even see real tulips up close.

Today I arrived in Barcelona, though, where it is sunny and 60ish. Our hostel is right next to the beach, which is amazing. It really was a great day, except for dragging 75 pounds of luggage through two cities. First of all, I thought I left my A/C adapter for my computer in Amsterdam because we left our dark room at 6:30, but it was sitting on top of my clothes when I opened my suitcase. Secondly, I didn't get charged by the sketchy Clickair airline for having baggage that was 10 kilo over the limit. It was spectacular. Now I'm tired and ready for bed, but I have to read a little Harry Potter Book 6 because it is not coming to Florence.

Wicked!

One ticket to see the musical Wicked: £20

Transportation: Free

Somewhere to stay after the show: N/A

Finally finding the ONE thing that is cheaper to do in London than in the US: Priceless

Well we all got up early on Friday for Les Miserables tickes. However, the only ones that were left were the most expensive seats in the house and the worst seats in the house. Luckily, before we dropped down £50 or agreed to sit in the last row behind a pole, the man at the box office suggested we come back on a weekday because they have much more availability then and we can get tickets for half price. We were still dying to see a show, though, so we made the trip across the city to the Victoria Apollo theatre, where Wicked is playing. They still had a few of the cheaper seats available and so Emily, Amanda, Heidi and I snapped them up.

The show was amazing! It was different hearing the characters' slight accents but I love the music so much. This production's Glinda wasn't as strong as the one I had seen in Chicago but Elphaba was wonderful. There is no better moment than the end of "Defying Gravity," when she is flying above the stage. Amanda and Emily had never seen the show, but they really seemed to like it. It was so nice to all get dressed up an see a show.

This morning, though, was a little bit of a disaster. I had trouble starting up my computer, which had been hibernating so I turned it off. However, it just froze at the welcome screen and wouldn't finish loading. Making matters worse, there was a message saying that the settings couldn't be loaded because of a lack of permission or corrupt file. Yikes. So, I took my computer upstairs and Heidi (not the Heidi that came to the musical) and Dan because I thought they might be able to help. Eventually, it did start up but my background had been reset and ALL of my files were gone. I thought it was a disaster. Luckily, after enless minutes of waiting Heidi was able to reset my computer to the way it was yesderday and everything is fine. I was sooo scared.

harmonicas and jazz hands

I should be working on one of my two major final papers right now- but I've decided to blog instead.

One of the running themes for this week is music. Even after a long, boring class with John in the morning, we wanted to find something fun to do at night. After some internet browsing, we came upon a small blues club. It turned out to be a tiny hole in the wall called, Aint Nothin' But... Even though it was only a short tube ride away from 270 ECR, we had to queue in line for about 20 minutes. It was definitely worth the wait, though. Time Out's website described it as a place where B.B. King would have found himself when he was just beginning his career, had it been built. We were able to listen to a number of different bands and it was nice to hear some fantastic live music. The impromptu performers on the tube just don't always cut it. Also, Lee and Ben just drooled over the guitars because they're both suffering from withdrawal. We've already decided to go back sometime soon; we'll just have to get there early because space is limited and seating is almost nonexistent.

Last night, we went to the musical Billy Elliot for class, which couldn't have been further from what we had heard the previous night. I, for the most part, enjoyed the show, but it's definitely not one of my favorite musicals and I was really surprised to hear that Elton John wrote all of the music. Clearly, dancing was the main focus of the production while music and singing took the back seat. However, the dancers, especially Billy were wonderful. His talent was definitely shown in the range of performances throughout the show. He had one large classical ballet number midway through the show but then also had another number at the end that was influenced by break dancing and, since the actor had been in gymnastics, had numerous tumbling elements. I don't know how he didn't pass out. However, there are five different boys that perform on alternating nights because the role is so demanding. Again, the dancing was impressive but the music just wasn't enough.

Tonight is pretty low-key. I do plan to start that paper eventually. Tomorrow we have class with Sarah, so there will be a lot of walking involved. Luckily, we have a three day weekend to recover. Amanda, Emily and I have plans to see Les Miserables on Friday. I could not be more excited. Another girl who is on the program went and she was able to buy a ticket less than an hour before showtime extremely close to the stage. We're also going to find a place to have dinner in Leister Square, which is known as Theatre Land in the West End. There will definitely be reviews later.

Marketeering

One thing I love about living in London is being able to go to the markets. Each one offers different a different mix of fruit and veg, specialty foods, clothing and other objects. On Friday, we made the trek after class to the Borough Market. It is heaven for anyone who loves food. There is fresh produce but also butchers with many cuts of meat, decadent deserts and dozens of cheeses. I went for the olives. The vendor was extremely friendly and let me sample all of the varieties. They were very delicious and it was hard for me to choose but I was able to purchase a mixture. Delicious. However, we began our visit to the market with the juice stand. It offers bottles of juice made from fruits grown in Kent, England. There are different combinations and during my first trip to the Borough Market, I tried one with rhubarb in it. It's hard to believe but each one we sampled was better than the one before it. Since there are so many good ones to choose from, I do what any poor college student would do, go for the apple juice because it's the cheapest. It is extremely fresh and pure.

Today we went to the Portobello Market, which is in the Notting Hill area, for the first time, though. The first thing I bought was a little, red telephone booth key chain for a pound. I've decided to start collecting a key chain from every new city or country I visit this semester. I already have a little black and silver Eiffel Tower key chain from Paris and miniature Shakespeare from Stratford. The Portobello market has a lot of antiques and cool artists. It's so nice just to look around in the afternoon; the crowds are a little much, though. Eventually, we got hungry and Lee and I split a crepe filled with Nutella and bananas. Probably one of the most delicious things ever. After we made it through most of the market, we picked up some peppers and tomatoes for dinner and I bought a really cute grey dress.

Now we're getting ready for a late dinner and a fun Saturday night.