01/18/11
After having the first day of classes under our belt, we had somewhat of an idea of what to expect the next day, although we had completely different classes today. The day started with our Layers of Rome class, a class that unravels the history of Rome by taking class excursions to actual historic sites to better understand it. The first class was set in the classroom though to outline the course and to enable us to understand what was expected of us over the course of the semester. Our professor is very intimidating and from England. He reminded us a little of Severus Snape from Harry Potter with his accent and slow paced reading style. Something we’ve noticed is that the translation from other languages to English is sometimes a little misguided. For example, often times when this professor wants us to be quiet, he says “shut up!” rather than be quiet. Although it may not be his intention, many of us have found it very offensive. After this class, we had a quick break where many of us searched out a spot to eat. We wound up sitting down at a place called Ristorante Da Carlo where I got a margherita pizza that was delicious. It probably wasn’t appropriate to finish the whole thing in one sitting, but I definitely did! We discovered that we needed to start asking restaurants if they have student specials because many times they do and it winds up being much less expensive.
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| Lunch at Ristorante Da Carlo |
From lunch, we went to our first Italian class. Our group is split up into three separate classes so that there is a smaller amount of us in each class. Our teacher didn’t speak in English the entire class period, but rather spoke in Italian with hand gestures to help us understand what she was saying. I really like that they are teaching us this way because everything moves at a quicker pace, making it easier to catch on and learn more in a shorter time period. This class was followed by our weekly mandatory on-site facilitator meeting to check in and make sure everything is going okay. For dinner, we made caprese salad and pasta with chicken and broccoli with a creamy garlic sauce.
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| Family style dinner |
Later that night, a group of us decided to go to Campo de Fiori to a bar called Drunken Ship. It was a good time other than the fact that it was so crowded we could barely move.
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| On the tram headed for Campo de Fiori! |
01/19/11
We started today out thinking it was going to be extra relaxing and just intended on going to class, coming home, making dinner, and going to bed early. Let’s just say that is not what the day wound up being, but I’m definitely glad it turned out like it did! We had three classes today, Food & Culture, Italian, and Food & Media. We have the same teacher for both food classes, his name is Federico. He discussed his background with us and from the sounds of it, he has had a very interesting career path. Currently he writes for the Italian version of the Wall Street Journal, but is a food/wine critic for a column in the paper every day. Previously, he worked/wrote for Italy’s version of the food network. Needless to say, testing food and wine seems for a career seems like something I could get used to! In our food and culture class, there are three different days where we will be in the lab learning how to cook. One day is dedicated to different pastas, one to different meats, and one to different desserts. Other than that, we will learn about the history of food in Italy and how it makes up their culture. In between our two food classes was Italian, which we have every day so hopefully I’ll catch on to bits and pieces quickly! In our food and media class we again got split into groups and the main portion of the class revolves around a three part video we are making. It sounds like a really fun project and a good way to get to know kids in the program I don’t know as well. A field trip for this class is to go to a TV studio in Italy and get a tour of it. These two food classes also have a fieldtrip towards the end of the semester in Cilentro, farther south in Italy. While I don’t know what exactly we’ll be doing while we’re there, from the pictures I looked up online I can’t complain about having to go there, it looks absolutely beautiful.
At 4 o’clock, our classes were over for the day. We had been planning to meet my roommate Lauren’s friend Federico outside of our school. He had studied in the United States during high school and lived with one of Lauren’s good guy friends, so she had gotten to know him pretty well during his stay. We had asked him if sometime he could show us around the nightlife to see what true Italians do. Out of politeness, in his words, he suggested that we all first meet during the daylight. This was very sweet. We figured he would just stop by and say hello/introduce himself. Instead, he took us on quite the tour. I’m pretty sure we traveled in and out of every part of Rome during our tour and he gave us insight on places we otherwise wouldn’t have known. A tip that we all took away was that anywhere that you can see the food and/or it looks really good, then it’s not. Also, he suggested that many of the good restaurants are those that don’t have names. He took us to one of his favorite gelato places near the Pantheon that had very obscure flavors and it was by far the best I’d had. I had a mixture of coffee and caramel flavors, yum! After venturing around the city for several hours, he asked if we would want to go with him to meet up with his friend Gianvito for drinks and dinner. Even though we had originally planned to cook our own dinner that night, after being such a kind guy and showing us around, we were looking forward to meeting his friend and going to a place locals go. We went to a place where they sold over 100 different types of beers and they apparently recently opened one up in New York as well. These were very large bottles so for a table of eight, we got four bottles. We tried four very different types including a fruity one, an Egyptian one, a darker lager, and then Federico’s favorite. I really liked all four types although I can’t remember the actual names of them. For our appetizer, we got these freshly fried potato chips with their special spicy catsup.
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| A glimpse of the 100 beer bar! |
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| Roommates with our new Italian friends! |
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| First limoncello |
After hanging out for awhile, we were getting hungry, but the boys weren’t since it was only 7:30 and the earliest they every eat dinner is 8. We headed to a place called Rossopomodoro, where they make pizza similar to that of Naples. We each got a pizza and it was by far the best one yet. The crust was so thin, yet so doughy I don’t know how they did it! For dessert, Federico insisted that we tried limoncello with them. I was expecting to like it; however, they just sip on it and in my opinion it was far too strong to just sip on. After dinned we parted ways and agreed that once their exams were all over, they’d take us out at night, but until then it was study, study, study. I thought we studied hard in America, but Federico said he wakes up and studies at least 6 hours a day in addition to classes! I wouldn’t have the patience to do that! After a very long day, we all crawled into bed and slept with no problems!
01/20/11
Day four of classes started on a dreary, drizzly day. As I stated earlier, we are scared to death of our Layers of Rome professor and since we meet at various locations in Rome for class and since he said if we’re late, we miss class, we made sure to leave with over 45 minutes until the start of class. It’s the one and only time all of our roommates were ready on time without question. Today we were meeting on Tiber Island at the church of Saint Bartolomeo. Even though our teacher is frightening, I’m really looking forward to this class. I’ve always found history interesting, but getting the chance to be on-site of the history we’re learning about makes it that much better of an experience. Today, learning about the origins of Rome and its beginnings on Tiber Island is a lesson I won’t forget. The first class was really enjoyable as we learned that Rome, like many other famous cities like Paris and New York, started out as an island and then expanded outwards. During a time of distress, the Romans went to the Greek gods for aid, and Asclepius, the god of healing and medicine, arrived on Tiber Island in the form of a serpent. For this reason, the island was shaped as a boat (his transportation mode) and there is still an outline of the statue of Asclepius with his staff and serpent intertwined on the outer walls of the island. We learned that the reason one of the hospitals is located on this island is two-fold. One being that islands are a way to keep contagion contained and second being that it is in honor of Asclepius and him being the god of healing/medicine. We had our class in the church of Saint Bartolomeo, which was neat as well. I learned that nothing changes in Rome over the centuries. We saw this first-hand at the church where our teacher pointed out that the church consisted of columns made up of three different materials. This is something I wouldn’t have noticed without having it pointed out to me. I also learned about how the concept of a basilica changed so much over the years in Rome. It started out being a simple term for a meeting hall for the king to being the location of worship once Christianity entered Rome.
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| Church of Saint Bartolomeo |
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| Professor "Snape" next to the outline of Asclepius |
The rest of the day consisted of classes, making dinner, and the stressful event of attempting to book our first flight until we went out for the night. After several hours of searching for the best flights, we opted to skip class the following Thursday to catch a flight to Prague for the weekend! I can’t wait as traveling is my number one priority during this four months!
01/21/11
Last night we had quite the adventure. Our entire group decided to go out together to a part of Rome called Testaccio. We were headed to a club called Coyote, but no one thought to mapquest it because two of the boys were convinced that they knew how to get there. Instead, we got very lost and wound up near a very shady building with a lot of graffiti where we aren’t quite sure what was going on… it could have been an underground rave or some form of a mafia meeting. When we finally figured out we made a wrong turn, we backtracked and got back on path. In reality the club wasn’t that far away, but it took us about an hour and a half to get there. After another long night, it was nice to be able to sleep in Friday morning because we didn’t have any classes. We slept much later than expected and it was raining and cold outside. We took it as an opportunity to catch up on sleep and relax before going out for one of the girl in our programs 21st birthday. For dinner, all our roommates other than Gina, who was sick, went to dinner at a place down the street from our apartment called Le Fate. It was my favorite meal of the trip thus far and with the student discount, at a single price we all got wine, an appetizer, a main course, and dessert. The meal changes on a daily basis so you never know what you’re going to get. For our appetizer we had one piece of regular bruschetta and one piece that had some form of melted cheese with arugola on top. The main meal was pesto and basil pasta followed by coffee/vanilla ice cream. I left feeling very satisfied and ready for another fun night. We had plans to try out a bar called DJ bar located in Trastevere just before the Tiber River. We didn’t get there until after midnight because our group was all having so much fun together back at the apartments. It was raining out and of course, we got lost on our way there as seems to be the norm when we try to go somewhere in this city.
01/22/11
Saturday was another chilly and rainy day. While I expected this type of weather, I didn’t realize how brutal it is to try and explore in this kind of weather. We decided that we would be better off to see the sights in Rome when the weather is better and all of us were exhausted after a very busy first week in a new city. We lounged around and watched movies/caught up on TV shows. During lunch time, my friend Ashley and I decided to try McDonalds in Italy because I always like to try it in foreign countries simply to compare it to those of America. Like in China, the McDonalds in Italy are similar, but have very different and smaller menus. Likewise, they have a 1 euro menu, but the items on it differ. They also offer burgers with mozzarella and tomato on it, not something you would see at an American one. We started to look at other flights for several other trips we planned, but recognized that the weekend is not the time to try and find the least expensive flights so we postponed this activity to early next week. For dinner, we went to a restaurant recommended to us by a group of girls who did the program the year before us. It is called Cassetta di Trastevere. Here I tried the bruschetta, penne al’arrabiata (which was spicy, but amazing!!), and the house wine. The majority of our program decided to call it a night after dinner knowing that we have a long week ahead of us, starting with the bears playoff game tomorrow night, which we’re going to watch at Scholars Pub!
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| Penne al'arrabiata |
01/23/11
Today started out more studious than my past week abroad. Because the Porta Portese market is located right outside our apartment and they start setting up at 5 a.m., it’s pretty impossible to sleep too late Sundays. I managed to keep sleeping until ten when I decided it wasn’t worth my time to keep trying and started doing my homework. I didn’t have much (just a short reading and a journal entry for Layers of Rome), but it was nice to have out of the way for the rest of the day. After we all finished our homework, we traveled out into the market to see if we could find anything we like. I’ve been trying to find new aviators since mine snapped in my purse on the flight here so I’ve been sunglasses. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to find anything I really like though other than scarves, but I’m going to go back and buy some later. The market itself reminds me of an expanded garage sale, a lot of junk you have to sort through to get to something you like. Our last stop on our journey through the market was going to be at the supermarket to grab some food to make dinner tomorrow. Unfortunately, unbeknownst to us, every supermarket closes at 1:30 so buying food to make for dinner wasn’t an option. Instead, I came back to our apartment and relaxed/plaid games with my roommates. We sipped on wine and played the game where you write the name of someone on a blank sheet of paper and stick it on someone’s forehead. Then each person can go around in a circle asking yes or no questions until they can correctly guess what the name on their forehead says. We had a blast playing it! Then we got ready to head out to Scholars to watch the Bears game and grab a bite to eat. We sat down in a little booth within Scholars, which we were lucky to grab. We weren’t all too hungry so we ordered a couple appetizers to split (Nachos and Chicken Sticks)—it tasted fantastic and reminded me a bit of America. We spent the rest of the night hanging out with what felt like every American who was in Rome that night watching the Bears game. Sadly, it didn’t end as I would have liked, but I still enjoyed watching it in the atmosphere that we did!
01/24/11
What feels like a month into the trip began week two of our four-month adventure! Today definitely felt like I was back at high school again with how long we were in class for. Our schedule changes each week, so we never really are able to understand what the week will be like beforehand or get used to something. Our first class was supposed to last from 9:30-12:30, but since Italians don’t move quickly for the most part, class went 25 minutes late. Given we only had a 50-minute break before Italian to begin with, you can imagine how irritated we all were with our limited lunch break. My Italian Culture and Society class is my latest of the day and it’s a constant struggle to stay awake. After a long day of class already in addition to the professor’s monotonous voice, I find myself pinching myself to stay awake. Today I actually caught myself dozing off only to wake myself up in a jerk, spreading pen all over my notes. We walked from class to the supermarket to grab food for dinner, as well as food to bring for lunch and dinner the rest of the week until we leave for Prague on Thursday. We discovered 1 euro soup (I got minestrone) that was delicious, I’ll be eating that multiple times this semester! For breakfast I decided to go European and get croissants with nutella inside them, Nutella is hugee here! As far as lunch goes, I’m keeping it simple with a salami and cheese sandwich with a piece of fruit on the site. After dinner, we had to buckle down and study for our first Italian quiz! It shouldn’t be very hard, but I don’t want to mess up on the first quiz! Gina, knowing Italian nearly fluently, made us a practice quiz and graded it to make sure we’re on the right track! As far as tonight goes, I’m going to bed early to make sure I can get up on time for my scary professor Severus Snape lookalike so he doesn’t leave without us!
