Puppet People

It's true I'm still a little ill but I thought I should catch up on most of the things that have been happening.

I bought tickets to Animal Collective on March 12 and the next day I'm hoping to fly off to foggy London town to meet up with Erin and then to Amsterdam to enjoy some sticky green museums.

School is going alright, except for a certain teacher who is so unbelievably dumb I don't know how in God's name she was able to teach in this study abroad program twice already. I won't go off on a rant about her but, holy shit, she brought a LASER POINTER to a museum and started using it on hundred year old paintings until a security guard rushed up to her, crying, telling her to stop. She's making us look really really bad. But, as my Grandma would probably say, there's a nice fiery layer for her in Hell.

Anyway, I'm reading at lightning speed here, I'm afraid to come back with an extra suitcase of books. I have to come up with a trade system with other students (if any of them actually read...). I found a great used book store, with a huge English section, right next to an ever better Gelato place called GROM. I go there at least twice a day. It's absolutely amazing.

I'm really going to try and update as much as I can, the internet in Italy is hard to get and is super slow.

PS: the pictures below are of some weird Gypsy market out in front of the Santa Croce. They had a creepy puppet performance going on with really scratchy, loud music from a boombox from the 1980's

PSS: tomorrow is Carnivale here in Florence. Gonna be NUTS.

Sick...

So I've been deathly ill for the past week, sinus infection and whatnot. Hopefully by the end of the weekend I'll have the energy and strength to go do something. School is hard enough to drag myself to, it's absolutely freezing and our rooms have mold and are muggy so no matter where I go my sinuses are getting destroyed.

I'd hate to have this entire trip ruined because I was sick the entire time. I've lost track of the past three days even though I haven't slept at all. It really really sucks.

I'm feeling betrayed.

Gigi e Antonio

Last night my roommate Greg and I stopped by a local pizza place for a slice before heading back home after a couple stops at the bars. We get inside and the owner (Gigi) and his nephew (Antonio) are there so I start chatting with them in Italian. Antonio speaks a little English so we were able to carry on for a while. They ask where we're from and we say California, but the owner wants to know what heritage I have because I look Italian. So I tell him most of my family comes from Sicily. His eyes get wide and he runs to the back and gives us two cups of his homemade wine. It was the best wine I've had so far. So we're having a little pizza and sipping our wine when Gigi says "no, you drink like this", pours himself a cup, and drinks the whole thing in one gulp. So, because I didn't want to offend him, I drank what was left. Before I know it we all had another cup and 'salute' and we all drank it at once. Gigi tells us to bring our friends and we got some more free pizza and he gave me a big piece of focaccia with spinaci and ricotta and we went back home where Greg and I collapsed with laughter.

Che buone notte.

New Home (Florence)

I've been in Florence now for a few days, getting settled and getting to know the city and it's absolutely amazing. My apartment is five minutes from La Santa Croce (the big church below) and ten minutes from my school (the last picture). We, and by 'we' I mean my three roommates and the ten girls above us, live in a beautiful apartment right downtown. I've gone on a couple of tours to the Duomo and Palazzo Vecchio and I'll post more pictures later. There's trips to Piza and Rome all lined up and really really cheap so my weekends are full.

I'm having the time of my life and it's not even the end of the first week.

I've been keeping a journal but I'll try my best to update this with fun stuff as much as possible.

La vita dolce.