The Beginning of the End

Monday was pretty uneventful, I won't lie. The weather was pretty nasty, so I couldn't go to the waterfall like I wanted to. Stayed inside mostly and hung out. I was kind of bummed that I spent a whole day in Italy inside, but we had fun that night. It was Molly's 21st birthday, so most of us went out for dinner at Squa Qua, which was delicious as always and quite fun. After Squa Qua we went over to Seven's...of course. It was pretty fun. We spent the day making some CDs so we wouldn't have to listen to the same old stuff again, so we all had a good time hanging out and dancing to all of that. Charlotte, Mac, Mike, and I all left together and thus began the late night buildering adventures. Mac and I started scoping out door frames to climb and we climbed one. Good times! There are also some little cracks and stuff that were pretty fun to try out across the street from their apartment. Hahaha, it was so random. That was pretty much the excitement for the day...sad but true. Today was a good day. It was my haircut!! I had my Italian exam in the morning, which went well, and then an Intercultural Communication quiz...which was ridiculously hard...and then I went to Matteo's! I was SO pumped about getting my haircut, it's not even funny. I told him he could do whatever he wanted, and it seems that the consensus is that I turned out looking like a french girl. I LOVE it! I'm still kind of getting used to the bangs, but it's cute. It takes a lot more styling than I'm used to, but it's all good. After my haircut I went to Dan's apartment for lunch with Mac and Charlotte. It was so tasty! It was actually the meal I've been waiting for--something where everything comes from its specific shop. We went to the bakery for the bread, the meat and cheese store for the prosciutto and peccorino, and Dan had the wine from the wine store--all very tasty. After lunch I came back to the lab for a bit and finished up my web page and stuff. There was a soccer game at 6 between the Italiani e Americani, which was HILARIOUS. I pretty much died watching it. Just the warm-up was awesome. One of the Italian kids plays for like...the youth Milian team or something...but all of them were seriously legit and we had like...Matt who was wearing dress shoes. Basically, we were a motley crew. Awesome. We left towards the end of the game to go hit-up Squa Qua...again. I had the french fry pizza, which was surprisingly delicious. Good combination of foods. After Squa Qua, we went back to Casa Lapis for a bit and I just kind of chilled while everyone got ready. We went to Seven's around 10 or 10:30, but it was a relatively uneventful night there. Pretty much just chatting going on. Mac and I bailed a little early for another buildering excursion. We ad been checking out the archway to the door of our school building, which proved to be totally worth it. We can't climb stuff during the day because it would look REALLY bad, but it's a fun late-night activity. We hit up a few other "problems" around and then headed home, but it was pretty worth it. It was a good two nights of buildering adventures and other fun!

Assisi!

Today was our trip to Assisi...FINALLY! The drive there was really long and windy, so I ended up getting motion sick again. What else is new? When we got there, the first place we went was the Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli which was pretty cool. Most of it was pretty standard, but in the middle of it, there is the little chapel where St. Francis would come to pray when he transitioned from being a heathen to a saint. It was really pretty cool. The frescos were kind of amazing, and it's just crazy to think about how long that chapel has been there. I mean, St. Francis was alive in the 1200s. A few feet away from that little chapel was the place where St. Francis died, too. Wow. After that was mass, which I didn't go to. Charlotte and I visited the monastery instead, which was pretty sweet. St. Francis is the patron saint of animals, so there is one part were there is a statue of St. Francis with a basket and there are live turtle doves in it. So cool! After mass ended, we walked over to a restaurant for lunch. I think we may have experienced our first traditional pranzo! We started with pasta and then had a meat and vegetable course. Not exactly a full pranzo, but the best we've had. The food was decent, but I've kind of been hoping for better. Oh well. I can't complain--I'm in Italy! After lunch we hiked up the hill to the main city of Assisi. That was funny. We were all crazy tired from lack of sleep and a big lunch and then trying to take like a two mile walk uphill. It was really cool to walk into the city though. We went up to the Basilica of St. Francis, which is where St. Francis's remains are. The crypt was an intense thing to see. It was kind of an oddly holy moment for me--not because St. Francis is really important to me or anything, but just that it's so special to so many people that they come from all over the world to see it. It's pretty amazing that something like the crypt of St. Francis could bring people together like that. The rest of the basilica was seriously cool. The frescos were INCREDIBLE. They were just crazy detailed and vibrant. It's amazing to think what it looked liked when it was first finished. Unreal. In the front of the top part of the basilica, there is what is said to be the most realistic interpretation of St. Francis (in fresco). Interesting. We were given free time to walk around and shop after that, so I ended up buying a gift and walking around with Charlotte. The views from up on the hill were SO amazing. It was like how I pictured Italy being. Olive trees, open fields, cypress trees...so pretty. We got some gelato--always delicious--then started heading back in the direction of the bus. When we got back to Cagli, I stopped in the lab for a little bit then headed home, make some pasta, and conked out. Cassidy went out with Molly for her birthday and when she got back, I was literally asleep in my clothes with all the lights on. Dang. Sleep-in tomorrow because there is no class until 1:30!

End of a Busy Week

Finally the weekend!! Pretty much a lot of the same story. Last real day of classes yesterday...only Intercultural Comm next week! After class, Cassidy and I ran around trying to get our stand-ups done for our videos and getting B roll. I guess I should probably explain what some of this stuff is?? A stand-up is basically what you see on the news when reporters are on the scene or whatever and talking directly to the camera, so we both use a stand-up at the end of our videos. I was really against doing one at first, but I needed something different to conclude and had NO B roll to support it, which lends itself to doing a stand-up. Plus Dan really wanted us to do stand-ups, so there you go. B roll is basically like....secondary footage, so supporting visuals like people walking around and whatnot. So it was pretty crazy yesterday afternoon and REALLY hot, which didn't help. We were both exhausted by the end, so we went out for pizza with a few other girls. Man...it was SO good! I got pizza bosciola (I think that's the right spelling...) which is pomodori (tomatos), mozzarella, funghi (mushrooms), and salsiccia (sausage). Yum! Also, when I ordered, I spoke in a complete sentence which pretty much floored the waiter after a bunch of Americani pointing at things. Pretty funny. I went to Caffe d'Italia with Charlotte, Victoria, and Nicole for a little bit, but we were all pretty exhausted after a long week. This morning I woke up, did the tracking for my video package (the voice over narration), and then headed to the lab to start editing. I didn't get very far because I ended up not liking the audio, so I went back to the apartment to retrack and by the time that was all imported and subclipped, it was Cassidy's turn to use the computer. I didn't really have any way to get things done, so Charlotte, Dan, and I went to lunch "for Father's Day" at La Lanterna. It was kind of silly because we invited Dan to come with us and he ended up taking us out for Father's Day. A little backwards? Absolutely. Quite tasty though. We had prosciutto e melone for an appetizer, which sounds kind of gross, but is actually crazy delicious. I had gnocci as a main course, which was good, but this region isn't known for gnocci. I skyped during the afternoon after I got back from lunch and then finally got to work on my editing. I ended up finishing my video around 9 and I was SO glad to be done! Just web production from here. Yes!! I threw together some pasta when I got home and then ended up going out with everyone. We went to Seven's for a little while, but then ended up at some random party at a caffe near La Lanterna. It was a little too crowded and a little too hot for me, so I didn't end up staying for a terribly long time. Charlotte and I left after an hour or so and then ended up sitting in the hallway of our apartment building chatting for an hour. Good times. Tomorrow I have to wake up early for our trip to Assisi! I don't really know much about it, but it should be cool. Buona notte!

More work and Karaoke!

Still lacking in exciting things to report...

Yesterday morning we went to The Loft, Matteo's salon, for my interview and to get B roll. It was pretty sweet. Matteo was such a good subject. He speaks English, so we didn't need a translator and he could talk about hair and fashion for days on end. It was cool to see the salon, finally, and we all made appointments to get hair cuts. I'm getting mine cut Tuesday! A little later than I was expecting, but I'm still pumped about it. I guess it will just be more fresh for when I get home! After the interview, I came back to the lab for a looooong time to do photo editing, which was just frustrating. Whatever I did I pretty much ended up hating. I think I liked my original pictures better. Whatever, I guess. I made a few attempts and they look alright now. I took a long break to go have lunch at Dan's apartment with him and Mac. It was SO awesome! We stopped at the porchetta truck for a panini and then brought them up to his terrace. You can see over Cagli to the mountains and it's freakin' awesome. I could try to describe it, but I can't do it justice. Not even a picture can. It was nice to relax for a little bit before coming back to school for classes and then to work on my article. In our intercultural communication class, the lecture was about gypsies and I'm pretty sure it was the most offensive lecture of my life. Our professor actually asked us if we had seen any gypsies during the market that day pretty much equating them with homeless people. I don't even know how to describe everything he said, but it was SO offensive. He basically just reinforced common stereotypes of gypsies instead of trying to clear them up. Crazy. After classes, I stayed in the lab until like...8:30 and then got home and was exhausted. While I was at school I went to La Foccacia for my first suppli and patate frite. Yumm. Suppli is a pretty traditional Italian snack...more around Rome...where they roll mozzarella in rice and tomato sauce, then roll the whole thing in breadcrumbs and spices and deep fry it. I think that was the only fried food I've really seen in Italy thus far. I also got fries and they tasted SO good! I was dying for some french fries. We've all been talking about how much we miss things like take-out chinese food and taco bell. I don't miss American food too much, but I won't lie--a burrito from Chipotle sounds pretty good right now. Just kind of chilled-out last night because I was exhausted after everything today. Today was a lot more of the same, with working on my video script. We meant to go out and get some B roll, but we kind of ran out of time and energy. Dan didn't completely shoot mine down, but he ripped it up a little bit, so I wasn't in the greatest mood. I went back to Casa Lapis and watched the Corpus Cristie procession with Charlotte, which apparently happens twice. It was kind of interesting watching it from one spot. After everyone passed, the kids ran into the street and started jumping in the leaves and flowers. It was pretty cute. I relaxed for a little bit, then everyone started to get ready for Karaoke night. Charlotte straightened my hair, which was really weird. I couldn't stop touching it just because it kind of freaked me out. Maggie also lent me a dress and Sylvia lent me a necklace, so I pretty much looked nothing like myself. I wish I would have taken a picture, but alas. Karaoke was a good time. I actually got up and sang a few songs with other people, so I had fun. At the end of the night, the guys Charlotte was trying to convince to sing American songs for her project came in, so I played wing-man for a little bit. I was about to leave, so I went up to pay for my beer and some guy was standing at the bar and started going on about how pretty I was and trying get me to kiss him on the cheek and I was like, "ummm...no." Then I went back by Charlotte and her friend's (Ale) friend (Luca) started going after me and like touching my hair and putting his arm around me and stuff. Not cool, but he was at least kind of nice and talked to me for a little bit first. The Italian guys seriously treat American women like meat because they all think we're crazy easy. Maybe true for some, but definitely not me. I left shortly after that and went to bed! Long night. Overall, quite enjoyable despite some uncomfortable moments!

Class Stuff...

Nothing too exciting so far this week. It's going to be a busy week of just getting work done. Did a bunch of interviews yesterday and today. It's pretty interesting working with translators and getting a chance to talk to people. One thing that is a little frustrating is that often times the translators do a lot of paraphrasing, which is understandable, but we really need good details for our stories. We just do what we can I guess. After classes we met up with Matteo to go to his fashion academy for the fashion story (duh) and I started shooting some B roll there. Probably was a smart idea to run back and grab a video camera. Got some decent footage. We have final photos due on Wednesday so I went out shooting last night for the transportation piece. It was kind of cool, but I didn't get many good pictures because it was getting a little too dark and there wasn't anyone around because of the USA v. Italia soccer game. Needless to say, I gave up on the pictures and headed to Seven's to watch the game. I think it goes unsaid that Italy won. It was hilarious because when the Americans scored we were kind of like, "yay!" but when the Italians scored, they were like, "ASKDPGAWPEGAPAJGPAWEPAFPDKGARGAIEWAPPAE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Good times. The bar kind of turned into a random party after the game ended. Some of the kids from our program made a CD of american music (because they always end up playing the same CD every night) and we ended up going crazy dancing to it. Fun times! This morning Cassidy and I went shooting again and I ended up getting some good pictures. This one is my favorite: I spend the rest of the day editing photos and doing some interviews--finally got all the interviews for my story! I also spent my evening working on my article. I need to turn in a final draft to Judy tomorrow, so after I turn both the photos and the draft in, that's a lot of weight off of my shoulders. Video shooting should be pretty much done tomorrow, WOOT! Then just final article editing, video editing, and web production to do!

Corpus Crisite

I woke up early today for Corpus Cristi festivities. I was just planning on observing, but as I was sitting at Caffé de Commercio drinking my cappuccino, I was suddenly swept up by Giordana to help lay out flowers in the piazza for the procession. Victoria and I made a heart and did zig-zags of petals along the path. It was actually pretty sweet even though it was basically an oven out there. After a little while of setting up, some of the old men watching us bought John and I something to drink. It was really nice because I felt like they really appreciated that we were helping. It felt good to help them out because they have graciously allowed us to enter their community, video cameras and all and this allowed us to thank them a little bit for their openness. Jake even gave me the key to go upstairs and get a SWEET view of the decorated piazza. Very cool. After that, Victoria and I walked around looking at all of the flower decorations. There were some seriously awesome ones. My favorite was from the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts that said, "la mia strade che porte a te" which means something to the effect of "my road leads me to you." We stood in the piazza and took pictures once the procession started and joined in as it neared the end. It was pretty cool processing with them because we got to see the decorations all over the village. We bailed a little before they reached the end because we were starving and I needed to get back for a Skype appointment. After Skyping, we went to the waterfall for a little bit. It was PACKED. Most of the other girls were leaving when we got there and Victoria didn't even have a swimsuit, so we didn't stay long. It was basically a ton of Italian guys there. I hopped in for a little bit to try out my boulder problem, which dissapointingly only took two tries to send and on my first attempt I just had bad feet for the start. It's kind of difficult because once that rock gets a little wet, it's CRAZY slick and I had to start in the water and I was also trying this in Chacos which stick, but are bulky. Fun nonetheless, but I wish it had been a little more of a challenge. When we got back, Charlotte and I made pasta for dinner which was tasty and killed a bottle of wine before we left for Carmen. Good thing, because the whole Carmen experience was a DISASTER! Apparently, no one read the fine print, because on top of it being a sweltering 256 degrees on the top floor, it was a freaking DANCE RECITAL! We got all dressed up to watch some four-year-olds prance around in tutus. REALLY?!? I mean, it was cute and all, but not what I was expecting for 10 Euro. Oh well. It makes a good story, right?

Fano!

Today was supposed to be the trip to Florence, but because of the crazy high cost, we went to the beach in Fano instead. Charlotte and I were so proud of ourselves for figuring out the buses in Italian. Go team! We even had to switches buses at some random bus stop in Calmezzo or something and we didn't get lost. Woot! The only problem was that I got CRAZY motion sick. The roads are so windy and there was a lot of stop-and-go thoughout Fano, so when I got off the bus I was not feeling well. My stomach calmed down after a little bit though, so that was good. The beach was really nice. I think we were supposed to pay at some point...but I'm not really sure? Anyway, it was all rocks, which was pretty cool. We spent a lot of time just lounging in the sun, which was nice. We swam a little bit, too, so I can officially say I went swimming in the Adriatic Sea. Cool! We came back a couple hours earlier than the rest of the group so I could get back to Skype with my parents. On the drive there were huge rock faces that looked sweet! I tried to get some good pictures, but it was pretty difficult. After group dinner at La Lanterna, I got gelato and totally crashed. I didn't even realize how tired I was, but I got back to my room at around 10:30 and fell asleep with my glasses on, headphones in, and a half played game of solitaire on the screen of my iPod.

R.I.P.

I have a bad feeling these blog entries are going to become increasingly sparse. I'll try to keep them up the best I can, but my hard drive bit the dust today. No more computadora for me. :-(

Ohhh computers...

As you know, my hard drive died today. Mike Williams tried very hard to resuscitate it, but to no avail. Sad day, but it will be fine. We have laptops in the lab that I can use for the remainder of the Cagli Project. I’m not the only one with computer issues. Charlotte had her laptop shipped here after she arrived because she realized how useful it would be, but she’s had a lot of problems trying to track it down. It’s been floating around Italy for a while because she has to pay some random BS import tax of almost 400 Euro! Ridic! After classes today, we got a bunch of interviews done. We went to some shops and did two interviews for the fashion story and got one with Enrico for my youth story. It was a busy afternoon. We spent Friday night relaxing and hanging out at Caffé d’Italia where we learned about hot shots. Mmmmm.

Grocery Mishap and Karaoke

Today we lost a lot of glue in our program when Carole and Dr. Byers left. Carole has been a technical and organizational MASTER and she is going to be sorely missed over here—Dr. Byers also for his classroom contributions and quirky sense of humor. We all wish they could have stayed for the whole trip. In other news, my feet are itching like CRAZY! Apparently they are just bug bites, but I seriously look like my feet are breaking out in hives. I’m trying to keep it under control with hydrocortisone cream, but it’s still bothering me a lot. Hopefully it will get better soon. This morning I found out that, unfortunately, the Florence trip was cancelled. Boo! Apparently the travel agency we were arranging this through jacked up the price. No bueno. (Shh, I know that’s Spanish.) It’s alright though. None of my close friends here were going to go anyway, and we decided to go to the beach in Fano. It should be a good time! After classes today, I moved out of my second apartment and finally into Casa Lapis! There are drawbacks, but at this point I think the pros outweigh the cons. As soon as we got into our new apartment and started to try get settled, Giordana came frantically running into our room to tell us that we were missing an interview we didn’t know was scheduled. Yikes! We ran out of the room just as the maid was coming in. Carole had cleaned the apartment before she left, but apparently Mario, the landlord, would have flipped out if it weren’t properly cleaned by the maid. So, we ran out the door and did some interviews at the orotorio. It was pretty cool to see everything in action there. It’s basically like a big playground that the church runs so kids have somewhere to play. There’s a basketball court, a soccer field, a caffé, and some jungle gym type equipment. After the interview, Kevin, Victoria and I were planning to go to the grocery store so I ran up to my new apartment to see what I had and what I needed. I walked in, opened the fridge, and to my horror all of our groceries had been thrown away—even all of the unopened food! Apparently the maid thought the food was leftover from Carole, so we lost everything! Fortunately, I found some of it in the trash (all sealed things), and we are being reimbursed 30 Euro (supposedly), so that’s good. What a nightmare, though. Kevin and Victoria were really nice and went to the grocery store while I figured that out and got some stuff for dinner for me. After we ate, we went to Squa Qua with Dan and Charlotte for some coffee before karaoke at Seven’s. We talked for a long time and even Dr. Thorn showed up for a bit. Pretty entertaining. We went across the street to Seven’s after a bit for karaoke, which was HILARIOUS to observe! I’m really glad we went. It was kind of a USA fest for a little while with songs like “Born in the USA” and “Surfin USA” and “Sweet Home Alabama” which was possibly a little culturally insensitive (??), but still highly entertaining. Left the bar pretty much as soon as I started getting hit-on by Italians. Pretty much a mood killer right there. Still a good night, though!

Simone Dice

Today was the second market day that we have been here for. Giordanna was very nice to us and let us out of Italian to go shopping! I walked around with Charlotte for the whole morning looking at all the carts. I bought some pretty cute knock-off Birkenstock sandals. I saw them at one stand where they were 50 Euro, went around the corner and got them for 25. Niiiice! During lunch I decided to get a suitcase to bring back souvenirs. Although I have room in my suitcase, it’s WAY too close to the weight limit. It gives me a little more space to pack breakables, too, which is nice. Not a bad little suitcase for 50 Euro. For lunch, I stopped at the porchetta truck to get a panino. Mmmmm. After lunch, I got a pear as a snack at the produce shop right down the block from our school building and it was seriously the most delicious pear I have ever tasted! Perfectly ripe and juicy. In Italian in the afternoon we learned the names of body parts, so we played Simone Dice (Simon Says). It was pretty awesome. It reminded me of high school French. That afternoon, we were scheduled to go to impromptu interviews with La Foccacia (NOT La Foccaciaria…I have been calling it the wrong thing this whole time), but we found out that the shop owner, Marina, was not willing to talk to anyone for interviews. Yikes! So we brainstormed ideas for a new story and it’s about fashion now. Crazy as it was changing, it’s all good. The fashion story actually seems really solid. Unfortunately we didn’t end up doing any interviews today, but we should be fine. After that drama, Victoria, Kevin, and I went to Casa Lapis to make dinner. Charlotte came back from an interview after we ate and we all hung out. We were thinking about getting gelato, but never really made it. We spent a long time just talking and being ridiculous. It was fun!

Getting into it

This post is a combination of yesterday and today. I don’t have much to say because I’m pretty much in classes all day right now, which isn’t very exciting to read about. We started talking about video yesterday. I’m kind of intimidated because we watched examples of videos (all Dan’s, our professor,) and critiqued them. The major elements that were off I could pick up, but the more subtle ones were a LOT harder for me to spot. Cassidy basically told me that once you start editing video for yourself, you pick up on more of other peoples’ mistakes, so that’s a little reassuring. Victoria and I are kind of in the same semi-clueless boat. We had a long lunch break and went to Caffé del Corso for a “lunch meeting.” I don’t think we really got anything done, but the food was great! Following afternoon classes we had a meeting with Gale, our mentor, to talk about our story ideas again and start trying to pin point some things. I think we made progress and just got a little more focus, which is good. Last night for dinner we had a cooking class with John Caputo, which was delicious! It was penne pasta with a ricotta cheese, butter, basil, and garlic “sauce”. Mmmm! Victoria and I stopped by Caffé d’Italia after dinner to ask Romano for an interview, which he readily agreed to. We went to Casa Lapis to find Charlotte after that and just hung out for a while. I had thought about shooting some pictures, but was too tired. I experimented a little with the digital SLRs and Kevin helped me a lot to understand everything with f-stops, shutter speed, aperture, types of focus, etc. Today was…you guessed it…more class. For our afternoon Italian class we got to go outside, though, which was cool! We walked around to some organizations around town that might be good sources for our stories. This afternoon we had an interview with Romano about his garden that went pretty well. I think we got some good information and Victoria seemed happy about it, so that’s good. After the interview we stopped at Caffé di Teatro for a cappuccino and then went to dinner at La Laterna on MU. Woot! Although, Cassidy pointed out that we did pay for these dinners… Anywho, I had spaghetti carbonara, which was kind of salty, but pretty delicious. We also had a surprise dessert of nutella pizza! Yum! After dinner we need to do a film assignment based on the prompt “Mmm…gelato”. Each group member did three shots and we’ll edit them…later this week? I’m not sure. I kinda feel like we have a start on this stuff now, so I’m a little less nervous than I was. It’s really stressful trying to set up interviews when you don’t know whom to interview and you don’t speak the language! Luckily, we knew Romano and he also speaks French, so that was easy to set up. The others are a bit more of a hassle. We’re supposed to have all of the writing drafted by Friday…scary! I think we’re going to try to get more interviews tomorrow and go from there. I am so full right now of pasta, vino, nutella pizza, and gelato! All delicious, but making me sleepy. Bedtime is early tonight so I am ready to go for the rest of this busy week! Ciao!

La Cascata

This morning I slept in then got up and hung out for a little while and made a semi-early lunch while people were at mass. After lunch, I headed over to Casa Lapis to meet up with Victoria and Charlotte to head down to the waterfall. We were kind of upset because it was a little chilly, but it was okay. We dallied for a bit and then started our trek. When we got there, there were a few people hanging around lying out on the rocks. There were some dark clouds headed our way by the time we got over there and it looked like rain, but we didn’t mind. We made our way though the river and over the rocks down by the waterfall. It was pretty cool. The rock is a little chossier than I originally thought, though. I think there must be a lot of minerals in the water because it seems like whatever is close to the river is a lot smoother for one and has a layer of like…calcified junk on it. I think that free-standing boulder may still have decent prospects, though. We climbed up over the waterfall where there is like a ledge and a pond that is maybe a couple feet deep and if you walk behind the waterfall and around the corner there is a big river that seems to go on for miles. We waded through it for quite a long while and eventually found some small rapids. It was really fun! We decided to turn back when it started raining and walked all the way home in the rain. Boo! It was fine though. My warm shower felt so nice when I got back! I headed over to Casa Lapis for dinner. I didn’t have a lot of ingredient options, so I created a kind of Italian fajita sandwich thing. I don’t even know, but it was delicious! I fried some sweet onions and prosciutto, sliced some tomatoes, and put it on pita bread. Mmmmm. A little boot leg, but seriously delicious. I’ve never had those kind of onions before, but they were SO sweet and delicious. We hung out for a while after that and went to Caffé d’Italia. 8 AM classes again tomorrow…

Vino

This morning I finally made my own breakfast in my own apartment. I tried the pear yogurt that I bought a few days ago, and it was delicious! I also made coffee with my mocha pot and had some bread and jelly. How euro! Unfortunately, the bread is pretty stale. I bought it from the bakery mid-week and it is hard as a rock by now. It’s not that bad though…with jelly on it, it’s kind of like a tartine. After breakfast I rushed to the piazza for the walk led by John Caputo. We walked around some new part of Cagli for me, like the basketball court and a lot of well-known shops. We walked by the ceramic store where the woman does hand painted ceramic pieces. Really cool…I need to find something to bring back with me. We also went by a lot of the local food markets—non grocery store. I really want to cook at least one meal using ONLY ingredients from the local stores. I think if I did that too much it might get kind of expensive, but at least once it will be so worth it! The grocery stores are still good, though—especially the smaller one. Their meat looks incredibly fresh, and the fruits and vegetables do too. We walked all the way down to the big grocery store, which was kind of a waste of my time, but oh well. Then we walked all the back through Cagli and up into the mountains to visit the Cappuccini monastery. Apparently, it is for this particular order that the cappuccino is named because of the similarities of the monks’ hair and the foam on top of the cappuccino. It was beautiful at the monastery and I think we’re planning to go back soon. There were some great views of the mountains, New Cagli, and sort of Old Cagli. After the monastery we came all the way back down the mountain and about a mile up the highway to go visit the waterfall. It was pretty cool and I climbed all the way down to go check it out and dip my feet in. Much to my thrilling surprise, there is—wait for it—CLIMBABLE ROCK down there! I’m excited to try out some nice looking “shallow-water bouldering problems” when I go back tomorrow. If you see pictures it looks a little chossy (like Rifle) but the rock seems solid from what I can tell. It’s could be limestone? It’s kind of slick, but very featured—kind of blocky. There’s a pretty awesome free standing boulder in the middle of the river with an overhanging section, so that’s what I’m going to be playing on tomorrow. Can’t wait! After our “one hour” walk (actually 3 and ½), I ran back to my apartment and ate lunch quickly so I could make my Skype dates with my parents and JJ. It was nice to talk to them—especially because it seems like most people have talked with their friends and family a lot more. It’s going to ridiculous to try to explain this trip to people when I get back and all is said and done. Anyway, after Skype I went to the wine tasting at Alimentaire. It was so fun! We tried two whites and three reds—all of which were region specific. Most people had a couple they didn’t like but I enjoyed them all. They were all very different. My favorites were two of the reds—Lacrima di Morro (Tears of the Moore), which was the most interesting wine I have ever tasted, and the Rosso Conero, which was fairly sweet. The Lacrima had a very floral taste similar to lilac and finished with a hint of black licorice, and the Conero was more like…some sort of baked good. It very much reminded me of cupcake frosting or something. There was also food between each wine to cleanse the palate and everything was awesome. There was some bruschetta (brew-SKEH-tah) between two wines that was really awesome, some Peccarino cheese, which I believe is region specific, that was awesome. We’re going back on Wednesday night for a cheese tasting. Yummm! I can’t wait! After the wine tasting, we shopped for a little and hung out before dinner. We went to dinner at the same pizza place from a few nights ago, but we were finally allowed to order something besides pizza! Man, I am SICK of pizza. It’s good an all, but I just want to try some new foods. Charlotte and I split two pasta dishes—penne all’arribiata and ravioli di ragù. Both were very different and both good in their own ways. This place is clearly not super awesome, but still good. The freshness of the pasta is the most clear difference from American Italian food—not too mention there are a lot more ways to prepare pasta than spaghetti and fettucini alfredo. Victoria and I also had some wine and in one afternoon, I think we turned into wine snobs. The table wine at the restaurant tasted TERRIBLE compared to the tasting earlier. At any rate, Charlotte and I went to Seven’s (Caffé del Corso) for a bit after dinner to attempt bonding with other members of the program, but I’m not really sure how well it worked. We didn’t stay for very long because they were all going to the discoteca anyway. Before we went to Seven’s, we saw Romano and he asked us sarcastically if we were going to the discoteca and when we said maybe, he got very worried and told us that it was dangerous and we should be careful. I trust Romano, so that solidified my decision not to go. He’s kind of like my Italian grandfather. He looks out for us. It sounds pretty much like a meat market, which is Seven’s times a thousand. No thanks. We decided we will go to the discoteca when the one in New Cagli reopens so that we are close enough to walk home. Anyway, a few of us hung out at Caffé d’Italia for a little bit and had some caffé corecto, which is espresso with a little bit of liquor for flavor. Very tasty! Charlotte, Matt, Kevin and I ran into Jackie and Claudia when we were leaving Caffé d’Italia and decided to check out Caffé di Teatro (Theater Café), which is next to my apartment about a block off the piazza. It was cool, but I think I still prefer Caffé d’Italia’s nightlife. By the time we were done there, it was about 2:30 in the morning and very much time for bed. Tomorrow we go back to the waterfall!

Mocha Pot

Not a whole lot more interesting things to say about today. Continued classes, who is surprised on that one? We turned in story plans, so I guess that kind of finalizes things? We don’t have to be 100% set until next Thursday, but I’m pretty excited about what we’ve talked about. We nailed down our jobs more, so I’m producing the story on gardens, writing on the ragazzi (Italian youth), video-ing the story on La Foccaceria, and photographing the story on driving. Should be very cool! We got lunch from one of the pizza places in town that does their pizzas on foccacia bread, which was pretty good. Everyone seems to rave about it…but I don’t know. It just seems rather inauthentic to me. It’s too similar to American pizza and it makes me feel like even the small towns of Italy are subject to Americanization. It’s a little sad. Honestly, I don’t miss anything from America right now (except friends and family) and I don’t really want to experience anything remotely American. I want to experience Italy, not some globalized version of Italy. Anywho, after classes we went to the small grocery store for a few things. Victoria and I both got espresso to make in our mocha pots. It was quite exciting and Victoria, Charlotte, and I tried it out as soon as we got back. We were so proud of our Italian mocha pot skills! Victoria and I are both thinking about buying a mocha pot to take home. We just hung out for a while after our espresso and then started thinking about going to dinner. We were planning on going out somewhere for dinner in a little group, but when we found out everyone was going to dinner for John’s birthday, we decided to join them to celebrate. We went to Ristorante di Commercio and it was pretty good! I got the tagliata aromatica, which I’m pretty sure means something like herb steak, so basically it was a steak with an herb sauce over it (rosemary, basil, etc.). Quite delicious, but kind of over-cooked on the edges. I also tried a small piece of the regional specialty—chevallo (horsemeat). I what I tried was ground horsemeat with different herbs mixed in, and quite tasty! I thought about order the horsemeat steak for dinner, but I chickened out. We got gelato after dinner and found out that there were election speeches going on in the piazza. Tomorrow is elections for both the Mayor of Cagli because the current mayor is unable to serve another term, as well as the European Parliament. There are quite a few posters around for different parties—of which there are many. I’ve probably seen posters for at least five different parties, which is kind of embedded in Italian governmental history. Everyone was gathered in the piazza and we were told the speeches would go on until at least midnight. Romano introduced us to his son, Simone, who is a journalist. Cool guy. I hope we get a chance to talk to him again. He seemed less than enthused about our story ideas, but I don’t think he views Cagli the same way we do. After gelato we headed back to Casa Lapis to hang out for a while and ended up chatting with Carol for a good couple hours. Good day, but I’m ready for the weekend so I can sleep in tomorrow! YES!

Che?!?

Today was pretty much more of the same. Classes and such. However, we did get a chance to meet with our groups and mentors to discuss story ideas over cappuccino at Caffé de Commercia in the piazza. Very cool! We have some pretty good ideas that I think could be sweet: gardens/green space in Cagli, driving in Cagli, pizza, and the Cagliese youth. We’ll see where those go. We will probably try to get a better idea of what we’re going to do tomorrow because we need to turn in rough story plans. It’s a little crazy how quickly this is going to go because there is a lot to accomplish in very little time! After pranzo (lunch), we had some more classes—of course. I interneted for a little while after class to catch up on my blog and then headed back to the appartamento to pack up my stuff. The gatto (cat) was keeping me company as I packed. That crazy thing managed to get up on the roof and came to see me as soon as I opened the shutters of the bathroom window! Kind of sad to leave Daniella’s place, but that’s how it goes. I THOUGHT we were moving in to Casa Lapis with the other girls, but apparently not. We are staying at a room from a Bed & Breakfast right off of the piazza near city hall. It’s very cute, but the lack of windows may drive me crazy. Sitting here typing this post is really warm with my computer on my lap. Cassidy and I are also kind of disappointed because we anticipated being with the rest of the girls (minus the grad students) in Casa Lapis. We feel that we’re missing out a little on the bonding experience. I’m not really sure what the change was all about, but here we are… At least John Caputo, one of the faculty members on the trip, is in the apartment next to us, so we have someone from the US nearby. After we unpacked and got settled, we headed over to Seven’s (Caffé del Corsa) for a welcome dinner from Matteo, the hair dresser. Matteo also gave all of us 20% off coupons for haircuts, so it’s only about 30 Euro. Not bad! I’m definitely getting mine cut. Dinner was a good time…I actually enjoyed myself at Sev’s! Quite delicious food and the vino was flowing. We left after dinner though to go hang out at Caffé d’Italia with the grad students and a few faculty members. I talked to another French-speaking Italian for a little bit, who told me that I speak much better than most Americans—yay! It’s so nice when I get to chat with them in French because I can actually understand what they are trying to tell me! OH! This morning as I left my apartment to get some breakfast, I saw an older woman walking down the street, so I smiled at her. She smiled back and said, “Buon giorno,” so I said the same back. She then continued on in Italian and I just smiled and said, “Non parlo italiano” (I don’t speak Italian). She then said, “Ohh…you must be American,” and I told her, “si.” She continued on for a little bit, so I just smiled and nodded and as she left she pinched my cheek and said, “Aww, ciao!” She was so cute! She could have said the meanest thing in the world, but I would have no idea because she was so cute and friendly saying it! Anyway, after Caffé d’Italia, Victoria, Charlotte, Kevin and I walked around a little and talked and then stopped at Kevin’s for a bit. Now it’s late again, and time for bed! Sorry for the lack of pictures recently. I’ve been carrying my camera around with me, but haven’t been doing a great job of documenting everyday life. I’ll try to get more!

Finally pasta!

Today was a pretty normal day of classes and such. Had some Italian this morning where we looked at clothing and color words because today was market day in Cagli. Because Cagli is tiny (only around 4,500 people!), there isn’t a ton of shopping. On Market Day all kinds of vendors come and set up little stands where people can buy…just about anything. In effect, Market Day brings the mall to Cagli. We didn’t get to experience it too much today because we were in class basically the whole time, but we will another day. There are Market Days every Wednesday and Saturday. After Italian, we talked about past stories a little bit to help us with ideas for our own stories and then had a photo class. We got a quick run-down of everything you need to know to work a digital SLR and what makes good composition. We had a quick break for lunch, and then came back for more Italian—some food words—and an Intercultural Communication class. Both quite interesting. Most of the stuff we talked about today in Intercultural was stuff that I had already talked about in previous classes, but I think I’m really going to enjoy that portion of the class time—which happens to be the majority, so yay! Interneted for a little while after class, then took a trip to the big supermarcato in New Cagi. I found myself in dire need of a shopping trip today, as I didn’t eat out for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. It was kind of fun walking around, but honestly, it was pretty much like any American grocery story. This chain—Conad—was the same grocery store we stopped in on Sunday night in Rome. I found some pear yogurt that I can’t wait to try! Vino is also CRAZY inexpensive. Even what seemed to be the better wines were only a couple Euros. We walked back home and then I made dinner with Victoria and Charlotte. Yum! We made pasta with garlic and olive oil, sautéed onions (chipolla), a little bit of vino rosso, tomatoes (pomodoro), freshly grated parmigiano and I put in some prosciutto. So good! Everyone was telling us how good the house smelled from our food. We also sautéed asparagus (asparago) in olive oil and red wine vinegar for a side. Tasty! After dinner we went to the piazza to meet Kevin and Matt to get some gelato. We ended up sitting and talking for a while because Dan struck up a conversation with Romano—one of the locals. He was so nice and really easy to talk to! He knows a little English, so he could help us out a little and kept his sentences nice and simple for us. I was surprised by how much I was able to pick up of what he was saying. Most of the time Dan or John translated for us, but I found myself often not needing the translation. He also speaks French apparently, so that’s also exciting! After we got our gelato, Romano invited us over to his house to see his garden and his new kitten. The kitten was SO cute! I wish I had pictures, but alas. It was the tinniest little grey thing—probably only about ten inches long—with bright green eyes. Que bello! Romano also invited us to come back for vino sometime when it is light out—what a nice man. Speaking of cats, the one that Daniella, my landlord until tomorrow, is so cute! He's (or she?) is so sweet and will just come in to our apartment through the back door.

We're moving tomorrow, though...I'm not exactly sure where. Hopefully Casa Lapis with the rest of the girls! I think we may go hiking in the mountains after classes sometime soon. A group of people went up there today and said it was incredible! I would love to see it! But for now, it’s time for bed. Buena notte e a demani!

Viva Italia!

This morning started early with Italian at 8. It’s been a little frustrating for me to not be able to speak the language here. I often think that the people are disappointed that none of us really speak Italian and I often worry they think I am being rude. I really hope that’s not the case. I’m really trying to pick up and use as much Italian as I can, but it’s difficult—especially when I’m constantly mixing French and Italian in my head! Anyway, the lessons are fun and I’m really excited to be learning a little about another language. We had a quick’n’dirty photo lesson following Italian because our assignment for the rest of the morning was to go out and shoot photos of the parade for Festivale de la Repubblica. Festivale is basically our 4^th of July and we talked about it in Italian this afternoon. I had no idea that Italy only recently started to unify. They became a country in the late 1800s, but didn’t become a Republic until after the fall of Mussolini in the mid 1900s. Even after the end of monarchy in Italy, cultures have been very segmented by city/region and Italian was adopted as an official language within the past 50 years! Anywho, my assignment for the parade was to shoot children and families. It was really fun and I think I got a couple decent shots, but I felt a little creepy! It was kind of weird to get up close to these small children to take their pictures when their parents clearly know we are strangers. We were using our own cameras today, which I think made it worse. If we had real cameras we would probably look a little more legit. While we were shooting, an old Italian man started chatting with Victoria and I. It was pretty interesting because he didn’t speak any English and we really don’t speak any Italian. Claudia, who knows Spanish, came along and was able to help us communicate a little. He seemed to be a pretty interesting guy, and he actually ended up buying the three of us a cappuccino after the parade! After he left, Victoria, Claudia and I grabbed a panini from Caffé d’Italia and  my first gelato of Italy! Che deliciosa! The man who served us the gelato there, Jack, told me that he speaks French, so we spent half of our conversation in French. It was nice to finally be able to talk to and understand a local here! We relaxed on the piazza before going to class again. It ended up being beautiful today and no cars were allowed to park in the piazza this afternoon, so it was a great place to hang out. We had a couple classes this afternoon and finally got Internet access! Woohoo! As I said before, we had more Italian this afternoon and talked about “Italian” culture. I found it really interesting that Italy seems to have a lot of the same cultural issues as the French. Both countries had to deal with uniting under an official language when all of the regions originally had their own dialects, both have a lot of race issues, and both are interested in their “ness” (ie: French-ness and Italian-ness). They also compete to be the best in all the same things. Maybe if they weren’t so concerned with being better than one another, they would realize that they are basically the same country! We also had a Story class and an Intercultural Communication class. We haven’t gotten into too much yet, but we are supposed to have story ideas by the end of the week. Yikes! After class, we hung out at the school for a little while, got reacquainted with the Internet, and did an assignment. We all went out for pizza at 7, which was a good time. After dinner, there was of course more gelato (from the other gelateria) and then some walking around the city with Victoria, Charlotte, Kevin, Michelle, and Nicole. After our walk, things got interesting. We decided to grab our computers and sit out by the school. I was about to walk into the garden when I realized the gate was locked. Key inside. Crap. I ran all over the city (which isn’t a lot) trying to figure out what to do. Carol and Dan ended up lifting me up so that I could jump over the wall and get into the garden. Pretty hilarious. I even pulled a heel hook on the ledge. Assisted buildering? Funniest part: apparently after I jumped over, the vice-mayor walked by. Niiiiiice. I’m just glad we didn’t have to wake Daniella up with more key issues! That was pretty much the excitement for the night and now it midnight and just about time for bed. Buena notte!

Roma and Cagli!

Today, I am enjoying my first few hours in Cagli. I got a little more adventure than I was bargaining for on Friday when I missed my scheduled flight to Rome, but made it in yesterday morning. I was fortunate enough to sleep for the majority of the plane ride, so I was able to spend the day touring Rome and meeting people. Yesterday we took a quick walk past the Spanish Steps and the Pantheon before meeting up with the rest of the group for lunch where I enjoyed my first Italian cappuccino. As we were leaving the restaurant, we heard some sirens down the block from the Giro d’Italia, which ended in Rome yesterday. I stopped to take some pictures and see a few riders go by. An excellent surprise! 

After lunch we stopped back at the Pantheon, so I was able to look at it more and go inside and take some pictures. We walked over to the famous Piazza Navona where they used to hold chariot races (I think?) and took some pictures of the church and the Fontana dei Quattro Fiori (Fountain of the Four Rivers...thanks Wikipedia). It was definitely the biggest piazza I had seen and really beautiful. The artists gathered around the fountain selling paintings reminded me a lot of Monmartre, but a pretty different atmosphere. We spent the remainder of the afternoon at The Vatican. We went inside St. Peter’s Basilica for about an hour before deciding to fork over the 5 euro to hike up to the cupola. Five hundred some-odd stairs later, we arrived at what were probably the best views of the city from anywhere. So worth it!
When we got back to the hostel we hung out for a little while, and by 12:30 I was in bed…exhausted after a looong day. We woke up early this morning to get on the bus to Cagli. It rained through our entire long and windy drive up until now. It doesn’t look like it plans on stopping any time soon and it’s supposed to rain tomorrow as well. The weather is supposedly looking a little better for Wednesday. When we arrived here, our temporary landlord, Daniela, took Cassidy and I to our apartment in her TINY Fiat. It was a feat to get the three of us crammed in there with all of our luggage. The apartment we were supposed to move-in won’t be ready for us until Thursday, I think, so we’re here in the meantime. We’re a little separated from the rest of the group, but the apartment is very cute. Second surprise adventure: we couldn’t get the key to our gate to work and could not for the life of us figure it out! We had to ask Daniella twice to help us (which was also interesting because neither Cassidy nor I speak Italian) and finally figured out that in Italy, you put keys in the lock with the teeth-side up. Should have been a no brainer! We got lunch at the Caffé d’Italia, where it became plainly obvious to us that everyone could tell we are the Americans. (Not that I’m saying it would be possible for us to blend in.) It’s been pretty interesting trying to communicate in general. With Daniella I could get by with a mix of Italian and French, but it’s hard to order food when you have no idea what you’re getting! I don't really like the just point game, so I ended up just picking a random word. The random word was still tasty! (Panini piccoli, if you're interested, which I have since learned means little panini.) We had our first Italian lesson today, which was fun and came fairly easily, but I think I’m going to get confused with French a lot. It’s also really hard to remember to flip my r’s instead of using French r’s. This morning I slipped and said “perfavore” with a French accent when ordering coffee at the hostel. It’s just hard to shake when they are so similar and that’s what you’re used to! Tonight we are going to one of the nicer restaurants in town for dinner and then to the infamous Seven’s for a welcoming party. Should be a good time before classes begin tomorrow. Ciao!