Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Monday- Valentine's Day in Italy

Yesterday was a great day! I didn’t have class until after lunch, so I slept until 10:30 to store up some sleep for the rest of the week. For lunch we had soup for the first course (seems we have soup every day for lunch- not my fave but it’s still good). We also had tuna salad- different from what Americans would think of it as, an assortment of vegetables, and toast with tomato on top. Lunch can sometimes be pretty odd! Haha! The staff surprised us with Valentine’s Day treats for dessert. In addition to the fruit that we get at the end of every meal we also got little dessert pastries.

After lunch we had a core meeting and Sharon (Paolo’s wife who helps him run the center) told us about our Wednesday trip to Perugia and next week’s trip to Rome. These past few weeks have gone by so quickly! I cannot believe our first extended trip is next week! Basically we are going to Rome for three nights, then Pompeii the next day; then we are staying in Sorento for two nights. On the way back from Sorento to Castig we are stopping in Naples (not staying for long though because it is somewhat dangerous there- especially for tourists).

After core meeting I finished up some sketches of things that I wanted to make in jewelry making class. At 2:45 we met downstairs and took a Castig school bus to the jewelry-making studio. It is the studio of Andrea Roggi who is our art teacher for lack of a better term. He is a famous sculptor who’s work is on display all over the world. His pieces typically include topless women, which is interesting culturally because you’d never really see that kind of open display of sexuality in America. I’ve been told that one of his pieces is in College Station. I am curious. If I can find it somewhere on google I’ll put a link or picture up.

Being in Andrea’s studio was awe-inspiring. Suddenly the sketches that I had previous been so proud of I wanted to burry deep in my pocket and never let him see. His work was all over the studio- both finished and unfinished. Katie, my roommate, and I agreed that being around so much of his work was intimidating. As we sat at the table molding wax into future jewelry pieces (which is MUCH harder than it sounds) he was ten feet away welding and creating huge bronze sculptures. It was pretty amazing. For my first day of jewelry making I had planned to keep it simple- but my drawing as anything but when trying to create it in wax. I finally got my first piece done and then finished two smaller pieces- one for Chris and one that I will add to something else later. He told us that next time we meet our pieces would be in bronze. It will be exciting to se how it turned out. We have the choice to use silver, gold, bronze and copper for our jewelry, but since bronze is cheapest we started out with it. Maybe later when my skills are honed a little more I’ll make something in silver.

The ride to and from the studio made me absolutely fall in love with where I am. It is hard to put into words just how amazing it is here. It is even harder to capture it in a photo- at least with my poor photography skills. The weather was amazing and the skies were clear. As we drove away from the walled-in city we saw the bell tower that lovingly (HAH!) wakes us up in the morning, the watchtower from the Roman ruins of the city, and if we looked closely enough- the courtyard of Santa Chiara. I am so in love with this little cit that I am calling my home for the semester.

After class we had dinner (amazing pasta, spinach, and pork). *We found out for sure that yes- they will sell us the cookbook from the center at the end of the semester for ten euro. I’ll be able to bring a little bit of Italian culture home and share it with my friends and family!*

Planning for spring break is taking over the lives of students here. I’m lucky because one of my best friends, Kristin, is coming over to visit me during that week. We’re staying in Italy so I don’t have to stress about all the country hopping that my friends are doing. However, I am going to Paris for the first weekend of spring break before Kristin comes. I’ve already booked my flight over there- I think it was about a $50 ticket. Not to shabby if you ask me. We’ll be leaving from Venice where we’ll have just finished a trip on Friday morning and we’ll head to Paris for the weekend (sounds luxurious, doesn’t it?!). When the rest of the group heads to England, I’ll head back to Rome and meet up with Kristin for a week of exploring Italy together.

After booking my flight, we watched a movie in Italian that was required for class. It was supposed to show us the lives of Italian families on the eve of the holocaust. It was unanimous between the ten of us watching it- the movie was horrible! We have about six or seven of these “required” movies left, yikes! We are going to try and convince the professor to let us watch Inglorious Basterds next time. Really historically accurate, right? Hah!

We finished off the night at Regiro’s, or “Pirate Bar,” for a Valentine’s Day party/ a A&M student’s birthday party. We got two of the four rooms closed off for us. The back one we pushed all the tables against the walls so we could dance- which Italians in Castig have to mayoral permission for; and we brought an iPod to play all of our favorite American music. About an hour and a half into the party some Italian guys came in and started dancing. It was interesting to watch the cultural difference. When they were dancing they were hopping up and down, clapping, and chanting “hey, hey, hey, hey, hey!” We all had a pretty good laugh about it, but I’m sure they thought our dancing was weird too!
Best part of the night you ask?... Definitely doing the Aggie War Hymn in Regiro’s at midnight! Amazing day!

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