Saturday in Florence

Haven't posted in a couple of days, so I'll give you a quick recap:

Thursday: Class & Velvet Underground After

Friday: Slept in & Did a load of laundry. Laundry is unnecessarily expensive here. Doing a moderate sized load costs about $10.

Continued to bond with the roomies. After laundry we went to the co-op and Liz bought an enormous jar of Nutella... she's already finished a smaller one so this time she went for the mond0-size! She's excited... can you tell?!

Aaaaaand today: SATURDAY! :)

Today a big group of us woke up early and headed off to Florence by train, which cost 13 euro round trip. There was word of a chocolate fair and a leather market. While the leather market went unseen we definitely found the chocolate fair. There was chocolate out of the wazoo!! I didn't but any, but my friends did and it all looked pretty delicious!

While we were walking through the town all of a sudden we heard all this banging... needless to say we were a little alarmed being the tourists that we are. We kept walking and came across what seemed to be a parade... which we thought was odd. However, after watching for a few minutes and our sad interpretation of their signs in Italian we realized that the thousands of people walking through the streets banging on pots and pans were protesting the Prime Minister's recent scandal. (At least I'm pretty sure it was the Prime Minister... I'm not too up to date on my Italian government scandals!)

They had all sorts of signs saying things like "confess your sins" and things that sounded really funny once translated into English. Seeing it was definitely an experience!

After window shopping for a bit we ate lunch at a little cafe close to the train station.

We continued shopping and found this little market that was selling all sorts of leather goods (I've been told that Florence is one of the world's leading leather producers). One of the first carts (I guess you'd call them that... they're outside vendors) I walked by had this purse that I immediately fell in love with. And then... I looked at the price tag, haha. It was priced at 75 euro, which my currency converter conveniently tells me is close to $102. I wasn't going to pay that much for a bag because 1-it was far too much and 2-I just didn't have that much cash on me. We kept walking around the market and I was looking for a cross-body bag that is bigger than the one I have, but I couldn't get that first purse off my mind! Hah! I've heard that you've really got to haggle and they'll lower the price on things. So, I went back to the man and I told him I literally only have 45 euro, will you give it to me for that price? He immediately as like "No," so I put the sad face on and started to walk away and he was like... "okay." He told me "special price" and "just for you" and made me promise not to tell anyone that he gave it to me so cheap (so if you're ever in Florence and meet this purse guy don't let him know!). So basically I paid 45 euro instead of 75, which was close to $60. I thought it was a steal, especially for genuine leather from Florence. And it has been my only splurge so far so I don't feel so bad... haha. I love it & I needed a bigger purse. (This is me validating my purchase to myself, haha!!)

Afterwards we took the train back to Castiglion Fiorentino (which Liz and I have decided to shorten to "Castig") and we had dinner, which was amazing! The center made us pasta, fried chicken and french fries- once again, the comforts of home are amazing to have! They always make us healthy food so when they give us something that isn't directly vegetable related everyone gets excited. But, they always make sure to give us salad and instead of desert we get fresh fruit.

Okay, now for the random things:

-Italians take their dogs everywhere. I'm not even exaggerating. In clothing stores, in restaurants... EVERYWHERE. And they aren't all even small dogs. There are huge dogs like Dalmatians in Louis Vuitton! And they are all dressed up cute and whatnot to keep them warm. They're all pretty adorable. They're all well groomed & taken care of. Definitely makes me want a dog more and more every day.

-Everyone and their mother drives a Fiat. Everyone. And if they don't have a car then they ride their bike everywhere, even when they appear to be wearing entire designer outfits.

-I have gotten okay at "survival Italian." That means that I can get around and do essential tasks and communication in Italy. I can order food and make sure that I am headed in the right direction (like if I'm headed to the train or back to the center).

-I've tried a lot of new food while I've been here. Unless something looks absolutely inedible or disgusting I'll typically give it a try. I've determined that kiwi tastes pretty good, I still like other fruit better. Oh, and that blood oranges are delicious!!

-When we went to the co-op the other day Liz bought something she thought was lotion and when we got back to the room it turned out to be hand soap. So now we have a nice bottle of hand soap in the bathroom. :-p

I am really enjoying each and every day here. Everything is so beautiful and I've met a lot of really awesome people. I don't really miss being home or in College Station; however I do miss some friends and my family- but I've been so busy that I haven't really had a lot of time to think about it.

Hoping to go to Arezzo tomorrow (only 1.90 euro for that ticket!) to go to an antique fair and hang out. We shall see... :)