UNIVERSITA FIRENZE (LDM sweatshirts don't exist)

Got a purple sweatshirt for 13 euro, suck on that stonehill bookstore.

CINQUE TERRE

So this past weekend my program went to Cinque Terre, which is five villages on the Italian Riviera coastline. So after three different train rides, we arrived in Cinque Terre. Props to program advisor Chiara because she is like our own Peer Mentor (just abroad status). Sat on the last train surrounded by 3 Germans which complained about how useless and hard the Polish language is to learn... cool i'm gonna put in my iPod to drown you out, kthanks have a nice travel. When we train it by through the 5 villages and see the views of the Mediterranean Sea, unreal. Then we get off the Monterosso (the last village where our hotel was) and it's breathtaking views. The whole place looked like a computer screen background, not real life.

So the first day we get to hike the mountains between the villages, the first leg was hundreds (maybe even at least a thousand) stairs up a mountain then a half hour walk on this nice mountain sidewalk. You can't even see the horizon line because it is that hazy in the ocean. The water is so clear and this beautiful cerulean blue (look it up if you never used any crayola crayons like I did my entire childhood). Then the next leg was unfortunately closed for whatever reasoning, and the detour was a 2 hour hike up and around so we trained it to the 3rd village. Hiked like it was my job cutting an hour off the 2 hour hike to the 4th village with Katie, Kat, and Allison. I was in need for some endorphins and a nice hot ridiculous workout (though carrying a black bpack in the heat was a bit much, I dealt). Chilled in the forth village waiting around for other people to catch up, got an Italian slush which was EPIC. That limone slush drink was exactly what I needed after that portion of the hike, almost went back for a second one. Then we went to a small beach/rock/i dont know what by the Sea and swam in the MedSea! It was so refreshing and perfect temperature. Granted there were a few mishaps of people slipping on rocks getting in and bitter old Italian women nearby that would not mind their own business (imma do me, you do you). Regardless, so nice. Then we hiked the last an hour and half path in 45ish. Katie, Kat and I do not mess around with hiking. It was beyond nice to just see these Italian mountains and houses of them with vineyards and crazy, spectacular views of the Mediterranean. Oh yeah I forgot to mention the fact that we ran into Lauren Melaugh and Briana Burke twice in Cinque Terre. Casually running into Stonehill friends halfway around the world? CHECK. How ironic is it that they happened to be on the exact train we were on and then ran into them on the mountain path (which by the ways was extremely narrow and challenging to hike on). 

The next day I woke up early and Courtney, Ali, Lengel and I went down to a Monterosso beach and enjoyed the sunrise in the morning with an empty beach. I went around getting a bunch of seaglass to bring back home. The beach was a tad harsh when it came to the rocks on it though, but hey I'll take it anyday over Cape Cod, Lake Winnipesaukee, lakes in Maine, or any beach in Rhode Island. Hands down Mediterranean is the best body of water I've been in. Though it does rival the Bahamas a bit. So after getting lunch for the second day in a row at this small Focaccia place (I AM IN LOVE WITH FOCACCIA, it was so damn good and so damn cheap) we were supposed to go kayaking in the Sea, but Italy decided for once to rain. Now I love rain and thunderstorms so I have no problem with it, let me kayak in the rain I couldn't care less, but unfortunately we had to wait until it got nicer out but we did get to kayak. Yet another nice relaxing workout activity where I get to enjoy ridiculous unreal life views.

2 trains back to Florence, last one being 2 and a half hours, put on iPod, listened to Maroon 5 and boom conked out asleep the whole ride. So nice. 

Casual run in with Melaugh

Sporty B came into fruition 

om nom nom

not real.

definitely not real. looks like a travel brochure

I should really go hiking more often, I've always wanted to climb Mount Washington, so going to do it this summer.

narrow path way, rocks, plants, and dirt errwhere

casual dancing in the street of Cinque Terre, there was kids playing music and what looked like a seeming dance off.

I felt like I was on an island from LOST, minus all the LOST craziness.

Man in the Italian mountainside

Stolen Mediterranean seaglass

Titanic pose over the MedSea? check

whattup kayaking

my new screen saver

CHRONICLES OF ITALIAN CLASS SIDENOTES

My Italian professor Daniele is hilarious, which I've already stated but he really is. Today my class was seriously messing up the pronunciation of Cs. In Italian you pronounce C either like chi or k. So to his frustration he wrote down the word faccio, to which my whole class pretty much pronounced it fakio, when it should be phonetically said fachio. He wanted our class to get why we really shouldn't screw up saying the C because if one would say faccio like fakio, it sounds like fak-u, which Italians probably wouldn't do to well hearing an American saying fuck you when he/she really meant something completely different. Got me again Daniele, I also enjoyed him mocking people in my class when we screw up, gets us to learn Italian better without it being so.... boring.

THINGS I MISS

-Dunkin iced coffees... badly. I have decided to give up coffee completely while abroad to save money and because Italy does not have iced coffee (and if it does I don't want to know about it... talking to you Astor)
-Ramen, no seriously I miss that crap.
-Hibachi fried rice
-Fire + Ice, I know it's only been a month, but I always crave it
-English language
-Having a job, I MISS STONEHILL ADMISSIONS SO MUCH (aside from the fact I have ZERO incoming moolah coming my way)
-Stonehill in general, obviously.
-Being able to run anytime I want/need it, still yet to find a good running route, it's a major problem.
-Panera.... JK never want to eat Panera ever again after this summer, enjoy it Stonehill you can have that one.
-One dollar bills. screw you euro coins.
-Casually running into people and not having to deal with a 6 hour time difference to communicate with them
-The O-Team.
-Molly McCabe and Casey Papuga shenanigans
-12 packs of soda
-Being able to drive
-my iPhone (yeah call me a consumerist until you get an iPhone and see what I mean)
-and above all else, FRESH AIR. If I did from second hand smoke you all can thank Italy for it.

ABROAD SONG OF THE WEEK

Pump up song, beats that say hey wake up you're in europe.

Calvin Harris - Feel So Close

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGghkjpNCQ8&ob=av3e

I really don't get the video concept, but whatevs, beat the beat.

FALL BREAK PLANS

Finally booked my flights to London and Ireland! I'm going to be in major credit card debt after this whole abroad experience is over, but I've already accepted that I'll be broke for forever because who knows if I'll ever get to travel around Europe again. Anyways, can't wait to visit friends in London/Galway/Cork, head to my homeland, and go to countries where English is spoken (I'll take the accents and the strange slang anyday).

Places I've been to so far:
- Florence (duh)
- Pisa
- Lucca
- Paris (hands down favorite place I've ever been in my whole life)

Places I will be heading to:
- Cinque Terre (Italian beaches yessss)
- Venice
- Perugia (whattup Melaugh, Cait, B, and Frankie)
- Rome (whattup Sean)
- Chianti (wine tasting?)
- London
- Galway
- Dublin
- Cork (maybe I should track down my relatives from Cork County)
- Pompeii (tentatively trying to)

Hopefully can afford others!

PREPPING FOR THE AMAZING RACE

So traveling is never fun. Whenever someone asks the age old question: "If you had a superpower WHAT WOULD IT BE?" I always answer to be able to control time & space. To be able to teleport would be a super convenient power to have. Oh I'm bored let me just go over to Australia real quick, I'm hungry let me just pop over in Paris for baguette, oh I'm stranded in Pisa because of a train workers strike? No worries I gotchu, imma teleport us right back to Firenze. Life would be grand, and besides what is exciting about wanting to fly (I really cannot stand when people say thats the super power they'd choose, everyone says it but let's be real what is exciting about flying.... so you say you want to be a bird?)

So my 12 hour travel experience from France to Italy was eventful to say the least. Sparknote version: metro into Paris from Vanves, wait around 2 hours for bus, get painfully full of delicious croissants/pain au chocolats, take hour and a half bus from Paris to our airport in Tille, hour and a halfish flight to Pisa, take train from Pisa aeroporto to Pisa Centrale, oh our train back to Firenze SMN is delayed a half hour....to an hour.... to 16 hours... that's cool Italy start a strike at ten at night on a Saturday that's helpful nbd, frantically go into survivor mode trying to figure out how to get back to Florence, meet up with 3 BU chicks who are also stranded trying to get back, my program advisor Chiara is our savior calling her trying to find a way back, get on a city bus back to the airport (would have been better if they decided to strike 20 minutes prior), literally BOOK IT amazing race status off the bus to the airport to find another bus back to Florence, bus it back an hour and twenty later and finally get in Florence at 1:30 AM.

We survived, It was Lauren's 21st bday finally, nothing like some good life experience from traveling, Courtney had a complete Izzie Stevens hysterically laughing/crying moment, I busted out some values game questions (light edition) while waiting for our bus back to Florence after a night of hell to calm the tension, and I really hope traveling to London/Ireland next month will be so much less stressful... and we're taking the bus back and forth to the Pisa airport from now on.

Sidenote: What's the point of having a public bathroom if you lock it after ten o'clock? Riddle me that Pisa train station. Homeboy really had to go to the bathroom and even the McDonalds (which was the only thing functioning, thanks for not striking fast food workers so I could have dinner) bathroom was broken... thank you hotel that was unhelpful to us trying to get back to Florence for at least letting me use your bathroom (though the sinks were weird and orange... not okay)

View of Pisa/sunset from the plane

Finally thought we were headed home... casual workers strike says otherwise. 

unexpected twist of the night

Me being a complete hobo eating MickeyDs on the floor of a foreign train station.

WE GOT ON THE BUS TO GET BACK TO FLORENCE!

Ryanair saves the day? If only your website wasn't such a bitch and a half trying to book a flight I'd like you ryanair

It was a long day..

So as we were waiting to get on the bus back we all screamed of joy thinking this was our bus, it was however not but the driver THOROUGHLY enjoyed the enthusiasm we sent his way and when he drove around the airport he beeped at us every time he drove by, we made his night.

Moral of the story: The wind blows for anyone who has been stranded in a foreign country!

ITALIAN SIDENOTE

So my italian class ended with my professor telling my class to shut up and sing. We were learning about listening and he required us to sing for class participation. It was scary hilarious. Daniele is hilarious. One class he left us with a "love you guysssss" and now I have a ridiculous 60's Italian song about a creepy love obsessed guy stuck in my head, but it's alright it strangely put me in a good mood. Perfect way to start my 4 day weekend (which I have ever week whattup).

I WANT TO MOVE TO PARIS

So it's Thursday and I'm frantically packing for Paris with a good 5 minutes to spare. I had to wake up early and get my pastel art homework done then I book it to my apartment, pack in ten minutes, then it's off to Firenze Santa Maria Novella and from there to the Pisa Aeroporto to then the Beauvais airport to then a 3 hour bus ride (thank you chaos night traffic while in Paris) to then finally being IN PARIS FRANCE!

So I took three years of French in high school, should have continued it in college but I didn't take it my senior year so I thought I'd be too rusty for Intermediate, then I found out it was a joke and regret wasting a year of learning Spanish (which I pretty much still at best know how to say the bathroom is on fire and I can't speak good Spanish). Needless to say, I have always been a huge fan of France, actually going there only made it that much more obvious to me that I am in love with France.

So after Alex freaking out a bit because we couldn't get in contact with Dev (our friend who we were staying with) we met up with him, took the metro back to his apartment in Vanves (right outside Paris), then metroed it back to Paris to see the Eiffel Tower at night and just as important, get some food.

I must have said this is not real life almost every hour in Paris. Dreams coming true. So on the metro (which btw Boston step your game up, Paris is owning in sick public transportation) heading to Paris and this man with an accordion comes on our car. I'm going into Paris with a French guy playing an accordian.... not real life moment. Then the three of us walk around, sit on the lawn illegally in front of the Eiffel Tower, get asked by a sketchy dude to buy some champagne (oh we'll get to the sketchy hawkers), watch the Tower sparkle on the hour then we walk around and eat at this restaurant that translated means the dome (whattup Duomo) and I can order in French! I loved being able to ask for directions and have a casual conversation or order in the country's actual language. Granted a few times they'd continue it and I wouldn't understand it all and have to talk in English, but still I knew how to be polite and speak French. So I ordered le steak-frites. It was bomb.

So as I'm casually eating in a Parisian restaurant the floor opens up besides us, a waiter puts a trash bin on it, and it just goes down below never to be seen again.... not real life.

(video won't load properly.... blogger fail)

Then we wake up bright and early to get to the top of the Eiffel Tower at 9:30. First in line thanks to the others that were staying in a hostel and got there even earlier. Did I mention the fact that I dislike heights and went almost a mile up off the ground? yeah... so worth it still. Go to the second floor, amazing views, a little bid cold weather. Then we head up to the top going straight up this less than pleasant elevator. We get to the top of the Eiffel Tower, not real life views.

Court and I are owning in our Titanic pose off against the Galway Girls.

I had a serious fear I was going to drop my camera and kill someone below...

Then Alex, Dev, and I go to get food since we didn't have time before the Tower. Walk around, stumble upon a Boulangerie... I could literally eat my weight in French baked goods. Pain au lait, croissants, pain au chocolat, eclairs, bread... Paris has forever ruined bread back in America, even the semi stale bread at the restaurants I ate at were still hell of a lot better than anything in Italy or America.




Walking around Paris, see the outside of Napolean's former digs, see the outside of the Louvre, see a lot of French flags (did I mention I love that too?), walk along la Seine, go to the Notre Dame and inside and around the outside gardens of it, go this this outdoor market festival, try a little free wine, go see the Arc de Triomphe and then climb to the top of it, see the best views of Paris on the top, get a la crepe sucre by the Eiffel Tower, chill by the Eiffel Tower at sunset, my camera dies (no surprise after 7 videos and 400 photos later), get attacked by the creepy hawkers of the stupid eiffel towers and flowers.... like we don't want your stupid crap stop harassing us especially when i just passed by two other persistent pricks I wasn't waiting til I got to you to waste a euro of your crap. Go the frig away and let me enjoy my breathtaking views of the Eiffel Tower, back the f off.

la Siene River

oh hey there Louvre

Inside Notre Dame, not real life.

Outside Notre Dame... still not real life

Arc de Triomphe 

(can we just take a second to see how big Paris's streets are? Clearly Florence didn't get the memo)

Dying over seeing actual art I've learned in class

Spiral staircase of hundreds of stairs to climb the Arc de Triomphe? check

View from top of the Arc, I'm obsessed with the Eiffel Tower

Doing awkward selfies around the world. You really can only smile by famous monuments for so long

Sugar crepe by the Tower. I could eat those daily.

French metro >>>>>>> Boston

View from Metro. Priceless.

Orange coke? Had to buy it, it tasted like orange coke.... shocking?

I guess we're just going to continue to have jumping photos in front of European famous icons

self explanatory.

But even their annoyance couldn't ruin Paris for me, wasn't going to let it. I loved every single bit of it (with the one exception of my battle with their self cleaning public restrooms on the street.... none of them ever wanted to work with me).

Then we walked down some side streets and I ate probably one of the best meals I have ever eaten in my entire life. I ordered le poulet that was cooked in lemon sauce and then had a side of le riz. Chicken, lemon, and rice? Only three of my favorite foods of all time combined and cooked in the best manner. Oh and there was bread too. Our waiter had his hair spray painted blue, white, and red, and had the french flag face painted all over, celebrating rugby I think, but it was hilarious and I'm in love with French food. Sorry I'm not sorry Italy, France wins in that department... bread alone France owns.

Crepe for breakfast? check. 3 croissants, 4 pain au chocolats and and orangina too? check. I literally did not want to leave Paris, I could see myself living there honestly. For the worlds most visited city, it's so quaint and beautiful. The streets are so wide and giant sidewalks and people are running in the perfectly 60 degree sweatshirt weather. The architecture is a mix of French modern with classic old French beauty. French people are super kind, stereotypes my ass, as long as you are pleasant and respectful they love Americans. Considering there's a ton of statues of American heroes and places named after famous Americans you would never guess its a place where "snooty French" live. J'aime les Francais. J'adore the language. I could walk around for hours listening to the French speak.

All in all, I love France and definitely did not get enough time there. I want to go back.

TO BE CONTINUED: 

France to Italy in 12 hours: Abroad travel like you're on the Amazing Race

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