Italy Recap part 3
Ok, so now onto March 2, 2005
We had to wake up at 6am (which is like midnite east coast America time!) and be packed and ready to leave the Florence hotel at 7:30 am. Needless to say, I was not a very happy camper. I loved Florence, and hated to see it go.
We then drove two hours to lovely Siena, our first stop on today's voyage. Siena is such a pretty little city, and I was surprised to hear that there are only 5000 more people in Siena than in my hometown of Enfield. They actually have a giant horse race in the city square every year, and tens of thousands of people crowd the square to watch. I thought that was kinda cool. I loved our tour guide in Siena, Donatella. She wore a bright yellow-lime trench coat with matching fur trim, a giant wide black belt around it, big designer sunglasses, a pointy hat, and a louis vuitton bag! She was a trip!
The most memorable thing about Siena was, of course, St. Catherine of Siena's head. Yes, that is right. They actually have the saint's head (skin and all) and a finger preserved in a block of wax on an alter 4 adoration in the chapel. It was one of those sights I'll never forget. It left me speechless. Just as I was trying to get over the sight, however, trusty ol' Stewey came up 2 me and my friends and said "She's pretty cute, isn't she?" in his British accent. Oh Stuart!! EEeeeeewwww
Ok, next up was a two hour drive to Assisi. (PS I slept the entire time we were on the bus, even when Stuart told us not to sleep! He may be a British god, but he can't control my napping!) We were assured that the only saint relic there would possibly be a piece of ST. Francis' skin, but no head. (I never ended up seeing the skin tho.)
Ok, side tangent. Does anyone else find that displaying saints body parts or bodies is somewhat disturbing. It doesn't make me feel holier, just disturbed. I dont think that religion should do that to someone. I mean, it is meant to be powerful, but not grotesque. This is the same reason why I refuse to see "The Passion". Now, I know that many of you guys will write comments disagreeing with me, and its true that I havent seen the film so I dont know, but that is where I stand on it.
Anyways, back to Assisi. Before I went, my dear friend Chris Kelly told me that this city would be so beautiful it would "make me throw up". (I swear thats what he said). Luckily, I did not lose my lunch, but it was remarkably beautiful. I was especially excited about seeing the frescos, because I had seen a video on them in Italian class. They were so vibrant and detailed.
In the Assisi gift shop, I discovered my new best friend: glow-in-the-dark st. francis. That's right, in a gift shop filled w/ religious items like rosaries and crucifixes and prayer books, i bought a 2 euro plastic glow in the dark figurine! Originally the figurine was for chris (my bf not chris kelly), but I have grown too attached to it, and I do not think that I will be able to part with it. I struck up a deal with Chris and we have joint custody of St. francis, now.
After Assisi (and the pay rest rooms- thats right you have to pay to use restrooms in italy), we got back on the bus for 2 or 3 more hours of driving to Rome. We got to Rome just in time for dinner, and after dinner we settled in our new hotel rooms. I was bummed because Jackie and Jamie were no longer next door to us, but on a different FLOOR (gasp). The Rome hotel was much nicer than the one in Florence. First of all you didnt' need to stick the card key in a slot to turn the lights on! Best of all, this hotel, like Florence, had HEATED TOWEL RACKS. While Jackie petitions PC to build a Duomo, I am writing them to install heated towel racks in all the dorm bathrooms. They were heavenly!
March 3, 2005
Imperial Rome day. Quite possibly the low point of our trip, at least in my opinion. We spent the entire morning looking at ancient Roman ruins like the Colisseum and Pantheon. Now dont get me wrong, those things were cool, but we spent too little time at those things and too much time @ that hill place (starts w/ a P!) Could you tell i was bored? It wouldnt have been bad but everything our tour guide Ioanna showed us was either from a picture book or stuff we had to "imagine". Let me give you an example. "See this square foot piece of marble, well that was where the wall would have been. And that brick? That was the imperial hallway". I stopped using my imagination in 1993 when Barney became uncool, i'm sorry! (Well, ok thats a lie, cuz sometimes I still imagine that I'm dating Josh Jackson or Brad Pitt, but thats another story!)
Highlights of the morning tour: The Italian "Newman" selling 20postcards for a euro!, the Italian schoolkids on a field trip, and the little kids climbing on the artifacts who lost their mommy!
As soon as we finished in the Pantheon and our tour was over, it started to rain. Now, on top of that, we were all hungry, tired, and really GRUMPY, (and some of us were PMSing). Little catfights followed, but we ended up finding somewhere to eat lunch. Then we went shopping for a little bit (like at this one amazingly expensive toy store that was playing maroon 5!!), got gelato, visited some famous squares in Rome, went back to see the Pantheon in the rain, and then climbed the spanish steps. On top of the spanish steps I bought the knockoff designer map bag I had been wanting, and I talked the guy down to 20euros! That made my day! After the spanish steps we took the metro back to our hotel and chilled 4 the rest of the day.
ok i'm gonna save this entry so i dont lose it, i will finish up the update in a few!
We had to wake up at 6am (which is like midnite east coast America time!) and be packed and ready to leave the Florence hotel at 7:30 am. Needless to say, I was not a very happy camper. I loved Florence, and hated to see it go.
We then drove two hours to lovely Siena, our first stop on today's voyage. Siena is such a pretty little city, and I was surprised to hear that there are only 5000 more people in Siena than in my hometown of Enfield. They actually have a giant horse race in the city square every year, and tens of thousands of people crowd the square to watch. I thought that was kinda cool. I loved our tour guide in Siena, Donatella. She wore a bright yellow-lime trench coat with matching fur trim, a giant wide black belt around it, big designer sunglasses, a pointy hat, and a louis vuitton bag! She was a trip!
The most memorable thing about Siena was, of course, St. Catherine of Siena's head. Yes, that is right. They actually have the saint's head (skin and all) and a finger preserved in a block of wax on an alter 4 adoration in the chapel. It was one of those sights I'll never forget. It left me speechless. Just as I was trying to get over the sight, however, trusty ol' Stewey came up 2 me and my friends and said "She's pretty cute, isn't she?" in his British accent. Oh Stuart!! EEeeeeewwww
Ok, next up was a two hour drive to Assisi. (PS I slept the entire time we were on the bus, even when Stuart told us not to sleep! He may be a British god, but he can't control my napping!) We were assured that the only saint relic there would possibly be a piece of ST. Francis' skin, but no head. (I never ended up seeing the skin tho.)
Ok, side tangent. Does anyone else find that displaying saints body parts or bodies is somewhat disturbing. It doesn't make me feel holier, just disturbed. I dont think that religion should do that to someone. I mean, it is meant to be powerful, but not grotesque. This is the same reason why I refuse to see "The Passion". Now, I know that many of you guys will write comments disagreeing with me, and its true that I havent seen the film so I dont know, but that is where I stand on it.
Anyways, back to Assisi. Before I went, my dear friend Chris Kelly told me that this city would be so beautiful it would "make me throw up". (I swear thats what he said). Luckily, I did not lose my lunch, but it was remarkably beautiful. I was especially excited about seeing the frescos, because I had seen a video on them in Italian class. They were so vibrant and detailed.
In the Assisi gift shop, I discovered my new best friend: glow-in-the-dark st. francis. That's right, in a gift shop filled w/ religious items like rosaries and crucifixes and prayer books, i bought a 2 euro plastic glow in the dark figurine! Originally the figurine was for chris (my bf not chris kelly), but I have grown too attached to it, and I do not think that I will be able to part with it. I struck up a deal with Chris and we have joint custody of St. francis, now.
After Assisi (and the pay rest rooms- thats right you have to pay to use restrooms in italy), we got back on the bus for 2 or 3 more hours of driving to Rome. We got to Rome just in time for dinner, and after dinner we settled in our new hotel rooms. I was bummed because Jackie and Jamie were no longer next door to us, but on a different FLOOR (gasp). The Rome hotel was much nicer than the one in Florence. First of all you didnt' need to stick the card key in a slot to turn the lights on! Best of all, this hotel, like Florence, had HEATED TOWEL RACKS. While Jackie petitions PC to build a Duomo, I am writing them to install heated towel racks in all the dorm bathrooms. They were heavenly!
March 3, 2005
Imperial Rome day. Quite possibly the low point of our trip, at least in my opinion. We spent the entire morning looking at ancient Roman ruins like the Colisseum and Pantheon. Now dont get me wrong, those things were cool, but we spent too little time at those things and too much time @ that hill place (starts w/ a P!) Could you tell i was bored? It wouldnt have been bad but everything our tour guide Ioanna showed us was either from a picture book or stuff we had to "imagine". Let me give you an example. "See this square foot piece of marble, well that was where the wall would have been. And that brick? That was the imperial hallway". I stopped using my imagination in 1993 when Barney became uncool, i'm sorry! (Well, ok thats a lie, cuz sometimes I still imagine that I'm dating Josh Jackson or Brad Pitt, but thats another story!)
Highlights of the morning tour: The Italian "Newman" selling 20postcards for a euro!, the Italian schoolkids on a field trip, and the little kids climbing on the artifacts who lost their mommy!
As soon as we finished in the Pantheon and our tour was over, it started to rain. Now, on top of that, we were all hungry, tired, and really GRUMPY, (and some of us were PMSing). Little catfights followed, but we ended up finding somewhere to eat lunch. Then we went shopping for a little bit (like at this one amazingly expensive toy store that was playing maroon 5!!), got gelato, visited some famous squares in Rome, went back to see the Pantheon in the rain, and then climbed the spanish steps. On top of the spanish steps I bought the knockoff designer map bag I had been wanting, and I talked the guy down to 20euros! That made my day! After the spanish steps we took the metro back to our hotel and chilled 4 the rest of the day.
ok i'm gonna save this entry so i dont lose it, i will finish up the update in a few!