wk 7
last thursday i was in my drawing class, on a break and saw my friend jess accompanied by her parents. she asked me if i was excited for dinner that night and i had no idea what she was talking about. apparently her parents offered to take the four girls in my house and jess's three other roommates to a fancy dinner, i just didnt get the memo. little did i know i was about to eat the most extravagant meal of my european experience, well...of my life, basically.
we went to this restaurant on borgo pinti that i have wanted to go to since i arrived. we walk by it all the time on the way to the jazz club. it has amazing blue and white christmas lights strung over the entire ceiling, with romantic table lighting and a delicious looking menu. i was so excited that we actually got to eat there! our group of 8 girls beat the Abrams there by a few minutes. before we had a chance to sit down the waiter had already started pouring us champagne. we started looking at the menu and the Abrams came in. we did our introductions, made small talk and the parents ordered us wine. after telling the waiter what we each chose for dinner, Mr. Abrams thought we needed more food decided to basically order 2 of every appetizer on the menu, plus half of the menu of entrees for the table. we all just looked at each other in shock and excitement. her parents were very sweet and extremely generous. the appetizers started to come out and everything was absolutely delicious. then dinner came and we were already so full, but just kept eating. then the waiter came around to ask about dessert and Mr. Abrams then orders two of every dessert on the menu. they brought out two huge platters between the 8 of us, of the most delicious and amazing dessert, all homemade and beautiful. he ordered dessert wine to make sure we 'did it right'. somehow, during dinner martinis were brought up and most of the girls had never had one. Mr. & Mrs. Abrams (mainly Mr. Abrams) were shocked and decided that we all MUST go back to their hotel (the Four Season which happened to be an old Medici Villa) and get a martini from a world famous martini specialist (the bartender the recruited from a far away country by the hotel). i was a little taken aback with all of the extravagance but thought 'why the hell not?! theyre nice enough to do this for us".
my plan for my thursday night was to go home right after class, make myself dinner, pack and study myself to sleep because we had to wake up at 5 the next morning to head to Rome with our art history class. who knew!
we made it home after a long night of being spoiled, crashed and five hours later, thankfully, made it on our train. we arrived 2 hours later, and realized we were actually in Rome. i got so excited! after stopping at the hotel to organize the rooms and drop off our luggage (all 55 of us) we headed out. the next 72 hours were the most jam packed and hectic 72 hours i think i will ever experience. my art history teacher is insane...in a good way. she is the most intelligent woman i have ever come into contact with and she overloaded us with important paintings, monuments and buildings. i can honestly say i would never have seen so many things in such a short period if it werent for her. a lot of kids in my class absolutely hate her and it really gets to me because she really means well and knows what shes doing, she just pushes us really really hard at times. she is also really passionate about what she does and talks really fast because all of her thoughts cant come out as fast as shed like. the only thing i cant get over is how much people from the east coast complain! they were all a bunch of whiners. although, it was pretty funny because right when we started walking on our first day, it started pouring and most people didnt have an umbrella so they were just drenched for the rest of the day. sometimes my neurosis comes in handy: i checked the weather earlier that week and saw it was going to rain so i brought an umbrella and stayed nice and dry!
we saw Bramante's Tempietto, The Vatican Museum including The Sistene Chapel, both Raphael rooms, various churches, the Pantheon, the Colosseum, Capitoline Hill, The Trevi fountain, The Spanish Steps and several other places. On Sunday we went to Tivoli and saw the 400 fountains at Hadrians Villa. My favorites of the weekend were: the Borghese Gallery (they had 6 Caravaggio's!), the hydrolic-powered organ at Hadrians Villa and the ruins in Tivoli. Everything was amazing but especially those things. i feel dense for not realizing that the world 'romantic' comes from the city Rome which 'is the most romantic city in the world'. definitely no lie.
this is midterm week and ive made it through! we had our extremely intense art history final this morning. i took it with the earlier class (as opposed to tomorrow) because i just wanted to get it over with. i feel good about it and did my best which is all that matters, right? tonight i am going to celebrate by watching 'down by law' with some friends and my film professor, eat gelato and the go to the jazz club.
tomorrow i pack for my 10 days of travel! we leave early in the morning on friday up to Milan, then up to Paris on saturday night where i will meet lahiana! maybe even my friend kate from evergreen! and then our friend nathan who came with us to Nice is going to go to Switzerland with us on wednesday. i plan to get out of Interlaken between thursday and sunday and go for an adventure to Lake Lucern and the areas surrounding it.
im having mood swings, which i realize are bound to happen here, everything is just really intense. im working through it all and trying my hardest to just get the most out of everything. all i want to do is take pictures and experience beautiful places.
how is everyone doing? tell me whats going on in your lives.
we went to this restaurant on borgo pinti that i have wanted to go to since i arrived. we walk by it all the time on the way to the jazz club. it has amazing blue and white christmas lights strung over the entire ceiling, with romantic table lighting and a delicious looking menu. i was so excited that we actually got to eat there! our group of 8 girls beat the Abrams there by a few minutes. before we had a chance to sit down the waiter had already started pouring us champagne. we started looking at the menu and the Abrams came in. we did our introductions, made small talk and the parents ordered us wine. after telling the waiter what we each chose for dinner, Mr. Abrams thought we needed more food decided to basically order 2 of every appetizer on the menu, plus half of the menu of entrees for the table. we all just looked at each other in shock and excitement. her parents were very sweet and extremely generous. the appetizers started to come out and everything was absolutely delicious. then dinner came and we were already so full, but just kept eating. then the waiter came around to ask about dessert and Mr. Abrams then orders two of every dessert on the menu. they brought out two huge platters between the 8 of us, of the most delicious and amazing dessert, all homemade and beautiful. he ordered dessert wine to make sure we 'did it right'. somehow, during dinner martinis were brought up and most of the girls had never had one. Mr. & Mrs. Abrams (mainly Mr. Abrams) were shocked and decided that we all MUST go back to their hotel (the Four Season which happened to be an old Medici Villa) and get a martini from a world famous martini specialist (the bartender the recruited from a far away country by the hotel). i was a little taken aback with all of the extravagance but thought 'why the hell not?! theyre nice enough to do this for us".
my plan for my thursday night was to go home right after class, make myself dinner, pack and study myself to sleep because we had to wake up at 5 the next morning to head to Rome with our art history class. who knew!
we made it home after a long night of being spoiled, crashed and five hours later, thankfully, made it on our train. we arrived 2 hours later, and realized we were actually in Rome. i got so excited! after stopping at the hotel to organize the rooms and drop off our luggage (all 55 of us) we headed out. the next 72 hours were the most jam packed and hectic 72 hours i think i will ever experience. my art history teacher is insane...in a good way. she is the most intelligent woman i have ever come into contact with and she overloaded us with important paintings, monuments and buildings. i can honestly say i would never have seen so many things in such a short period if it werent for her. a lot of kids in my class absolutely hate her and it really gets to me because she really means well and knows what shes doing, she just pushes us really really hard at times. she is also really passionate about what she does and talks really fast because all of her thoughts cant come out as fast as shed like. the only thing i cant get over is how much people from the east coast complain! they were all a bunch of whiners. although, it was pretty funny because right when we started walking on our first day, it started pouring and most people didnt have an umbrella so they were just drenched for the rest of the day. sometimes my neurosis comes in handy: i checked the weather earlier that week and saw it was going to rain so i brought an umbrella and stayed nice and dry!
we saw Bramante's Tempietto, The Vatican Museum including The Sistene Chapel, both Raphael rooms, various churches, the Pantheon, the Colosseum, Capitoline Hill, The Trevi fountain, The Spanish Steps and several other places. On Sunday we went to Tivoli and saw the 400 fountains at Hadrians Villa. My favorites of the weekend were: the Borghese Gallery (they had 6 Caravaggio's!), the hydrolic-powered organ at Hadrians Villa and the ruins in Tivoli. Everything was amazing but especially those things. i feel dense for not realizing that the world 'romantic' comes from the city Rome which 'is the most romantic city in the world'. definitely no lie.
this is midterm week and ive made it through! we had our extremely intense art history final this morning. i took it with the earlier class (as opposed to tomorrow) because i just wanted to get it over with. i feel good about it and did my best which is all that matters, right? tonight i am going to celebrate by watching 'down by law' with some friends and my film professor, eat gelato and the go to the jazz club.
tomorrow i pack for my 10 days of travel! we leave early in the morning on friday up to Milan, then up to Paris on saturday night where i will meet lahiana! maybe even my friend kate from evergreen! and then our friend nathan who came with us to Nice is going to go to Switzerland with us on wednesday. i plan to get out of Interlaken between thursday and sunday and go for an adventure to Lake Lucern and the areas surrounding it.
im having mood swings, which i realize are bound to happen here, everything is just really intense. im working through it all and trying my hardest to just get the most out of everything. all i want to do is take pictures and experience beautiful places.
how is everyone doing? tell me whats going on in your lives.