finito.

Today, the study abroad officially ended. As of 4pm, all inhibitions were checked at the door, and it was time to get sleazy....which is clearly what I'm doing writing this on a Friday night.

I've learned so much out here, and have loved almost every minute of it. More to come about my time here, but today in the season of gratitude...

.....I'm grateful for the handsome effect. haha.

My friends joke that I get everything I want over here, and I say it's just because I smile. So maybe I was able to get past the guards at the Uffizi with loads of drink in my bag as I look over at Bev and others who have to chug their drinks by the security. I sat in laughing at them, and grateful that A) I didn't really know what the guard was saying when I went through security about liquids, so I just said "Si" and stood there a second, smiled, walked on.

Maybe I also got away with a little more in Italian class than others. That [A] will look great on my progress report!

Maybe my best friend gave me some clothes and different music at the Irish Pub often.

....now I just hope this carries on back to the states.

Cheers to wishing!

x

t.

Miguel - Sure Thing by djraize

photo{graph}s.

The Assisi Trip through Eliesa's {lens}

Assisi

Audrey and I. Lost in [Music]nation

chicas. [Eliesa & Abby]

lit'rally biting our nails for the trains.

I’m about to go insane…I’m jumping [ON] this train.

Yesterday was our last free Saturday before the study abroad ends, so a few of us decided to go to Assisi for a nice day trip. Right? No!

The day began ominous when I had to wake up before seven, and Audrey and Eliesa were late waking up. I vowed to always be late when meeting those two after that! This left Abby and I alone to fare for ourselves like little lost kids. So we headed to the train station so I could get a ticket. We bought some water there, and were looking for a magazine when Abby said “…I could always get a DVD,” that’s when we noticed it said “Hard” underneath them. Out of sheer curiosity I wanted to see what DVDs they had for sale, maybe in English. I don’t know if the DVDs were in English or not because they were straight up Porno films. I mean I suppose it doesn’t matter what language it’s in, probably not much talking! Abby and I were in hysterics that they just displayed these, I mean where’s the curtain to separate the Adult section fro the rest of the movie store, am I right?!

By some miracle, Audrey and Eliesa made it right after 8am…we were literally running to catch the 8:06 train. Made it to the train bin, realized we had to confirm our tickets! Elies and I ran frantically to find the machine but the conductor said he’d just sign it. All aboard the train! We sat down and had a lovely SIX HOUR travel time to Assisi, when the trip should have been no more than 2!

The 2 stops where we changed trains took over an hour in each city before the next train. We enjoyed Chiusi and Terontl as much as we could without going to far from the stations. We get to Assisi, thinking, it took 6 hours here, so we’d basically have to turn around now to make it home on time. Since that wasn’t an option, we decided to take the 5 o clock train, leaving less than 3 hours in town.

We took a cab to the center, with a little bit of ill feelings all day thinking about the different scenarios risking the trains on a Saturday and later at night. Saw the Basilica of San Francesco, which was pretty, passed too many monks for a day, and enjoyed the beautitiful view of all of Umbria. And we tried calling our professor, who was unavailable, as usual.

Our cab driver came to get us at 3:30, we got our professor on the line coming down, and he said he would let us call our families. The audacity! None of us got a hold of our families, and so we waited for our train. Abby ironically said “Ideally we’d get to the the two stations and a train would be there just as we got there.” She spoke too soon.

We get to Terontl, check the board for the times to Chiusi, all the while a woman is in front of us with a rolling bag, the girls quickly find the time for the next train, while I’m counting on my fingers to figure out where I need to be looking [damn military time, I have to use my thumb to count from 1 o’clock = 13 o'clock]

Right when I get to 18 o'clock on my ring finger, the woman in front of us booked it to the train that was right there, that's when we realize we NEED that train. Literally someone springs the door open, Eliesa and the woman by us ask a man on the phone if the train is going to either place they said and he says “Si!” no knowing if he meant yes to us, her, or the fact that Chiusi means close, which the doors were closed. Abby and Eliesa get on, Audrey and I, trying to get on the train, HOWEVER, Audrey bought a beautiful, and gigantic bowl, which she had in tow and kind of prevented me from getting my big self on the train…it starts moving in the midst of us getting on. I’m pretty sure I blacked out for a second in my mind trying to get on this train…it was either that or the fact that the bowl was in my face as I’m running with the train to get on and I’m being pulled up by some girls!

We made it on, in disbelief not even knowing if it will take us to the right stop. We are laughing, nervous, and sit in the closest proximity to each other. We get to Chiusi after I sweat out some nerves, and as Audrey is struggling with the door, as she did in Torontal, a got a premonition of the a repeat at the last stop…Abby and I book it off that train, running like Olympians down that station. We get two bins over, wrong train! We go back underground to the next bin for Siena, and like a movie, the doors close right as we get to the top of the stairs. I yell, “NOOOOO” and hit the door, and then the conductors were still outside at the other end, I felt slightly stupid looking a fool just then! But they say come on, so we get on the train. We get aboard and serisouly sit and laugh about how we pulled this stunt off..and that if we had one more person with us, "no child left behind" would be null and void because they would have had a nice night in Chiusi!

After 6 hours to Assisi, we made it back in about 2, just in time for dinner. The perfect end to our stay in Siena. I hope Rome doesn’t bring this much excitement.

Fading by thoyt16

wake me up, in the middle of the night to say.

As a group, we went to Lake Garda/Sirmione, Venice, and Verona a couple of weekends ago. It was an amazing, yet quick trip. I love all three sites, but since I could write a novella on it, I’ll try and sum it up in a quick re-cap.

On Thursday. I woke up before any rooster would think about crowing: 5:45, [seminary ended 6 years ago!]. Then, we thought we were going to have to leave someone behind, who is a touch late EVERYTIME! But, she managed to MacGyver her way on top of the Fortress to find us, right before the bus came. Then, we took tiniest bus possible where I scrunched my big boy body into and headed to Sirmione. Thanks to Lisbeth Salander and Michael Blomqkist [The Girl Who Played W/ Fire] for the gripping entertainment, because there was no sleep for me on the bus ride.

In Sirmione/Lake Garda, we had lunch, walked around the area that the pot Catullus wrote about/lived, and enjoyed the beautiful lake. The view of the Alps in the distance was amazing, and there was even a mimi hot springs, where I had a bit of a ri-ri moment stating “I’ve never seen like hot springs in the ocean” Post-It to Taylor- we are not at the ocean…LAKE Garda. Then a group of Asians decided to step in the springs. The one who got in looked like a Happy Panda, rolled up his pants and shirt revealing his Buddha Belly, and did a sort of Truffle Shuffle. Then stepped in the water and screamed because it was hotter than he anticipated! Needless to say, I was cracking up while he was screaming, took a bunch of ‘peace sign’ photos, and the put his arm around some poor Italian man, who was enjoying his rock seat, to take a photo with him.

We took a ferry to the other side of the lake and headed to Venice! In Venice we went to a Vivaldi “4 Seasons” concert. Again, the little kid inside of me came out. The bassist caused such a giggle fits from me due to the spastic, turrets like head jerks he was doing. My parent really did raise me better! All things aside, it was a great concert inside a beautiful church in Venezia.

The next day we went to the Accademia, where The Tempest should have been, but it’s temporarily gone, then we explored all day. The city is so beautiful. We ate lunch at a nice trattoria, went to Murano where they’re famous for blowing glass, then had a big ‘family’ dinner at a local restaurant.

Saturday we went to Verona, home to the fabled Romeo & Juliet. It was love at first sight as soon as we stepped into town. It has small town charm, with big city style. We walked along the “5^th Ave” of Verona, and went to the edge of town by the river, which had a spectacular view. We walked to the top of an old roman amphitheater that overlooked all of Verona and the hillside with mondo Villas.

The day was perfect, misty/hzy and overcast, adding to the ambience and charm of the town. We visited Juliet’s wall, which was lame. The only redeeming quality was the number of dudes treating Juliet like a hooker! There were numerous accounts of guys taking crass photos as they grope her left breast [hey, you rub St. Peter’s foot, apparently Juliet was kind of a floozy!]

I said goodbye to Verona, and embarked on the magic school bus [this time it was a normal, giant sized charter bus]. This really was the best ride I’ve ever been on. Granted, it could have been the amount of walking I did or the waking up at dawn, but it was very hazy and we were driving through the mountains. There was a constant fog encompassing the tress and then a drizzle of rain began. I had the perfect dreary day playlist and was in a euphoric state the whole bus ride [with a minor moment of terror when I thought the bus driver wasn’t using the windshield wipers, but again, I’m a bit slow and didn’t realize I was only seeing the top of the window, not the area where the driver was. Thanks for clearing that up Katie!]

….we made it back to Siena just in time for dinner, and for a nice hibernation!

A dopo!

New Addition to the Misadventures, a sort of soundtrack. Enjoy!

Maroon 5 - Never Gonna Leave This Bed [Acoustic] by haibee_mirage