January 31, 2007

Our travel started today at the Philadelphia on a flight that should have left at 6, but the crew was drunk and never showed up, so the flight left an hour an a half late, which then caused us to miss our connecting flight in Rome. One the flight I sat next to Anna Flincini. She has adopted me as her granddaughter. She was born in the Czech Republic. She met her husband who was from Sicily when she was 19. They lived in Peru where her husband was an engineer. I got a geography lesson on Lima, Peru though. I found out that in certain parts of the country there is no sun for months on end, but up in the mountains there are more regular seasons. He got emphazema because the elevation is so low in Peru that it causes a lot of people to have asthma problems. Then she moved back to Rome to live, where she lives by herself. Anyway, we struck up a conversation for a better part of the flight, very nice woman. She filled me in on politics of Rome, and the market, and what meals to cook and how. She was very helpful. The best part was that she invited me to come and visit her in Rome, which ill do. When we got to the Rome airport we ended up meeting lots of other LDM students.

Finally we got into Florence. We checked in LDM, which took forever. We the proceeded to drag out super heavy suitcases down the cobble stone streets which was an awful idea. My bags must have fallen in the middle of the street a million times, all of which proved to be very humorous for the Italians passing by me. The men laughed, students looked at us like we had three heads. Two old women, who were the stereotypical Italian mama stopped my and asked something about Via or Viale, neither was the question or the answer I was looking for. Then we tried to get a taxi to take us to the apartment, but he wouldn’t even take up, with the excuse that the street was too narrow, it couldn’t be done. Personally I think it was an big excuse not to have to lug around three girls huge suitcases half a block

We finally dragged our stuff to the apartment. Its near the Central Market and the Lorenzo open air market, prime location. Via Chiara is a small alley, with doors that look more like old shop windows, and then there is our door. After dragging 6-8 bags up three flights of steps we got to our door, which has two large brass knockers on the door. You walk into our apartment, walk up a couple of stairs and face the tiny kitchen that we were given, equipped with several pots and pans, a bag of cookies and some jars of 300 year old capers that got dried out. Given this is no dump, its going to be home for the next couple of months. The walls are covered in mirrors and the ceiling has ornate decoration everywhere. My room is equipped with the biggest armoire ever as well as a very old bed. Everything is wood and the floor is white tile. The walls of our apartment are covered with artwork of naked people. The house favorite is in the girls room, a scene of naked men and women, whose proportions are questionable. The painting itself is odd, but the fact that most of the artwork in our apartment has a hint of eroticism throws me off every time I walk into one of the rooms.

Our land lord, Leonardo, came this afternoon to try to explain the heat and electricity. Leonardo speaks as much English as I speak Italian. Three girls and an Italian man trying to communicate which lights will blow the circuits and what buttons correspond with what times for the heat to come on, all done in two different languages, and no on understands each other, makes for a very interesting half hour conversation.

We closed our night with a dinner at some restaurant near the apartment where we learned several things. One, Italians think that you’re an idiot when you ask for doggie bags, never do that again. Second, if you think the waiter’s joking about change the first time and get the same response the second or third try, chances are, you cant have change for 50 Euro.

February 1, 2007
Today we went to orientation where they told us horror stories about getting stabbed and killed in Florence. And how Amsterdam is hell on earth, and the police talked to us and the American Consulate in Florence. All in all, it was alright. After orientation we went out and about the city, poking our heads into some shops. I also took my placement testing, which was surprisingly easy. After the test, I was going to meet the girls, so I tried to find my way to Via Faenza, the street where the main student checkpoint is. But true to form, I got lost, no surprise. I have to say though, that if getting lost everyday I got lost and ended up face to face to with the Duomo. That in itself was incredible, the sheer magnitude of the church takes your breath away, and pictures will never do it justice, partly because it could never fit in a single frame. We also tasted our first gelato for the semester. We think that we got ripped off though. The best part of our evening was dinner. We went to Osteria del’ Agnolo, which is a small restaurant near the Duomo. When we first walked in, the manager, Hani, escorted us to the bar and gave us free champagne while we waited for a table. The three of us had decided before that we wanted to look for a place that we could come back to all the time, become regulars. Hani then escorted us back to a table and proceeded to give us the royal treatment. He gave us free wine, and eventually our entire dinners for free, and complementary desert (bananas and ice cream in raspberry sauce with flaming sugar cubes dipped in alcohol), and he finished it off with shots of limoncello. The night was completed with a group picture, and the fact that the entire Carabinieri showed up and sat next to us (they lunch there every week, good to know).

February 2, 2007

I find the windows in our apartment to be complicated. Not only do they latch on the outside, but the glass panes lock on the inside and then the interior wooden shutters close, which block all light from coming into the room in the morning, which also makes it very difficult to get up in the morning. Needless to say, 10 am was the earliest I was rolling out of bed this morning. We made our first trip to the Central Market today. The Central Market is by far the best supermarket in the world. It is a large open building with two stories. On the first floor there are meat and fish counters, much like you would see in a regular supermarket. There are vendors for meat, fish, wine, oil, vinegar (which the let you taste on small plastic spoons..I had no idea that there were so many different types and tastes of vinegar) and vegetables. The upstairs is mostly vegetables. Its basically the biggest and best farmers market anywhere. The great thing is is that vegetables and fruit is very inexpensive. You buy what you need for the next couple days and that’s it. I saw so many artichokes today it was unbelievable. After getting some basics there, we unloaded back at the apartment and set out to do some exploring/shopping. Florence is going to make me a very broke college student. The amount of stores here will knock your sox off, everything from Hermes (where they very politely followed us through the store), to Guess, to leather goods stores, to candy shops. Everything looks so good that it is very hard not to want to buy everything you see.

Quotes from yesterday:

I wish I was an ice cream cone – a man commenting on the ice cream I was eating while walking through the San Lorenzo market. I had no idea what he had said and continued to walk while the girls, who were walking behind me, got a great kick out of it.

Half price because you’re American – another man in the San Lorenzo market.

Florence is the perfect little dog city. So many people here have small dogs that are dressed in chic doggie sweaters, and none of them are on leashes. They are just happy to be walking with their equally chic owner.

Everyone here in Florence is impeccably dressed. Women wear stilettos like its no big deal trying to maneuver through cobble stones because they have probably been doing it all their lives. Knee high boots are especially big here, the higher the better. I would like to think that after a while of taking cues from the Italians, I will be able to decided on a pair of boots and effortlessly throw together an outfit like them. This notion feels like it’s a long way off, considering that I was very comfortable today wearing my beaten up boat shoes..oh well.

A note on our apartment:

Its freezing and noisy. First off, the walls are thick stone and we have been allotted three hours of heat a day by our landlord. The heat goes on from 9-12 at night, no more, no less. The morning is semi warm but the evenings before 9 is freezing.

And it smells funny. A mix of musty smell and very old, wet building. The hallway especially.

The noise. At no point during the day can we escape the sounds of screaming Italians of motorscooters. At night it’s the street cleaning car and people out for the evening. And in the morning, it’s the vendors setting up shop at the Market just down the street from our house.

The past two days living here has seemed more like walking around in a dream more than anything. Nothing seems real, and there always seems to be the threat that you could wake up any minute and it would all disappear.

We did Friday night the right way for our first weekend in Florence. We made our way to Robin Hood bar on Via Orioule. This was my first time legally in a bar, and it was like a home away from home. Mostly everyone was American, with a few older Italian men. The frat boys with their polos. When we first got there it was kind of awkward because the three of us really only know each other, and it seemed like a lot of people came with larger groups of people. We all got amaretto sours and free champagne, and then I decided that I wanted to go to the bar to get a beer. We all ended up meeting some guys at the bar who bought us a couple rounds of drinks. They were all pretty nice, i think that we are going to meet up with them at a later point, maybe next weekend in Venice.

February 3, 2007

This morning we got up late and went sight seeing around Florence. What started out as a trip to the Ponte Vecchio turned into a walk of over 5 miles. We wandered over the Ponte Vecchio, and another bridge and across the river, past the parts of Florence that were shown on Lauren’s map. We walked and walked up the Boboli Gardens and turned back. Earlier we stumbled on the Piazza del Signiore, with all the statues. The Rape of the Sabine Women is my favorite statue there.

Florence is a truly inspiring city, and as I wander around here, there is not a doubt in my mind why this place is one of the most romantic cities in the world. There are couples everywhere, sitting on steps in piazzas, walking hand in hand, its no wonder that we’ve been told that its easy to fall in love here. I feel like I’m chomping at the bit to get started. I really feel like I need some structure for my day, other than aimlessly walking around Florence. I’m very excited for classes to start on Monday.

I also feel like I am in a state of constant confusion and constant disorientation. The other girls seem to pick up direction a lot quicker than I do, which really should come as no surprise. I think that I’m just going to need a few days to wonder around myself, get lost a couple times.

The other thing is that today was Saturday, which meant that there were about 3 times as many people on the streets today than during the week. The streets are crowded, and no one walks on the same side of the sidewalk, and the stores are crowded, and I kept bumping into people.

Lesson learned:

When someone tells you that you are beautiful in a bar, the correct answer should not be, “You’re drunk.” Next time, think of something more strategic.

Another issue: The Language Barrier

Not only are we having a hard time communicating with people in Florence (shop keepers, people at the market, our landlord), we are also having a difficult time understanding ATMS (which is a problem), and our phones, which think that it’s a much better idea to send us text messages in Italian than English.

Last nights club experience: We went back to Robin Hood last night and the crowd was completely different. I have never been chased out of a club like that. We ended up getting cornered by two Italian men, one who spoke decent English and one who didn’t speak at all. The one was the stereotypical Italian, greasy hair slicked back, tight sweater, dark hair, attempting to be suave with the ladies. He informed me that we had the same shape face, that he was in love with me, and that he wanted to take me to dinner in the near by town of Chianti. Then he wanted me to come outside with him while he smoked, and he couldn’t/wouldn’t understand that I was just not interested. After he left to go outside, his English speaking side kick followed us to the bar, and he had his hands on my waist, and all I could do was wriggle and try to get away. For the 10 feet to the bar, I got poked and prodded at like I was in a heard of cattle. Italian men everywhere..come dance with me, bella raggazzi..blah blah. I had had enough, and we ended up leaving. I think that culture shock is just starting to settle in. All we did yesterday as we were walking around was worry about what we were wearing, and where we should buy boots so that we fit in. And I hate crowds, and I cant get away from them here. And the men leer at the American women because we evidently stick out like a sore thumb.

Then I had a dream last night about saying good bye before camp, and this huge black bear came lumbering out of the woods and everyone piled into trucks to get out of there. While it was relatively scary, it was a taste of home, and mildly appreciated.