Devotissimo suo, Sarah: Verona, you have my heart

I apologize for the delay--school is actually real here (who would have thought?) and I've been so busy! So as it was kindly pointed out to me by my aunt, I may want to inform my readers that I am in fact here to study some things--pasta, pizza, gelato, all the important things in life. But really, here's a quick run down of my classes:

Italian (3rd semester): Terrifying. There are only six of us in the class so actually it's not that scary, and our professor is incredibly nice, but intimidating nonetheless. I have plenty to keep me busy in that class.

Roman Women: Dutch professor. The class is on and off interesting, basically the history of Roman women. There isn't much literature out there about women (insert feminist joke) so most of what we discuss is people's interpretations of what may have been.

Italy and the Invention of America: When I actually find out what this class is about, I would love to tell you. Our professor is amazed by all technology, it's quite fascinating. Mostly we just have been discussing explorers who first came to the Americas. (In 1492, Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue)

Florentine Renaissance Art History: This is probably the best class because we only have lecture one day a week, and the other day we do site visits in Florence to different churches and museums. Plus my professor for this class is fantastic. Guido. That's his real name.

So now that the discussion of classes is over we can move on to bigger and better things. To get "involved in the Italian culture" I've decided to participate in three things:
1. Volunteering at the senior center (Mai Dire Vecchio-which translates to "Never say old"), I'll start this tomorrow
2. Helping build floats/create masks/participate in the floats and parade for Sesto's Carnevale. The theme this year is Pinnochio
3. I am going to get a conversation partner.
All of this should be under way shortly, so I will update on that front once I know more.

And on to a quick update on this weekend! There is so much to say, and it was really a huge series of misfortunate events, but in the end everything turned out for the best and I just may have found my favorite place in Italy! (okay..this is only my first traveling weekend, but just wait for pictures, it was wonderful!) Oh, I guess I should mention, our destination was Verona and Bologna.

After a few mishaps at the train station (obviously a few difficulties locating the proper train) we arrived in Verona, you know the setting of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. And truly, the city was straight out of a fairy tale. Our hotel situation, not so much. We arrived at our hotel (bed and breakfast actually) and naturally the door was locked. Finally someone let us in and we climbed a million steps up a huge spiral staircase attempting to locate the door for our hotel. (Often times inside the main door will be a few different places, hotels, apartments and such). We called the hotel and a woman answered and after about ten minutes she came down. Upon seeing 8 of us, she looked incredibly confused. Turns out only one room was reserved. After sending our fluent Italian speaker up to talk to the lady (by this I mean we sent Camellia, killa cam, who is in Italian 101), somehow through the language barrier the woman offered three of us to stay in her own bedroom, and five could sleep in the one room we had for four people. Of course this would happen on our first travel experience.

So a few highlights from Verona:

Everything. Seriously. But more specifically..

Roman arena--basically the Colosseum but on a smaller scale. It was so huge though and beautiful.

Juliet's wall--like in the movie, Letters to Juliet. Except you don't actually put the letters on the wall, there is a mailbox. But there is writing all over. Then the balcony. Just as I imagined.

Probably my favorite place was the Teatro Romano. The views were just incredible. Camellia and I just sat for awhile and took it all in.

Castelvecchio--okay at this point I was actually getting so tired and not needing to see any more art, but it was pretty cool being in a castle.

And basically just everything else was great. It was just a walking city, hardly any cars in the downtown area.

Now Bologna:

Okay actually, at this point I was so tired from being completely sleep deprived and basically a zombie, we all kind of were. So I think I will need to revisit Bologna to actually see anything. But here's what I can tell you:

Bolognese sauce from Bologna is the best there is.

Neptune's fountain makes me feel uncomfortable.

There were Native American performers in the Piazza. It was strange. I considered getting a picture with them to see if I could get some sort of credit for Italy and the Invention of America.

And that is all I got. BUT I plan on returning before spring break we will be staying there a night, and hopefully I will get to see some of the actual sites when I am a little more lively.

Oh, and for those interested, I caved. I bought shoes. Brown leather boots made in Florence to be exact. This is what they tell me at least. And for my wallet and mind's sake, I will believe them.

Tiny little sign and tiny little button to press to locate our bed and breakfast. I think at this point we should have realized we may run into a few problems.