ventidue giorni

Thursday, May 26, 2011

A week from today is our last day in Italy! I can’t believe how fast it’s flown by! I’ll be back on American soil with my favorite people in the entire world in only 8 days! I’m so excited for all the fun things coming up this week and so excited to top it all off with a big hug from all the people I’ve missed like crazy since I’ve been away!

We began our day on the other side of the river, about a 30 minute walk from our hotel. We saw the Church of Santa del Carmine that included paintings of Adam and Eve; bot their temptation and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden. We saw the Church of Santa Felicita and the Medici family palace. The Medici was a wealthy, powerful family in Renaissance Italy. They were huge icons to the people during this time and they employed many artists. Their home is ginormous! They housed around 50 people in it at one time and it would’ve been far from a tight squeeze!

We ended our day spending 3 hours at the Uffizi Gallery. 3 hours! My legs are bloody stumps.

We had the opportunity to see world-famous paintings like the Birth of Venus and Spring (Primavera), both by Botticelli. Most of the paintings were ones I could’ve paid attention to only as I was walking by and feel satisfied; but, there were a few, like the Birth of Venus and Primavera, that I am so glad I got to see. Venus is the goddess of love and beauty and she is the focus in both of these paintings.

David was also put to shame today in the Uffizi. There was a giant painting of a naked midget (dwarf). It was absolutely hilarious! He was standing with his back (and bare butt) facing the viewer and he was looking over his shoulder as if to say, “Come and get it!” We were all dying of laughter! The entire museum is full of these elegant pictures of sensual nude women and then somewhere in the midst of them appears this butt-naked midget! If you walked around to the other side of the piece it gave you a full-frontal image as well. With a moth, A MOTH, covering his manhood. Haha, oh my gosh, I’m dying just writing about it. All in all, I found a new Italian heart-throb!

I had a nice little –much needed—pick-me-up at dinner today. We got this lemon sorbet for dessert and it had a funky little taste to it. With each bite closer to the bottom it began to burn the entire way down. After a little chat with the waiter, it was confirmed that the ice cream was mixed with lemon liquor. Yeaaaa-hooooo! Linds and I walked down the street pretending to be drunk to try and freak Steve and this really Molly-Mormon girl in our group out! Haha, we’re going to hell! …If not for drinking liquor, for teasing innocent people! I definitely needed a little alcohol in my system after the main course… I took a big bite of what I thought was chicken and realized it was fish right as I started crunching fish bones between my teeth! I threw it all up it my napkin and didn’t touch it for the remainder of the meal! Oh, barf!

Now we’re just back at the hotel trying to study, write our essays, and pack!

We leave early tomorrow morning to catch a train to Pisa! I can’t wait to do my part and hold up the leaning tower! We’ll spend the day in Pisa and then we catch a train that afternoon to take us to Cinque Terre. Turns out, our weekend getaway is more of a camping trip than a resort. We are staying in tents, have a community bathroom, and have to carry our belongings around in a backpack while we’re there. A little change of plans after the elaborate expectations we had, but it is still going to be such a blast! It’s a beach community with 5 separate cities to hike to, so we’ll be spending the weekend hiking, relaxing at the beach, and exploring through the cities. It’s going to be great! We get back Sunday evening, then I give my report Monday morning, take our final Monday afternoon, and then pack up and leave for Venice on Tuesday! It’s going to be a great week!

I won’t be able to take my computer with me on our weekend escapade, so I’ll get ya’ll caught up on Sunday night! Hope you can find some way to fill the 3 hours you would usually spend reading my email each day! :)

Can’t wait to see you guys!

Love Always,

Wit