Athena Blogs

4:45pm (US time)

I am officially back in America. The past couple of days have been a complete whirlwind of events. In the midst of stressing about finals I am glad that I was able to find time to hang out with the amazing friends I have made over the past semester and say some final farewells to the city I have come to love as my own.

During my last few days in Florence I had some quality bonding time with my friends, explored the real Florence, and revisited some of my favorite sites. One the Wednesday night before we all left my friends and I had a farewell/Christmas party where we ate at our regular restaurant, Il Porcospino, and played the game white elephant (or what I like to call Dirty Santa).

I’d say it was a rather successful night considering I got to spend quality time with all of my amazing friends, AND I walked away with a bottle of wine from the present exchange. It was a night full of mixed emotions. On the one hand I was sad that this was one of the last times I would see these people but at the same time I was happy that I had met all of these great people and could hang out with them one more time.

7:57pm

So I’m not going to lie, this blog is the production of pure procrastination. Finals are this week and I am in denial that my time here in Italy is almost up so I have decided to compose this blog to help me detach from reality. And so far it is succeeding tremendously. So this past weekend there was a holiday on Thursday so we got a 4 day weekend. I didn’t really want to go anywhere since it was my last weekend in Florence so Libby, Jessica and I decided to go to Siena for the day on Thursday.

It was a very relaxing day and it turned out to be a great way to sort of say goodbye to Italy. We were able to see the countryside one last time before our departure for home. We left in the late morning and basically just spent the day walking around Siena. We walked through the stores and I got a lot of my last minute souvenir shopping done and we just hung out around the main square all day.

We walked through the side streets as well which was really cool because in Siena they have broken up the city into several different ‘neighborhoods’. These ‘neighborhoods’ are the result of the big horse race they have 2 times a year. In this horse race each neighborhood has a rider and they race around the central square until the first person reaches the finish line. Doesn’t sound so bad, right? Well you see, in this horse race anything goes. There are no real rules as to how you get to the finish line; it’s just that you have to.

10:18pm

This past weekend I went on the school trip to Venice. I was a little hesitant to go at first because of all of the school work I had but I had already paid for the trip so I had to go. And I am so glad that I did. I had an absolutely amazing time exploring this wonderful city. It was so great to get to go on a trip and not have to plan anything. I didn’t realize how much I enjoy not making plans until this trip.

Yea it has some disadvantages, moving in a crowd with a huge tourist stamp on your forehead, but at this point in my travels I didn’t even care. I was just happy to not have to think about making the right reservations or moving fast to make sure I get to see everything that I want to. It was a very relaxing trip and I ended up loving the city more than any other city I have visited in Italy.

We got to a town close to Venice early Saturday afternoon where we ditched the bus and hopped on a private boat. In no time we were cruzing down the Grand Canal and after about 15 minutes we found ourselves on the shores of the little island of Murano. Murano is a very popular island in Venice that is known for its glass. We were only on Murano for a couple of hours but it was great because during our time there we were able to watch the masters of the glass work their magic.

10:11pm

We left right after class on Thursday afternoon. Myself and 4 of my friends we off to Berlin, Germany! I probably should not have left this past weekend due to the immense amount of unfinished projects and homework I have but how can you say no to Germany? We got there kind of late Thursday night so after we found and checked into our hostel we booked it to the world famous Christmas markets. We only had about an hour or so at the markets because it was late and they were closing down but we had a blast anyways.

We were running through there like little kids, cameras poised and ready to click. We spent that whole glorious hour going from booth to booth looking at the little things they had to offer and of could trying samples like nobody’s business. Now if you have not caught on already that day was Thanksgiving. So in light of the American spirit we decided to have a “traditional” Thanksgiving by going to the nearest, open restaurant (which are much more difficult than one would think at 11:00pm) and eating as much as we could fit in our stomachs.

Since we were in Berlin we had to skip out on the turkey and mashed potatoes however we did have a delicious German cuisine that consisted of beef, potatoes and vegetables. It was amazing! Not a bad alternative to Grandma’s home cooking. (Not that your dinners aren’t spectacular Grandma. I just said that for emphasis. ;) ) Although Thanksgiving was a little different this year I am very blessed to have been able to spend this time of thanks in as great a place as Berlin with my family (even if not biological).

11:14pm

After living here for just over 2 ½ months I finally made it to Rome. My friend Kelsey and I left Saturday morning bright and early on the 5:50am train. Or at least that was the plan. It ended up that our train had some sort of trouble so we had to get on a different train. Luckily since it was a train issue and not our own error we were able to use the same ticket as the first train. We good time and got into Rome at around 8:45am. Only 15 minutes later than our first train was supposed to arrive. Once we got to Rome we found our hostel which was conveniently located a couple blocks from the train station.