Spring Break Part 2: Naples and Pompeii

I instantly love Naples. Wild, raucous, noisy, dirty, balls-out Naples. An anthill inside a rabbit warren, with all the exoticism of a Middle Eastern bazaar and a touch of New Orleans voodoo. A tripped-out, dangerous and cheerful nuthouse. My friend Wade came to Naples in the 1970s and was mugged . . . In a museum. The city is all decorated with the laundry that hangs from every window and dangles across every street; everybody's fresh-washed undershirts and brassieres flapping in the wind like Tibetan prayer flags. There is not a street in Naples in which some tough little kid in shorts and mismatched socks is not screaming up from the sidewalk to some other tough little kid on a rooftop nearby. Nor is there a building in this town that doesn't have at least one crooked old woman seated at her window, peering suspiciously down at the activity below. The people here are so insanely psyched to be from Naples, and why shouldn't they be? This is a city that gave the world pizza and ice cream. The Neapolitan women in particular are such a gang of tough-voiced, loud-mouthed, generous, nosy dames, all bossy and annoyed and right up in your face and just trying to friggin' help you for chrissake, you dope--why they gotta do everything around here? The accent in Naples is like a friendly cuff on the ear. It's like walking through a city of short-order cooks, everybody hollering at the same time. They still have their own dialect here, and an ever-changing liquid dictionary of local slang, but somehow I find that the Neapolitans are the easiest people for me to understand in Italy. Why? Because they want you to understand, damn it. They talk loud and emphatically, and if you can't understand what they're actually saying out of their mouths, you can usually pick up the inference from the gesture.

-Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat Pray Love

Day three of Spring Break, Meghan, Hannah, and I took a train from Rome to Naples. When we arrived, it was like a completely different world. Naples is big. It's dirty. It's scary.

But if you come to Italy for the whole experience, you'd better go to Naples.

We stayed at a hostel called Giovanni's Home. Giovanni is really cool. He's this old man who smokes a lot of cigarettes and loves Naples and really truly cares about the people staying at his hostel. He called me when we hadn't arrived for our 1:00 check-in time to make sure we were coming and weren't lost. When we finally made it, he welcomed us inside and had us put down our things. He brought us cups of water, and then we sat as he told us of about a million things we could do in Naples.

Giovanni LOVES Naples. He wants everyone to love Naples. He is sad because everyone comes to Naples as a jumping-off point to Sorrento and the Almafi Coast. ("You can see beaches anywhere!") He is upset that the guidebooks leave out so many of the things there are to do in Naples.

He explained the history of his beloved city. Then he went off about how everyone thinks Naples is such a horrible place; people think it's dangerous because of the mafia, thieves, crime, etc. He showed us videos of pickpockets so we knew how they operate and how to avoid being ripped off. He gave us advice to not wear our purses out, what neighborhoods to avoid, and so on. He told us we should come home by 10 or 10:30pm latest; if we came back drunk, we weren't allowed to sleep there. (That wasn't really an issue for us, but it was nice to know that other people wouldn't be coming back drunk, as this was our first experience in a "dorm style shared room" hostel.)

Giovanni's Home is the best hostel in Naples. (Just ask Hostelworld.com; it's Top-Rated.) We had an 8-bed female dorm room that didn't lock, in a city considered very dangerous, and I felt totally safe leaving all my stuff out in the room when we were gone. (Meghan accidentally left €20 on her bed once when we left. When we got back, Giovanni said he had put it under her pillow for her. He makes sure your things don't get messed with. He's awesome.)

By the time Giovanni finished his Naples speech and fed us bowls of delicious pasta, it was already getting dark outside. We (Meghan, Hannah, and I, plus a random guy named Jeff who was staying at Giovanni's) headed out for a walk through town, following a route Giovanni had marked on a map he gave us, down to the water.

Side note: You must know that walking around Naples, especially in the dark, is terrifying only for this reason. Stoplights are discretionary. Not every street has street lamps. And I'm 99% positive there's some sort of game amongst the motorcyclists called Try To Hit The Unsuspecting Pedestrian. Also, a good portion of the streets we had to walk on were sidewalkless, with cars haphazardly parked right up against both sides, and trash spilling into the road. I don't know if my heart could have taken more than two days of this terror. I almost died every time a cyclist came out of nowhere and whizzed past us, evil grin on his face as we shrieked in fear.

But anyway, we had to walk back up through town to get pizza, and nothing was going to keep us from that.

In Eat Pray Love, she goes to a place called Pizzeria da Michele. We wanted to go the first night, but it's closed on Sundays. So instead, we went to their rival across the street, Pizzeria Trianon. It has more choices than Pizzeria da Michelle (which has only two kinds to choose from), but since I wanted to do a true comparison, I ordered margherita pizza (with tomato sauce and mozzarella) at both places.

Hannah and Me with our Pizzas

I tried to remember everything about this pizza, because I really wanted to figure out the difference between this one and the one we would have the next day. This was delicious. The edges were slightly burned. The crust was chewy. The sauce was flavorful. It was everything I had hoped for in a Naples pizza. And it was a wonderful ending to yet another wonderful day.

Monday morning, the four of us (Jeff began the day with us, but we ended up losing him before we went to Pompeii; he got lost when he went to get food and then we couldn't find him; that's another story for another day.) took the metro down to a stop near the water. Giovanni said we wouldn't have time to walk there if we wanted to fit in everything we had planned for that day.

We got off the metro and the water was beautiful. The sun was shining (as usual on this trip) and it was warm and breezy. The boats were lined up along the dock. The water was clear and blue.

Naples, Along the Coast

Once we had walked along the coast past a big castle (We didn't have time to explore it), we headed up a main street. We went to a bar Giovanni told us to go to, and we ordered some kind of coffee he told us to order. It was an espresso, but with lots of sugar and chocolate in it. It was just what we needed to wake up! Well. . . that and a sfogliatelle. What's a sfogliatelle?

After taking a bite, I remembered I needed to photograph it!

Sfogliatella is a "crispy scallop shell shaped pastry filled with sweetened ricotta cheese" (Rick Steves). It tasted like creamy cake inside a crispy croissant.

Then we went to Cappella Sansevero, a chapel where you can see the Veiled Christ. This may be the most incredible thing I have seen. Ever.

Veiled Christ, by Giuseppe Sanmartino, 1753

And possibly the second most incredible thing I have seen. Ever.

Disillusion

So, I think my favorite sculptures I've seen were at a chapel in Naples, not a museum in Rome. These were really, really amazing.

Next on the agenda for the day was Napoli Sotterranea, an archaeological site. It's an underground maze of passageways and ruins from Greek and Roman times. It's a guided tour. We went down 121 steps under the city and explored an old theater, ancient water channels and an aqueduct, and even a place where people stayed underground during WWII to avoid being hit by bombs. We had to squeeze through narrow tunnels and we carried candles for light, which made it feel kind of spooky. This wasn't part of our original Naples plan, but thanks to Giovanni, we went, and it was a very cool (I don't mean temperature, though it was a bit chilly) experience.

We spent all afternoon in Pompeii. Pompeii is a city that was destroyed and completely buried (under 4 to 6 meters of ash) when Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79AD. It was rediscovered in 1599. It has been excavated since 1748.

Going to Pompeii and exploring the city gives you a really weird feeling. The roads are still there. Most of the walls are still standing. You can see ancient paintings and mosaics, ovens used thousands of years ago. I couldn't pick just a couple of pictures, so here are several that give an idea of what it's like.

Walls Still Standing

I think this was part of the Forum.

When Vesuvius erupted, 2000 citizens suffocated under the ash. Their bodies were buried. Excavating Pompeii, archaeologists detected empty spaces in the debris. They filled the holes with plaster to create molds of the Pompeiians:


One of the Plaster Casts of a Victim



Frescoes on the Walls

Original Lead Pipes; Part of the Water System

A Brick Oven

The grooves in the street are from chariots.

Ampitheater

Pompeii wore us out.

It was time to head back to Rome.

Is it okay if Pizzeria da Michele was the thing I looked forward to most on this trip? Is it okay that I was a little obsessed, and would refuse to leave Italy without going? Seriously. I remember talking (dreaming) about getting pizza here months ago (after reading EPL), when Italy seemed so far away. The moment finally came!

Here's why I was so obsessed with the notion. (Bear with me.) It's another quote from Eat Pray Love:

Pizzeria da Michele is a small place with only two rooms and one nonstop oven. . . There's not a menu. They have only two varieties of pizza here--regular and extra cheese. None of this new age southern California olives-and-sun-dried-tomato wannabe pizza twaddle. The dough, it takes me half my meal to figure out, tastes more like Indian nan than like any pizza dough I ever tried. It's soft and chewy and yielding, but incredibly thin. I always thought we only had two choices in our lives when it came to pizza crust--thin and crispy, or thick and doughy. How was I to have known there could be a crust in this world that was thin and doughy? Holy of holies! Thin, doughy, strong, gummy, yummy, chewy, salty pizza paradise. On top, there is a sweet tomato sauce that foams up all bubbly and creamy when it melts the fresh buffalo mozzarella, and the one sprig of basil in the middle of the whole deal somehow infuses the entire pizza with herbal radiance, much the same way one shimmering movie star in the middle of a party brings a contact high of glamour to everyone around her. It's technically impossible to eat this thing, of course. You try to take a bite off your slice and the gummy crust folds, and the hot cheese runs away like topsoil in a landslide, makes a mess of you and your surroundings, but just deal with it. . .the pizza is so good we can barely cope.

That description is perfect.

Do you see the light in my eyes?
This is a magical pizza.

Yes. The whole thing was eaten by Yours Truly.

It was the greatest thing I have ever done.

Thank you, Naples.

Spring Break Part 1: Rome

I don't even really know where to begin.

We knew this week was going to be awesome. We had plans. We had booked our hotels and flights. We knew where we wanted to go, what we wanted to see, what we wanted to eat. We were excited, to say the least. Our hopes were high, and this vacation exceeded even our highest expectations. It. Was. Perfect.

Because we did so much, I am going to divide up my Spring Break blog into three parts. First, I'll tell you about Rome.

We left Friday morning. The forecast called for rain, pretty much nonstop for at least a few days. The real weather? SUNNY and WARM and PERFECT. (It rained for about 20 minutes the first evening in Rome. That was it. Oh, and it started raining when we got back to Florence, after we were already safely inside our apartment. How did that work out?) Anyway, we took the slow (cheaper) train to Rome and got there around 11 or so. We purchased Roma Passes to cover some sights we wanted to see, plus transportation. Then we headed to our hostel.

It's not hard to get around in Rome. The Termini train station is in the middle. The metro has two lines, which cross at Termini. We had to take the metro to a certain stop and then catch a bus from there. The bus dropped us off a short walk from the hostel.

Side note: If you are unsure of the differences between hostels and hotels, this article is helpful.

We stayed at Peter Pan Hostel. It's not very close to the center of Rome, but it is easily reachable by metro and bus, and it was a lot cheaper than the ones with better locations. We had a private room for only €13 a night for each of us. The beds were clean and the door locked, so really, that's all that mattered. We shared a separate bathroom with random people, which was okay, but the shower was NASTY. We didn't shower in Rome. Peter Pan Hostel also gave us breakfast: cereal and croissants. And the people working there were really nice.

After checking in, we left our heavy backpacks and headed into the real part of Rome. First stop: The Colosseum. The Colosseum is 2,000 years old. When it was built, it could accommodate 50,000 people, and they came to watch gladiators, criminals, and animals fight to the death. We marveled at the outside before using our Roma Pass to go inside.

Do those look like rain clouds? Nope!

Inside the Colosseum

After taking lots of pictures, we began to search for food. We stopped at a nearby restaurant for lunch. I had a sandwich and fries, and lots of ketchup.

Then we went to the Roman Forum. The Forum was the political, religious, and commercial center of Rome. We explored the Forum using a tour from my Rick Steves' book, and then spent the rest of the afternoon walking around Palatine Hill (ruins of emperors' palaces) before it started getting dark and we had to leave.

We walked across town to the Pantheon, where it started to rain. Since we needed to get out of the rain, we decided to was time to stop into Gelateria Caffe Pasticceria Giolitti, for Rome's most famous gelato. Although Florence is considered the birthplace of gelato, we now strongly believe Rome has the best. This place was where we went for dinner all three days we were in Rome.

Pantheon at Night

Once it stopped raining and we had finished our ice cream, we walked through town, stopping at the Trevi Fountain to toss in a coin. (Fun fact: The coins tourists deposit daily are collected to feed Rome's poor.) Rome was beautiful at night, with all the major monuments lit up. We went back to the hostel and went to bed after our first day.

Day two began with a trip to the National Museum of Rome. It houses the best collection of ancient Roman art. We saw tons of sculptures including "the best-preserved Roman copy of the Greek Discus Thrower," lots of mosaics, old jewelry and coins, and many other really cool things. The best part of the museum was this:

It's the Portonaccio Sarcophagus. I don't really know what that means, but I couldn't stop staring at the details carved into this chunk of marble. It's really jaw-dropping. I didn't want to look away!

After the National Museum, we went to the Capitoline Museums. We saw some famous works of art: Capitoline She-Wolf, Boy Extracting a Thorn, Commodus as Hercules, the Dying Gaul, and the Capitoline Venus.

At the end, we were pretty museumed-out. We ate lunch at this place called Miscellanea. It's in Rick Steves' Italy, and since we had the book we got free homemade "sexy wine" to go with our meal. It was a sparkling red wine made from strawberry-flavored grapes, and it was delicious. I had spaghetti carbonara. And after our meal, the owner gave us ice cream sandwiches, and more wine.

Since the restaurant was right by the Pantheon, we went inside the church after lunch. The Pantheon has the biggest one-piece granite columns in Italy. It also has a really awesome skylight in the middle. Raphael, and Italy's first two kings are buried in the Pantheon.

Once we finished looking around inside, we didn't have any real plans for the afternoon, which means we went shopping. I didn't buy anything, but Hannah and Meghan each bought some clothes. We wandered down the main shopping street, ended up in a square where we heard a woman singing a beautiful opera song, and we checked out a church called Santa Maria del Popolo. Inside is the Chigi Chapel, designed by Raphael. There's also the Cerasi Chapel, with Caravaggio's The Conversion on the Way to Damascus and Crucifixion of St. Peter.

Since we needed dinner, we headed back to the Best Gelato Place Ever, stopping along the way to climb the Spanish Steps and take some more pictures. When we finished our ice cream, it was dark, and we took pictures of the Colosseum at night before going back to our hostel.

Day three, we had reservations at the Borghese Gallery, a museum with Bernini sculptures and paintings by Caravaggio, Raphael, and Titian. We couldn't take pictures inside, but I googled this picture because I want you to see it:

Bernini's Apollo and Daphne

This sculpture is amazing. The picture is definitely not the same as seeing it in real life, because you can only see one side here. This statue alone was worth the cost of the Borghese Gallery.

It was time for us to head to Naples. We grabbed some snacks at a grocery store for lunch and took the slow train to The City of Pizza. Yes, pizza originated in Naples. And yes, we had pizza for dinner both days we were there. But more on that later, because after a day and a half in Naples (next blog), we spent one more day in Rome. (Confused? Don't worry.)

So, day five of our vacation, we took a train back to Rome from Naples. We went to the Vatican Museum first. (We had planned on going there the second day, March 19, but it happened to be a holiday for St. Joseph, so it was closed then.) The Vatican Museum is huge. The best parts were the Raphael rooms where we saw School of Athens, and the Sistine Chapel.

We ate lunch nearby (salad, lasagna, fruit salad) and then went to St. Peter's. We took pictures in the square and then headed inside St. Peter's Basilica. It is "the richest and grandest church on earth", and houses Michelangelo's Pieta, Bernini's seven-story-tall bronze canopy, St. Peter's tomb, and a lot of breathtaking awesomeness. Vatican City, where the Vatican Museum and St. Peter's are, is an independent country of 100 acres. It has its own postal system, radio station, mini-train station, and dress code. The pope is the religious and secular leader of Vatican City. We didn't see the pope. He usually gives a blessing on Sunday and Wednesday, but we were there on a Tuesday.

The last big thing we did in Rome was visit the Catacombs of Priscilla. The catacombs are burial places for Christians who died in ancient Roman times. No one was allowed to be buried within the city walls. And Christians wanted to be buried instead of cremated. Land was very expensive, and some wealthy Christians allowed their land to be used for burial places. To fit more tombs in a small amount of land, the Christians dug 375 miles of tunnels, from the first through fifth centureies.

The Catacombs of Priscilla were the ones we went to. The tour was about half an hour. We were the only people there, and the guide led us through the dark tunnels with a flashlight, pointing out some amazing things. We saw the first depiction of Mary nursing baby Jesus, and the oldest Adoration of the Magi. We saw layers and layers of tombs, some of them never opened, and some of them tiny, for babies. If you're ever in Rome, don't miss seeing some catacombs. Rick Steves recommends the Catacombs of Priscilla, because they're less crowded and commercialized, and more intimate than the famous catacombs of San Sabastiano and San Callisto.

Once again, we had gelato for dinner. Then we took a train to the airport, where we sat all night. Our flight from Rome to Athens left Wednesday morning at 7, so instead of paying for another night in a hostel and then figuring out how to get to the airport super early in the morning, we pulled an all-nighter. It would have been okay if it hadn't been so cold in the airport. We were freezing!

That was our Rome experience. (Check out the link to the pictures, on the right side of the page.) The next blog post will be about Naples. Prepare yourself for Pompeii and Pizza.

Ciao for Now!

Fact:

The Guinness Book of Records holds the record for

being the book most often stolen from public libraries.

I have nothing exciting to write about this week. I spent the majority of the past 5 days reading, writing notes, making flashcards, highlighting, rereading, rewriting. . . in an attempt to actually cram a little bit of what we learned in class into my brain. Monday was my Jewelry midterm. It was super easy because I knew exactly what to study. Tuesday's tests were the same way: Architecture and Italian. Totally got A's on all of those.

Today were my hard tests. Food and Wine. Even though they sound like they should be easy, they were not. I spent hours upon hours fretting over these tests. I typed up 22 (!!!) pages of notes for Food, and made a gigantic Excell spreadsheet over the wine regions, grape varieties (reds and whites), denominations (reds and whites), etc. I had to know about red and white wine vinification and sparkling wine-making methods and ways to analyze the wine (visual, olfactory, gustative).

After all that, I think I did okay. I got at least a low B on the Food test. I probably got a low A on the Wine test. And even if I didn't do very well, it's okay. Because IT'S SPRING BREAK!

Today is also the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy, and a national holiday. Last night there was fireworks, music, and lots of celebrating! I totally missed out because I was reading about the differences between Verdicchio, Vermentino, Valpolicella, and Vernaccia. But this is huge. It's like 4th of July for Italians, only it's not a holiday every year. It's special, just for the 150th year.

Since I've been locked inside studying, I've missed all the stuff going on outside. Click here to read about Lindsey's Italian holiday experience. She explains it wonderfully, with pictures. :)

Anyway, as I was studying yesterday, I almost went insane. I couldn't stare at the books any longer. I needed to do something. Naturally, I made some Irish Soda Bread! (Apparently I'm celebrating St. Patty's Day instead of Italian Unification Day. Oops.) The recipe is from Joy of Baking.

Straight Out of the Oven

With Dinner:
Some Delicious "Just Add Water and Boil" Soup

It was even better reheated this morning with jam on it. Did you know that Irish Soda Bread rises because of the reaction of the baking soda with the buttermilk? Cool! Oh, and it's SO EASY to make. Make some tonight. Do it.

Myself? Tonight, I'll be packing. I'll go to bed early because our train leaves early tomorrow morning. I'll go to bed, but I won't be able to sleep, because I'm so excited for our Spring Break trip!

I'll be back March 27 and will try to blog soon after I return. I won't have my computer on this trip.

Don't miss me too much. ;)

Taste

Fact:

A rat can last longer without water than a camel.

I love Italians.

And I love their food.

But more than that, I love that they are proud of their food.

Today, Lindsey and I went to an event called the Pitti Immagine Taste Festival. It's a festival hosting 240 exhibitors "from the country’s finest in food-related ideas, design, and professional technique." It was a "chance to experience genuine Italian cuisine, with a range of unusual flavors and products to nibble on." And as soon as I got the email about it this week, I knew I was going to go.

I don't really want to go into details about our trip to the festival. Just know that Lindsey and I made what should have been a 10 minute walk from the train station to Taste, an hour long walk in a giant circle from the train station BACK to the train station (in the rain and wind). Then, we gave up and paid to take the tram which got us there in about 30 seconds. Note to self: stop trying to use Google maps to find places in Florence; it usually doesn't help.

Anyway, we got to Taste. We went inside. It was very crowded.

We paid for tickets. Then we paid extra for wine glasses (so we could try different wines) and some handy dandy wine glass pouches to wear around our necks.

Glasses on, we dove right into the Taste experience. Here's what it's like. There are several very, very long rows of exhibitors on each side. You walk down the aisles, sampling each product. There are people everywhere; it's hard to get through to the samples because people stand in front of the food, chatting in Italian with the person selling the product. Everyone wants to try everything, and it's a little chaotic.

I only took like 3 pictures the whole time I was there;
this is the one that sums it up best

Here are some of the things we tried:

• Olive oil (on pieces of bread; LOTS of it; different flavors; my favorite was a basil olive oil)
• Balsamic vinegar
• Jams (holy cow; I didn't know there were that many funky jam flavors; in particular I remember trying a spicy mustardy one with apples in it. . . not my favorite)
• Cheese (I'm not a fan of the super strong stinky cheeses, so I had a few mis-tastes)
• Salami (so many different kinds)
• Wine (I had some more of my FAVORITE wine ever, Moscato d'Asti; a sparkling white dessert wine we tried in my wine class; it tastes like peaches.)
• Cookies (so many biscotti and other delicious cookies)
• Sweet breads (most of those were really big samples; this is where I started to get really full)
• Chocolates
• Olives
• Chocolate Salami (Google this. It's a real thing. It tastes like cookie dough. Ohmygosh.)
• Pesto, mushroom paste, olive paste, other spreads
• Fish (and fish-related things, like spread, sampled on crackers)
• Tomato/bread soup (like we made in class the other day)
• Canned tomatoes
• Fresh fruit juices
• Roasted Nuts

I'm sure there were some things we missed because of the crowd. I definitely got my money's worth, though. I was stuffed by the time we finished sampling things.

Before leaving, Lindsey and I each bought some things. I bought a jar of olives. I don't even like olives very much, but these were delicious. I bought some yummy flavored peanuts (though I don't think they're particularly Italian). I bought a couple of jars of pesto, and a jar of some out-of-this-world peach jam.

My treasures

First, there was a chocolate festival. Now, there's a gormet food festival. I think I am living in the right place.

On a much sadder (more sad? sadder?) note, mid-terms are this week. Which means I probably shouldn't have spent the first half of the semester not studying. It's crunch time. Thank goodness Spring Break starts Friday whether I do well on my mid-terms or not. :)

Wherefore art thou Romeo?

Fact:
By raising your legs slowly and laying on your back, you cannot sink into quicksand.

I'm not a Shakespeare fan.

There. I said it.

Now, hate me if you must. I understand it's important, great literature, yadda yadda. I was forced to read it multiple times throughout my high school career, each time thinking I'd magically become one of those people who adores Shakespeare and I'd maybe even read it for fun, or to voluntarily expand my literary knowledge. That never happened. It was all I could do to suffer through those English classes, the ones where we'd each pick a part and together we'd read the play outloud. I didn't mind reading outloud. But when it was Shakespeare, I honestly had no clue what I was reading. I don't understand the language. I don't even think it sounds pretty. If I ever have to read Shakespeare again, I'm going to rip my hair out; it's that bad. (I'd rank it right up there with the Odyssey on the Literature-I-Can't-Stand list. Luckily it's still very possible to get A's in every English class without truly appreciating what we read.)

That being said, I like the idea of Shakespeare. I like the idea of romantic love stories and violent tragedies and dramatic hullabaloo. And I like the story of Romeo and Juliet, but not the way it's written. So as much as I despise sorting through the dialogue, I was excited to visit the hometown of Romeo and Juliet and see Juliet's house and tomb. Even though it can't really be the hometown or the house or the tomb, because Romeo and Juliet weren't real, which leads me to question my sanity when I consider going all the way there for some fictional characters I don't even care that much about. Oh well.

And so it was that Meghan and I woke up at 4am, just when most people our age studying here in Italy are crawling into bed, and we got ready for a very long day. We left the apartment at 5:15, walked to the train station, and bought our tickets from Florence to Prato, and Prato to Bologna. (The reason we had to leave so early is entirely our thriftiness. There are plenty of much faster trains at a reasonable hour and with fewer connections, but they cost three times as much.) Our first train left at 5:41. We barely caught the second one in Prato. In Bologna, we had plenty of time. We enjoyed chocolate-filled pastries and cappuccinos before the third train, and we arrived in Verona before 10am.

Instead of buying bus tickets to take us from the train station to the city center (again, saving money here), we walked. It was only a 15 minute walk and the weather was very nice: warm when we were in the sun, cool when we were in the shade. We purchased Verona Cards from the Tourist Info place when we got into town. These cards get you into all the main Verona attractions, and they're a really good deal if you're planning on going to at least a few different things.

First, we went to the Roman Arena. It's the third largest ampitheater in the Roman world, dating from the first century AD. It can hold 25,000 people, and was the sight of Roman gladiator battles and medieval executions. We climbed to the top for a good view.

It was huge!

After a walk through the town, we found the house of Juliet. The main attraction is the courtyard. It's small and crowded with tourists. There's a balcony and a statue of Juliet. It's a tradition to rub the breast of Juliet's statue to help you find a lover. We took pictures doing that. (We had to wait for an enormous group of high school boys to finish their Juliet Breast Pictures- geez, how many do you really need?) Then we went into the museum. It's not very exciting; we only went because it was included in the pass, but we got to stand on the balcony!

Lunch time. We headed to Pizzeria Du de Cope, because Rick Steves said the locals consider it to have the best pizza in town. Except, I didn't get pizza. I wanted a huge salad: lettuce, tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, mushrooms, olives, capers, tuna, and anchovies (which I picked right off). It also came with some delicious, warm pieces of bread. Dressed with some olive oil and balsamic vinegar, it was just what I was craving.

Lunch

After lunch, Meghan and I went to the Church of Sant'Anastasia. Inside, it's amazing.

Gorgeous

We walked to the river and crossed the bridge and found the Roman Theater.

Roman Theater

Then we went back across and visited the duomo.

Duomo

Our next stop was the Torre dei Lamberti (a tower). We went to the top. Since we were trying to hurry, we took the elevator up the first 245 steps. There were still about a hundred more steps after that, though. The view was nice, but not as impressive as Siena's tower view.

There was a huge bakery we had passed in the morning. We had no choice but to go back for an afternoon snack, since we were passing by again anyway on our way to Castelvecchio. I got some strudel. Meghan got a fruit-tart thing, but then she saw what I had and got some strudel, too. (I'm a great influence on people.) We walked back to the first square and sat on a bench by a fountain while we enjoyed our treat. I thought it was just apples inside. But it was apples, and white raisins, and pine nuts, and it was sweet but not overly sweet. It was just perfect. I want to make something like it sometime.

The Top

The. . . corner

The Side

Please don't question whether it's necessary that I show you 3 different views of my pastry.

It is.

Our last stops were a castle (which was cool, but not as cool as I was expecting, so it was a bit disappointing) and Juliet's tomb.

Tomb of a Fictional Character

Juliet's tomb is pretty far from everything else. We walked there as fast as we could, took some pictures, and then tried to make it to the train station as fast as possible. It worked out perfectly. We ran to the 4:26 train, walked as fast as possible to our second train in Prato, and happened to make a train to Florence right away, because it was running late. We got home before 8. My feet felt like they were going to fall off, they hurt so bad from walking so much all day.

There was a lot more to do in Verona than we thought. We only got to about half of the things covered on the Verona Card. It was a full, but very fun day.

Me and Meghan by the river!

"Be vewwy, vewwy quiet. . . I'm hunting wabbits!"

In case you spent your childhood living under a rock, that quote is from Elmer Fudd. It pertains to this week's food class. But before I get to that, I have 2 random facts! (I forgot to put one in my last post. . . silly me.)

A female ferret wiill die if it goes into heat and cannot find a mate.

A 2 X 4 is really a 1-1/2 by 3-1/2.

Think about that for a minute. . .

Got it?

Good.

Now. Today in food class, we talked about Tuscany. (AKA where I live.) Tuscan cooking is simple country cooking. Some common Tuscan dishes are:

• Pappa al pomodoro (bread/tomato soup)
• Ribollita (vegetable soup with cavole nero- black cabbage)
• Zuppa di farro (farro soup)
• Caciuccio (fish soup)
• Fiorentina steak (a grilled beef steak from the chianina cow, a cow from Val di Chiana, between Arezzo and Siena; the cow is raised on the grass it eats outside; called Fiorentina because the cut of meat is made in Florence)
• Pecorino cheese (a sheeps' milk cheese, the only cheese actually produced in Tuscany; ask if you want details; I'm practically an expert now.)
• Salami and prosciutto (many kinds; again, I won't bore you with the details of each.)
• Wild boar (sauce, sausage, stew, etc.)
• Rabbit (typically fried; also made in sauce, baked, or grilled)
• Trippa and lampredotto (different parts of cow stomach; yeah, the real Tuscans actually eat these in sandwiches; I haven't been brave enough for that yet)
• Olive oil (Tuscany produces some of the best olive oil! I'm a connoisseur of olive oils now. I can totally tell you all about them.)
• Cannellini and zolfini (white and white/yellow beans)
• Cantuccini (almond cookies; you probably know them as biscotti)
• Chianti, Brunello, Nobile, Sassicai, Solaia wines (reds; Meghan and I did a presentation on Tuscan red wines today for our wine class.)
• Vin Santo (a sweet white wine made from dried grapes; we tried it last week in wine class and it was disgusting; I almost puked; but don't let me influence you.)

So, what did we make today?

Coniglio and Carciofi fritti, Pappa al Pomodoro, and Cantuccini

Fried Rabbit and Artichokes, Tomato-Bread Soup, and Almond Biscotti

or you can call it by its alternate name,

"OHMYGOSHTHISISDELICIOUS"

but it's up to you :)

We'll start with the Cantuccini, because, well, why not do dessert first?

You need:

• 330g flour
• 150g sugar
• 100g almonds (toasted)
• 2 eggs
• 1 yolk
• 1/2 bag baking powder (I think it's about 1 teaspoon; it Italy, baking powder is sold in little packets.)
• 50g butter
• Zest of 1 lemon

Mix the flour with the butter to make crumbles; add sugar, 2 eggs, lemon zest, and baking powder. Mix. Then mix in the almonds and shape the dough into long rolls. Place them in a pan, either buttered and floured or on parchment. Beat the yolk separately and brush it on top. Bake for 15 minutes at 180 degrees C. Let them cool. Cut in diagonal slices. Put them back in the oven for a few more minutes to dry. They should be crunchy, not chewy.

We made a half batch (except we still used 100g almonds and 2 eggs; she told us to; I don't know why; maybe the recipe is wrong how it is written?). It turned out wonderfully. Most of the biscotti you buy here is pretty expensive. I think the kind we made tasted the same as, or even better than the kind I bought! Also, you can find all kinds of chocolate biscotti; real Italians don't eat that. They eat the traditional almond version. Be a real Italian, and make some of this. :)

You're supposed to dip it in Vin Santo. I hate Vin Santo (if I didn't get my point across earlier). But you might like it!

I could eat the whole plate of them

Next, Pappa al Pomodoro

You need:

• 250g (8oz) stale coarse country bread
• 3 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 leek (optional)
• 1 hot pepper (optional)
• Sage (optional)
• A couple tablespoons olive oil
• 700g (1-1/2lb) very ripe tomatoes, peeled and cut into pieces (Since tomatoes aren't in season right now, we used a jar of sauce)
• 1 litre (1-3/4 pints) light chicken stock (use 1 stock cube)
• Salt and pepper
• A handful of basil leaves

Slice and toast the bread. Cool. Break it into pieces. Fry the garlic, chopped leek (my first time cooking with leek!), sage, some basil, and pepper in oil until it begins to color. Then add the tomatoes and bread. Cook, stirring, until the bread blends with the tomatoes. Stir in some stock to get a thick, mushy (That's a gross word.) consistency. Season with salt and pepper. Simmer 20 minutes. Serve topped with more basil.

The book says to serve hot with a little olive oil dribbled over each serving. We didn't add the extra oil. We didn't even have spoons or bowls, so we ate it on plates with forks, and it was amazing. Confession: I am partial to all things tomato-y. Ketchup, tomato soup, tomato sauce, tomatoes in pasta, tomatoes in cottage cheese (Try it! cottage cheese + tomato + a little salt = PERFECT snack), plain tomatoes. . . Dad doesn't call me Kato Tomato for nothin'!

Comfort food. This would be great on a cold day.

And finally, Coniglio e Carciofi Fritti

You need:

• 400g rabbit legs
• Rosemary
• 4 artichokes
• 1 lemon
• 70g flour
• 30g rice flour
• 1 egg (We left it out to make it lighter)
• White wine (I'm going to estimate we used about half a cup, plus half a cup of water)
• Oil
• Salt and pepper
• Ice cubes

Cut the meat in small pieces. Put it in a bowl with pepper and rosemary. Leave for 30 minutes.

Clean the artichokes. (It was my first time cooking with those, too!) Slice them (You should get 8 "fries" out of each), and leave them in a bowl of water with lemon juice.

In another bowl, mix the flours with the egg. Add the wine until it's a creamy consistency. Leave it in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Get a big bowl. Put ice cubes inside. Place the bowl of cream mixture on top of the ice to keep it cold.

Take a frying pan. Cover the bottom with olive oil. Make it hot. Dip the meat in the cream mixture and then put it in the oil. Fry until golden, turning when necessary. Dry the artichokes from the water and dip in the cream as well. Fry those, too. Sprinkle with salt, and serve.

Close-up of the rabbit and artichoke plate

My teacher says rabbit tastes better than chicken.

I'm telling you, rabbit tastes better than chicken.

Now, I want all of you to pick up some rabbit legs next time you're out at Wal-Mart doing your grocery shopping. . . what? You're telling me Wal-Mart doesn't carry rabbit legs? WHAT IS THIS WORLD COMING TO?

On a totally unrelated (or maybe it is related) note, I finally went to the Paperback Exchange bookstore Lindsey told me about! They have new and used books in English. I bought 2 pretty cheap used books. Julie and Julia and Starting from Scratch. Both have a lot to do with food. Are you hungry yet?

Also, Saturday is Hannah's birthday. She wanted a cheesecake. And since we're in Italy, I decided I'd make her a Nutella Cheesecake. It'll be better if it can chill for at least a day before it's eaten. (Yep, guilty; I've made it before, but a slightly different recipe.) Since Meghan and I are going to be in Verona all day tomorrow, I made it tonight. NOW are you hungry?

I hope so. Thanks for reading! :)

Monday and Tuesday (Sorry for the boring title.)

Quick update on the last couple of days:

Monday, I finished my earrings in Jewelry Making class!

Done!

They're really shiny. You can't tell from the picture (it's kind of dark). . . They look 40% better in real life. Just believe me. ;)

Since Jewelry Making class is from 3:00 to 8:30, we get a (glorious) 30 minute break from 5:30 to 6:00. During this break, another girl and I always get coffee. (Our classroom is usually freezing, and we always need something warm.) I get a cappuccino every time. Doesn't this look amazing?

Mmm. . .

That was Monday. Tuesday, my first class is the Architecture of Florence. We visited the Church of San Lorenzo.

Not my picture (no photography allowed)

It's amazing. . .

• how many churches are here
• how old they all are
• how much work went into them (back in the day when they didn't have the construction equipment we have now- and most of these churches took YEARS to complete)
• to see the beautiful sculptures and artwork and paintings everywhere

You know what else is amazing? I gave my first oral presentation today in Italian. I spoke for about a minute and a half; my teacher knew what I was saying; I only mispronounced a couple of little things; and I didn't feel totally stupid!

. . . I should celebrate. We should celebrate. Gelato, anyone?

Fiera Antiquaria di Arezzo and a Soccer Game!

Fact:
Your stomach has to produce a new layer of
mucus every two weeks or it will digest itself.

I have an obsession. I actually have quite a few obsessions, but the one I’m talking about here is a movie: La Vita è Bella, the Italian film starring Roberto Benigni, and the origin of the title of my blog. Have any of you not seen this movie? Here’s the trailer.

If this movie is new to you, go watch it. Now. You can come back and read the rest of this later.

Anyway, the movie was filmed in Arezzo, Italy. That’s about an hour by train from Florence. On Saturday, Meghan, Lindsey, and I took a trip to Arezzo. (It’s just been us three this weekend because Hannah’s been busy with art projects for school, Brittni’s been in Rome, and Kate has a broken foot.) So we went to Arezzo and got there around 10:15.

One of the reasons we were so excited about going to Arezzo this particular weekend was the monthly antique fair held here, the Fiera Antiquaria di Arezzo. It’s the first weekend of the month, and there are literally hundreds of vendors from all over the country who come to sell their antiques. The fair spills down several streets in the middle of town and fills up a few squares. We didn’t have a map, and Rick Steves doesn’t say anything about Arezzo in his books, so we sort of just wandered around all day.

I have never seen so many antiques in my life. Lots of ceramic dishes, tons of silver, jewelry and knick-knacks, antique toys and typewriters and telephones, countless old movie posters and postcards and stamps, furniture, paintings, boxes, books, and so on.

Of all things, I bought a fan. Like, an old hand-held fan, with hand-painted fabric and a wooden handle. It still folds up nicely, and I just couldn’t resist. I didn’t see any vintage Christmas ornaments (another obsession), but the fan is perfect. I’m not sure exactly what I’m going to do with it . . . oh well.

The price tag on it says 20, but the guy said he'd take 15 for it, so it had to be mine. :)

For lunch, we went to a place called Antica Osteria Agania. I had pici pasta with amatriciana sauce (a tomato sauce with bacon in it).



Lunch

The highlight of the day for me was finding a couple of these Life is Beautiful posters around town.

So exciting!

 There are a total of 8 of them, each located in a part of town where scenes from the movie were filmed. We only found 2, because we didn’t know how to get to all of the places listed, since we were map-less. It was still really cool to be there, though! It was like living in the movie (if you ignore all the antique booths).

During our afternoon quest to find a bakery, we stumbled upon a small market where I sampled some truffle on a cracker! Truffles (commonly misconceived as a mushroom or fungus; they are not; they are a sickness of the tree- learned that in Food class) are very highly aromatic and have a strong flavor, but a good flavor; kind of salty, kind of meaty, maybe? I just don’t know how to describe it—sorry. They're rare, very pricey, and only stay fresh for a few days.

Truffles! The sample I had was really tiny, but full of flavor.

I also sampled some jam made with Chianti wine, which I bought to take home for the parents (and myself).

We each bought a few treats from a bakery, and then we went to a coffee shop to sit down. Lindsey and I had cappuccinos; Meghan tried an espresso, and we sat and ate our bakery-buys. I had a small chocolate sandwich cookie with chocolate frosting inside and on top; a small, crispy, chocolate . . . thing, filled with cream, nuts, and more chocolate; and some sort of pine-nut, custardy thing with a shortbread crust: reminiscent of gooey butter cake, but less butter and sugar, and more eggs, and pine nuts. Does that make sense? Ha. It was wonderful, obviously.

Could this be why my pants are fitting a little tighter?

On the way to the train station, we stopped at an antique booth that was selling old postcards, letters, and stamps. I bought some old Italian postage stamps for scrapbooking. They were only 10 cents each.

We made it to the train station in time to watch the Florence-bound train pull away. We only had to wait about an hour for the next one, though, so we went to the nearby grocery store to kill some time, and because it was warm inside. (The weather on Saturday was a bit chilly and rainy.) We got back to Florence a little before 6:00.

This morning, Meghan and I went for a run. It had been over a week since I last ran, because we've been so busy with classes and traveling and the weather doesn't always cooperate. (I'm a wimp when it comes to running in the cold, wind, or rain.) Running in Florence doesn't actually require a huge amount of motivation, because the Arno River is our main running path and it's beautiful and only a minute from our door. I need to go more often now that it's warming up. I am planning on training for a half marathon in the fall!

Anyway, Today's weather was PERFECT. Absolutely gorgeous. It was great, because we spent the afternoon outside at a soccer game: Fiorentina vs. Calcio Catania.

Hannah, Meghan, and I had signed up for the soccer game; it was one of the optional school activities and we decided that since soccer is such a HUGE deal here (as it is almost everywhere besides the US), we needed to go. We were given pretty vague instructions, though. It was difficult to find a place to buy bus tickets since it was a Sunday and lots of places were closed. Then, we had to decipher the bus schedule at the bus stop, but we weren't completely positive which stop was the right one. We figured it out, eventually. As with anything, you just have to do it to learn how. Luckily, we had left the apartment just after noon. We caught the 1:00 bus and even had time to grab a sandwich and gelato for lunch before meeting our group at 1:45.

The group ended up waiting for some other stragglers, so we didn't really head into the stadium until around 2:30, and the game started at 3:00. It was a purple vs. white battle. Florence's team was purple, and we won 3 to 0. Hooray!

Meghan and I had popcorn. Meghan had a beer. I had a coke. Hannah didn't get anything to eat, because she's ridiculous.

The game was lots of fun, even though I'm not much of a sports fan. I like the atmosphere of sporting events, and the excitement of the crowd, and the concession stand food; and I like wearing purple! Does that qualify me as a fan? I think so.

Pictures I took of the actual game aren't very exciting to look at, so I put together this little video. The first part is just the pictures from today; the rest are videos from the game. The very last video segment occured just after Florence's team scored. A big thank-you to T-Swift for providing the music at the beginning; it's one of my current favorite songs.

Also, all the Arezzo pics are in the same album as the Cortona pics. Enjoy!

Under the Tuscan Sun. . . and the Tuscan Clouds

Fact:

If one places a tiny amount of liquor on a scorpion,
it will instantly go mad and sting itself to death. 

Have you ever read Frances Mayes' book, Under the Tuscan Sun? It's also a movie. I haven't read the book, and the movie was just okay. It's about her real-life experience living in a run-down house in Cortona, in the south part of Tuscany. In fact, she still lives there with her husband part of every year.

Today, Lindsey and Meghan and I took a trip to Cortona. We bought our tickets for the 9:13 train, at about 9:11. Possibly a bit earlier. But we still ran to catch the train in time. It was about an hour and half ride, and there was some confusion about whether we needed to get off in another town to change trains, but luckily, we made it there easily.

The train station is a pretty far walk from the actual city of Cortona, so we had to find a Tabacci and buy a bus ticket. The bus dropped us off right on the edge of the actual town, and the first thing we saw was an excellent view of the countryside. We were pretty hungry, so we first set off to find lunch. We chose a Rick Steves-recommended place, and he hasn't disappointed us yet. We did have to wait for it to open at noon, so we spent about an hour walking around the town and taking pictures. During this walk, we needed to find a bathroom. Incidentally, we found one built into the town wall. I mean, why wouldn't there be a bathroom built into the wall?

Why yes, that door is very short.

Here's where we ate:

Trattoria la Grotta

Here's what I ate:

Bruschetta al pomodoro

Plate of deliciousness

The pasta I had is called pappardelle al sugo di cinghiale; big flat egg noodles with wild boar sauce. Yes. I ordered something called wild boar sauce. I wasn't feeling the spaghetti today. I went outside the box. Turns out wild boar sauce is delicious! Lindsey had some moon-shaped pasta with pistachios and a cream sauce. Meghan had ricotta and spinach in some kind of red sauce. We shared some local red wine. Everything was perfect, and I was stuffed by the end of the meal.

We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around. We wanted to go to the Etruscan Museum, but it was closed because they are preparing to open a special exhibit tomorrow. Instead, we just went to the Diocesan Museum. The main event here was Fra Angelico's Annunciation.

This isn't my picture; we couldn't take pictures there. Thank you, Google.

We also visited the Church of St. Francis. But the majority of our time was spent just walking around looking at the pretty town. Since our visit would not be complete without hitting up at least one bakery, we made sure to do that on our way out of town. (Never mind that we ended up waiting around forever for the bakery to open following its siesta; it was totally worth it.) I had a shortbread cookie-ish thing, and a pastry filled with jam and walnuts. We took the 4:30 train home and were back around 6:00. It was a really good day and it didn't even rain like it was supposed to (probably because I remembered to bring my umbrella). It was a bit cold, a bit cloudy, and very windy, but it definitely could have been worse.

Cortona is a very quiet town with not a whole lot except the beautiful old buildings with green shutters, dilapidated brick walls, cobblestone streets, pretty countryside views, and apparently, delicious places to eat. I'm glad we decided to visit. It was a relaxing day.