Yours always, Venezia

This weekend ACM took all of us to Venice for the weekend. There are not enough words for how amazing it was, but I'll try to pen them down. Er, type it out.

An introduction to Venice.

The view from our balcony.

Venice is definitely one heck of a place. It's so different from any city I've been to and probably any city I'll ever go see. There is water literally everywhere. There are no cars, no buses, no motorbikes; just boats. And water. And people. So many people, most of which are tourists. Once we got there, we stayed in a quaint little hotel called Hotel Messner. We had picked our roommates beforehand and my room, in my opinion, was the best. My roommate and I were the only ones who got a balcony that looked out onto the water. Anybody could see us right from down below, but I loved being able to just step out and enjoy the mornings before breakfast.

When we first got to Venice, we went straight to the island of Murano that is known especially for making glass. The glass there was amazing and I know almost everyone in the program splurged a little more than they might have originally planned to on that island. I am definitely a part of that group, but it was all so beautiful. We watched a glass-blowing demonstration, and though that could be so awesome to watch for anyone who hasn't seen it before, it wasn't new for me. What was new to me was the sculpting the guy did. He formed a horse and a swan out of hot glass in less than five minutes each. It was like watching life form right before my eyes.

The horse on the left and the still-hot
swan on the right.

The colors used for the glass.

After that show, he led us (predictably) to the gift shop where they had Murano glass for decent prices. They apparently had it cheaper for tourists there, and I believe it after shopping around the main island of Venice. I bought one too many things on the island, and then we left for the hotel. 

After dropping our stuff off and taking a little break from all the traveling we'd done to get there, we went to check out Palazzo Ducale with the professors. It was lovely and beautiful like every palazzo in Italy, but we couldn't take any pictures. There were so many rooms to see that my brain got a little overwhelmed with all the visual stimulation. 

Basilica di San Marco

We had some free time afterwards and we mostly took that time to try and find our way around. I had planned on taking a nap, but ended up getting something to eat and then wandering around. I met up with some other people from the program and we talked in Piazza San Marco until it was time for us to meet at the Basilica di San Marco. The inside and outside of the Basilica was absolutely breath-taking, and we had the entire church all to ourselves. We got to watch the interior light up, revealing its lavishly-decorated domes one by one and its high ceilings and beautifully crafted arches. The high altar was revealed by a slow turn by the guard and I could swear my jaw dropped at the intensity of the design. The craftsman really wanted his altar to be for God, although Jodie later told us it had been stolen from Constantinople. Seriously though, who wouldn't want to steal that for their own church? It fit right into the scheme of the interior anyway. 

After that, we went and had dinner at the hotel and we all pretty much knocked out afterwards. It had been a long day for all of us. 

A panorama photo of the altarpiece.

One little part of the high ceilings. The
domes and arches are ALL over inside.

Piazza San Marco at night.

The next day we had most of the day free to explore. After a morning visit to the Basilica dei Frari and the Scuola di San Rocco, we split up and got lunch before checking out the list of places we had decided to go to the night before. ACM had given us a list of places to check out that we could get our tickets reimbursed for later, so of course those were the first on our list. Lunch was at an awesome little place that I can't remember the name of, but it didn't have a cover charge and it served seafood, something Venice is, and rightly so, known for. Being from the west coast, I know what fresh seafood tastes like, and the "frutti di mare" that was in my pasta was definitely fresh and delicious. I think I'm going to keep missing it until I get fresh seafood again. 

After lunch, we went back to the Basilica to go up to the second level where there was a little museum and we could step outside and get a great view of Piazza San Marco. It was a warm day and the sun felt really nice after being insider the cooler church. It was also a great day for taking pictures, and I'm really glad for that. 

The view from the top of the Basilica. The hint of my finger makes it legit.
Photography skills. What up.

After looking around the upper level of the Basilica di San Marco, we split up once again, half of them going to the Guggenheim Museum and the rest of us going to an archaeological museum near San Marco. It was a large museum and I hadn't expected that, but it showed a lot of the palace where a royal family used to live and then lots of old statues, coins, books, etc. It all seemed kind of thrown together randomly, but it was a cool find. We spent a lot of time in there because there was just so much to look at. Looking at things from the past always makes me wonder of how it's going to be in the future. We have much better records of how things are now for the future, but we still keep trying to piece together the ancient past. It's amazing to see how systems worked back then and how things were made. Will it be that mind-boggling for a student two thousand years from now when they look at artifacts from the early 2000s? These are the things I wonder about. 

The Peggy Guggenheim Museum was next and we spent another long time there looking at all the crazy art inside. The art was very modern and was breather from all of the religious iconography we had been looking at. I love all the iconography, don't get me wrong, but seeing something different after five weeks of it was kind of nice. Some of the art pieces went way over my head, but they had a little terrace that was right on the Grand Canal. It was undoubtedly my favorite part of the whole museum. 

The wishing tree.

We were pretty pooped after all the walking around, but by then it was time for a little nap and then dinner. With all of us being in the same hotel as our friends, we spent a lot of the night talking until sleep and thoughts of tomorrow overpowered us. 

The next day felt a little more rushed. We had to get out of the hotel and deposit our stuff in a storage area, and then went to tour the Galleria dell'Accademia. It was more paintings inside another museum that I really liked, but I was itching to use my free time to go see more parts of Venice. 

Not our gondola, but this is what they
generally look like. Fancy.

Once the tour was done, we went to lunch once more, walking around aimlessly for at least forty-five minutes before finding a Mediterranean restaurant for a decent price, and then went to find a gondola to ride. Not one of those water taxis, but a legit expensive gondola. Personally, I don't think it was worth the money we spent even if it was split between five people, but at least, if you ride it once, you can say you did. The view was beautiful and I got to see parts of Venice you can only see from the water. Our gondolier was also pretty funny and he gave us a mini tour, though he didn't sing for us. The ride was very peaceful once we went down the smaller canals.

I felt like I was entering another world.

After that, we did a bit of more rushed shopping before meeting up with everyone again to pick up our bags and leave the island. We took a boat to the train station and then the two-and-a-half hour train ride back to beloved Firenze. As beautiful as Venice was, I don't think I could ever live there. Comparing Venice to Florence, though Venice does have an otherworldly feel and a lovely charm to it, Florence has my heart not only because it's beautiful and the center of art, but because it is more real to me. Venice is a dream; Florence keeps me grounded. 

In Pictures from Italy, Charles Dickens titles his trip to Venice, "An Italian Dream." Dickens can articulate much better than I can, so I end with his words: 

"I have, many and many a time, thought since, of this strange Dream upon the water: half-wondering if it lie there yet, and if its name be VENICE." 

An Update

Apparently Carmina Burana is not actually an opera, it's a cantata. Meaning there's no linear plot, so I was even more lost than in Don Giovanni. With their flamboyant corsets and mostly naked people on stage, it was quite interesting, but not my kind of show. Needless to say, it was an adventure getting home too afterwards. The theater it was at, the Nelson Mandela Forum is across town from the Duomo area and right across from the sports stadium in a poorer-looking neighborhood. It's not a nice place to walk around in at night, but I had to anyway. Walking around trying to find the theater at eight-ten at night by myself was scary, but doing the same to try and find the bus to get home around eleven was scarier. At least then I had friends with me, but we made sure to first find a well-lit street with more people and then pull out the map to find our way back. I probably won't be making my way back to that side of town unless I really have to.

Besides that experience, the Chocolate Festival is around! It started Feb. 8 and goes till the 17. The chocolate vendors set up their tented shops in Piazza Santa Croce where people can buy chocolate and/or real hot chocolate (cioccolata calda...mm!). It's not always the cheapest, but there are some really great chocolate concoctions to try there. And, if you're lucky and it's not busy, they might even give out free samples. It's a small festa, but definitely worth it. The chocolate is excellent here.

At the end of the fifth week here, I've been just starting to make my end of the program plans. I'm going to London after spring break for the next part of my program and I'll really have to scrimp and save there. I do find myself spending most of my money here on food and souvenirs. Sometimes more on food, though, especially with the Chocolate Festival around.

One exciting find was The Diner, an American-style diner (literally) that serves American-style food. My friends and I had brunch there on Sunday and it was so good. Decently priced too, and the waitresses spoke English. Not only that, but we got 10% discount cards for being students and they recommended the restaurant right next to them that also gave discounts and served really good food. I'm planning to check that out sometime, but I usually eat breakfast and dinner with my host mom just to save money. Otherwise I'm not going to have any for the traveling I'm planning to do after the program!

ACM is taking all of us to Venice tomorrow on a weekend trip. It's going to be really fun and I'm excited to see everything. The last time I went to Venice for carnevale was horribly windy and rainy, and this time they said the water's risen quite high. I really hope my trip to Venice this time around is at the very least a little nicer and less rainy!

Celebrate for the Weekend

Classes are finally over for the week! I live for these three-day weekends. I'm actually surprised at the amount of work that we're expected to do for the my classes. Along with Italian, which isn't that bad at all, I'm taking Florence Through the Eyes of the Victorians and Collaboration. The first class has a lot of little projects which are easy to forget until the last minute. I've barely been making the cut so far, but I'm using this weekend not to travel, but to catch up on all that I should be doing. The second elective I'm taking isn't bad; the professor is really knowledgeable, but there's more lecturing than I like. I guess that's expected from an art history course, but I wish there was less of it.

Having classes onsite can be tough sometimes. One of the coolest places and also the worst places to have class is the Uffizzi Museum. It's an awesome, huge museum with so much to see, but there are so many tourists because it's so well-known as well as so many students. Not to mention there aren't any places to sit. For one of the 2 1/2 hour classes, I had to stand in front of paintings and walk around with all of my things on and it was torture. Really interesting, but torturous on my back. I'm really glad I brought hiking boots with me. After breaking them in, they make walking all over the city so much easier. I do, however, feel like I don't fit in and am currently looking to buy some new Italian leather boots. Let's hope the sales last for awhile!

I have classes every day now Monday through Thursday. Italian is everyday in the afternoon, but my two electives change. On Mondays and Wednesdays I have the Collaboration class; it's for three hours in the morning on Mondays and an hour and a half in the afternoon on Wednesdays. I have my other elective on Tuesdays and Thursdays; three hours in the afternoon on Tuesdays and two hours in the morning on Thursdays. The schedule is spaced out which I'm really glad for. Some of my friends only have class on Tuesdays and Thursdays and are so burnt out after running around everywhere Wednesdays and Fridays don't feel like days off, but time for recuperation.

On Tuesday we, as a program group, went to see the opera Don Giovanni. It was my first time seeing a real opera and I really enjoyed it. The theater seating confused me a little, but I got a pretty good seat accidentally so I didn't really mind. The only thing was that I didn't get all that was going on in the opera. I had to look it all up afterwards and then it made sense. My Italian class helped me understand a lot of the subtitles that were on the screen above the stage, but of course I don't know it all. I'm going to see another opera tomorrow night and not make the same mistake. One fun factor is that I get to dress up. I only brought one nice dress for events like these and it has really come in handy. It's all thanks to the Maggio Card from the program that these theater shows and concerts are discounted. Perks to being an ACM student, I say!

So far, I think my favorite museum is the Bargello. I went there with my class today and it was so cool. It used to be a prison, but I didn't really get that vibe. They have a lot more things on display and things that span from the Medieval times too, not just the Renaissance. I am very interested in that time period, so seeing suits of arms and Medieval weapons and such was really cool. There was also a Michelangelo room for his sculptures and a variety of other artists. I didn't get to see it all, but they didn't have many paintings like the Uffizzi nor was it so big and busy. Not only that, but it was a great place to have class because there were large benches in the courtyard that we could all sit on. They also had seats that we could move around to sit and draw inside the museum. I hope to go back there again and maybe try my hand at sketching some of those beautiful sculptures and pieces of armor if the room is open.

Buon Giovedì Grasso!

Italy with Class

Time and time again I find myself amazed at everything that has been going on here. This weekend, in particular, was busy and freaking amazing. The first week of classes was hectic and threw me off the schedule I've been used to for the past three weeks. It was kind of a slow transition, but I think I'll get used to it. There is a lot more work than I had expected to do for the two electives I'm taking, but I know it won't be too horrible. And if it is, well, I'll just have to make do with what I've got.

With the classes being on site, I get to see so many awesome places. This week I went into the Duomo, saw the frescos of Santa Croce up close, and walked around the Duomo museum all for free with my classes. There is so much that I never would have really appreciated without learning about it there. One of my favorite places was Santa Croce not because Galileo and Dante are buried there, but because it is a different church from the others. It's less dressed up, in a sense, and when all of the ostentatious decorations and paint is imagined away, the simplicity of the church is what makes it beautiful. I really liked that, but that church, as well as all of the others, are always colder inside than outside. Temperature-wise, of course.

Tiramisu birthday!

I also got to spend my 21st birthday here in Florence which was a blast! Besides the program and my peers making it special, my host mom made me a tiramisu birthday treat and gave me earrings which was really sweet of her.

After dinner, a few of us went out to a place called Be Bop where they have Beatles Night every Tuesday. The place doesn't open till 10 p.m. and stays open till around 2:30 a.m., but the drinks were reasonably priced and the music was really great. The Beatles cover band were made up of Italians, but they were actually really good at their impersonations. The stage, seating area, and bar are all underground too which gave it a cooler feel. I really liked it and I'm planning on going back sometime.

The Italian Beatles cover band.

Besides classes, though, I went on two trips this weekend. The first was to Siena with the program. It was a full day trip and we were able to have guided tours in the churches and museums as well as have time to explore and walk around on our own. There are some people who didn't think we had enough time to ourselves, but I was happy with the time we had. It's always nice to start off in a new place with a tour just so you can get your bearings and learn more about its history, and then go off and walk around. There are lots of hills in Siena that reminded me of San Francisco, so we definitely had a lot of exercise. Siena is a smaller, quieter town than Florence, but no less beautiful. We got to climb up to the random wall that was abandoned after being built, and the view from up there overlooks the town and all the country around it. It was quite a climb up the circular staircase that was very narrow and tight, but it was definitely worth it in my opinion. I also learned somewhat from experience that Italian wine, though very good, is also much stronger than wine in America. I may not have expected that, but I'm glad I know now.

The three Virtues: Faith, Hope, Charity.

The inside of one of the many rooms
inside of the Duomo.

The Duomo of Siena.

The view of Siena from the top of a hill.

The view of Siena from the random wall.

Two of the many costumed people.

Then on Saturday, most of the people from the program and I took a trip on our own through EuroAdventures, a European student travel site. We went to Venice to see carnevale and it was around 65 euros for the bus ride there and back and entertainment on the bus. We had a pretty large group and we inadvertently split ourselves in half between the two buses going. It was a pretty even split too, so walking around and getting lunch was easier on us and the restaurants.

Lunch was nice because we were lured into a fancy-looking place with the promise of free cocktails, no tax, no cover charge, and 6 euro pizzas. The guy was true to his promise and so I was pretty pleased with that. Note to self: sometimes those people who are trying to get you into their restaurants are actually true to their word.

My friend about to get hit by a banana.

A view of the party parade.

The weather was horrible in Venice when we went; it was rainy, windy, and really cold. But after getting lunch, we found the parade of people all wearing masks, dressed up in costumes, the band, and people partying all around. It was a lot of fun joining them. We were able to kind of blend in with the crowd wearing our own masks, and took lots of pictures of and with the costumed people. We went off on our own after awhile to take a little break and wander. Then we found the parade again and followed them all the way to the Mediterranean where they took a boat somewhere. We took that as our cue to leave, but following them, some of them grabbing us and dancing, others getting hit with blown-up bananas, was a lot of fun. It really felt like a moving party with the theme, strangely, being about bananas.

The mask I bought in Venice for 4 euro.

After the parade was done for us, we went and took another break at a cafe where we spent nearly an hour and a half just talking and laughing at all of the things that had transpired that day. Then it was time to meet up with everyone again and, by then, all of our umbrellas were breaking in the unbearably harsh wind and rain and we were dying to get into the bus and stay there for the three-hour ride. It took us forty-five minutes to get from San Marco square to the buses; usually it takes around an hour to get to San Marco, but we were pretty desperate to get back.

Venice!

I could see why Venice is such a romanticized city. The canals that surrounded us everywhere were beautiful and is definitely the city's trademark, though the gondola rides are very expensive. The way people get across is usually by water taxi which is sometimes easier than finding the bridge to get across.

All in all, going to see and experience carnevale was worth the time and money. Even with bad weather, we got to party along with a lot of other tourists and Venetians and have a good time together. Though the two groups we split into never really met up, I think we both had an awesome time. While we were following the parade, the other group went bar crawling, and we both had fun stories to share afterwards. We're going to Venice in two weeks with the program, but by then carnevale will be over. I just hope the weather is better by then!