So the Superbowl started off at our new go-to bar, Naima. They have cheap drinks, fun music, and the bartender is a formed student abroad student from New Jersey who now lives full time in Florence! We watched the game but unfortunately without any sound and no American commercials. We watched the game until half time then decided to go to another bar where some friends from the program had reserved a table. We hung out and watched the rest of the game then walked home around the block and crashed for the night.Monday Anna and I decided to try Ganzo for dinner to use our meal plan. The menu was really intricate and me being picky had a hard time ordering since every dish had at least one ingredient that I didn't like. Finally I settled on linguini with clams and Anna ordered pasta with DUCK ragu. They both ended up being moderately good but nothing to be excited about. With our dinner we were able to choose if we wanted an appetizer or a dessert so of course we both ordered a dessert. Anna got chocolate mousse with fresh ricotta and I got an apple strudel. The strudel looked delicious but when I went to take a bite I realized it was stuffed with GIANT raisins..gross. I picked out the raisins and it was also pretty good.
Tuesday was time to head back to class where I enjoyed religion then was overwhelmed in Italian. I came home from class and decided to cook an easy dinner before going to the community service meeting. Of course my first time cooking for the roommates I overcooked the pasta since it was like angel hair and I'm used to cooking penne. And the wine I picked out at the store was just bad. My roommates tried to make me feel better and say it’s okay, it’s the pasta's fault, and its cheap wine so of course it’s going to be not the greatest but I still felt bad. Right before the meeting we decided to get gelato at Grom again since it’s so delicious! This time I tried pear and zabaigone. A-MAZING. The meeting ended up being in a tiny room so we had to sit on the steps, then I looked through all the opportunities and of course all the ones that looked interesting were at times I couldn't go and I didn’t want to do any of the ones that were available for my schedule. So with my good luck, the torturing lasted for over an hour.
Wednesday I had class in the morning and I'm really beginning to not like the class since its an introduction into PR, Marketing, and Communication in Publishing, but no one in my class even knows what a press release is so it’s really an introduction to pr. After class I met up with Anna and we went to the fresh food market near the San Lorenzo market. We were shocked that inside, the market was massive! Anna said she was going to have nightmares because there were dead chickens and pigs for sale but it’s different than the States since they leave the heads on the animals! It was like basically walking through a slaughter house. There were also tons of fresh fruit and veggie stands, a fish market, wine stores, and stands filled with dried fruit. We decided to get a chicken breast to make for dinner and for 6 big slices of chicken it was only 3 euro which is AMAZING! In our super market they were selling have the amount of chicken for almost 17 euro! We also got some fresh ingredients for a salad, freshly baked bread, wine, and fresh cheese to make our pasta sauce.
We dropped everything off at the apartment then went to the Oil Shoppe for lunch. It was this little shop that was JAM PACKED with students ordering sandwiches. Since being in Italy, Anna and I have both been craving Chicken Parm since hello, we thought it was Italian...As it turns out it’s not so we can’t find it anywhere! Fortunately the Oil Shoppe had a chicken parm sandwich made with fresh tomato sauce and fresh mozzarella. It was nothing short of amazing, we will definitely be going back soon!
We walked off our lunch by meeting the roommates at Florence For Fun, a travel agency that specializes in student trips all over Europe. I decided to book a day trip to Verona for tomorrow, a trip to Venice for Carnivale, and a day trip to Chianti to tour a wine vineyard and have a wine tasting all for $245! So excited for my upcoming weekends of traveling!After booking our trips I went back to apartment to tackle the rest of my unfinished homework and video chatted with Uncle Marty and Mom for a while. I love seeing familiar faces after not knowing anyone on the streets of Firenze. At night it was Anna and I's turn to cook dinner so Anna cooked up an alfredo sauce recipe from Mrs. Gleason and I made the salad, prepared the bread, cooked the chicken, and cooked the pasta. All our hard work paid off since it was considered the best homemade meal by all the roommates! It was so delicious we all went up for seconds and wished there was some left over for thirds! While the other roommates worked on the dishes, Anna and I did her homework of watching Sabrina and How To Marry A Millionare, what a great day.
Thursday I woke up refreshed and ready for my favorite day of the week! I started with Wine class where we took an insane amount of notes then tasted 3 Sangiovese wines, the first was good but the next two were definitely not my cup of tea. After class I went home and ate the second half of my sandwich from the Oil Shoppe which was heavenlyyyy then went to Italian class. My head was literally spinning the entire hour and 15 minutes, we learned numbers, greetings, adjectives, conjugations of adjectives and nouns, food vocab, how to order at a cafe and more. It was exhausting! When I got back from class I went with April to pay our lab fee for the wine class and picked up my last book for wine class. We went back to the apartment ready to cook the rest of our chicken when someone mentioned mexican food and we all decided we were craving it. We picked a place, got there and were told it was a 2 and a half hour wait. Not happening. Unfortunately this is Italy and there are not an abundance of Mexican restaurants so we thought we were out of luck until Jen suggested House of Sizzle, a steak house. We get there are there is a special on pitchers of margaritas and they have nachos and quesadillas on the menu, YES PLEASE! Anna and I shared everything and it was the perfect amount of food!We were paying our check to leave when an Aussie approached the group and asked us our plans for the night. We didn't have any so we chatted for a while and then headed next door to sing karaoke, SO FUN. I headed home early since I had an early morning and long day planned for Friday.
Friday morning I woke up super early to meet my religion class to go on a walking tour through the Synagogue and the Jewish Museum. I wasn't too excited until I saw the building, my jaw literally dropped it was so beautiful. We weren't allowed to bring anything inside so everyone had to lock our bags into lockers then go through really intense/futuristic metal detector/body scan machines. It was worth it though since once inside I literally couldn't stop looking up. The arches and domes and walls were all covered in intricate patterns and just plain brilliant architecture. We got a history lesson from the tour guide and I learned so much about Judaism that I never knew about. The only problem with the tour was that the synagogue was built in the 1600's aka no heating so it was FRIGID. We then proceeded to the museum, were guided some more, then were sent on our way. Right after the tour was over I stopped quick for a takeout sandwich from Ganzo then ran to meet Anna, April, and Jen at the Santa Maria Novella train station.
We got our tickets and boarded the train to head to Pisa! The city of the leaning tower! The train ride was kind of depressing since it travels through the poorer sections of Tuscany plus everything is dead because its still winter time. Once we got to Pisa we all realized that we didn't bring any sort of map of the city, how did we think we were going to find the tower? You'd think of its fine just walk toward the giant building, well no since the tower was no where to be seen. Finally I found a map of the city near the train station and we headed the in right direction. We crossed the river and thought we were almost there but of course we got distracted. By what? Gelato of course! I'm so glad we stopped because that shop makes literally the best gelato I have ever had. I ordered a cone of cookie and nutella. Yes they have ice cream flavors that literally consist of COOKIES and NUTELLA. Creamy, deliciousness at its finest. We walked with our gelato singing "Just around the river benddd..." since every bend of the road we wanted to see the tower but 30 minutes later and still. no. tower. Finally we started to see some signs and tourists and headed in their direction, ALAS THE TOWER! We tried taking fun pictures of holding up the tower like all the other tourists but it is not as easy as you'd think! We got our pictures then wandered back toward the train station looking for somewhere to eat dinner. Surprisingly, no places in our 30 minute walk back were even worth a second glance. We decided to catch the train back to Fireze and figure dinner out when we got back. We stopped at a restaurant between San Lorenzo Market and the Duomo where I ordered a yummy baked lasagna.On the walk home we grabbed some wine and then sat around playing games and telling stories all night. Anna and April got tired just as Jen and I got our second wind, so we through on some clothes and headed out to see what the night could bring us. We went to a few bars and then were brought to an Italian club by some girls we went. The place was PACKED but so much fun with loud music and dancing.
Today is just a relaxing day. Jen and I are watching illegal movies and tv online while Anna and April headed out to run some errands and do what else, SHOP. Tonight we are going to cook up the rest of our chicken and pasta then call it an early night since we are leaving for Verona at 8 am tomorrow morning!
So much for a short post....I promise I'll be better with blogging this week! Love and miss everyone! xoxo
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