APIAN WAY

“Bicycle! Bicycle! Bicycle!

I want to ride my Bicycle,

I want to ride my bike,

Bicycle! Bicycle! Bicycle!”

-My theme song for the day as made famous by Queen

Today our professor took us on a bike ride down Apian Way to see the catacombs and the countryside. We all rented bikes and had a lot of fun riding around. Along the way we stopped at a famous catacomb, saw a few tombs and dodged traffic. Riding a bike down an old cobblestone road on a mountain bike might be fun, but when riding on a bike designed for nicely paved streets it is a different story. We took the brand new bikes we rented off-roading through the mud and off a few jumps just to test out their capacity. I think we approved. Riding through the countryside has been one of the highlights of the trip and I cannot wait to do it again sometime soon. It is difficult to describe the excitement of a bike ride, so I hope my pictures will fill the void I have left here in my blog.

FYI: Don’t ride a bus without a bus ticket!

Today I decided to play hooky from school so got together with one of the girls I met this weekend for lunch on the outskirts of Rome. She lives in an apartment outside “downtown” Rome, so I took the subway and wandered around looking for her building. The density in Rome is intense! The large apartment buildings go on for miles it seems and they all look similar. Getting the opportunity to see a genuine Roman home was fun and a nice break from my hotel room.

On my way back I decided to take the bus because it would give me the chance to see some other parts of the city. When you get on a bus in Italy you must already have a ticket, because there is no machine to buy tickets once you get on. Normally you would buy your ticket from a newsstand and you validate the ticket when you board the bus, however, there is no one who checks your tickets when you get on the bus. My friend was telling me earlier in the day that she knew someone who rode the bus for two years without ever buying a ticket. Did I hear someone say Murphy’s Law? I couldn’t find a place to buy a ticket before my bus showed up at my stop, so I decided to hop on. I was riding happily for a while before my luck changed. Our bus pulled up to a stop and there were three men in blue uniforms waiting to get on and I new what was going to happen next. The sequence of events reminded me of an action movie, because as we were pulling up I knew that I should get off before I got caught, but there were too many people in front of the door so I could hop off quickly. The men got on the bus and started asking everyone for their tickets and unfortunately I did not have one. I tried to make up some excuses in Italian that I had lost my ticket, but it was apparent that my strategy was not going to work. They wrote me a ticket for 50 euro and said that if I did not pay them at that moment, the fine would increase to 150 euro. Considering that I need to use the public transportation system for the next few months, my immediate thought of ditching out of the ticket was not an option. Being banned from the bus and trains might make it more difficult for me to get around. After paying the fine on the bus, the man kindly told me that my ticket would serve as my bus pass for the rest of the day. Thanks officer! It was a lesson learned the hard way, but it was a cheap price for a fun adventure and now a great story.

The weekend has given me some time to catch up on my sketching assignments, do some exploring and enjoy what Rome has to offer. In an attempt to find the local hangouts in Rome our group did a little bar hopping and managed to make a few Italian friends along the way. It seems that Romans are big fans of the Irish because there is some form of an Irish pub on every street corner and I think we managed to hit up almost everyone this weekend.

Later in the week I got together with some of the Italians I had met over the weekend. Over the phone they said they wanted to go to a “rasmus feast,” which I thought meant going to dinner, but as I found out it is a huge party. A funny thing about the translation from Italian to English is that some words like ‘party’ do not translate very easily. What we actually went to was a party for European students studying abroad in Italy at a bar down a small street. It was an incredible experience because I was one of the only Americans and I was surrounded by conversations in various languages. One of the Italian girls I went with to the bar was having a conversation with one of her friends in German, while trying to keep me up to date by translating what was happening in English and Italian. I don’t think I have ever felt so stranded by a lack of communication. Just being immersed in the culture made me want to learn German and Spanish immediately, but unfortunately I am having a hard enough time learning Italian, so I am not going to get my hopes too high.

After walking around Piazza dell Popolo all day with our professor, a group of us were eager to enjoy some wine and take the day off from sketching. We happened to find a great restaurant where we had a few bottles of wine and an amazing lunch! From there we broke off into smaller groups and three of my friends and I decided to buy a few bottles of wine and watch the sunset over Rome from the Pincho hill. It was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen and it is a memory that I will never forget. The sun set right behind St. Peters church and painted the sky with amazing red and yellow streaks. With no other plans for the rest of the night we were ready for a spontaneous adventure and that is what we got. We happened to find an ice skating rink on the opposite side of the river where we could not resist the opportunity. I must say that it is very difficult to ice skate after a few too many glasses of wine. Being an experienced rollerblader, I have never had much trouble ice-skating, but tonight was a different story. I hit the ice hard a few times and would be feeling the effects in the morning…

It seems that the quickest way to learn the geography of Rome is by getting lost unintentionally. Today after class I was ready to take it easy, drink a beer and listen to some country music, but it was not going to be that easy. It is impossible to find a grocery store in Rome, so I decided to just start walking until I found one. Part one of the plan was successful: I found a grocery store, I had beer in hand, but I had no idea where I was. I tried to back-track my way to the hotel, and after walking in a circle for an hour I was in the same place I had started, and no closer to my hotel. It only took an hour longer to find my hotel, while also learning the back streets of Rome along the way. I am normally very good with directions, but today I was in such a hurry to get home that I must have made a wrong turn at some point and could not get back to the main street.

Another side note:

When you buy a cheap bottle of wine for less than 2 euro, don’t expect it to taste any better than a bottle of rusty grapes.

FIRST DAY OF CLASS

After having class in the streets of Rome while looking at examples of classical architecture, it is going to be very difficult to go back to school next semester and settle for PowerPoint presentations on architecture. There is so much that can be learned from seeing every building in person that cannot be explained with a picture. We spent half of the day walking around Rome with our professor as he lectured us on the importance of each building and its significance within the history of architecture. At about noon we took a break for lunch and we were left to sketch and analyze all of the buildings we had seen. I was really excited to start sketching everything I was seeing in order to document my experience in Rome. Lucky for me we were assigned a series of sketching assignments that I would not have enough time to finish even during the 2 weeks I am in Rome. Everyday there are more drawing assignments and everyday it seems like there are fewer and fewer hours in the day. My current schedule seems to be: sketch, eat, sketch, drink wine, sketch, sleep, then repeat.

On a side note…

I didn’t think it was possible but today I ate the worst pizza in Italy. We went to a restaurant in Piazza Navona for a nice little lunch after we were dismissed for the rest of the day. I decided to order a Capricciosa pizza that was topped with: tomato, mozzarella, artichokes, hard egg, olives, mushrooms and raw ham because it sounded like something that I had never had before. Well, I had never had it before and I will never have it again. The pizza arrived with a pile of mushrooms, three olives, one artichoke and one whole hard boiled egg. I think this picture that is included is worth a thousand words to describe how awful the pizza looked and tasted. I learned later that almost every restaurant serves a form of Capricciosa pizza and they all are served the exact same way. It was a lesson learned the hard way.

IL PAPA

Going to Catholic mass at St. Peters Basilica was an experience that I will never forget! On Sunday morning we got a group of us together to get in line early in order to get a seat during the church service. Not only was it amazing to see a service in a church I have learned so much about, but it was also beautiful listening to a service in Italian. After the service the Pope was giving a speech at noon to a huge crowd outside of the church. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity to see the Pope speak while he is still in good health. Even though I am not catholic, it was incredible to see all of the people who had been waiting all morning for the Pope to give his speech. He has such a large influence on Italy both religiously and politically that it is incomparable to anything I have ever seen before.

If that wasn’t enough action for the day, we followed that up with an AS Roma soccer game. After the service we all caught a bus over to the Olympic Stadium for the AS Roma game versus Catania. When we bought our tickets the day before, we had thought about buying the cheapest tickets that they sold, but we were afraid that there would be a poor view of the field. After finding our seats, we had regretted upgrading because the best seats in the house were not the ones with the greatest view. All of the cheap seats were full of rowdy AS Roma fans who were singing and cheering during the whole game. It was an incredible sight to see the entire stadium empty except for the cheap seat tickets. AS Roma eventually won the game 2-0 after an amazing header and a goal scored on a penalty kick.

When in Rome…

They say that all roads lead to Rome, but I learned that in fact that they do not. A group of us took a train from Como to Milan and had the opportunity to practice our Italian while trying to navigate our way through the Milan train station. According to the map we thought we could take the subway as a short cut in order to get to “main train station.” To our surprise it was not a short cut, and was not the main train station that we ended up at… after back-tracking and making our way back to where we started, we found our correct train that would take us to Rome.

We rode on a high speed train from Milan to Rome and got to see much of the country side along the way. After 5 hours of sitting across from a guy who was taking up all of my leg room and stinking up our section of the train, I was ready to get off the train and explore Rome. We reached the city in the evening and had a difficult time finding our hotel in the dark.

Even though we were excited to get to our hotel safely, we were not very excited about our accommodations. For the next two weeks I will be staying with three other guys in one small hotel room. There are four twin beds pushed together in a room built for one bed… I am beginning to feel like a sardine! It will be interesting to see if the four of us survive these tight conditions for the next two weeks. I will keep you updated.

On a side note…

The quickest way to learn Italian is when ordering food at an Italian restaurant. Every meal is an opportunity to try something new and learn a few more vocabulary words. For example, “gamberetto” means shrimp, but don’t ask me what I had to eat in order to learn that lesson…

Two words: Jet Lag or Time Change or just Really Tired. After flying all day, partying all night and trying to adjust to my new schedule, I am a little worn down. No choice today but to keep on truckin’. I am learning the Italian ways very quickly and love it! It is completely necessary to have your morning dose of caffeine, and I prefer mine in the form of espresso. On every corner there is a “bar,” which serves coffee in the morning as well as liquor in the evening. Unlike a Starbucks, it is expected that you drink you coffee while standing at the bar before you depart for work. Most people are in there for a very short time, usually only long enough to swallow their shot of espresso.

We had our introduction to the semester at Villa Olmo, where we will be having our studio class everyday. I think it will be difficult getting back into the school mindset when I still feel like I am on vacation. We explored the city of Como in the cold and the rain until we were dead tired. The city is not very big, but there is much to see…

I left Seattle on Monday evening and arrived in London by Tuesday afternoon ready to take on Italy at full throttle. My friend Olen and I flew together on British Airways from Seattle to Milan by way of London and we took full advantage of the free drinks on our flight over. While on the plane we heard that it could take over an hour to get from one side of the Heathrow airport to the other, but we only had about half of that to make our connecting flight to Milan. Fortunately luck was on our side and we made it to our terminal with plenty of time to spare. Once our plane landed in Milan I think I forgot all of the Italian I had been practicing for the past 4 months in less than 3 seconds.

Thanks to Olen’s Spanish skills we were able to find our way to the correct train that would take us to Lake Como. While we were in the airport I made sure to buy a bottle of wine, because we were going to need it once we made it to our hotel room…

I left Seattle with two backpacks and my computer, thinking that I had packed lightly, but after carrying all of my stuff around for 3 hours I was about ready to ditch all of it and wear what I had on my back for the next seven months. Thankfully I talked myself out of that idea.

Our train ride was an adventure with all of our stuff on a packed commuter train from Saronno to Como with everyone else that was on their way home from work. I barely fit on the train with my entire life on my back before the doors closed but, where there is a will, there is a way.

Once I made it to our hotel in Como, it was time to get the party started! The other 14 people in our group had already arrived the previous day, and were already settled in the hotel. I did not have very high hopes about the hotel we were going to be staying in, but I think I set the bar a little too high. The room had a bunk bed, a desk and a window…but not quite enough room for all of our luggage.

COMO