Italy gets Baracked

Let me say as a disclaimer that this post is not an attempt to impose my political views onto anyone. These are simply my personal observations of what inauguration day was like abroad.

Being able to watch the inauguration here in Italy was a little difficult to make happen, but I am happy to say I was able to hear the 44th President's inaugural address, thanks to MSNBC radio. Some technologically savvy boys were able to hook some speakers up to one of their computers so we could listen to the radio broadcast in english. We then found a channel that was showing a live broadcast, which of course was in Italian, so we muted the sound and watched and listened to the speech from two different sources.

 

It was a unique experience to listen to the speech via radio with everyone in the villa (professors included) downstairs in the cantina. It creates a totally different vibe for the recipient and I felt it his speech had a more powerful effect on me personally because I really had to focus on his words as opposed to seeing his speech accompanied by his posture, body language, and also how the audience was responding (I opted not to watch the muted speech on TV because the sound delay was a little distracting). So as my dad my say, I had an old school experience (excluding the fact it was being broadcasted from a computer as opposed to an "old school" radio) and it was really cool to listen to it with input from 20 other students and my professors. Although during the speech everyone was intently listening to the new President's first official address to the people as Commander In Chief.  I wish I had the ability to use language like President Obama does, his rhetoric is really unbelievable. 

It will be interesting to see now that we have such an internationally popular figure as President how the rest of the world will view Americans. Whether just or not, nobody can deny that the world's opinion of us, especially in the last decade has not been a favorable one. My room mate has already had a conversation with a total stranger, who approached her while she was running, about President Obama. He stopped her, gave her a hug, and told her how happy he was that we finally had a new President. I think it's safe to say that the general world population would agree with that statement.  The way the rest of the world views our country is important and we have elected a leader who for the most part has earned a lot of respect and hopefully will succeed in rebuilding our reputation domestically and abroad.

To completely change topics now, I signed up for an internship to help teach kids at a local elementary school english. I think the students I will be teaching are in 3rd grade, so they won't know too much english. The teacher said bringing songs, nursery rhymes, and things like that are usually a big hit with the kids, as long as the words are relatively easy to understand. I'm sure they will be able to help me with my italian as well. 

A lot of people in the program are traveling this weekend, but I want to stay here in Florence and do some more exploring before tourist season. Starting the first weekend in February my weekends will consist of non stop traveling until after spring break. Hopefully this weekend I will make it to some museums. Although tomorrow morning my art history class is meeting at The Uffizi (I still can't get over my art history lectures are on site at the works we are studying) and it will be my first time there. :)

Ciao for now

Mi Amo Firenze, Sesto Fiorentino, e Lucca

So I've been super busy since my last post so hopefully I'll be able to post everything. Professor Mariatti took us on a tour of the major monuments/churches in Florence and we got our bearings a little better and went to explore on our own. Florence is not a very big city, we walked from one end to the other in about 45 minutes. But there is a ton to see in this relatively small space. The Duomo would probably be the closest thing to the center of the city which is convenient because you can see it no matter where you are (for the most part). I will definitely be doing a lot of exploring on my own. Professor Mariatti has been working for five years to get us free museum passes for the semester and so we can go to all of them an infinite number of times for free (the art history nerd in me is super happy). 

Classes started on Wednesday and they actually all seem interesting. I'm taking my Italian class pass/fail since I don't get degree credit for it though. They will be more work than I initially thought and I don't want to stress over a class that, while beneficial for my Italian, doesn't count towards graduation. I'm taking a Shakespeare's Italy class that the english nerd in me is really excited about (even though I have to read "The Tempest for the fifth time). We will be performing scenes for everyone at the end of the semester and then writing a paper on our experience. Compared to the two six page papers and presentation I need to do for my European  lit and film class and the two papers for my Art History class seems like a piece of cake. I haven't had a lecture for my Birth and Origins of Renaissance Art class in the tower room yet (where all my classes are, minus Italian), but I have had an on-site lecture at the Baptistry of the Basilica of Santa Maria del Fiore (The Duomo). It was amazing, Professor Mariatti continues to hook us up with amazing benefits. We got to go inside at 8:30 and it doesn't open to the public until 10 so we were the only ones in there. The Byzantine mosaic on the ceilings and the romanesque architecture were beautiful. Then we went into the museum of the Basilica where a lot of the original statues and things are displayed. The facade of the church is not original, it was constructed in the 19th century in the same basic style as the rest of the structure with more ornate frescos and sculptures. I am going to love being on site to study these works of art every Thursday, even if it means waking up at 6:50 to catch the train.

Thursday night was my first night going out in Florence. A huge group of us went to a pub called The Fiddlers Elbow (which was an Irish Pub) and I got my Strong Bow. :) Then we went to a club called Astor. 

Saturday was my first day trip. A big group of us woke up at 7:30 to go to a town called Lucca. It was the perfect day to go, sunny and relatively warm (compared to how it has been). The medieval wall that surrounded is still standing and so we walked around the entire thing. We went and looked at a couple different churches and got pizza and gelato. The highlight of the day was easily climbing the Torre Giagni (I'm not sure if the spelling is right on that). There were two trees going on top of the tower and we climbed up there and enjoyed the amazing view. It was almost surreal, hopefully I can load some of them here. My internet enjoys being difficult. 

Today I went to a park where a lot of girls go running and they told me would be a good place  to exercise (I'm going to try to keep on top of that while I'm over here).  It is another beautiful day here (it's sunny and nearly 50)!  They have paths to run on at the park so I jogged/walked for about an hour and just admired the beautiful scenery. Even in the middle of January, everything is still green and warm. I'm excited to see the flowers bloom in the spring. I then decided since it was such a nice day to take pictures in the Villa's garden. It's massive. It has multiple fountains and sculptures, a hedge maze, a walking path covered by trees, a stream with a cute little bridge,  and Bruno the gardener's pet chickens. 

Well at least I got to upload one picture. I have so many more I want to post. I guess you will just have to take my word that this place is beautiful.

First Full Day at the Villa

Well I finally made it here after some plane mishaps. My flight out of O'Hare that was supposed to leave at 2:33 didn't leave until 9:15ish and therefore we missed our connecting flight in Frankfurt to Florence. We got into Frankfurt around noon and took a 4:45 flight to Florence from there. We got to the Villa around 6:30, about a half hour before dinner and it is BEAUTIFUL. I can't believe I live in the villa of an Italian Count (his family has rented it to Wisconsin and Michigan for this program for 23 years). I live in one of the "tower rooms" and I have two other room mates (Kate and Kelli) who are both from Wisconsin. We also have our own bathroom with a lot of storage space (major plus). We only had time to take our suitcases to our rooms and then we had dinner (pasta and chicken, the pasta was awesome). 

I didn't really walk around the villa until today. We had a tour from Professor Marriatti (Art History) and she showed us the Count's private rooms and the garden (which is beautiful, even in the winter). I will definitely do more exploring outside in the HUGE gardens (including a hedge labyrinth and an English garden) when it gets a little warmer out. I did a little wandering on my own then. There are so many paintings, frescos, and sculptures so the villa feels a little bit like a mini museum. 

All of the classes will be taught in the actual villa and we got a rundown at our orientation this morning of what they will be like. Every Thursday morning the other students in my Art History class and I will take the train into Florence before 8:30 to meet Professor Marriatti on site at the places/pieces we will be studying and we will have discussions on Tuesday afternoon. I'm also taking a Shakespeare class specifically focusing on his plays set in Italy (go figure). At the end of the semester we will be acting out scenes from the plays we've studied for the rest of the group on the stage in the garden (scary). I'm also taking a film class (which supposedly counts as an Art History class. I hope that's true because I can only take one of the two Art History classes offered here), and third semester Italian. Classes start on Wednesday. Tomorrow We are being taken into Florence and go on a walking tour and then we have to get ourselves back to the villa. It shouldn't be too difficult because there is a bus that stops right in front of it.

My internet won't let me post my pictures right now but I will try to put some up soon. Ciao for now.