Travel, Enjoying Siena, and Kindergartners!

Well, it's been a busy few weeks, but I finally have some time to write an entry! I've done quite a bit since my last post, so I'll try to condense it all... Oh and beware of random thoughts and stories! There are a bunch of them. :)

On both of the past two weekends, I've taken trips: One to Florence for the day two weeks ago, and one to Rome for three days last weekend. In Florence, we were able to see Santa Maria Novella church, the amazing Cathedral and Baptistery, the Palazzo Vecchio (the town hall), the Piazza Signoria, and the Ponte Vecchio - check out the link for a bunch of pictures! We also climbed to the top of the Dome of the Cathedral, which took up a large part of our time, but it was worth it for the beautiful view. We also had a nice lunch with delicious pizza and pasta, and we headed back home by about 6. It was a great day trip, and it's very easy (and cheap!) from Siena since it's only an hour bus ride. We didn't get to see everything of course, but we'll be going back to Florence with our Art History class, so I'm not too worried about it. Oh and below is a picture of the group of us on top of the dome!

Last weekend, three friends and I ventured to Rome and did the tourist thing. We got to see almost all of the big sites, along with some great smaller stops along the way. We hit the Colosseum, the Roman Forum, Vatican City, the Trevi Fountain, the Spanish Steps, the Pantheon, and a lot more. Again, check out the link for pictures! To get there we took a three hour bus ride from Siena to Rome on Friday afternoon, and then we returned on Sunday evening. The trip was very exhausting (since we got up early and rushed around every day to see all the sites) but it was definitely worth it. And now the next time I go, I can just spend my time at two or three spots and fully enjoy them, since I've already seen most of the sites. Below are a few extra pictures that aren't in the albums!

The Colosseum, of course.

The Arch of Constantine

It's Carneval this weekend, so my roommate and a bunch of my other friends went to Viareggio, a coastal town that has the second biggest Carnevale celebration in Italy (after Venice). But since I've been go-go-go for the past few weeks, I decided to stay in Siena for the weekend.  My initial goal was to wander around and explore some more, since there is still so much that I haven't seen. I also thought about taking a day trip on my own on Saturday, to another small Tuscan town like Montepulciano or Arezzo. But I didn't realize how exhausted I've been, so I ended up just having a relaxing weekend at home, which will hopefully energize me for the next few weeks... But I think I'd still like to take a small trip by myself at some point. I always envy those people who can travel alone, and I think it'd be a nice little challenge for me. Even the idea of eating alone at a restaurant makes me nervous, but I think it would be a good experience. It would really make me use my Italian (since I wouldn't be able to rely on anyone else, like I have been doing some of the time) and it would really allow me to experience a city in a new way. I'll let you know when I complete my goal. :)

One problem I'm dealing with is that I'm torn between wanting to travel and wanting to fully experience Siena. On the one hand, I feel that since I'm in Europe, and so close to so many amazing places, I should really take advantage and go out and see as many of those places as possible. Especially with the flights being so cheap, I feel like there's nothing holding me back. And that's where Siena comes in. I really love it here, and I don't want to miss out on its incredible aspects and then, by the end of my time here, feel like I don't even really know the city. Of course I have some time to explore during the week, but I'm just nervous that I'll end up shortchanging Siena. It's absolutely my favorite place of all the places I've visited in Italy so far, and I feel so lucky that I was able to come here, so I'll definitely be making an effort to fully enjoy it.

During the weeks, my classes have been going really well! I have to be honest, it's tough sitting through 2-hour classes, but I think I'm getting used to it. The subjects are right up my alley, so that's always a plus, and the field studies have been really fun! So far, we've gone inside the Palazzo Pubblico (the town hall building) to see the frescoes for my Art History class, and for my Presence of the Past class we've walked around the town center looking at art that refers to the foundation myths of Siena. I also really like all of my professors because they're all very enthusiastic about their subjects. And I think I was right about foreseeing my favorite class to be Presence of the Past, too - It's so much an art history class (which is great for me) and the Italian is just a tiny bit above my level, so I still understand almost all of it, and it will be perfect for helping me improve.

It's funny, sometimes I momentarily forget I'm in Italy. It usually happens in the morning, when I haven't heard any Italian yet that day, and then I walk out onto the street and I hear someone speaking. It always hits me for a second, like "whoa, they're not speaking English" and for some reason it still takes me by surprise. Of course then the realization comes over me and it becomes no big deal. But I'm guessing that by the end of the semester it will feel completely normal to hear Italian everywhere, and it won't catch me off guard at all. 

The other day, two of my friends and I were walking back from class in the evening, and we noticed some smoke coming from the valley (there's a huuuge deep valley on the edge of town that we walk by to get to the IES center), so we stopped by a look-out point to check it out. There was this older man there, probably in his 70s, looking as well. Both of the girls I was with are in the advanced Italian class with me, so we started talking about the smoke in Italian so that he might talk to us... And he did! He was so sweet, and we were all just conjecturing about the origin of the smoke and talking about the smell, etc. It only lasted for about a minute, but it was really fun to just stop and talk to a local. Yes, I talk to waiters and people working in shops and things like that, but it was different to just talk informally with a person on the street. I'll try to make this a more regular occurrence. 

At home, I'm becoming quite the cook! My roommate and I cook dinner almost every night, and at first we were only inclined to make pasta... And just pasta. But by now, we're definitely mixing it up a bit, adding chicken, vegetables, and other sides to our pasta nights, and making nice dinners like baked pasta, and chicken and broccoli teryaki stir-fry with rice (yum!). It's funny because the grocery stores here really only have ingredients to make Italian food (go figure), so in order to find teryaki sauce I had to go to an International Food market (which really only had Asian food ingredients). I've also been baking, but that's also an issue sometimes because it's difficult to find little things like baking powder or cream of tartar, and they definitely don't have anything like crisco. And I finally found brown sugar after a long search, but it was randomly at that International food market - strange. So basically, I've had to alter a few recipes or just put some on the back burner until I can find some of the ingredients. But I've already made brownies, 3 loaves of banana bread, and crepes! Baking is my catharsis; plus where's the fun in baking with the right ingredients? Or with an electric mixer for that matter? ;)

I finally started teaching English to kids!!! My friend Elise and I are going to be teaching a kindergarten class every Wednesday morning from 10:30-11:30. The school is a bit outside of the center of town, outside the walls, so we have to take a 20-minute bus to and from there each time. We went this past week to introduce ourselves and do our first lesson (we taught them colors) and it was so much fun. We had no idea how many kids there were going to be, or what the teacher would be like, or anything really. But there are around 10 kids (we're not sure, because a few were out sick), all so adorable, and a really nice teacher named Lucia who speaks very little English. The kids we got to meet are: Matteo, Jacopo, Cesare, Sara, Rebecca, Davide, and Andrea (as a boy's name). They're really cute and they were pretty good for us too. A few kids know a little bit of English, like the numbers and a few greetings, but I hope we can teach them a few things during our time with them. :) Below is a picture of the building (in which they have only kindergarten classes) and I'm sure I'll get pictures of the kids by the end of my teaching! Surprisingly, it's really difficult to figure out ways to teach them, since most of them don't know ANY English at all. And because of that, we had to use a lot more Italian than I expected, in order to tell them what we wanted them do. I think that teaching English will actually help improve my Italian, strangely enough, with having to give directions and especially with trying to understand the kids, who mumble like crazy. :) Oh and it's also possible that we'll get assigned another class in addition, since this is only an hour per week, but we'll see! I'm really excited to see how it will all go. 

The kindergarten building where I'll be teaching each week.

And in addition to classes, teaching, cooking, and traveling, we also go out in Siena! If you remember, I mentioned that IES has this connection with the Erasmus program, which is basically the international student community in Siena. Well, every Tuesday Erasmus hosts an aperitivo, and each week it's held at a different bar. I've gone to the last two, and they've been so much fun. It's a perfect atmosphere to meet other students, and even though they're from all different European countries they still all speak Italian (some a little more than me, others less) and some even speak a little English. So far I've been able to meet people from France, Spain, England, and also some of the Italians that work with Erasmus. I really like it because I don't have many other opportunities to hang out with students outside of my own program. Don't get me wrong, I really like the all people in IES, but it's also nice to branch out sometimes.

Alright I think that's about enough for today. :) I already have a list of things to write about in my next entry, so look out for that sometime soon! I hope everyone is doing well, and I miss you all so much! I would really love to hear from you guys, so feel free to shoot me an email anytime! - lindsay.gaskill@richmond.edu. And now I'll leave you with one last picture of a place I just thought was so gorgeous, which we passed on our way from the Kindergarten to our bus home. Other than that, until next time, arrivederci!

Le Lezioni (Classes)

Hello everyone!

So by now I've had a full week of classes, and other than the fact that it's a lot of class per week, I'm really enjoying it! I finally finalized my schedule, and I'll be taking 4 classes, along with an internship+seminar that I can get credit for like a class. My classes are all 2 hours long (whew) but most of the professors include a 5 minute break in the middle (pausa) and then finish a few minutes early, thankfully. So. First, the classes: 

I have Advanced Italian on Monday and Friday mornings (my only Friday class), which is going really well so far. It's a bit challenging, considering some other people in my class have been taking Italian for a lot longer than I have. But it should help me improve, so that's a plus! I also love my professor, Alice (pronounced A-lee'-chay, which actually means 'anchovy' in Ialian!) - she's young, really sweet, and really enthusiastic about the subject, so that helps us get excited for it as well. We have about 10 people in the class, and it's a good group of people so it's been fun so far.

Next, I have this Art History class called "Comparing Siena and Florence During the Renaissance", and it's on Monday and Thursday afternoons. So far, it's sadly not as exciting as I had hoped. Yes, we're covering amazing works of art, but the issue is that our Professor, Sara, speaks very little English... and she's teaching the class in English. So that has proven to be a big problem, even in our first few classes. Most of the time in class is spent by her reading off her English notes about the works, not really knowing what she's saying, and asking us if her English is correct. Don't get me wrong, she's a really sweet person; she just graduated from the equivalent of grad school last year so she's new to this, and she tries really hard so I can't get mad at her. And her little mistakes definitely lighten the mood of the slow-moving class - for example, yesterday we were studying an altarpiece called "The Birth of the Virgin", but on her powerpoint she had written "The Bird of the Virgin". When one girl asked about it (because she really thought that's what it was called, and there is clearly no bird in the image) Sara didn't understand at first - but when another girl translated for her, and told her that she had written "Bird" instead of "Birth", she burst out laughing, and so did the rest of the class. Soooo that class should be interesting. :) Oh and we're also going to be taking a few trips for class, to Florence and other Tuscan cities nearby, and it will be nice to see what we're studying!

Another class I'm taking is called "The Literature of Love", which is taught in Italian, and is on Monday and Thursday afternoons as well. We only have 4 people in the class, all girls, and it is INTENSE. Our professor speaks so quickly, and his voice is really deep and monotone so it's difficult to understand sometimes. He never speaks English, and he just whips through his lecture for the entire 2 hours. I feel somewhat accomplished because I can understand almost everything he says, even when he's talking a mile a minute, but you definitely can't lose concentration for even a second in that class. We've had 3 lessons so far, and after each one I've had a headache. I'll have to remember to take some medicine before that class or something... But it's a really great subject - we're going to read works by Dante, Petrarch, Bocaccio, and other Italian writers, whom I've always wanted to study. Plus, it's a direct equivalent for a class I would need to take at Richmond for my Italian major, so it works out really well! It'll be tough, but I'm excited for the challenge.

My fourth class is the required core course, called "Presence of the Past", and it's basically a class about the history and art history of Siena and the region of Tuscany. It's also taught in Italian, and it has about 11 people in it (basically our advanced Italian class plus one girl from intermediate). Our professor, thankfully, is very understanding of the fact that Italian is not our first language, so even though she never speaks English during class (she doesn't know much anyway) she'll slow down or repeat herself if she can tell that we're not fully understanding her. She also seems extremely knowledgeable on the subject, so that is making us all excited to learn. The class is twice a week like my other classes, but the Tuesday class is lecture, while the Wednesday class will always be a field study somewhere in Siena. So on those days we'll meet our professor somewhere in town to go see what we've studied, and she'll teach us on site (kind of like a guided tour). There is also an English section of "Presence of the Past", and they'll be going to the same sites at the same time for the field study, so it'll be the whole group of us together. I haven't had one of these field studies yet -our first is tomorrow - so I'll let you know how it goes. And I think I'm most excited for this class, especially because it seems like it'll focus on art history even more than my art history class will, and I think it'll be the most interesting Italian-taught class. But we'll see! :)

Now, the internship. I had no idea that I was going to be doing this, but a girl I know was talking about it and it sounded like a lot of fun... So I initially applied to get an internship at a museum in Siena, but sadly none were accepting interns at the time. However, I'm really excited about my new endeavor: I found out that I'll be teaching English to kids at an elementary school! I don't know the details yet - I should be getting them this week - but I'm so excited to see what it'll be like. I love working with kids, and for some reason I think little Italian children are the cutest things ever. So I'm sure it'll be great. :) And as a nice bonus, little kids don't usually know all the proper grammar, so I won't feel stupid if I say something wrong in Italian. (And I probably won't even need to speak Italian that much anyway, since they'll need to be hearing English.) Along with the internship, IES requires that we take an internship seminar, which is once a week for two hours on Wednesday afternoons. Our professor is quite the character and is really enthusiastic about us learning about other cultures and expanding our world views and whatnot. He speaks English really well, but since all 5 of us doing internships are in advanced Italian, he said he would speak Italian more often in order to help us. But then he ended up speaking some combination of Italian and English, and it was even more difficult to follow than if he had just spoken Italian... Haha but that class will definitely be fun. He told us that we'll even do a bunch of our lectures on site in places around Siena. Like for example, he mentioned that during one lecture we'll be talking about Italian healthcare in comparison with that of other countries, and we'll hold class at Santa Maria della Scala, one of the first hospitals in Italy (which is now an art museum). I'm actually not sure what else we'll be doing in that class (none of us are, really) but I'm excited nonetheless!

So those are my classes! And this may all be very boring, but if you'd like to know my schedule as well, it's as follows:

Monday:

9-11  Italian

2-4  Renaissance Art

4-6  Literature of Love

Tuesday:

2-4  Presence of the Past

Wednesday:

2-4  Presence of the Past (field study)

4-6  Internship Seminar

Thursday:

2-4  Literature of Love

4-6  Renaissance Art    <-- (these two switch times on Thursday - weird, I know)

 

Friday:

9-11  Italian

So there you go! And I'll also have a few hours per week of teaching English, but again I won't know the schedule until sometime this week or even next week. 

I'll try my hardest to post again soon, but until then, arrivederci! :)

Milano!

Sorry that it's been a while since I've posted - We finally started classes this week, so I've been and I'm going to be a lot busier than before!

Anyway, last weekend the IES program took us on a trip to Milan! All 30 of us went on the trip, which included transportation by bus, two nights' stay in a hotel, dinner both nights, and a few tours of the city. We got to see all the historic sites of the city, including the incredible Duomo, La Scala Opera House, some churches, and other noteworthy areas in Milan, and we had a lot of free time as well!

The trip started off with a 4 hour bus ride on Thursday morning, after which we checked into our hotel quickly and then took the metro into the center of the city. The first thing I saw once I exited the subway, literally, was the enormous Duomo of Milan. Its pink-white marble was so beautiful against the blue sky that day, and the piazza was pretty packed with people when we arrived. And funny story: the Italian version of TRL films on a balcony in the piazza, which they have showing on a huge television screen on the other side of the square, and our group was on the show for a few seconds! So now I can say that I was on Italian television. :)

That afternoon we went on tour #1, which took us inside the Duomo to learn more about it. Some fun facts: It took 500 years to construct (which is why it encompasses so many styles); it is the second biggest church in Italy (after St. Peter's in the Vatican) and the third biggest cathedral in the world; the entire facade is made of marble from the Italian Alps, with the exception of the gilded bronze statue of the Virgin Mary at the highest point on the roof; there are over 3,400 statues covering the exterior; its actual name is la Cattedrale di Sant'Ambrogio (the Cathedral of St. Ambrose), but absolutely no one calls it that - in Milan it's just "The Duomo".

the Duomo of Milano

After the Duomo, our tour ended with a walk through the pedestrian area of Milan, with the final destination of the Sforza Castle (which looked amazing all lit up in the evening - follow link for pictures). Afterwards, we headed to a restaurant where we had a delicious dinner - I had gnocchi in a cheesy tomato sauce for the first course, and a dish called Cotoletta alla Milanese (breaded and fried veal - a Milano specialty) for the second, along with red wine of course, and finally tiramisu! Everything was beyond amazing, especially the gnocchi... Then, as we were all desperately tired from our long bus ride and even longer day of walking across the city, that concluded our activities until the following day.

On Friday, we got up bright and early to trek over to Santa Maria della Grazie, a monastery that houses Da Vinci's Last Supper! They're very stringent there, so only 25 people are allowed into the room at a time, and only for 15 minutes. No pictures are allowed (sadly) but they have a tour guide stationed inside to tell you all about the painting. The Last Supper is more or less a fresco, per se, that Da Vinci painted on the refectory (dining room) wall of this monastery . Pretty appropriate, I think - the monks could contemplate the last supper while they were eating. And Da Vinci's experimentation with techniques (he painted on dry plaster instead of the traditional wet, and he used tempera paint) is what caused its bad condition nowadays. Even so, it was incredible. I was in complete awe. When I saw the Mona Lisa in the Louvre, it was kind of a let-down - It's very small and is placed very low on the wall in the museum, and the usual crowd around it makes it uncomfortable. The Last Supper, on the other had, exceeded my expectations. It's huge, first of all, taking up an entire wall of the room. And just being that close to a work that I've studied so much over the years, and that Leonardo da Vinci painted himself, was just amazing.

outside the entrance to the 'cenacolo' / last supper!

We then started day two of our city tour, on which our first stop was a medieval church called Sant'Ambrogio (follow the link for pictures). We then stopped by the IES Milan center (there are IES programs in Siena, Rome, and Milan in Italy) and we were able to check out the building and get a quick tour. Their program has over 120 people, compared to our 30! I can't imagine... And it made me really glad that we have such a small group. In fact, the whole trip made me more in tune with that fact, because the trip could not have worked out so well with 120 people! Anyway, after our short stop at IES, we finished up our tour at Porta Genova, where there is a canal. Who knew Milan had canals? I didn't. Apparently they were constructed in order to tow all of the marble from the Italian Alps (about 84 miles away) to Milan to build the Duomo - and that's a lot of marble. Makes sense.

the Milan canal

After our tour we had the entire afternoon free, so my friend Emma and I decided to go up to the roof of the Duomo! They charge 5 euros to take the stairs (and even more to take the lift!) but it was worth it. The views were incredible, and the architecture itself was so intricate and ornate that I couldn't stop taking pictures. And Emma and I are both fairly afraid of heights, so it was definitely a challenge, but one worth taking on. :) After we steadied ourselves enough to look out over the edge, we had a great time and actually ended up staying up there for over an hour and a half - and getting some great pictures! (Check out the link for more!)

love it.

beautiful architecture

reeeally high up!

After the Duomo, we ventured to a museum called the Pinacoteca di Brera. For all you art history nerds out there like me, I got to see Piero della Francesca's 'Brera Altarpiece' (that one with the peacock egg and the sacra conversazione), a special traveling collection of Caravaggio's artwork, and Mantegna's Dead Christ (the one with the crazy perspective). Although, we didn't stay for too long, and I just found out that I missed seeing a painting on which I wrote a huge paper for a class at Richmond. :/ Oh well, I'll just have to go back... And finally we ended the day with a big group buffet-style dinner, which was delicious of course.

The next day we had a tour of La Scala Opera House, one of the most famous opera houses in the world. We were able to go through the foyer, the attached museum, and of course the performance hall. It really is a beautiful theater, and I would love to be able to see an opera there, especially after studying so many operas in my Italian class last semester... Well, we'll see! Unfortunately we weren't allowed to take any photos inside the performance hall, but I did grab one of the foyer!

We had a bit of free time again before checking out of our hotel and climbing back onto the bus, and in that time I was able to visit another museum I had been eyeing since we got there, where they were showing an exhibit on Magritte. No one else I was with was really interested, so I went by myself, and it was really an enjoyable experience. I really like seeing sites and traveling with other people, but sometimes I love to just get out on my own and explore. This was one of those times. So, I strolled over to the museum, bought my ticket, and perused the exhibit, mostly among Italians. When I came upon one of my favorite Magritte paintings (below) I ended up standing beside a mother and her young daughter. I overheard the mother explaining the painting to the girl (in Italian of course), saying that on the bottom of the painting it was nighttime but on the top it was daytime. Seeing the recognition on the little girl's face and seeing her smile widen was just too much, and I couldn't help but smile, too. :)

Magritte, 'The Empire of Lights'

And that concludes our trip to Milano! It was a really fun city to visit, but, like Bologna, it made me really glad that I'm staying in a smaller town like Siena for the semester. I didn't like having to keep an eye out for pickpockets, and even though the metro was easy I don't think I'd like to take it every day... I thought of the whole thing kind of like it is at home: I like visiting New York City every once in a while for a day trip, but for the most part I prefer the daily life of the quieter Montgomery. Now given, Siena is not as quiet as Montgomery - we have some pretty hopping bars and restaurants here that definitely overshadow those at home - but the main point is there. :)

Look out for another post really soon - aka this weekend - so that I can tell you all about my first week of classes and explain what my schedule will be like from now on! I hope everyone is doing well, and I miss you all!!