Athena Florence Spring 2012: Mary Wihnyk

Hello all!!! It has been a long time since my last post. Sorry about that! Things got busy here with midterms and what not. 

Hey everyone! This past week has been a pretty great one. I traveled, classes become more fun, and there was a LOT of chocolate eating.

CHOCOLATE FESTIVAL

Last Friday Florence began its annual week long Chocolate Festival. My roommates and I went and it was SO great. There were booths and booths with tables covered in piles of all kinds of chocolate. They had hot chocolate (which is basically just melted chocolate here), chocolate covered fruits and waffles, and even IPhones and shoes carved out of chocolate! It was so overwhelming that I only bought a little bit of chocolate and made plans to develop a strategy for purchasing more later in the week. It was snowing lightly as we were walking around and it was so pretty.

In the piazza that the festival is held in there is also a carousel. I was feeling very in touch with my inner child with all that sugar around and so I decided that riding the carousel was a must. Not only were the no children on the carousel but I was literally the only person riding it. My friends just stood in watched in what I can only imagine to have been a mix of amusement and embarrassment. Not only did I insist on riding it but I also insisted on waving like I was a queen in parade or something. Like I said ... I had consumed a LOT of chocolate. It really was such a fun day. Definitely one of my favorites so far.  I am actually eating Chocolate Festival chocolate right now so if things get crazy just blame the sugar.

At first when I heard that the festival was 7 days long I was little surprised. 7 days seemed like a long time for a festival solely dedicated to chocolate. Boy was I wrong! 7 days isn't even close to enough time. I won't lie; I visited that Chocolate Festival probably 6 out of those 7 days.  Yesterday was the last day and sadness overtook me as I purchased my last bag of Chocolate Festival goodness.

Chocolate Festival,

We really did have some good times together. I will never forget the free samples, the laughs, and of course the chocolaty goodness. I am so sorry I ever doubted you.  You really deserve better than that.  I hope you have forgiven me for that and will only look back on our time together fondly and with joy. You will be greatly missed. Until we meet again...

Your adoring friend,

Me

DAY TRIP TO LUCCA 

So the Saturday after we went to the Chocolate Festival, two of my roommates and I decided to make a day trip to Lucca. Molly, Mina, and I had a great time! Lucca is sort of like Florence but smaller and prettier in some ways. The buildings are much more colorful and there is a lot more greenery. They have some really beautiful piazzas and a huge wall surrounding the city that people can walk, jog, and ride bikes on.

While we were there we climbed this huge tower that had trees growing out of the top! I almost had a panic attack going up the narrow stairs but the views of Lucca were well worth it. While in Lucca we also visited Giacomo Puccini’s house! That composer really knew how to live it up. His house was pretty nice! The best part was that the museum had some of his real sheet music, letters, and costumes from his operas! After hanging out with Puccini we headed back to Florence to have a great dinner at one of our neighborhood restaurants.

CLASSES  

During the week my classes went pretty well! Some of them I am still a little bored with but my Archaeology class and my Food and Wine Pairing class are awesome! In Food and Wine we have been making all kinds of great food. This past week we focused on pairing wine with cheese dishes. All the dishes were amazing! In archaeology we spent 2 hours cleaning off pieces of pottery that were excavated in a site nearby. It was so fun! I was really worried I was scraping off pieces of pottery instead of dirt and ruining the artifacts but my professor is so nice and encouraging and she assured me that I was ok.  So far I'm really enjoying the class. I hope we keep getting to do hands on things like we did this week!

THE WEEKEND

This weekend my original plans were to spend a couple of days in Venice. Because I think the sick part of my cough is finally starting to catch up with me I decided it might be better to stay around Florence and go to Venice when I can really enjoy it.

Friday I spent the day running errands around the city. I got antibiotics from the doctor, had lunch, shopped for boots, bought a book and even went to a movie! Apparently Italian people don’t have big feet like me because all the boots I loved only went up to like 2 sizes under what I wear! It was a bummer. Even though no one has my shoes size, I had a great day exploring Florence. I’m really starting to feel at home here and I LOVE it!!!

So since I didn’t go to Venice I felt like I still needed to go somewhere this weekend. I started researching towns that were close to Florence and that I could just visit for the day. At first the idea of traveling alone didn’t seem very fun to me. I was afraid it would be lonely! But then I came upon a city called Montecatini Terme that is well known for its Spas. What could be better than spending time at the spa?!

I figured it would also be the perfect place to go by myself and relax. In the town they also have this little medieval town up on the hillside that you take an old train to and can spend time walking around and checking out the views. I thought this would be perfect to add to my day. Some time at the Spa, a trip to an old town, and some food! It sounded perfect. BUT I have been part of enough crazy road trips to know that things don’t usually go as planned. This trip really didn’t go as planned at all!

First, I missed the stop I was supposed to get off at because I could figure out how to open the train doors. Embarrassing. I got off at the next stop with plans to just buy a ticket and go back one stop. When I got off I realized that I was in a little town that didn’t even have a ticket office by the track. I didn’t know what to do. Luckily there was a lady sitting on a bench on the platform. I went up to her and asked her where I could buy a ticket. It was immediately apparent that she spoke about as much English as I do Italian. Somehow we managed to communicate enough so that she understood that I needed to buy a new ticket going the other way.

She motioned for me to follow her and she started walking of the platform into the town. For about a second I thought "she could be leading me into an alley way to kill me or to sell me..." but then I figured she was my only option so I went for it. She lead me to a little tabacchi shop and explained my situation, the woman sold me a ticket, my new friend had an espresso shot, and we were back on our way! While walking back to the shop we picked up another friend. A really hot guy who I'm guessing was her boyfriend.

He started to talk to me but the woman quickly explained to him that I don’t speak Italian and that I'm in the wrong place. We made it back to the track and sat to wait for the train. An older woman came up and I stood to give her my seat on the bench. She started talking to me in Italian and my two new friends quickly began to explain to her my situation. It seemed like everyone in this town knew each other and every time someone came over the group would explain my situation all over again. I would just grin and nod. It was pretty funny.

When I finally got to Montecatini it was cold and rainy. I set out to find the Spa. When I got there the woman told me I couldn't get the treatment at the place I wanted to because you had to have some sort of doctors note. Then she told me that they had a similar treatment in their beauty spa but it was more expensive. What a shocker. I made an appointment for a little bit later and went and had some lunch while I waited.

The treatment I signed up for was called “Mud Therapy”. This sounded a little weird but it was also the cheapest one when I looked on the website. In my mind I imagined a group of people hanging out in a pit of mud that had been dug earlier that day and filled with water.  They would be drinking wine and chit chatting while mud hardened around them. I wasn't sure how I felt about this.

Then I remembered one time, years ago, when my friend and I gave ourselves our own mud treatments. We had karate class later that afternoon and didn't want to go. For some reason we thought our best way out was to get really really dirty. We started digging holes in her back yard and spraying water everywhere with her hose. Then we proceeded to sit in the holes and cover ourselves with mud. Other than the getting in trouble part, it was actually really fun!

I figured if this mud treatment was even the slightest step above that, it would be awesome. Then I noticed a picture that went along with the not very descriptive description on the site. It had this fancy looking lady with good skin, sitting in a pretty chair, wrapped in a towel, and getting the cleanest looking mud I had ever seen rubbed on her arms. It looked so luxurious!

I got back to the spa and got ready for my treatment. It was probably the most bizarre experience I have ever been through. Just to show you how naïve I was about how this worked, I brought a bathing suit with me! I was sure I would be at least able to wear a bathing suit. I was so wrong. They gave me robe, told me to take off all my clothes, and then gave me this weird disposable underwear that didn’t really do anything. I did as I was told and then followed some lady back to the room.

She didn't really speak any English but she knew some key phrases like "take of your robe" and "lay face up."  At this point I was feeling so awkward. Then she started to put really hot mud on me. It was so strange. Just when I thought things couldn't get weirder she starts lifting up the ends of the plastic hanging off the table and wrapping it over me!!

You know in movies when killers wrap up their dead victims in plastic shower curtains? That’s what this was like! I definitely did not look like that fancy lady in the picture. Then she put things over my eyes and goes “I will be back in 50 minutes”.

50 minutes?!!!! 50 MINUTES!

What was I supposed to do, wrapped up like a mummy, for 50 minutes?? All kinds of crazy things started running through my mind. What if fell off the table and smashed my face because my arms are plastered to my side by mud and plastic and I wouldn’t be able to catch myself? What if someone stole the keys to my locker and took all my stuff? And then my mind went to the worst possible place ... what if I got an itch?! Of course as soon as I thought this my face started to itch like crazy.  "Calm yourself! This is supposed to be relaxing!" I told myself. I guess this worked because next thing I know someone was unwrapping me. Anyways, long story not so short, my skin does sort of feel softer!

After my very interesting spa experience I went in search of the train that was supposed to take me up to the town on the hill. I literally walked in circle for an hour looking for this place. I finally find where I need to be only to realize that the train is closed for repair! What a bummer. So I decided to spend some time at beautiful nearby park, I ate some gelato, and I headed back to Florence.

Even though things didn’t quite go as planned, I think the trip was a good experience! It got me out for the day and gave me some stories to tell. I definitely recommend visiting Montecatini Terme for the day and experiencing their Spas! Hopefully the train will be working when you go!

This post has been epically long but hopefully somewhat enjoyable. More stories next week!

Ciao,

Marykate

                     stuffed tomatos we made in class       Tiramisu                                         Lucca           

   My cleaning kit                    Cleaning off some pottery. Looks like a handle for something.

 The Spa

The park

This past week was mostly about getting situated in my apartment, acquainted with the area, and finding all my classes. Things went pretty well! I had some decent shopping experiences at a place called The Coop. They have really fresh local veggies and meat and everything is really well priced! Finding a good grocery store was right at the top of my list so I was happy to be able to cross that off pretty fast.

The next most important part of the week was my classes. I was a little nervous about finding all of them and getting there on time but it went very well! I got a little lost and was a little late to two of the classes but since it was the first day the professors were really nice about it. I think my red face, heavy breathing, and the non-stop "I'm so sorry!!!" helped my case a bit too.

My classes are Beginning Italian, Art History: High Renaissance to the present, Pairing food and wine, Intro to digital photography, and Archaeology lab. So far they all seem like they will be pretty interesting! Art history has never been my favorite, and I’m pretty bad at learning languages, but I figure taking these classes actually IN Italy will help make them more do-able!

The class I am actually most excited about right now is the archaeology class. We will be cleaning and putting back together real artifacts that were excavated from sites around Italy. So cool! Also learning how to cook some real Italian dishes and what wines go with them wont be so bad either ;).

For some reason before I came here I had it in my head that all of my classes would be super easy. I figured that since I was studying abroad and would have lots of other plans that didn't involve schoolwork then class would be no problem. Well, I was wrong. I think these classes will all be challenging and will require a lot of time and effort. Now I am attempting to get my head from "vacation" mode to “school” mode. Wish me luck!

So something I want to start doing on my blogs (especially shorter ones like this) is having a “Things I love!” list for the week. This will be pretty easy since there is SO much to love. But I am also doing a list of “Things I don’t love so much”.

At first I thought maybe this was a bad idea. How could I say that I don’t love things here? Would that mean I’m ungrateful or something? Well at first I would have answered these questions with a resounding “YES!” but then something happened to change this: I had a bad day.

It was one of those days where nothing really terrible happened but it was just that nothing was really going right. I got back to my apartment and just wanted to cry. So I did. Embarrassing. And then I started to feel bad about feeling bad. I felt like I wasn't allowed to be sad when I was getting to live in Florence. This is a vicious cycle. The cycle lead to tears, talking to various people on the phone, skyping, and eating lots of chocolate.

And then I figured out something that is really important. YOU DON’T ALWAYS HAVE TO BE HAPPY!

If you are reading this and you are planning on studying abroad or you are currently studying abroad, say that to yourself a few times to let it really sink in.

YES I understand that you are in a beautiful, charming, exciting foreign country. You are in a place that many people want to travel to (Esp. if you are in Italy!) and you have lots of people telling you how lucky you are! That being said, it is very different living in a foreign country than it is to just be visiting one for a few days or even a few weeks.

Yes, it's exciting and fun most of time, but it can also be frustrating. Everything is new and different and you there is so much you have to learn just to do things like buy groceries. Not to mention you are away from home and your family and friends, which is hard even when you are not in a foreign country! No one is happy every second of everyday and being in a foreign country doesn’t change this!

So if you are having a day where you are feeling frustrated and unhappy, don't feel guilty!  Its ok!  Skype a friend, call a parent, VENT!  Do whatever you need to do to make yourself feel better (like eat chocolate!), take a deep breath, get some good sleep, and remember that tomorrow is a new day!

So basically what that all lead me to was that it is ok to have a list of “things I don't love so much”. The only catch is that with this list there has to be a plan of action. It is ok to be unhappy with things sometimes, but you aren't just allowed to sit around sulking and being unhappy about them (although sometimes you can just be in a bad mood for no reason in which case just eat chocolate!). You have to either have a way to change it, or you have to decide that you are going to adjust to it.

 Without further ado (and there has already been way too much ado), here are my lists!

 Things I love

1.  My apartment!  It is so comfy, the water stays hot for years, we have a great TV, a big fridge, AND my landlords are super nice and helpful!

2.  Grom! It is this GREAT gelato place! The best I have tried so far.

3.  The Coop. It is so easy and fun to shop for my groceries here. The people who work there are nice, it is very clean, close by, and has everything I need for cheap!

4.  Walking! I love that everyone walks here! I feel like I get great exercise every day without even trying.

5.  The Food (obviously). Do I even need to explain? The food is great!!

Things I Don’t Love So Much

1.  It’s so cold! I'm already getting more use to the cold than I was when I first got here. My plan is to keep dressing warm! I can’t wait until I get to wear my summer dresses!

2. I don't speak Italian. This is rough. I really want to be able to communicate with everyone I meet and it is hard to not be able to. My plan is to study hard in my Italian class. I am determined to learn this language!

3. The streets and the maps don't always go together. Sometimes the maps will be missing whole streets! And the streets twist and turn. There is no grid system. It is pretty easy to get lost and turned around and that can be so frustrating. My plan is to keep working on it. Every day I feel a little more confident about my knowledge of the streets of Florence.

This week’s blog took a turn somewhere and became “lets test out different things!” Just stick with me ... I promise it wont always be this crazy and random. So now I want to try something I am thinking of calling “Crazy Story of the Week” or “Weird Story of the Week” or something. You get the point. Anyways here is this week’s:

Although I know this sounds completely crazy, today I ended up on a very thin median while cars were speeding by me on both sides and I am really not sure how it happened. I take the same way back from the store every time but today I guess I did something different without really realizing it because next thing I know I’m in the middle of heavy traffic!

My guess is I made my way across the street where I thought I usually did and got to the median right when the street got busy. I wasn’t really sure what to do. I noticed that where the median was at its most thin is where it was closest to where I actually needed to be. So as I tightrope walked along the median to safety I just sort of smiled and waved at people.  Then the light turned red and I awkwardly squeezed between some on looking cars and eventually made it to real sidewalk! I was still alive! A little embarrassed…but still alive! 

Ok, thanks for hanging in there with me for this crazy and random blog! This coming weekend I hope to go on a trip somewhere so hopefully I will have some interesting stories about that! I am not making any promises but I also hope that next week’s blog will be a little more cohesive!

Ciao,

Marykate

Discovered the river while finding my way around!

Gelato from Grom! 

It snowed this week!!! Being from Florida this was very exciting! 

 I made it! After months and months of filling out forms and having to get in contact with about a million different people to obtain important documents (right up to the last minute!), I have made it to Florence!

       Getting ready to leave my hometown in Florida was a bit hectic. Lots of running around to different stores trying to find everything I might need while away, trying to put together a warm but fashionable wardrobe (for someone who is not very fashionable!) and saying goodbye to all of my friends and family was pretty crazy! It still shocks me that I managed to get it all done without forgetting too much of what I was going to pack!

     I left Florida on Tuesday afternoon, had a connection in Atlanta to Paris, and ended up in Florence around 9:00am on Wednesday morning. Surprisingly all of my flights went pretty smoothly. Nothing was delayed or canceled, the movies were great, and even the food wasn’t too horrific. The Paris airport was a little bit crazy but luckily I ran into some other students who were also making their way to Florence and we were all able to find our gate together.

    When I arrived in Florence a friend and I took a taxi to the Lorenzo de’ Medici meeting point where they gave us the keys to our apartments and sent us on our way. A taxi driver was called to get me to my apartment since I had two HUGE suitcases, one carry-on, and a backpack. The streets here in Florence are all pretty small and everyone, drivers and pedestrians alike, move confidently among them. I swear my taxi driver almost ran over three or four people and almost killed us at least twice. He kept trying to make conversation with me, taking his eyes of the road to look at me in the rear view mirror, but I was so nervous that we would go crashing into an oncoming car or take out a group of poor unsuspecting tourists, cameras glued to their faces and pointed upward at all of the beautiful buildings, that I could only smile and nod. He was very nice though and we did arrive to the apartment in one piece.

     When I got up to the apartment a very nice older couple was there. They explained to me that their son and his wife own the apartment and that they were there to make sure things were in order for our arrival. They were so sweet and funny! They even showed me how to work the TV.  I was pleased to see that you can get the dialogue in English OR Italian on most stations! I was so happy to see how beautiful, clean and spacious the apartment was. They left and I unpacked while I waited for my four roommates to arrive. Two of my roommates arrived in the early afternoon and we all went out to grab some pizza. It was our first meal ever in florecne and it was delicious! By late afternoon/early evening they had all gotten to the apartment.  Everyone was really nice and equally as excited about the apartment as I was. After we all got acquainted and settled in, two of my roommates and I decided to go grab some dinner.

     We really had no idea where we were going and basically just kept walking until we found a place that seemed nice with reasonable prices. So far I had not felt too out of place or uncomfortable about the language barrier, as I really hadn’t had to communicate with anyone who didn’t speak decent English, and then I met our waiter. He was adorable and super nice but we had some communication issues. I was trying to order wine and he was trying to figure out how much I wanted. I really had no idea what amounts he was listing off and I was starting to feel awkward so I just nodded at what I thought was the smallest amount he had said. A few minutes later my wine arrived in what were basically two mini water pitchers. I had, without realizing it, ordered a half a liter of wine! I just stared at him as he set them down in front of me, a big sweet smile on his face.  Lucky my roommates were there to help me out and we all shared the wine. The food was SO good. I got a pasta dish with a creamy sauce and my roommates both got great looking pizza. The prices were very reasonable and much cheaper than what you might see at an Italian restaurant like that in the US.

          This morning we had to wake up at 7am to go to our 8:45 orientation. 8:45AM!!! After basically two days of traveling, and severe jet lag, the last thing we wanted to do was have to wake up at 7am and walk in the freezing cold to the other side of Florence. Once we were up and out though it was actually kind of exciting. We got crazy lost, of course, and then let a nice American kid handing out pamphlets lead us to where we were supposed to be. During orientation we were warned about things like burglars, gypsy children, being too loud at night, and not going anywhere with strangers (even American ones!) especially those handing out pamphlets in the street. Oops! After orientation and a day of getting lost, we hung out at the apartment and met our very handsome and nice landlord. Then the same dinner crew from the night before went out and we had an interesting meal at an American themed Italian restaurant. Although the fries were amazing, I do not recommend Italian hot dogs.

     All in all it has been an exhausting but exciting couple of days. There is so much I want to do and to learn (like the Italian language) but I know I just need to take it one step at a time. The goal for tomorrow is to try and navigate the city and find our classrooms without getting too lost. I also plan to do some serious gelato eating! We can all be assured that at least one of those things is going to happen! Wish me luck with the rest!

  Ciao,

Marykate