Home Again

So ends the greatest spring break of my entire life.

Lydia and I got up at 7 Friday to meet Erika and Kelsey in the Villa Manos parking lot. The four of us drove to the red beach (which was only about ten minutes from where Bethany and I almost drove over a cliff looking for the beach Wednesday) and parked in a church parking lot near the entrance to the trail down to the beach.

The trail was much longer and more treacherous than we had anticipated. There was a lot of sliding down gravel hills and climbing over potentially loose boulders.

Beware of falling rocks and abrupt drops into the
Aegean Sea.

Kelsey, who had decided to wear flip-flops, opted out of the whole thing about halfway down the cliff. Lydia, Erika and I, continued slowly on until we made it to the red beach.

When we got to the beach, the three of us sat in the lava rocks for a while and just watched the waves rolling in. Then we explored.

There were four doors resting along the beach and built into the side of the cliff. I went up to the first door to test if it was open (it wasn't) and to peek in through the broken window.

There was a dwelling inside the mountain.

Exterior.

Interior.

I was very excited by this and called Erika and Lydia over to investigate while I ran down the beach looking in each of the other doors. In addition to this room, I found a kitchen with a countertop, sink, table, shelves, and refrigerator, and a storage room of some sort. The fourth door had planked over windows so I could not see inside.

I also found a house around the bend of the cliff, out of sight from where we had originally been sitting on the beach.

The house was rectangular and half carved into the mountain/half built up with cinderblocks. There were stairs leading to the roof, which I climbed, and found there was an entrance to the house from the roof as well as from the beach. Both doors were locked, however, so I crossed the roof to stairs on the other side of the house, climbed down, and found myself in a little garden. Behind the garden, a boat sat covered for the winter and an outhouse stood just beyond that.

On the side of the house facing the garden, I found a door covered with Greek writing. If you can read this, let me know, because I'm very curious about these beach dwellings.

Erika and Lydia didn't join me in exploring this building. Instead, they sat on the beach and waited patiently until it was time for us to get Kelsey and make our way back to Fira. Their loss.

In Fira, Kelsey and Erika showed us their hotel room (nicer than ours, but ours had a better location), then Lydia and I shared a chocolate strawberry crepe for breakfast at a little crepe stand across from where we rented the quads. We returned the quads after breakfast, then sat in the main square until our four roommates arrived.

The six of us walked down the donkey trail from the other day to the port below. There we found a ship docked and ready to take us on the volcano tour we booked earlier in the week.

The cruise to the volcano was short, but lots of fun. The ride was beautiful and we got to go up to the top deck of the ship and take photos. When we docked at the volcano, the ship captain helped us ashore and told us to be back on the boat in an hour.

I felt like we were on the moon. Everything in front of us was hills and craters of red and black volcanic rock. We just started walking, climbing up hills and sliding down into gullies, being careful not to fall over the edge of anything because there would be no getting out once one of us was down a volcano hole.

After an hour, the ship blew its horn and we all scrambled back down through the ashes to the port.

The next stop on the tour was at the volcanic hot springs about ten minutes cruise from the volcano. Here we were given half an hour to either lounge on the boat and enjoy the day, or jump into the icy water to swim twenty meters to the hot springs.

I chose to stay on the boat, laying on the bow listening to the waves and seagulls while I soaked up some sun.

The other girls chose to jump in and swim for it.

I watched Lydia, Bethany, Caitlin, Kate, Jess, and an assortment of Asian tourists (everyone on the cruise except us and a couple who looked and sounded like Kitty and Red Forman was Asian) flail around in the water with their teeth chattering until they were out of sight around the bend, then I laid back and read "Bridget Jones's Diary."

The boat honked again just as I neared the end of a chapter and everyone who had gone swimming returned.

"How was it?" I asked as the other girls were pulled into the boat by one of the tour guides. I heard "miserable" and "never again" muttered while everyone glared at me and shivered as I handed each of my friends her towel.

I loved the ride home. I sat on the prow of the boat with my feet hanging out over the water. It was chilly, but not nearly as bad for me (the only dry one) as for my friends who huddled together on a bench behind me, picking gunk off of their bathing suits and complaining about how disgusting the hot springs had been. They were all covered in mud and slime and Bethany broke a comb trying to untangle her hair.

I don't feel like I missed out on anything at all.

When we got to shore, we spent some time shopping, then walked home in time for the sunset. I read on the deck while my roommates showered. Lydia was the first ready, so she and I went to Poppy's office to order room service baklava for everyone's dessert. Lydia and I both ordered dinner as well (moussaka for me, some vegetarian dish with vine leaves for Lydia).

The food arrived quickly and was delicious. We spent the rest of the evening talking and packing before another early bedtime.

Saturday morning, we met Vangelis in the parking lot at 7:30 for a ride to the airport. He packed all of our things in his van, then shook our hands and wished us a safe flight before leaving us at the tiny airport's main door.

It took us about half an hour to get through security since their was only one man working in the entire airport (remember how I said the Santorini airport is essentially one room?). Luckily, we were on the only flight leaving that morning, so there was no rush and we were about ten feet away from our departure gate.

The flight back to Athens was smooth and took less time than going through security. We had a five hour layover in the Athens airport, so we looked around at the shops, ate lunch, then played Simon Says and Never Have I Ever outside in the parking lot until our next flight (we got a lot of very strange looks...).

From Athens, we went to Zurich, Switzerland to catch a connecting flight to Firenze. I feel like I belong in Switzerland.

Standing in line for the ladies' room, I noticed that five of the other women in line were taller than I was and the only two women shorter were other Americans.

Walking from the W.C. back to our gate, I noticed that I was surrounded by people my height or taller. All of the men were taller than I was. Most of the women were taller than I was. I felt like an average height. There were women in heels who towered over me, walking with men who were still taller than the women. I turned to Lydia (who is just about my height) as we walked through a souvenir shop.

"I never want to leave," I told her. "These are our people."

Lydia laughed. She spent a weekend in Interlaken, Switzerland in February and so had already had one of these awakenings.

The entire time we were in the airport, I kept looking at the women's pants and shoes. They all had feet my size! Or bigger! They all had legs as long as mine! Many of them had longer legs! I could buy shoes here with no problem! I could find jeans that cover my ankles without digging through every pair in the store for something marked "long" or "tall."

I looked at the men, too. They were all definitely over six feet tall. No exception (except for tourists). If I lived in Switzerland, I could meet a guy taller than me who isn't a basketball player. Success! We could buy shoes together in the normal part of a store and live happily ever after.

I am moving to Switzerland.

Sadly, not yet though. We touched down in Firenze around 8 p.m. then took a taxi home. After unpacking, Bethany and I both went right to bed. This morning, we slept in and went grocery shopping, and have just been hanging out this afternoon. Erika still isn't home since she's taking boats and buses back from Greece rather than a plane. Apparently, she won't be home until midnight. Good thing we didn't do that. Also, there's laundry hanging on every available surface of the house since Bethany and I both washed a week and a half's worth of clothes today. I wish we had a dryer. Study abroad problems.

So that's it. That was my Grecian adventure. No riots (except for the one James went to our last night in Athens); just lots of sun, fun, friends, photos, gyros, and ouzo, and the greatest week of my life.

Donkey Trails

This morning, we got up bright and early to ride donkeys down a hill.

That wasn't quite our original plan. The actual plan was just to ride donkeys somewhere. We thought that somewhere might be somewhere that felt safe, like along the sea or on a level path.

Instead, Bethany, Lydia, Kate, Jess, and I rode donkeys down steep stairs leading from the top of a cliff down into the sea.

This was all Lydia's idea. Lydia has been going on about riding donkeys since we left Athens, and all of us but Caitlin gave in and agreed to this plan.

The five of us rode our quads into Fira this morning and found a stable Lydia saw yesterday. The stable was more of a lean-to at the top of some stairs where about fifteen donkeys and two very weathered old men dressed kind of like donkeys were milling around on the steps. We approached the two men and their herd and Lydia asked how much it would be for a ride.

"Five Euro down, fifteen up," answered one of the Old Men of the Sea.

Our group stepped aside to discuss this. Poppy had warned us not to ride a donkey down anything because they slip easily down things like stairs leading into the sea. But Lydia really wanted to ride donkeys and we didn't know where else to go for that and we didn't want to pay the ten extra Euro just to go up the stairs.

We returned to Santiago and his brother and Lydia told them we wanted one ride down the hill for each of us.

"Five Euro," Santiago repeated, holding out his hand for all of our money.

Things got uncomfortable after that (because they weren't before...). As soon as we were all paid for, Santiago literally grabbed Bethany and threw her up onto the nearest donkey. Next he came toward me and I jumped up onto the next closest donkey to avoid the old guy getting too close. Right behind me, Kate scrambled onto her donkey as Santiago patted Bethany's donkey and the whole herd started stumbling down the stairs. I turned to make sure Kate was seated; she was already white and clinging to her donkey with a panicked look in her eyes. She mouthed "I'm scared" to me and looked about to cry.

As we rounded the first bend, I heard Bethany - who has to make friends with everyone we meet - asking Santiago what her donkey's name was.

"Maria," I heard him answer after a pause of about a minute.

"What about that donkey?" Bethany asked, pointing at the white donkey I was riding.

"Maria," Santiago answered after another long pause.

"Oh, so they're both named Maria?" Bethany asked.

Santiago didn't answer again. In fact, he said nothing else to us the entire way down the hill, nor when we got to the bottom. "Maria" was the last we heard from him.

Bethany turned to look at me with a slightly alarmed look on her face.

"Do you really think these donkeys have names?" I asked her. "I bet you any money he's going to eat Maria as soon as we leave."

I heard Kate laugh and/or sob behind me and turned to look at her.

"Amy, keep telling jokes. I want to forget where I am right now."

So that was the beginning of one of the stranger experiences of my life. I talked about eating donkeys while we bounced and slipped our way to the bottom of the stairs. The whole thing only lasted about twenty minutes, but I lost all grasp of time as I focused on keeping Kate from losing her mind. Despite the fact that my donkey almost face-planted once or twice and fell on its ass three times and I had to side-saddle at one point to avoid Bethany's donkey pooping on my leg, I started to kind of enjoy the ride. We were overlooking one of the most beautiful settings I've ever seen, it was an adrenaline rush and I felt safer as we went further on and no one fell into the water or under trampling hooves.

Me and Bethany on the way down.

Kate holding it together.

We finally got to the bottom of the cliff and another paddock. Santiago said nothing, but motioned us to jump down, then he led all the donkeys into their pen and went inside a little hutch. He didn't come out again.

The three of us waited for Jess and Lydia who were coming down with the second man and another group of donkeys. They too were ushered unceremoniously from their steeds when they got to us and Santiago the Second followed Santiago the First into the shed.

We were left with nowhere to go but up. It was now very hot and we had to walk up stairs that had taken us twenty minutes to ride down. This sucked. When I finally got to the top of the hill after a very long time, I was dripping sweat and panting. The five of us sat about ten feet from the donkeys that had been left behind at the top of the hill in the only shady spot we could find and didn't speak until we had all caught our breath and were ready to move on.

We got lunch at a cute little restaurant where we could sit and eat on an outdoor terrace hanging over the street. I ordered moussaka and, in doing so, discovered one of my new favorite foods. It will be my mission when I get back to the States to find somewhere in Pittsburgh that serves good moussaka.

After lunch, we met the rest of the girls for another afternoon of four-wheeling. Erika, Yelena and Kelsey rented quads this morning, so we could all drive around together, calling ourselves the "Santorini Saints" gang and posing for gang photos on a scenic overlook. Real tough.

We ended the day in Oia, where we shopped for souvenirs (I bought some earrings made with lava rocks), walked around the neighborhoods, befriended stray dogs and cats, saw a windmill, and stayed to watch what we were promised would be the most beautiful sunset in all of Greece.

This is pretty good.

After that, we found another restaurant where we could eat on a terrace overlooking the sea. Because Bus2Alps was in the area with about 200 college students in tow, the restaurant was filled and the poor couple working the restaurant (that's right; our waiter and his wife were the only two people working in a restaurant about the size of a typical Eat 'n Park) ran around in an obvious state of panic the whole evening.

They were very nice about the whole situation though. The husband read us the entire menu (not necessary since it was in English), then got very stressed out when half our group tried to order Greek omelets ("We don't serve eggs for dinner!"), even though he had recommended them ("I think you should come back tomorrow to eat breakfast"). Everything worked out though and I ended up with a phenomenal vine leaves lasagna (the house special) and a glass of the famous local Vin Santo dessert wine (not as good as the raisin wine I had in Cinque Terre, but still excellent).

Once we had all finished, we tried to order baklava for dessert, but our waiter wouldn't have it. Instead, he brought us fresh-out-of-the-oven brownies and told us not to pay because they were on the house. The brownies were delicious and made me realize just how much I miss American desserts (Italians always ruin chocolate cake).

We just got home from dinner a little bit ago and I am exhausted. As soon as I can get in the bathroom, I'm taking a shower and going right to bed. Lydia and I are planning to get up early tomorrow to watch the sunrise and try to find that red beach before meeting the rest of our group in Fira for a boat tour.

I can't believe we only have one day left of spring break. This week is going by far too fast.

Four Wheeling

Today we rented quads. I have a feeling this will have been the best decision of the entire trip.

Santorini might be an island, but it's too big to walk and our hostel - though very. very nice - is off a highway and not close to anything.

Poppy, the lovely woman who runs this place, and her husband Vangelis made us coffee this morning when we stopped in the main office to ask about renting quads for the day. As we drank our coffee outside in the garden, Poppy made a few phone calls and arranged for the manager of a local vehicle rental company to pick us up from Villa Manos and drive us to his shop.

The two guys at the rental place were very nice, recommending things to see and do this week while they fitted all six of us for helmets and had us fill out the paperwork for renting three of the quads.

A brief driving lesson lasting all of two minutes and we were good to go for the afternoon.

We spent the rest of the day zooming around the island (Bethany driving our quad while I rode behind), stopping when we saw something interesting, and off-roading wherever we thought we could chance it. If you ever go to Santorini yourself, keep in mind that this is the way to travel.

Me driving out of Fira.

Our first stop was back at the beach we went to yesterday just to make sure we could read the map and get our bearings properly. Then we rode off in search of a restaurant in Fira recommended to us by the woman Bethany and I met on the plane to Athens.

Fira was up a very high, winding pathway with a gorgeous ocean view. In this case, getting there was more than half the fun. When we got to Fira, we stopped in a grocery store to ask directions to the restaurant, only to find that it's closed weekdays. Instead, the cashier and her only customer consulted and sent us down the road to Mythos Taverna, which they said was the best of the few open restaurants in the area.

Mythos was fantastic. I love everything about the food I've had in Greece. We ordered a plate of tomato balls (again recommended by our friend from the plane) to split among the six of us. They were interesting, but in a good way. I feel like they may have just been mushed up tomatoes fried with various seasonings. They had a very strong tomato taste and were crunchy and delicious. Our main course was gyros again, followed by halva for dessert.

When our waiter first brought out the halva, I had no idea what it was. I had to Google it when we got home because when we asked the name of the dessert, the waiter just kept repeating that it was traditional.

It was served in a brick and looked somewhat like a used bar of yellowing soap, topped with cinnamon. The consistency was strange as well. As much as we poked at it, it kept springing back into its original shape. We couldn't really chew it, but it dissolved in our mouths into a bunch of little beads. It had a flavor that reminded me of pound cake, honey, lemons, and oranges all at once, and - once I got more used to the consistency - I decided that I liked it.

Not everyone shared my opinion of this unidentified dessert. We were split right down the middle with who enjoyed it and who hated it. Oh well. More for those of us who enjoyed it (or were at least intrigued enough not to hate it).

After lunch, we went looking for a red beach that we thought was nearby. We found only one sign pointing in the direction of the beach, and it lead down a dirt trail.

Since we had our quads, we followed the trail - me driving this time and Bethany riding - until I suddenly found myself caught in a little ravine that had sprung out of nowhere in the middle of the increasingly steep and dangerous hill. Our quad lurched to the side and turned quickly toward the edge of the cliff. I stood up and put all my weight into holding onto the break lever, and we stopped about a foot short of going over the edge.

Bethany and I had been last in our little caravan, and by the time we got off the quad and pulled it back into the road, we realized no one had seen us nearly die. The four other girls had gone on without us.

We got everything together and made it around the next bend when we saw Caitlin and Lydia driving toward us. The road ahead was getting too dangerous to continue, so the pair of them and Kate and Jess were turning around.

Once we were all turned around and back on the main road, we stopped to check the map again and try to find out where we had gone wrong in searching for the red beach. We couldn't figure it out, so instead we made a new plan: to find a lighthouse.

Surprisingly, this was much easier than finding a marked beach. Not only did we find a lovely lighthouse and spend the next hour or two climbing the rocks all around it, but we also ran into Melanie and Simone from our St. Patty's Day adventure in Athens and spent some time catching up with them.

We continued riding around until dinnertime, when we went back to Villa Manos to eat. After dinner, Caitlin, Lydia and I drove to Hotel Antonia in Fira to pick up Erika, Yelena and Kelsey, who arrived today with Bus2Alps. Since they were tired from traveling and we were tired from riding all day, the nine of us hung out by the pool and just talked until we couldn't stay awake much longer and took the other girls back to their hotel with plans to meet up again in the morning.

Athens to Santorini

Our last day in Athens ended almost as perfectly as the rest of the weekend went.

Bethany, Lydia and I went into the Temple of the Olympian Zeus to see the ancient pillars up close. Today was one of the most beautiful days I could ever possibly imagine. We took no less than 200 photos (in reality, it was less than that, but maybe not much less) around the temple, including this one.

We also took some nice photos, too. But this is the best picture ever created. Be jealous. And note the logo on the side of the spaceship. I'm hoping this will allow us to comp some free tickets from Lufthansa (If you know anyone with inside Lufthansa connections, give him/her the URL for this blog NOW! Thanks!).

We wanted to make it back to Fresko for Greek yogurt (I got yogurt with wild honey and walnuts there yesterday and it was delicious) before our flight, but we ended up not having time after all of the photos and the fraternizing with packs of wild dogs.

*Wild dogs roam everywhere in Athens in slightly menacing packs, but all of the ones we encountered were very friendly, including the one Kate named Balto, who followed us from our apartment to the restaurant last night, then waited outside to walk us home and the blind bug-eyed one that Bethany petted but the rest of us were too afraid to touch. We knew the blind one was blind because kept tripped over curbs and walking into things, like phone poles and oncoming traffic.

The three of us met the other half of our group back at Athens Studios at 11:30 to collect our bags and go to the airport, where we had a flight to Santorini at 2.

Even though the flight to Santorini was barely half an hour, we flew Lufthansa, so we flew in style. We were greeted on the flight by two smiling hostesses handing out individually wrapped gumdrops. Halfway through the flight we got free pop and pretzels. It was a lovely experience.

Landing in Santorini was much different than landing in Athens. The airport is one room and has one runway.

After we picked up our luggage, we went out to the curb, where a man holding a "Villa Manos" (the hostel we are currently staying in) sign greeted us and directed us to the Villa Manos bus.

He was very nice, like just about everyone we've encountered in Greece, offering to carry our bags and loading the van for us. The ride to our hostel was only about 15 minutes and seemed faster as we drove along gorgeous beachfronts.

Once we got to the hostel, unpacked and checked in, our first plan of action was to lay out by this pool.

We did this until we were hungry for dinner, so we went for a walk to scope the place out, then did some grocery shopping. Then it was sandwiches for dinner (we have no appliances for cooking in this new hostel) and watching "Hercules" before bed.

(By the way, this "apartment" is tiny. The first room has a double bed and the second room has four beds wall to wall, a four-person table, a tiny desk and chair, and a refrigerator - all about three inches from each other. But at least you can't beat the view.)

This morning we slept in, then caught the 11 a.m. bus to one of the black sand beaches. That was interesting. The "city bus" was a tour bus with cushioned seats and televisions, but the guy taking everyone's money was crazy. When we tried to ask if we were on the right bus, he started repeatedly yelling that the fare was 1.60 Euro. We ended up just paying and having to trust that we were heading in the right direction.

Eventually the bus came to a halt in a neighborhood with no beach in sight (this was about two minutes at after the driver stopped at a convenience store to get a sandwich).

"Get out! Everyone out!" barked the ticket man. We made the mistake of questioning whether we were in the right place, and he gestured us off the bus, still yelling.

Clueless as to where we were, we began wandering around and luckily found the beach within about five minutes, since there was no one around to ask directions.

Once settled on the beach, we laid around all day reading and listening to music. Santorini, we've discovered, is completely dead outside of tourist season, so our group made up more than half the beach-going population.

After a few hours, we left the beach in search of lunch, and found excellent and cheap gyros in the only restaurant that seemed to be open. Then we shopped (there seem to be more boutiques open than restaurants) for another few hours, got ice cream, and took the bus home (well, we took it past home, since the driver was totally oblivious to our standing in the aisle saying, "Hey! We needed to get off there!")

No sooner had we got into our room, than the woman who runs Villa Manos knocked on the door leading out to the pool.

"I have a surprise for you in my office, if you are all here," she told us.

Curious, we dropped off our things from the beach and followed her.

The surprise turned out to be a home cooked meal of pasta, bean salad and fresh bread. The food was delicious and we were thrilled to have it.

Now that we are all fed and the sun has set, we'll be sticking to our room for the rest of the evening. It's too chilly right now to sit outside and we all have blogs to catch up with anyhow. We're currently planning renting Vespas or quads for tomorrow to see the island. Unfortunately, I don't think there's much to see. Since the tourist season here doesn't officially begin until the end of April, nothing is open and there's almost no one around. The place is a ghost town. It's a little bit depressing, I think. Looks like we won't be making friends like we did in Athens.

But there are six of us on a beautiful island in Greece. How hard can it be to find something to do?

Where are all the riots?

I don't know if this weekend could have been much more perfect.

After dinner last night, we met James and his new friends Claude (from Portland, Oregon) and Melanie and Simone (a French-Canadian couple) at the sports bar downstairs. The bar was getting crowded, so we made the executive decision to follow James to a bar called "The James Joyce," which we had seen earlier in the day. 

Unfortunately, James' sense of direction isn't as good at night and/or after a few drinks because he lead us all over Athens. We were actually circling the Acropolis looking for this place, until we caught a promising glimmer of green and yellow lights coming from down a street.

The James Joyce was hopping. Our group immediately got split up in the overwhelming crowd. Everyone and everything was green and two guys on stage were playing some kind of weird Irish music. Eventually we got our group back together with everyone but Simone, who had told us he needed to say good-bye to "some people" before running off into the mob. Melanie told us she would stay and look for him and the rest of us moved on.

We found a restaurant that was a lot more calm and decided to hang out there for a little while. It didn't take long though for us all to realize just how tired we were, so we made our way back home; getting lost again but not minding since it was such a beautiful night.

This morning we met James and Claude at the Fish Cafe, then did our own tour of Athens. We went into the Acropolis since it's free Sundays and around some of the other ancient temples.

The Acropolis is amazing (I mean, it is the Acropolis). We saw the Parthenon, of course, and the Erechtheion, and they were beautiful. I feel like the ruins here are a lot similar to the ruins in Rome and I think that unfortunately diminished some of the awe factor here, but it was still incredible to walk around these ancient buildings. Also, the view from the top of the Acropolis is breathtaking. We spent most of our time up there just sitting and watching all of Athens spread out below us (and posing for about 200 photos).

Me, Lydia, Caitlin, James, and Claude in front
of the Parthenon.

After the Acropolis, we went back to the lookout hill we visited on our tour and laid around talking and enjoying another beautiful view and perfect weather before moving on to get lunch (gyros again) and do some shopping in Syntagma Square.

The Square was packed and we ended up getting split into three groups within the crowd. Bethany and I gave up trying to find everyone and began making our way home, hoping to find at least part of the group there.

We ran into Jess, Kate and Claude near the Acropolis Museum and Caitlin, Lydia and James back at our apartment, where Claude left us to go meet a group from his hostel.

James left a little before dinner, this time for good since he was heading to a soccer match, then returning to England on a late plane tonight. We said our good-byes, then the six of us girls went out in search of dinner.

We ended up wandering until we found a promising-looking restaurant called Plakiotissa Taverna Mezedopolio (say that ten times fast). I liked it because everything in the restaurant - from the furniture to the walls to the chandeliers - was green. A little old man brought us bread, olive oil and vinegar, and water with our menus while the two-man band tuned up. We were the only people in the restaurant until our food arrived, so we were slightly concerned, but this turned out to be one of the best decisions of our time in Athens.

The band struck up an upbeat tune in Greek (this is the first place I've been in Europe where they listen to their own music and not music from the States) and soon our waiter was out clapping his hands and singing along while we followed his lead and clapped along with him.

The staff were all in a great mood and made us feel like guests of honor when they brought out our dinners (rice and meatballs for me). They continued serenading us throughout dinner with a mixture of Greek music, American oldies and Beatles tunes.

Once our plates were cleared away, the manager asked which of us was the best singer. We pointed to Jess since used to sing in a chorus. She protested, but between us, the band and the manager, she ended up standing with the band and singing through "Let It Be" with them.

After that, the manager called the rest of us up and taught us how to dance. We did some sort of Greek circle dance that involved sidestepping and kicking and it was tons of fun! After we thought we had the hang of it, the manager stepped out to let the six of us dance on our own while he stood back and clapped in time.

Once we had the circle dance semi-mastered, the manager pulled out a chair and set it in the center of our circle. He had Caitlin stand on it and told her to dance while we all danced around her. At first she wasn't sure what to do, so the manager called a guy who I'm going to assume was the dishwasher out of the back of the restaurant and this guy showed us how to dance.

Caitlin tried to copy him, but he was really into it, with a lot of hip-shaking and jumping around. Caitlin tried her best but ended up inventing her own dance on the chair.

Caitlin, Kate, me, Kostos, Bethany, Jess, and Lydia
with the band.

We danced with the manager and the younger guy and sang along to the songs we knew from the band until all the other guests had left. It was nearly midnight when we left and at least Lydia and I plan on getting up early tomorrow to fit in a bit more sightseeing before we have to be at the airport at noon for our flight to Santorini.

Today was such a full day, I can't wait to crawl into bed. Hopefully I'll sleep better tonight than I did last night. It was cold and loud in our room because we accidentally left a window open... Won't be doing that again. 

The Road to Athens

Spring Break 2012: Florence Edition is well underway. I'm currently in Athens with Bethany, Lydia, Caitlin, Jess, and Kate and this is already THE GREATEST SPRING BREAK EVER. Life itself may never get better than this, and I'm kind of okay with that.

Bethany, Lydia, Jess, and I left the Firenze Airport yesterday morning on a 9:20 flight to Frankfurt. Unlike on our flight to Madrid, we had no problem getting through security and to Frankfurt. We had an hour at the Frankfurt airport to get to our gate (MUCH easier than when we went through Frankfurt in January to get to Florence), and let me just say, if you ever need to fly in Europe, fly with Lufthansa. Not only was our flight easy, but it was enjoyable. The two flight attendants were so kind and obviously loving their job. When you asked for a drink, they said "Absolutely!" with genuine delight, as if they could imagine no greater joy than serving food on an airplane. They asked several times if we were enjoying our flight and if there was anything they could do to improve our trip. We got a meal (beef stew, a roll and a chocolate bar) and it was all tasty, quality food.

As if this wasn't already far more than we could have hoped, Bethany and I sat next to the sweetest little old Athenian woman. She was on her way home from a business trip in Germany and we passed a lot of time on the plane getting suggestions on where to go and what to do in Athens and Santorini from this woman. She was also very interested in hearing about our study abroad experience. When we got off the plane in Athens, Mrs. G (no matter how many times she said her name, Bethany and I still couldn't get it) shook both mine and Bethany's hands and wished us a lovely stay in Greece.

From the airport, we had a half hour metro ride to the stop closest to our apartment in Athens Studios(we rented a cheap apartment for the weekend, figuring it would be safer with all of the riots that we have yet to see). The apartment is literally three minutes past the metro stop, so it was easy to find.

By the time we got to the apartment (where we met Caitlin and Kate who flew from Rome), it was just past 6 p.m. Greek time (they're an hour ahead of Florence) and we were all exhausted from getting up earlier and travelling. We checked out the apartment (it's bigger and more modern than mine in Firenze) and caught up with Cait and Kate, who arrived in Athens about three hours before the rest of us.

Once we were all rested up, the six of us went downstairs for dinner at Fish Cafe, the restaurant owned by our apartment complex. It was DELICIOUS. I got fish and chips with Greek yogurt and strawberries for dessert. We were all really happy with our meals.

We went to bed early in order to be rested for breakfast and a walking tour today. Fish Cafe offers free breakfast for residents and this breakfast was better than most of the breakfasts I've paid for in Europe so far. We got two fresh-baked rolls with butter and jam and a hardboiled egg. The rolls were so warm and tasty, and very filling, which was great since we had a long day of walking ahead of us.

The walking tour left from Athens Backpackers, a tour company owned by Athens Studios and located about a five minute walk from our apartment. It was only 6 Euros for a nearly five hour tour. And the tour couldn't have been any better.

Our guide (once again, I couldn't understand his name, which I felt really bad about, but Greek is ridiculous) was really awesome and the people in our group were good as well. The guide made us all go around in a circle and say our names and where we were from. There was a good mix, with people from France, Argentina, South Africa, and James from England. James immediately jumped in with the six of us as the only as native English speakers. I'll get to him in a bit.

We saw everything on this tour. We went to the Temple of Olympian Zeus and Hadrian's Arch, the Acropolis, the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, an Islamic temple, the Olympic Stadium and Olympic training center, the House of Parliament, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, a flea market, and several look-out points. The six of us and James even ate some of the "oranges" growing in trees lining the streets.

"And don't eat the oranges, because they aren't oranges," our guide said as everyone turned to watch the seven of us stuffing our faces with the sour/grapefruit-like fruits. Oh well. At least we weren't all dumb Americans for once.

Everywhere we went, our guide gave us an entertaining and thorough explanation. He was very funny and seemed to know everything about everything. We quickly compared him to a Greek Fabrizio/Rocky; incredibly friendly and a walking encyclopedia. In between locations, he suggested other places to visit in Athens and Santorini and asked us questions about study abroad. He also teased James a lot about being British, since there's apparently a large rivalry between England and Greece. The Greeks feel like the English have stolen a lot of historical artifacts from them, but it seems to be a good-natured rivalry.

We had a break around noon to get lunch (I had a really good gyro from a stand near the flea market), then finished the tour around 3:00. At the Odeon, our last stop on the tour, an angry older woman came out of nowhere and started barking things at our tour guide. He answered and she would start again. Finally, she calmed down and walked away. We all looked expectantly at the guide, but he told us he would explain after the tour.

So we waited patiently for him to give the last ten minutes or so of his speech, then - as the group began to split up to go our separate ways - Bethany asked again what the woman had said. Everyone stopped what they were doing and came back to hear the response.

"She was asking if I had a permit to give you a tour," our guide said.

He then explained that he never went to tour-guide school to become a licensed guide, so he told the woman that he was a professor - not a lie since he told us at the began of the tour that he's a was a history teacher up until two years ago when he became a guide - and that we were his students.

We asked if he's ever been asked that before. He told us he has a few times, but the Backpackers company has the capacity to intervene if he ever has a real problem.

"All of these registered tour guides are 60-something women who don't get enough sex, so they're out here to bother everyone else."

We all burst out laughing at this.

"I probably shouldn't say that," he added. "But I know it's true."

We talked more about tour school and about his teaching job. He taught at University of Kent in England, but quit because he said the English students are disrespectful and not very serious about their studies.

James kind of grinned at this and kicked the ground, but did admit that students in England "are a lot more cheeky" than students he's encountered in his travels to other countries. He said he already knew English kids have a very bad reputation.

The six of us, on the other hand, were excited to hear "Kent" and "University" in the same context and announced that we kind of go to Kent University. This rang a bell with our guide and James, who both made comments along the lines of "Oh, yeah, I did know there was another Kent in Amerirker."

When we got back to our starting point, the six of us said good-bye and left to return to our apartment. James - who we knew came to Greece by himself for holiday - seemed very reluctant to part ways and watched us leave with this kind of lost puppy look on his face.

We walked a little bit away and consulted as a group whether to invite him to come with us. Deciding it was okay, I called him over.

He was obviously very excited about us inviting him to hang out, and as the afternoon went on, we realized we made a great decision in inviting him along. We agreed to meet him at Fish Cafe in half an hour to take our own tour of Athens.

Caitlin, Lydia and I were the only three who weren't too tired to walk some more, so we met James at the appointed time and started walking without any particular location in mind. James was about as lost as we were since he only got here Wednesday, but since none of us had anywhere to be, we were content just wandering.

We roamed around for about an hour, looking at various sights and discussing the differences between America, England and Greece. We talked about our semester in Italy and about all of the places James has been in Europe.

Eventually, we stumbled accidentally upon a coffee shop James went to Thursday morning and we stopped for Greek coffee. James said it had an acquired taste since it is very sweet, but Lydia and I loved it immediately. We sat outside on a main road and watched the crowd (the street was so crowded) and talked more about school. James is a journalism major as well, so we had a good long discussion on grammar and differences between British and American English and stories we've written for school newspapers and otherwise.

When the sun began to set, we got up and made our way back to our apartment. James was eager to get back for a rugby match which they are currently showing in the sports bar next door to Athens Studios. So we left him at the bar and went next door to Fish Cafe for burgers. I had a Hawaiian burger and it was by far the best hamburger I've had since leaving the States; although that's not saying much, considering I've only had two other burgers on this trip - one at McDonald's and one completely raw one at the ClubHouse in Florence.

Currently, I'm digesting this excellent meal and waiting for my hair to dry a bit before going out tonight. I just got a much-needed shower since we're supposed to meet James at the bar when his match is over.

Needless to say, it's been an amazing day. I had so much fun and I don't know how it could have been much better. I am SO happy right now; I'm never going to want to go home.

I'm glad all the naysayers who said we'd die in Athens didn't dissuade us from coming here, because the city is gorgeous, the people are the nicest I've met to date in Europe, the weather is perfect, and I am seriously loving life right now. I can't wait to see what's in store for the rest of this week and, of course, to tell you all about it.

Happy St. Patty's Day!

Going Mad In Madrid

Madrid Day One: Friday.

We got up around 9 Friday morning and went to Cafe Nebraska down the street for churros and chocolate caldo (super thick hot chocolate; like hot icing to dip the churros in) and to plan our day.

Our first stop after breakfast was Las Ventas bullfighting arena. The bullfighting season doesn't begin until April, but we got a fantastic tour of the arena. Our guide showed us the names of the most famous matadors to ever fight in the arena and told us some of their stories; like Antonio Bienvenida being carried out of the arena on the shoulders of a parade (the highest honor) eleven times in his career and another matador being gored through the heart and killed in his first Las Ventas match. The most interesting story was about an older matador in the early 1900's who was so popular, Spain would not allow him to retire when he wanted to. And when I say "Spain," I mean he was legally not allowed to retire by order of the King and Queen.

His solution? Throw a bullfight. He let the bull win and it cost him his life. I'm sure you can imagine how that went down.

After these lovely histories, we got to sit in the expensive season ticket holder seats (in the shade), then walk around the arena to see where the bulls are let in, where the matadors stand to wait for the bull and where the backup on horses enter the arena.

We then moved to a back hallway to see the matadors' dressing room, the arena emergency room where they operate on gored matadors and the veterinary hospital where they inspect the bulls to ensure they are in perfect health before going into the ring to meet their deaths. How warm and fuzzy.

Lucy, our tour guide, told us that in the arena's history, only four fighting bulls have been spared this brutal fate. A bull can be spared if the matador thinks the bull is unusually smart and brave. The matador can stop a fight to ask the arena manager for the bull's life. The manager then polls the audience and if he and the audience agree that the bull being fought is too majestic to kill, the match ends in a draw and the bull is sent back to the breeder to be used as a prize stud.

In every other case (which is essentially every case) the matador fights the bull in three stages, ending with the bull being stabbed through the shoulder, into the heart and out the chest cavity, supposedly the quickest and most human way to kill this animal. If the matador does well, he can be awarded in one of four ways.

The first way: He is allowed to cut off one ear from the bull to keep as a trophy.

The second way: He is allowed to cut off both ears for trophies.

The third way: He is allowed to cut off both ears and the tail for trophies.

The fourth way: He is carried from the arena on the shoulders of the fans in a giant parade through Madrid.

Naturally, the better you fight, the more prizes you get. It's fairly uncommon for a matador to get one ear, so anything beyond that guarantees you a spot in the record books. If you get carried out, forget about it. You'll be a national hero longer than there will be bulls in Spain. It's a big deal.

After a very thorough tour, Bethany, Caitlin and I asked Lucy if we could go back into the arena for photos. She had to take us because we weren't allowed to be there unsupervised, but she was very cool and talked to us for about twenty minutes after the tour ended, answering our additional questions and talking about how she fell in love with bullfighting when she was twelve. Born and raised in England, Lucy saw her first fight on a family vacation to Madrid and moved to Spain specifically to work in Las Ventas when she graduated university. She finally passed the audition for tour manager two months ago and lives and breathes bullfighting. Lucy addressed how even in Madrid, many people view bullfighting as a form of animal cruelty (which I can agree with). But she also explained how revered the bull is in Spain and how its a symbol of the strength of the Spanish people. The bull is sacred, in a way. There is a very technical art to bullfighting that triggers strong emotions in the audience, and those emotions are what bullfighting is all about.

I thought this was a very interesting answer and, even though I don't fully agree, I can understand now some of the deeper meaning behind these fights.

After talking to Lucy, we went to the Las Ventas museum to look at the matador costumes on display there, then walked across the city again to El Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, best known for its Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dali collections.

If you are ever in Madrid, go to this museum. I know you probably don't like modern art, but this museum is sweet and the almost the entire second floor is dedicated to Picasso and Dali paintings and sculptures. So you know it's good stuff. Also, there's a series of movies filmed in the mid-1800's showing old Spanish men drinking and playing cards and some girl spinning around in a flamenco dress (two different movies; don't get ideas). As far as movies go, these are each about thirty seconds long and really boring, but the novelty of seeing really early film was something that I at least could appreciate.

After this museum, we took a metro back to the hostel. And this is where the weekend took a very fast, very bad turn. The three of us were about four stops from home when the metro stopped at another station. A man who had been standing near us got off the metro, then turned and looked directly at Bethany. He said something in Spanish, but since I wasn't expecting it and was a few people away from the man and Bethany, I couldn't understand him. Bethany asked what he said and he repeated himself, then turned and disappeared running into the crowd. This time I understood the word bolso, Spanish for purse.

"Check your purse," I told Bethany as the man vanished.

Bethany looked and her purse was wide open. Caitlin and I exchanged some dark looks, both of us realizing what happened as Bethany began shoving the contents of her purse into our hands while she searched for her wallet.

"It's gone," she said, panicking. "It was right on top."

We knew what it was, of course. By this point we were one stop from home. One of us told Bethany to put everything back in her purse and zip it shut until we got somewhere safe.

It was a really tense ride home with Bethany having a silent meltdown and Caitlin and I wondering how, if possible, we could console her.

When we made it safely back to our hostel, Bethany dumped the entire contents of her purse onto her bed, but the wallet and everything in it - money, credit cards, drivers license, insurance card, keys to school and to the hostel - were long gone. We reported it to the hostel manager, but she said there was nothing that could be done, which we understood. We already knew there are no security cameras on the metros or in the tunnels.

Since Bethany clearly needed some time alone, Caitlin and I walked around for about an hour looking for souvenirs and exploring the neighborhood shops. We got home in time to shower and get Bethany before dinner. The three of us had new roommates now: two girls from Philly and a girl from Boston. We talked to them for a while (we were so lucky that five of the six roommates we had this weekend were wonderful), then went to a flamenco club called "Las Tablas."

Las Tablas was another spectacular deal. For €22 each, we got sangria, tapas and a nearly two hour flamenco show. The drinks and food were good, but the show was excellent. I was surprised that the dancers were all older (two women and one man, all in their mid to late 40's), but they were really talented. They each danced solos while a flamenco band sang and played behind them, then all three danced together for the finale. The two women wore about eight beautiful costumes between the pair of them and they put on a very entertaining show. The three of us were especially impressed when the man danced because he moved his feet so fast it didn't seem humanly possible.

Even Bethany left the show in a very good mood. We got out of Las Tablas around 11 p.m. and tried to find somewhere to go dancing ourselves. Unfortunately, in Spain you can't get into any clubs if you're under 18 and since Bethany no longer has any I.D. with her, we wandered from place to place being rejected. Apparently we look younger than 18? We finally found one bar that let us in, but the crowd there was not our style, so we didn't stay an hour. Instead, we wandered around observing the nightlife from outside before going back to the hostel and going to bed.

Madrid Day Two: Saturday.

We went to breakfast at Dunkin Donuts Saturday morning. I got a maple glazed donut and black coffee. It tasted like America. As we sat on the restaurant's street-side patio eating our donuts, we planned day two.

The plan ended up to have no plan. Instead we walked all day. We saw street performers and a wedding in Plaza Mayor, Palacio Real and Los Jardines de Sabatini (Royal Palace and Gardens), the Gay District, the Shoe District (conveniently located just outside the Gay District), Puerta del Sol, San Francisco El Grande, and El Parque de Las Vistillas, where we watched the sunset along the edges of Madrid.

After the sun went down, we wandered in search of food since - again - we had been too busy touring all day to eat anything. We managed to find a restaurant where not a soul spoke English, which meant the food was going to be authentic. I ordered something unidentifiable that involved lobster and nothing else I recognized. Caitlin ordered an assortment of tostas, or open-faced sandwiches, and Bethany closed her eyes and picked something.

What I ended up with was a plate of many things resembling hush puppies, filled with pureed lobster. They were good once I got past the puke-like consistency and discovered that they were most definitely pure lobster rolled in oil and bread crumbs.

Caitlin got three types of tostas: Raw salmon on brie, seafood salad and liver pate. Caitlin does not eat seafood, but she pushed through anyhow. She ate the bread and cheese and picked at the fish. She ate all the liver because Bethany was able to convince her that it was oddly colored cheese.

Bethany did the best out of all of us, ending up with steak and french fries even though she definitely ordered some kind of tacos out of the seafood section of the menu. Caitlin and I were very jealous of this dinner until Bethany cut into the steak to discover that it was - in typical European fashion - completely raw inside. At least by now we know you can eat totally raw meat in Europe, so she survived, albeit being somewhat letdown.

We ended up all sharing our plates so that no one ate too much of something vaguely threatening. Needless to say, the menu this weekend was a far cry from the nachos and enchiladas we had expected from a Spanish-speaking country.

We were home by 11 Saturday night since we had a plane to catch at 9 a.m. We left the hostel just before 7 in order to ensure we had enough time to make our plane. As it turned out, we needn't have gotten up so early: our RyanAir flight was delayed by two hours. We spent that time talking to a girl from Texas who is engaged to a guy from Florence and was visiting friends in Madrid for the weekend. She talked about how she met her fiance while he was studying as an exchange student in San Marcos and about the language/cultural barrier between her and her non-English speaking in-laws. We all talked about the biggest differences we've found between American and Italian culture and about how rude Europeans are. It helped pass the time.

We finally got to Pisa around 1:30 and took a train home at 2, where Bethany and I promptly ran home to eat since we'd had nothing but snacks all day. I don't think I've ever been so excited to see a bowl of penne and 59 cent tomato sauce.

So that was Madrid. It was high highs shadowed by low lows, but all in all, I'd say it was a good weekend. It sure beats being back in Ohio.

Getting To Madrid

I finally did it. I finally took my first weekend trip outside of Italy... I went to Madrid.

Which is kind of funny considering Spain was not on my original list of places I wanted to visit. I had no intentions of going there until two weeks ago when Bethany and Caitlin decided they were going and asked if anyone wanted to join.

Because I took four years of Spanish in high school and because my favorite Spanish teacher Sra. Taylor talked a lot in class about how beautiful Madrid is, I decided to go.

But I haven't decided yet how I felt about it.

Don't get me wrong. Madrid is very possibly the most beautiful city I've ever seen. There is so much to see and do. It's like a cleaner, Spanish-speaking version of New York City (at least I think it is - I've never been to the Big Apple) and I would never in a million years persuade anyone against it.

But some of the things that happened in Madrid tainted the whole trip. So let's begin at the beginning. This will take two posts.

Day One: Thursday. Bethany, Caitlin and I skipped class to take a train to the Pisa airport just after 11 a.m. This was my first time on an airplane since our transatlantic voyage in January and I totally forgot about the no-liquids-over-eight-ounces-rule. So when my brand new bottle of body wash got confiscated at the x-ray machines, that was insult to injury. The latex-gloved woman at the scanner held my bottle at arm's length and asked me if it was okay that she was going to throw this unopened bottle away and if I understood why this was necessary.

"I mean, I guess it has to be," I said. "Do I have any other options?"

"I can escort you from Pisa and return this bottle to you from a safe location. Would you prefer that?"

"I mean, not really. I'd rather not."

"So you understand that I am going to dispose of this contraband?"

"Yes."

"I am disposing of this."

"Cool. Great. Nice talking to you."

This came roughly ten minutes after I paid a €65 boarding fee because RyanAir didn't believe me when I told them my online boarding pass would not print. Even though I had the receipt. The woman at the ticket counter was pretty unpleasant about the whole thing and acted like I was an idiot who made the mistake of not having a working link to print my boarding pass. Cool. Grazie. Nice talking to you.

By the time we got through security at Pisa and into the line for the plane to Madrid, I was steaming. Some woman standing in line behind me patted my overstuffed backpack and asked in Italian if I had a puppy in it. I yanked my backpack away from her and moved it to the front of my body where I could keep an eye on it. This crazy, flamingo-pantsed senior citizen probably wanted to steal my puppy/money/clothes/journal/Italian One book. I was kind of in a xenophobic mood by now. I stared her down and didn't answer while Caitlin and Bethany snickered into their sleeves. Finally this woman with the wild pants turned to her equally Q-Tip-haired friend and began complaining about me in Italian. I know she was complaining because she sounded affronted and kept saying "Americani" and "ragazzi."

When we finally got through the line, we had to get in a shuttle bus to ride down the tarmac to our plane. Which was highly therapeutic for me because such an endeavor is a no-holds-barred free for all in Italy. The gates open and you have to kick and trip and elbow and claw your way through the throng to get in the shuttle before it leaves and you miss your flight. It's cutthroat.

So I threw some people down and jumped on the shuttle for the roughly one minute ride to the plane. Once on the plane, we didn't have assigned seats, so the three of us had to climb over other passengers and fight our way to the first trio of seats we could find.

At last, we sat down and I listened to music until I began to hate RyanAir a little less. The rest of the two hour plane ride was uneventful, until the last half hour or so when I got plane sick. With Ticket Counter/Body Washgate preoccupying my immediate attention, I completely forget to take my motion sickness pills. Lovely.

So I stared straight ahead, willing myself not to be airsick while the plane rocked and boogied its way through major turbulence and a bumpy landing. When the plane finally landed and the doors finally opened, I physically climbed over an entire camera-happy Asian family to be one of the first people on solid ground, where I promptly fell on my knees and kissed Spanish blacktop.

Welcome to Madrid.

Caitlin and Bethany eventually made their way off the plane and met me in the airport cafe where I was nursing a ginger ale. They got sandwiches and I tried to remember how to breathe without losing my lasagna. Cool. Bravo.

By the time I was ready to walk in a straight line, the girls were ready to hop the metro to Gran Via and find our hostel.

The metro was another adventure in throwing 'bows and breaking noses, but we got on without any problem and made it to Gran Via just before 6 p.m.

Gran Via Madrid looks like Times Square. Our United World International Hostel was located between Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts and across from a gigantic theatre advertising "Grease" the musical on its luminescent marquee. Two doors down from Dunkin, another theatre advertised "El Rey Leon" the musical. Seeing those skinny antelope guys and creepy mechanical baby Simba on the flyers outside really made me want to shell out the Euros.

But I refrained. Instead I settled for the next best place on the street: United World of Are These Really the Only Bathrooms In This Whole International Hostel.

The hostel was situated in what clearly used to be a very nice, upscale apartment complex. We're talking East Egg, but after it's been fried. What used to be super swanky, I'm sure, was now swank buried under layers of "What did you expect for the cheapest hostel in Spain?"

We made our way up to el tercero piso and rang to doorbell to check-in. We were greeted by a young woman who was obviously very upset that she had to interrupt her Facebook time to check-in some spoiled American tourists. She handed us room agreements with an expression not unlike what prison wardens probably wear upon ushering in new inmates.

While we read through the paperwork ("You can rent a towel for €2 and place one phone call to the outside world"), Nurse Ratched handed out keys for us to get in the front door and green wristbands for us to wear all weekend. As we followed her down the lone hallway to our room (appropriately labeled "America" with a hand-drawing of Mount Rushmore sketched over the water-damaged eggshell paint), we saw several of our fellow lodgers sporting their neon bands. It was like entering the world's most depressing amusement park.

To my surprise, our room was not bad. It was painted pink with flowery white curtains and three pairs of bunk beds jammed together along the walls. Each of the top three bunks were graced with a folded piece of paper, one of our three names printed on each paper.

I got bed #1, decorated with flowery green sheets that I actually really liked. Laying in bed that first night, I came to the conclusion that this sleeping arrangement was in fact much more comfortable than most of the Workcamps I've been on. So that was good.

What was not so great was the fact that there were 36 people in the hostel and only two bathrooms. Each bathroom had one toilet, one sink and one shower. I showered once the whole weekend and it was in the middle of the day Saturday. I showered in pitch-darkness because there was no window and the motion-sensitive lights could not detect me in the shower unless I leaned all the way out and waved my arms. Just another way Workcamp has prepared me for college.

Moving on...

As we surveyed our surroundings, the door opened and two of our roommates - Ashley and Kylee - came in. We lucked out this weekend with roommates. Ashley and Kylee left Friday afternoon, but we talked for a long time Thursday night. The pair are sisters from Australia who have been backpacking Europe together since October. They had been in Madrid all week and recommended some sights for us to see.

We talked to these two until almost 9 p.m. when we left to find dinner. Bethany had heard of an area with great tapas, but we couldn't find it, so we settled for a little bar we found a little way from Plaza Mayor where all the food was fried. We split fried cheese topped with jam for an appetizer. Caitlin and I shared fried mushrooms with ham and Bethany had fried calamari. Then we had cake and ice cream (not fried) for dessert because we had barely eaten all day.

By the time we got out of dinner, it was nearly midnight, so we went back to the hostel (our third roommate, a guy who said nothing but "hello" in heavily-accented English, was sitting in bed doing math problems by flashlight while the Australians slept) and went to bed.

Worry not though. Our weekend improved considerably after only a few meltdowns Thursday. All for one giant problem that kind of tainted the whole weekend...

Because this weekend was too much for one post, I now present to you The Rest Of My Weekend In Madrid. Enjoy.

Halfway Equals Sad Day

Another month over. Another month closer to that thing I've been trying hard not to think about lately...

As much as I hate to do it, here's my updated to-do list of what I've accomplished so far this semester and what I still have to do before I have to say good-bye to bella Italia in May.

The original list from December 16 can be found here and the first update from February 8 is right over here.

• Go to Croatia.   *Booked.
• Go to Germany.   *I definitely don't have the time or money for this.
• Go to Ireland.   *Again, it looks like I can't afford this.
• Go to any other country I can go to.   *Greece and Madrid are booked.
• Get a touristy photo of me holding up the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
• Eat authentic Italian pasta.
• Drink authentic Italian wine.
• Take a Beatles tour of Liverpool.   *In the planning stages.
• Get a photo of me crossing Abbey Road.   *Planning.
• Take a Harry Potter tour of England.   *Part of the Liverpool trip.
• Get a photo of me at Platform 9 3/4.   *THIS IS HAPPENING.
• Strike up a conversation with a local.
• Try to read an Italian newspaper.
• Spend a day just people watching.
• Follow a road just to see where it goes.
• Visit all of the major Italian cities.   *Not happening. There are more than I thought. But Florence, Rome, Assisi, Venice, Milan, Sienna, and Orvieto are checked off.
• Visit Dante Alighieri's house.   
• Swim in the ocean.
• Actually see an ocean.   *Hello, Cinque Terre.
• Stay in a hostel.   *Doing it tonight in Madrid.
• Attend an Italian youth group with Jess and Katy.
• Go to an Easter service in a church older than the United States.
• Appreciate the fact that I can be in anything older than the United States.
• Get lost without panicking.
• Do something 100% spur-of-the-moment.
• Grocery shop in an open-air market.
• Make one purely selfish and frivolous purchase.   *I'm going to call going to Madrid my frivolous/selfish purpose since it wasn't on my original list of places to go and the sales here are over, which means I can no longer afford a leather jacket.
• Hang my laundry out to dry over the street.   *Not legal in my neighborhood.
• Watch the local news.
• Learn about international communications (duh).   
• Learn at least enough Italian to get by.   
• Learn about art.   *"We call this an... en- ... tab- ... lature. Come on guys. You know this." Rocky is a trip.
• Live out of a backpack for a weekend.   *Rome, Assisi, Orvieto, and Madrid!
• Go to a pub.   
• Take more photos than I know what to do with.   *For real.
• Blog every (?) day.   *Like I said last month, I have failed at this. But at least I keep up with this blog.
• Remember to keep my feet off the frescoes.   *So far, so good.

Unfortunately, it seems I didn't dream very big with this list since it's basically all checked off. Also, from where I sit now, it seems my goals have changed quite a bit since I'm booking trips I never intended to take and skipping over places I had wanted to go. In the case of Germany, other opportunities have come up in the past two months that just seem more appealing to me. In the case of Ireland, I still really want to go, but it would be my most expensive weekend trip and I have no one to go with since no one can really afford it.

I'll have to go when I'm older and Mom can come with me. 

Busy In A Good Way

This week has been busier than usual, but mostly in a good way. It's midterm week, so I had studying to do for Fabio's Intercultural Communications exam Tuesday and Francesca's Comparative Media exam Wednesday. Gloria's Italian midterm is next week since the business majors have been in Geneva, Switzerland all week for a conference. Rocky's Art midterm is also next week because he's Rocky and he's an internationally known art historian and he's starred in the History Channel's Engineering An Empire and he's from Rhode Island and married to a French model so he does whatever he wants.

"En-TAB-La-ture."

Just ignore that.

Monday evening the school hosted a screening of the movie La Vita é Bella, starring Roberto Benigni. You may have heard of it because it won three Oscars in 1999, but I had never heard of it. And apparently no one else had because only four of us came to watch it. But I'm so glad I made the trip across town in the rain to see this movie because it is one of my new favorites. It is so, so good! I don't want to give anything away, but if you haven't seen it, do so. It's hilarious, it's super depressing and it's an all-around excellent movie. And I'm not being paid to say that.


Tuesday was another fun night out. The school offered a trip to St. Mark's Opera for a performance of La Boheme. That was interesting, but I loved it. First, it was an opera, which is not an artform with which I am particularly familiar. Secondly, it was in Italian, which is not a language with which I am particularly familiar. But it worked out. And English narrator explained each scene before they acted it out, so the story was easy to follow. Also, I've seen Rent, which was based on La Boheme, so that gave me another advantage. If you haven't seen this one, it too is super depressing, but not at all funny. 


Today I went to lunch with Katy again between class and caught up with her since it's been a few weeks since we got together. After that, it was class with Fabrizio where we watched a History Channel special on the Medicis, starring our one-and-only Director Marcello Fantoni. We are surrounded by celebrities every day in Palazzo dei Cerchi.


After class, Lydia and I walked down to the Arno where we laid out until dusk, then got gelato. 


That's about it for this week. I have to pack now for a weekend in Madrid with Caitlin and Bethany. We have a flight out of Pisa tomorrow at 1 p.m., so we'll have to leave home by 11. I'm really looking forward to this being my first trip outside Italy. It was a very spur of the moment decision (Bethany said, "Hey, me and Caitlin are going to Madrid next week. Want to come with?" And I immediately said, "Why not?"), but I've been getting more and more excited as this weekend approaches. I won't have my laptop with me, but there will be lots of photos on Facebook Sunday and you'll be able to read all about it right here by Monday or Tuesday. So check back soon and often! 

Love you all and talk to you when I'm back in bella Italia. I hope my high school Spanish doesn't fail me this weekend... Puedo ir al baño, por favor?

The Five Lands

I have a new Favorite Place In The World. It's the islands of Cinque Terre, Italy.

After spending the Friday in Milan, Bethany and I turned around and woke up at 7 yesterday morning to catch the first of two trains to Cinque Terre. We took our first train to La Speza, where we caught a second train to Corniglia Island in the Cinque Terre.

Our two thankfully uneventful rides got us to Corniglia just after 1:00. But before I move on, I should probably amend the "uneventful" part and add in when I cried on the train.

No. Really. I cried. We were nearly to Corniglia when I asked Bethany when she thought we might get our first view of the ocean. At this time, we had been in a tunnel for the past few minutes and, no sooner were the words out of my mouth, than the train emerged from the tunnel and I looked to my left to see nothing but wide ocean (okay... wide sea; it was the Ligurian Sea). All I could see up, down, out, and around in any direction was sparkling, diamond sea. And I cried.

Well, to be perfectly accurate, first I screamed and jumped out of my seat. Then I cried for about thirty seconds. Lee Ann Womack sang in my ear and I got really emotional over seeing so much beautiful water in one place. I'm not proud of it, but Bethany spread it around to everyone we associate with in Florence, so now the whole school knows I cried upon seeing the sea in Cinque Terre. And now you do, too. There are more embarrassing things that could happen.

Luckily, we were only a few minutes from Corniglia at the point where I lost my head and I was able to pull myself together before we got off the train.

It's good that the islands in Cinque Terre aren't too big. It didn't take much for Bethany and me to find our hostel after getting off the train in Corniglia. We had a very long hike in the sun (it was warm Saturday) to the top of the hill our Bed and Breakfast was on, but after that we followed my Rick Steve's map to the neighborhood of the B&B.

Finding the neighborhood was no problem, but navigating it was a challenge. There's this thing they love in Italy where they change street names halfway down the street. So Bethany and I literally walked in a square, then a smaller square, then a smaller square looking for the B&B. It turns out the street we were on kind of goes like this:

Here you are on Via A. Walk ten feet to Via B. Walk fourteen feet to Via C. Turn left at Via A. Walk four feet to Via D. Turn left on Via C. Walk 200 feet to Via A. Turn right on Via A. Turn left on Via B. Walk two feet to Via A.

You have now reached your destination.

Whaaatever. The good news is, we made it, and Corniglia is so incredibly gorgeous that we didn't really mind all of the retracing our steps over and over.

We got to the B&B about an hour before our scheduled check-in time and the door was locked and no one was home. By this point we were ready for lunch, so we walked back to a little cafe we had seen on the next street over and ordered pesto lasagna with fresh-squeezed lemon juice. The lemon juice was fantastic, but the lasagna tasted like leftovers. It probably was, too, since we watched the guy pull it out of the microwave. It wasn't bad thought, and we left lunch only a few minutes before our scheduled check-in time.

There was no need to rush though, since we sat for fifteen minutes outside the B&B and no one came for us. Bethany finally called the number on the sign outside the door and a woman told her someone would be there for us in a few minutes, then hung up. So we waited another twenty minutes until we heard huffing and puffing from the alley next to the B&B. An old man clutching a set of keys in one hand and the stitch in his side in the other hand came around the corner and walked past Bethany, directly up to me. He then proceded, amid all of the coughing and wheezing, to spit a whole bunch of Italian at me while I stood there presumably looking like an idiot.

Since Bethany speaks more Italian than I do, I kept looking at her over the guy's shoulder for help, but he ignored me and kept talking, despite my repeated "I don't speak Italian."

Bethany finally got the guy's attention and was able to explain to him that we had a reservation and needed let into our room.

It took awhile for him to figure out why we were there, and then twice as long for him to get up the stairs, but the guy finally showed us to our room. And fortunately, this B&B was very nice. There was a common dining room with two bedrooms leading off of it - one for me and Bethany, and one for another pair of guests. As soon as we were in the room, the guy handed me the keys and shuffled off without another word.

"When do we pay?" Bethany asked, but the guy just looked at her, then kept going. Whatever. If we paid, we paid. If not, if not, I guess.

We took a few minutes to unwind and admire our fantastic sea view, then set off to explore.

Our first adventure was supposed to be hiking the trail from Corniglia to Manarola, but about twenty minutes down the trail, we discovered that a landslide had made the trail impassible. We were both upset about this since it was a gorgeous walk and we had both really been enjoying it until that point. Instead, we walked back to Corniglia and hopped a train to Riomaggiore.

The highlight of Riomaggiore is the famous Via dell'Amore walkway. The walk takes you on a scenic tour around a hillside overhanging the sea. Along the way, we saw many ribbons and locks attached to the netting holding the cliff together. Many of these tokens featured the names of those who had left them encircled with hearts, just like the locks hanging around Ponte Vecchio on the Arno.

After a little way, you had the option of continuing along the marked trail, or descending into more treacherous trails down along the sea. Bethany and I picked one of these trails and very carefully climbed and scooted our way down to sea level, where we sat inches from the crashing waves until we were ready to move on.

Once we resurfaced on the trail, we found it lead into a sort of tunnel with many windows overlooking the sea. Inside this cave/tunnel, the locks turned into love graffiti. Thousands of couples had scrawled their names inside hearts and left little love notes to each other. Bethany and I even discovered a Kent State Florence heart on one wall, and added our names to the list of our classmates.

It took us a long time to finished the Via dell'Amore because we kept stopping to read all of the notes and Bethany stopped to make a heart for her and Alex and take photos with it. By the time we got out of the Love Walk, we were both ready for dinner.

I consulted with Rick Steve's, and he told me the best island to go to for dinner and nightlife was Vernazza (which Bethany and I prefer to pronounce Ver-NAHT-za). As soon as we stepped off the train, we realized we had made a mistake in going to Vernazza. We had seen a sign in the train station warning that Vernazza was mainly shut down to a devastating mudslide in October 2011, but we had no idea until we got there how bad it really was. The first thing I thought of when I got off that train was the day my church youth group toured the Ninth Ward in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina. Total devastation. You could see the water level lines on all of the abandoned homes and shops. Every building we passed was caked in mud and gutted. Shopvacs sat in the streets, some humming and some abandoned. Every once in a while, we would pass a small group of men shoveling mud out of a doorway or hauling sandbags into or out of the island. Nothing was open. There was no nightlife and not a single place to eat. I doubt we saw more than ten people the whole time we were there. A few stray dogs and cats were still hanging around, but they were all dirty and ran away from us. We didn't hear any signs of life.

Bethany and I finally made our way to the harbor as night fell over the Vernazza ghost town. We sat on a rock and let the waves wash up to where they nearly touched our toes. We were the only two people in sight. We sat in silence and stared out over the endless water as dusk turned into night and the air turned chilly. Despite the devastation behind us, I have only known a few places in my life that come close to matching the perfect serenity of that rock in that harbor. I could have sat there forever and been overwhelmingly at ease and content, except that Bethany and I both began getting hungry.

Reluctantly, we pulled ourselves away from the water long after sunset and picked our way through the rubble and back to the train station.

We decided to head instead to Manarola and try to find food there. We lucked out in finding a main street leading down into the ocean that had many quaint giftshops and promising-looking restaurants. Rick Steves recommended we get dinner at a restaurant on this main strip called Trattoria Il Porticciolo, so that's exactly what we did. And boy were we lucky Vernazza had been closed.

We sat in a heated outdoor room looking down the street toward the water. A handsome waiter brought us endless bread with baby green tomatoes and olive oil to munch on while we waited for our main courses. Bethany got lobster (batti batti) ravioli and I got spaghetti batti batti, spaghetti drenched in red sauce mixed with little bits of lobster and served with a giant lobster tail on the side. It was THE BEST spaghetti I have ever had. We were so happy with our meals, and the waiter was so cute and sweet, that we decided to go all out and order dessert as well. Our waiter let us each pick which kind of cake we wanted from a dessert display, then he brought us each a slice of both selected cakes, garnished with fruit, whipped cream, and chocolate candies.

It was the most exciting dessert I've ever seen. There was also a note in the Rick Steve's book that said if we showed the book, we could each get a free glass of sciacchetra dessert wine. Also some of the best wine I've ever had. This was my first dessert wine, and it was so smooth and rich, it was absolutely delicious. Even Bethany was won over and she had hesitated to get it since she isn't normally a fan of dessert wines.

That meal was easily the biggest I've eaten in Italy, and Bethany and I both literally waddled home after it. When we left, our waiter told us to "Come back when you speak Italy."

Once we caught the train back to Corniglia, we had exactly 382 stairs to climb to get up to the town, then back to our B&B. By this point it was after midnight, there were no lights, we both had food babies, and it was painfully slow going. But we made it safe and sound and spent the rest of the evening watching "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" on Italian TV before we fell asleep.

This morning, it rained. We decided to sleep in a little because of this, but we were still out the door around 9:30 and on our way to find the landlord and return the room keys. We had an address for an office on the other side of the island, so we packed up all of our belongings and set off in the drizzle.

We were about five minutes from the B&B when we saw the man from the rental agency limping along a side street. Bethany flagged him down and asked him in Italian where we needed to go to pay for our night. He didn't answer, but instead took the €50 note motioned for us to follow him. So we walked about another five minutes to a house and followed him inside. This was obviously where he lived; an elderly woman was watching TV and eating toast in a room just to the left of where we stood. The man went off into another room and came back with a cigar box full of money from which he extracted our change. He handed the change to me without a word and then went to sit down in the room with the woman.

Bethany and I hesitated for about a minute, then let ourselves out.

Our first stop after that strange experience was coffee and a train to Monterosso al Mare to explore the beach. The beaches in Monterosso our less rocky than on the four other islands. There are actually excellent sand beaches, that were clearly very touristy in the summer, but were nearly vacant in early March.

It had stopped raining by this point and was warm enough that we could kick off our shoes, roll up our jeans and run around in the surf for awhile. We were distracted at this point by all of the pretty beach rocks and spent literally the next hour and a half scouring the beach for the prettiest stones, pausing every once in awhile to climb the giant rocks sticking up out of the beach.

Three shots of me exploring the beach. You will have
to drag me back to America in May.

During all of this exploring, we found a lovely pier lookout, an abandoned World War II submarine, a breathtaking overlook accompanied by a giant statue of St. Francis and a dog, and a cave filled with fishing boats. An afternoon of this and we were ready for an early dinner. The two of us followed our noses in the direction of the most heavenly seafood smell known to mankind and were stopped short at the sight of Ristorante Belvedere, the swankiest place in the Cinque Terre.

The place looked five star, with white tablecloths, tuxedoed waiters, fancy artwork on the walls, and flowers on every table. Plus we could tell just looking up at it from the beach below that this place had one of the nicest views around.

But, seeing nowhere else to eat and already being in love with the Belvedere, we decided to attempt it. To the relief of us both, as we stood waiting in the entryway to be seated, we noticed most of the other patrons were dressed casually, some even in work clothes grottier than our two-day, slept-in outfits. A penguined waiter ushered us to one of the fancy tables with a nice view overlooking the sea and told us the day's specials in near-perfect English.

Since everything on the menu looked so good, Bethany and I split a grilled swordfish steak, grilled vegetables, penne scampi, and a basket of rolls. We figured why not go all out and make this our only meal for the day?

Like last night, the service was prompt and the food was out of this world. Honestly, I've never in my life eaten better than I did these past two days. Everything was perfect and if I could only eat the meals I ate this weekend for the rest of my life, I don't think I would ever complain.

We both left stuffed and thoroughly satisfied. In an effort to digest, we took a very leisurely stroll to the other end of the beach to see Il Gigante, a giant statue of Neptune carved into a rock coming out of the sea. My tour book said this massive structure once held a trident which supported a private dance floor that hung out over the waves. Unfortunately, the dance floor collapsed years ago and was never replaced. But Il Gigante still looks cool.

Since it was getting late in the afternoon, we decided to take one last train ride to Manarola. Our first stop there was to return to the main street from last night and get gelatto. I, of course, got my favorite pistacchio and dark chocolate, and we ate while walking along another seaside trail.

After that, we hiked up another cliff to the local cemetery. It may not sound like a great way to end a weekend getaway, but the view overlooking the sea was another one not to be missed, and the cemetery itself was very beautiful and well-kept with little gardens and charming, fancy headstones. I found the Italian headstones with their photos of those who had passed morbidly interesting.

We sat up in the cemetery, staring - once again - at the sea for a long time. We then made our way back down to the train station just before sundown and took the last train home to Firenze.

So all in all, this has been a fantastic weekend. Even with the rain this morning and the constant threat of rain all weekend, Cinque Terre was the most amazing and gorgeous place I have ever seen in my entire life. I'm so excited now for the Greece islands in just two weeks! I was iffy about this spring break trip before I discovered the majesty of the sea and its power to make me cry. I feel like I should have known I would have this reaction, considering it's the sea and all, but I didn't. And now all of my friends are already talking about bringing tissues with us when we go to Santorini. Oh well. Cosi va...