Isn't every day what we make it?

[edit:

my picasa: http://picasaweb.google.com/117760715011314376547/Florence?feat=directlink

my rollinglobe blog this week: http://www.rollinglobe.com/RGWeb/blogs/default.aspx?u=lastone ]

Gahhh it's going to be impossible to get down every thought I have every day. It's frustrating. It's ten to 1 am and tomorrow I'm going to Lucca at 9 am, soooo i need to go to bed!!

Classes are going great so far. We had an awesome discussion in European Fascism about what great orators Fascist leaders were and why and compared them to this article about a magician who hypnotized people. It was a really intense discussion and by the end of it, I felt pretty mesmerized, too, which is ironic. haha. another guy i was becoming friends with is dropping out of the class too. People don't want to learn or work while they are here. I actually don't think it's bad at all for a history class. Only one paper and a final. and yeah...reading. get over it. most of it has been really interesting so far anyway.

I had my first Oral and Written presentation in Italian on Friday. We have one a week. This one was kind of ungraded though. Like it'll count if your grade needs a boost at the end of the semester. I did well, I think. He called me Michael Jackson when I was done because the kid had asked me what time it was in italian and I did a cool little turn to face the clock. haha, pretty funny.

I switched Econ classes. Complicated story, but now I'm in Money and Banking. So far, so good. We didn't really do any teaching last week. But I got the text book and it's all math and economics and interest rates etc and I'm really excited. I haven't done math since freshman year. It's kinda weird how it was pretty much my favorite subject until I came to Duke. Thanks for that. Then history took over...and it's way cooler anyway :) The professor is pretty legit though. He is currently a councilman in Florence, which is kinda neat. he got his PhD in the US too, before coming back here, so that's interesting. He seems very intelligent, no funny-business kinda guy when it comes to class. like if dad taught.

My first class field trip is this Tuesday at 9. It's not really a field trip because it's just a walking tour of Florence, but I'm so excited because it's with my family and gender teacher, and I think it'll be super interesting. Checking out stuff in Florence and figuring out how it relates to women.

I had my first hardcore rehearsal on Thursday. It was fabulous. the director works a lot like joseph megel (miser) in that he's a little spastic, like "let's try this. maybe you can do this. and when you say this think about this. oh and try this. because the implication here is..." Lots of random blocking and dissecting the language and learning historical contexts and meanings of the words. Since my added part is from Moliere, I get the way his lines work (miser), but I definitely learned a lot in just an hour of rehearsal. The dean (??) was there at the beginning of rehearsal and when I walked in early, the director introduced me as Rebecca, playing one of the "key roles" in the show, which made me feel pretty special. A lot of the adults in charge I guess are excited about this show because it's the first time they've had a student production.

I guess I could do a quick synopsis...

The basic idea of the play is the ancient story of jupiter (jove) impregnating a mortal he's in love with (Alcmena) who gives birth to a half-god-dude-thang (Hercules). But we don't get that far. The story is basically thus: jupiter/Jove decides to send Amphitryon off to war so that he can sleep with his wife, Alcmena, who's like gorgeous etc. and pregnant (amphitryon's kid). Since Alcmena would never have an affair on her husband, Jove takes on the looks of Amphitryon (since he's a god, he can do whatever he wants). Jove's son, Mercury (who three people play in our show, one of which is Catherine) is mischievous and wants to join in on the fun, so he takes on the looks of Sosia, Amphitryon's servant. Cléanthis (Me!) is Sosia's wife, also servant to Alcmena.

pretty much, it's just a play about the situation, and trickery and mixed up identities. Mercury (who looks like Sosia) convinces Sosia that he isn't Sosia because He (mercury) is. So Sosia goes back to Amphitryon (at war) and is like...dude...I told myself that I am not myself anymore (haha). and amphitryon is like what the heck, you crazy, and goes home to talk to Alcmena, who is like "Oh wow, I didn't know I was going to get to see you again so soon" and Amphitryon's like "dude, it's been awhile." and Alcmena's like "uhh...you just left this morning." and Amphitryon's like "dude i wasn't here this morning, you're having an affair on me!!!" (Jove had been with her, using amphitryon's looks, get it?) and then when everything is exploding and Amphitryon's freaking out, Jove comes and is like "Amphitryon. Calm down. I impregnated your wife. She will give birth to two sons. One is yours and one is mine, half-god thing." and Amphitryon's just like "Oh well that's cool then." and then the play ends.

The only part I have is having these two conversations with my "husband" one of which is Mercury (Catherine gets to play my husband!) and then the actual sosia. and there's all this internal conflict because Mercury (as Sosia!) is mean to me and pretty much tells me he could care less about me and I could go have an affair and he wouldn't care. and then Sosia comes and is like, I don't know what you're talking about. and then I end the play with

"Un bel'applauso, per l'amor di Giove [Jove], e di Alcmena!"

I bet that made a lot of sense....

Friday I slept in until 10:30 and it was glorious. Italian oral. Then Catherine and I went to the train station because we had to get these Student ID cards to be able to ride the buses around Florence for cheaper than everyone else. I needed another passport photo (I knew i needed more mom!), but it was okay because we got them done at the train station, and though my hair was messy, it's probably good that i have an id that actually looks like me (i look very different apparently with short hair). so now I have an NYU student ID card and a Florence Bus Pass with my picture on them... and they are very cute and make me feel legit for being here. :)

After that Catherine and I had mexican night!!! Just did quesadillas with sauteed veggies and guacamole that was okay, but it was nice to not have pasta or pizza, haha. Twas delish. So far, cooking has been extremely successful... I wonder if we'll ever make something that doesn't come out well. haha.

toooooday (saturday sept 11th):

Lots of things were going on in America today. 9/11 remembrance, koran burning (wow.), gator game, and Duke game (boo). so that was kinda weird. Facebook was crazy today with all of that going on, and part of me (selfishly, i might add) felt thankful that i was here...I know, that's kinda bad. But i was just really happy with how my day went:

Catherine and I finnnaaallly went to the Galleria dell'Academia...right next door. We actually only covered the entire first floor though, so we have to go back (but it's free with our Student Museum pass nyu gave us!!). Cool things on the first floor: old paintings, old statues, THE DAVID, the Rape of the Sabines, the musical instrument museum attached to it, and an exhibition they have going on call Virtù d'Amore.

-The David, I must admit, is as cool as everyone says it is. Common misconception of mine: I thought it was...like man-sized. Um, no, it's huge! like huuuuge. Catherine and I took a bench and just stared at him for 20 minutes. He's gorgeous. and I like how he's holding the sling. I learned that it was an unusual depiction of him for the time because usually david is sculpted with a foot on the head of the giant Goliath or holding the head. But he kinda just has this attitude of "yeah, i just killed that." haha. I can't wait to see him again. thank you Michelangelo.

-The Rape of the Sabines. I've actually seen pictures of this before, so it was cool to see it in real life. I think it's an amazing statue too. I learned it's the triumph of a younger stronger roman over an older man for the sabine woman... i also learned that the rape really meant like abduction to take as wife. the statue still looks like rape to me, though, haha

-the exhibition Virtù d'Amore is about the bedchamber and things associated with it. Consummation of marriages, having babies, and dying. and it was mostly artwork depicting that stuff. Some artwork they had was known to have hung over people's beds and depicted wedding ceremonies/processions, etc. It was really neat. then I was even more excited to find out that my family and gender class is taking a field trip specifically to see this exhibit, and I'm, as you can guess, very excited to talk about this artwork in the context of my course. should be very interesting.

(side note: I think i'm going to learn a ton this semester...so exciting)

Then catherine and I headed over to the train station (it's called santa maria novella by the way) and caught a train to pisa. yeah just like that 5 euros, each way. we were like "umm... i feel like going to pisa today." ...okay! it was about an 1 hr 15 min train ride, and it was actually neat because we got to see a bit more of the Italian countryside. I'm still surprised by how hilly it is. Next thing I know we're in pisa! Pisa, from what we can gather, is much quieter than Florence (more of a suburb than a city), and it is under construction/renovation right now. haha. lots of buildings were anyway. on our walk to the leaning torre di pisa, we ran into this little pasticceria, which actually my time-out book recommended, so we stopped for lunch. It's known for being the oldest pasticceria in pisa, so that's kinda cool. Food was different but very good. I tried to order a coffee and failed again (see picasa pictures), but definitely a shout-out to Catherine's strawberry risotto (you read right). it was pink and definitely tasted like strawberries and had parmesan cheese and balsamic vinegar on it. Weird, but delicious. and then to my Strawberry, Cream, and Honey gelato. yum yum yum.

also on our walk to the torre we went by some roman baths. definitely not as cool as Bath in England, but still interesting. I'm very excited for my Fam & gender field trip to some public baths somewhere. haha

then...out of nowhere...we saw it. the leaning tower!!! my first thought was that it looked like something at an amusement park. it is so UNREAL. it leans so much more than I thought it did. Like i thought youd have to make sure you were standing straight to be able to tell that it's leaning. No, this thing looks like it's friggin falling over tomorrow!!!! They also just finished cleaning it so it's bright white, which i wasn't really expecting either. took some typical pics (see picasa). I learned that the actual architect is unknown, which i thought was funny... we can't put the blame on anyone for this, maybe that's why he wanted to remain unknown hehe. but it's been leaning hardcore since 1300 (see timeline photo on picasa). they tried to correct it by adding more floors that were shorter on the side leaning and taller on the other side (hahahahhaah), but it just made the building curve. so when you look at it, it leans a LOT towards the bottom and then sorta levels off at the top, though it's still not straight.also interesting fact: they just recently stopped letting tons and tons of people go up there at a time. now you have to be with a group or pay like 15 euros and there's just a whole lot more control on how many people are in there. Considering it started leaning from the time it was built, I'm surprised it took us that long to figure out that maybe having a gazillion people up there wasn't such a good idea.

then we went into the cathedral next to it. As you can guess (and see on picasa), it was gorgeous! i read some stuff out of my book about it, but there was a big fire in 1595, which messed up some stuff in the cathedral but i heard the first thing they rescued from it was this tiny little painting of the virgin and jesus (see picasa), which i thought was kinda funny to be the first thing they tried to save. uhhh, the architect is buried in there. the Medici family replaced the ceiling so it looks a little different, but is still very pretty, blue and gold and ornate and has the medici family emblem all over it.

other fun things we saw: a woman pushing a dog in a stroller. a family on a bike that looked kinda like a golf cart. gothic italian teenagers. and the arno not looking as pretty as it does in florence.

sadly and happily we made it back to the train station. I passed out the whole way home. we got home. chilled for a bit. and then planned a trip to Barcelona and then a trip to Dublin and London. Yeah, my mind is blown right now. but both trips were actually relatively cheap ($150 each on average), which includes planes, trains, buses, etc haha. so I was pretty impressed with us. ...and also stoked. my brain was just like whoa... that just happened?????? we're going to barcelona, dublin and london??? i can't wait. I also cant wait to plan our 1.5 days in london because i have to show catherine everything (and eat at Eat, Pret, and Wagamama or I'm gonna die), maybe see a show at the National, and I'm thinking about emailing someone at LSE and seeing if I can come talk to someone that weekend. Just about my interest in applying, etc. see if i get anywhere with that. As for dublin and Barcelona, yeah those are gonna be baller.

Our big trip left to plan is fall break. oh my goodness, fall break. more on that later. and then i think our final large priorities: we want to spend a weekend in Rome and a weekend in Venice. :)

In the past three days I've been confused for an Italian four times!!!!! one was particularly special:

I was waiting for the bus to go to school on friday. A woman came up to me and started to talk to me in italian. I could tell she was asking a question about the buses because she said "venticinque" which is 25. and we were at the bus stop for Bus 25, which I take to school everyday. But alas, I answered "Mi dispiace, non parlo italiano." and she just said "ohhh." and then she asked me qual nazionalita i was, and i responded "sono americana" and she said "ohhh americana," rubbing my arm as she said it. she asked me about school and i told her, because i was looking at my Italian notes because I was about to have my oral when I got to campus. but then Bus 7 got there and she went to go get on it and i said ciao! and she was very sweet and said ciao! I felt very proud of myself, but also like i was ready for my oral. haha :)

holy cow, it's really late. tomorrow we're going to Lucca! we're actually going with NYU on a sponsored field trip for students... sooo, hopefully itll be good, but I hope it's not like a big tour group thing where we have to follow someone around all day. whenever I see all the stupid tour groups around here, I start "moo-ing" in my head, haha. or I think of Mom and Dad's experience with a tour group in Europe, and I'm proud and happy to be here as a student for three months. I feel much more local.

anyway, i don't know much about Lucca except that it is pretty. But I have my time out book so hopefully we'll get somewhere with that.

I miss you all. :/ I wish you all could be here with me. seriously. I'm so happy and honored, but it's not fair that some people will go their entire lives without seeing the things I'm getting to see. So blessed.

*yawn*

buonanotte!!!!

becca