food

I'll post soon about last weekend in Maremma. Real fun. Tonight we had Chinese takeout for dinner which was fried rice and spring rolls. It was funny. I think the only other ethnic food restaurant in this city is kebab.

Rome (ing)

Today my Italian class watched a Fellini film (I Vitelloni) for the cultural section and then we went to our teacher's house to have lunch! The other Italian class is jealous of us because everyone loves Claudia (our teacher). She's cool, hip and nice. She made us lasagna and wine was brought. Her apartment is baller. She lofted her be d to make more room and has lots of eclectic pictures and furniture. Her place seemed like a perfect expression of her personality.

It's starting to get warm here too. SPRING IS UPON US.

Rome was interesting! It didn't feel like Italy at all and was pretty metropolitan. The subways were just as crowded as New York but had interesting graffiti all over. I went with three friends, and met 2 others when we got there. The bus was comfortable and only took about three hours from Siena. The buses have huge windows so it's nice to just look out on the rolling hills/ sheep/ green land. The Sunday there was the Giornata Della Donna in Italy so admission to the Forum was gratis (free) for all women (woooo). There were a lot of tourists and I can't imagine what it's like during May and June, probably what carnivale was like. For some reason I can tolerate tourists in NYC but in Rome it was a little too much. All in all it was fun. Here are some pictures.

academia

Sistine Chapel

Piazza Basilica

Pieta with dramtic lighting

Rome has so many great ceilings but it hurts your neck after awhile

In the huge basilica

More dramatic lighting

We sat here for awhile

Fontana Trevi at night

Pantheon- so geometric

Colosseum

vicino forum

anche questo

sitting on ancient ruins

Finito

This weekend is Maremma with the school. I hear they have great parks with horses and wild boar a-roaming.

Sun

Today in Art History 2 (curatorial/ museum studies) we met again at the Pinacoteca, actually first in a caffe across the street and then at the Pinacoteca. We talked about what theme we want our show to have and I think we decided on paintings with narrative featuring important saints. We're also trying to incorporate paintings with references to Siena (sienese cloth, sienese architecture, etc). We decided on 7 paintings focusing mainly on medieval and about two from renaissance. I think it'll be really good. We're going to research the pictures and then reconvene next Thursday to discuss. Eventually we're going to put together some combo of displays, plaques, and pamphlets.

On another note, my Italian teacher is awesome. She is so nice (Claudia) and we swapped music. I think our class is going to eat lunch with her on Wednesday. She's pretty young too and she wears funky cool stuff.

The Book Art woman is fun too. She's Australian and ended up living in Italy when she was asked to help restore books that were hundreds of years old in this private library. She often brings in books that shes bound and they're great. She is extremely patient considering there are 8 of us asking her questions all the time. You can tell she really enjoys what she does.

Today was also the first day that it hasn't rained this week and everyone was roaming around the main streets with their dogs.

Tomorrow is Rome! We're taking a 7am bus so I'm not looking forward to waking up at 6am but I think it will be well worth it. I'll post pictures when I get back.

Probably will be getting a housemate from Hungary who is taking a course in art restoration in Siena or Florence.

Tuesday

Going to Rome this weekend. It's about 3 hrs away by bus. More later

woop

Today is going real good.

The weather is perfect, sunny and warm. I had Italian class then the two Italian classes. One of the Art history classes is a medieval/ renaissance overview and one is about curatorial studies. We visited the Pinacoteca Nazionale and the Museo dell'opera. It's crazy to be able to see the Duccio's up close instead of on paper because there is so much detail that just can't be appreciated on a handout. Then I went with two friends and got pizza and this HUGE gelato. They have amazing flavors here (Mom and Dad, I will take you to this place when you visit). I got fondente (dark chocolate), caffe (coffee), ricotta and fig, and tiramisu and in one giganto delicious cone. It was everything a Friday should be.

Yesterday we went to the Tea Room past the campo which has really cool decoration, chairs, and millions of awesome teapots/ flaming desserts. It seems like a cool/ chill place to hang out and just talk. It smells like wonderful burning outside, like just after a campfire.

PS- I just want to say thank you to Miriam, Maria, Geraldine, Bridgette and Casey for the wonderful package. I miss you guys (and everyone else).

Happy Friday!

woop

Bought a plane ticket to visit Hannah in Greece for the long Easter weekend in April and I can't wait.

A friend's pic of some random night out

Here's the book I've been working on (it's still in progress):

Print

Here are some pics of my print in the art show at B.U.

Thanks Laura for taking them!!