Felice festa della mamma!

Happy Mother's Day to all Moms out there, and especially my Mom and my Titis! I miss you guys!

More Cornellians come to Visit

Two friends of mine from Cornell, Antonio Pietrantoni and Eli Meltz, came to visit Bologna this week for a couple of days. Tony is studying at Oxford and Eli is spending the semester studying in Paris, and Bologna was their last stop on a busy and travel-intensive spring break.

Though they were only here for a couple of days, they made a point to stop by my apartment and meet JAB:

The three of us trying to get JAB to pose for a photo op

I stole this photo from Tony's online photo album. He had captioned it "dog from hell."

Though they were impressed by my Italian, they were not impressed by my attempts to tame the wild beast.

Il Nostro Giro Italiano

Ciao a tutti!

My parents are back en route to NYC and I am back in Bologna after what ended up being a wonderful two week spring break together, when we did a grande giro italiano, a big Italian tour: we hit Bologna, Florence, Rome, Tuscany, Venice, and Lake Como. There were far too many laughs and stories to fit into this blog, but here are some of the highlights:

Mom and Dad ready to start the hike up to San Luca

Climbing San Luca -
Shortly after arriving in Italy my parents were brave enough to commit to hiking the 666 continuous porticoes up to the Sanctuary of the Madonna di San Luca, just outside Bologna. The legend tells that the sacred image of Madonna di San Luca (Virgin by Saint Luke) was brought down to Bologna in 1433 and miraculously stopped the heavy rain, from then onwards the sacred image was (and continues to be) brought down once a year from the church, and the porticoes were built in 1676 to protect the painting during its descent.

St. Peter's Square in preparation for Easter Sunday mass

Visiting the Vatican on Good Friday -
This day was too much to take in at once - in one day (one MORNING, really) we saw the Sistine chapel, Michelangelo's Pietà, Emperor Nero's bathtub, St. Peter's Basilica, and countless incredible sculptures, paintings, maps, and tapestries. We all agreed that this morning spent at the Vatican was by far our favorite experience in the eternal city.




Our knowledgeable tour guide, Leo, informed me that looking through this keyhole would give me a peek inside the papal apartments. Too cool!

Grapes beginning to grow in the vineyard where we stayed

Drinking Brunello in Montalcino -

We were lucky enough to be able to stay a couple of days at a family friend's vineyard in MONTALCINO, TUSCANY, where they produce Brunello di Montalcino, one of Italy's best wines. We had a wonderful time doing so! The town was small and quaint, the food was incredible, and the wine was even better!

The plaque on our Olive tree - we bought this olive tree in the vineyard a couple of years ago and each year they send us three bottles of olive oil from our very own olive tree! Coolest investment ever.

I had never seen a GPS point me into water before when there wasn't a bridge

Putting our rental car on a ferry to cross Lake Como -
Lake Como was, simply put, one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen in my life. We stayed in Bellagio but in order to check out some of the other towns surrounding the lake, our GPS instructed us to put our car on a ferry across the lake. We obeyed.

Unbelievable two weeks. Photo albums to come soon!

Ci Sto!

Ciao a tutti!

Sorry it has been so quiet! I am halfway through my two-week spring break, and have been around and about, living out of a suitcase!

My parents decided to come and visit for the full two weeks, and we have been traveling all around Italy together. I'm blogging right now from Venice, the second-to-last stop on our journey, where we are spending two days.

Here are some photos from our trip so far:

Mom and Dad jumping for joy in Piazza della Signoria, Florence

Me by il Colosseo in Rome

Dad hanging out by the pool at the vineyard we stayed at in Montalcino, Tuscany

More updates to come when the trip is over - until then, a dopo!

A Monica Moment

This past Wednesday I had to go to ROME to take care of some business at the American Embassy. I was done pretty early in the morning and so although it was raining and I was only there for the day, it was my first time in la città eterna and I figured I would try to do a little sight-seeing before I went back to Bologna. I headed to the nearest major site: the Trevi fountain.

For those of you unaware of the rules governing the Trevi fountain coin-toss, they are:
- Throwing one coin over your shoulder into the water of the fountain will ensure a return visit to Rome
- Throwing two coins will ensure a marriage coming soon
- Three coins means a divorce.
And fun fact: over 3,000 euros are collected from the fountain daily.

Even though I was by myself in the middle of a downpour, I couldn't leave without tossing in a coin - it would be bad luck! So while performing a balancing act with my umbrella, I tossed my coin over my right shoulder...

My toss was followed by a "bing" and a "bang." The "bing" was the coin bouncing off the edge of the Trevi - the "bang" was it hitting me in the back of the head. The Spaniard couple next to me nearly died of laughter.

Ouch.

Karaoke, italiano-style

A few days ago my friend Alex (James) had a friend from high school visiting, and so the time was ripe to get the gang together at a local bar, Soda Pops, for some karaoke: in italiano.

After failing miserably at several Italian melodies, we got the DJ to put on some Michael Jackson, and even convinced him to download the karaoke sing-a-long lyrics to Britney Spears's "Oops!..I did it again," at which point we put on quite a performance. The pictures speak for themselves:

Jamie, Rachel, Kara, Kelly and myself attempting "Billy Jean"

Jamie and Rachel rocking out - with a new friend

A Grammy-worthy Britney performance

Barcelona

¡Hola! and Bon dia!

I am back in Bologna after an awesome weekend in BARCELONA, SPAIN, where I was visiting my friend Lauren Engelmyer who came to visit me in Bologna a couple of weeks ago.

On Friday Lauren and I started out on La Rambla, Barcelona's bustling pedestrian-only boulevard, and stopped by La Boqueria, a huge food market that seemed to be selling every species and type of fruit, vegetable, cheese, fish, and meat. Next we headed to the edge of the city and up Tibidabo, a mountain overlooking Barcelona, where we were rewarded with spectacular views of the city (including the one above). After descending from Tibidabo we continued strolling the streets of Barcelona and looking for architecture by Antoni Gaudí, a highly individualistic Catalonian architect - we managed to pass by his La Pedrera and Casa Batlló.

On Saturday, Lauren headed off to the Salvador Dalí museum with her program, while I set out to conquer more of Barcelona's sights. I started out at la Sagrada Família, Gaudí's unfinished masterpiece. It's still very heavily under construction (it's currently scheduled to be completed around 2026, although whether this finish date will be reached is highly disputed. If completed, it will be the largest cathedral in the world). Here is a photo, although I warn you in advance that it really doesn't do it justice:

Gaudí's la Sagrada Família

Next I headed to what turned out to be my favorite place in Barcelona: Park Güell, a park and garden complex designed completely by Gaudí. Everything in the park seemed to be straight out of a fairytale - even the buildings looked like they had been transported from Hansel and Gretel.

Gaudí's Park Güell

I spent my afternoon strolling the streets of Barri Gòtic, the old city of Barcelona, and even got to check out an archaelogical excavation from Barcelona's Roman period at the Museu d'Història de la Ciutat de Barcelona before Lauren met me for tapas!

Saturday night we got tickets for a GIRL TALK concert at one of Barelona's largest and hottest clubs, Razzmatazz. The crowd was huge - here's a video of some of the craziness:

Madness.

Last but not least, since my friend Carly Miller (last seen when I was visiting Florence earlier in the semester) was also visiting Barcelona, we managed meet for breakfast on Sunday morning! As always, it was great to see her, and it was extra nice of her to get up early to meet me!

Barcelona was incredible, beautiful, and sunny sunny sunny, but I feel like I only scratched the surface of all there is to be seen there. Definitely a city I want to visit again!

To see more pictures from my weekend in Barcelona, check out the webalbum:

Barcelona, Spain

Enjoy!