Week 6-Break Week!!

Well, this is the 6th week and it was considered our break week. We were given a 10 day break and would pretty much do anything that we wanted. We were forced to leave the villa and go and find someplace else or some other people to bug for the next 10 days. Everyone else already had their lame trips planned; while Nick, Evan and I had our awesome trip planned out.

So, this was the basic layout of our plan. We were to get a ride to the biggest local city, Perugia, and we would take a flight to Brussels, Belgium. We would hang out there and check it out and stay for only one night. We would then take a train to Amsterdam and stay there for 2 nights. Take another train to Berlin and stay there for another 2 nights. Take a train to Prague, Czech and stay there for 2 nights. Fly to Milan, Italy and stay there for 2 nights, and then make our way back to the villa.

So, the beginning of the trip, we never really had any problems; or through the whole trip at all. We got a ride to the airport from one of people that work at the villas, husband. We left early, paid him and just waited around in the airport and checked it. The flight was good and we got into Brussels. As soon as we arrived, it was pretty damn cold and I was glad that I had brought a coat. The weather reminded me of home and I was a bit happy.

We got out of the airport and found a hot dog. It was pretty damn great to have some food like that! Just being in Italy, I’ve been getting tired of the food and it always being pasta! So, having some good old fashion hot dogs was great. We had to wait in a bunch of lines trying to figure out how the hell to get to intercity Brussels. Found out, there were buses, and a couple hour ride, we were there and walked to the hotel.

We left and went to this really nice restaurant, where the food was really good. I started out by getting this beer called kreik. Its a red beer that smells like licorice, and tastes like cherry. Its a cherry beer, and Brussels is well known for it. It was pretty damn good. We ordered some food, and got all meat. We all took great advantage of the fact that we could  get some pretty good food that wasn’t Italian.

After, we just kind of went back to the hotel, rested, and check out the church square, which was pretty cool.  We went to a couple bars and checked out the local places. Got food at this restaurant which turns into a club after 11. The food was good and a got a huge liter glass of beer. Then, we just went back to the hotel, slept, and went and caught the train to Amsterdam the next morning.

We got to Amsterdam and there were a lot of people. Its a really huge tourist spot because of things. But, we walked around and got to the hostel, which was supposed to be the best in the city. It was pretty nice. There are 8 bed rooms that you stay in and it has a bar with food in the lobby area. 

The first day, we just pretty much walked around all day and saw a lot of random things. They had a carnival that was going on for some reason and it was huge! The food they had there was good. But, we walked around and saw that and walked around for most of the day. That night, we walked around and got to see a zombie walk/parade that they had going on for Halloween. We got back to the hostel and they had a huge party going on in the bar that was black light and paint, which was a lot of fun. Then we went next door and saw a bunch of old guys, dressed up in suits and they were covering old western songs with their band. The first night there was a lot of fun.

Not much happened the second day. We walked around a lot and saw the basic things. We checked out the red light district, and saw some girls. Then we pretty much just went to the hostel and hung out there. We got up the next day and made our way to Berlin on the train...first class by the way! ;)

We got there pretty late on the first night and didn’t do too much. We just got some food and went back to the hostel. The hostel was a lot like the last one, it was the most popular in Berlin and had a cafe and bar at the bottom. It was a lot bigger and the 3 of us got a room to ourselves.

The next day, Nick went on a tour to a concentration camp, while me and Evan just kinda walked around the city and walked to Checkpoint Charlie. That is a point for checkpoints while the Berlin wall use to be up during WWII and caused a lot of problems with Russia. It was up for a really long time and taken down I think sometime in 80’s. 

My thoughts of Berlin after this walking around was that it had a very western feel to it. It felt a lot like the United States because the architecture was very similar and the streets were actually normal. Italy is a lot different in building style because they’re so old and what you think are ally’s are actually streets. So, I wasn’t too impressed with Berlin.

That night in Berlin, we were sitting at a table in the lobby getting on the internet, and there were other people around us. It was a circle of us and we were just kind of keeping to ourselves. Some of the people starting talking to each other because they knew one another, and they said something and I just kind of randomly jumped in the conversation with them. There were about 7 of us sitting around and we all got to talking with each other. We found out that we were all American and I met someone that was actually living in Billings. We started talking and ended up going to this pub crawl. The last night in Berlin was definitely one to remember because it was so much fun!

The next day, we got a train to Prague and checked that out. We just got a hotel this time, so, we weren’t really social with people. After the night in Berlin, I had really come to like hostels because of meeting new people and having fun with them.

But, we just walked around Prague and we hoped to do something for Halloween. But, we couldn’t find a single thing and ended up walking the whole night and checking out the scene.

The next day, Nick and I decided to do a 6 hour walking tour. It wasn’t too expensive, and we just walked around and the tour guide told us about the history of Czech and of some of the buildings. We walked around, got some food that was included in fee, got on a boat and a free drink for an hour. Then we Czeched out a huge gothic church. All that probably ended up being the highlight for Prague, because we didn’t to do much after that and ended up catching a flight to Milan the next day.

We didn’t nothing in Milan, almost. We got to the hostel, and it was supposed to the most popular...again. It was a bit sketchy though. It just seemed that it was dirty, but it was still kind of cool. We got there late and I just kind of sat out in the lobby on my phone and randomly started talking to people. I met a guy from the states and a girl that was from the Netherlands. Both were pretty interesting and fun to talk to. I also met a woman from Australia that travels for her job because she does photography for some charitable thing.

the next day, Nick didn’t really like the hostel and got his own hotel room; but, he was also getting sick and he slept all day I guess. Me and Evan walked around and checked out a huge gothic church. The outside had spires that went up really high while the inside had some nice paintings. We just sat around at the hostel the rest of the day and made our way back to Perugia.

The entire trip was really fun and I thought it would have been pretty intense because of checking out 5 different countries in only 10 days. But, it wasn’t really that bad and I got my backpacking through Europe experience done. I was gonna do it again after I got done with classes here in Italy, but, I really miss home and my friends and decided to put it off and just come home when I was supposed to. I do recommend that if it ever crosses someones mind to backpack through Europe; do it! Its a lot of fun and you don’t get too many opportunities in life like that. I do plan on doing it again sometime, but it would be longer. Its actually not that bad either if you’re by yourself. I met quite a few people that were doing it by themselves and they never had any problems. Any stories that you here about people hating Americans, or pickpocketing or things like that are bullshit. People have actually been very friendly to us and you just can’t put yourself in stupid situations where you might get pickpocketed. Communication with foreign people is not that hard either. Most people in Eastern Europe speak English, and even if they don’t, its still not hard to communicate. But, definitely backpack through Europe!!

Church in Brussels

Amsterdam!

Carnival in Amsterdam

Zombie walk in Amsterdam

Party at our Hostel in Amsterdam

Sign in Czech in the trainstation

Prague

Prague

Prague

Prague

Prague. 

Prague

Prague

The Gothic Church in Milan

A little break

So last blog had ended with the entire class going to Florence and just us enjoying ourselves when we were there. It was really a lot of fun.

This blog will only cover 4 days and won't be too long. It just covers from Monday, October 22nd, up to Thursday, October 25th.

The week didn't consist of much. We did our Italian class in the mornings which is  the same things as always. Another language that is difficult to learn for people that only know one. The rest consisted of us actually finishing up firing our clay pieces. Most of the week consisted of getting them out of the kiln and cleaning up the clay room to make it look like no one was there.

We did have critiques with the class and individually with the professor. We took pretty much a whole day and showed off our clay pieces to each other and see what people had to say. A lot of peoples pieces turned out pretty great. Some had the problem of them breaking, but, it was mostly the handles, which are pretty difficult in the first place. Their pieces were still great. The critiques with the professor went good to. She just talked about our strengths and weaknesses and what we could do to improve.

Another thing was that our clay class had us require 2 pieces to do. One was fired in the kiln that we built here at the villa. We were able to talk to the people where we painted on the plates and bowls and they fired the other piece for us. It costed some money, but they turned out great and both pieces will be shipped and hopefully be to Rocky sometime before Christmas.

This week was a lot shorter and more laid back than the other weeks because it kind of marks a transition in classes. We finished up our clay classes and half of the Italian. It was on Friday of this week, that everyone gets a 10 day break to do what they want and we are to return on Sunday, November 4th to continue the other half of the classes which would consist of Italian and Painting. Everyone is kind of doing their own thing and going to other places. Me, Evan, and Nick will be traveling a lot over the next 10 days to try and see as much as we can. The plan is to fly from Perugia, Italy to Brussels, Belgium and stay there a night. Take a train to Amsterdam and stay there for 2 nights. Then take a train to Berlin, Germany another 2 nights; train to Prague, Czech for 2 nights; fly to Milan, Italy for another 2 nights; then finally return to the villa.

The following blog will be about the whole travel week.

Week 4-Kilns and Clay...and stuff....!!

The 3rd week ended with us finishing up our Art History class and the Italian Bowl/Jeopardy style contest. A friend and I ended up spending the weekend in the town of Florence. It had already been talked about that we would be going there on Sunday and going to a museum called the Galleria Academia. Nick and I decided to leave on Saturday, spend the night and check out the town and just meet everyone at the museum on Sunday.

So, Nick and I left and we got to Florence and checked into our hostel. We got there no problem because the trains are pretty straightforward once you get used to them. We got to Florence, and the first thing we do is get Mcdonalds. I know it seems a little American to do that, but, you really get used to things and we just decided to go ahead and get it because we missed it.

We got that, and it was only a five minute walk to our hostel. The hostel ended up turning out to be really nice. The staff was super helpful, they spoke english and everything was pretty clean.

After, me and Nick just walked around Florence all day. We got to see one of the markets that sold nothing but expensive jewelry, I got a few clothes that were pretty nice and some nice shoes on top of that which was meant for a dress up type night if it were to ever come around. ;) We also got to check out some of the bridges and see the canal and got some pretty great pictures. After being in Florence for only an hour, it was already my favorite city in Italy. It just seemed that it had more history, it was much cleaner and everything seemed much more convenient than the other cities that we had been to.

The following day, which was the Sunday, we got up, checked out and went and met everybody at the museum. We probably waited in line for about an hour and got in. There was a no picture taking policy, so I do not remember much from the museum. There were a lot of unfinished sculptures and a lot of busts of some famous people. The thing that I do remember however, is the main reason that we had gone there, and also something that I had studied in a previous class. It was the statue of David by Michelangelo. Its a huge statue depicting a character from the bible from his fight with Goliath. Its very big, detailed and incredible because you look at it and you observe the expression on his face, wondering what is going through his mind and wondering, at which point in his fight is it depicting. It was very incredible. 

As for the rest of the day in Florence, I can’t really say much. It just spent a lot of time walking around. We did, however, find this really nice spot that overlooked the entire city. There were a lot of people, it had a nice breeze; it was nice to kick back and relax up there with a beer and just oversee everything. We were there for a few hours, and left for home to just fall right asleep when the time came. It ended up being a very enjoyable weekend.

The rest of the week was a back to the grind type of thing. We had class Monday-Thursday and it consisted of our Italian class and our clay class. We had finished up Art History the previous week and so we were done with that. But, classes kind of went the same as they usually do. Italian was the same. Basically just learning another language and dealing with the frustration of rules that you aren’t used to because its a different language. It’s quite weird. You have one verb, but, depending on who you’re talking to or how you’re talking to them, it completely changes the form of the verb and so you have to remember the 6-7 different forms of it. On top of that, you have male and female words, plurals, and articles that just keep changing. I’m sure with time I’ll get it down. :)

As for clay, we had to have our second project finished up which it could have been anything. It could be anything you want to make or something inspired by work that we’ve seen over the last few weeks. I spent quite a few hours frustrated because I didn’t really know what to do at all. I started out with a mask, scrapped the idea and just kind of played with clay, until reverting back to the original idea because I couldn’t think of anything at all. I came up with that idea because of previous sites that we visited, there were a lot of theatrical masks. Also, while in Naples, I walked by this shop almost everyday, and it had masks out in front that peaked my interest. So, in the end, I decided to just go with that.

For clay, we also had to build a kiln. A kiln is kind of like a giant oven that’s completely enclosed. We made it with bricks that the villa had. We tried to do it with everyone, but, there were just too many people and everybody kinda of just got in the way of each other. We did end up getting the kiln made and by the end of the week, we got the clay pieces that we made fired up.

For the firing of our pieces, we had to find a metal object that we could put our piece in. We then wrapped our piece in paper, put it in the metal object, put them at the bottom of the kiln, and filled it up completely with sawdust and burned it. We all took turns watching, as to make sure that it didn’t burn the countryside or something. it took around 12 or more hours I think, and the pieces came out black like they were supposed to. Its a type of firing that was done by the Etruscans when they did there stuff a few thousand years ago.

Something else that we did this week, which was on the Wednesday, was that we went to  town that has been doing pottery since around the 15th or 16th century. Its a business that has been in the same family since then, and they make pottery and paint it. We toured and it got to watch someone paint and make a vase in a matter of minutes! The skill that they had was incredible. But, the main reason that we went there was to paint a bowl and plate of our own. We had arranged for it to happen and come up with our own designs prior to it and do it on the plate and bowl.

Creating the design wasn’t really a problem at all because we were able to do it on paper. when we got to the actual bowls and plates, it was a lot harder because we couldn’t actually touch them or else the glaze on them would fall and crumble. So, trying to paint a line with a free floating hand was hard for me. I wasn’t too happy with the design because of the crooked lines, but, it was still a fun experience none the less.

The 4th week ended by everybody taking a trip and going to a chocolate festival in Perugia. Its called Eurochocolate and is supposed to be one of the biggest chocolate festivals in Europe and in the world. its a 9 day festival where the streets are just lined up with vendors and tents, each of them having something to do with chocolate. There were so many different types and things that had to do with chocolate that it was a bit overwhelming. There were different brands, to different chocolates, and even different types of liquid that had to do with chocolate. There were even alcohol based things that were being sold that had mostly chocolate in them.

We spent some time getting there, which wasn’t really too bad. Just a couple buses and some taxi’s with walking, and we were there. My and a friend of mine just kind of walked around all day. I didn’t really try too much. I had a couple chocolate bars that were pretty good, bought a hot chocolate that had rum in it, and bought a couple alcohol bottles of chocolate that were very good. In the end, it ended up being really fun.

We spent the rest of the weekend just kind of lounging around because we only went to the festival once.

Photo of Florence

 Before putting in the kiln

The pieces in there containers and about to put them in the kiln

In the kiln

Filling the kiln up with sawdust

Covering the kiln

Now, just to wait...

Week 3-Villa life and classes

For the third week that we were in Italy, I never really did get around to taking any pictures. It mostly has to do with the reason that we moved into a villa, where we'll be spending the next couple weeks doing classes and there's not much to take pictures of. I like to take pictures of scenery and other things like that. I'm not the type of person that just goes around taking pictures of random people in the middle of class.

We got into the villa Sunday evening and got a run down of the whole place. We were introduced to some of the staff and got a tour of the place. There are many patios scattered around the place for people to just sit back and relax. It has a student lounge area (which we don't really use), a little room where you can play pool (still have yet to find the balls and sticks), an exercise room that is very....nice...you could say. It has an eating area where breakfast, lunch and dinner is provided at certain times of the day. The entire villa is huge. Its been around for a couple centuries and has a ton of rooms for the family that owns it, and for any staff that may work here. Next to the villa is a pretty good sized castle that has been around for a couple centuries, but is not open to the public because its under renovation. So, it sounds like that is out of the question.

After we had gotten to the villa, we got our first meal, and it was pretty good. It was a normal Italian meal where you get bread in the beginning, followed by a first course, second course and dessert later. We get a bottle of wine per table for every dinner, so some people start to get feeling pretty good.

Over the week, we get breakfast at 8, lunch at 1, and dinner at 7. Breakfast is interesting. Its been the same everywhere that we've gone to, where it consists of small portions of dishing yourself up and having some coffee to go along with it. I'm not really a big fan of the breakfast because the meat just doesn't taste like home. I miss bacon and eggs and all the good, greasy American stuff. I do like the bread and coffee that we get.

Lunch is almost the same as dinner, except we don't get a first course or dessert for lunch. Most of the meals consist of a lot of pasta, some vegetables and a little meat on the side. I almost feel like I'm going vegetarian sometimes. Can't really complain about the bottle of wine that we get at dinner each time.

Its pretty much like that through the course of the whole week for meals. As for classes now...

We have a few classes over the week. This week is different because we have 3, when we're supposed to have 2. We usually have a class in the morning, a break and lunch, then a class in the evening. The classes for this week are Art History, Clay, and Italian.

Italian has gotten to be a bit frustrating. We had it twice this week and learned some basics in being able to communicate in Italian. It just gets frustrating because we're being taught and the instructor keeps talking to us in Italian. It's like, "I have no idea what you're saying!" I realize that its good in that it could help us, especially in being in Italy, but, communication could be a bit easier. There's a lot of memorization to be had with this class, but I guess any language class could be like that. Its not a walk in the park to learn a new language.

Before we even came to Italy, we were supposed to have read our Art History book and taken something of a pretest. The Art History class for this week was a few times and lasted around 3 hours each class. It mostly consisted of reviewing us for a competition that we were having at the end of the week to see how far along we had come and also acted as a test. We talked, we went over slides, we were put into groups. There were 4 groups and they were for the Italian Bowl, which was the competition/test in jeopardy style. Our groups met and somewhat studied with each other....in the end, my group won. We got cookies! ;)

Clay class is  something completely separate from the other classes. We started our first class with Rhett introducing us to clay and excercises to work on your clay and get bubbles out and what not; keeping it wet, rolling it, pinch pots, etc. We had to get started on our first project, which was to replicate a piece we had seen over the few weeks. This was what I had talked about in an earlier blog post. The bocoroo pieces; which was red clay turned black from the firing. I replicated a piece that had a pretty simple design, but not simple in creating. It took me all week and I probably put about 10-12 or more hours into it. It ended up being the largest piece in the class and I put a lot of work into it and was pretty proud. I don't have any pictures, but I do have a picture of the original. They look similar to each other, but its not perfectly replicated.

This project was time consuming in that I had to build it up slowly and slowly to the top. The hardest part was the handles. You have to do those just right, or they can break off pretty easy. A lot of the people had trouble because some of their pieces broke, they were too much of a perfectionist, or their handles mostly likely broke. Its not that they messed up, its just that handles are very hard in getting to stay, making sure they dry right and stay on. Some peoples broke after they were already dry because they picked it up by the handle and it just snapped. Mine was very heavy and sturdy.

That about wraps it up for this week. I am down with my first clay project and have to start my second one for the 4th week. I was still unsure what I was gonna do for it by the end of this week. But, the project could be anything we wanted, but it was encouraged to be something that you seen over the weeks that inspired you. Until the next post...probably tomorrow...

Week 2-Napoli

So, the last blog ended with the group of us in Rome. We left the next day for the town of Naples. Now, people told us that Naples was a very sketchy town in that it was ruled by Mafia and there were large amounts of crime around the city. It is the city in Italy where you are most likely to get pickpocketed and so you have to kind of be on your guard the whole time, especially on buses or anywhere that's crowded at all.

The Sunday of the week was spent just getting to Naples. We took a train that was only a few hours long and it wasn't too hard getting our way around or even finding every thing. The train station in Rome is very big and there are tons of people, but the trains are roomy enough. We arrived in Naples and took 4 taxis to the hotel. I have to tell you, the sight on the way to the hotel from the view of the taxi was not pretty.

Just driving through the city, you could see why it sounded so sketchy, and this was without the viewing or hearing of a crime. There was trash everywhere! I've been to some pretty big cities, Rome being one, Boston, New York City, Minneapolis; and none of them had the trash that even came close to this city. It was everywhere and it reeked getting out.

From just judging, I didn't really like Naples too much. But, we got to the hotel and it was really nice and clean with the rooms being pretty big. Later that night, me and Nick just walked around for a few miles and got to know the city that was around the hotel. After actually doing a little and seeing things, my opinion of the city changed immensely and it actually wasn't that bad. Still not as cool as Rome though. ;)

The first day in Naples, we went to a museum that was down the road from our hotel. It was the Archeological museum of Naples and it was awesome. It contained a lot of mozaic like murals that were recovered from the town of Pompeii. For some of you that dont know, Pompeii was a town on the coast of Italy and was completely smothered in ash and lava from the volcano, Mt. Vesuvius.  People were killed instantly and the preservation of some of the things was impressive. The museum contained something that we weren't really studying, but interested me a lot because it had paintings that are from the era that interests me. Which is around 1400-1850. It had around 8 highly detailed paintings that were huge, with a designed ceiling and a statue of Atlas holding the world on his back in the middle of the room.

The first day in Naples consisted of nothing. We were supposed to go to Pompeii, but transportation workers decided to boycott and so transportation was not running that day. So it just became a day of relaxation and sleeping in. Found a really cheap pizza place where the pizza is only about $4 though. :)

For the third day, we took a bus and went to the town of Pompeii...or...what's left of it anyways. Like I explained before, the place was completely buried in ash and it was uncovered and excavated. The place was huge and it housed a lot of people. The preservation that the ash did was incredible and so we got to see a lot of the murals that were still left over and visible. We were there the entire day and walked around checking out the ruins. The last stop was something almost like the colosseum, but on a much, much smaller scale. We then went home.

Ruins of Pompeii with Mt. Vesuvius in the back.

The fourth day was almost like the third. We took another train to a small town that I forgot the name of. Outside of the town are the ruins of Herculanem. It was another town that was almost like Pompeii. It met the same results, but was a bit further from the volcano and so, it was it a day or so later. It was much smaller than Pompeii and ruins are still being excavated to day. It had very well preserved art and scientists were able to dig up where bodies once were and made casts of them.

Casts of people from the volcano in Herculanem

Town outside of Herculanem

Preserved are in Herculanem

The fifth day, we went to another small town called Pasteum. It has some of the most preserved temples that are still around today. Most of the structures that are preserved are just the outside columns and some of the tops. But, the sheer size of the things was massive. The columns were built in pieces and they each weighed at least over 5 tons. The size of them and actually seeing them was awesome. There were about 3 of them and each one was supposed to be a temple to the gods. One being for Posidieon, Hera and Demeter.

Our last day, Saturday, was somewhat like a free day. It started out with our Professor talking about going to some island called Capri. He never really told us why were going there. We just walked over to the harbor and got on a big boat that was about an hour long trip. Some of the people didn't fare to well because they get motion sickness pretty easy. We landed on the island and it was gorgeous. The cliffs went high and you could see green from the trees everywhere. There were little beaches and a harbor that housed a ton of boats with a small town that was jutted into the cliffs.

Anyways, after we arrived, Mark just told us that we had a free day and that we could do whatever we wanted. So, me, Nick, Evan, Mark and his wife, Rhett rented a boat for 2 hours. It was pretty cheap when split between the five of us and we circled the entire island. We saw huge cliffs, swam around in the Mediterranean, and did some cliff jumping.

The breeze from the boat and the weather was so relaxing. It was just nice with the breeze going through and the sun hitting you. We stopped once and decided to jump in and swim around. The water was really blue and salty. But, the temperature was just perfect to swim in. We drove around on the boat more and got to some cliffs that people were jumping off of. They were around 30-40 feet high and Mark jumped off it without hesitation. I went on it after a while and it was quite an adrenaline rush and really fun. We finished around the island, I got something to eat and we went home, ready to head to the villa the next day. It was by far my most favorite day in Italy so far. :)

Banana Split in Capri

Cliffs!

Capri!

Week 1-Roma!!

Well, I guess that this is way overdue as I was supposed to start this quite a few weeks ago and am just now finally getting around to it. For those of you that are reading this, we are supposed to keep a daily blog entry of our time through Italy. I am now starting it and will be updating it every now and then, catching up over the exciting weeks that have been my education. This week, I will be starting with Rome and what we did through the week.

Starting out, I traveled all the way to Rome from Billings, MT for a program through Rocky. It's almost like a study abroad thing but without the whole, going to another college in a another country thing. I mostly wanted to do this because I thought that it would be interesting to go to another country and be able to explore the world. The program also helps benefit me in that I'm an Art Major and it's very art oriented. I also thought that it would be a nice break from school even though I still have to go to school; but it's in Italy. ;)

I've never been really one to travel by myself. I've driven places before, but never really did any flying. So, naturally I was a little nervous to be flying by myself. I went to the airport with my dad, got my ticket and ended up having my professors, the Moaks, and another classmate Amanda on my plane, which made things a lot better. The nervousness just kinda went away.

We did are little flying and it really wasn't that bad. I just watched watched movies over the long flight as I anticipated our arrival into Rome. We got there in the afternoon and made our way to the hotel, where our other classmates were. We all got introduced with each other and made our way down the road to eat at a local restaurant that was very close to the hotel.

I never really was a wine drinker, but its the big thing in Italy, so I thought that I had better go along with it. You know what they say, "When in Rome." (Pun intended)

This was a picture of us all at the restaurant. We all had a great time getting to know each other and the food was pretty good. If I recall right, I'm pretty sure I got some chicken that was covered in a type of gravy. 

The rest of the night consisted of me and my roommate Nick walking around Rome and getting to know the city. We were out pretty late and got to see quite a few things. The night life of Rome was interesting. As late as it was, the were tons of restaurants that were open. They all have seats outside and you could see people eating out under the lights or by candle light. It made for a very interesting scene along with the tons of tourists that were still out that late. Me and Nick made our way back to the hotel (getting lost along the way for an hour an a half!) and got back to bed.

Something I forgot to mention is that one of the courses I am taking is Art History. Our first week in Rome was what this had to do with and some clay pieces, but, that'll be later.

First day consisted of us going to a place in Rome called the Roman Forum. A forum, for the people that don't know, is a place usually built by emperors as a gathering place for the citizens to talk about politics, etc. Anyways, we went there and theres like 4-5 of them just built over the years by emperor after emperor. They did it to honor someone or just built it to show there power. There are temples, libraries; but the big thing are the arches. The arches are very massive and very detailed usually detailing stories and what not.

The Arch of Constantine

The Roman Colosseum 

All the ruins the we visited were very...ruined. Back when they were in there glory, they were just massive buildings that I would have loved to see fully constructed. But now, after years of decay and civilization living around them, not much remains but some columns, save for a few buildings like the arch and colosseum above. The colosseum was very impressive. To me, it's really just an empty shell of its former self. Its still an impressive building, but, when it was in its glory, it held 50,000 people with gladiator fights for entertainment and the building with strewn with decorative clothes that cloaked it. It would of been quite a nice site to see.

On the Tuesday of this week in Rome, we went to a large museum called the Capitoline Museum. Its 3 separate buildings that have a very extensive collection of statues, busts and pottery. It has almost any art you can think of from murals to paintings. As you walk up to it, you have to go up a large flight of stairs that just really add to the museums. At the top are 2 large statues and another one of the emperor Marcus Aurelius. 

The museum takes a couple of hours to get through because of the collection that they have. One of the first pieces that you see is a statue of one of the Emperors, Constantine. He was one of the great emperors of Rome and had a huge statue built of him. The only thing that remains now are the feet and a head. Even though that those are the only ones remaining, the size of them and what it once was, had to have very impressive as it still is.

This was one of my favorite pieces that is in the museum. Its a bust of Medusa. What really gets to me the the detail in it. In the sad face to the detail of each head of the snake just makes for something very impressive as to what artists were capable back when this was created.

Over the rest over the museum, you see busts of emperors and a lot of pottery. One of the main reasons that we went to the museum was also because of pottery. We had to have a clay class and replicate a style of pottery called bucaroo. Its basically red clay, that when thrown in the kiln, turns black because of a chemical process. We had to pick a piece over the few weeks and recreate it.

In the Wednesday of the week in Rome, we went to a small town called Tarquinia. Its a small town that's a few hour train from Rome. the town is actually pretty good sized and there are a lot of nice shops there. We made our way through town to a site that had a lot of graves. The graves, or, tombs, were rooms built underground and had paintings on the walls with the person buried in them and treasures along with them.

There were maybe around 10-12 graves and each one was empty, save for the paintings on the walls. You couldn't really see everything too well. You couldn't go into the rooms as a door was blocking them and locked. So, all you could do was peer inside and either, not see the paintings too well because of the thick glass, or the paintings were pretty worn. But, there were still quite a few cool ones and the color in them was gorgeous. Pictures didn't turn out very well because of the poor lighting and flash reflecting off the windows. :(

After the graves, we made our way to the museum that held the treasures. It was a lot of pottery that was also bucoroo and a lot of penants made of gold that had impressive craftsmenship and detail. Once again, no pictures because we were not allowed to take them in the museum.

Thursday, we visited the Villa Julia. Another museum that was in Rome and a very long walk. It housed a lot of pottery that we seen for more bocoroo designs that we could go off of and some more gold granulation are pieces. The museum took quite a while to look through as I got into quite a few of the pieces and decided to sketch some of them in my journal that we have to keep. I did have quite a few favorite pieces. The piece that the museum is most famous for is a sarcophagus of a young man and his wife that they were that to have been cremated and put inside.

Friday, we visited the town of Ostia, which had a lot of ruins in it. The town itself was very small, but the main attraction were the ruins. You could see all the walls of the buildings that were once there, but have been ruined by time. The coolest things was a giant amphitheater that stood along the side. It was almost like the coloseum, but not as impressive. It had huge steps that people sat on and were thought to have been covered with marble. The theater was half circle shaped and down below was the stage that people would either speak or act upon for theater performances.

Our last day in Rome, Saturday, was interesting. We had a free day, and so some of us decided to go to the Vatican. We made our way there and payed to get inside. Everything in the Vatican is very impressive, but, we didn't get to see much of that. We were so set on getting to the Sistine Chapel, that we just rushed through, thinking that we could see the Vatican Later. That wasn't the case, it was only a one way type of thing, and that was a bit disappointing. To me, I wasn't too disappointed because I was happy that I got to see the Sistine Chapel.

The roof of the Sistine Chapel was amazing. Most of the work up there is by Michelangelo. He isn't my favorite artist, but the era that he did is work is some my favorite. Its the color, the attention to detail, the shadows and the lighting, the realism of it all is what gets to me and I love it. I loved the ceiling and it was so awesome to be able to look up and gaze at it and see that this thing was hundreds of years hold and still in such fine shape.

The same night, we all met up and decided to go and check out The Pantheon. We all went had night and had a pretty fun time. I got a few pictures and a group picture. We checked out a few more places along the way to, such as a couple fountains. It was mostly just a group night to see the things that some people didn't get to see.

Group picture in front of the Pantheon

Picture from inside the Pantheon

As for my over all experience in Rome...it was pretty fun. I did get to see a lot of art. The thing that I enjoyed the most though, was the nightlife. Just walking around the big city and see things, eating at different restaurant, and meeting new people. The big hangout spot is the Spanish steps. Its a huge staircase were hundreds of people from different countries just hang out and chat. I had a few good memories there and met some awesome people there. The whole things was a blast.

As for these, these were 2 locations that were close to us that I thought I'd share. I hope you enjoyed my first blog entry and that it wasn't too long. ;)

Ceiling inside the Pantheon