Ravenna and Bologna

We had another great day trip this week. To Ravenna and Bologna, two cities in Emilia-Romagna, which is the region to the north of Tuscany. Both of them are very old, historical cities. Ravenna is known for its beautiful mosaics and one of the first Christian basilicas. The Basilica of San Vitale is a Byzantine basilica that is almost 2000 years old and absolutely beautiful. It has the shape and appearance of a flower on the inside, with a beautiful painted ceiling and the most beautiful mosaics. The colors are so vibrant. It just amazes me how people can create something like that: it must take so much patience, precision, and skill. In Ravenna also we saw a Paleo-cristian church, which has a different style of architecture, but was also covered in mosaics.

After that we went to Bologna, which ended up being my favorite. It is a little bit bigger than Ravenna and also seemed more busy and lively. The main piazza is the Piazza Nettuno, which has the famous "Neptune Fountain," which has sculptures by Giambologna, who is my favorite sculptor and did a lot of work in Bologna (hence the name!) It was especially nice there this time of year because there was a huge decorated Christmas tree in the piazza. I loved the feeling of the cold, and the hustle and bustle and seeing the Christmas lights. Bologna also has two leaning towers, though not leaning as far as the one in Pisa. All in all, it was a nice afternoon.

This week is the last week of classes. I only have two more days until Christmas break, which is taking me to so many fun places. First, I'm flying to Brussels, Belgium with five friends from school, including my boyfriend, and then heading to Amsterdam in the Netherlands for a few days. After that, I fly to Athens, Greece to meet my mother, father, and brother. We're going to do some sight-seeing there and then head to Santorini, one of the Greek Isles for Christmas. New Years will be in Venice, and then back to Florence for two days, before I hop on a train to Switzerland to meet my boyfriend and a few others for the weekend. We're planning to see Geneva and Zurich and then come back to start the next round of classes. It's going to be a crazy few weeks but I'm very excited! I want to make the most of this chance I have to travel and see new places.

Arrivederci!

Holidays Abroad

I have had my first Thanksgiving away from home and family. It was definitely a unique holiday. Italians don't celebrate Thanksgiving, but here at the school they try to make it special for us.

We had a day trip to Pisa and Lucca, two cities in Tuscany. Pisa, obviously, is famous for its Leaning Tower. I had already been there a month or two ago, so I just enjoyed wandering about the streets of the city a bit. It drizzled rain, but wasn't too bad. Next, we went to Lucca, a city I hadn't seen. It wasn't a big city, but it had several beautiful churches, including San Michele in Foro, which stood in a huge piazza full of pigeons. It was a nice little town and we all just strolled and looked in shops. Also, Lucca is known for its ramparts, the old city walls that are now grass-covered and turned into walking paths on top of them. Altogether, it was a good day.

In the evening, when we returned to school, they had prepared a really nice dinner for us. Delicious food! Almost all the traditional American foods. We all dressed up nicely and took photos, and just relaxed and ate together. It was definitely a good ending to the day. As nice as it was though, at the end of the day I couldn't help but think about my family and wish that I was with them. Some things will never change!

And speaking of holidays, I am shocked by how fast Christmas is approaching! In a little over two weeks I am heading off for Amsterdam with some friends for a few days and then Greece with my mother, father, and brother.

Here in Florence, everyone is getting ready for Christmas, also. We took a walk into town today to go to a Christmas market that is set up in the piazza at Santa Croce, one of the beautiful churches. Along many of the main shopping streets, they have strung up beautiful white Christmas lights and almost every store has nicely decorated trees in the windows. It is exciting to see how another country views the holiday. I love Christmas. When we made it to the market, it was so exciting! Delicious cookies, candies, hot cider, trinkets, all kinds of things everywhere. I bought some bread and pesto cheese for dinner, a pretty ornament and several gifts for friends and family. Mainly it was surreal just to be walking through a Christmas market in Florence, Italy in front of a beautiful old church. Definitely a Christmas to remember!

Some photos from Pisa, Lucca, and Thanksgiving dinner are up on my Picasa Album. Enjoy!

Ciao

Medieval Towns and the Mountains

About two weeks or so ago, we took a day trip to see two medieval Tuscan towns: Volterra and San Gimignano.

Volterra is a very small Estrucan walled city that is famous for its craftsmen who work with alabaster. It was one of those little towns that you see in movies (or actually, everywhere in Tuscany) with narrow streets paved with stone and beautiful views over the valleys of Tuscany. We stumbled across an elderly man who had an alabaster studio. It wasn't even a store, just a little room full of alabaster pieces and little statues and trinkets. So cool.

Next we went to San Gimignano, a place I was so excited to see. The city was famous for it's 70-some towers that were built by rich families and made into sort of a "medieval Manhattan." Today there are 14 of the towers left, which make is so unique. I took so many great photos of the towers and the shadows they made across the faces of the other buildings. In the middle ages, San Gimignano was an extremely important city along the main trade route, but it was overtaken by Florence in the 1300 or 1400s and lost its significance. However, this means that it is very well-preserved. It was a nice day we spent there, exploring the city and sitting in a cafe for hours. That's one thing I love about Italy: life moves so slow here.

This past weekend, we had a spiritual retreat in the mountains of Tuscany, at the "summer camp" of the Italian Adventists. It was a beautiful little spot with cabins and nice views. It was a short walk from a small hill-town called Poppi, which we went and visited. We had a few meetings with a religion professor from the school, but mainly we just spent time together. One thing that I loved was Saturday night when we made a big bonfire and had the Italian version of S'mores...a little different, but still delicious. Surrounded by beautiful hills colored with trees with orange and red leaves, I almost felt like I was in Tennessee--home. It was a nice feeling.

I really love experiences like that one: to be together as a group, to discuss important things, but also to laugh and have a good time. No stress, just fun and relaxation. I think it is an important thing to have to keep sanity. I feel a lot of appreciation for everyone here, and the new friends I have made.

Now I'm going to have a hot shower and catch up on my sleep!

Good News

A great new development has happened to me. Thanks to advice from those more computer-savvy than me, I have created an online web album that can be viewed by anyone. All you have to do is go to this website:

http://picasaweb.google.com/jennifer.meyer0

Currently I have only one album created with a few pictures of Florence and the school, but I will add more soon and try to keep you all updated in the future about all the beautiful places I am able to go!

If for some reason the link doesn't work, will someone please let me know? :-)

This weekend is a spiritual retreat in the mountains of Tuscany; can't get much better than that! I am very excited. Things have been going really well lately. I'm loving it here. It's really turning out to be the best time of my life.

Hope all is well with everyone at home! Miss you all!

From Naples to Edinburgh (and everything in between!)

I'm not even sure how to begin! There has been so much going on lately. Out of the last 16 days, I've been traveling for 13 of them. I've been on so many buses, trains, airplanes, subways, and city streets it makes my head spin to think about it!

In the interest of not having this blog be miles long and bore my audience, I'll just give the general overview of where I've been and specify a few of the highlights also.

SOUTHERN ITALY:
We started out with a school trip to Naples and southern Italy. Such a cool place. I could definitely see the differences between the north and south of Italy. Naples had its charm, but was much wilder, run-down, and dirtier than Florence. Beautiful cathedral, though. We also traveled to the Amalfi Coast for a day, visiting the cities of Positano, Amalfi, and Ravello. Fantastic views, just like you see in the movies. Blue water, high cliffs with idyllic little towns built up them. I loved the beach at Positano, and the charming little square in Ravello, a mountainous town.

We also took a day trip to the island of Capri. Without a doubt, the memories of that day are going to be with me forever. Five of the girls and I explored the island and found a secluded little cove, with the characteristic loose stone beach. The water was so clear and cold it took your breath away. But we swam anyway, out away from the shore, where you could look up at the cliffs towering above you on the island. So cool. And relaxing. We had lunch at a small bar on the beach in the sun. An almost perfect day.

Another major highlight of the trip was Pompeii and Herculaneum. Mount Vesuvius, which erupted in AD 79 and destroyed both those cities sits on one side of the Bay of Naples. Pompeii sits at its feet and is such an awesome place. Seeing buildings and frescoes and streets that were walked by ancient Italians even before the time of Christ was so awe-inspiring. It is so well-preserved.

After a few days with the school, six friends and I decided to strike out on our own and see a little bit more of the south. We had a loose plan, and we just went, hopping trains and buses. We went to Sorrento, and Salerno, and finally Bari, a small town in the region of Puglia, the "heel" of the Italy boot. It was quite the experience, spending a cold night in a train station. But we had a great time. I felt like I bonded with the people who went. I'm making good friends here.

ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND:
Then, if that wasn't enough adventure, three friends and I had made plans to go to England this past weekend to visit two former teachers and their daughter who are now living in Newcastle upon Tyne, in the northern part of the country. It was quite the trip, with a lot of traveling to get there. We had a great weekend, though, visiting Edinburgh, Scotland and the Lake District of England. So beautiful. We visited the home of William Wordsworth and also the home of Beatrix Potter. We also got to spend half a day in London to see some of the sights there, including Westminster Abbey, which may be one of my favorite places in the world! We were very English for the weekend, having a proper tea with scones, jam, and clotted cream. Delicious!

Now I've finally made it back to school and gotten settled back into the routine. Tomorrow, we have a daytrip to the medieval towns of Volterra and San Gimignano. Can't wait for that!

I feel so blessed to be able to see all these things. It amazes me that I have crossed a continent and seen three countries in just a matter of days. This is why I wanted to come here: to have experiences like these!

God In Italia

I believe I have discovered what my favorite part of Europe is: the churches.

It seems that every town, no matter what size it is, has at least one church. A large city like Florence has dozens. And that church is almost always the center of the town, the most important building. Florence's Duomo is a cathedral that is the center of the city: Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore. It was begun in the 1200s and is the world's fourth-largest cathedral. I am still in awe that I live only a 40 minute walk from this place. This week I went inside for the first time. Incredible.

But my favorite church in Florence is not Santa Maria del Fiore, but an unlikely church that you might miss if you're not paying attention. It is a square, rather plain-looking church (on the outside, at least) that sits on the main street between the River Arno and the Duomo area. It sticks out a little bit because of the niches along the outside that each contain a statue of the patron saint of each of the old guilds that used to rule commerce in Florence. The church is called Orsanmichele and was orginally built and used as a grain market in the 1200s. The inside of the church is very small, but beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. That's the best word to describe it, I think. I love just sitting inside on the pews and observing.......

That's the thing about the churches here: as soon as you go through those huge, carved, dark wooden doors, it's almost like time stops and you are in a place of total peace and reverence. Every church that I have been in has felt this way, from the fourth-largest cathedral in the world to a tiny forgotten church on top of the small town of Monterosso del Mare. It's hard to describe the quiet and peace there. And I love how these churches have survived so much. Many of them are almost a thousand years old. We have nothing like that in the United States.

Of course, there's another aspect to these churches. A friend said to me the other day, while we were sitting inside a big and beautiful church: "you know, these churches were built by the clergy during a time when people were starving in the streets. I think that's interesting, because God was not in them then."
I had never thought of it that way before...and I still wonder now, is God in those churches? They are all blatantly Catholic, each dedicated to a different Saint, when they should be dedicated solely to God.

Interesting thought. But I feel that if you are a person in need of God, and you go to one of those churches, and go inside and sit on the smooth wooden pews and look up at the altar made to honor Jesus hanging on the cross, and you pray...then God will be there.

So I still love the churches here.

Pisa and Beyond

On Saturday, I did my first bit of independent travel. Two friends and I took a day trip to Pisa, which is of course the home of the famous Torre Pendente, or Leaning Tower.

It's only about an hour or so by train, and then we were able to walk around the city, it being rather small. The Tower, which sits with the Duomo and Baptistry in the Piazza dei Miracoli (Square of Miracles) is beautiful! All the many photographs I have seen of it cannot really do it justice. It isn't the tallest thing in the world, but the fact that it doesn't stand straight gives it an extra interest to look at. The Duomo was also a beautiful building, as it seems that all Italian duomos and cathedrals.

We took the obligatory tourist photos with the tower, of course (leaning on it, pushing on it, etc.), but more than just enjoyed the perfect, sunny, fall day by sitting on the grass in the square and relaxing. It was a nice day.

On the train ride home, I felt myself feeling like I was going "home" to Florence. Amazing how quickly you can adapt to a place and feel like it is your own.

Sunday, after lunch, a few of us decided to hop on the bus to Santa Croce, a beautiful church that is close to the River Arno on the west side of town. We wanted to go inside to see the graves of several famous Italians whose resting places are there: Galileo, Machiavelli, Dante, and others. There was also a beautiful open courtyard and cloisters, and lots of beautiful frescoes by Giotto in the church. Beautiful place.
Luckily, after the church, we walked across the Ponte Vecchio to the Palazzo Pitti, where there was a wine-tasting festival in the Piazza. Walking a little ways further down the street, we found the back entrance to the Boboli Gardens, the gardens of the Palazzo. Normally it is over 10 euro to get inside the gardens and palazzo, but that day it was free, because of European Heritage Weekend! So exciting, because the Boboli Gardens are absolutely stunning. We walked around and found a huge fountain designed by Giambologna, lots of little meandering paths through the woods, and a hilltop which overlooked the whole city. Afterwards we were able to walk down the hill and go into the Palazzo Pitti, which was the main residence of the Medici family from about the 1400s onward. It is full of their collections of art treasures: statues, paintings, furniture.

Altogether, it was a great weekend. I still can't believe that I'm here in this place, seeing all these things. Florence is practically in my backyard, and every time I open my nice thick guidebook, I read about a new church or piazza in the city that I have yet to see!

So many places, so little time...

Cinque Terre

How do I begin to describe the day I had yesterday. Absolutely amazing. I know that I will see many beautiful and breath-taking things while I'm here in Europe, but after yesterday I am feeling in awe of what I have already seen...it almost feels like enough to satisfy my desire to see new and beautiful places.

We left early in the morning to make it to the Cinque Terre, which is an area north of Florence, on the coast. It is comprised of five small villages that are built on the rocky coast of the Italian Riviera. Each of the villages are a few kilometers apart and are connected by train and footpaths. They are the quintessential villages of Italy: small clusters of pastel buildings overlooking the sea, with its blue-green water crashing against the rocky shores.

The first two villages, Riomaggiore and Manarola, are connected by a paved trail called "Via dell'amore", or Lover's Lane. It sprinkled a little bit as we were on the lane, but afterwards it cleared and became a perfect day, slightly cloudy so it wasn't too hot, nice breeze, perfect...

Next is Corniglia, which is built up a bit higher on a hill, looking as if one of the houses on the edge could break off into the ocean at any moment. We stopped to have lunch here, sitting on benches overlooking the ocean. We explored the streets and found a tiny little church that overlooked the town.

The fourth town is Vernazza, which may have been my favorite. It has a natural harbor, with lots of little, brightly-colored boats. We stopped for an espresso and then explored the streets and went inside a tiny, charming church, with a domed, stone roof and beautiful views of the ocean out the high windows.

The last and largest town is Monterosso del Mare, or Monterosso. Here we made our best discovery. There was a small castle-like building at one end of the main street, up a slight hill, and we followed the path there, passing little cafes that overlooked the ocean. It turned out that the castle was actually someone's private residence (my dream house, by the way!). But there were stone steps that continued up the practically vertical mountain. We kept climbing and found a little overlook where there was a statue of St. Francis of Assisi, overlooking the ocean, like everything else.
But the best was yet to come. Curious, we continued climbing, following small and seemingly-forgotten little paths. Farther up the hill was a small church, so beautiful and peaceful, with paintings and music playing inside. There was another set of stairs that continued up, and curious, we followed it.

It led to one of the coolest places I have ever been. At the very top of the hill, as high above the town as you could get, was an old, forgotten cemetery, but not a normal one. This place had crypts, with smooth marble fronts, stacked on top of one another, 10 high. There were also mausoleums of families, with small shrines and wrought-iron gates, some left open. Inside were graves of over a centuries worth of family members. Many of the graves were from the 1800s. The cemetery seemed to continue on forever, and we explored for quite awhile. The thing that made it so much better was the fact that we three girls were the only ones there. It was like a hidden treasure that we had discovered.

Being there, I found myself becoming a true traveler, having the desire and the curiousity to keep going, to constantly see something new, to always want to know what is around the next bend or behind the next door. I know that this is the attitude that will make my time here that much more amazing.

So, in conclusion, I highly recommend going to the Cinque Terre for anyone traveling to Italy. Even just a day is enough to see and appreciate the towns and their beautiful setting. And they are the types of places where you can make your own little discoveries, like I did!

The (Sur)realities of Italy

Today we began our literature class: Italy and It's Culture in British and American Literature. It's in English (thankfully) and we're basically just reading excerpts from different books about Italy and examining how our culture views Italy...and how realistic those perceptions actually are.

It made me think about my own perceptions of Italy and what I was expecting...and what the reality is. So far, I've been pleased with what I've seen: the history, the architecture, the food, the gelato, and the way the city is. I've always idealized Italy as something of a paradise, and being here makes me realize that it's a real place, just like my own hometown.

However....

it is a beautiful, surreal, and fascinating place at the same time, and in that way, my expectations have not been disappointed.

The other day I returned from town and walked up the steps into the dorm. The entrance area is a big open room with winding stone steps and a stone floor. Connected to it is a small chapel, where the choir was practicing that day. As I was walking up to the dorm I could hear their sound resonating on the stone and filling the whole building. It was so beautiful I had to sit down on the stairs and listen until they finished their song. It really made me feel for that moment that I was in a movie, and that music was the soundtrack. For that surreal moment, I felt like Italy really was a paradise.

The campus makes me feel that way on almost a daily basis, also. Heather and I went exploring a little bit this evening and found several little paths made in between the hedges. There are little winding paths with benches along them and a low wall that faces a field. On the other side of the field are yellow houses with red roofs and those characteristically-Tuscan trees: tall, deep green, and skinny. We walked down into the field as the sun was getting low and just stood (ok, not really, we actually frolicked a little bit, because after all, it's ITALY!!). It was beautiful. So many things here are beautiful. I don't know if I ever want to leave!

Discovering Florence

I'm getting settled into a routine in school. Classes have been going now for four days and I feel like I'm starting to get a grasp on the language a little bit more. We've started at the very beginning (my name is...., I'm 20 years old....I am American, etc.), but I've been doing some studying on my own and trying to learn as many new words as I can.

So that's the boring stuff. However, we have an amazing schedule. Class starts at 9 and I'm almost always out by 12:30. Mondays are electives. I'm taking ceramics; fine arts and monuments, which prepares us for the tours that we will be taking around the country; and a literature class which examines how Italy is viewed in English and US literature.

Otherwise, I'm still loving Florence. (Almost) everything about it! We've started finding places that we can make our own: cafes, gelato shops, piazzas. One of my favorite places is the Piazza della Signoria, where there are many famous statues, including the Rape of the Sabine Women by Giambologna, and the Neptune Fountain, as well as a copy of Michelangelo's David. The Ponte Vecchio is interesting (and expensive). The Duomo is the most important building in the city and is so beautiful, made with the characteristic green, white, and pink marble of Tuscany. Orsanmichele is a small, but beautiful, church that used to be a grain market in the late 1200s. I love how the streets of the city are paved with cobblestones in the historic area. I just love everything!

We went to see the real David at the Museo 'dell Accademia on Wednesday night. It's in a very small museum, where there was also a display of musical instruments owned by one of the Medici! So many things in this city have been affected by the Medici family.
But back to the David. It amazed me, standing in front of it, that a man could chip away at a huge chunk of stone and make it into what it is. You can see the definition of the muscles and the curls of the hair. So realistic.
I can't wait to the see the Uffizi Museum. There is the art that makes Florence the famous center of culture and art that it is!

The First Tale

Well, I made it. And now, I live in Italy! The trip here had a few ups and downs, but overall was successful and not too difficult. I think the best part of it was when I woke up from a short nap on the flight from Munich to Pisa and right below me were the snow-covered Alps. Absolutely gorgeous and seeming close enough to touch. In between the mountains were little villages, with white houses with red roofs, just like you see in movies. That made me feel so excited to be in Europe and to know that I will be here for 10 months.

After arriving, I settled in with my roommates Heather, Jessica, and Sarah, my awesome friends from Southern. We have a big room together and have been having so much fun. We don't get much sleep because we end up spending so much time talking and laughing. The campus is absolutely beautiful; so old, with so much history. It overlooks the city and sits on a slight hill, but is only a 15 minute bus ride away from the center of town. In the center of Florence is the Duomo, which is the main cathedral of the city. It is amazing and surreal to look at. I'll try to post photos later!

In the last few days, we've seen a lot of Florence: the River Arno, with the Ponte Vecchio, Santa Croce, Piazza della Signoria, Orsanmichele, the Palazzo Pitti, San Lorenzo, and many other beautiful buildings, and there is still so many more things to see. I love this city! I am so excited that it is going to be my home for the next few months.

We also found the best gelato in the city (so the guidebooks say, and after having been there twice, I believe it!). I can see I will have to exercise some self-restraint in the next few months!

Classes begin tomorrow, which will change a lot, I'm sure. But I'm excited to begin learning the beautiful language that is spoken here, for multiple reasons (but the main one is that it's frustrating to not always be able to communicate!)
Wish me luck in class!

Love, Jen