Mamma Mia!!!

Happy Halloween!! (Yesterday:D )Italians don't really celebrate Halloween; it's more of a kids' holiday, but we actually saw some little bambini in costumes running around Santo Spirito. Italians celebrate The Day of the Dead the day after Halloween by visiting deceased loved ones.  We celebrated by having a day out in the hills of Tuscany with Mamma Lo!

Mamma Lo had told us about

 these natural hot springs a few weeks ago and we decided that today would be the day to squeeze into Mamma Lo's 

tiny car and drive off to spend a leisurely afternoon there. We planned to be up early to clean our rooms, make lunch, and be off by eleven A.M.. Of course in Italy nothing goes as planned.  The water pump broke again. This is the second time it's broken since we've been here and apparently it breaks once a month always on the weekends when things are closed.  Fortunately, Mamma Lo gave the plumber a stern talking to and he ha

d the pump finally replaced, instead of fixed, by the time we returned 

(and boy would we need that water when we got back).  During this commotion we (Angel, Jenny, Alexa, and I) went to the market to get the fixings for our Panini.  Alexa

 had one with a mushroom spread, tomato, basil, and Bresaola (a less fatty Prosciutto), and the rest of us had a goat cheese spread, Bresaola, tomatoes, pepper, basil, and oregano. So fresh and delicious!   

After an hour and a half drive off into the beautiful countryside of Tuscany, we turned onto this small gravel road, parked almost under an overpass and hiked down a small path with our bundles of food and towels. It was the most unsuspecting place for a hot sprin

g, but there it was. Smelling like burning rotten eggs, the steaming water was 

piped down into several different pools.  It was like mulit-leveled hot tubs an

d bathtubs carved into the rock with water cascading down 

into the main pool right next to a small river. It smelled so badly once we arrived, but gradually our noses adjusted and we could 

barely smell anything but the fresh air. Underneath the white sulfur water were pocke

ts of dark mud in-between rock c

revices.  Of course we took full advantage of a free spa treatment and proceeded to take a mud bath. (I g

ot two facials!)Mamma Lo even joined in to help us!  

We Lounged in the springs for two 

hours before partaking of our picnic.  Wanting 

to make the mo

st of our day, after lunch we packed up and headed home; but not without some more forays. 

First, we stopped at the tiny walled

city of Menteriggioni.  We walked around it in about 30 minutes while having a cup of t

ea or coffee at a little cafe. 

The only down side of the springs is that the terrible rotten 

egg smell clings to you quite passionately after emerging from the springs.  All five of us were in a soap shop (a pretty fragrant one at that) when a man nearby placed his nose under his

 scarf and leaned away from us.  We laughed and quickly left as to not overpower anyone with our stench.  We had completely forgotten that we smelled wretched!

After leaving Monteriggioni, twenty minutes down the road was Mamma Lo's center called "The Roses".  She created this center for mentally disabled kids to attend after high school. See, in Italy these kids go to school mixed in with all the "normal" kids, but after high school, have no where to go and tend to be left behind. Mamma Lo's center is a place of beautiful expression, learning, and adventure for these "kids" (Some have been here so long, they're in their thirties, but have the youthful vitality of a fifteen year old).  We saw where the horses are, the gardens, the many sculptures, mosaics, fountains, pots, theater, and many other art projects that the kids have done.  Each year is a new curriculum where each activity reinforces the core of the curriculum.  For example they are learning about the body. So in their lessons they draw themselves, in ceramics they create sculptures of the body, their dance and music lessons sing about the body, they carve woodwork into miniatures of themselves, and many other forums of discovery.  It was amazing to see where Mamma Lo spent her time, and what she had created from nothing. 

By the time we got home at 6:30 we were stinky, cold, and hungry, but so very satisfied with the day.  And then we had Halloween night to look forward to...but I will leave that for tomorrow.  And I promise you will hear of my excursion to Greece.  A Domani!  

Final Rush

Whew! The weeks just fly by here in Florence.  Its been a hectic rush of classes and getting used to an actual schedule after having over a week of freedom in Greece for fall break. Oh yes, Greece.  But I'll get to that in a minute. Or maybe tomorrow; it's a multi-chaptered story.  Let's start with the preliminaries and do an overview of all things leading up to and involved with fall break.  

Two weeks before fall break I was sick

...but thankfully I have very good gi

rlfriends that I live with who took wonderful care of me. The girls would sit around with me and watch movies in bed, make me tea, periodically checked how I felt, and made sure I got lots of sleep.  Unfortunately I may have given my bug to my room mate who was not feeling well the next week: midterms.  I had a midterm or paper in each of my classes as payment for being released into freedom. We also had classes and our crazy/awesome 80 year old art history teacher threatened to punish us if we were absent from our museum visit on Thursday to start 

our break early(as we don't have class on Friday to her dismay). Thankfully all of us are good st

udents and hadn't made plans until Friday or Saturday.  

We were scattered over Europe: Greece, Tuscany, Sardinia, Ireland, London, and San Marino.

Half of the girls' families were coming to visit over fall break so there were 5 of us who needed plans for break.  Being sick two weeks before, I had not planned much and decided to go with Holly on a student trip with this company called EuroAdventures to Greece. We would first spend 2 1/2 days on

 an island called Corfu, then 

see Athens for 2 1/2 days.  With this trip you pay a set price and get a guide, transportation, accommodations, some meals, some tours, and a whole group of students to meet. There are several different companies like this in Florence

 to choose from.  It can be fairly expensive for a student to travel this way, but we also pay for the convenience of not having to deal with being in charge of finding places, transportation, finding that transportation...lots of thing

s involved.  We had done that f

or some weekend trips and for fall break it was nice to relax and see Greece without worrying when we needed to switch trains or where to find the right boat going to Greece.  

We finally bought our trip Monday, made it through midterms, checked the weather in Corfu and Athens, threw some clothes in our carry on bags, and we were off to the train station to meet out adventure!

I will tell you more about Greece in my next few posts...A Domani!

You Concentrate on Your Bicycle

Today was our trip to Assisi.  We were all a little disappointed after our very fun outing in Siena.  Our tour guide was just as entertaining if not more than our Siena guide, but the town was not filled with its usual charm but with thousands of religious pilgrims.  Tomorrow is Saint Francis' day and there will be thousands and thousands more pilgrims there to see St. Francis' tomb, church, house, and town. I was constantly being pushed and chided by 5 foot Italian grandmothers.  At one point I think a little old lady was hitting me in the back of the knees with her purse so she could get past me quicker!  Then Victoria and I had a conversation about how we wanted to be these crazy pushy little old ladies when we were grandmothers. 

This city was completely built around the Catholic faith. Not being Catholic, I am quickly being educated here in Italy on Catholic traditions, art, and saints through our art history classes, day trips, and my literature class.  This is good! But today was clouded over by 6 hour bus rides, crowds of people, and a very tiny town dedicated to tourism.  The jewel in the day besides the girls with whom I get to spend my time, was our tour guide, Joseph. (pronounced Yoseph) He is a native of Assisi and has 7 dogs.  He also was very friendly and entertaining as well as knowledgeable about his town. Two of my favorite quotes of his were in explaining why the Italians never add to frescos because evidently, "It would be like seeing my grandmother in a miniskirt".  And in response to some Italian cyclists whistling at our group of 10 females, "You concentrate on your bicycle!"  It was great. Once home, the evening ended with some Chinese food and laundry.  Tomorrow is the beach! It's an early night for me.  A Domani!

The most glorious days in Italy are the one spent leisurely  wandering the city.  Today was shopping day though, and we had a mission: leather jackets. Mamma Lo had told us about this leather market that evidently had the best deals on quality Italian leather.  The first place we went I found some buttery brown leather jackets that fit like a glove, however they were 275 Euro.  Thats 400 US dollars! We had to run out of there before they pressured me into buying it one of them.  I then ran into Alexa and found out that she has already purchased a coat for 120 Euro! So of course we go back to that store and Stephano ran to get me several different options. While he was gone I found this black fitted jacket that I ended up buying. Chin Chin for leather!

Next order of business was lunch. However, it was then 3:30 P.M. and most restaurants close from 3 till 5 or 6.  This practice boggles us American because we are used to having food service available to us all day long.  Eventually as we hungrily wandered the streets we found a restaurant called "Il porcospino": The Porcupine! Our waiter was very friendly and even encouraged us to order in Italian and nicely corrected our vocabulary.  We all agreed it had been a successful day in Italy and rushed home to take a nap and get some work done, which is what I must do now.  A domani!

Peanut Butter Jelly time

Monday was my birthday...unfortunately I had 6 hours of class and homework due.  So while I was typing up questions for polisci I hear giggles outside and Angel and Jenny burst in and throw balloons all over the room and sing "Happy Birthday" to me.  They also gave me a card with an adorable fat giraffe for me and a poem inside!  It goes,

"Dear Jordan, It's your birthday 

And we're proud to say 

That you're a great appartemento-mate, 

All of us living together must be fate! 

Tu, Jordan Garegnani hai 20 anni, 

Watch out world, she's gonna get all the great uomini. 

We're glad that we can celebrate with you and show you how much we care, 

If needed, we'd give up Mama Lo's dinner for you,

Finding someone like that is very rare." :)

The day of my birthday was not very exciting with all of my classes and my nap after.  However, the night was just great. Some of the girls and I went off to Dante's (the usual birthday spot for JMU kids) where we had great pasta and lots of free drinks :)  We then of course went to get Gelatto and then this sweet bar called Naima. 

 The next day was a continuation of my birthday because our faculty in residence got a cake and some bottles of prosecco to toast with all the girls and some of the faculty.  Then of course dinner was fantastic at Mamma Lo's with spaghetti and clams and Shepherd's Pie and salad...nom nom nom. We even had dessert!  We're going to Assisi this weekend and the beach nearby.  I'll let you know all about it. A domani!