new home

Ok, after much panic I finally found an apartment and it's amazing! I'm living with a 23 year old Italian named Emanuele who is really nice and chill. Eventually there will be four of us in the apartment because he's renting the last room a double. Steve helped me move my stuff there, which was really nice of him. I did buy him a beer after though, so at least that was a little repayment. I'm trying to think of what else has been happening here. Tenderoni and I went to the Gay Village, which was such a good time and we met a lot of really nice people. Other than that, I went on a job interview, which went well and I need to call them on Monday about going in for a second interview. Right now I'm kind of in a panic because I have an interview tomorrow and I'd been saving all the info about them in a spreadsheet file on a disk. Well of course today the disk decides that it's corupt and won't open my file! Now I need to call the school and ask what time my interview is for tomorrow, which hopefully won't make me look like an idiot. Other than that, things are good. I need to get a job soon though because I'm getting bored. Steve and I are both poor but then it's hard to just hang out when either you don't have a TV or the Italian TV sucks. We end up spending a lot of time bored together, which is, of course, much much better than spending time bored alone :) It was a little sad to move out of my ghetto apartment, which I didn't think I'd say, but it's kind of cool to get life started here. Steve had an interview at a language school where his friends work, so I'm waiting to hear word of that. When I called home a few days ago Jake asked if I was almost home and when I was coming back. It's so sad to hear his cute little voice ask me that!! I can't wait to see him at Christmas time.

Ok, well that's all for now, hopefully I'll have internet in my apartment soon since we just need to activate the line. Here are some new pics to enjoy.......


Me and Tenderoni Pre-Gay Village


Hallway - There are all these retro art pieces and light fixtures on the wall



The blue retro kitchen. Fairly large by Italian standards.


View of my bedroom from the terrace. I'm still unpacking.


Another pic of my room. I have a couch and hopefully I'll get a double bed in there too.


The best feature of the house! My bedroom opens onto the part that's covered by the roof. The terrace even stretches around the corner a little bit. And we have a lemon tree!!



View of the park from the terrace. There's a little river that runs through it and some bike paths.

living in the comune

It's been a good few days here in Rome. At the very least I've eaten really well (and probably gained 5 pounds in the process). For the past two nights, me, Steve, Tenderoni (my roommate Steve), and Nick (Steve's friend from NYC) have been cooking up a storm. I swear Nick should have his own show on the Food Network, the way he always talks about food. The first night I made my eggplant parm and Nick made an amazing bolognese sauce with some pasta and sausage. Then, last night I made canelloni filled with ricotta and spinach and Nick made peppers, onions, and sausage. Having the guys help me stuff all the canelloni was one of the funniest things ever....but they did do an excellent job! And besides all the food we all got wasted on rum and whisky while listening to our iPods. I will say the first night I felt like I was in hip hop nation with the music. Nick's iPod is filled with all this rap and hip hop I've never heard in my life (u guys at home know how much I love Jamin 94.5, just imagine that times 10). It was fun listening to the stuff though and Nick and Tenderoni were freestyling. Nick is actually really talented with it and Tenderoni is coming along quite nicely.

The whole time we said we were all on a double date, me and Steve and then Tenderoni and Nick. I swear those two were more lovey dovey than me and Steve! The first night the two of them left to go get more drinks while Steve and I went to bed. I swear I'm such a lightweight now and I'm going to bed really early! So sad, but I do suppose I have more to look forward to in bed now, so it's cool. :) So because we've all been hanging out nonstop for the past few days, we said it's been like our own little comune. I will say though that during both nights, I got pretty homesick for my Htown girls!! I mean, it's really fun hanging out with the boys, but listening to Nick and Steve reminisce about home just got me nostalgic for the girls. I could already picture you guys getting along soooo well with the boys, it would be crazy. You have to visit soon and show Italia how we do it.

Tonight I'm going to the Gay Village with Tenderoni, which should be fun. I'll finally get to break out my clubbing clothes. Steve is having a friend visit for a few days, so this will be the first time since last Sunday that we won't be together, which will be weird. I can't wait to see how the gay Italians party though, especially considering most Italian men are already half gay. I'll keep you posted on how the evening went...........


Nick giving Tenderoni a cooking lesson


Us about to chow down on our feast.

back in rome and faced with life

Well this post was supposed to be all about my trip to Padova and Venice with Steve, but first I'd like to take some time to vent my frustration. I am still homeless as of now and I'm starting to get depressed and think I'm not going to find a good place. For the second time I've been turned down at a nice apartment and I don't know what I'm going to do. I'm still looking online all the time, but I've already seen a lot of the listings and I'm hoping something else will appear soon. The paper with a bunch of listings comes out on Friday, so hopefully something will be there. The only hope I have right now is from Giuseppe, weirdly enough. He text me out of the blue and asked if I was still looking for a place. His friend Tommi lives in Rome and goes to school here, so I guess he's going to have him call around to some friends. We'll see though, I remain pessimistic that anything will come of that and I shudder to think of what type of places he'll come up with. Oh well, at the very least this is slight repayment on his behalf and I'm happy for the help.

Ok, on to more interesting and less depressing news. First, Matt came to visit this weekend and we had a lot of fun. I will say though, I always feel a lot of stress in hosting people, which is not to say that I don't love having people here (I do), just that I want to make sure they have a good time. I'm pretty sure Matt did though, even though he did have to leave for the airport at 3:30am Monday. After Matt left, Steve and I took the train to Padova (which was delayed an hour, so we had to wait in the train station). It was really nice to see Padova again, although the weather wasn't so great. I'm really glad we went though, it was nice to get out of the city and we had a lot of fun. At least I did! And shockingly, for those of you at home, not once during the 2 days period of us being together did I get annoyed at anything. It was actually a pretty relaxing time, minus the tourist dodging in Venice. Venice was beautiful as always, but it seemed like there were even more tourists than usual. Plus, St. Mark's Square was partially flooded when we got there in the morning (you'll see it in the pics below). It was kind of cool to see but people were dancing around in the water barefoot which grossed me out. You could see the pigeon feathers and shit in the water and I have no idea what people were thinking putting their feet into that!! Steve said the square looked like pigeon heaven and they all must tell each other to flock there (he did a much funnier impression of a conversation between the pigeons, complete with ghetto nyc lingo). All I kept thinking was that Venice would be Goldie's idea of hell with all the pigeons jumping all over the place! They even freak me out a little because they're so agressive.

Ok, so overall the trip was a success. I tried to keep being a pain in the ass to a minimum and hopefully that worked. Haha, he's only been home for a few hours now and I'm already wondering what he's up to. You guys at home would be surprised at how normal the whole thing is (and Steve, I know you are reading my blog now so I will say nothing further :P) Hopefully we'll go somewhere else again soon. I talked to Kate and she said we should come visit her in Sardinia. That would be cool, but I need a job and apartment first.


Rainy shot from our hotel room in Padova. You can see Prato della Valle.


Our first attempt at a photo on our balcony. We both agreed it was the best one because you can't really see us!


The flood in Piazza San Marco. Notice the trash in the water!! Bring on the water born diseases!

bbq and the beach

Yesterday a bunch of us went to Ostia which is about 45 minutes out of Rome, towards the beach. A guy from our course, Rob, lives there with his parents and we had a BBQ. It was nice to eat some burger for a change! After the BBQ we went to the beach for awhile. The water was sooo nice! No freezing your limbs off over here. It's really salty though and burned my eyes a little. The highlight of the whole day had to be on the way there while we were on the bus. I was riding with my roommates and we were getting a little rowdy. Hyper Steve (Tenderoni, as we call him) has a voice that's really loud and I guess pissed the driver off. All of a sudden the driver pulled the bus over on the middle of the highway. I actually said out loud "This is a weird stop" when the driver got out of his seat and said that we were talking too loud and had to be quiet! It was fucking hillarious. Anyway, it was a good day, but tiring because of all the travelling back and forth on the trains. I got to talk to Tiffa last night (big ups big ups haha) which was good. Thanks for the emails Goldie, Kel, and Ellam. They keep me feeling like at least a little in the loop!

So since last time I've taken my grammar test (no problems) and finished the course. We had a nice farewell dinner with some of the trainers from the program. Afterward I left (we were at the restaurant until midnight!), but the owner of the school took a bunch of the others out drinking until 4 am. Haha, too hardcore for me!

On Friday night me, Melissa, Steve, and Luciano went out for dinner and then sat at this bar by the Tiber river. It was really nice out and you could see the ruins of this bridge right in front of us. Pretty crazy to think that bridge is from Roman times and we were just chillin, having drinks in front of it. Afterward we met up with my roommates and had some more drinks in Campo dei Fiori. Needless to say I pretty much passed out in my bed that night.

So this week, besides continuing on my apartment quest, Matt is coming to visit me!! I'm really excited to see him, especially since he's decided to move back to Canada for awhile to continue with school. He's coming in on Friday night and was supposed to leave early Monday morning. He just called me though and apparently he clicked the wrong date and is now due to leave Sunday morning! So that basically means he'll be here for a day, which sucks. He tried calling the airline but they were being bastards and won't let him change. Damn KLM! I think he's going to try to change it again. Hopefully he'll find a way to do that. On Monday me and Steve are going to take a trip up to Padova and stay the night so that we can go to Venice too. He's never been to either place, so it should be fun. Jesus, can't believe I'm actually going on a trip with a guy, even if it is only for one night! Should be fun though, we spend so much time together I don't think it'll be that odd to spend two full days together. I'll let you know how it goes!!!

Here are somemore pics from our dinner and BBQ.


Everyone at our Farewell Dinner giving "Blue Steel"


Me and Melissa


Us in Rob's backyard, getting ready to grill and listen to Tupac


Steve, drinking his beer


Jen kissing the hot hot chick on the front of the €0.88 Birra Morena


The beach at Ostia. It's around 6pm and still nice out!!

The end of Via Lingua

Hey all,

Tomorrow is the end of our course! I can't believe that it's only been 4 weeks. It feels like an eternity since I've gotten here. I think I'll be weirded out to actually have some free time. Today I got my first ride on a scooter courtesy of Melissa's boyfriend Luciano. We just went around the block, but it was so much fun! I went out with some people from the program last night and two of the students from the elementary English class. Claudia was my student for the individual sessions that we had to do and Moira was Jen's (Jen is the girl I share my room with). Anyway, they're really nice and took us out near the Olympic Stadium to something called Roma Estate. There were all sorts of outdoor booths selling food and clothes and jewellry. We ended up at a section that had Latin dancing (Moira was infatuated with one of the Cuban dancers there). It was pretty hillarious, since the night started out as one big Latin line dancing session, with two dancers on the microphone telling people what to do in Italian. Of course my roommate Steve (the most hyper man on earth) was so into it and shaking it like no tomorrow.

We have our grammar test tomorrow and I should be studying now, but I'm not too worried. I'm more annoyed about my apartment situation. I went to see a cool place yesterday that was well located and cheap. Of course they ended up giving it to another girl who had contacted them before me! It's frustrating but I'll keep looking.

In other big news...during our many delirious hours at Via Lingua, Alex, Melissa, and Steve have come up with a rap. We actually have been recording it and I sing the "hook." I'm like Fergie from the Black Eyed Peas....haha it's sad but we're excited about it. When it's done I'll post it online for everyone's laughing enjoyment.

Hopefully I'll go to Sardinia in the next two weeks to visit Kate. I looked up ferries online and it's not too bad. I'd like to visit Adriano too, but he's being a flake of course.

Ok, and now the photos........

Top: Me, Melissa, Luciano, and Steve
Bottom: The roommates (minus Ann): Alex, Jen, Me, Engish Steve, Hyper Steve

Top: At school Alex, Melissa, and Steve working hard to write a rap.
Bottom: Me straightening Alex's hair in my room. He's drinking wine to give himself strength (in the end he loved it.)

Top: Me and Claudia. She's my student from the individual lesson project that we had. She used to be on the Italian national team for rhythmical gymnastics!

Bottom: Me with yet another Steve. He's from NYC.

I'm a shitty blog keeper

Hello,

Sorry I haven't been writing too much. I suppose I'm not a great blogger! Things are going pretty well here, even though I'm so busy with school. I literally live in that building and then come home and live with 5 of the people I see all day. Luckily everyone is pretty cool, even if there are a few people I wouldn't probably hang out with on a normal basis. I have met some cool people in the program though. One American girl has lived here for two years and went through the same dual citizenship thing that I did. She and her boyfriend took me out for dinner this weekend, which was a nice break from the apartment. Plus, I got to speak Italian, which is something I'm unfortunately not doing much of at the moment. I also hung out with this guy from the course and his friend from home this weekend. They're from NYC and so "New York," it cracks me up.

I'm still looking for an apartment. It's so hard trying to figure out who to contact and my fear of speaking Italian on the phone isn't helping any. I'm trying to arrange to see some stuff this weekend though, so I have my fingers crossed.

Hmm...what else? For all those inquiries, no, I do not have an Italian guy yet. Haha I know I'm a sucker for them but give me some credit, ok? I need at least 3 weeks to find my future husband. Actually I'm so busy with school and basic living stuff, I haven't really gone out too much.

Oh yeah, I do have some pictures that I took while I was with Tracy. I've just been to lazy to post them. I'll try to do it by next week (is that cool Rebekah?).

ps. Tiff, I heard you're a real drama queen. You have no idea how that much cracked me up.


pps. Tracy told me that you guys (you know who you are) were laughing about my blog! Haha, I'm glad I'm still fodder for amusement even from across the ocean.

Well I'm sitting at an internet cafe right now trying to find out about the outside world. I must say, I really like the Via Lingua course (trainers are great, really informative) but the resources we're given at the school are driving me crazy. Of the 9 computers at the school, only 1 prints, only 4 are connected to the internet, and 3 of the 4 connected to the internet have viruses and won't open my Hotmail account. The one computer that will open my email is slow as molasses. Needless to say, I'm glad it's Friday and I finally have a chance to sit down and write something.

I tought my first lesson the other day and it went pretty well. 45 minutes really isn't a lot of time to fit in all the stuff we need to do, but other than that it was cool. All the students are really nice, which makes it easy. That being said, I have 3 lessons coming up next week plus we need to start on a project where we select one student and do 2 1-hour private lessons with them. So, I'll be really busy next week too and uncommunicative with the world!!

I must say I'm kind of stressing about finding somewhere to live. Anyone know some fun Italian people in Rome who need a roommate?? A girl on the course who already lives in Rome is going to have her Italian boyfriend ask around to see if any friends need a roommate.

Ok, well this is long enough...I need to shower (in order to feel human again) and finally finally go out somewhere in this city!!!!

A presto