I don't have a title for this one.

My plans for the day are dead.

I was planning on walking around and exploring the city and taking tons of pictures. I need more practice with Bartolomeo (my camera). Bart is treating me well, but I still have lots to learn. However, the weather is absolutely not cooperating. The day was sunny and beautiful until about 45 minutes ago. Adesso, sta piovuto (now, it's raining). Boooo!

Ah well, I will still be making the best out of my day. Maybe I will go for a walk without good old Bart. Tomorrow will be a big day for him anyways as I am taking my first trip to the Uffizi and possibly the Galleria dell'Accademia. I'm so excited I might pee. Not pee my pants, just pee in general. That's real excitement for you.

Today I may explore for a bit before dinner and then after dinner I am heading into al centro (the center of town) to get gelato at Grom, the best gelato place I have found yet. This gelato is literally the most amazing thing you can imagine. I have no words for it. Sorry.

I have been making some amazing friends here. God has placed some truly wonderful people in my life already. Just today I was stressed out about a sick family member and one of my new friends held my hand and prayed for me and my aunt while we were walking down the sidewalk in the midst of a hoard of people. She is so incredible. It made my whole day better; it refreshed my faith and gave me a sense of peace and calm and since then this has been one of my best days so far. Grazie Valerie! You are super fab!

I can't wait to see how my friendships with these new people will grow and develop over the next three months. It's going to be GRRRREEEEAAATTTTT! (I hope someone caught my channeling of Tony the Tiger there. It was very intentional. I am missing Frosted Flakes these days. As well as Taco Bell, but that's another story for another time.)

Meanwhile, or mentre, as the Italians say, I am learning TONS. My Italian is improving in leaps and bounds and that makes me very happy. I am not, however, fluent yet which irritates me. I really wish I were Professor Agheana's secret twin and was a language genius. That would be very convenient right now. Alas, I am not in any way related to Professor Agheana and so I therefore cannot speak the Italian language well, let alone 7 other languages along with it. But I'm getting there. Fluency in the Italian language is within sight, which is a very exciting prospect for me. Soon I will be able to say whatever I want to my Italian momma, Anna. I will tell her her cooking is fabulous and she is my favorite and I love her very much. But for now I'll stick with basic phrases and charade-like scenarios in which my acting skills are put to the test while I try to piece together sentences. I'm so classy, as per usual, of course :)

Okay care mie (my dears), I hope you are all having fabulous lives and that you all enjoy this fine day. I would love to hear from some of you. Facebook me, email me (sarahmklooster@gmail.com), send me a letter (see last post), skype me, come visit me, whatever you like. If any of you choose to come visit, you are welcome to join me on my trip to Siena on Saturday. My program group is going for the day and then on our way home we will be stopping in Chianti for a wine festival. Let me know if you would like to come. It will be grand. Otherwise I will write another post soon about how wonderful Siena is (because I'm sure it will be meraviglioso (marvelous) and bella (beautiful)) and about how fantastic the wine in Chianti is (because I'm sure it will be gustoso (tasty) and delizioso (delicious)...what are appropriate words to use to describe wine...? I guess I'll find out this weekend. I'll let you know.).

Ciao ragazzi (Bye guys.). Vi amo tutti (I love you all.).

P.S. The girls in the picture are my new friends Amy (who is part of the ACM program with me and who I LOVE) and Valerie (who goes to Rutgers University and is here with eight other kids from Rutgers and who I also LOVE). Photo credit goes to Vittoriana (who is also part of the Rutgers group and who I also also LOVE). My new friends. They're my favorite.

P.S.S. You're welcome for all the Italian lessons I have been surreptitiously giving you. I should charge you all. But I won't because I love you all that much.

P.S.S.S. The piove (rain) has stopped. Maybe Bart will get to see the outside world today. Ole! (That's Spanish but you get the point.) Arrivederci! (That's Italian and it means goodbye!)

MAIL? PLEASE AND THANK YOU :)

P.S. I got my address and I was thinking that you should all send me some mail :)

Sarah Klooster
ACM Florence Program
c/o Linguaviva Scoula d'Italiano
Via Fiume 17
50123 Florence
ITALY!

Make sure to declare NO VALUE or it will cost you lots of moneeeyyy.

I'm expecting mail by next week you all. Pip pip! Chop chop! Get on that my loves. Thanks! You're all so fab! :)

haha

Paper lanterns, cell phones, and mopeds. What else do you need in life? Nothing at all.

Ciao care,

I hope all is well in the real world where dreams do not come true. Here in dreamland, things are super fabulous. Tonight is Festa della Rificologne (festival of the paper lanterns). It is a festival that is specific to Florence and has existed forever. Well, not forever, but for a ridiculously long time, like everything here. Basically it started when the farmers would come down into the city from their homes for a big market that took place on September 8th. They wanted to get a good spot to set up their booths in the piazza because the money they made at this market would support them ALL winter, so they would pack up their stuff and leave in the middle of the night the night before. In order to see the path at night, they carried paper lanterns attached to poles. The local Florentine children (all of whom were very rich because everyone who lived in Florence then was very very rich compared to the mountain and village folk from the surrounding areas) would make fun of the ragged clothes that the farmers and their families wore and they would mock their lanterns by making their own and walking behind the processional singing mocking songs and ditties. (To this day in Florence they still call people who dress poorly a "rificologne.") The children's making of lanterns and parading around the city with them became a tradition which continued even after the market ceased to take place. Now it is known as Festa della Rificologne, a festival that takes place on the night of September 7th and the morning of September 8th. 

Sorry for all these history lessons I've been giving you all, but I'm learning so much about the culture and traditions and history of this country and this city and these people and it's all so fascinating. Their culture is so beautiful and unique. I've heard the paper lanterns that the children carry in the parade are absolutely beautiful. I'm so excited to see them!

In other news, it is also the 21st birthday of one of my new friends, so we're going to go out for a little bit and celebrate. I'm meeting up with a few people to watch the parade and then meeting up with other people later to go out. So many new friends!! Tonight is going to be a good night. (That song is actually playing on my iTunes right now. I kid you not. Wow. It really is going to be a good night. Fab!)

In other other news, I have explored the cell phone that I got last week and have come to the conclusion that it is hilariously crappy, but that it also has the most brilliant "tool" I have ever heard of. And by the most brilliant tool I have ever heard of, I mean it has a function that is in the tools folder on the phone and is called "fake call." Basically you can set an alarm which, when it goes off, will call you therefore enabling you to get out of something. For example, if you were to go on a date that you were worried would suck or that you didn't really want to be on, you could turn this on and your phone would call you at whatever time you told it to, you could answer it, pretend something urgent had come up, and leave hurriedly. And you plug in a number or a contact who will be the person that will then "call" you. So there's no embarrassing my-phone-rang-in-my-ear-while-I-was-desperately-pretending-to-be-on-it moment. The call also shows up in your received calls folder, so if they don't believe you, you can show them the call on you phone and (falsely) prove that someone actually did call you. The Italians truly are a very ingenious bunch. Gotta love 'em :)

Finally, I have one more thing to add to the 10 Things I Love Most about Italy list (thus making it the 11 Things I Love Most about Italy list), and it is this:

11. The moped culture here. There are women in 4 inch heels and skirts who cut off the busses fearlessly on their way to work. There are men who are in gorgeous Italian suits who fly by with their ties flapping in the wind over their shoulders. There are cute boys who wink as they drive by. They are all so aggressive and don't obey the rules of the road AT ALL. They drive between lanes to pass busses and cars and at stop lights they all make their way to the front of the traffic so that when a light turns green, one or two thousand mopeds speed off before any of the cars or busses. They are truly fearless people. They are so smooth and skilled. It's fascinating to watch. I'm very envious of their obvious talent, actually. Maybe one day a gorgeous Italian man will pull me on to the back of his as he drives by...I should only be so lucky...

Until next time my chumly wumlies. Love you all!

10 Misses and Loves

As you can guess, this is a post about the 10 things I miss most about America and the 10 things I love most about Italy.

10 Misses:
1. Carpet (yes, carpet is at the top of the list).
2. Colin (naturally).

3. Mia famiglia (see photo at right).
4. Dogs that understand and obey commands in English, commands such as "stop licking my feet."
5. An excess of public restrooms.
6. "Normal time,"as Steph would say (as compared to military time).
7. Being able to say a sentence to someone without first looking up all but three of the words in a dictionary.
8. FRESH water. As in not salt water, which will give you high cholesterol if you accidentally swallow too much because you jump in with your mouth open because you forgot it was not fresh water.
9. Grapes without seeds (I hope grape vines don't start growing out of my stomach).
10. Taco Bell (I can't help it...I'm addicted).

10 Loves:
1. Fresh bread from the market at break time.
2. Wine with lunch.
3. Hearing "bellisima!" every time I walk by an Italian man (who doesn't love that?).
4. Seeing impossibly beautiful, incredibly old buildings every way you look (churches, houses, palaces, everything is beautiful).
5. The shoes. I've yet to see any Italian, young or old, male or female, with ugly shoes on their feet. I kid you not.
6. The mountains in the distance.
7. The food. Let's be honest, what is better than legitimate Italian food? Nothing is the answer you are searching (not very far) for.
8. Anna, mia momma.
9. New friends!!
10. The language. It's hard and I am frustrated and impatient, but it is the most beautiful language I've ever heard.

A week in the life...

Ciao miei amici Americani!

It has been one week and two days since I first set foot on Florentine soil. In some ways, those nine days have been one of the shortest of my life, and in some ways, they have been the longest.

I have done so much and been so busy. Between getting my permiso (which allows me to legally live in Florence while I am studying…a good thing to have), meeting and moving with my host family, learning how the bus system works, and trying to keep up in Italian 2, it has been hard to find time even to sleep. Well, that’s a lie (slightly). I have actually slept super well since I moved in with Anna (my host mom!) and her family (Agata, her daughter, and Andrea, her son, yes son, who are both in university as well as her mother, who is to be called nonna who walks around the house mumbling and says Bella! Bella! Bellisima! every time Leslie or I walk into the room). I’ve probably been sleeping so well since I’ve been so busy, but it’s time to move on from the sleeping thing. You don’t care if I’ve been sleeping well or not. You want to hear about ITALY! So Italy I will tell you about…

Italy is still amazing. The food continues to tempt me into obesity, the buildings continue to astound me with their beauty and history, the language continues to challenge me and push me to learn more because it is so beautiful, everything in this country continues to make my eyes wide with awe. On Tuesday Jodi (our program director) took us on a brief walking tour of Florence. We took a bus up to la Chiesa di San Miniato and then walked back to the hotel from there. San Miniato is just outside the old city walls and provides amazing panoramic views of the city (as shown in the picture above). La Chiesa di San Miniato is the oldest building in the city. Construction on it began in the middle of the 11^th century. It was built in honor of San Miniato, who was a martyr for the faith and who, after being beheaded carried his own head to the top of a hill where he finally was laid to rest. Strange, I know. But it is a beautiful Romanesque style granite building with mosaics both inside and out. It is very unique because it combines several different architectural styles from regions all over the eastern world (sorry, I have to throw in a little art history lesson somewhere…I mean, that is the reason I am here).

Once we had a lecture about the church and saw the whole inside, we started our descent into the city. Once we got down to the city, we made our way to Fiume Arno (the river that runs through the city) and walked along it until we reached Ponte Vecchio. We crossed to the other side while looking at the very temptingly displayed (and very highly priced) fine jewelry. After getting across the river, we headed towards the Uffizi and walked past it into Piazza della Signorina. This is the famous piazza that is right outside Palazza Vecchio and that houses all of the statues of Perceus and Zeus and all those guys. I took TONS of pictures, which I promise to edit and put on facebook soon. Actually, I think I already did. I don’t remember. Struggles? Me? Never.

Moving on…Saturday (yesterday) was the best day of my life. Linguaviva (the school I’m taking Italian at) chartered a bus to Cinque Terre. Everyone go there. Now. It is legitimately the most beautiful place I have ever experienced. Cinque Terre means “five lands” and so, naturally, Cinque Terre is made up of five cities that are nestled into the sides of mountains and have cliffs that drop down into the ocean. And yes, it is every bit as amazing as it sounds. We walked between a few of the cities, not all of them, and had lunch, swam in the Mediterranean, drank some wine, ate some gelato, all those Italian things that Italian people do. It was glorious. I made new friends (hurray!!!) and so I spent the day with them. Chiara is from Sweden, Charlotte is from Holland (the country, not the city all you Hope people are currently in). Geraldine is from some northern European country (I can’t remember), Arne is from Sweden, Gai is from Israel, Bruno is from Brazil, and then Mike is from Aspen and Marco is from San Fransisco. Pretty diverse group of people, huh? But they are all so wonderful. And Elisabetta, the Linguaviva teacher who went with us and was our tour guide, is my favorite person in the whole world. She makes sound effects when she talks and uses tons of those ever-present Italian gestures and she is basically just out of control. I believe at one point she suggested drinking Absolut Vodka while we were jumping off the cliffs into the Mediterranean. Not like, right before or after we jumped, during our jump. Like make a toast as you’re flying through the air towards the water. But she was kidding. I think.

In Cinque Terre, we walked down Via dell’Amore. The street of love. It was terribly romantic. People had graffitied all the walls (it was like a tunnel that ran right along the ocean on one side and had legit mountain rising up a hundred feet or more on the other side) with their names and their anniversaries and words like amore (love) and sempre (always) and other such words that have to do with eternal love. This is also the place where people get locks and lock them to the fence or the conveniently placed gates and then they throw the key into the ocean which signifies that they will love each other forever. Incredibly romantic. There were thousands of locks. Maybe Colin and I will get to do that when he comes (awwww!!!).

Anyways, the perfect way to top of the perfect day is to go out with some good friends. Can I get an Amen! What? That was weird. Sorry. So, getting back on track…last night after returning from Cinque Terre I had one of the best meals Anna has cooked yet: pot roast and rice and cucumber and tomato salad. It was delicious. Then I showered and got ready for a big night out on the town. I met up with all my new friends at the Duomo and we bought a couple bottles of wine and went to sit and drink them in the grassy area outside of Santa Maria Novella. We just chatted and hung out. A few of the girls got bored so they made us go walk around. We wandered for far too long before I decided that I wanted to go home. I really didn’t want to pay for a cab, so Mike (from Aspen) and Arne (from Sweden) agreed to walk me back to my house. It was quite the adventure. We got lost several times and realized that when you get lost, a half hour walk becomes an hour and a half walk. Whoops. But we did get here eventually and I went to bed pretty early (about 1:30) and got ELEVEN hours of sleep, praise the Lord. I desperately needed that sleep.

Now that I am rested and happy and loving this country even more than I did two days ago, I am spending some time writing to you, you lucky dogs. Today I need to go to the supermercato (supermarket) and buy food so that I can pack lunches for school this week and stop spending money. I also need to prepare for the presentation I have in class tomorrow. It should be big fun. I hope you all are well and happy. I hope America is fabulous. I know Italy is :)

I love you all!

A pronto!

Giorno Due! Yesss!

So I woke up this morning and I was still here.

This is still so surreal. And wonderful. And yes, I am still absolutely enamored with this place. So all's well.

Last night we went out to some sweet, but pretty sketchy club called Space Electronica. Basically it was American college students and then desperate Italian boys. It was very much like a middle school dance: three or four girls dancing in the middle of ten or twelve Italian boys. Very classy. But it was so fun. We had a blast. We went to bed ridiculously late (around 4:30) after talking when we got back. Then we woke up to a brigade of people standing outside our door knocking at 10:30. It was fab. Kind of. After a brief trip to the grocery store to buy some fruit for "breakfast" (at 11:30), we came back and promptly returned to our beds where we slept off our late night and possibly some lingering jet lag.

Today was the first day that everyone in the program was all together. I love the people. There's a lot of strong personalities, which should make for an interesting, but entertaining group. I can't wait to see where this semester takes us all. Jodi, our director here in Florence is amazing. I just want to hang out with her all day. She's lived in Florence since 1972 and has a wealth of information. She's wonderful.

We went out to dinner and I had my first Italian pizza! First impression: an individual pizza here is way too big for a single individual to eat. It was enormous. Everything here seems to be very big. Anyways, it was delicious pizza, which is not at all surprising to me. However, I have heard that the best pizza exists in Naples and south of Naples, so I will have to check that out at some point and compare.

For now, I am going to bed. It's quarter after one in the morning and Italian class starts at 9:00 AM tomorrow...

...ready...set...GO!!

I. AM. HERE. Yesss!!!!!

I love it here.

I have never been anywhere that is so full of beauty like this place is. Everything here is beautiful. The buildings, the people, the art, the food, the streets, the language, the clothes, the shoes; even the parking lots and pharmacies are beautiful. The women are sexy and confident and sassy. The men are gorgeous and arrogant and full of compliments. They also seem to be full of invitations to clubs, to dinner, to be alone with them, anything. It's very flattering :)

The food is absolutely incredible. You cannot believe how good it is. Every single bite I take is better than the last. My first meal consisted of: bruschetta (my favorite thing I've eaten so far); penne with olive oil, tomatoes, garlic, and peperoncini; and a wonderful full-bodied, red house wine. Unbelievably good. Everything is just right. Just the right amount of peperoncini in the pasta. Just the right amount of tomatoes and basil on the bread for the bruschetta, just the right amount of sweetness in the wine. I will never stop eating in this city. I am seriously concerned for the state of my weight. It's going to be a struggle.

We walked a lot today, and it was very hot. We're currently in the midst of a little late afternoon siesta. We probably walked a solid 8-10 miles. I'm not very good at estimating those things, but I'm gonna stick with 8-10. It felt like 20 though. But it was worth it. We saw the Duomo (the most beautiful enormous building I've ever seen), we crossed the river via the famous bridge with all the jewelry shops (yes, one day my engagement ring can come from there...just saying), saw tons of basilicas and palazzos, and then looped back around just in time for lunch (pasta salad with fresh mozzarella, roma tomatoes, black olives, and peperoncini). We discovered that all grapes here have seeds in them (SURPRISE!) but they were the perfect ending to the meal. Also, in case you were wondering, gelato is a million times better than ice cream, and I will be eating only gelato for the rest of my life. No more ice cream. I don't yet know how I am going to accomplish this in the US, but I will find a way. Gelato is way too good to give up.

Tonight we are going to eat some more delicious food, drink some wine and some limoncello, and have our first "going out" experience. We're going to some club called the Space Club or something like that. We walked by last night and scoped it out. It looks pretty legit. I'm stoked. Time to meet some Italian hotties and dance the night away. YESSS!!!

Now it is time for me to go fraternize with the beautiful Italian people in their beautiful Italian city. After a quick power nap.

So long my American chums and chumettes! I love you all...almost as much as I love this place. Almost.

xo Sarita