The Journey of Eggs

Bongiorno!

So I've had a week of classes, and a weekend Cortona-style. I'll tell you about classes first.

Classes seem ok. They'll be fun. There will be a lot of free time until homework starts to pick up. Now onto my weekend.

Weekends in Cortona are three days long - Friday, Saturday and Sunday. With no homework and three days off, it only makes sense to get out of town for a bit. Don't get me wrong, Cortona's great, but getting away can be nice.

Other groups headed out all over the country: Como, Florence, Arezzo, Perugia and Sienna all got visted. As for myself, Nicole and Christine, we headed back to good ol' Rome. We took the train on Friday, wrangled up an appartment (when we initailly planned on staying in a hostel) then did some late night viewing of the Spanish Steps and Trevi Fountain. We also did some window shopping. At some very nice stores. Then we stopped for some dinner at leonardo's. It was only ok.

Man, I think I'm going too fast. But I think I'm in the fast-paced Rome style of speaking instead of the laid back Cortonese which I've used previously. Anyway, after dinner we went back to the appartment and to bed. It's nice sharing a room with two people instead of four.

The next day, we headed for the Vatican Museums. This time I was actually awake because we didn't climb the dome at St. Peter's first. This time Nicole and Christine had to drag me through the rooms because I wanted to stay and look at the art for longer. But it's still easy to get arted out. By the end we were fairly booking it to the Sistine Chapel. Oh, I forgot to mention that this time we got audio guides. It was great fun, since the man kindly gave us a discount on the guides. What a nice guy. Anyway, we got to the Sistine Chapel, and I had enough energy to keep my head up, and my goodness, it was amazing. Completely stunning and all that jazz. I listened to the audio guide for like ten minutes, about the whole chapel, about the ceiling, about the Last Judgement. It's all really amazing and cool and I think the word amazing wants to retire soon because I keep using it. But it's under contract, so too bad!

My goodness I'm strange today...

Anyway, after the museums, we went and did some shopping. The first store we hit was Prada. There were a few bags in there that wanted to come home with me. But I'm sure my credit card would have been declined. But my god, was it tempting to try! We then hit another designer store, whose name I can't remember. But he is famous. Anyway, there were more bags in there that I could have taken home with me. I actually looked at their prices. They were like a thousand euros each. Ugh. After that, we went to shop in earnest, only everything else after that seemed like cheap junk in comparison. So I ended p getting nothing, although Christine got some Miss Sixty Jeans, and a scarf, and Nicole got a Valentino scarf. Very very nice.

We had originally planned to go back to St. Peter's and climb the dome, but it closed at sunset and it was pouring rain that day (Saturday, that is). We went back anyway, because we'd promised to try and get a picture of something that we hadn't got last time... for those that didn't come back to Rome with us. So we headed back to St. Peter's, had a few laughs, then headed back to the appartment.

Next, we went grocery shooping, because we decided cooking would be cheaper than eating out again. So we bought ingredients for garlic soup, garlic pasta, and a real Canadian breakfast - eggs. So the eggs got carried back to the appartment. Anyway, we had the supper and it was really fantastic, and worked out to about 2.50 each. Woot. Then it was bedtime.

The next morning, we were all ready for actual protein in our breakfast, but we could not could not could not get the lighter to work, so the stove stayed unlit and our egs uncooked. But we decided to take them back to the hostel with us to cook later. It was only as we were preparing to leave, that the guy from another room offered us his matches. Gah!

Our plan for th morning was to go to Termini, leave all our stuff in lockers there, then head to the Vaticanto try and attend mass, and then catch the train to Camucia. Of course, we get to Termini, and storing our backpacks and grovery bags doesn't happen, so we end up taking the eggs on the metro to the Vatican. We get there, and it is then that Nicole realized that it was the day that we remember the slaughter of the innocents, so of course the Pope is baptizing babies and there is no chance of getting inside for mass. So we take the metro back to termini, go and pick up Linday's coat, which she left at her hostel, then sit around for two hours waiting for our train.

In the end, we caught the train, but we had to go to the bathroom. I was thinking that there were bathrooms on the train, but I couldn't remember much else about them. So Christine heads to the bathroom and decided to wait till Camucia. (Ps, I'm sorry for the ranom tense switching, I don't feel like fixing it). When we got to Camucia, it's 3:00 on a Sunday afternoon, so, naturally, everything under the sun is closed. There was nothing for it but to wait until we got back to the hostel, and we had to wait a while for the bus. Ugh. Anyway, after a long train ride, a long bus ride, and a short hike up a steep hill, we made it back to Cortona, eggs in tact, bladders barely.

To sum it up: the eggs rode the Metro twice, traveled to a different country, walked the streets of Rome, waited for the train, caught the train, wandered around Camucia, caught a bus, climbed the hill in Cortona and are now sitting uneaten in my room. They are officially the most well traveled eggs ever.

Ok, so other stuff happened too, but it would take a year to tell you everything. If you know where Christine's blog is, you can read it. I'm not going to tell you. Anyway, sorry for the poor diction, but, whatever, this is Italy!

Arrividerci, i miei amici e la mia famiglia! Ciao!

On a final note, I'm sorry for not posting many pictures. The internet here is slow.
On a final, final note, while technically, I'm staying in a hostel, I'm only sharing with other students in the program, so it's more like a residence situation than a hostel.