Cowboys in Siena?

After a low key day of meetings , housing orientations and applying for a student permit. Lauren, Giusy and I prepared dinner - chicken, salad and bruschetta (something slightly more manageable than our previous dinner). We then got ready for a night out on the town. Our group then met up and began our night of bar hopping. Everywhere we went was packed, so we never stayed for more than 5 minutes. After three failed attempts, we finally ended up at this cute little place called "Il Cambio". It's a little hole in the wall with a group of old men dressed in cowboy outfits singing Johnny Cash and the Beach Boys. Half of the songs they translated into Italian, and the rest they just left in English.

After about an our and half we were too sweaty from jumping around (mosh pit, crammed bobbing of heads and flailing of arms definitely did not qualify as dancing..) so we decided to hunt for a late-night gelateria, but only small cafes were open so instead we discussed weekend trips. Looks like I found two friends, Alexandra (Vanderbilt) and Lily (Tufts), to accompany me to Greece for at least the first half of spring break. Other places that people talked about going for the second week were: Barcelona, Berlin, Paris and London. I might opt for Berlin seeing as I have already been to Spain, England and France. As far as weekend trips we're planning: Venice, Milan, Pisa, Naples, and Prague. The great thing about our class schedule is that almost every Friday our classes are held in a different museum or section of Florence (what we like to call "hands-on art history classes"). That way, afterwards we can just jump on a train to our desired destination!

Walk, walk, then walk some more

(left to right: my street. me in front of my apartment. la piazza del campo)

So yesterday was the first real day in Siena. Lauren and I started the morning out by meeting up with the group in the Piazza del Campo which is in the heart of the city. There are only 11 people in the program, 10 girls and one guy. Everyone is great! They are so nice and we had such a fun time getting to know each other! Il Campo is where the famous Palio takes place during the summer. Siena is broken up into 17 different neighborhoods (contrade) and each contrada enters their best jockey into this horse race. People come from all over Italy to see this, and they pack thousands into a tiny courtyard (it is the opening scene in the newest james bond movie)!

We then headed to a local cafe where we had our first experience with Italian coffee. In the Italian culture it is common to go to a cafe up to three times a day. It is only acceptable to order a cappuccino until 11:30 am (anytime afterwards, you will get a "foolish american raised eyebrow look"), then the next two are either "un cafe" which is a shot of espresso or "un macchiato" (espresso with a little bit of foamed milk). Most of the time you are crammed into a tiny shop to drink standing up at a counter. I apparently had one too many espressos this day because I ended up not falling asleep until 6:30 am! (During my insomnia attack I disappointingly discovered that online tv stations don't work outside the US, so I couldn't even catch up on Desperate Housewives or any of my other "quality" tv shows)

After getting our morning caffeine fix we started our walking tour of Siena. Looking on the map it seems a lot bigger than in reality. We wound our way through the extremely narrow, cobblestone streets attempting not to get smashed into walls by vespas or taxis that don't seem to really care about pedestrians (most definitely not in Maine anymore)! We made our way to all the most important stops in Siena: CET (program) center, libraries, grocery store, good shopping spots, bus stations and of course the most important stop of all the infamous "gelateria"

Guisy, Lauren and I then headed to "il supermercado" to stock the kitchen for the week. On this program we only get 4 meals a week through the school which we'll use for lunches. Therefore, being on the wonderful student budget, we are planning on cooking most nights and buying the 1.40 euro bottles of wine! Giusy is a fantastic cook so we are really excited for her to teach us some traditional Italian dishes!

Abbiamo avuto una cena magnifica! A traditional Italian meal consists of 4 separate dishes, therefore we had an authentic dinner starting with the "antipasto" of bruschetta, cheese, prosciutto and salami. Followed by "il primo" a piece of lasagna and pesto pasta. Then "il secondo" traditional sienese pasta with meat sauce. As if this wasnt enough for three nights of dinners, it is followed by "un dolce" of tiramisu and vanilla custard dusted with chocolate powder (we used to worry about the "freshman 15", now were are worried about the "abroad 30")! This delicious meal was of course accompanied by a bottle of sweet wine from the Tuscan countryside.

We ended the night at an Irish Pub with a sign outside that read: "Esotichi Shots Liberi per Tutti i Ragazzi" (Free exotic shots for all girls).. oh Italy...So after a girls' night of dancing, signing and avoiding creepy looks from Italian men we all headed back to our apartments tired and ready for bed..

Let the adventure begin

Hey everyone so this is the first of many posts to come (hopefully)

Day 1: arrived in Siena after a loooonngg day of traveling starting with a delayed redeye from Boston to Munich where I thought I would miss my connecting flight to Florence. So I was running through the airport, backpack and duffle in hands, sweating wearing 3 coats since they wouldn't fit in my bag, I decided to ignore the "Caution Wet Floor" sign then proceeded to wipe out face first, bags flying everywhere. I was then helped up by three very German looking men and continued to run to my gate only to find that my flight to Florence was also delayed.

When I finally arrived in Firenze, I met up with two other girls, Abbey and Emily and we had to fight to shove our 6 rolling bags, 3 duffles and 3 backpacks into a very small taxi. This took us to the bus station for our 1 hr. 15 min ride through rural Toscana to the heart of Siena. Taking a taxi to my apartment I met Giusy, my 27 year old italian roommate. Hauled my bags up three flight of stairs, attempted to unpack, but ended up just passing out because I was so tired!

Lauren, my roommate from Virginia got here a couple hours later. I finally woke up, and we got settled into our very cozy apartment. The room is about 15 ft x 15ft with two beds really close together, white walls, wooden beams on the ceiling and a window that opens out to look at the back of neighboring apartments. After we unpacked Giusy made us her special "Carbonera" pasta with egg and ham in it. Full and exhausted Lauren and I dragged ourselves to bed and were passed out before 9, with the fact that we were now in another country still not really hitting us...