Friday, April 22, 2011

See you later...

Ah hey friends! What a crazy week! We finally finished our 12 page capstone papers and took our [only] final was yesterday. It seems like we just got here though, this is not okay. It's also hard to believe that I am basically a senior in college now! and I am only 20... I don't wanna grow up!!

This week has just been full of so many emotions... I haven't been able to sleep at night because I am so anxious to get home but then I am holding back tears during the day knowing that this experience is all about to end.

I live with 19 girls who have become like family. We do everything together. Literally. The only time I have been alone the past 3 months has been in the shower. How do you go from that to living alone in an apartment for the summer? It's going to be tough. I will miss going to the market on Monday mornings and getting fresh fruit and veggies and then being able to cook healthy dinners all together at night... while drinking wine and laughing at everything.

I will miss traveling to a new country every weekend and only packing in a backpack. Adventures like these taught me so much... like how to make the best of every situation and that I am capable of more than I think. Sometimes showering with just a dirty t-shirt in Paris or taking the wrong train in Switzerland is okay. You will eventually get there and will love laughing about it later. I don't think you have truly lived until you have seen the world with barely any money, one small bag, and no idea what you are doing. I have made more memories [and taken more pictures] in my time abroad than I know what to do with! But I wouldn't change a single thing about it.

I will miss Italian food!! Pizza, bread, pasta, and wine galore!! Does it get much better than that?? No. I might be the only one here that did not care at all about how many carb I was eating. We are living in Italy... so why not go big while you are here? But I can't lie... I am VERY excited about "American" food.. I am not sure Chick-fil-A, Mexican, Chinese, BBQ, hamburgers, etc will ever taste as good. We are also going to The Varsity straight from the airport... go ahead and judge. You know you are jealous.

I will miss my roommates even though I know we will hang out back in Auburn. Laying in my nook at night, talking and laughing with [and at] each other is one of my favorite things. I felt like I was living on the sorority hall again... except with girls I wouldn't have had the chance to become friends with it weren't for this trip. [Except for my sweet Rae Ann who God had already put in my path]. But as for Katie, Sallie, Taylor, and Leah... I am so happy to be able to call them my friends and I will never forget room Siena.


I will miss my amazing professors and faculty members. Cinzia [our Italian sister] is someone that I will never ever forget. She put up with 20 crazy American girls day after day... answering all of our questions with such patience and even willing to come to the palace at any time of the day [or night] to take of someone who was sick or just fix a broken TV. We always joke about how we are obsessed with her and we all laugh... but if only she knew how serious we were. She is such a strong, beautiful, and independent woman who did everything she could to make us happy. Everyday. We would walk [sometimes run] behind her like her little ducklings because "whatever Cinzia says is best"... that girl really does know everything. Tommy, our faculty advisor from Auburn, was the "dad" of the trip. This trip would not have been the same without him. He constantly went out of his way to help us or always knew the best places to eat :) Tommy is a Marriage and Family therapist and is the main influence on my career goals since I have been here. He encouraged me and showed me that I have so many options in life. I am excited to get back to school and further learn about what exactly it is I want to do. I will be sure to keep in touch with Tommy and hope he will help me get through this crazy thing called... college, internship, graduation, and a job. Ah. Our other professors, Marco [history], MaryLou [cooking], Rosella [philosophy], Francesco [art history], Corinna [italian], etc. will also have a special place in my heart. MaryLou is the most precious woman I have ever met. She is a talented artist, perfect wife/mother/grandmother, and a great cook. She deemed me her "personal photographer" and gave me one of her beautiful paintings. Little did she know the colors match my room and it will be the first thing I hang up. Going back to Auburn, where there are huge classes and teachers who I sometimes cannot understand, will be one of the hardest things I have to do. Forming personal relationships with each one of the professors, eating dinner at their houses, and learning so much from their lives is priceless. Just another example of how unique studying abroad is. I will never have the chance to become friends with intelligent and fascinating Italian men and women who want the best for my future.

Last night, was our final appertivo [tear]. All of the people I just mentioned plus more were there and I couldn't have been happier. We all chipped in and made our favorite dishes from home: mashed potatoes, chicken nuggets, 7 layer dip, egg salad, macaroni and cheese, brownies, salad, fruit salad, bbq chicken burritos, etc. It was delicious!!!! We had the best time talking, saying our thank yous/goodbyes, and of course dancing! America really needs to pick up on the Appertivo... we are definitely missing out.

Before it started, we gave Tommy and Cinzia gifts to show our appreciation.
We got Tommy an official Chigi Palace book written by our professor/his good friend, Francesco, and we all signed it with a note. 
...and we got Cinzia an iPad! and she was very happy :)
So much love.
I love these girls with all my heart!!
and will miss them so much :)
Beautiful Cinzia!
Southern food!!! Yummm
Me and Katie with Maurizio. We love this man!
3 blonde roomies :) 

Francesco, Cinzia, Maurizio, Roberto
So thankful for everything they do!
Marco and MaryLou!!!!
My adopted grandparents aka angels on earth.
Dance time with Laurie and Katie!
Francesco and Sal! haha
Kacedawg! Love this girl :)
Can't forget MC... so blessed to call her my friend. I'm just not sure why it took so long!?

We got up this morning and started to clean the palace and do inventory for the last time. It finally hit me that it was over... and there was nothing I could do about it. Now, I am completely packed, sitting in my empty nook, reflecting back on the past 3 months. All I can think about is how thankful I am. I am not sure my parents will ever understand how much I owe them and appreciate what they have done for me. It makes me sad that not every college student can experience what I have. Studying abroad for 3 months has taught me more about myself and what I want to do in life than I have learned in my other 3 years of school. Being able to learn and then see/do is without a doubt the best way to learn.

I never wanted this night to come... but I don't have a choice. We are all about to go to dinner together for the last time before we leave for the airport at 6 am. It will definitely be a bittersweet night. I better go find my waterproof mascara...

I hope everyone is having a beautiful Good Friday! "He was made sin, who knew no sin, that we might become His righteousness" ...so thankful for the cross today. Jesus has blessed me so much. If there was a perfect time to go home... tomorrow is definitely it... the day before Easter. I am soooo excited to spend Easter with my wonderful family and Matt on Sunday. The best way to be reunited... on the day of the empty tomb. We serve an awesome God! :)

Can't wait to see the rest of you either!!! I am free to do whatever [after my much needed pedicure and highlight appointment haha] I will be in Auburn on Wednesday and want to hug every single on of your necks!! YAY!

Until then...

xoxo
Britt


Oh and shout out to my new best friend and soul mate, Katie Whitehurst. She is currently sitting in my nook, eating chips, in her hot pink housecoat. This is why I love her. We enjoy dancing to rap, watching J Biebs YouTube videos, and taking awkward pictures of each other. Why did it take me 20 years to meet this girl? Ebony and Ivory 4eva :)

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Positano & Capri... Yes please!

Hiii! I can't believe this is my last week abroad!! The countdown has officially begun and I am very excited to be in America with you again! ...but also sad to be leaving such an amazing place that I have become so comfortable with! Is it possible to be in 2 places at once yet???

I know I have become a slack blogger... and I apologize... there has just been so much to do now that we are winding down. Last week was for the most part really chill.. we spent a lot of time in class and had lunch at the beach again which was fun! 

Friday morning we left bright and early for our 2nd optional trip to POSITANO! I had heard so many great things about Positano and was very excited to finally be going. It was the perfect place to spend our last weekend together. I will truly miss the "Chigi Babies". They have become best friends and like family since I have been gone and it will be quite the adjustment not spending every day with them. The weather forecast for Positano said rain ALL weekend so we packed warmer clothes with disappointment but tried not to let it get us down. 

Well... like always, the Italian weathermen were WRONG! We had beautiful weather and even got to take a ferry to CAPRI on Saturday! Capri is fabulousss! Definitely one of the most beautiful places I have ever been....

View of Positano from our hotel!
Lemon Slush!
Positano is famous for their HUGE lemons and anything you can make with lemons! I had 3 of these slushies before the weekend was over! haha

First night at dinner! Over looking the water.

1st course: Yummy pasta with mussels!

2nd course: Fried shrimp... unpeeled! With their heads and all!
Waiting for the ferry to Capri on Saturday! Bluest water I have ever seen.


Roomies for the weekend! Love these girls!
Rae!

Rae Ann, Susanna, Me, Elizabeth, Jamie, Taylor, Danielle

Jamie, me, and Megan on the ferry!
Positano behind us! 
CAPRI!!
Love these boats!
Me, Laura, Brittany, and Rae
My twin for the day... Mary Cate!
Beautiful trees!



These pictures are not edited!!! The water is really that blue!!! Amazing.

Bye Capri.... I love you!
Windy ferry ride back!! So much fun! 
Me and Laura :)
Sunday we walked down to the beach and enjoyed our last few hours there before we headed back to Ariccia! It was a perfect weekend!

:)
A successful weekend for sure! Now we are back in Ariccia... trying to finish up our last assignment: Capstone Paper! and it's rough!! After hardly doing any school work for an entire semester, writing a TWELVE page paper during your last week is not easy, or fun. I have been procrastinating.. (even more now that I am doing this blog) but the good news is I only have 2 more pages so I will finish it up today! Besides that we are packing, cleaning, getting last minute souvenirs, and just having fun together the rest of the week! Bittersweet!

Thursday night we are hosting our 2nd appertivo but this time it's "homestyle"!! We are making fried chicken, mashed potatoes, buffalo dip, 7 layer dip, and other yummy dishes the Italians are going to loveeee :) haha I am excited!

I can't believe I will be home in 4 days! Just in time for Easter! Yay!!

Hope everyone is having a great week!!! Miss you all dearly.

xoxo
Britt

Monday, April 11, 2011

Bologna, Milan, & Barcelona!

Hey yall! I am struggling finding time for this blog in the middle of all my last assignments and recovering from a long week! So I apologize if this is not as detailed as it probably should be...

I couldn't have been happier to see my nook yesterday! It has truly become like home to me and traveling for 10 days is very long. As you might know, I got back from Switzerland on the 3rd (at 10 pm) and then had to be ready to leave for Bologna at 6 am the next morning... so surprise... I didn't sleep! But it's okay because I successfully unpacked, repacked, showered, and skyped my mom all in time. For obvious reasons, I slept the entire bus ride to Bologna. We arrived around lunch time and were given free time to eat and walk around. Bologna is the location of the first university in the world. Yes, world. So it is filled with college students, which is always fun.

Bologna's main square.




Our visit to Bologna was very brief... the next day we checked out early and were headed to Milan! On the way we stopped in Maranello to visit the Ferrari Museum and a local balsamic vinegar factory, Acetaia del Cristo. We had a guided tour around the Ferrari museum and got to see Ferrari's from many different years. Italian's love Ferrari's... so we tried to act just as interested! After the tour we were allowed to test drive one of the cars for 10 minutes (for 40 euro)... I was tempted... but quickly reminded that I'm broke :)
Galleria Ferrari
Racecars
Custom models.
The balsamic vinegar farm was more my idea of fun... we have visited many wine/olive oil farms with tastings so it was great to throw in a balsamic tour too! [We use a lot of balsamic while cooking here!]

The farm!
One room of barrels! The vinegar stays there for at least 15 years... and some have been fermenting for 200 years!!! Crazy! Each barrel has a hole on top but it covered by a film (like above). The oldest vinegars are extremely thick because they have had more time to evaporate.
Tasting time! I like the strawberry vinegar the best!
... and by dinner time we had finally made it to Milan!! The fashion and design capital of the world!!

The Duomo!
The Galleria Victorio Emmanuele
Spinning on the bull (3 times) in the Gallery for good luck!! 
Later that night, the program treated us to an "Appertivo" with yummy spritz drinks!
Oh.. and then [beautiful/delicious] Pina Coladas!!! 

On Wednesday we met Max! Max is a professor in Milan who works at the Portaluppi Foundation. He gave us a lesson on "Modern Milan" then spent the rest of the day taking us to exhibits to see awesome designs and Italian showrooms!


A couch!
Bird's nest chair?
Octopus comfy chair!
We took a break for a JAPANESE lunch! This made my day week!
Teriyaki Chicken, Rice, Seaweed Salad, Egg rolls! :)
Back to the art... This is on the side of the Duomo... essentially a huge pile of salt with horses.
Kinda strange if you ask me.
Picasso
How incredible is the Duomo?
Art? I don't get it... :)
These 8 panels were done entirely with a blue ball point pen!
This was a painting a guy was working on inside the museum. After it was done he took all the squares a part and people held them to form the picture. He made a movie out of it and we got to participate! I didn't get pictures but it was really cool!
Unique flower vases.
Love this furniture. So fun.
Appertivo for the 2nd night as well! How can you resist those drinks??
Our few days in Milan flew by and before we knew it we were getting on a plane to Barcelona, Spain!! This trip was definitely one I had been looking forward to.. all 20 of us decided to go together for the weekend and I had heard so many great things about the city! Well... they were all right! Barcelona was so much fun and beautiful. The city is so clean and easy to get around. The only downside was there are very sketchy men wandering around at night... good thing we were in a big group! and I thought the Italian men were bad... nope, Spain wins.

Of course the first place we went was.. the beach!!  It was 80 degrees and fantastic. I'll admit it took some time to get used to the topless women and occasional butt naked men but besides that I was very content!
Me and Rae!
My favorite part about the beach is that these little Asian women walk around giving massages. 15 minutes for 5 euro!! Can't beat it! That might have been the best 5 euro I have spent since I've been abroad... and Yes, I know I am white as paper. 
Susanna, Mary, Rae, Me
Danielle, Jamie, Me, Laura, Susanna
Beautiful!
After a few hot hours at the beach some of us decided we better site see a little. We didn't want to visit a country to only say we laid on the beach the whole time! This was good for my poor skin anyways... the sun has never been my friend.

I love Spain for it's culture. Music and dancing in the sunshine!
Gaudi Park!
View from the top!

Love these purple flowers. 
The beautiful mosaics of Park Guell!



More Gaudi style buildings!
Haha how cute is he?
La Sagrada Familia!
The construction for La Sagrada Familia was started in 1883 and is still NOT finished!!!! The church was designed by Antoni Gaudi. He devoted his life to it but died in 1926, only getting to see 1/4 of the finished product! The completion date is 2026- the centennial of Gaudi's death!
KFC for lunch and proud of it!
Agbar Tower!
A 38 story building that marks the gateway to the technological district of Barcelona.
War Eagle, Hey!
... and back to the beach the next day! with Kacey!
Our sangria by the beach was interrupted by a Bachelor party! You can't tell but he is wearing "Michaelangelo's David" swim shorts... while trying to sit on my lap! haha
The best Sangria!
I wish I could be back now...
We spent out last evening enjoying a great 'Tapas' dinner!
Trying not to eat Subway and KFC for every meal :)
Because we are poor college students and will do anything to save money, therefore we booked a 5:55 AM flight home [the first flight out of the entire airport that day]. In order to make sure all 20 of us made the flight we had to pack up and head for the airport around 2 AM! We looked ridiculous! All of us in a line, hauling luggage, down the streets of Barcelona at 2 in the morning... and it was not a short walk. We got to the airport around 3 and all made the flight! Success! Kinda... Our flight was supposed to land around 7:30 am so when I woke up and saw that it was 8, I got concerned. The pilot tells us over the intercom that there is too much fog over Ciampino to land so he has just been circling until it was safe to go through. Well... after an hour he decides it's safe and says we will be landing in 10 minutes. So we start going down.. rather quickly... and from the window I can see than we are almost there when suddenly the plane jolts upward again at full speed! Everyone on the plane is scared for their lives at this point and very confused to why we were going back up. Turns out.. it wasn't safe. Great. We ended up having to land at Fiumicino [the other airport in Italy]. What a disaster! 

For those of you who have not experienced the airline, Ryanair, lucky you. They are the "cheap" flight of Europe... and what we have used to fly everywhere. Flights are around 30 euro round trip... but you certainly get what you pay for! haha They never leave on time... sell smokeless cigarettes and cellphones down the aisles the entire flight... and everyone cheers when you land! I know.. this doesn't even sound real... but believe me, it is. So as sad as it is that my time abroad is coming to an end I am happy I can say I never have to fly with Ryanair again! but also very thankful that they did get us back safely after all. The cheering after that last flight was very necessary. We made it back to our nooks around 1 pm due to the delay and everyone crashed from being up all night!!! So happy and thankful to be back in Ariccia!

So today is Monday and I know I should have posted a cooking blog :/ buttt you see I am behind with work and sweet Mary Lou's friend passed away so she was unable to be at cooking class... Cinzia and Tommy improvised and made a really yummy artichoke pasta for us though because it is artichoke season! I was too busy working on my resume and other big girl stuff to take pictures.. so I just ate :) But if anyone is really disappointed [and I'm sure many of you are] I would be happy to make Artichoke Pasta with you when I return to make up for it!! Please don't hate me! 

xoxo
Britt

P.s. - I will be home in 12 days! What?!