Chronologically Inaccurate, but Aesthetically Pleasing...

Things have been so busy here lately. I had a midterm in Italian, my mom, aunt, and cousin came to visit, we had three field trips this week, etc. etc. My time has not been entirely my own lately. This weekend is a little bit better however I have two presentations to prepare for and we're leaving for our program's trip to Campania next Saturday!

I'm looking forward to crawling into bed with a good book. (It's very cold outside and in bed seems like the best location to be.) But to tide you over until I muster some actual narrative content here are some pictures.

So if you are good at keeping a timeline you know that I went to Sicily before I went to Greece, but I was on such a Greece kick when I got back I had to post all of my Greece photos. Here are a few more from Sicily.


This was one of two beaches we visited in Sicily. Apparently while we were swimming at the beach it was snowing in Chicago!
This is a shot from inside a stone quarry. I couldn't even tell you where we were in Sicily at this point. That whole week has merged together.
This was in Taormina, where we saw Mt. Etna. He's a street performer who is usually perfectly still hanging out on a stoop having a cigarette break.
This is a Greek theater, as it is built into a hill. Roman theaters tend to be freestanding.

Doric temple in Paestum. My friend Hannah was kind enough to give it scale. Paestum has some of the most well preserved Doric temples in the world.
Theater in Taormina, with Mt. Etna in the background.
That's Franco, our program coordinator, he's the go-to guy in Rome. He's standing between two medieval structures at the top of a Greek theater.

That's Mike standing in some Roman housing ruins.
This is Tom, he goes to WashU and knows Priya! Behind him is the Mediterranean.
This is a Greek theater... psych! Actually it's a comitium where the senate would vote.

This is my friend Rachel sitting in the medieval castle. She said she wanted to buy it and live in it so for the picture I told her to look "homey." I think it worked.

Home Sweet Rome

There is something amazing about sitting still, and especially knowing that you can remain in one place for a looong time. My trips to Sicily and Greece were both amazing, but I am so overwhelmingly excited to be back in Rome right now. My trip to Athens and Napflio was very relaxed and restful, but part of me is still a little worn out. Looking at the schedule for the week (A three field trip week) and looking ahead to my reports and tests... I'm quickly wearing away at the peace I stored up on vacation.

Here are a bunch of pictures from our trip, with captions to contextualize them.



This is a view of Athens from the Acropolis. The weather was a bit chilly and it was overcast both days we were there. Compared to the views of Nafplio, Athens is pretty unattractive. Overall I enjoyed seeing the ancient sites in Athens as well as visiting the National Archeological Museum, but the city itself was not my favorite place to visit.


This is the Odeon of Herakles. Faith and I had fun discussing it's Roman qualities and being Classics nerds in general.


Temple of Hephaestus. It's a canonical Doric temple... woot!

This is Faith and me in Athens, with the Acropolis in the background.


This is the Parthenon lit up at night. My camera took a pretty blurry picture, but this one's better than the manual setting, which made it look like the Parthenon was on fire.


Ahh, now we have pictures from Nafplio. This is the view from our hotel room. It's a cute town on the Aegean coast. The town is conscious of its tourist appeal and defintely caters to them. We did a lot of shopping but not much buying since it was all overpriced. It was the perfect place to relax for a few days.


More beautiful Nafplio.


The mountains turned purple at night!


This is our room at the Pension Mariana in Nafplio. The view alone was enough to satisfy me, but the cute decor, clean sheets, and tasty breakfast were also greatly appreciated.


In Nafplio there is a fortress from the 18th century on the top of a hill that is allegedly up 999 steps. We had been advised by our professors (the same professors who march us around Rome relentlessly) to take a taxi or bus up to the top, but with all the time in the world we decided to go up, counting the steps. Faith did most of the counting, I just asked, "What are we at now?". The result was 912 with an error margin of 5. This is me still perky before we start the climb. The fortress is in the background.


This is step 587. Slightly less perky.


This is 587 as well I think. We got tired by the end but it really wasn't that bad.


The views definitely made it worth the trek.


Look, it's me... in Greece!


Our hotel is in that picture. If you find the pine tree closest to you, the big one in the middle-ish of the screen, go back to the next big one and then find the yellow building just to the right of
that pine tree and you have the Pension Marianna! (If you actually found the hotel from that horrible description serious kudos for you.)


When we were traipsing around the fortress we found this really fun tunnel. Faith was sad that she was actually smaller than it was.


This is physical evidence that I am taller than Faith.


But it's okay, Faith found a tunnel that she was taller than as well.



These are the two cannonballs that mark the entrance to the stairs up the hill. We sped all the way down the stairs(it was 3:00pm and we were hungry for lunch)but our leg muscles were a little shaky afterwards.


In other news: JONES BEAT SID IN POWDERPUFF!! I'm sorry to my Sid friends (Jenny already chastised me for this) but I have to celebrate. Sid had been undefeated for something ridiculous like 34 games, spanning several seasons. And we finally beat them! This bodes well for playoffs, although I'm sure they'll be out for blood then... Anyway congrats to my powderpuff girls, you kick ass.

I have work to do, things to read, translate, learn etc. My mom, my aunt, and my cousin Katelyn will be here at the end of this week, so that's very exciting. And if we can work out details I think I get to see Sofia O. this Friday? Then more visits, trips, and work. Then Christmas, New Years, and back to Rice. How did I just summarize several months in two sentences....

Emily in Sicily

This last week really drained the life out of me. I had an amazing time on the trip though. We had heard rumors that the Sicily trip would really shake things up. More than a straight week with the same 40 people, having class every day, and traveling by bus a minimum of 2 hours per day... Che intenso! (This is not really a legitimate Italian phrase, but instead one that my friend Nikki came up with.)

I saw some of the most well preserved Greek temples in the world, as well as the scenery from almost all of Sicily, swam in the Mediterranean, and ate even more amazing food. We stayed at some pretty nice hotels, some pretty regular hotels, and a couple that didn't have enough hot water in the morning for the 40 Centristi that needed to shower. The weather was nice for the entire trip which made the daily excursions up hills, through temples, into theaters, etc. very enjoyable. I did miss having potable water at my disposal, however. I probably spent a small fortune on bottled water during the trip.

This isn't really the full story of my Sicily trip, I'll try and be more in depth when I get back. The past week essentially fried my brain. Some people actually left from Naples after our ferry got in from Sicily, and a few left Saturday afternoon (when we had just gotten back Saturday morning). Leaving tomorrow morning is hard enough, and I really really want the power to suspend time for a few days and just recover from the trip. As it is, I'm so excited to see Greece. Athens should be a great experience, and I've heard lots of positive things about Nafplion, the smaller city we're spending a few days in.

Here are a few pictures from my trip. I'll have more when we get back from Greece.

Here I am standing in from of a Greek temple. It is of the Doric order if anyone is interested. The columns are fluted and have substantial entasis. This particular temple is in Paestum but we saw a lot of them...

Here I am in Taormina, our first stop in Sicily. Although it's cloudy in the background you can make out some of Mt. Etna.

This is Libby and me at the Castle of Euryalus in Siracusa. You can see a little bit of the amazing view behind us.

And here's Sully, happy to see me home. Just as they decided we didn't need fans, they decided we needed heavier comforters, which can also be seen in this picture.

I hate to go MIA again but we leave in the morning for another week! I'll hopefully find more time to write a few specifics about both trips. So look forward to Emily in Greece!

They Took Our Fans Away

So apparently it's fall in Italy. I know because the maids who tidy our room once a week decided we no longer had use of our amazing fan. I was very confused when I came back to our fanless room. It's sad because we use the fan as a noise machine as well, to block out the city sounds and chattering of other Centro students. I hope I can sleep deeply enough without it.

Just a quick post for now, I took a few pictures on our trip yesterday. I have two quizzes later today and must spend the day studying.

So last Tuesday when we went to Cosa it was a great hike up the hill. This week when we visited Palestrina (historically Praeneste), east of Rome to see a temple of Fortuna. It too was on a hill. This time our method of torture was stairs. So many flights of stairs. The icing on the cake is a brief exchange our head professor had with a local when we had almost reached the top (this was in Italian):
-Professor! I can show you where your bus can come.
-No need, it's a nice walk.

I do agree that it was a nice walk, and I certainly appreciated the view more since I had earned my way to the top. The temple is situated with a perfect view between two hills. You can't tell in the pictures I took, but it was engineered in a very specific location for it's view.

Friday morning (at 7:00am!) we leave for Sicily by bus. I think it will be an opportunity to do a little light reading. Thus far the only reading I've had time for has been for class and it's driving me nuts.


Look! It's me in Rome. This journal is not a ruse, I swear! The view is far more impressive in person. Even if I wasn't learning so much, and enjoying living here, this whole semester would be worth it for the wonderful scenery and beautiful things I've gotten to see. Even the bus rides to our sites are scenic and amazing.

This view is from a little lower down. The haze is still obscuring the picture, but you can see more of the town below.

This is my friend Breanne. She is enamored with Alexander the Great. She has a necklace with his picture and was very happy to find this sculpture of him.

Weekend Rush

So the weekend is an interesting time around the Centro. Usually the student population is decreased, since many people take the opportunity to travel. The people who stay lounge around spending hours doing the reading for The City course. Everyone around here works, it's pretty remarkable. When they're not being dilligent a lot of people explore the city. Every weekend feels like an uphill battle, however, because of the amount of translation and reading. It has been a good weekend though. No rain, which instantly makes it wonderful. The weather is still in that perfect range of not too hot but not really cold.

I've done a lot of work today and so as planned I'm going to the Sicilian resturant (the one mentioned in a previous post). We've been trying to spread around our money and eat at different resturants as much as possible, but tonight I have an intense desire for the ravioli again. I'm really looking forward to that followed by an episode of Grey's Anatomy. We've been slowly working our way through the second season on DVD. (Thank you Aunty Lee!!).

Friday morning we leave for Sicily and I might be MIA for the duration of the trip. It's going to be an exhausting few weeks...

Here are a few extra pictures from last week:
These are walls of a temple at Cosa. The way the stones are put together is called opus mixtum. Yeah I had to look that up... Libby knew (Faith and I didn't).

This is my friend Libby. She knows things. Look she's even learning things in this picture (not posed). We are on the bus. We are on the bus a lot actually.

Faith is hugging an olive tree. She loves olives... A LOT.