Part II: A new view from Venice

Well, I'm in a weird place. I don't mean physically, but emotionally. I've been using the past tense about my semester abroad, I never fully realized that would happen. I was so used to talking about it in the future or in the present, but not in the past.

My last night in Rome to say the least was incredibly memorable. Out with the majority of my friends one last night. I miss all of you so much already! Saying goodbye was one of the worst things in the world and now they are in the States. But we went all around the city and saw all of our favorite things. Rome really has become my home and I already miss it so much as well.

Venice is beautiful. Finding my hostel was a mess though. I had the directions, but one street didn't lead to the right street, which lead me asking directions, but those weren't right either. I was so exhausted because of hardly any sleep and lots of crying, so I ended up just taking a water taxi. It was much easier after that.

My hostel is really nice. I'm on the main island and pretty close to everything. However, I could never live or have studied in Venice, it's a mess trying to find your way around. The people in my hostel are really nice though. I went exploring with one girl yesterday from Germany, we had a good time. She spoke perfect English, I was so impressed.

Everyone eats breakfast and dinner together, which is really nice. There has been lots of good conversation and hearing about where everyone is from, where they are going, and how long they have been traveling is so interesting. One guy, who sat across from me at dinner, has been traveling so far for 10 months. He started in London and has been working his way around Europe. He's going to go to Istanbul, then up to Russia, Moscow, then into China, then he is going to Australia and then before heading back up north to Canada, he is going through South America. So he still has another year ahead of him. He's going to be traveling two whole years out of his backpack!! I was so amazed. I can't believe it. He put my 5 months of travel to shame! 

Yesterday, I thought of Adri when I was walking around, because the pigeons here are crazy! I've never been scared of birds before, but these were intense and flying right next to me. Even landing on people. After spending a semester with Adri around a lot of birds I've somehow developed a fear of them too. Not as bad as Adri's though. haha.

My parents get here tomorrow. To say the least I am incredibly excited and anxious to see them. It will be so wonderful to be reunited again and spend lots of good quality time together.

I have my computer with me for now, which is nice. So I will update when I can. Five weeks until I'm home. I feel as those these five weeks, will be the most interesting ever. Full of uncertainty, excitement, anxiousness, loneliness, and happiness. Hopefully more happiness than anything else.

Love,
Katherine

7 weeks and a volcano

Life is always a funny thing when you look back at it. Things that happened last week feel like a year ago, but then memories from years ago feel like yesterday.

I have a film paper to write, but I'm listening to The National and can't help but write.

This volcano has everyone freaking out. People are really worried they won't be able to get home. I'm just worried my parents won't be able to get here. Good news is I still have some time before they are supposed to arrive. Please, everyone, cross your fingers.Volcano calm down!

In the meantime . . . assuming everything works out, I have successfully booked my trips for the summer. I can't wait to start. It was really difficult for me to get to Krakow, not sure why. At one point I was going to book a flight through Oslo or Stockholm to get there. Those places would have been awesome to see for sure. In the end though I had a top hit list of places I really wanted to visit. I decided it was better to not overwhelm myself and stick to a few countries and cities. I'm really happy with how it turned out. It was really important for me to get Krakow, so I made it work.

I start in Dublin, then go to Krakow, then go to Vienna, then to Berlin, then to Geneva and then back to Rome. I'm very excited!

I'm having a love affair with Rome. So I've decided I'm going to make a top 10 list of things I love while being here.
1. Villa Borghese. I can't get enough of this park. Every time I go it just makes me so happy. Granted there are a million couples making out everywhere, but I love being outside, seeing the trees, laying in the grass. It's become a great spot to journal.
2. Walking through the Monte Mario neighborhood. Especially the walk to calcio every Wednesday.
3. Hearing children playing outside. I love hearing them speak Italian. Walking by the schools when they are out at recess is the best.
4. The cobblestones. Lots of people are sick of the cobblestones because they hurt their feet. But I can't get enough of them. I love the sound when my foot hits the pavement and feeling the stones beneath my feet.
5. The Protestant Cemetery. One of my favorite places in Rome for sure. It's oddly very peaceful and beautiful there. Flowers and trees growing everywhere. Plus, a nice place to reflect.
6. Cappuccino's. Who knew I would become such a fan, but I love the taste, but more than that the feel of drinking them.
7. The view outside my bedroom window to a beautiful tree and field. It's lovely to wake up to every morning, feel the sun and hear the birds.
8. Going to the million different gelateria's. Trying new flavors, figuring out how much you will get at each place and rating all of them.
9. Trastevere, my favorite neighborhood in Rome. A maze of pathways, all intertwined and Italian's everywhere. It's the best place to feel lost and yet feel at home.
10. The feeling of going to a new part of Rome, pulling out your map, not sure where you are, then turning the corner and realizing you know exactly where you are. Rome is not as big of a city as people think. It's all connected and I'm convinced you can walk everywhere.

Thinking of all of you, sending a big hug to the States.

Chapter Four: Life between the adventures

Ciao!
I suppose it was inevitable for me to fall behind in the blog. But here is an update from life in Italy thus far. Though I might not be blogging a ton, I am writing in my journal and at the end of the day, I know that is the most important one for me. My journal holds everything from this trip, from all the big events to all of my random thoughts. I've already started rereading some of the entries at the beginning of the semester. So much has already happened, it's hard to believe. But of course I still have to give everyone an update, hence the blog.

The semester is coming to a close. So weird to say. The majority of all of my friends will be returning to the U.S. in just under three weeks. If I wasn't staying I would be going with them. That is even stranger for me to think about. The United States still feels like a different universe for me.

The last few weeks have been full and exciting. I've been to Istanbul, Greece, and Malta, not to mention many wonderful days in Rome. I've been a machine these days when it comes to traveling. Taking international trips has become so normal to me (I know, that's crazy!) but seriously traveling has become my life. I think my perspective of traveling in the United States will be very different once I get back. The idea of picking up for a weekend trip will be no big deal.

So, at this point, it will be easier for me to share about these last few trips in person with all of you. However, I will say a few comments about each of them.

Istanbul: This could very well could be my favorite trip. I think it was the one that impacted me the most. The culture, the people, the food, the city was all so amazing. If I could back to one city that I've been to this semester it would be Istanbul. My favorite thing there was when we were walking around the city and heard the call of prayer on the loud speakers between the mosques. It took place five times a day. It was as if the mosques themselves were chanting to each other. Such a cool experience to see and hear.

Greece: I got my beach fill in Greece. The weather ended up being really hot and it was so nice to lay on the beach and relax. Eating gyros and greek yogurt as well as kayaking in the Mediterranean was unbelievable. The trip had it's good and bad aspects, but overall I really enjoyed myself as did Sara, Marriam and Adri. I'm thrilled I made it to Greece, it was one of the countries at the top of my list.

Malta: I just got back from Malta yesterday. The smallest country in Europe, besides Vatican city. Malta was also a lot of fun. My favorite part was traveling to Gozo, an island right next to Malta and traveling around and taking a boat out through caves in the water and seeing the cliffs. I also went with a whole different group of people to Malta, which was exciting.

My parents will be here in 19 days. I cannot wait for them to get here! It will be so nice to see them in person, catch up, and have some familiarity for awhile. We will be going on quite the Italian adventure. They have it all mapped out. So lately whenever I'm feeling stressed about school I just think about all the stuff we are going to do.

There is still so much I want to do in Rome. I'm determined to get through my to-do-list. I did go to the Vatican Museum a few weeks ago. I really enjoyed it. Especially after studying so many different artists and paintings in my classes, it made it much more special to see them in person, in particular Raphael's "School of Athens."

I'm the type of person that always gets sentimental. Those of you who know me are already very aware of this. I get attached to the most random things and now that the semester is coming to an end, I feel my sentimental side kicking in. The hardest part will be saying goodbye to everyone, especially my friends who don't go to Loyola and who I won't see in the fall.

But, it's not over yet! These next three weeks will be very busy socially and academically. I'm not going anywhere else for now, just focusing on spending time in Rome. Absorb the city to the fullest. :)

Love
Katherine

How I accidentally lost weight in Italy

I should be writing this post about Istanbul. Don't worry I will. It was too amazing to not share it with all of you.

But... this is just too weird to not tell. Somehow since being here I have lost weight.

At first, I thought it was because I had worn the same pair of jeans a million times in a row and they were stretched out. But then the comments from my friends started coming in. "Katherine, you look so skinny!" "Katherine, did you lose weight?" Then when my friend Bridget came and visited and she noticed as well, I figured something was up.

It was also suspicious when I received a pair of jeans from home that hadn't been worn since January that were also looser on me. 

But I mean really, how could I lose weight, in Italy of all places?
I mean on a weekly basis I eat . . . bread, pasta, more bread, more pasta, yogurt, cornflakes in the yogurt, cornettos, peanut butter, more bread, nutella, oranges, more pasta, some salad, corn, more nutella, random pastries, more peanut butter, some pizza, lots and lots of gelato . . . yeah this isn't adding up is it?

Well, finally when three more of my friends commented that they could tell I had lost weight, I finally got on the scale and after making my conversions from kilograms to pounds, the verdict is in. I have lost weight, more than I would have expected. But I really don't get it. I mean yes I do walk a lot here. I hate Mensa (the food at school and don't eat a ton of it) but it's not like I don't eat. Perhaps carrying my big travel backpack had something to do with it? Haha, I have no idea.

I don't say any of this to rub it in people's faces or worry my family. Don't worry I'm still a healthy weight. I just find it so odd. But seriously, go look at some of my photos. You can see my pants falling off of me.

Who knew I would lose weight in Italy... I never thought in a million years.

Tunisia!!

This will probably be the most difficult blog post to write, just because it's so hard for me to put this trip into words. My 10 days were jammed packed. We got up early, no later than 7:30 every day and went all day long.

Around 70 students went on the study trip. It was through Loyola, so it was all taken care of with meals, hotels, transportation etc. As soon as we arrived in Tunis we went to the U.S. Embassy and met with the Ambassador which was really interesting. He gave us some background on where he has worked, all over the Middle East, and some background information on Tunisia as part of the Islamic and Arab world.

While in Tunis, we also got the opportunity to meet with Tunisian students who are studying law. We talked with them about the politics in Tunisia. One of the main conversation points is that Tunisia, as part of the Arab world, is much more progressive than other countries. Women have many more rights and can drive. Oddly enough one of the topics we ended up discussing with the students was abortion. While some of the women had the view point that abortion was not a controversial issue at all in the country, many of the men had more conservative views and were very concerned about it. Hearing these viewpoints and even witnessing the beginnings of heated arguments was interesting and not what I was expecting.

In Tunisia, the official language is Arabic and their second official language is French. It was so fun to use my French again. I was a bit rusty, but as the week passed I remembered more and more. Whenever we would go to one of the medinas (markets) I would use my French to the best of my ability to bargain. Of course it more or less turned into a blend of French, Italian, and English. The markets were incredible though. The first one we went to, was the most overwhelming, but also my favorite. It was a series of very narrow winding streets, with street vendors everywhere. Yelling at you, grabbing at you, saying, "Good price, good price for you. Come look. Come see." And when you decided to go "look and see" you better be serious about it, because if you showed the least bit of interest they would hound you. Tunisia uses the dinar. It was better than the Euro so we did pretty well. I have some of the currency to bring home.

Then there was my hair. I thought that my blonde hair would be a bigger deal in Italy than it is. Obviously no one looks at me and thinks I'm Italian, but I've been mistaken for a fluent Italian speaker multiple times. In Tunisia, I was stared at constantly. Everywhere I went there were a million head turns. The American, tall, blonde, pale girl stood out. I was very easily spotted. I quickly got the name Snow White from many people we encountered.

The other thing that really surprised me, though reflecting on it shouldn't have, was the shocked faces we received when we told people we were from America. Everyone assumed we were from England. A few thought I was Dutch, (which I am) but no one could believe we came all the way from America. The next statement that followed this shocked face was always, "Obama!" Of course we have all heard that Obama is loved internationally, but I don't think anyone really gets it until you see it. They love Obama. People were so much more willing to talk to us once we said we loved Obama too. It's clear to me that America has become more respected now that Obama is in office. I felt very proud to say I was from America and that Obama is our President.

I know many Americans are frustrated with him because they feel he has not done enough since being elected. But if it gives any peace of mind at all, internationally, his presence is such a huge step. Just being able to talk about America and politics with other cultures like this shows that this huge wall is starting to be broken down. I think the American people are starting to be seen differently. This makes me so happy and so eager for the future.

But there were so many other highlights of the trip. Riding camels in the Sahara was awesome! I mean really, I couldn't believe it. Having 70 people all on camels at the same time was also a riot, especially because we had our hair wrapped up and had to wear these robes when we went on the camel ride. My camel was tied to my friend Matt's, which ended up being a little scary, because Matt's camel, Jamie hated me. She was not happy with me when I tried to pet her. She made these very awkward camel noises and I thought she was going to bite me.

We were all forewarned that once we reached the desert, "operation save my camera" went into effect. The Sahara has the finest sand I have ever seen. The individual grains are incredibly small. In past trips our SLA's told us that it has caused multiple pieces of electronics not to work. But I had to have my camera. It is my life since I've been abroad. But I didn't take many photos while on the camel ride, one because I was on a camel and I'm pretty clumsy. Two, when the wind started to pick up it was difficult to see let alone take photos. Sand did get in my camera by the end of the desert, but it's alive and well. I've been able to get the majority of it out and the rest doesn't seem to be hurting it.

After the camels, it was time for the desert. Here's the funny part though. When you think Africa you think warm. Well, one full day while we were there, it poured! And I mean poured! I was drenched head to toe. And our bus decided to leak through the windows as well so even when we were indoors we were wet. So the day we were supposed to go to the desert, it almost got canceled due to the weather. Luckily, the weather cleared up and we went. I would have been heartbroken if we weren't able to go.

We had a campsite in the desert. There were people working there that pitched up the tents, which was a large blanket on the outside, and metal poles that were secured in the sand that held the blanket up. The blankets hung over the sides so the wind wouldn't get to us, but the bottom of the tent was just the sand. We put mats down to sleep though.

As we arrived in the 4-wheel jeeps, we all found a sand dune to sit on, hang out, and watch the sunset. We wrapped our scarves around our heads because the wind very harsh. At some points it was hard to see and my sunglasses became caked with the sand. The best part was when we would close our mouths and I could feel all of the grains of sand in my mouth. When I touched my skin, it was as if there was sand permanetely in me. When dinner came we all went into a small concrete building, sat on the floor and ate. At almost every meal while in Tunisia we had a similar salad to start off with - part of a boiled egg, cold potatoes with parsley, and a chutney carrot like substance, which was really good! We also ate this bread that we saw prepared with coals in the sand, as well as soup with garlic, tomato, and pasta. Delicious! During dinner one boy apparently got stung by a baby scorpion (my worst nightmare) but he was okay.

After dinner, we went out to the huge bone fire and danced and listened to the entertainment of drums and flutes with a belly dancer. When I see things like this I never know how "traditional" it actually is to the culture. Regardless, I enjoyed myself. At one point, with the smell of the fire in the background and listening to the music, I laid back and stared at all of the stars. I knew seeing the stars in the Sahara would be amazing. But it made me want to cry. I saw three shooting stars. The milky way was so clear to see and me and my friends had many debates on where the rest of the constellations were.

It was so peaceful. It was so beautiful. As I was there, looking up, so many thoughts were going through my head. Mainly, "I am in the Sahara desert, spending the night here, seeing the stars, never in my life will I do this again." I also thought about how it was still daytime in America and how I was looking at a completely different sky than the people at home, but how one point it will turn into the same sky and we will see the same things. Then I thought about how all of these stars are always present in the sky, it's just that we can't see them because of all the lights and pollution. The longer I would look and focus on the blackness, the more stars I would see. If I could describe the experience as anything I would say spiritual, because I felt at such peace with the world, with myself, with life.

We ended up singing all kinds of songs by the fire for hours. Everything from TLC, to The Beatles, and Third Eye Blind. As long as we were by the fire it was warm. But we had also been warned that the desert was going to get extremely cold. So when we finally went to our tent to sleep I had on my shirt, fleece, sweatshirt, and another jacket, hoods up, with gloves on, leggings, jeans, sweatpants, and two pairs of socks and my shoes with a scarf wrapped around the majority of my face. In the beginning I was okay. There were 10 of us in the tent, so pretty good body heat. But probably around 3 a.m. it got bad. My body just went numb. The temperature was probably around 15 to 20 degrees. I think I woke up every 30 minutes and I was so happy around 5:30 when the sun started to rise and we got up.

However, in the morning, my friends told me that I kept everyone up with my snoring. Oh god, I was so embarrassed! Whatever noises I was making were not normal and not typical, even from me. They said it sounded like some animal. Of course for the rest of the trip I made everyone tell me exactly what I did in the night to find out if this was some normal behavior, but alas, I guess I just saved that special noise up for the desert. But it will be quite the memory. At least everyone had a good laugh.

Now, being a movie person, this next part of the trip was pretty crazy! We got to go see where part of Star Wars was filmed! Yes, as in the actual sets they built for the movie, which are still up. They are in the middle of nowhere, but it was so awesome to see!

We saw a ton of Roman ruins. I wish I could go into more detail about them here, but at this point I would need to go through the schedule to remember all of them. But they were really cool to see. The best was the amphitheater in El Jem. It was fascinating to learn how the Roman Republic spread to Tunisia and to see the influence leftover from other civilizations.

One of the last days we were there we visited a mosque. After, we went to a store where there were hundreds of handmade rugs. The rugs ranged in prices between $200 to $15,000. The $15,000 rug took four years to make and was made out of pure silk. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw it! Don't worry Dad and Julie I didn't buy one. But they were magnificent.

The hotels we stayed at were also really nice, for the most part. One night we stayed in a cave, literally. That was a little much. But the other hotels were beautiful. It wasn't warm enough for my swimsuit, but I know there will be more opportunities. But from staying in the desert to staying right on the beach, the hotels were unbelievable. One was a full resort, I was in heaven.

I bonded with so many people on this trip and made many new friends. Matt and I are now siblings, because of our blonde hair. The Tunisians seemed to think that we were related and that Tim and Marriam were brother and sister too. It will be a running joke for awhile.

We also have a million memories at every meal because as soon as we would get through the main course, we would rush to the dessert bar. Matt and I had a system by the end of the trip - to get all of your desserts (one of everything obviously) before you sit down. Then you don't have to worry that you won't be able to get dessert. It was a carefully planned strategy, which the majority of everyone did by the end.

I also always enjoyed the bus rides, to journal and listen to music. It always reminds me of the bus scene in Almost Famous, which always brings a smile to my face. There was a lot of time for reflection and lots of time for fun as well. I'm still leaving out a lot about the trip. But I have to leave something to talk about when I get back. :)

To conclude, it was the trip of a lifetime. A ton of fun with great friends. And memories I hope to never forget. For those of you who read this whole post, thank you. I know it was a lot. But I'm glad you read it all, because I wanted to share it with all of you! I took over 900 photos and though not all of them will go on Facebook, the majority will.

Much love,
Katherine

Chapter 3: Napoli (Pizza, Sunshine and Neopolitan ice cream)

While here, I keep feeling very clear shifts of time. Chapter three of the journey has definitely occured. It's no longer the beginning, it's no longer the first exploration, life here has become normal, natural. I awake and I feel that everything is in its place. I look forward to my days, I look forward to seeing my friends and the adventures that we will have. Overall, Rome, Italy, has become home. The idea of life in America feels so far away, mentally and physically.

This weekend, after taking a break from studying for midterms and applying for internships we went to Naples. Our friend Joe had already been there and kept raving about how wonderful it was. I had heard very mixed things about Naples. "It's so dirty!" "You'll get all your stuff stolen." "The pizza is incredible." Obviously, I had to go find out for myself. And my stance on Naples, is that it is wonderful. It's a real city. It feels alive, so much so, I thought the cars were going to run me over. It's very different from Rome, which I wasn't expecting. I suppose Napoli is just a bit rougher. But it's charming and I really enjoyed myself.

I did have the best pizza of my entire life. It was called the Carmela - sausage, mozzarella, and spinach. But what makes the pizza is the dough. It's incredibly fluffy, but extremely thin, with amazing flavor. You can just tear the pizza, it's so delicate using a knife just seems wrong. I want to go back to Naples just so I can have more pizza. We got to Gino's just as it was opening and by the time we left there were probably 75 people standing down the street waiting to get in and eat.

Of course I also had to get neopolitan ice cream in Naples too. "Voglio cono piccolo con chocolato, fragola, e crema." Delicious. Megan and I had it melting all over us, but it was so worth it.

Then we found these rocks right by the sea. We were there for over an hour, just relaxing, taking in the breeze, the sun, the sounds of the sea. It made me so happy. That moment will for sure go down as one of my favorites of the whole semester. It was just pure happiness. We each climbed down the rocks to stick our feet in the water. Megan was the first to go and a huge wave hit her, she was drenched for the rest of the day until we went to Zara and bought her new clothes.

Laying in the sun, listening to the waves made me that much more excited for Greece and Malta. My weekends for the semester are now booked. This is helpful because I have everything else planned out and can just go with the flow.

I really cannot believe it is March. I leave for Africa in just over four days. Amazing. I can't even wrap my mind around it, but it is for sure to be an incredible experience. Time here is a funny thing, I feel like my days fly. I think time overall moves so fast. But it's so hard to describe my life to people at home. I try my best to put it into words, but I don't think it will ever make sense. It wouldn't make sense to me if I wasn't living it. I'm just so happy to be able to have this experience. I know this is what my parents have always wanted for me and thanks to them it is possible that it has happened. Every day I am more and more grateful to have these experiences. They are once in a lifetime. Thank you for letting it be possible!

Florence, Pisa, good friends, and the tin man

Well calcio got canceled tonight. I know I can't complain about the weather here, especially compared to Chicago. (I'm thinking of all of you over there.) But it loves to rain here, all the time, I feel like it's monsoon season. The SLA's decided there was too much rain to play calcio. We didn't need more injuries than usual. This is probably good because I need to keep working on my Italian homework, the amount seems to grow larger every day. But of course I needed to distract myself and write a blog before I begin.

I'm not sure if my Italian is getting better, but my English is definitely getting worse. Sometimes it takes me a good minute to say sentences, because I get all the words out of order. Even typing my blogs and emails I forget letters and forget basic sentence structuring. But I figure it's good. My brain is learning in new ways.

Time is continuing to move fast here. I can't believe it is almost March. I have exactly 15 days until I go to Africa. Just saying the words Africa boggles my mind. Marriam and I like to insert the word whenever we can. "When we go to Africa..." "When we get back from Africa..." "When we are in Africa . . ." It gets me even more excited, if that's possible.

As far as planning my other trips, it is a slow process, but one that will hopefully get figured out soon. I'm trying to stick to my budget I've made myself, because I have a long way to go still...I don't want to be broke in a month. So far so good.

This past weekend I went to Florence. The best way to describe Florence, for me, was calm. It's a great little city. We learned our way around really fast and I was really happy to just be there with three others. Traveling in smaller groups is definitely much less hectic. Me, Marriam, Adri, and Josh saw all the great sights. My favorite - Michelangelo's David. Spectacular. Everyone has said "You just can't believe it." But I figured it's just a statue, I'm sure it's cool, but not out of this world. It's out of this world. I stared at it and stared at it and stared at it. Everything about it just put me in awe. I can't wait to go back when my parents come to Florence. I know my dad will love it. Julie has already seen it and I know she is really excited to see it again. 

The hostel we stayed at in Florence was also super cute, it was called Leonardo's House. And Leonardo was our guide to Florence. He was rather goofy, but very helpful. And even told us to change our train tickets from Florence to Rome to Pisa to Rome. We did this because on Sunday we went to Pisa for the day and then just came home from there.

There is really nothing to do in Pisa though. I mean we went to the Leaning Tower, that was cool. We ate lunch by it and I laughed really hard at Adri because she was terrified of the pigeons. But other than that Pisa was dead. We were going to go see a movie, but the theater wasn't open. The only thing they were showing was Avatar. Not going to lie, I would have really liked to have seen that in Italian. But instead we sat at a cafe and ended up paying way too much for overpriced sandwiches.

So the top things that happened in Florence:
 - Josh cut his hair . . . a random decision he made so he could look good in a hat he wanted.
 - I bought a very cute leather purse that I bargained down from 45 to 28 euro!
 - We ate amazing waffles, pizza, and fantastic Mexican food.
 - Josh and I kept everyone up snoring. And Adri smacked me in the face in my sleep.
 - We took lots of pictures of the tin man, but I forgot to bring Dorthy to Florence. It was really sad.

All in all a fantastic trip. I am really looking forward to making it a Rome weekend though. There is still so much to do and see here. Also it is exhausting to travel. Everyone needs a break and to save some money.

Ciao for now!