Another Average Day...in ITALY!

Hola! (I decided to switch the language up on you guys...)

So, we started classes two days ago...yuck! Actually, I'm really enjoying the classes I am taking (I know I'm a dork...don't be a hater). I'm taking Comparative Legislative/Electoral Systems and Strategic Intelligence, which are the two hardest classes to take here. Both of the professors, Dr. Bullock and Dr. Johnson, are two of the best teachers in the School of Public and International Affairs (where I will likely spend the next four to six years of my life, depending on where I go to grad school) at UGA, and they are extremely hard to get into on campus. They are both going to be extremely challenging; I'm in class from 8-12:45 Monday-Thursday, and I have at least 15 chapters to read each week! But I'm really enjoying them, which makes it easier to pay attention. Plus I have friends in each of my classes, so it will be nice to have someone to study with for my midterms that are NEXT WEEK.

Let's see...the past few days have been pretty chill here. We have been trying to decide what weekend trips to take, and we finally figured it all out! This weekend I am going to Salzburg, Austria, which is where The Sound of Music was filmed/where the von Trapp family actually lived, and where Mozart was born (shut up, I told you I was a dork!). 8 of us girls are going, and we're staying at a hostel. And by hostel, I mean campsite. Luckily with all of my camping experience (NOT) this will be easy for me. We're doing a Sound of Music tour, including the field where Julie Andrews sings at the beginning, the abbey where Maria lived (and hopefully going to mass there on Sunday), and seeing the mountains that the von Trapps climb over at the end of the movie! I am so excited.

Then next weekend, we are going to...drumroll please...DUBLIN, IRELAND! I am thrilled about this. I have always wanted to explore my Irish heritage, aka the land where pale is the new tan. Six of us are going, which will be a nice small group. I can't wait to visit the actual home country of "Dancing at Lughnasa"! The next weekend, we are going to Barcelona, Spain, which I've heard is one of the most beautiful cities in the world. It's right on the water, and apparently there are cathedrals and palaces and plazas (oh my!) everywhere you go. It should be really fun!

Speaking of trips, the other day a bunch of us went to the train station to pick up our train tickets to get to Salzburg. While we were waiting at the bus stop for the train, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned around, and some guy was touching my shoulder! Needless to say I was a little freaked out, so I pulled away. Then he came over and started touching each of our arms and grabbing our hands. We realized that he was mentally handicapped, but it was still pretty creepy! All of a sudden, all of my harassment training kicked into gear, and I just started saying "No! No! Stop. No." ("just say no" has a whole new meaning now!). The group was pretty freaked out, but he finally left. Then, we all realized that the situation was pretty funny overall, and it's been an inside joke ever since. We later regretted that our guy friends weren't there. Then again, the situation was so funny that they probably wouldn't have been able to do anything but laugh anyway! Now you know the reason for my apparently puzzling facebook status...

This afternoon/evening, we loaded up the tour buses and went to a winery about 20 minutes away from Verona. We toured the actual winery and then we were served dinner and got to sample a white wine that goes with appetizers, a red dinner wine, and a sweet dessert wine. It was so much fun, and I felt so sophisticated! Definitely a unique experience.

Fortunately, the weather has cooled down A LOT. It has been in the 90s since we got here, and it was 97 yesterday! But today, it finally cooled down to the normal May temperature of 75. I had forgotten what it was like to not be dripping with sweat 24/7.

I can't even tell you how much fun I am having. First, it's a surreal experience to even be in Italy in the first place. I can sit on my double-wide balcony, look at the river that snakes through the city, and see the snow-covered Alps in the distance. Apparently we got the best room in the place (top floor, living room and kitchen, two bedrooms, double-balcony, etc...), so everyone loves hanging out with us! Which is pretty cool. We are able to cook for ourselves, so the past few nights everyone just brings over their dinner and we all sit on the balcony, eat our pasta, drink our wine, and look at the Alps. It is so cool! I love everyone on this trip. I have made so many good friends so far. I went from casually knowing only two people on the trip to having a ton of really good friends who I'm going to jet-set all around Europe with. I am so incredibly fortunate to be able to go on this trip, and I can't wait to experience the rest of it!

Thanks for keeping up with my blog! Love and miss you guys!

Arleta

Ole, Ole Ole Ole! Chievo, Chievo!

Hello all!

Well, the last few days have been super busy! On Friday, we walked all over town on an historic tour. Our progam coordinator lives in Verona, and his son walked us all around the old part of town and told us all about the history of the city. It was really interesting to learn about all the different stages of Verona's history! Some structures, like the arena, have been standing since the Roman days (before 100 AD), and others were built as recently as the 1400s (which is considered modern to the Veronese). We got to see all kinds of sights, like "Juliet's balcony" and a square dedicated to the poet Dante. It was absolutely amazing.

Yesterday a huge group of us got up early to catch an 8:30 train to Venice. When we walked out of the train station, we literally walked right up to the edge of the Grand Canal. I had always heard that Venice was smelly, dirty, and overrated. Well my friends, none of those things are true. Venice was absolutely BEAUTIFUL. Epcot actually did a pretty good job of replicating it, but it doesn't even come close to portraying how beautiful it is. We didn't get to go on a gondola because they were pretty expensive, but we did take a water bus down the canal and got to see the old basilica and the Guggenheim museum there. Most of the day we just walked the streets, since it is very hard to get around in Venice. Most of the side streets dead end at the water or at a "water alley," so it's easy to get lost. But it was more fun that way! We decided we wanted to eat somewhere close to the water, so we found a really cool restaurant that was right on the Grand Canal. We got there before the crowds, so all 11 of us got to sit together right on the water! It was absolutely beautiful. On our way home, we got on a train that we thought went straight to Verona. Little did we know that the end of the line was Vicenza, which is a 25 minute ride from Verona...

By this point it was about 11:00, and we were told that no more trains were going to Verona that night. After some mild panicking, we found a sleeper train that was coming by on its way to Munich that stopped in Verona. However, we had to stand in the tiny corridor of the sleeper train for the entire 25 minute ride back. It was a tad uncomfortable, but it makes for a great story!

Today we actually got to sleep in for once, and we decided to go to a football game that our program coordinator told us about. It was a playoff game between the team from Bologna and a neighborhood team from Verona called Chievo Verona. Apparently they were a team from a small neighborhood that wasn't expected to even get to the playoffs, and they've been slowly advancing in the playoffs in the last few weeks. We stood in line for tickets (in the 90 degree weather), some people bought jerseys, and bought hamburgers outside the stadium. This whole time, I've been thinking that one thing America has over Italy (Chinese food, ice, and free refills) was that we make amazing hamburgers. Well, I was wrong - this was probably one of the best hamburgers I have ever had! We actually had pretty decent seats in the stadium, and we cheered along with the rest of the Italians, even though we had no idea what they were saying. Chievo Verona ended up tying with the other team, so they got to advance to the next stage! It was so fun, and such a great experience!

Well, tomorrow we start classes...at 8 am. That's going to be rough, but I guess that's what we're here for...it is called STUDY abroad after all...

CIAO!

"In Fair Verona, Where We Lay Our Scene..."

Bonjoirno! (hope you all caught the not-so-subtle Romeo and Juliet reference in the title...)

I have no idea if that is spelled correctly, but you know what I mean! I am finally in Verona, Italy, where I will be for the next four weeks. Yesterday we flew from Istanbul to Venice, and from Venice we took a two hour bus ride to Verona. This city is so beautiful - it's just like I imagined it. There is a beautiful river running through the city with beautiful old stone bridges. The roads are cobblestone/some other stone and are worn down from centuries of walking. They took us to an "Italian fast food" place (along the lines of a pizzeria that we would find in Atlanta) for dinner, where we met an older lady who was an opera singer performing in "Carmen" at the arena! We asked her to sing, and she did! She had the most amazing voice, and she just started singing in the middle of the street! Oddly enough, none of the locals really acted like it was out of the ordinary. Even though she didn't speak a lot of English, she was so happy to see us and was so sweet.

After dinner we were free to do what we wanted with the rest of the evening. A group of us decided to find a cafe to sit at for a while and then we decided to walk around the streets after it got darker and observe the nightlife. We stumbled upon a younger section of town, where we met two girls studying from Chicago. They had been in Verona for four months and last night was their last night. They gave us advice about places to eat, places to shop, and things to do here. One of them was even from Marietta originally! Only in Verona...

It seems that a lot of the people who live here are families with younger children and older people. It seems to be a very tight-knit and friendly community where everyone watches out for everyone else. The weather is extremely humid and temperatures in the 90s...yuck! But because it's Italy I am going to excuse it...

Today we had an orientation about what to expect here at the residence and in the neighborhood. We were taken to the grocery store and stocked up on groceries - if you think buying groceries in the States is hard, try looking for coffee filters when you don't speak Italian. My friend, another coffee lover, and I almost had a mild heart attack when we thought we couldn't buy coffee. But the day was salvaged when we realized we could use paper towels...

This afternoon we have a historical tour of the city, which I can't wait for! Stay tuned for more from fair Verona!

Final Day in Turkey

So this is our last night in Turkey, and I think everyone is ready to leave the land of kebabs and move on to the wonderful world of pizza, pasta, and gelato. I have really enjoyed Istanbul. It is so different from anything I have ever experienced (in a good way). It was definitely something I never would have thought to do on my own, but I am so glad I got to come here.

Today we got to go on a cruise down the Bosphorous Strait, which separates the European side of Istanbul from the Asian side. The other day we got to actually cross over and spend some time at a university on the Asian side, so that was pretty cool! I can actually say I have been to three continents in the last five days. We also got to go the Spice Market and the Grand Bazaar, which are two of the oldest markets in the modern world (we´re talking like the 16th century). There were a lot touristy things that you would expect from a market like that, but there were a lot of surprisingly expensive things, like rings for 4000 lira and Arabian carpets for 2000. And it was a cool experience that you pretty much can´t get anywhere else.

Tonight there is a HUGE football (or for all you uncultured Americans out there, soccer) game tonight between Russia and Germany, and the entire city has been crazy all day. There are tv screen set up on a ton of the buildings, and everyone is wearing some kind of jersey. They told us not to go out late tonight because they take their football VERY seriously. And I thought drunk fraternity guys at UGA really hated the Florida Gators...

Tomorrow we are flying to Venice and from there taking a train to Verona. This part of the trip has seemed so far away for so long, and it´s finally here! Verona is definitely a much smaller town than Istanbul, so it will be an interesting contrast. We have an orientation about our classes and such on Friday, and then we actually start classes on Monday. Being in class from 8-12:45 Monday-Thursday = not my idea of a vacation. But it will be worth it!

Thanks for reading these. I´ve been reading the blogs of some of the other people on the trip, and theirs are SO much funnier than mine! But I know you love me, so thanks for still reading mine! You know I love you and miss you all! Stay tuned for my exploits in Italy!

Arleta

Day 2 in Turkey!

Hey guys!

So you´ll have to forgive me, since I am at an Internet cafe and the keyboard is a little different than in the states...

Today was really busy! Jet lag + getting up early = a lot of unhappy campers, but they had coffee downstairs so I was good to go. They took us to the Old City, aka the part that used to be Constantinople, the capital of the Roman Empireş until the Roman Empire fell and was then then the capital of the Ottoman Empire. We went to two mosques today. One, the Hagia Sofia, was originally a church in the sixth century but was made into a mosque when the Turks took over. The other one, the Blue Mosque, is absolutely breathtaking. As the name would suggest, the inside was filled with blue tiles that cost an insane amount of money. We had to take off our shoes, and the girls had to cover their shoulders and legs. There were a lot of people inside doing their prayers. Interestingly, this mosque was viewed as a house of God, where Jews, Christians, and Muslims were invited to pray. Pretty cool stuff. We also saw an old palace where the sultans and their nobles used to live. Inside, they had all kinds of old artifacts from various sultans and religious figures. They had a lot of things from Muhammad´s tomb. However, the coolest part was seeing John the Baptists arm and hand that were cut off by Herod, and even the top of his skull was there. They had part of the bronze covering moved away from John the Baptists arm, and you could see the bones and stuff. Pretty cool. They even had a bowl that allegedly belonged to Abraham and a staff that belonged to Moses. And to think that we in the States consider a tissue that George Washington may or may not have sneezed on to be a historical artifact.

The food is better than I thought...lots of bread, beans, potatos, fruit, and weird meat stuff. And lots and lots and lots of kebabs! Fortunately they have coke, coke light, etc. The tap water is not safe to drink, but we just buy water bottles for brushing our teeth and drinking.

Well I must go now...it is almost dinner time here in Turkey! Hope things are going well in the States!

Arleta

Greetings from Istanbul! (not Constantinople...)

Well folks, I'm in Istanbul! After what felt like a year of my life spent in airports and on planes, I made it here at 10:00 am local time (that's 3:00 am Atlanta time). The plane portion of the trip was pretty interesting. First, on my flight from Atlanta to New York I sat next to this huge guy (not fat, just insanely muscular) with scorpion tattoos all over his hands and everything. He was from South Africa, and it turns out he works as a military contractor who basically organizes and recruits mercenaries to fight in wars. He's sent soldiers from all over the world to fight in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Zambia, and more. Needless to say he was pretty jaded about war. After he said that he spends three days a week on international flights, I don't feel as bad.

When I was getting my ticket scanned to get on the plane at JFK airport to go to Istanbul, the lady who scanned my ticket said I had to go to the information desk. I was struck with the fear that my ticket wasn't valid, they had lost my information, or I was mistaken with someone else who couldn't leave the country. However, they printed me off a new ticket, and it turned out to be in first class! Somehow I was randomly selected to get an upgrade to first class, which on a 9 1/2 hour flight is pretty awesome. So, I had a huge comfy seat that almost reclined all the way back, had a footrest, my own personal tv with a huge selection of movies and tv shows (needless to say I watched three of my favorite shows, Friends, Two and a Half Men, and The Tudors!), an amazing dinner selection (filet mignon in a bernaise sauce with potato gratin and broccolini with an ice cream sundae for dessert? My kind of traveling.) So that was a nice surprise.

After a cab ride that nearly cost me my life (lane assignments are more like guidelines than actual rules here) with a cab driver who made his thoughts about American politicans perfectly clear in broken English (don't get me wrong, he was really nice!), I got to the hotel, which is pretty nice in a nice neighborhood. Guys, this city is INCREDIBLE. It's nothing like I've ever seen before. It's a mix between what you would typically imagine a Mediterranean/big Middle Eastern city would look like mixed with modern skyscrapers, advertisements, condos, etc. Plus the mosques are absolutely breathtaking. And there's a body of water everywhere I look. It's beautiful. I can't wait to actually get to walk around in it.

Sorry that was long; the rest of them probably won't be as long. But I just wanted to let you know that I got here safely (and in style, apparently).

Love you all, and thanks for reading this thing!

Arleta

First Post

Hello everyone!

As most of you know, I'm going to be in Europe for six weeks this summer. On Friday, I'm flying to Istanbul, Turkey, where I'll be for five days. After that, I'm flying to Verona, Italy (in northern-central Italy, halfway between Milan and Venice and almost due north from Rome), where I'll be studying and taking classes for four weeks. My last week there, I'm going to be traveling in Florence and Rome before returning home to the States on June 26. I'm so unbelievably excited about my trip, but I'm going to miss you all so much!

So, I decided to make this blog. Since not all of you are on Facebook, I figured this would be an easy way to keep you guys updated on what I'm doing. I'm kind of new to this whole blog thing, but I think there's a way that you can "follow" people's blogs and receive updates when they post things. I'm not quite sure, but I'll figure it out. But anyway, I'll try to post as often as I can to keep in touch with you guys. I'm really going to miss my friends and family while I'm gone, but I can't wait to get there and immerse myself in a different culture (especially the food! I doubt I'll ever be able to eat Papa John's again...).

Anyway, I love you all, and I'll post something more substantial later!