Firenze Living

Ciao compagni e famiglia!


I'll start this off by saying I'm realllly trying to get better at Italian so I may throw a few words d'italiano in once in a while! I passed my placement exam into Italian 2 yesterday at our orientation, so I feel like a pro :)

So for the past two days all I have been doing is exploring! Yesterday, I woke up around 9 AM (3 AM at home, still sooo weird to think about) and Rachel and I decided to do some exploring. The weather was pretty warm so we walked a few blocks to the Duomo, which as I've already told you, is still breathtaking every time I see it. Since we had some time to kill, we went inside. The inside is absolutely MASSIVE and so silent!
I lit a candle for Grandpa in the center, I knew that would be something he would love to hear!


Afterwards we decided to take our program advisors advice and "get lost... with a map." We ended up wandering around for a good two hours, just enjoying the city, shops and cafes. We stopped at a small cafe to have lunch. I ordered a panino al salame e fromaggio (salami sandwich), which was very tasty and Rachel ordered ciccolata caldo (hot chocolate), which was incredibly dark and creamy. 


We then made our way over to the university headquarters to sit through more orientation nonsense for a few hours. Afterward, we met Shira and Steph and went grocery shopping at the supermercato and the 99 cent store. We bought 4 bottles (for only 10 euro!) of wine at our corner store and came home and made pasta!! Then we went out to the Lion's Fountain, definitely an experience but it was completely packed with American students, so I'm not sure if I'll want to go there again. If I wanted to see a bar filled with drunken American people, I could have stayed at PC. 


Today, Steph, Shira and I went to the Mercato Centrale which is a HUGE market indoors to find some fresh fruits and veges. We ended up getting a late start and the only thing I had time enough to buy were these delicious apples that I'll be munching on with Nutella very soon. We then met up with one of the Italian students at the Santa Croce for our neighborhood tour. Leonardo showed us around the neighborhood where our apt is located, but we had already scoped it out so it was just fun to pick his brain about good restaurants and gelateries!


Afterward we wandered back to the Duomo to meet up with Irene (pronounced I-ray-nay) for the walking Art History tour. She took us all around the city, down to the Piazza Signora which has all the famous sculptures in the plaza, even the "David." Not the real David but a life-size replica. She then took us across the Ponte Vecchio (the famous bridge that is jam-packed with jewelry stores) which I definitely need to revisit and spend time (money) on. She brought us around the other side of the river but the wind was so nippy that we came home shortly after. 

                                                         (view of the Ponte Vecchio)


Right now, we're about to head out to a wine bar down the street that has "Apertivo," very similar to Happy Hour in America. If you order one drink, you can eat off of their antipasto bar for free! So we're heading there now! More to come soon!!