Ciao Bella Roma <3

Sorry I've been slacking on my blog entries, school has been very busy. However, last week was my spring break, where I ventured to Rome and Athens. I'll tell you a bit about Rome in this entry and more on Athens in an entry to come. We had an early flight Friday morning and our car was coming around 4 am, so we had the bright idea of trying to stay up all night. This was following a long day of classes and then attending fashion weekend (which was amazing!). So we arrived at the airport, with plenty of time to spare, all extremely exhausted. After waiting, we boarded the airplane, which I thought was mildyly sketchy, but thats just me. 3 hours laters we could see the bright blue, cloudless skies of Italy. Upon disembarking, the weather was gorgeous, we thought it had to be 70 degrees. We managed to make it through customs with no issues. However, when I got my luggage the handle was ripped off, fabulous!! Other than that no main problems occured, and we were in a van on our way to the Hotel Solis in the heart of Rome.
As we were driving, me being me, I got insanely car sick, but hey I got to see all of the sites on the way to our hotel! It was amazing because as we pulled up in front of the hotel we could see the Colloseum down a side street, because it was only 1 block away. Also, at the end of the road was the Roman Forum. We were right in the middle of all this history! The hotel turned out to fabulous in itself and the woman at the desk was awesome. Her name was Madame Rita and we ended up calling her Stepmom, because she felt like our mother haha.. In the end we ended up calling her Mama Rita.

The hotel staff then suggested a little restaurant behind the hotel in this little side street. It was the one of the best meals I've ever had. I ordered the gnocchi and profiteral for dessert, both were incredible! Everyone was beyond satisfied with their meal, we actually ended up going back there on our last night in Rome.... yes it was that good! In other food news, we lived off of gelato, the greatest creation in terms of food. The chocolate fondante being my favorite.
In terms of sightseeing, we saw every major attraction except for the David because you need a reservation for the Galleria Borghese. Our first night, we went the Spanish Steps and just ventured around the area. The second day, was spent exploring the Colloseum. It was amazing and by far my favorite attraction. It was awesome to think about the gladiators fighting there sooo long ago. Our next adventure was to the Pantheon and Trevi Fountain, which we visited twice. The Pantheon was huge and ornate with a sunroof, which looked almost fake. At the Trevi, we all made wishes with Euros (1: you'll come back to Rome, 2: you'll find love, 3: you'll get married). The next day, we had a cute little lunch outside with strawberry daquiris and yummy pasta. After, we ventured to the Roman Forum that never ends (we made up a song about it and the Sistine Chapel, I'll post it at the end). Our last day was spent at the Vatican and St. Peter's Basilica. We just so happened to be there on the same day as the Pope and were able to see him enter in his motorcade. Very cool experience. In St. Peters, I was able to see one of my favorite statues, St. Theresa in Ecstacy. Here I bought rosaries and blessed them with holy water, which I thought was a memorable thing to do. Our final stop in the Vatican was the Sistine Chapel that never ended. It was remarkable!! The paintings within it were so ornate. Every room was hand painted completely different. Incorporated were statues and other artifacts. But the ceiling that Michelangelo painted, which is the most well known was immaculate and definitely worth the long process of venturing through 40 other rooms to view it.

That basically sums up the extent and highlights of Rome. Hope you enjoyed!

The Roman Forum never ends....

Yes it goes on and on my friends...

Some people started building it not knowing what it was...

And they continued building it forever just because...

The Sistine Chapel never ends..
Yes it goes on and on my friends...

Some people started painting it not knowing what it was...
And they continued painting it forever just because.....

(The rest will be added when I tell you about Greece)

I <3 you all the way to Belgium

Travelling to Belgium was quite the experience. To start off the morning Brittany and I took a bus to meet Jeri. From here we walked 10 minutes to the tube stop (the purpose of this is because our normal tube route was closed). Upon arrival, we see that there are severe delays and at this point it is already 7:45 and our train is departing at 8:25. We start running looking for a cab, which of course there is not one in sight. As we run probably a mile, we spot one pulling out of the gas station. We all sprinted to the waiting cab. We made it to the train station at 8:25 on the dot. Of course the train had already departed so we were left with useless tickets. Thank god we were able to find information and exchange them for a later departure.

All in all the remainder of our journey went by smoothly and we caught a cab to Hotel La Madeleine. It was a fabulous little hotel located in the heart of Brussels just steps from all of the sights and shopping. We were starving and ended up eating at Pizza Hut, so anti Belgium. But we ventured to the Grand Place after, which you'll be able to see in photos. We embarked on a minor shopping excursion in search of trends and souveniers, which was mainly successful (I got a cheap Manchester United Ronaldo jersey!).Also, i purchased as stein and mock wooden shoes, which are really porcelian, I thought they were very Belgian. The next day we had the famous Belgian waffles and frites (french fries). AMAZING! Possibly the greatest creations! I ordered my waffle with vanilla icecream and hot chocolate sauce, I could so go for one of those right now! Those are basically the main highlights of the trip, and we also went to the Museum of musical instruments.

Bath, Glastonbury, & Stonehenge

Hello All! Sorry it's been awhile since I've posted, but I've been super busy with school and travel. So 2 weekends ago I went to Bath, Stonehenge, and Glastonbury all of which were amazing. First at Glastonbury, we were able to see an old abbey which was mainly destroyed except for part of the structure. A plaque at the site claims that it was once the burial site for King Arthur and Gueneviere which I found to be totally awesome since I'm a dork and love mythological/historical stuff. The one boy in the group actually laid down on the grave and pretened to be Arthur.
Anyway after that we made our way to Bath, to see the Roman Baths. We were actually able to see the real baths the Romans used, still supplied by the same hot springs. The majority of the structure was in fantastic condition and I was able to walk on it and touch it, way cool. Also, there was a museum all about the Baths, which contained ancient sculptures, tombstones, and parts of the bath that were destroyed. We stayed the night in Bath, which had next to no night life from what we found. The good thing was how incredibly cheap food and drink are outside of London. A Sandwhich, chips, cake, and 2 drinks cost around 11 pounds, where in London it would be about double that. So for us poor college students we were way excited.!!
After the baths, we went to Stonehenge the next day. It was terribly freezing and the wind was horrendous. Stonehenge was definitely interesting, but it's disappointing that you can't get very close. But it's rather mesmerizing to think that someone created it and how they did it, because the rocks are massive. We were entertained though and took pictures trying to be Stonehenge as well as the same picture from every possible angle. It was funny because you get headphones that tell you facts about it, and one was "Some rocks remain standing, while others have fallen down." But, I wonder what in fact it was made for. Apparently some people say that it has great acoustics, that would be awesome for a rave. So while we were there my friends were messing around and had me give commentary on the purpose of Stonehenge, which I obviously said was used for raving. Another little tidbit about it is, apparently a certain religion is allowed to enter the grounds on the Solstice in order to worship. Who knew! That's all for now, I'll be posting about Belgium soon enough!

Nightlife!!

The night life in London is much different than in PA and Ithaca. It revolves more around the club and bar scenes considering you only have to be 18. So far, we’ve ventured to many clubs and pubs for entertainment and food. The pubs we’ve found have cheap, good food and yummy desserts. As for the clubs, there is a wide range. The first real bar I went to was called OH! Bar. It is a really laidback atmosphere with pool tables and comfy couches and chairs. The drinks are amazing especially Jaffa Cake, yummy! This first week we really took advantage of the club scene considering we didn’t have classes. The first club we ventured to was Metra. It was more upscale, costing 10 pounds for cover and the drinks costing 6 pounds and up. It was a good time though, and we all enjoyed it. Especially Brit and I met boys the first night haha. They were pretty chill and so far we’ve kept in contact. Next night we tried a club called Oxygen. It was 3 floors consisting of 3 bars and a dance floor. It had an upbeat atmosphere and the majority of people were around my age, as compared to Metra, which was a little bit of an older crowd. All in all they were both an interesting experience considering I DON’T dance. The best part was that they played almost all American songs, like Lil’ Wayne, Shakira and Snoop. There were some British/European songs that I didn’t recognize which the boys pointed out and proceeded to sing. Now everytime I hear that song I think of the first night out, I just need to download it and I’ll be all set. Too bad I don’t know the name of it.
The next time we attempted to go out was not as much of a success story. Doug (the boy from Metra) told me about student night at a club/bar called Tyger Tyger. Naturally, I was all about going and talked everyone else into it, plus we were meeting the guys from the other night there as well. Well when we arrived the line was ridiculously long but seemed to be moving fast. Of course, half of the people were willing to wait, while others complained that it would take too long. In the end we walked around for a ½ hour or so and when we got back to Tyger Tyger, there was no line. So this time we were just going to wait, but a club promoter lied and said they weren’t letting anyone else in and to go to Oxygen, which was crowded and had good dancing. Everyone agreed but Brit and I. In the end, they got ripped off due to no dance floor and about 5 people in the bar. With a lot of luck they were able to get their money back. At this point I was so frustrated, I gave up and returned home.

The First Week

The first week in London was one of the most stressful times ever. During this time we had to run around the city in search of a flat, which is not exactly the easiest thing to accomplish in a weeks time. We began in Baron’s Court, which was dirty, dingy and all around scary despite how nice the neighborhood seemed. The stove was gas and needed matches to light it. That was enough to freak us out and I almost ran out screaming. Next, we ventured to places in Marble Arch, which were not impressive. The first flat had an elevator like in Manhattan that opens right into the entry way of the flat, so if the doors aren’t closed all the way downstairs you’re stuck. The elevator was so claustrophobic and reminded me of the Tower of Terror that I screamed as it dropped. Another place seemed normal as we walked in, but as we explored further we noticed Barbie curtains and the mirror was smashed. It looked like someone had their head bashed into it and Brittany said she thought there was red in the center of it. The best part of the day was on the way to view these flats. We were on the tube and an announcement was made that the train was stopped indefinitely due to a person under a train. So that started the day off well, which resulted in us walking 20 minutes to Marble Arch. Finally, after being desperate for a place to live and calling multiple agencies, someone finally decided to help us. We now have a lovely flat in Bayswater/Queensway and I’ll post pictures of it so everyone can see!

Travel to London

Just getting to London proved to be a difficult task. I left home at 10:30 in order to arrive at 3:00, 3 hours in advance for my 6:00 flight. At 12:30 I learn that the flight is now postponed until 10, great! After arriving in the airport, my parents and I spent 3 hours just wandering. Finally they left and I spent the remainder of the time with other Ithaca students. The security checkpoint was not as demanding as I thought it would be. They didn’t inspect any liquids or prescriptions; I did however beep as I went through the metal detector thanks to my belt. 3 hours later, we managed to board the plane and by take off it was a little after midnight.
Upon arrival in London we ventured through customs. Everyone I spoke to had an easy time being asked minimal or no questions at all. Of course though, I end up getting grilled by this middle aged lady who seemed to hate me. She asked and thoroughly read every piece of paper I had, as well as asking how much money I was carrying and how much I currently had in my bank account. She asked if I would be leaving and reentering the UK and a million other questions, all while Randi is staring at me giving me a thumbs up and thumbs down wondering what was taking so long. Needless to say it was not a good experience. If that wasn’t enough, there were enough seats for us on the 2 coaches but no room for our luggage. The drivers had to cram our stuff in the back of the coach. We figured we would see our bags sitting on the curb as we drove away.