Bene

Buonasera!

This week was fun, until I realized yesterday that I have to read 400+ pages before Tuesday!

Wednesday morning I had my first on-site class downtown. We met at the Pantheon, and learned a little bit about it and the building techniques, then we had to draw it! After the Pantheon, we went to a building that is only about 4 years old and we also had to draw that. I'm still not quite sure what exactly we will be working towards in this Architecture class, but I do enjoy it.

On Wednesday night there was a mass and dinner downtown that we went to. The mass was in this really old church in the middle of downtown Rome. The priest, Father Al, is a prof at the JFRC and he came around introducing himself before mass started. He got to me, and I said my name is Kory, and he said Kory as in Cory Feldman? or how about Corey Haim? and I just laughed and he said "oh thanks, is that old?" and I said "REALLY old!" and thus began a great friendship. He then wouldn't talk to me and he kept snubbing me and at communion, he said "Body of Christ, KORY" with a hint of "KORY you little brat." So mass was nice, and my History prof played the organ for it.

After mass we went to dinner at a restaurant across the street. I sat at the table next to the Dean of Students, two of my professors, and, you guessed it, Father Al. During dinner he kept saying "I hope you are all having a great time over there... except Kory." Dinner was amaaazing. First they brought out small appetizers like bread, mozzarella balls, black olives, meatballs, bruschetta, mushrooms, peas, etc. Then came pasta, then roast beef and potatoes, and for desert we had fruit and pancake-like cookies. During dinner my table only got one bottle of wine while the others got 2, so we were throwing a fit, and we eventually got another bottle from another table after being told by the waiter that our teacher didn't want us to have more than one. The next day in class during attendance, the teacher that was sitting at the table next to us called my name, and then said "so you got your bottle of wine then?" I really like that the profs are all involved here, it's great.

On Thursday we went out for Manak's birthday, and I had my first Roman Cheeseburger. It was good, and their fries are a lot better than in the states. After the restaurant, we went to a pub where they played only Shakira. All in all it was a success. Friday consisted of reading. and more reading. and more reading. And then going to Trastevere to a gelateria and a bar that had real Italian kids our age!

Last night I also found out that I am on the "Purple" calcio team. It also has all the people that I love on it, and a real Irishman! Practice starts on Wednesday night, so I have to go to the flee market tomorrow to get some shoes and shorts.

Today we are going to the Keats home/ museum by the Spanish steps. Oh and I'm also doing laundry for the first time! hoorah.

Ciao Regazzi.

heeeciaooooo

Oy vey. I tried to wait two days to blog again, but it feels like it already has been two days. Time goes slow here. Yesterday I tried to go shopping with some friends, but everything was closed because it was Sunday. It's such a different life here! God forbid I wanted some granola bars and nutella. They make THE BEST nutella croissants in the cafe here. Oh lord. They are my new chocolate long johns.

I only had one class today! It was Italian and my profa is so funny! Her name is Nadia and she always tells me how my name doesn't exist in Italian. They don't even have the letters K or Y in their alphabet! But today we had to go around the class and say random countries from the book and the nationalities that go with those countries, and wouldn't you know it, I got Canada! So I learned that in italian, Canada is "Canada" and Canadian is "Canadese." So bravissimo. Hopefully I get an A. I tried helping Dana with her Italian homework today, but she's kind of a lost cause, so we'll see where we end up by the end of the semester. We had an Italian speaking partner party tonight and we met some Italians who are studying at the local university, so it's like we help them with English and they help us with Italian, although they know English much better than I know Italian. All I have learned so far is "mi chiamo kory" and "dove la fermata del autobus" also my favorite word is "basta!" I say it all the time. It's like "stop, enough!" in English.

My books were $185 dollars this semester! Not bad! I was still like, ughhh this is so much! but then I remembered that last semester I payed nearly 800 so i reminded myself that it could be worse.

It's raining here today and I'm not too happy about it.

Ciao Regazzi!

Assisi and Back to Rome.

For orientation, we had a 3 day stay in Assisi, about 4 hours north of Rome. We stayed in hotels, and had activities that were "somewhat" helpful, the best of them being a tour of Assisi. It was odd to hear on the tour about two "new rooms" that had been added to a church. The "new" rooms were added in the 1700s but in relation to the centuries old church, they WERE new. Something being hundreds of years old here is nothing.

On our last day in Assisi, Tim and Dana and I took a walk up to the castle. The view was amazing, and it wasn't foggy which made for some great pictures.

Back in Rome, classes started last wednesday. My first class was an architecture class that I thought was going to be mostly writing papers, but as it turns out, it is actually a drawing class. I had to go buy sketchbooks and special pencils and pens, and compasses and rulers. I'm pretty excited about it seeing as my major would be architecture if Loyola offered it. On thursday I had 3 classes, but I accidentally skipped my first class because I went to a class that I wasn't even enrolled in. I was even pretty adamant to the prof. that I was in it, because my name wasn't on the attendance list. So when I got back to my room I checked online and it turned out I spent 3 hours in a class that I'm not in. oh well! My other classes are Italian Film Genre, Italian 101, The world of Late Antiquity (history class), and an Italian writers class. It's going to be different than my latest semester of business and math classes, but it will be a welcome change.

So this is our first real weekend in Rome, and it was a good one! We don't have classes on friday, so we spent the day planning our spring break trip to Madrid and Paris, and then we played a game of "calcio" (soccer) with some other students. I also ate about 12 clementines picked straight from the tree in the courtyard. I'm going to miss that in Minnesota. Friday night we went downtown and saw the Colosseum and went out to eat at a little restaurant. Yesterday we went to the Emperor Hadrian's Villa in Tivoli, about an hour outside of Rome. It was a huge estate, and a lot of the walls are still standing. I have taken a rock from everywhere we have been, and at Hadrian's villa (or Villa Adriana), I took a piece of terracotta from one of the walls.

Last night my friends and I went to a pub, but since it was a Roma soccer game, it was full. Then we went to a nearby restaurant and I ordered Nachos with guacamole (and got made fun of by my friends) which was actually doritos and guacamole when it came. Everything in Rome is uphill so I have become pretty used to walking great distances on uphill cobblestone roads. Between the clementines and the walking, I'm not too worried about getting scurvy or getting out of shape when I'm here.

I'm joining the intramural Calcio team tomorrow. I wasn't going to at first, but I am heeding the advice of one of the full years here that "you're f*ed up if you aren't on the Calcio teams."

Anywho, I hope this wasn't boring. I'm not good at blogging, so I'll work on it.
Ciao!

I'm a blogger now.

Ciao!

I'm sitting on Dana's bed with Manak and Dana. We just finished watching Manak play futbol with the other children, and I just picked clementines from the courtyard. I'm trying my best not to get scurvy while I'm here.

Anyway, once I get all my thoughts in order, I will start to write about what I have already done, and then the blogs will go in order, but I figured I would try it out once today.

The water in the building is shut off today, as they are cleaning out the calcium build ups and trying to get us more hot water, so it's a good thing that I showered before I went to bed last night. OH! There was a spider in my bed last night! I crushed it with my alarm clock. It's almost warm enough to sleep with the windows open! A nice change from the great white north that is Minnesota. So, I'm going to go enjoy the weather and go to the tabachi to buy stamps. I hope you all are well!

Ciao and I love you all!