Week Eleven

This past week was a lot more relaxing here than it has been in a long time. Classes are sort of winding down. This is the last two weeks of both History and Italian classes and so we've been getting excited about that. They basically have us wrap up everything except exams before our break and then all we will have left is our history test and studio work until the end of the semester. Seems like it will be nice because they promise us that this way we will have more time to enjoy Rome some before we have to go home. I can't believe I only have 5 weeks left! Although I am definitely looking forward to going home and seeing my friends and Dan and everything.

The walks for history this past week were pretty cool. We are learning about Boromini and Bernini who we have studied in class before but it's so awesome to see all the stuff in person. On one of our walks we went to San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane and it was so beautiful. It is this tiny church on one corner of an intersection where 4 fountains were designed for each corner of the intersection. The fountains were so cool and interesting, and shows just one of the many things I love about Rome, that while standing to cross a busy street with cars whizzing by, there are these beautiful old fountains. It's just so crazy how old this city is. I think that is definitely something I'll miss. Just walking down the street and oh hey, there's the Colosseum, just chillin there.

Anyway, the inside of the church was just so awesome, such my kind of church/architecture. It was really plain white, simple, stark even, yet so beautiful. There was this amazing coffering on the ceiling in the dome that was made up of crosses and ovals, and was beautiful in it's detail and I think better just plain white. That is definitely something I've noticed here, the churches are just so crazily adorned with different stones and it's just gaudy sometimes, whereas this tiny church is so simple and is probably one of the most beautiful in my opinion.

This weekend we also had our last planned trip with school. We went to Fabriano and a couple of other small "hill" towns outside of Rome. In Fabriano there is a paper making factory where they are famous for their paper and it's sold in art stores all over. We got to go to the factory and each make our own sheet of paper. It was really cool because I didn't know that that was how paper was made (obviously the non-mechanized version) and it was fun just to do it. We also did some scavenger hunts and got a really nice lunch at this cool restaurant where it was also a furniture store. They sold the furniture that you sat at to eat. The tables were all made out of these awesome tree trunks with glass tops and it was just so cool. I wish that place was in America so I could buy some stuff!

After the planned activities were over we walked over to this big park and played around for a while. Simona's daughters were there and it was fun, so people played volleyball, the boys mostly played some pick-up football/rugby, and then there was this zip-line thing that we all took turns riding. It was pretty funny. We even convinced Claudia to do it! She was so scared but it was great.

That night we stayed in a hotel in Fabriano. Most people called it an early night - there wasn't much to do anyway. Today we basically just made our way back to Rome but stopping at a few different cool places on the way. The best part was we went to these caves and got a tour through. It was so beautiful and even though we weren't supposed to take pictures, I took a bunch of really good ones :)

All in all a pretty low-key week in Rome. My dad comes on Tuesday and I am so excited. It will be nice to hang out and go on break with him! Especially since he has a fun week planned out for us! David Brown is coming too which I'm happy about so my dad will have a friend to hang out with while I'm busy with classes and my Italian exam on Friday!