i canNOT believe i live here.

(written 1/29)

made it to florence. and hooooly crap. i can’t believe it. the city is gorgeous. like insane. and our apartment…beautiful. so cute. oh and newly renovated- we’re the first to live here. it looks like an ikea showroom only more italian. we legit have green shutters that open and close. our task tomorrow is to get flowers to put on our windowsill. i can’t even describe what it’s like. and i LIVE here. for the next 3ish months. it’s mind blowing. we have a real kitchen. and a flatscreen tv. and two hairdryers. and towel warming racks. and amazing beds. etc. and we’re a block away from the arno river. bridges all around. sup ponte vecchio. i am just so in shock right now that i don’t know what to do with it all. i can’t sleep. i’m too excited to go live.

here's a little tour around our apartment! sorry for sound

pasta. dresses. all these dresses. opera. opera and seashells. no lo so.

(written 1/28)

the best experiences in all of italy happen by chance. after school today we were trying to use the internet in the student center and there was this extremely good looking australian guy playing guitar. he stopped playing so i said hey don’t do that and he said but it’s almost 130 and i said oh (no idea why that would be significant). anyway talked to him for a little bit and then a lot of people started coming in and we didn’t know why. turns out we accidentally had front row seats to a mini italian opera concert. our new australian friend sam apparently sings opera. so he and this older italian man sang and it was crazy good. funny the cool things we stumble upon. lauren got some footage. australian beauty starts at 3:30

(video to come)

today i became a woman.

italian culture immersion success. firstly another A on my Italian test. thank you, thank you. i’m smarter than i think. then we were walking around and ended up looking at aprons (for those of you who don’t know aprons are my collective item of choice from every place i go). so we went into this shop that embroiders on kitchen stuff…like aprons. i got “bacia la cuoca” which means kiss the cook. the lady that owned it was so sweet and spoke very little english. which was fun. i had to use way more than i even thought i knew. i don’t know how to explain it but she’s the nicest anyone’s been to us and for the first time i didn’t feel like a complete idiot trying to use a language i don’t really speak. she asked us to come back and teach her english in exchange for her teaching us italian! so cute. i actually got two aprons today which brings my total to 3. i will probably end up with like ten. they’re so cute and cheap. at night we had cooking class that was so past adorable that i can’t even explain. julia childs worthy. we actually made some great pici pomodoro and gnocci. and we’re now so excited about cooking in florence that we went through my cookbook and marked all the meals we are going to try to make. and vowed not to leave the country until we make them all. the cooking class teacher only spoke italian so we had a translator. we seriously learned so much. and we became women. in our aprons. italian culture is so cool. i love it.

cutsiest pictures you ever did see:

wednesday…jeanne’s birthday. school was SO SLOW but our teacher enzo was getting wild and told us he loved sex. and we stalked his facebook for half an hour in class and all became friends with him. he’s hilar. went back to visit ruscia the apron lady. taught her some words. took her picture. then wine tasting. which was actually pretty cool. we tried three different types- white wine is my fav. then a bunch of us went out to the fire bar for jeanne’s birthday. bellinis and crepes all around. from there we went to the infamous shots bar but we were there before 11 so not many people. therefore we danced like fools and sang karaoke. so bloody fun. we dedicated “genie in a bottle” to jeanne for her birthday. pretty sure everyone thought we were smashed. we weren’t. at all. we’re just fun girls. by midnight it got realllly crowded and hard to even dance so we quit at 1. overall an excellent night. we did siena proud. florence in three days. i’m so ready.

art fascinates me/blessings all around.

art fascinates me. like really. never gets old. and i’m surrounded by it. all day. every day. crazy, mind blowing, inspirational art. this place is unreal. art is such a blessing. as are people. god is providing left and right here. miss lauren devere is a blessing and a half. i have wonderful friends here and it hasn’t even been a week. i’ve seen things i could never have imagined i’d see in real life. god is so good.

welp i haven’t written in about a week. internet here is real shotty. so here’s a lil catch-up. good thing I journal every day.

still in siena, we don’t go to florence til saturday. i seriously can’t get over the breakfast at this hotel. biggest jar of nutella i’ve ever seen in my life. pigged out the whole first week but i’m getting sensible. and not fat. walking everywhere helps. we had an optional art history tour of siena tuesday but I was so weary I opted out for a nap. so bummed. apparently i missed some sweet stuff. but little sleep plus lots of walking equals weary jac. we keep going to this one bar in the piazza that has these crazy good fruity drinks called bellinis. like we’ve been there four times in the past week. disclaimer: i am not drinking very much at all. i don’t have more than a drink or two a night. and not every night. my mom pointed out that it sounds like I’ve become an alcoholic. i haven’t even gotten tipsy. no worries. anyway… we found the cutest fruit market that we go to all the time and it’s insanely good.

wednesday was awesome. kinda lame i guess but just awesome. such a chill day. didn’t do much after class. and i love doing things but sometimes i just need a chill day and wednesday was so good. funny little story i decided to take a bath for my achey muscles. while i was in there my roommate natalie knocked on our room door because we only have one key and she was locked out. so in trying to get the door i knocked all three of our new towels into the bath. soaked. and then just stood there naked laughing by myself. so she stayed locked out. quite funny. but mostly a day of homework and music listening and reading and straight chilling.

thursday we went took our first test which actually wasn’t hard- i managed an A. then went to the chianti sculpture park. it was pretty cool but outside so it was malto freddo. i’m so random about sculpture- some pieces i just laugh at while others hit me hard. there were some light, less-than-impressive pieces and some brilliant ones. overall pretty cool. tuscany is a wiiiiindy place to drive and borderline nauseating for those prone to carsickness. dinner is usually a mix of some of the same people but sometimes new people come with us. it’s always a good time. it’s funny how long meals are here, usually more than two hours. good conversation and bonding. i love it.

weeeeekend. friday was another chill day, napping after class and bumming barely worth writing about. got all dressed up and went out to dinner. ended up not going out with everyone after which was probably a good idea- bars are way overcrowded with all of us here. and mostly with americans. not the cultural experience i’m looking for. it’s so funny how much crap we get for not going out every single night. so we had a movie night and we’re just as happy. saturday we went to san gimignano or san chimichonga if you’re me and can’t remember the name. cool place, a lot like siena. great art. saw the city from the top of a tower. but it was soooo cold we didn’t enjoy it as much as we should have. i love history. especially art history. oh most importantly: hot chocolate. it is literally like melted hershey bars. you can barely drink it you have to eat it with a spoon because it is just straight melted chocolate. and then today we woke up late again. sleep is so good. lauren and i just walked around a bit today and did some work. we went to mass at the duomo tonight which was really cool. i understood more words than i thought i would. but it’s easy to get distracted in a place so beautiful. art. man. it gets me. italy was the right choice.

wow. that was a lot. this is dedicated to those of you who complain i don’t blog enough. what i really don’t do is take enough pictures. it’s hard to carry my camera everywhere because my stuff is so heavy. when i get to florence and have more of a routine and less busy schedule i hope to walk around and shoot a lot. also i had to drop my photography class because of a stupid scheduling conflict. sucks. i’m sure i’ll still take pictures. but i’m slacking. today we bought tickets to see iron & wine in bologna february 12. i am so excited i almost cried when i found them. blessed blessed blessed. art and blessings. that’s my life right now.

my favorite sculpture in the park

pretty ladies going out

view from the tower at san gigieiegmggmgmego

il cioccolatto caldo

i actually have to go to school?

^the view from our hotel

after our full day of travel to siena, we ended up in this gorgeous italian town. our hotel is pretty sweet- i live with lauren and natalie who are two of my four roommates in our apartment once we get to florence. lauren is legit i like her a lot- she's involved with young life plus we hang out with the same people here (hi lauren if you read this...you're sitting next to me. i like you a lot). so the night we got here we had this welcome dinner and drink thing at this super fancy restaurant. we had a 5 course meal which was insanely good. i love italian food. it destroys england food. dinner lasted like 3 hours...that's just how they do it here. so it was fun and we sat with new people and just talked and drank wine all night. yesterday was mostly orientation stuff and meetings, etc. we did get to walk around the city a bit and explore. it's beautiful, contained by these huge walls and everything is made of stone. we found this sweet outdoor market with all this cheap vintage stuff. it was really quaint and non-touristy which i love. italians don't seem to like us too much, probably because we are a huge group of loud americans and when we walk together we get stares. not many people speak english well or at all here. lauren, kayla, jeanne and i were walking down the street by ourselves just talking normally and these guys snorted at us like we're american pigs? we weren't even being obnoxious. we signed up for all these sweet activities and day trips over the next two weeks which is cool. last night we had another drinks party at our school and then went out for a bit. we stopped to get gelato and made friends with these older men there. but when they started asking us "where we sleep" we left. but not before they gave us this huge plate of free sandwiches. when we got back to the hotel we found a bunch of people sitting on the 7th floor terrace so we got some bottles of wine and went up and chilled out there. it was lovely and it's not too cold here! but once there were too many of us we got kicked out for being too loud. so lauren, kayla, jeanne and i just came back and talked...all night? by accident. going to bed after 3 was dumb because we had to get up at 730 to start classes. 4 hours of italian class for two weeks straight is a lot. i'm a bit overwhelmed. people keep saying they don't know any italian but then in class people seem to know way more. like when i say i don't know italian...i do not know italian. at all. ciao. working on it. lauren and i are in the same class so that's fun. it's split up to like 12 students per class and we play little games. it's taking me a little bit to catch on though. but i'll get the hang of it. i just forgot i actually had to go to class here. after class we had more meetings. i'm signing up to do volunteer work in florece, hopefully with kids or helping out at a food bank. should be fun. we've been chilling in our room a bit and the internet is finally working! some. and now we're going to dinner. ciao bella!

sweet phones from the outdoor market

drinks on the terrace

london is dreary.

i haven't had internet the whole time i've been here so i've got some catching up to do. rewind to last wednesday...my flight didn't get canceled and i ended up in london at a ripe 6am which is 1am USA. having slept zero hours on the plane. and then had a full day of londoning in the muggy rain. saw some cool stuff. everything is so expensive. i made friends right away but still haven't met everyone seeing as there are 165 of us. overall london consisted of lots of rain, walking, sightseeing, pub hopping, and very little sleep. good times, but i don't know if i could have studied there. the first night was the most fun, we had a welcome drink in the hotel and then a bunch of girls went to dinner at this sweet pub full of old british men. fish and chips are actually good. later that night 7 of us went out which ended up being a journey around london. we finally ended up at this bar which turned out to be really fun. european guys dancing is one of the funniest things i've ever seen. and they love to buy drinks for american girls so we took full advantage. after leaving we took like an hour to find the right bus and finally got home around 4am. some people went like 40 hours without sleeping. the next day we had a bus tour which i may or may not have fallen asleep on. saturday morning we had to leave the hotel at 545am to take a flight to pisa. this is how saturday went: hour bus ride to airport, hours of waiting for delayed flight, 2 hour flight, 2.5 hours of people organization at the airport, 2 hour bus ride from pisa airport to siena. arrive at hotel at 7pm. a whole day of travel. unnecessary. so now we're in siena.



this is the bridge from the beginning of the 6th harry potter movie. seriously. the real thing. i think i saw a death eater fly by but couldn't capture it fast enough. next time.

i'm going to italy in three days

actually i lied. i'm going to london in three days. and then three days after that i'll be in italy. so i'll be on my way in THREEEE days. my room is a wreck. i am not packed. i know about four words in italian. literally. not exaggerating. i have no idea where i am living or who i am living with. i'm walking (more like running) blindly into this completely new situation. and i'm siked outta my mind. we're having a young life going away party for me tonight which is weird. i will miss people. probably you. but seriously i'm stoked to grow and learn and live. that's really all i have to say about that. hope my flight doesn't get delayed by snow. see you on the other side