Fun Italy Facts

These are some things that I found interesting that I didn't know about Italians. So hopefully you will too!

-Italians marry later than Americans

-Many Italians live with their parents until their 30s (Mom and Dad, I bet you'd love that, right? ha!)

-A lot of Italian women keep their maiden names when they get married

-Many people think of Italy as a Catholic country, which it is, but a lot of Italians do not practice it

-Appearance is everything in Italy. It is called La Bella Figura

-Lunch is not served until after 1 pm and dinner is not served until after 7:30-8 pm

-You don't leave tips unless you leave a few small coins

-Most Italians do not drink cappuccinos after 11 am

-Italians count with using their thumb first

-Italians use a 24 hour clock (still not use to that yet!)

A little story from today... Jessica, Julia and I went to dinner and the weather was awful. It was so windy and rainy, I was having to use my umbrella as a shield in front of my face. Then Julia takes a tumble down the hill (which was a little funny :)). So we get into the restaurant and we're being seated and this man comes up to us and is just talking gibberish and doing strange hand gestures while cracking himself up. Our waiter tells us he drinks for free there if he rolls the silverware in the napkins. Oh, and he also has on a sweater with a button up shirt over it with flames all over it, but its open. So, after dinner I go to the restroom and you have to go through 2 doors to get to the toilet. While I'm using the restroom, the light turns out. I start to freak out because I swear that man has come after me ha! So I hurry and get up and push my back to the door in case he tries to open it. I'm trying to talk myself through it and I'm thinking can Julia and Jessica hear me if I scream? I'm thinking I'm going to have to do some self defense moves and karate chops. And this is all in the dark by the way. So I swing open the door as fast as I can and ready to scream.....and I find nothing. I guess the light was on a timer. Just a little funny story! Silly me!

Here are some pictures from a girl in our group's 21st birthday and others....

Everyone on the trip minus Madelin (who was taking the picture)

Kelly, Brittini (the birthday girl) and I

Back to Ariccia after Genzano

Me and Porchetta because I love it so much...NOT :)

On Friday we walked to Genzano, the other neighboring town besides Albano. It was a lot bigger than Ariccia and very pretty! That night Jessica, Laurel, and Julia went to this restaurant and had pizza for the first time! It was delicious!

Saturday, we rode the train to Rome. We had to go to three different places to buy train tickets and we thought we were going to miss the train because it left at 10. Well it didn't leave until 10:25, so we ran all the way for nothing. Once we got to Rome we shopped - which was wonderful! We were trying to find a store called Zara and I saw a lady with a bag. So I went up to her and said (well probably yelled) "Za-ra...Do... you... know... where... Za-ra... is?", because I just assumed she didn't know English. Not the best assumption...she starts spitting out perfect English. She probably thought I was the retarded one! ha I'm definitely not going to do that again!

That night a girl in the group had organized a pub crawl. So we went and checked into our hostel -my first and maybe last experience in a hostel. Just kidding, tt wasn't too bad...I'm starting to figure out we're pretty spoiled in the U.S. We had 4 girls in our room and a sink. The toilet and shower were community. At least it was only 9 Euros!

The pub crawl was hilarious and definitely an interesting experience. I was expecting maybe 20 people to be going...nope, it was more like 150! People were from everywhere. About 50 of them were from Denmark and they're not kidding when they say Denmark is a happy country. They were singing Denmark songs like it was their job. One of the pubs was really nice and very chill. For the other two...just imagine you're in karma on Jersey Shore. Italian guidos were everywhere. I felt like I should've been fist pumping at all times! But we danced and met some Australians so it was very fun! Oh, and people here like to dress up to go out. So there were bunnies and people from the 70's. It was very interesting! Here's a few pictures...

On our walk to Genzano...

Genzano!

A pretty window...

Roma!

The Spanish Steps...

Even their ceilings have detail!

Friends!

The Coliseum (don't know why this is underlined)

"I'm proud to be from the land of hamburgers"

Today we went to neighboring towns of Ariccia; Castel Gandolfo (my favorite!), Frascati, Montecavo, and Nemi. We had a wonderful day today exploring around these beautiful towns! I took tons of pictures, so I'm going to let those do the explaining...

This is a villa in Frascati...

Frascati is know as the town of the 3 breasted woman, so they have these cookies everywhere. Two breasts are for milk and one is for wine!

Frascati has places where you can bring your own food and sit outside but buy and drink their wine. This is very popular in the summertime.

This is in A Notte Castellino in Grottaferrata, the "Iron City", and we went to a place where Monk's live.

This is church in the middle of where the Monks live.

This is where the Pope spends his summers, Castel Gandolfo

View of Lake Albano...

The town of Castel Gandolfo

The town of Nemi...

Nemi is known for their tiny strawberries.

Cute villas in Nemi...

Picture from Day 2

The historic street in Ariccia...

View of some of Ariccia from the top of the Chigi (key-gee) Palace

Rare artwork of Bernini that he signed of Joseph and Christ

The church across from the palace. The small fountain in front is where Peter was yelling ha!

L to R Sara Beth, Mary Hester, Kelly, me, and Jessica

"I have slender ankles"

Today had an interesting start...I electrocuted myself. Yep, sure did. I was plugging my adapter in and touched the metal part and it just gave me a little zap. I couldn't feel my thumb for about an hour, but now we're good. We had class for a short while and then got to go grab lunch. Lunch was quite an experience. Since Ariccia is a small town, English is not very common. We thought we were ordering pizza but really it was just bread. Over here everything is sold in different store...meat, fruit and veggies, bread, etc. So we had to go to a couple of stores and got mozzarella and tomatoes to add to our bread. It was very tasty!

We met the "town crazy" (or that's what we call him). His name is Peter and today he stood by the fountain across from the palace and yelled things at people and cars. It was pretty entertaining... except when he started unbuttoning his shirt and undoing his pants. We told him we did not want to see his peter. That was a little frightening. I meant to take a picture of him but I'm sure he'll be out tomorrow so everyone can see what he looks like!

Today we got to take a tour of the rest of the palace. We saw our classroom, some rooms with artwork, and Francesco took us up to the top of the palace which he has never done before. It fascinates me that I'm living in a town that has so much history to it. The palace was built in the 1600's which is unreal. I feel so fortunate to have this experience and learn so much about Italian history and culture.

We got to go to the grocery store this evening. I couldn't read anything so I was just guessing at the food. But one thing they did have that I could read was Activia. I was so excited because that has become an essential. (I know you all know!) We then ate dinner at a local restaurant and the owners were so friendly. They knew no English but we're so helpful! And the food was great! Tomorrow we get to tour more of the neighboring towns! I'll have to put pictures up tomorrow because it's taking a long time to upload them and I must go to sleep! Buona notte (good night)!

Day 1

We took a bus from the Rome airport to Ariccia and these Italians are pretty crazy drivers. When we arrived at the palace we got to unpack and rest, which was nice because we were all exhausted. Then they provided Porchetta sandwiches for us. Ariccia is know for their porchetta which is pork. Well when I bit into the sandwich it was a little funky tasting, but I was willing to give it a try. The only problem was I couldn't chew it. I swear it was like the ear of the pig or something, because it was not chewable. I'm already weird about funky meats, so after that first bite I couldn't eat anymore. But the bread was good!

After resting some more we took a tour of the neighboring city, Albano which was so cute. Everything here is so compact and they even have palm trees (because we're really close to the Mediterranean sea). They weren't kidding when they said we walked everywhere. We walked and walked and walked. For dinner, they had a special meal for us at the Hotel Ariccia. It was 4 courses! The first was the antipasta which include bruschetta, random meat, fried zucchini, etc. The second was lasagna, third was a pasta that was like macaroni and cheese and then lastly tiramisu for dessert. It was a ton of food! But very delicious!

The cute town of Albano!

First course: antipasta...

Third course...

Finally made it to Italia!!

So the luggage situation turned out to be not too bad. I just had to take my vera bradley duffle bag. So, my carry ons were a little on the heavy side. Jessica and I only had 45 minutes to catch our connecting flight in Chicago so we knew we had to run. We asked the stewardess if she could let us get off the plane first...her response was to run as fast as we could to the front. Needless to say that did not happen. So we're already panicking because its taking forever just to get off the plane. When we finally get off, we start running looking for where we need to go. Can you imagine me with a hiking backpack on and holding my vera bradley all while trying to run - let's just say not a pretty sight. We finally make it to the Allitalia terminal and no one is at the counter. We were like seriously?! Well then comes leisurely strolling out a woman who works there. We were like woman, WE HAVE A PLANE TO CATCH! After that we go through security which takes me 50 years with all that I'm carrying. Then when I go under the metal detector the woman tells me to lift my arms and frisks me!! I felt extremely violated. I guess I looked like a terrorist...cool. Anyways, we made it to the gate and the plane was actually delayed by 30 minutes. Thank you Jesus!

The flight was good except for the food and an Indian man sat in front of me and had his chair RECLINED the WHOLE time. I was like man, I have 8 foot long legs and there is no room for them. So I basically had restless leg syndrome the whole time. Jessica and I slept for a little while thanks to our neck pillow. I'm just glad the flight is over and our luggage arrived! Here's some pictures from our wonderful flight...(the last picture is our yummy beef tips...I know you're all jealous of our plane meal)

Ready to go!

Jess loved her neck pillow!

The sunrise we woke up to...