Message in a bottle (of milk)

When a date appears as the expiry date for dairy products you know it's getting close.

That's how I came to realise that my time in Italy is drawing to a close as we walked around the supermarket the day before yesterday.

I had wanted to keep some kind of regular blog of this trip but it just hasn't been possible due to me having scarce opportunities to access the internet, and these rare opportunities I have used to contact friends and family.

In fact, as I type, I am using the public Wi-Fi connection of Pietrasanta, which can only be accessed from the piazza (town square) where I am sat, as I do every night, keeping an eye on Umberto while he plays. I have been in this town permanently from the middle of the month, before which we were only here on weekends; spending weekdays in Rovigo, where Umberto's parents work.

While I write this, I am sat on the church steps on yet another beautiful, mild evening. A woman prepares herself next to me with face paint, ready to perform her bubble-blowing spectacolo to the people in the piazza; a performance which, as a regular to the town over the last month, I have already seen.

The piazza from which I type.

The beach at Forte dei Marmi is absolutely beautiful. Aside from rubbing shoulders with professional footballers and other Italian elites, tranquillity and relaxation can also be found here. For example, today while Umberto was off playing with a friend, I put down my copy of The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafón and closed my eyes. The sun blazed down, warming my face and body while the sound of endless frothy turquoise waves massaging the dusting of fine golden sand on the coast lulled me into a blissful trance where it felt wonderful to be alive.

So this trip hasn't all been struggling to look after a kid. My Italian has really come on too I feel.

However I find myself now, in these final days, nostalgically longing for home, for my friends, my family; for unequivocally English things such as trips to the pub and cups of tea.

This makes it tempting to try and make this last week go as quickly as possible however I am doing my best to savour my remaining time here, before I am thrust back under a veil of rain in a land who's hidden treasures I have long known and lived with; far from this land of which I have barely scratched the surface.

But that's all for now,
I'm a busy bee.

My Month In Italy - The Basics

Right. I've been staying with this Italian family for five days now. My original intention to keep a travel blog of my stay here has proved difficult as I am only able to access the internet at the place where I am currently sat: the legal offices of the couple with whom I am staying (they are lawyers).

The wireless has decided to be a prick and hate my laptop, meaning I have been unable to upload any of my photos or get on to Skype due to the fact that this is Alessia's computer. I may add pictures to this post later or feature them in subsequent blogs if I have any success with my laptop. If there are any grammatical errors, I blame the Italian keyboard.

Right so I'll keep it concise because, frankly, to mention everything I have done over the last 5 days would waste a lot of time which I should be making the most of.

The Family


Alessia and Michele - The adults of the family; both Lawyers. They have a passion for art, especially the modern and interesting sort, and their houses are decorated accordingly.
Umberto - Their 6 year old son.

Locations


Rovigo
This is the town where the family have their permanent house in which they live all year round. Rovigo is a modest little town in the Veneto province of North East Italy; the same province in which the city of Venize is found. Their house is quite simply amazing, with art everywhere and interesting furniture. I wish I could upload pictures of it but hopefully I will get my laptop working soon. If not, I'm sure you can wait a month.
During the day here, Umberto is at Animazione, a kind of summer school for kids of his age. While he is there and the parents are at work I have the day to myself, giving me lots of time to explore; such as yesterday when I went to visit Bologna, in the Emilia-Romagna region of the country. I collect Umberto at around 5.30 PM and we then go home where I look after him until his parents get home at around 7.00 PM. His parents want me to teach him a bit of English when it's just me and him together.

Pietrasanta/Forte dei Marmi
Pietrasanta is the small town in Tuscany where we go to stay on the weekends. It is a city known for its art and due to being located near abundant sources of marble, features lots of the gorgeous white rock in its architecture. In fact, Michelangelo even stayed in the town at one point, in a building which is now a bar; fittingly named Bar di Michelangelo.
During the day we head to the beach at Forte dei Marmi. On the beach there is a swimming pool resort with a bar where we often sit and swim when we are not on the beach itself. This place is for the elite sectors of Italian society and some of the people I have had pointed out to me there are the president of Inter Milan and the Italian national footballer, Andrea Pirlo; who I have so far seen everyday I have been there. When we get back from the beach, some time after 7.00 PM, if Alessia and Michele want to go out, their Italian babysitter Patrizia comes over. Me, Umberto and Patrizia then have some dinner, either in the apartment or at a restaurant, and then me and Patrizia sit in the Piazza keeping an eye on Umberto while he plays with the other kids. On Saturday nights there are performances in the piazza, the only act I have seen so far being a man juggling fire on a giant unicycle.



Well that's all I really have time to write now. As I've said, I don't want to be wasting my days stuck in on the computer. Tonight, in Rovigo, there is the weekly event of Notte Rosa (Pink Night) where the shops stay open until late and there are shows in the piazzas.

Next time I blog, I will write up the positives and negatives so far of being here, trying to keep it to a concise and general nature like this, rather than rambling on about specific stories which will take ages to tell. If I get my laptop up and running then I'll be able blog in a bit more detail, WITH PICTURES!

Sicily 2010 - The rest

Due to the fact that I am jetting off to Italy again tomorrow to spend a month with an Italian family, I feel that I am unable to blog the rest of my recent trip to Sicily in the day by day fashion that I set out in the last post. Instead I will skilfully condense the rest of the trip into this one post. So here are the highlights of our stay with Alessio in Catania.

So I last left off where me and Lucy were shattered after our day in Palermo. The morning after our well-earned sleep, me, her and Alessio went to San Giovanni beach, formed from cooled lava from nearby Mt. Etna. As a result of its volcanic geological formation, the sand on the beach is black, as are the rocks.

That afternoon, we went to watch England beat Slovenia in a betting shop. Then later than night we went on our first Catania night out, starting off drinking in Piazza Teatro, a big square full of bars. Alessio and his friends were introducing us to Sicilian drinks such as Rum e Pera, a drink made up of two shots, one of rum which is drank first and one of pear juice which is drank to wash down the rum. Another awesome shot was the torcia which is a strong shot with a slice of orange on top of it. Sugar is then poured onto this orange with a flammable liquid. Torcia means torch, a name for which the reason quickly became apparent when the barmaid then set fire to the sugar on the orange causing it to caramelise. You then bite the orange and down the shot.

After this Sicilian drinking lesson we headed to Moon Beach, an awesome nightclub on a beach.

Another day, we watched the Italian world cup match where they were eliminated by Slovakia at Alessio's university in the auditorium. I found it very atmospheric being surrounded by Italians with their hand gestures out in full force, accompanied by yells of "Dai cazzo!" as they watched their team lose.

For our last night in Catania, we partook in the Italian tradition of passeggiata, a late night stroll. However, our passeggiata took us back to Piazza Teatro (below) for a second schooling in the wonders of Sicilian drinking.

 

Alessio's friends were all so generous, buying me drinks, and none of them spoke any English so it gave me and Lucy lots of opportunities to practice our Italian. Among Alessio's group of friends was a guy called Fabio. From the day Alessio's friends saw me and Fabio together, the fact that we bear a striking physical esemblance to each other became a running joke among the whole group, so much to the point that, by the end of the trip, I was addressing him as fratello (brother).

In all, my five days in Sicily gave me a real taste of the island, its people and the way it feels inexplicably different to mainland Italy. I met some wonderful people there through Alessio and can't wait to return there one day and see them again.

As of tomorrow I'm back in Italy to stay with a family there. I'm really not sure what to expect and am currently feeling a cocktail of excitement and nerves due to the whole stepping into the unknown. No doubt my next blog will be while I'm there.

Sicily 2010 - Day 1

After a long, long journey broken up with a couple of - sporadic at best - hours of sleep, mine and Lucy's plane finally touched down at Trapani airport. In our tired haze we went and sat at the baggage claim and started chatting. A couple of minutes passed until it suddenly hit us that we hadn't in fact checked in any baggage and the only luggage we had taken was already in our hands, rendering our being at the baggage claim absolutely pointless.
So first thing was first, we needed to cure our tiredness; with the time being 10.30 AM, the day had barely begun and we had a lot ahead of us. So what better way than a good Italian caffè to wake us up? The second I had swallowed the espresso my tiredness began to subside.

From the airport we got on our pre-booked coach to Palermo. We were due to meet Alessio that night in Catania which is about 2 hours 40 minutes by coach from Palermo. However we weren't meeting him until around 9.40 PM so by the time we reached Palermo at around mid-day we had a good few hours to kill.
The night before while tossing and turning on the floor of Stansted airport with nothing more than a lumpy suitcase for a pillow, I had gone and bought a Sicily travel guide to give me something to do. This proved useful for our time in Palermo, with the map allowing us to find our way back to the Central Station (above) when we needed to get our coach that night in Catania.

The first real thing we saw was this giant tree at Villa Garibaldi. There were a few giant trees like this; this one being far from the largest although the biggest one was cordoned off. We had an amazing sandwich for lunch at a little Panino bar called The Navy, which I would love to return to next time I'm in Palermo.

Next we found our way to a beautiful view of the Mediterranean sea.

Later, we captured this photo of a Vespa, an Italian icon.

We strolled through the beautiful Villa Giulia, where we saw this statue of Poseidon.

 

This is a stall at a street market we visited. It was a long street that snaked along among the buildings, lined with stalls. I got a real sense of Italian-ness from the market, with people all around me yelling about how their fruit was the best in Sicily or how their fish was caught today. Another scene that greeted me here was a group of vendors taking a break and playing some cards. It was a very cultural experience.

 

Then it was off to the Palermo Cathedral which we went inside and saw the beautiful art it had to offer.

 

This picture was taken at Quattro Canti, a piazza at the intersection of Via Maqueda and Corso Vittorio Emmanuele; essentially a giant beautiful crossroads smack-bang in the middle of the city. We passed through Quattro Canti on the way back to the station where we then set off to Catania.

Two hours and forty minutes later we had arrived. Alessio greeted us with open arms and took us home on the bus where we then got off at the stop nearest to his house and walked the rest of the way, catching a glimpse of the Cathedral at night.

Once back in his flat we could relax. Our travels were complete. We had reached our destination. We had gorgeous home-cooked Italian food in our stomachs and I was finally able to change my clothes after the 24 hours since I had last been able to before leaving my house.

Some of Alessio's friends came over and we sat eating pasta and watching Italian TV. After the large amount of travelling, walking and heat we had endured, we were pretty exhausted and no matter how hard I tried to listen to the Italian conversation between Alessio's friends to get involved, the words were just blending into incomprehensible sounds as my tired mind failed to process them quickly enough.

It was time for sleep.

Sicily, here I come

Well, despite the fact that only me and Lucy are going to Sicily, we have sorted out what we are going to do.

This is my last blog before I jet off to sunny Sicily.

I fly tomorrow but get a train to Stansted tonight, where I have to kill 7 hours at the airport.

The plan is that we will head to Palermo from Trapani airport via bus, see Palermo for a few hours then get another bus to Catania where we will meet Alessio and stay at his place. I'm really looking forward to it.

Hopefully everything goes to plan.

In other news, I got a call from the university the other day informing me that, contrasting to what I previously believed, in fact I can go to Italy to stay with an Italian family! I'm going for the whole of July and the flights are already booked! I'm very nervous.

However I have a busy day of packing and Euro-getting ahead of me so more on that and my Sicily trip when I return!

Arrivederci!

Crisis in the slow lane

A bit of an unpleasant surprise has surfaced regarding my trip to Sicily.

I was talking to Giovanna, asking if she had sorted out where we are going to stay. She was sorting it out with Alessio, due to them both being Sicilian. I stressed that it was only a week until we are due to come over to Sicily. She then said it was more like a month. This provoked a confused reaction in me due to my flight being on the 22nd June. She then went on to inform me that all our other friends have booked flights for the 22nd JULY and that she won't even be in Sicily on the dates I'll be there.

I don't recall ever facepalming harder than in this moment.

Due to the fact that we booked the flights together, thankfully Lucy is on the same flight as me on the 22nd June. When we booked the flights we checked and double checked that the 22nd June was the right date. I really don't know how this misunderstanding came about.

By the grace of the gods, Alessio will be in Sicily when me and Lucy are there. So, although we won't get to see all of our other friends for the last time in quite some time, at least he may be able to find us somewhere to stay. If there's no room at his inn then we will probably have to seek out a hostel.. or something.

Had I foreseen this mistake, I would have said my goodbyes to them all properly the last time I saw them in Cardiff. I merely said goodbye to them all like it was just another day, thinking I would see them all in Sicily.

Oh well. I'm sure I'll see them again.

I hope.

And at least I still get to go.

Open all the boxes

The boxes are at it like rabbits. Floor space is getting smaller than smaller. And it's only going to get worse until I move on Thursday.

The World Cup is well and truly underway and I'm enjoying it accordingly, trying to catch as many matches as possible in all its HD glory. I'm involved in so many sweepstakes and fantasy football things I've lost count, the most recent of which is a sweepstake between my friends where the prize is around £50. To win that, I need Italy to win. I don't particularly like my odds however I might feel better after I've better assessed them in tonight's match against Paraguay.

An Englishman cannot mention the World Cup without mention of the quite frankly disappointing result against the USA from Saturday night. Seeing Rob Green clumsily fumble that ball across the line from Dempsey's average long-shot was painful to say the least. I felt the hearts of the patrons of The George unanimously sink, which contrasted against the elation following Gerrard's goal earlier on in the match. It still fills me with disappointment and embarrassment to think of it now. Beckham's reaction says it all.

Following the match we hit town hard for a night of fun-filled frolicking; my first night out in Plymouth since my glorious return from Cardiff. There was a lot of dancing, England flags out of the window of Liam's Fiat Uno, singing Nathan's x-rated re-working of the alphabet at the top of our voices and acts of piracy in the form of boarding docked vessels.

I'm really in the mood for going to play football at Jennycliff. Chris Allin, if you're reading this, do you fancy rounding up the boys some time soon for a kick around?

I've made my decision as to what to do about the whole broken laptop thing. I'm going to get a new laptop for an early birthday present and go to Spain for a week with the money I have saved. The electric drum kit was too expensive anyway. It's no big deal though because I can just play my real drums whenever I'm home, due to the fact that there will actually be room for them in the new house. I will probably spend a week in a hostel but am a bit worried about going alone because I would rather have some company to make the week pass better and so that I don't have to take photos of myself. If anyone's interested in a week in Barcelona (or maybe another city if you present a valid argument) give me a shout. The ability to speak Spanish is preferred but not essential.

Oh and Sicily is now ridiculously soon. 8 days. The sun is shining and life is good.

Reflections

So the first year of university is well and truly over. It doesn't seem at all long ago that I started this year a month or so into my freshman year. Now it's gone already.
During the exams my mind had been hell-bent on getting the exams finished and getting home to Plymouth. But now that exams are done the parts of Cardiff I will miss are starting to come back to me after a month of being locked into a mundane revision routine. Mainly I will miss my friends and the city itself. But I can't wait to be reunited with Plymouth, its glorious coastline and countryside and my lovely friends.

The au-pair trip to Italy I mentioned a couple posts back? Well.. that's not happening any more. Che peccato! The only families left for the trip all wanted females students only. Sexism in force.
I am not a paedophile. I have had a CRB check for when I worked in a school as a cleaner. That is probably more than the girl who ends up replacing me will have, you sexist bastards.

Oh well. As is my style, there is an (albeit obscure) Plan B. Me and Lucy will probably go to Italy for a month staying with various friends of hers. She just happens to have friends dotted around Europe like that.

And I still want to get to Barcelona for a week. Afterall, seven years studying Spanish without having been to the country is rather ridiculous!

I had my last night out as a fresher in Cardiff tonight. Hit the pre-lash hard with Nick, Ben and Nick's lads. They are true lads. As I haven't drank at all over exam period, it was a rude awakening having them shouting 'See it off fresher!' at me. It probably contributed heavily to the drunk state I am in now. After the pre-drinks we headed to the Union for Boombox. It was a right laugh although I was pretty hammered. Then we head to town for a well earned Burger King. Nothing sobers you up like an XL Bacon Double Cheeseburger.

Then me, Nick and Ben headed back to the flat, played a bit of COD with the speakers up really loud as a bit of revenge for all the times pricks have kept us up. Then we played a bit of FIFA. I beat Ben 7-1 so he had to go around the building twice. A good ending to the year really.

I'm going to miss my friends and the new life I have founded for myself up here.

However, my parents are picking me up tomorrow so I simultaneously cannot wait to get home!

Bring on the summer.

L'estate

I am excited.

I could have yet another thing planned to ensure that this summer will not be a boring one.

Giuseppe (Italian lecturer) is offering places for an au-pairing trip to Italy. I have been put on the reserve list in case anybody drops out - because I was late in replying to the email- and when I saw him the other day he said I'll probably be able to go and that he'll email me soon.

The trip would entail going and staying in Italy with an Italian family for a month. He mentioned that it would be by the sea and that during the day I would be going to the beach with the kids and speaking English to help them. Then in the evenings and when I'm with the parents I would speak to them in Italian to help me improve. There would also be time to look around and stuff.

Just the prospect of more time on Italian soil is exciting enough, but getting to stay with an Italian family would be a wonderful experience. One whole month eating homemade food dalla Mamma italiana would be pretty sweet to be honest.

If this whole au-pairing thing doesn't go ahead, I'm sure I'll book something else. Lucy's already throwing the idea around of going around Italy and staying with her Italian friends, one of whom lives near the beautiful Florence which I would love to visit again.

I hope I do get a place on the au-pair trip though, but I won't get my hopes up just yet.

Either way this summer is going to be awesome.

Hello again old friend, alcohol

So here I am, three out of five exams down. My education exam yesterday was the peak of my worries and now that it's out of the way, I feel like I'm on the home stretch, the final descent to the joys of summer. The current chaos of books, paper and notes that I find myself submerged in will only last another 11 days as of today. As the exam period has been rather dull with regards to providing me with material to blog about, I'll allow this post to give a summary of anything worth mentioning that has happened.

My plans for this summer seem to have changed a lot. Mine and Lucy's hitch-hiking plan for Spain and Italy has now gone out of the window due to exams causing a lack of time for the meticulous planning it would require. Instead, she has invited me to go on a free week's trip to Egypt which she won on a scratch-card. Providing it's all valid and there's no catch, she said I could go with her. Egypt's not even a place I would have thought of visiting, but you can't really turn down a free holiday. Also, with the money I have saved for the summer, I'm thinking of going to Barcelona for a week.

It was Nick's birthday yesterday so our flat went to The Bay for a gorgeous Italian meal and some drinks to celebrate.

It quickly became clear how much of a lightweight I have become as the drink went straight to my head. I hadn't been drunk in quite some time due to exams so by the time we got in the taxi to leave I felt pretty sozzled.

The taxi was by no means the end of the night, however. Instead of going home, me and Ben got the taxi to drop us to a restaurant to meet Lucy and the Erasmus lot. Gael is back over from Spain this weekend so I had to see him while he was in Cardiff.

When we arrived at the restaurant they were just paying the bill, after which we headed to Vagelis' house where he generously laced us with vodka orange. By the time we all left Vagelis' to head to Buffalo, me and Ben were well and truly fucked due to foolishly drinking at the same pace as everyone else who had just started drinking, despite the fact that the two of us had been drinking for hours.
We ended up staggering home at 5:00 under a pure blue sky. It was the most surreal experience because it was so light. It felt like mid day. Ben stubbornly decided to walk a different way from me, Lucy and Giovanna, with his reasoning being that his way was 'quicker'. His plan backfired, however, seeing him getting lost for over two hours and ending up on the total wrong side of Cardiff, meaning he didn't get home until gone 7:00. 'Quicker'? Really, Ben?

I had to suffer Ben's new Fifa punishment again yesterday afternoon, doing a total of three underwear laps around our building. This time it was in the middle of the day, with loads of students outside sunbathing. A rather sizeable group was sat right outside our building so, as it turned out, I had quite the audience.



Sam

A small update from behind an Italian history book

Revision is bogging me down. Fascism was not a good idea.

I popped my sushi cherry the other night. I enjoyed it very much. I haven't quite acquired the art of picking it up from the conveyor belt. One dish nearly ended up in a friend's lap as my clumsy butter-fingered club hands fumbled at it. However, I liked the simple pick-up-what-you-want style. It was quick and efficient, just what the modern man wants. Although eating chocolate cake with chopsticks was far from efficient. Or quick.

I'm back home in Plymouth at the moment. I corrected my Spanish tandem exchange partner's English essay today. It's interesting to see what parts of the English language foreign people find difficult. It probably isn't for you though.

I should be going hitch-hiking through Spain and Italy this summer with Lucy. I hope we don't get raped. I don't know if I had mentioned that plan before. I think I have.

Now here's a music video. At least if I talk about something that isn't my life, then you may not be bored. If my life's dull, the blog's dull. So problem=solved if I don't talk about the revision and exams that will be no doubt dominating my life for the next four weeks. But this blog was made to talk about my life. So I just won't talk. There's no way Italian history revision can be made into something fun for my readers. Unless I had some kind of kill-the-Mussolini game. That would just be rotten and obscene. Maybe I'll talk a little, about the little things, with little musical treats and such-like to make the tiny (and I mean tiny) gems of interest in my life over the next month of exams seem more rewarding.

So without further ado, here's the video. Darwin Deez - Radar Detector. Have a cheeky little dance to it. He's like a skinny Jesus.




Thanks for sticking with me through this boring patch.

Sam

A slice of home

In honour of the recent string of sunny days we've been having, we had a barbecue today. We went to Bute Park, this lovely great park a stone's throw from our halls. It was me, Lucy, Darshni, Darshni's boyfriend Dan and a handful of their friends. We were sat there in a circle with our instant barbecue's and our burgers and buns. It served as both a precursor of what I have to look forward to this summer and also brought memories of last summer rushing back. We were all so independent back home in Plymouth last summer; with our cars, on the beach every other day and night. And tonight reminded me of those summers back home. Especially the next part.

When the sun had gone down and the flames on the barbecue had done the same, the coals slowly smouldering away, embers gently twinkling as the breeze caught them in the dark twilight air, we decided to fill the barbecues with some little twigs, working our way up to bigger sticks until we had built ourselves an ever-growing fire as we took trip after trip to get more sticks. Everyone had left the park by this point and a few members of our group had peeled off and gone home, leaving the eight of us there, in a circle, snuggled in blankets, my speakers blasting out music, providing a soundtrack to the conversation and crackling of firewood. It was absolute bliss.

I had pangs of nostalgia of those summer nights on the beach back home, this feeling an all too familiar scene to me. I sat there in my element, warming my hands on the fire, drinking cheap rum, a simple coastal town boy in his comfort zone, surrounded by big city-folk to whom this was a rarity. I felt miles away from everything; a safe and secure isolation from everyone outside of our paradise. For those few hours we were the only people in the world, sat around those comforting flames under a sky speckled with stars, a moment so perfect in its simplicity and intimacy. The kind of moment that brings friends closer. Moth's Wings by Passion Pit came on at one stage on the speakers while we were all laid there around the fire. It was the perfect song for a perfect night. Have a listen and imagine you're laying there. We're definitely going to do it again soon.



Of course, we then had to return back to the real world and burst our relaxing little bubble of carelessness; back to the lights of civilisation and the noises of the city. But now here I sit typing this in my humble, cosy little box room, where a night of slumber awaits me.

The only thing tonight was missing was the sand and sea, something which I will be able indulge myself in when I finally reach this well-earned and fast approaching summer. On the topic of summer, after discovering that I won't be going to Spain with Allin any more, I have discussed travel plans for the summer with Lucy. We might be going hitch-hiking around Spain and..... Italy! Her having lived in Spain before helps because she will be able to show me all the best places and secure us places to stay with friends in Spain and Italy. So, whatever happens, it should be a good summer. Provided I get through these exams.


Sam

Italy

I'm back from Italy, and thus breaking my brief hiatus from blogging. I was planning on keeping a diary of what I was doing every day and giving each day its own post here once I got home. This just wasn't possible however due to the fact that sleep was a very valuable resource to fuel my hectic days, plus I didn't want to spend time sat with a notepad where I could be seeing more of Italy. So I thought I would sum up the whole week as concisely as possible in this blog post. Let's see how it goes..

All in all, the week was brilliant. Prior to this trip I had only visited Italy once when I was 15, where I only visited Venice and a vineyard in the countryside surrounding Verona. On this original trip, I had little interest in Italian culture, had never studied the history and didn't speak a word of the language. I was just a young lad who took everything I saw at face value. Oh how times change.

This time in Italy, I went over with much more passion about the country, much more historical knowledge with which to put everything I saw into context, allowing me to make much more sense of it all, seeing the country on a much more intellectual level. Being a university trip, it was probably the most academic and cultured holiday I had been on. It helped that the guy who took us over, our Italian teacher Giuseppe, was from Italy which allowed him to recommend us all the right 'proper Italian' food and places to go.

The trip was very mind broadening and really opened my eyes to the world of art, giving me much more of an appreciation of art and architecture than I originally had, and allowing me to get a feel for what kind of art and architecture styles came from what eras. Additionally, the trip really put everything we had learned in Italian history into perspective and context. It's one thing reading a book about Victor Emmanuel II, but actually seeing his tomb really makes the words in the dusty old textbooks into a reality.

That isn't to say it was all art and cathedrals, however. We got time to go shopping, roam around on our own and see the towns for ourselves and, of course, drink lots of wine. Wine and coffee are another cultural element of Italy that are so much better than over here. There's nothing quite like an espresso machiato to give you that energy boost to keep you going on your cultural jaunts through Rome.

I spoke so much Italian over there as well and really feel that my Italian has improved over the mere week that I was there, which poses the question of how it will improve if I go there for longer. Not everybody in the group spoke Italian however, which was a bit disappointing. Their choice I guess.

I won't bore you with the details on every single place I visited, for which the reasons are two-fold. One, I can't remember all the places I visited and two, it would take a lot more than this one post to explain it all. I've tried to be concise, after all.

Now, I include some photos to give a brief overview of some of the things I saw. I took A LOT of photos of things rather than people because there was just so much interesting stuff around. I found photography a bit of a problem on the trip due to the sheer scale and immensity of the things I was trying to capture on camera. It was difficult to really do a lot of it justice with a photo. The rest will be uploaded on my facebook but these will just give a bit of a flavour of what I did. Call it the highlights if you will.

Rome

By the Trevi Fountain

St. Peter's square, Vatican City

 Vatican Museums, Vatican City

 Victor Emmanuel II monument

 Colosseum

Pisa

The tower that needs no introduction

Basilica and Tower

Florence

Florence Basilica

Me and my mate David

 Our gorgeous Villa in the Tuscany countryside

Venice

 One of the many bridges in Venice

 The camera was in a very dangerous place at this point on self-timer

 Saint Mark's Cathedral

 The kind of beautiful canal that is round every corner in this wonderful city

 Chiesa di San Rocco

In all these cities, I found the small little side streets in areas unspoiled by tourists to be particularly charming in so much as they were perfectly flawed in their rustic beauty. Fair enough the paintwork might be a bit chipped on the houses but I wouldn't have it any other way.

Wishing you all a happy Easter,

Sam

Poker Face

I just played poker with the boys. I was doing really badly for the first half but then, as the underdog, came back and fleeced everybody. Here are my chips.

That right there is a pile of victory.

I went to town today, got a haircut and bought Final Fantasy XIII and a Manchester United home shirt. It felt good to be back in my city. In the words of Elbow, "Coming home I feel like I designed these buildings I walk by". 

In other news, I have fallen in love with another song. It is so simple yet so sincere. It brings feelings of nostalgia, both happy and sad, and I think I want to have it played at my funeral. The thing is, I don't think people at my funeral will want to sit through the 9 minute length of the song. Well here it is anyway.

Iron & Wine - The Trapeze Swinger


I am off to Italy on Tuesday. I am brimming with excitement!


Sam

Ti amo, Italia Pt. II

The flight has been sorted to Italy. We're leaving from Gatwick instead but will get there nonetheless.

There's a relief.

Ti amo, Italia

Today Giuseppe, the professor who has organised our Italian trip, called a meeting for anyone going on the trip. Now I was expecting us to just go over what we would be doing, flight times etc. to get us even more excited for the trip.

I think it's fair to say I was wrong.

The meeting was opened with the news that our flight to Italy had been cancelled. Not good bearing in mind we have all paid Giuseppe £600 each. He then went on to say that he is trying to get the airline to put us on another flight and if not we may have to end up paying extra for a new flight.

The meeting then moved on to more light hearted things such as where we will be going (if we get there!).

So the places we shall be visiting are:

Roma - Capital of Italy and a major tourist hotspot. Needs no introduction.

Livorno - A place we will be staying in during our visits to Pisa, Firenze and Lucca.

 

Lucca- Beautiful little walled city.

 

Pisa - Famous for that leaning tower.

Firenze - Florence. A beautiful city in Tuscany.

Venezia - Venice. Possibly the most romantic city in the world.

Treviso - A small town we're going to visit on the last day.

If this flight cannot be resolved and I end up not going to Italy, I will be distraught.

A Musing (not amusing)

I always feel an odd sadness when I realize my inevitable departure to university is approaching again; the kind of sadness that, when you let it rise up in you, just leaves you to sigh.
It isn't so much that I don't want to go back. I absolutely love the course and my independent lifestyle up there. It's just I feel sad to be leaving people behind, saying goodbye to friends and family and not knowing when I'm going to see them again. I am yet to feel the kind of closeness, attachment and affection to anywhere or anyone in Cardiff as I feel for my house and my family; the kind of affection that makes you feel at home.

However, coming back to Plymouth recently I have found nostalgia to be waiting round every corner as I walk old shortcuts a younger me had discovered in his scruffy school uniform, scuffed shoes and ripped trousers. Again I sigh as I think back to these memories, monochrome mementos to a world that can't exist for me any more. I am older now. With every year comes more responsibility. I now understood why my parents always said I would miss my childhood once it was gone.

Once I am up in Cardiff again with my friends, this feeling tends to go away. It's just the leaving that's the hard part, thinking of all that's behind me.

I need to look forward instead, where Italy awaits me in a mere four weeks. Venice, Rome, Florence and the rolling hills of Tuscany lie waiting to be explored by this young intrepid traveller struggling with his rudimentary grasp on the Italian language. I'll blog it.

The Finish Line

The exams are done; banished from my head and leaving my mind clearer. And I sit here back in Plymouth once again, typing this. My proper return to Cardiff will be this Saturday. Until then I can relax.
The exams all went really well, and I found out today that I got a B in my Spanish assessed grammar test which I did before Christmas. This was one of the best marks out of everyone on the course so I'm pretty happy and have nothing to complain about right now.
I read the whole of Pasta per Due, a little Italian book we had to read over Christmas, on the train today. Even though it's a laughably simple and short book, it's still satisfying to say you have read three books in Italian when you have barely been studying the language for three months.
Right now my head is filled with dreams of travelling to Spain in the summer. I have never been so I am planning on going for at least a month and making it a brilliant trip.
I'm thinking of possibly setting up a travel blog when I go, which I may use for all posting while travelling; especially on my year abroad.
Also my trip to Italy is at the end of the March.
I think this year should be a good one.