My Weekend in Croatia

Hey everybody, it's embarrassing to say that its been over 2 weeks since I last posted, and I apologize to everyone who wanted posts to read and never got them. I am going to write two posts about my last two weekends, which have been incredible in (almost) every way and deserve a post of their own. First destination: Croatia!

Before I begin, a side note: Before coming to Italy, I never once thought about visiting Croatia. Not once. To be honest, I didn't really know that Croatia was even a beautiful destination to visit. It wasn't until I was perusing the different trips offered by the company Bus2Alps that I even considered going across, or rather around, the Adriatic Sea.

The trip began on thursday evening. Everyone met at Termini station and boarded the luxury coach bus that would be our mode of transport for the next 15 hours. Although it was nice, there's only a certain amount of luxury that can be applied to a bus. We stopped in Florence to pick up the second half of our group, and we were off to Croatia! There comes a time during a 15 hour bus ride, about 8 hours in, where you say to yourself, why in the world did I even sign up for this?? Long bus rides like that are almost never fun for more then a few hours. Anyways, by hour 10 I was at this point.

A few hours of sleep later, we were about two hours from our destination, Split, and so I watched the sun rise on the landscape that we were travelling. We finally arrived at our hostel, and let me tell you, it was one of the strangest places I have ever been to. Recently renovated, they called it a "design hostel", which means they went out of their way to make it look like they had some artistic vision. The rooms were basically long closets that had beds sunken into the wall. It was weird. They gave us an hour before I had to get back on the bus to go White Water Rafting. Great, the last thing I wanted to do was get on another bus for an hour.

We arrived at the river that we would be rafting down, and it was beautiful. The rafting itself was not too exhilarating, but the scenery was fantastic. Midway through we stopped and climbed a 20 foot tall cliff and jumped into the river. It was absolutely surreal.

After the rafting we had some time to get dinner before the pub crawl. You all know how pub crawls are, what they entail, and in order to not incriminate myself I will just leave the night up to your imagination. I will say however, that the highlight of the night was talking to a bunch of Croatian guys, all about 23 or so, for 45 minutes before they invited me to go down to the club with them. They kept trying to pair me up with a Croatian girl so that they could show me how much better Croatian girls are then American girls. Very entertaining, and I got back in the hostel around 4:30 AM. Fantastic night.

The next day, Saturday, was perhaps my favorite of the weekend. Everyone who signed up for the island hopping tour met for the boat at around 11. We boarded the boat, and the boat was serving grappa. I politely refused, as it tastes horrible, and the last thing I wanted to do was drink alcohol. We visited one island, called Brac, which was absolutely beautiful, but only stayed for about 45 minutes. This gave everyone enough time to buy a bottle of wine for the rest of the cruise.

The next island we visited we stayed for about 3 hours. It was a nice little beach where we could swim in the Adriatic Sea, and drink the wine that we had all bought. I wonder what the locals thought when they saw a bunch of American teenagers swimming in the Adriatic, each with a bottle of wine in their hand. A Croatian man, who was about 40 came swimming up to us to talk to us. I ended up talking with him for about 45 minutes, and he told me his views on Obama. I thought it was incredible how up to date they are on American politics, but I couldn't even name the president of Croatia.

After we got back on shore from the cruise, we had dinner at a forgettable restaurant. I was so tired I went back to the hostel and fell asleep around 10 PM.

The bus ride back from Croatia was incredibly long, as we got stopped in Slovenia for 2 hours because our trip leader didn't have her passport. She ended up getting stuck in Slovenia while we continued home to Italy. When I arrived in Rome it was 4:30 AM, I had been on a bus for 17 hours, it was raining harder then I've ever seen rain come down, and I had class at 9:30 the next morning. I was beat. But I had a fantastic weekend and I wouldn't give up the experience for anything.

The moral of this weekend is that busses suck. If you're gonna be on a bus for longer then 8 hours, you should fly. Simple as that.

First week impressions

First impressions are incredibly important. Show up to a job interview with your zipper down, a mustard stain on a wrinkled shirt, and some sort of mullet-mohawk combo? Chances are you weren't going to get the job when you walked through the front door of the company. So how does that apply to my time here in Rome? Well, I figure first impressions could have a lasting impact on how I see this grand city for the next 4 months, and perhaps Italy in general. So I'm going to write down my impressions of Rome so far, and come back to them to see if I was correct. Without further ado...

1. Whether or not you believe in stereotypes, they are all founded in some truth. So the stereotype that all Italians do is eat pasta? TRUE. Good God is it true, and while I do enjoy spaghetti, and rigatoni, and those curly cue pastas, let's be real: Its all the same, just in a different shape. It's kind of like how all mexican food is essentially the same, with beans and rice and sour cream and a tortilla of some shape. But this isn't even a mix of ingredients. Its like if Mrs Fields cut their chocolate chip cookies into star shapes and square shapes and circles, but sold them as different things. Yeah, annoying.

2. Traffic is unbelievably dangerous here. No car will stop for you if you are standing on the side of the road waiting to cross. You have to step out, look the driver in the eye, and they will literally get within an inch of you and stop. I've gotten used to it, but it doesn't mean that I don't fear for my life every time I go to get some pizza.

3.For all of the great food that they make here, people don't eat. What? They don't? No, they don't, and I was just as shocked as you. Breakfast? Maybe a croissant or something light if they eat breakfast at all. Lunch is a big meal, so I'll give them that, but after they eat at like noon or 1, they dont eat again until at least 8. And that's at the earliest. I have been out and about and seen people in the middle of dinner as late as 1230 AM. No lie.

4. Time is just unimportant here. After being raised in a culture of "If you're on time, you're late, if your early you're on time", the idea that being late is too early baffles me. Tell someone to come over around 8 means, "If you come any earlier then 830 you are too early and I probably haven't showered." Takes some getting used to, but Italy is a very laid back place.

5. There is graffiti everywhere. We are staying in one of the most residential and wealthiest neighborhoods in Rome and there is graffiti on the walls of our building. It doesn't mean that its a "sketchy" neighborhood, it just has graffiti. In fact, I have not come across one sketchy neighborhood, even though I hear that Termini station is a handful after dark.

Thats about all I've got for right now. As for what's been going on in my life here in Rome? A lot of walking about, seeing some sights, and taking Italian for 2.5 hours everyday. It's gonna be a fun semester it looks like.

Also, I just booked a trip to Croatia (completely spontaneous, but I am so stoked for it) for the weekend after this one. I will definitely be posting pictures and telling tales all about it when it happens. Thanks for reading.

Arrival and the First few Days

So I want to say that I'm going to write this blog for two reasons. The first is almost an egotistical one but I am going to say it anyways: You want to read and follow what I am doing in Rome and abroad. Maybe I shouldn't feel like anybody cares about what I do over here, but, hey, you might, so I'm going to give you, the reader, every opportunity to live vicariously through me. The second is for myself. In such an exciting time, it's always helpful to write down what you've done over the last couple of days so that you can organize your thoughts, fully appreciate what you have done, and lastly, but most importantly, relive the experience once you come back home. It's a strange feeling knowing that in 3 short months this will all be over, but I'm going to try to make it the best trip I can. Now that this longwinded disclaimer is over, let's get going!

My travel day to Rome can only be expressed in one word: Long. It was thoroughly uneventful, which is definitely a positive when we are talking about airline travel. I read almost 300 pages of my book on my 6 hour flight to Philly, and watched 3 movies on my flight to Rome. My flight to Rome had probably 80 college students on it, the majority of them being from Temple. I arrived in Rome at around 9 o'clock local time, and by this point had been travelling for 16 hours straight. IES graciously provided us with a room in the airport to debrief and have a snack, and had organized a shuttle service straight to our apartments, saving us a train trip to Termini Station and then a taxi ride to the apartment.

Our apartment is quite big for Rome, with 7 people living in it. Our ISC (Italian Student Companion) is a really nice guy and will be a helpful resource in getting around the city and the rest of Italy in general. After getting unpacked and generally settled into our apartment, the guys that live in the neighborhood all went on a walk to get a feel of our surrounding environment. I'll let this picture do the talking:

Its really an incredible place, and I'm not sure that it's hit me that I will be living here for 3 months. I think Ill write about all of the things that I notice and deem interesting. But for now, I'll just post a few pictures from the first day. Ciao tutti!