The Uffizzi

I've been in Florence a while now, and I haven't fully taken advantage of all the beauty here. Lately I've been visiting some of these historical places. One great place I went was the Uffizi. It's a museum that houses paintings from the greats Michelangelo, Da Vinci, and Bacilli. Mind you ALL of these artists are from Florence. It also has pictures from Raphael, and he's only from a small town right outside of Florence. Do you feel the greatness??? There I heard some of the stories about Michelangelo who was arrogant, stubborn, and greedy,but he was a genius, so no one could say anything. I learned some things about Da Vinci who was a student for six months before he collaborated with his master on a painting, and his part of the painting was better. After this, his master never painted again, this painting is also at the Uffizi. There are also a lot of Bacciali paintings, who was the first to start making paintings appear more realistic. The greatest part of the Uffizi is that it had a separate corridor that royalty such as the Medici, would walk through over the city, the ponte Vecchio, and the Arno river, to get to the Pitti Palace. This corridor has over 300 self portraits. The Uffizi is definitely one of the top ten tourist sites in Florence.

LONDON

So somehow Ive failed to talk about my trip to London. It was INCREDIBLE. Now Caleb had continuously made it seem as if it wasn't what it's cracked up to be. From what he told me it was cold and dull. Now, it was cold, but dull it was not. The first place he took me was to the Big Ben, London Eye, and Thames River. He didn't even give me a warning or anything, just took me to it. I immediately screamed! It was sooo beautiful! The sun was setting right over the river...and it was just...to much to handle. He then took me over to Buckingham Palace which was pretty, with a really pretty fountain in front of it. However, the coolest part was the soldiers walking back and forth like they used to do in the past. We also went to the Queens Garden. It was fillllled with so many flowers, and just colorful leaves all over the ground. If there's anywhere you want to be during Autumn, its here. It also had these small ponds with ducks, and black swans in it. To a city girl like me, this is a site to see. Buttt I got a lil taste of the city too. There's a street in Central London that looks just like Times Square. It's filled with all these theaters, which pretty much makes it the European Broadway. Caleb treated me to one of the shows, "We will rock you". Umm it was interesting, kind of, but it's more about the experience.d We also participated in something called Orange Wednesdays, when movies for students are like dirt cheap. We went to see Paranormal 2, and it was funny sitting in the theater with excited British kids.

By the way, I LOVE there accent. Caleb claimsss they love ours too, but I highly doubt it. They are also some of the nicest people ever! The fact that they're all mean is a myth. Although, I have met mean ones, let's not forget about my trip in.Anyways, we also went to a night club called Oceana! Oceana reminds me of Vegas clubs! It had four beautiful rooms for different genres of music! It was the first time partying with just my boyfriend, but it was fun! The last big thing we did was take a River Cruise. It was at night and it was beautifulll. It was sprinkling a little bit but we didn't even care. We were able to hear all the history of that's surrounds the river, which was pretty awesome! Like some of the ships that still sit there in the water. In war, they were used as decoy ships, and if anyone would approach, they would be shot instantly. If you want to know anymore, ask me! Overall, it was a great Fall Break! We're not even going to talk about me missing my flight back. That's another story entirelyyyy. :) wait! I almost forgot! One of the best parts about London...I was reunited with my love....Chipotle!

The Italian Night Club

So a lot of thestudents party here, but they only party at the American tourist nightclubs. I decided if I was going to party, it would be at an Italian club, with Italians. So Chelseas intercambio and his friends invited us out for a night with them, so of course we said yes. They came to pick us up at midnight on a Friday night. Italians would start partying that late.

They drove us to a different part of Florence, kind of along the outskirts. It was kind of exciting seeing the city from inside a speeding car. When we got there, we met up with some other men and women. Rolling pretty deep with the Italians. The club was free entry which was cool. It had cars parked upstairs which was different. The people, of course, party hard. We danced the night away! One of the guys, Daniele, said "the word of the night is Be stupid!" and that's just what we did.

Me, him, Chelsea, and her intercambio joined together doing the craziest dances. The wave, the robot, an airband, we did it all. It was really fun. Afterwards we went to another secret bakery. They call it their breakfast after the club. Kind of like Denny's for us, I guess. They treated us to delicious pastries, and we hung out there talking for a while. It was a nice night. Did I mention there was a man dressed as Elvis in the club??

Gusta Pizza...Again

I show Gusta so much love, because you know what, they deserve it! Gusta is the pizza place on the same street as my apartment, and we like to say it's the best pizza in Florence. The men who work there are from Naples, and Naples is known to have best pizza in Italy. Gusta also owns a coffee shop next door, and a panini shop next to that, that is sooo delicious!

Anyways, we went to Gusta to ask if we could use the restaurant to film, and they were very nice about it. They called Caleb Will Smith, and flirted with me right in front of him. Italians have no shame. They agreed to let us use the place in the morning, before they opened. Not only did they do that, once we got there, they gave us free pizzas, free beers for the actors to use, and even made me my own personal mini pizza. They don't even sell these. They got really involved in the film, laughing and reciting lines. They let us stay as long as we wanted, and pretty much made the customers move around us. No American business would ever do this! Ahh The joy of a relaxed country. At the end, they had us all sign autographs for them, and made us promise to show them the film. Ahhh I love Gusta.

Short Italian Film

The last time Caleb came, he said the city was so beautiful, that we just had to film a short film here. So we brainstormed some ideas, and I wrote a script up. I found some students that go to my school to act in it, and we dedicated a whole weekend to filming. All it did was remind me of what a beautiful city I live in. We filmed some scenes at night, and had a chase seen on the bridge. This was exciting to see, especially since Caleb asked one to jump in front of a car and he did it. He also had the main guy of our film try to jump over a street barrier. When the guy didn't make, he went down, and so did the barrier. I guess because we were loud someone decided to throw BLEACH on us! Yes Bleach! Now I know when you're being loud after hours, Italians are known to throw down water, but this was bleach. We thought it was raining at first, until we smelled it, and notice everyones clothes had changed color. It was awful. However, we filmed in some really great places, and overall it was a good experience.

The Apperitivo

So Italy has this thing they call the Apperitivo, very similar to Americas happy hour. If you come, this is something you HAVE to get. They offer one at a restaurant most of the students go to called Ganzo. What you do is pay 4 euro for a drink. This could be wine, alcohol, etc. But I must first warn you that Italy is not stingy with there alcohol. This could be a good or bad thing, depending on the person. They give you this large glass of alcohol to drink. You then are able to have a mini-buffet of food, available for about 3 hours. When I went they had this delicious jambalaya, pasta of course, little sandwiches, nachos, bread with mean baked into it, kish, and more. I ate until I was stuffed. It was actually during the night of an art gallery, which had some portraits that my roommates did in it. So there were paintings, an unlimited amount of food, Americans, and Italians, plus music. The atmosphere was great.

The guys come to make us Italian dinner

A couple of days before we left for Fall Break, my roommate Chelsea invited her intercambio over, well he invited himself. He, and two other friends, came to make us a TRADITIONAL Italian meal. When they walked through the door, they came ready to go. One of them cracked his knuckles, and threw his apron on. You don't see this in America! They pulled out packages of different cheeses, meats, and fresh pasta. The three of them begin whipping up the best meal I might of ever had. They brought out five bottles of good wine, since all we've been getting is boxes. As they cooked, they had two of my roommates chopping up cheese and meat. Of course they complained about the waythey were cutting it. The food was ready in no time, and the men start serving us. (The way life shouldbe) The first course was the pasta. Now since I've been in Italy, I haven't tasted pasta that I've really loved. I actually kind of missed the pasta from my school cafeteria, but this one was AMAZING. It had spinach in it, and I couldn't tell you what else, but it was absolutely DELICIOSO! After that, they brought out this baked eggplant, with melted mozzarella cheese, and pasta sauce. You can pretty much guess how good this was. Then! The last course was a juicy roast beef. I have went to quite a few restaurants since I've been in Italy, and this was definitely the BEST food I'd had so far...well besides Gusta's pizza.After dinner we had a dessert drink. We dipped Biscotti (Great Italian cookies) in it, and it was definitely the cherry on top.

It was really nice getting to know some locals. They were really nice, and bubbly. One couldn't speak English, so we tried to speak in Italian...that didn't last long. They even taught us an Italian song, that we're supposed to sing before we drink our wine. "Brendizzino, La La La La!"

It was really fun! Oh and how I forget to mention the tray of appettizers covered in Salami, Prosciutto, and other meat. So good!!!