Venezia- the sinking city!

After two weeks and a couple days in Italy, it was definitely time to travel to my favorite city...Venice! As a water girl, practically being raised on a boat for the better part of my summers, I love the idea of a city without roads- only rivers. The city is so beautiful and serene with its canal waterways and colorful buildings, it is not very hard to feel at peace here. Venice is also known for its glassware and carnival masks, so there are endless shops to look at- and we all know how much I love shopping!


So yes, my roommates and I (except for Jill and Lisa who are enjoying their weekend in Capri) woke up very early to catch the 8:37am train to Venezia! It did not take us very long to prove ourselves as the token Americans on the train yet again- we were all assigned specific seats on the train, but we didn't realize it was taken so seriously! After moving seats about 3 times, we were scattered but settled across the train. Two and a half hours later, we were in Venice! We walked along the Grand Canal, and soon found a very interesting mask shop. The man who owned the shop was great, he let us all try on the masks and take silly pictures of ourselves. What really impressed me was that he let us have our fun, but did not pressure every single one of us to buy a mask- awesome marketing skills! Nicole got a beautiful mask of grey and silver.


All that shopping soon made us hungry girls! We found a great little place with a slice of pizza, a soda and a gelato for only 4 eur0s- one of the best deals we have found in Italy! Full from our pizza, it was clearly time to go out on a gondola ride. Now one thing about Gondaleers- they have a tendency to be crabby. Last time I was in Venice, our driver didn't narrate unless we asked him to, wasn't very cheerful and occasionally got mad at other gondolas and would slap his paddle at them! Well, I was pleasantly surprised with our gondaleer this trip- Diego. He not only gave us a very good deal- 15 euros each instead of 20, but he made the ride very relaxing and enjoyable. He took pictures for us, let us climb to the front of the gondola to take a picture with the amazing views in the background, told us everything he could about where we were passing (we saw Marco Polo and Casanova's houses) , and was just a very very nice person. After we returned to the dock, Diego even let each of us stand in the back of the boat with him pretending to row. Definitely the highlite of our trip to Venice!

After the gondola ride, we didn't have much time left before it was time to head back to Florence, but we had to at least walk through the Piazza de San Marco. With a beautiful Church in the back, and 3 walls surrounding the other 3 sides, it is one of the prettiest places in Venice. Unfortunately, it was undergoing construction so the full effect of St. Marks Square was missed, but it was still very impressive! We also had a laugh at a tourist who decided it was a good idea to put food on himself and let the pigeons crawl on him. He was of course yelled at by the police and asked to leave the pigeons alone- but not before I snapped a picture of him!

All too soon, it was time for the six girls of Anguillara 18 to head back to Florence. Fortunately, there was an extremely cute baby who kept us entertained on the ride home!

Frescobaldi Wine Vineyard

Yesterday my marketing class traveled to two wine vineyards owned by the Frescobaldi Family, an Italian family that has been producing wine for over 32 generations, since the 13th century. Our professor joked that the first vineyard, in Pomino, was more like a vineyard in Germany than in Italy. It was high up in the mountains, with an incredible view of the Italian Landscape nearby. The actual winery looked like a beautiful old villa- the family is always welcome to stay there still, but most live in Florence in order to do business. We had a tour of the winery. First, there were large metal vats for fermentation. The first wine we saw fermenting was a Pinot Noir (mom's favorite!) After the metal tanks, there were the standard wooden barrels- lots of them! Rooms and rooms filled with wooden barrels of aging wine. The wine is first fermented in the metal tanks and then aged in the wooden barrels. Some of the more expensive wines are aged for as long as 5 years before they are even barrelled. Not being super knowledgeable about wine, I found everything about the process of making wine very interesting, and learned several things that I had never known before. For example, where the grapes grow on the vineyard is a very important part of the wine and grapes are sometimes pealed in order to make white wine.


After a few more rooms filled with aging wine, it was time to sit down and try the family wine! We were treated extremely well- 3 different wines were tested and there was an incredible spread of food to go with the wine. We tried a Pinot Grigio, a blend of Merlot and Pinot Noir, and a Chianti. Our host explained different methods of tasting the wine- it is not just a show men like to put on in restaurants!! She had us smell the wine, check the color, the reflection of light through the wine, and pair the different wines with different foods to find the best and worst combinations. The food was delicious, and it was the first time I actually enjoyed red wine- the Chianti was great!

Sufficiently filled, it was time for the class to make our way to another vineyard. Which was again beautiful, and this time featured a castle as well as a villa! It was pretty amazing. We were showed a few more aging wines and fermenting wines, but the best part of this site was definitely the private wine cellar for the family. It is tradition in the Frescobaldi family for whenever a new member of the family is born, either 100 or 300 bottles (100 for women, 300 for men) from their birth year are placed aside in the cellar for their personal use at special occasions. They remain unlabeled until a bottle of wine is taken out, at which time a custom label will be made. There were still wines from the 1800's down in the cellar- undoubtedly undrinkable by now, but very interesting.

All in all, it was a fantastic day, and I have a much bigger appreciation for wines and everything that goes into making them.

Learning Our Way Around

Nicole (my amazing roommate from Uconn as well as here in Florence) and I decided that when its comes to having a sense of direction, we are extremely spoiled as Americans. I can find my way around Cheshire, around the mall, even around New York City once i figure out which direction is uptown and which is downtown. However, here in Florence, we quickly learned that our admittedly small senses of direction are quick to get confused. All the city blocks look the same, and when not in view of a familiar landmark, it is very easy to get lost. While this provides some funny moments (Example: me sitting down with a map on the steps of a church determined to find my street without asking for help...and then realizing this was the church directly next to my street) it also is helping us to learn our way around the city. After two fast weeks here, we are slowly learning (Nicole much quicker than I) our way around.

Our favorite technique of learning the city is to go walk around, get lost, and then find our way back to a familiar landmark. This brings us to new parts of the city we would have never seen before. Yesterday, we found an older Jewish neighborhood complete with stars of david in the windows, Hebrew store names, and an old flea market. There was even a random Catholic Church there. Then, later last night (while eating chocolate gelato from the world famous Vivoli) we were determined to find out what the large brick building was that we can see out of our windows. After a few minutes of wandering, we discovered it is an old prison/fortress which has since been turned into a museum- this is one landmark we will definitely have to check out further!

A Week and a Half in Italy

Well, I have been in Florence for 11 days now (excluding travel time to get here) and the time is already starting to fly! I have been meaning to start this blog for a few days now, but we have been keeping so busy! I will give a little recap, and then try my best to post more regularly!

Getting Here...

Oh what an adventure the 20 or so other University of Connecticut students on my flight and I went through trying to get to Florence! We endured four hour plane delay in JFK due to thunderstorms in upstate new york, missed our connecting flight in Paris, had to wait in the Paris airport for about five hours, flew into Bologna (home of bolognese sauce), took a bus to the airport in Florence, and finally hopped onto another bus which took us to a hotel which we would be staying at for the night. What a long journey- but hey, at 2am and 28 hours after our trip began...we were in Florence!!

Orientation and Week one

Saturday we stayed at the hotel (The Hotel Aurora, overlooking the city of Florence) for orientation. We heard from the director of our school, the housing coordinator, the bursar, the school psychologist (who gave a very interesting lecture about removing our "American lens" and putting on an "Italian Lens" when viewing and interpreting the culture here) and the director of the police here in Florence (who made us a lot more comfortable about our safety while here, though did tell us girls to beware of the "Italian National Sport"...women).

Nicole and I also met our roommates and finally got to move into our apartment later that day! We are living with six other girls- one from Uconn, one from Marist, two from UVA and two from Penn State. Our apartment is beautiful- probably the nicest apartment of any of the students. Its location is also fantastic- just a few minutes walk to both the Piazza's Signoria and Santa Croce, and we have a view of the top of the duomo from our sun room! It is also very close to a lot of great restaurants, gelaterias, and bars. To sum it up- we lucked our majorly!


Yes we do have to go to class...

It isn't all fun and games here in Florence- we do have to go to class! I am taking two classes- each meets twice a week for three hours. I am taking Marketing in Italy and Architecture in Italy. Both are very interesting. Marketing is all Uconn students, and taught by a Uconn professor, so we are all very comfortable with each other. This class takes out to different types of Italian businesses or manufacturers to learn about how they run their business. So far we have been to a bottle producing company that makes glass bottles for almost any use, ranging from wine and olive oil bottles to food and makeup jars, a terra cotte factory, and today we went to a company which spins woolen thread to sell to the high end fashion companies (Dolce and Gabbana was one of their biggest clients). In Architecture, we useually spend the first two hours of class learning about the basics of architectural typology seen in Florence, and then for the last hour our teacher takes us on walks through the city to show examples of what he just taught us about. For example, it is very common in Florence when building or reconstructing to use the materials from the previous structure- perfectly seen in the curved streets and buildings which were built on the foundation of the old Roman Colleseum (which also happens to be about a block from where I live!)

...But we make sure to have fun as well (obviously)
My roommates and I have of course spent our time doing as many fun things as we can, and trying to get a bigger taste of Italian culture while we are at it. We went to Pisa to see the leaning tower. It was very pretty, but mostly a tourist spot. We took our silly pictures pretending to hold it up and that was about it. The next day, we traveled to Siena and San Gimignano. Siena is a very old city built by Remus (brother of Romulus who built Rome). It was all made out of red brick, and we got a beautiful view of the city after climbing to the top of a tower! San Gimignano is an old medieval city high in the hills, so the views of Italian countryside were absolutely incredible. While there, we visited a museum of torture, which was very interesting but also a little creepy! This weekend we are planning a visit to Venice for Saturday so I cannot wait! Nicole and I also booked tickets to Paris and Amsterdam for June, so I am unbelievably excited for that! More to come later!