While many bars that cater to American students threw Mardi Gras parties last night here in Florence the locals celebrated Carnevale. In the video you can see that all of the people that are dressed up are adults. There were traditional, modern, simple, and elaborate costumes. I got a ton of ideas for Halloween next year. All of the video was shot between 11 and 12 at night and the party in the streets kept going for a long time after we headed back to the apartment. Everyone was just out to have a good time as you will see and many of them were armed with bags of confetti and cans of silly string. I think my friend Andrea put it best when she said "This is the most bizarre thing I've ever seen." I would just add bizarre in a good way.

CLICK HERE FOR A VIDEO OF CARNEVALE IN FLORENCE

I have received many questions from home regarding the protest that happened in Vicenza over the weekend. Click here for more on the protest. There was a notice posted at school that warned Americans not to venture into the city of Vicenza and I was not planning on it so my plans stayed the same. I had a quiet weekend in Florence. Sunday my friend Colleen came over and said there was a parade going on. So we walked out to the Piazza De la Republica (about a minute away from my apartment) and made it just in time for the start of the parade that lasted for at least a half an hour. I asked around and the parade related to Carnevale. Children were dressed up just like they do for Halloween in America and threw confetti at everybody. I have been seeing children dressed up like this for the last couple of weeks in honor of Carnevale but this was by far the greatest number I have seen at once. The children were either watching the parade or in it. The groups that went by represented many nations ranging from Sweden to Peru to China. Most participants dressed in traditional wear and there was normally traditional music accompanied with each group. So no need to worry at home, Florence had no protests and I felt no different in the city, but I did get to watch an amazing parade that topped off my weekend.

CLICK HERE FOR A GLIMPSE OF THE PARADE.mov

Venice was our big, weekend long field trip during orientation in Siena. It was postcard perfect, but freezing cold. We stayed in a 500 year old building that used to be a monastery, I would like to say I wasn’t creeped out at night, but I was. We did not ride in a gondola because it ran an average of 80 euro for one ride. We took art tours and did the normal tourists things; St. Mark’s Cathedral was amazing. For most of the trip we were completely grossed out by all of the pigeons. In front of St. Mark’s Cathedral there were vendors selling seed to give the pigeons. Watch the video to see what it was like.

CLICK HERE FOR VENICE VIDEO.mov

During orientation, we got to do a bunch of different little field trips, but this meant that huge tour busses had to come into Siena to pick us up and then drive us out. The video shows just one trip out and some of the problems that we encountered. But at the end you can see how great it was once we got out of the city walls. P.S. this video has nothing to do with pigeons, sorry to get your hopes up.

Italy-Pigeons-H.264 300Kbps Streaming.mov

Ok so I realize that it has been a long time since I have been able to get on the internet, but we actually made it to Italy. It only took us 28 hours, yes we had a 5 hour layover in Washington DC and then in Munich. Because we had so much time we were able to adjust our sleeping habits during travel making jet lag almost nonexistant which I guess is one plus to a gruelling travel experience.

I have so much to put up but I will try and space it out. I spent three weeks in Siena, Italy for orientation and an "intensive" language course (I can order things in a bar now and tell people where I am from). Now I am living in an apartment smack in the center of Florence, Italy a city of half a million, much more than what I am used to in Puyallup. I live with Becca, a friend from Pacific Lutheran University and Liz a student at Babson College in Boston. So not only do I have a bunch of stories about the difference between home and Italy but about home and the East Coast.