1. On Ponte Vecchio, towards Duomo
2.Ponte Vecchio, Florence 3.Beyond Ponte Vecchio, Florence

4.Piazza del Campo, Siena

5.View from S. Catherine, Siena

6.Sunset same view, Siena

7.On leaning tower, Pisa

8.View from tower, Pisa

9.Duomo and tower, Pisa

10.View from bridge, Pisa (church that holds thorn on right)

Mary Shannon: Hello everyone! I have so many amazing pictures, but I dont know how to put multiple pictures on here without spending 5hours here in the internet cafe (I might be calling you soon Andrew!) Friday, Kelsi and I went to Pisa with two of our friends from Wisconsin. It was so beautiful. Well, Pisa isn't the prettiest city in Italy, but the leaning tower was really worth the hour train ride. On the way there our train went through 'New Florence', west of the city and there was a lot of industrial buildings and dumpy apartments. I was pretty surprised by this. When we got there, we had no map, no itenerary, and no idea how to get around - pretty much a parent's worst nightmare (we also slept in that day and didnt even leave Firenze until almost 2pm!) It was great for us though, no 8am wake up call with parents rushing you out the door haha! We read road signs and headed towards the river, since we figured out every duomo is near the center of towns. We walked past this small gothic church in the middle of the sidewalk-and come to find out it held one of the thorns from Christ's Crown on Thorns! When we got to the tower, there were more venders here than anywhere I've seen. (Stolen-but real- Prada and Louis Vutton bags are sold everywhere, but if you buy one from a vender they get arrested for like 3 months while you get up to a $10,000 fine!) Climbing the tower made me kind of motion sick, not only are you walking up steep stone stairs that spiral up along the sides, but the building is as you know leaning! So walking up I would be forced to lean into the left wall and then 10 steps farther up would have to start leaning on the right wall!! At the top, Kelsi exclaimed she was afraid of heights! However, she was tough and even went up along the edges. (I cannot lie that I had my own slight fears that I was constantly neglecting in order to enjoy the amazing views). It was worth the £15 to climb up though. Walking around the huge bells, we also stepped onto this thick piece of bolted down glass in the center of the tower-through the glass you could see all the way down the center of the tower! A huge hole beneath our feet! We also found another set of stairs that went even higher than the bells, onto the very top of the tower! Talk about an adrenaline rush! We could see the entire city, the snow capped mountains in the north, and soccer players practicing in the Pisa soccer stadium! On the way down, we had a difficult time acclimating to walking no longer on a leaning platform (it was like that feeling when you get off a tredmil and you feel like you're floating). Our legs were shaking and we all had to sit down for a minute. We went in the Pisa Duomo, which was just as extravagent as the one in Florence. Only, when I walked around one corner into one of the side chapels, there was a glass coffin! It was the patron saint of Pisa wrapped in a cloth with a metal? mask covering his face! It was really creepy! We then got some gelato and walked back to the train station and home. It felt so great to travel so short a distance to see something you've heard your whole life about, and then get to come back to your OWN bed! After spending an hour or two in our local pub with the free wireless and apperitivos (appetizer bar food) we headed off to bed. Saturday, my roommate Kate and I decided we would meet our Wisconsin friends (Joe and John) at the bus station to travel an hour and a 1/2 south of Firenze to Siena. Unfortunately, they got completely LOST on the way to the bus station, and so Kate and I had to go by ourselves. I cannot say the trip was spoiled though, the bus through the wine country, covered in vineyards, was very picturesque. In Siena, we once again had no map or itenerary. We got there around 3pm and decided to walk towards the Church of St. Catherine. It was much less gothic or baroque than most the churches we've seen, but was still really interesting because inside the church was a box with her head in it! This, again, was really cool-but creepy. (Her thumb was supposedly there too, but we didn't see it). Kate and I then walked through the VERY hilly town of Siena to the Piazza del Campo. In the city center, it was filled with Italian families (Siena is definately more of a family town, unlike Florence where I never really see school-aged children). There was a huge building and museum at one end, and then a string of hotels and cafes along the other side. There was a beautiful water fountain in the center that actually used to be the towns water source! Here, Kate and I sat down and again had gelato. We watched all these families come out into the square with children, aging from around 3-5yrs old. They were all dressed in costumes, throwing confetti and silly string out into the streets. We never figured out what this was for-we think maybe like mardi gras for kids before Lent?? We also bought frigoletta (doughnuts) that were being made in this shack in the square. They were making them right in front of us as we ordered it, throwing the dough into these huge vats that were boiling the dough, then they poured sugar on them! YUM! I am going to get so fat, but I've really come to peace with it haha! Before it got dark, Kate and I headed back to the bus stop. It was really the most beautiful place I've seen so far though. There were no imparticular 'tourist sights' but I would never tell someone to at least not try and see it! On Sunday, our school threw a welcome party at Space Electronica Discotecha! (Free Wine!) We ate apperitivos here and met some other students before walking all the way back to our favorite pub (The Friends' Pub owned by our new friends Matt and Fabrezio which I mentioned in another one of my posts) and ate pizza! Then, so tired of walking, we had to take a taxi back to the Disco (thats what they call clubs here) to watch the superbowl on the big screens! We met all our friends here, and I even met an Australian guy who taught me that if you don't want to be stuck talking to someone you don't like you must scratch your head-as I sign to your friends to come over and HELP! But if you like talking to that person and want to be left alone, you scratch beneath your nose! I will be using this technique in the future, so watch out! Yesterday, Kelsi and I spent 4 hours trying to find where we buy books! We also ate dinner at one of our favorite, and conveniently located restaurants, Angiolino. MMM!
Things I've noticed: Everyone has a dog! And they take them with them to work, in all buildings, even to come to school to teach! They have really pretty breeds here though; I think they clean the streets at night because they are always wet in the morning-shopkeepers are also sweeping the street right in front of their doors; there are Asian tourists EVERYWHERE in mass groups! That cliche stereotype of the Asian tourist is so much worse here than in America (at the leaning tower of Pisa, this one Asian girl was walking around on her knees freaking out about the height-they seem even sillier than Kelsi and I if that's possible); I must say again how much graffiti there is!; Every cafe, restaraunt, business, pub, or disco plays majority American music, and mostly 80s and 90s music at that! So even when you try to immerse yourself completely, you are doing it to the tune of Michael Jackson, Sheryl Crow, Prince, or Madonna!
Ok. Love you all, miss you all...still strong : )