(insert feisty Italian hand gesture here)

Ciao tutti!

This week brought some fun and some challenges (well, the challenges all came today actually...).  Amazingly, friends from law school and from college were in Rome this week.  It was so much fun to share this city with them--even if I did get lost trying to take my first set of guests to my favorite gelato spot (sorry guys, next time)!  Fortunately, when Sapna (my freshman year dorm roommate) and her husband  came into town we found it!

I took Sapna and her husband around--showed them a few of my favorite places, introduced them to a few of my friends and hit up all the ultra touristy spots I have been avoiding since I arrived (but so glad I finally went).  I did opt out of returning to the Vatican museum with them (I think that I am good on the whole shoving-other-tourists-to-get-a-better-view-of-the-Sistine-Chapel thing for at least another year...).

We also went to the Galleria Borghese which proved to be as beautiful inside as it is outside. I had heard that of all the museums to see in Rome, this ranks near the top.  I totally agree and as Rick Steves suggested we say "Grazie mille, Cardinal Borghese, for commissioning such an amazing art collection."

Fresh off a weekend filled with Rome love, I returned to my apartment this afternoon to find that the crazy wind storm had blown and broken two windows in my apartment and my kitchen sink was clogged (awesome.).  Normally, shattered glass all over the floor would bring me to tears, and it nearly did today, but having faced a broken window in my apartment previously, I both knew the Italian vocabulary for "Can you fix my broken window?" and where I could find someone to help me fix it (just down my street, my new buddy, Luigi, at the glass shop).  I dropped by to see Luigi and he already came, picked up my window, fixed it and brought it back--in an hour.  Oh Luigi, grazie mille!

But what to do about the kitchen sink...well, my landlord's childhood friend, Marcello, owns a shop below my apartment. So, I went and saw him and asked for some aiuto, and he quickly called up his buddy Massimo who came and checked out the problem and will return tomorrow with tools.

Instead of crying out of frustration, when Luigi, Marcello and Massimo came to my disaster apartment rescue, I nearly cried over happiness at the willingness of people to help (despite my broken Italian), at the thought of how cool it is to live in a place where every body knows each other and at the fact that even when Rome throws me challenges, it only ends up making me love it more. How is this possible??!!!

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Vatican city

St. Peter's Basilica

Palantine Hill--amazing to imagine what it used to be and what it used to look like. It was used from 500 B.C. to 500 A.D!!

Inside of the Colloseum

Plug for Rick Steves? Riiiiccccckkkkk!!!

Sapna and I!

                         

Gardens at Villa Borghese

Festa Fine!

Ciao!

Oh Roma--yet another amazing week!    This week flew by but was punctuated by my roommate and I throwing our first festa (hopefully of many) on Friday!  It was a great time, and grazie mille, Roma--i poliziotti hanno aspettato fino alla 3:30am smetellare la festa.

I spent the rest of the weekend relaxing and enjoying the sun and hanging out with friends!  On Saturday, we took it easy, just wandering and sunbathing in Villa Pompilli and on Sunday, we went to the beach--Santa Marinelli!  It was absolutely gorgeous!  We ate lunch at this tiny little pizza shop right on the beach, which was the epitome of Rome line/ordering chaos--but of couse, very charming also!

I really think that I will never run out of beautiful things to see in Rome. Mi piace tanto la mia vita a Roma.

Party preparations. My roommate, Johanna, our friend Davide and a 5 liter jug of wine. yes. 

On the way to Villa Pompilli

A presto!

Come è Maggio?

Ciao tutti!

How is it May already? Time is flying so fast!  This weekend hundreds of thousands (no joke..) made the pilgrimage to Rome for the beatification.  I had been warned that over 5 million people were coming to Rome just for this event, but did not really appreciate the magnitude of the influx until I was walking on Via Vitorio Emanule on Saturday night and saw a steady stream of people decked out with country flags from ALL over (from Mexico to Australia), sleeping bags and guitars (I suppose for entertainment while they awaited the ceremony...).

I was so impressed at the dedication of these people to come from so far for this one day. wow.  Check out some pictures.  While I did feel slightly guilty that people were coming  from thousands of miles away to attend, and me, who lives less than 2 miles away, couldn't get far enough away!  A friend and I headed to Via Appia Antica, which on a normal day is an oasis of an escape from the chaos of Rome...but especially today!  We laid on the grass, drank white wine and rented bikes to ride!  So nice!

Also, this weekend it was May 1st, which is labor day here in Italy.  In honor of this day, San Giovanni hosts a huge concert!  We dropped by and it was actually very nice!

Via Appia Antica and my bike :-)

The concert at San Giovanni

(sorry, not too many pictures this time...I was distracted by the sun and wine and kinda forgot to be snapping away...)

Dov'è il sole?

Ciao!

After weeks of gorgeous weather, Rome has decided to be rainy! And...certo, just in time for our long Easter weekend! I had big plans to go to Sperlonga (oh, com'è bella), but the sun did not cooperate...

I still managed to make the most of my days off by wandering around Rome--hanging out on Isle Tiber, going to a night club UNDER Villa Borghese, getting lost looking for Villa Pomphili, fighting the hoards of people who have descended on Rome for Pasqua and the beatification (what is a beatification?, you may be asking) of Pope John Paul and then heading to the ancient ruins of Rome's port city, Ostia.

I have decided to make this post more exciting and interactive, so click on the links!

No easter egg hunts here, just giant chocolate eggs--with a toy inside!

The Vatican on Sunday. So many people! (I borrowed this picture, I actually avoided the Vatican area all weekend!)

The sun came out...temporarily! The upside to all the rain, everything is so green!

Ostia Antica is said to be one of the best preserved ruins sites in Italy! Apparently, it is even more extensively preserved than Pompeii!

Enshallah!

Ciao! 

I am back from my 10 day adventure into Morocco and Spain!  It was amazing to see places so different from anything that I had ever encountered before.  I flew into Marrakesh where I met up with Katie Rose (!) and 4 of her co-workers from Washington D.C.  We adventured around Marrakesh for the day, wandering and getting lost in the endless medinas.  It was hard for me to resist not buying everything that I saw in the markets--the colors were amazing, jewelry and shoes were beautiful, the spices smelled fantastic.  It was a sensory explosion! 

The next day we headed off on a tour, driven by a hilarious and entertaining Moroccan guy named Hicham, who loves American rap and loved to blast it as we drove through the countryside...awesome.  Black and yellow. yes. 

We saw so much of Morocco, from the Dades Valley to the Sahara!  We spent the first night in an oasis of a hotel, literally...we got kind of worried as we drove off into the middle of the rocks looking for our hotel.  The highlight, though, was our desert trek out into the Sahara to spend the night.  We loaded up on camels and headed out into the endless sea of sand.  

The camels were surprisingly stable and fun to ride! 

On top of a dune which was shockingly hard to climb...SIDI ALI!

 Our guides had set up a tent for us, cooked a lovely meal of couscous (ok, maybe lovely is not the word--we got a bit/a lot tired of couscous, it was pretty much the only thing we ate for lunch and dinner while we were in Morocco...not by choice).  That night, we slept out under the stars!  It was truly breathtaking and such an incredible experience.

After the desert, we continued to the Ziz Valley where our local tour guide took us on a tour of his village--truly an adventure, which at one point included our tour guide carrying me across a river (yes, I admitted it...but really, the water looked sketch).  We then ate lunch at his house.  Everything we ate, including dates and milk, came from his farm!  It was the freshest everything that I have ever eaten! 

The tannery in Fez

Barcelona!

 We then continued on to Fez, sadly parted from Hicham, and spent the day exploring.  We went on a tour of the medinas, which were even more of a maze like than Marrakesh--our tour guide turned out to be the Moroccan Amelie, guiding blind men, giving fresh baked bread to construction workers, joking with kids all while telling us about the history of the city! We found some delicious couscous and went to a hammam!

Katie Rose and I then headed off from the group for a whirlwind tour of Spain.  We flew to Barcelona where we spent a fantastic day!  We took a bike tour, so were able to cover a lot of ground.  We ended the day by relaxing on the beach drinking sangria and eating tapas.  It could not have been more perfect! We then flew to Madrid for our last day and a half of vacation.  It was fast, but Madrid was amazing!  So many people and things to see.  I will definitely have to return

Gaudi craziness!

Madrid

Too many pictures...it was so hard to choose!  I am posting the rest on picasa, so if you want to check them out, click on this link: Lots of photos!

A presto!  Happy Easter da Roma!

Andiamo a Napoli!

Ciao tutti!

Spring has arrived in Roma!  This week and weekend was stunningly beautiful--blue skies, 25 degrees.  The trees are all blooming with bright purple flowers and the sky is a clear clear blue. Just sitting and chatting with a friend in Piazza Navona seems just that much better in the sun! 

I think that this is truly the best time of year because the city is still relatively quiet.  I can tell that more and more tourists are descending on the city as each day gets warmer. So, I will enjoy it  while the city is still in a relaxed state of transition from winter to summer.

I really took advantage this weekend--on Satuday went to Testaccio market (where I got carried away and bought 10 euros worth of artichokes) and then spent the rest of the day wandering around from cafe to gelato to cafe with friends. It was truly relaxing and perfect.  Then on Sunday, we headed to visit Napoli!  Armed with my Napoli-native friend's step by step tour--really...he gave us a 15 step tour of the city, including where to have caffe and where to get the best sfogliatella--it was great!

Napoli was not what I expected.  I had been warned that it was a rough city, where you need to hold on to your bag even tighter and never travel alone.  But really, it was a beautiful, friendly and even quiet and relaxed. Well, quiet until Napoli won the soccer match--then the city kind of exploded!

Not sure why, but I love this picture.  Seems very Italian to me...

Pizza Margherita at the pizzeria that invented it (or so they claim!)

Mt. Vesuvius

Another beautiful weekend!  On Friday I am off to Morocco and Spain!  Can't wait to share pictures and tales from my adventures there!

A presto!  Baci!