Buona Pasqua con il Papa Francesco!

Buona Pasqua/Happy Easter! Today I had the incredible experience of attending Easter mass at the Vatican with Pope Francis. We had applied for tickets a while ago, and mass wasn't until 10:15, but the gates opened at 8, so we left the apartment around 7:45 to get there with plenty of time, because we were told that the square fills up pretty quickly.

Because we got there so early and we had tickets, we were in a sectioned-off area of the square that they didn't completely cram with people, so we had plenty of space to spread out for the two hours we had before mass started.

I'm obviously not Catholic, but it was a really cool experience to be at the Vatican for Easter. Not to mention the fact that I'm now a huge fan of Papa Francesco, so it was cool to see him perform a mass.

Priest who came into the crowd to give communion to those who could receive it

Popemobile!

Delivering the final Easter blessing

Yummy brunch we all made after mass!

Sorrento!

On Thursday, I took the train to Naples and then a train called the Circumvesuviana from Naples to Sorrento to meet up with my mom and her friend, who had gotten there the night before. The Circumvesuviana train is a little interesting, but it took me right to the heart of Sorrento, and it was an easy and BEAUTIFUL walk from the train station to my mom's hotel. They were already back from their day trip to Capri by the time I got there, so we spent a little bit of time relaxing at the hotel before heading out for a little bit of shopping and dinner.

They had already found a favorite cameo shop with a friendly owner who also happened to own an English bulldog... how perfect?! We stopped there on our way, but unfortunately Odie was at home and not at the shop... but he promised that Odie would be back the next day, so we made plans to go back! I also left with a GORGEOUS 7-layer cameo owl necklace (thanks Mom!). We stopped at a few more shops and finally found a cute place to get dinner.

On our way back to our hotel, we ran into a Maundy Thursday procession of people going to church. Sorrento is really famous for a series of Good Friday processions it does, but we weren't expecting this one. It was pretty short. There was another one that night (technically Friday morning) at 3 am which we didn't get up to see, but the concept is that it's a procession of people dressed in white robes and hoods (they actually look like members of the KKK... no joke) with Mary looking for Jesus. Then, on the evening of Good Friday, they do the same procession but dressed all in black, and they carry the crucified Christ through the streets of Sorrento with a distraught Mary following behind.

The next morning, we got up and took the Circumvesuviana train to Herculaneum, which is another Roman city (like Pompeii) that was destroyed by Vesuvius, but in a different way, and in a way that caused it to be much better preserved than Pompeii. It's also a lot smaller, so it's easier to see more. It was absolutely amazing to see how things had been preserved for thousands of years from the volcanic material. Some of the buildings even had their original wooden door frames. After Herculaneum, we took the Circumvesuviana train a few stops back toward Sorrento and went to Pompeii.

Pompeii was a little frustrating a) a lot of the more famous sites are closed right now and b) the vast, vast majority of the artwork has recently been removed from Pompeii and put on display at the Archaeological Museum of Naples. Now, I understand that some things need to be preserved, but in at least one place (the House of the Faun), an incredible floor mosaic had been removed for display in the museum and had been replaced with a replica. We just didn't understand why they couldn't do that in every case where they removed a famous fresco or famous mosaic or statue. At the very least, would it be that hard to display a picture of what the site used to look like? Probably not. Yes, you can see all of those things on display in Naples, but it's not the same to see them in the context of a museum... it's so much more awe-inspiring to see them in their original settings (like they are in Herculaneum). Even without the art, Pompeii was still really cool, and we pretty much stayed until closing time to see everything.

When we got back to Sorrento, we went back to our favorite cameo shop and guess who was there?? Odie! I'm not even ashamed of how excited I was to see an English bulldog in Italy. We stayed there for a bit to say goodbye to our new friend, and then we made our way to find a restaurant for dinner. After dinner, we got some gelato (yum!) and found a place to sit and watch the procession that was coming up (the one I mentioned earlier that happens every year for Good Friday). The procession was super cool... I've never seen anything like it before in my life. It ended up getting to us a lot later than we expected, but the only thing we had to do the next day was make it to Naples by 3 for our train back to Rome, so it was fine.

We took it easy this morning getting back to Naples. Our original plan was to take the Circumvesuviana back to Naples (which my mom and her friend had not had the pleasure of experiencing on their way to Sorrento... they had taken a car), but we ended up taking a cab because we had a driver offer us a pretty great price for one, and it was definitely easier than managing all of their luggage on the tiny and crowded Circumvesuviana train.

We got back to Rome and they dropped off their luggage at their hotel, and then I took them to my apartment to drop off my luggage before dinner. It was raining, so we ended up taking the bus to Trastevere, which is a really cool neighborhood in Rome with lots of great restaurants. The one I had originally wanted to take them to was too busy, so we went across the street to a restaurant that was equally amazing.

Today was their last day in Rome; they leave in the morning on Easter. I had such a great time showing them around the city that has become my home, and it was so great to be able to spend time with my mom... not going to lie, it made me a little homesick! I'm in my final month now, and as much as I love Rome, I know that I'll be ready to go home in May.

My mom is in Rome!

My mom got here a few days ago and I have had so much fun showing her and her friend around Rome! They landed on Thursday morning, and unfortunately I had class until about 2:30, so they came to meet me at my school Thursday afternoon. They had already had a busy day before they came to see me and had done a lot of walking and had seen some of the sights already, so we decided to find a place where we could watch the Butler-Bucknell game a couple of hours from then.

There are a few "American" sports bars in Rome that masquerade as Irish pubs, so we called a few of them to see which ones would be able to broadcast the game. We finally called one that said they might not be able to broadcast it from ESPN America, but that they would stream it online for us on one of their TVs, which was good enough for us! The plan was to go there, watch the game (which started around 5:30 Rome time), and then find somewhere to eat dinner (since Italians eat dinner pretty late... around 8 usually).

We got there and I was pretty hungry, so we ordered an appetizer... nachos. Don't laugh. I hadn't had nachos in the entire time I had been in Rome until then. About halfway through the game, it became obvious that they were not going to make it to dinner... they were both falling asleep at the table! So yes, on my mom's first night in Italy, we ate dinner at Scholar's Lounge... one of the most American places you will find in the entire city of Rome.

The next morning they had planned on doing an early tour of the Vatican Museums, so I gave them directions from their apartment to the metro stop closest to the Vatican. I was supposed to meet them after their tour was over, but when I got there, they told me that they hadn't ended up taking their tour because the Sistine Chapel was closed that morning so they were taking a different one later in the afternoon. So we got lunch instead, and they took their tour and we met up afterward. I took them to my favorite gelato place, Old Bridge, which is right outside of the Vatican walls (how convenient!).

We got dinner that night close to the Colosseum, and the next morning I met them at their hotel somewhat early because we had a pretty full day planned. There's a pretty famous flower market in Rome in Campo di Fiori, so we went there first in the morning. It doesn't have as many flowers as it used to, but there are all sorts of vendors selling fruits and vegetables and various food items. I made them try oranges from the market, because you'll never find anything more fresh. From there, we walked over to St. Peter's to climb to the top of the basilica. Okay, actually, we cheated, because we paid the extra 2 euro to take the elevator halfway... but it's really not that much of a cheat because you still have about 250 stairs to climb after you get off of the elevator.

That was definitely worth the view! There were some parts of the climb that made me feel a little claustrophobic (narrow, winding stairways... enough said), but by the time we got to the top, I was glad that we did it. I could even see all the way to my apartment, so I pointed that out to them.

We made our way back down to the ground level and stopped for lunch at a little restaurant on the other side of the Vatican. After that, we took a bus to Piazza Venezia, because they were booked on a walking tour of Rome that started at the Colosseum. They managed to get me added on to it, which was fine with me even though I've obviously seen everything on it. It was an ambitious tour, though... the Colosseum, Forum, Pantheon, Trevi Fountain and Piazza Navona in three hours. I could spend three hours in the Forum alone, but it was a good introductory tour. I wish we could have spent more time in the Colosseum and the Forum (even though that was my third time in both this semester!), but I tried to point out the things that I knew that our tour guide wasn't telling the group. The Pantheon was closed for mass (or some kind of ceremony) by the time we got over there, but luckily they had already seen it on their first day. We got gelato at Trevi and finished in Piazza Navona, which will always be one of my favorite places in Rome!

That was their last night of their first part in Rome, so I took them to the Jewish ghetto area of Rome for dinner. I had never eaten in any of the restaurants in that neighborhood before, but everyone says it's one of the best places in Rome for dinner, so I knew we would find something good. Also, it's getting to be the end of artichoke season in Rome, and the carciofi alla guidia (literally Jewish artichokes) are a must-try in Roman cuisine. They were SO GOOD, and so was the rest of the food.

The next morning they got on a train for Florence, and that's where they are now. I'm meeting them in Sorrento on Thursday after my classes are done, and then we all come back to Rome on Saturday afternoon!

Life lately: photo class

So, I realized I haven't posted lately about my adventures in my digital photography class, which I am really enjoying! Sometimes our assignments are a little strange, but I'm learning so much more about how to use my camera and today, we made prints of our pictures for the first time. I've never made such big prints of my own photos before, and it was really cool to see something I had taken printed out in such a large format.

From an assignment called "Bird, Dog, Worm" where we had to take pictures from those three perspectives:

Worm's eye view

Worm's eye view

Bird's eye view

From our street photography assignment:

There was a Michael Jackson impersonator performing in Piazza del Popolo and this woman just decided to join in!

"Day in the Life" where I had to take a picture of everything I did and saw in a single day:

Finally, this week, we had to do portraits! This is one of my friend Tara in Villa Borghese:

This class has been such a nice break for me from my academics, and it's been really fun to get out into the city and explore. For my final project, I'm working on capturing the vivacity of the many fountains in Rome, and I have to have 20 images every week for that assignment. Here are a few I've done so far:

Adventures in Germany

When I was 8 years old, my grandparents took me out of the country for the first time on a trip they took with my aunt, uncle and cousin to visit good family friends of ours in Germany. There's a lot I don't remember about that trip, but we have maintained a close relationship with everybody in Germany, so I knew I wanted to go back this semester.

I left Thursday afternoon right after my Italian class finished to get to Termini, where I then took a train to the airport. I flew to Frankfurt, and oddly enough it was really hard to find a direct flight from Rome to Frankfurt, so I had to fly with a layover in Amsterdam. I arrived in Frankfurt a little after 10 pm and Leonie and her sister Melanie and Melanie's fiance Udo were there to pick me up! It was so exciting to be back in Germany. Of course Leonie was in the US this past summer, but I hadn't been to Germany since 2000!

We stayed the first night at Melanie and Udo's apartment in Frankfurt, which was a very welcome change from all of the hostels I've stayed in lately. Leonie is in a program for school where she takes classes in Mannheim and then works in Frankfurt, so she often stays with Melanie and Udo. They had to work the next morning, but Leonie and I slept a little later and had breakfast at the apartment (where I had my first taste of her mother's jam and German brown bread--yum!) and then took public transportation into the center of Frankfurt.

We started exploring in the neighborhood of the Romer, which is the city hall of Frankfurt. This was Friday--we mostly walked all over Frankfurt seeing a few churches, Paulskirche (the seat of the first German assembly), and Main Tower. Leonie also took me to a shop that sells gingerbread from Nuremberg, so I bought some of that to brin back to Rome with me! We also went to a chocolate cafe to get some hot chocolate, and then we did some shopping on the main shopping street in Frankfurt.

She introduced me to Primark, which I had seen in the UK but didn't visit. It's basically the store that I've been looking for in vain in Rome... it has everything from clothes to accessories to small home goods. It's basically Target without the food. We don't have anything like that in Rome... you have to shop in 10 different stores for 10 different things. I was basically obsessed with it.

We also walked by the European Central Bank. I'm still trying to understand how the Euro works and Leonie and I had an interesting conversation about Greece and how all of that has been playing out. She said that it's hard because Germany has tried to help, but Greece isn't very appreciative of the help and hasn't wanted to make any changes. She said that the euro is very convenient but I can see how it would be very frustrating for a company like Germany to have to keep supporting people who don't appreciate it.

That night, we went to a traditional Apfelwein restaurant. Frankfurt is famous for apfelwein, and you can drink it plain, with water or with Fanta. She helped me order some traditional German food (bratwurst, potatoes with green sauce, "handkas mit musik") and we both had the apfelwein with Fanta... it was so good! When I've traveled this semester, I've really tried to branch out and order things that are traditional and different than what I would eat in Rome or in the US, and that was definitely the case at this restaurant. The bratwurst was obviously amazing, but I can't really describe the green sauce or handkas. But I loved everything, including the apfelwein!

We just went back to the apartment that night and hung out with Melanie and Udo. They showed me pictures of their trip to the US this past fall and Udo showed me pictures of a school trip he took to Rome. We watched some German TV and Leonie and I made our plans for the next day. We planned to get up and go to the botanic gardens in Frankfurt and then do the Ebbelwein Express, a train sponsored by one of the apfelwein companies that goes all around Frankfurt. We got up the next morning and had breakfast with Udo (more brown bread--yum!), and we took the train into the city... and we were almost there when I realized that I had left my iPad at the apartment. Yup. And we were leaving for the train station straight from the Ebbelwein Express to go to Leonie's hometown, so I needed to have it with me because I would be going to the airport the next day. Oops. So we turned around and got it (I felt so stupid... at least I left it at their apartment and not in some hostel), but by that point we were worried that we would have to rush through the gardens, so we decided to go to the Goethe House instead. That was actually really cool. The original house was destroyed during WWII, but all of the furniture and artifacts had been placed in storage for protection, so when the house was reconstructed, they moved all of that back into it. They reconstructed it to look exactly like it had before. They even had Goethe's writing desk, where he sat to write Faust. Geek moment there.

After the Goethe House, Leonie took me to a German bakery where we tried some traditional German pastries as our lunch. We ate those while we waited for the apfelwein train. The train is an older version of the new trams that Frankfurt uses, and it was so cute! We got on and were given our choice of apfelwein beverages... we both tried the apfelwein with water this time. It took about an hour for the train to go all around the city and it was really relaxing.

After that, we went to the main train station in Frankfurt to take the train to Neustadt, where Leonie's dad picked us up and took us to Leonie's house in Momberg. We settled in for a bit and chatted with her parents over coffee and cake, and we Facetimed with Erik, then my dad and Ethan, and then my mom, Erin, and my grandma (who were shopping for prom dresses at the time!). That was so exciting because usually I can't get good enough wifi in Italy to facetime! And it was nice for Leonie to "see" everybody. While we were facetiming with my mom, grandma and Erin, Gerd and Helga walked in the door for dinner. When I was in Germany 13 years ago, I stayed with Gerd and Helga with my grandparents, so it was so cool for my grandma to get to see them through Facetime! Gerd and Helga came for dinner that night, and Leonie's mom made us an amazing dinner. She cooked schnitzel (SO GOOD) with potatoes, salad, more handkas mit musik and brown bread. Compared to my last few trips, it was nice to relax and catch up with good friends over some wonderful food (and of course we sampled some wonderful German beer to go along with it).

We slept in the next morning a bit, and Leonie's mother prepared an amazing breakfast for us, which included Bavarian white sausage. I can't really explain it, but it was so delicious. We also had some more of her strawberry jam with brown bread, and she gave me a jar of it to bring back to Rome with me! We spent a couple of hours walking around Neustadt and seeing all there is to see in Neustadt, and then we went to Gerd and Helga's house for some tea before Leonie and I got on the train back to Frankfurt so I could get to the airport.

I promised that I wouldn't wait 13 more years before I visited Germany again, and Leonie and I got on the train. We made it to the airport with plenty of time, but we had to share the train there with some very excited Frankfurt soccer fans who were on their way to the stadium. That was interesting. Once we got to the airport, we sat in the waiting area for a bit before I went through security. Minor mishap: Gerd and Helga had given me a large jar of Nutella (they remembered how much I had liked it when I visited before, which was before anybody in America had ever heard of it) and Leonie's mom had given me a jar of jam, and I was really hoping they would let me take those through security, but they wouldn't, so I ended up having to get out of line and check my suitcase for the flight back. Well worth it, I assure you... the jam is amazing! I still made it to my flight with plenty of time, but I had a layover in Paris, and my flight from Paris to Rome was delayed for about two hours for mechanical problems with the plane. The last time I was on a plane with mechanical problems, I ended up missing a trip to Madrid and spending two days in Washington D.C. (my family will laugh about that one), so I was worried that I was going to get stuck in Paris overnight. Luckily, I didn't, but by the time I made it to Rome it was almost midnight and the metro was closed, so I had to take a cab back to the residence.

One thing I thought about the entire weekend is how lucky I am that I know English as a first language. Leonie and I talked a little bit about this. Everywhere I've traveled, people use English as a universal language. If two people don't speak the same language, they revert to English because most likely that is a language that they have in common. It's the same at tourist attractions, airports, and public transportation... like in Frankfurt, everything was in German, but it was also repeated in English. It makes me ashamed because I don't speak any language as well as most of the people I've met speak English. Sure, I studied Spanish for four years and I'm learning a lot of Italian here, but if I had to make my way around a city using only directions spoken in Spanish or Italian, I would struggle a bit. I know enough of both to get around, but if I was forced to use only Spanish in a country that didn't speak English at all, I don't know what I would do. It amazed me when I see tourists in Rome speaking English to shop keepers or museum workers when clearly English isn't their first language. And it definitely motivates me to keep studying languages. Just a few thoughts on that...

Pope Francesco!

Just a few hours after I wrote my last blog where I said I wasn't expecting to see white smoke from the Vatican tonight, we have a new pope! I walked over to St. Peter's around 6:15 and stopped for gelato on the way, expecting to wait around in St. Peter's, see black smoke, and turn around. Last night, we didn't see smoke until about 7:45, but around 7:15 everybody turned to the screen. At first it looked kind of gray, but then it was obviously white and everybody started screaming and cheering and rushing to the front of the square. It was then that St. Peter's started to fill up as people from all over the city rushed to see the new pope make his first public experience. It took almost an hour for everybody to be ready for him to come out, but it was such an amazing experience!

First, someone came out and announced that there had been a successful vote and gave us the name of the newly-elected pope... Pope Francesco, formerly Jorge Mario Bergolio, of Argentina! How exciting!

It stopped drizzling right before he came out to address the crowd, which was nice because it got everybody to put their umbrellas down so we could see better. I couldn't understand all of what he was saying because he spoke in Italian, but people around me were laughing so he must have been funny!

While we were waiting, members of the Swiss Guard processed out to the front of the Basilica basically right in front of me, so that was cool.

Once he finished speaking, he told all of us good night, and then came the mad dash to the exit. One thing the Vatican does not understand: crowd control. They wouldn't open the rest of the gates, so we were all trying to exit through one tiny little opening in the gate out of the square. But I eventually made it out and back to my apartment, where I am still in shock! I was not expecting to get to witness this tonight... I thought for sure it would happen this weekend while I'm gone.

Sitting back at my apartment, I am still in shock that I got to witness something like this! Not only that, but I get to see the new pope at Easter mass in a few weeks. And I'm going to Germany tomorrow to see some good family friends, and my mom is coming to visit next week. I actually cannot believe my life right now.

Papal Conclave

So, in case you've been living under a rock for the past month or so, the Pope has resigned and the Vatican is in the middle of conclave, as of yesterday afternoon! 

The first vote started yesterday around 4:30, and the smoke from the ballots was supposed to be between 7 and 8. I was in class until 6:15 but we headed to St. Peter's right after (getting gelato on the way at our favorite gelato place, which just so happens to be right outside the Vatican walls...) to wait with the crowd for the first smoke!

Waiting for smoke from the first vote!

They have cameras on the chimney because you can't actually see it from the square.

It's been crazy being here for something like this, but it's not like people in Rome can drop whatever they're doing to hang out in St. Peter's. There really isn't anything to do there in between votes, anyway. Apparently every day there's supposed to be smoke between 12-1 and 7-8, since they're voting twice a day now. Then as soon as there's white smoke, rumor has it that everybody runs to St. Peter's because it takes about 45 minutes for the new pope to get dressed and prepare to make his first public appearance.

I'm going to Germany this weekend to visit a good friend of mine, so my fingers are crossed that we see white smoke before I leave, but I have a feeling that's not going to happen and that sometime while I'm gone we'll have a new pope. But, we just found out that we got confirmed for tickets for Easter mass with the new pope so that definitely will make up for missing the white smoke if it comes this weekend!

Black smoke... no pope!

"Sede Vacante" stamps and seals (it's a different seal during a conclave than when there is a pope!)

I'm headed back to St. Peter's tonight to watch the smoke from the third vote... fingers crossed!