packing up - last few days in ROMA ETERNA

i don't think they'll
ever learn what
is and what isn't
a parking spot.

Oooooh goodness. I can't believe it! Only a few days left here in Rome. This week has been a whirlwind. I thought that the past few weeks had been flying by, but just the past few DAYS have been like a blink of an eye.

I've spent my time soaking up as much of Rome as I can, as well as spending some time recouperating from the nonstop craziness that has been the past few months. Now that classes are over I can sleep in later (well..until 9 instead of 6), so that's been nice. I've been spending a lot of time with my roommates, too, which has been fun. Sunday night we all walked to dinner in the Jewish Ghetto since we had never eaten there before. My mom, Dave, and Becky ate at a famous place there so we tried it out. It's called Da Giggetto (or something along those lines). The Jewish Ghetto in Rome is famous for their friend artichokes, and apparently this place had the best of the best. We shared a couple of them, and they were amazing!! It almost tasted like a really really yummy potato chip. As my entree I got a new type of pasta I'd never tried - spaghetti with tuna in red sauce. Wonderful, wonderful. On the way home we stopped by a gelato place.

my newest addition to my photo purchases -
the picture of the picture doesn't
do it justice.

Sunday and Monday were crazy (as well as a few days before then) because it's the Beautification of John Paul II. There were sooooo many people in town! Even in Prati, which was so weird to me. When we walked home from dinner Sunday night at like 10:30, there were still loads of people in St. Peter's Square.

What other exciting events have happened this week? Monday I had the last yoga class of the semester and was so used to having photography after that I wasn't ready to go home yet when I left the gym. I decided to head back over to the Jewish Ghetto to see if the photo store was open since that's my #1 favorite place in all of Rome. Lucky for me, it was! I spent over 2 hours searching through all the old photos again. This store is so neat, I wish I could explain it. All the picture are so different - all from different parts of the world, geographies, types of people, ages, rich and poor, still lives, portraits, moments in lives..it's really beautiful. I think that is my favorite part - the moments. Every picture was taken for a reason, to document a special moment in the person's life. Sifting through the thousands of pictures, I get to dive into their world even if just for a moment and relive that feeling that they felt as they snapped the shot.

I couldn't leave without buying something, and when I handed the old man who owns the shop the pictures I chose, he spent a few moments on each one, observing them and critiquing my choices. I got a "bellisimo", a humored laugh, and a "magnifico". Looks like my choices were successful! Then he asked me if I studied photography, which I was really excited about because I'm hoping that means I have a good eye haha. He was a cute little old man, I'm going to miss that shop!

I took a long, slow walk home since it was such a beautiful day. It's been really pollen-y so my allergies have been acting up like craaaazy. I decided to walk down by the river, which was more covered so the wind wasn't as bad. It was so nice to meander down by the river and soak up all the sights! I'm going to miss it here.

attempt at ship-like mini cakes

Tuesday was my one exam for art history and it went really well! I studied some for it but not too much, since I have an A in the class so I don't necessarily need a good grade on the final haha. (Don't worry mom and dad, I'm pretty sure I still got an A on the exam anyways). It was really easy, so that was good. I came home and baked a cake for our "Scipmates" dinner - the last planned family dinner we were having together in our apartment on Via degli Scipioni! We each volunteered to make something, and of course I offered my baking services haha. I spent all afternoon making little miniture cakes for each of us that looked like ships (since we live on Scipioni - pronounced SHIPioni - get it??). They were so cute! Not exact replicas of ships, but hey...they tasted amazing so that's all that mattered.

 Debbie made pesto chicken with mozzarella melted on top, Tara was in charge of the bruschetta (tomato/mozzarella and pesto/prosciutto/mozzarella YUM), Kaylie made a salad, and Ashley made pasta with veggies. It was soooooooo good, and so nice to hangout with everyone while they cooked. I planted myself in the kitchen while they cooked since I had finished my cake earlier. That was an awesome decision because they let me be the taste tester! :)

beach time

Other than that I've been packing up (so weird), napping, relaxing...it's been so nice. Wednesday I spent the day at the beach in Ostia which was suuuuper nice and relaxing. Thursday I had to run a few errands. I'm trying to get reimbursed from the insurance company for my doctor's appointment so I filled out a claims form for that and picked up my last paycheck for yoga.

Serafino wanted to meet with all his photo classes one more time, so we met for an hour on Thursday. We talked about just random stuff - he decided he wanted to take the last meeting to talk about the philosophical and deeper part of photography as opposed to the technical stuff. We discussed Osama's death and why no pictures were out yet / how someone could easily photoshop him into a picture and make it look real, so why did we need to SEE it if we knew things like this were possible? Then we went around the room and talked about our work, what we learned about ourselves through our photography, etc. It was really nice to meet once more with him. He is definitely one of my favorite teachers I have ever had.

I came home after, and Debbie, Tara, Ashley and I began the celebrations for Cinco de Mayo. When Kaylie got home after her exam at 7 the party was already hopping. Around 8 we went to dinner at the Mexican restaurant around the corner to celebrate some more. Quite a night. Debbie and Kaylie participated in the "tequila cart race"... and it went downhill from there. Haha it was a successful (?) last night out in Roma.

Today is our last day. INSANITY. It was absolutely unreal to check-in online for my flight tomorrow morning. Pretty much everything is packed up. API threw and Arrivederchi lunch for us at this super nice restaurant outside of Rome. They had a gorgeous garden where we got some awesome pictures. Unfortunately my camera has decided to die completely from the sand from the Sahara, so I'll have to post pictures once my roommates put them up on Facebook. We had a yummy lunch, then came back to the apartment.

The plan for the night is to go to all the big monuments one more time, swim in the Trevi (if there are no police around so we won't get arrested), eat at the pizzeria across the street, clean the apartment, finish packing, and bring Tara and Ashley's mattresses into our room to hangout all together for one last night. AKA: no sleeping. At 2 am we have a pancake "breakfast" planned (in quotes because, well, it will be 2 am) to get rid of our syrup and pancake mix. After breakfast I'll probably shower, do a little wee-hours-of-the-morning yoga, then catch a cab to the airport. AH!! this time tomorrow I'll be on a plane home. I can't believe how quickly the time has flown. It seems like every day sped up more and more. I'm soooo excited to come home and reunite with everyone, but I don't think I realize how much I'll miss this beautiful city and the lifestyle here. Oooh goodness. It'll be an interesting transition home.

I'll probably do one or two more posts to let you know when I get home safely! Thank you all for reading this blog, I'm so glad I could keep you up to date with my crazy life in la citta eterna:)