Catching up. Vatican City!

So I guess Friday has already been covered since our acquaintance with the neighborhood happened that day rather than Wednesday. We were lazy and went to bed early Friday night so we could get up early and go to the Vatican Museum and the Sistine Chapel. The line was long for students to get in, but it was only 8 euro if you had a student ID. Poor Nika is still waiting on hers, so she had to pay the full price of 14.

The Museum was incredible. I probably took another 400 photos. There was so much depth and detail to the paintings of each individual room we entered. There is so much intricacy that covered such a large mass it was almost too overwhelming to comprehend. But than once you take a few steps closer and you can see the texture of the paint, and the movement of each stroke the painter made with his brush. It's beyond words to describe the detailed work that lined this museum. We walked for an hour through each of the rooms, some of which used to be bedrooms of previous popes. We stopped, sat, and gazed in a few rooms because we were in such awe. The ceiling was covered in art and the walls from top to bottom. With detailed marble lining all of the floors. We wondered how long it could have possibly taken to create such a masterpiece. To give you an idea of how large this place is, we only went through HALF!

The Sistine Chapel was purely undescribable. To see one of the most famous and historical pieces of art right before your eyes is powerful, moving, and again indescribable. To see man reaching for the heavens, and the tension between their two fingers almost touching but never will. It was mind blowing. We sat for about a half hour in the chapel. Some of our group bought rosaries for their mothers who would be thrilled to have a rosary from the Sistine chapel, I however moved on. Afterwards we got a bite to eat outside of the Vatican and walked around the neighborhood and shopped since it was the last day of sales. I bought a pair of boots and a leather bomber jacket! The jacket is purple and has sweet collars. Nick went on a major shopping spree, Lauren got some boots as well, and Nika finally got a new wallet. We wandered for a couple more hours, stopped for Gelatos and headed home for a quiet evening. We all watched Pineapple Exrpress in Rinaldo's and went to sleep. It was a very calm night life weekend in Rome which was really nice for all of us.

Sunday we attempted to get up and go to the market, but failed miserably. We had no idea where we were going, and since it closed by 1 we decided there was no point in trying to get get there with limited time to shop. We slept in late to get ourselves well rested to watch the superbowl from midnight until 4 am. We ate dinner, caught up on some homework, and headed out for the evening around 11. We went to a new bar called On the Rocks. There were more Italians there which was nice. Its in an area called Trestevere which I am looking forward to exploring more. I hear there are more bars, less Americans, and a more diversified population in the surrounding areas. So I have yet to lose all hope in meeting some young Italians. Sunday night was also the most dramatic night of my life. I think alcohol and an extremely intense football game can really throw some people over the edge. Especially men who already have a tendency towards "Asshole" qualities. Needless to say, beer was thrown, screaming took place, kicking out of those men screaming at us, and finally a chair was thrown at us as well by some older Italian man. I was incredibly sober so this course of events was to say the least draining. But a funny memory in the long run. But to top off the night we had the best taxi ride home I have ever had in my entire life. It was Lauren, Nika, Katie and I. The man was staked outside of the bar waiting for those ready to come home after the superbowl. I'm sure he could hear the frazzled and distressed tone in our voices, so within about 2 minutes of the cab ride he pops in a cd and turns it on blast! It has 8 songs on it including Maroon 5, Jordan Sparks, Rhianna, and several other American Pop artists. This man was running a business! He had us all screaming at the top of our lungs and dancing to the music, he even participated as well! We had so much fun on the cab ride home we were able to completely forget about our disasterous night. Unfortunately I didn't get to bed until about 6 am and Monday morning I my first Sociology test. That didn't go as well as I had hoped. I am gonna step up my game in school for sure! Classes like I expected though are extremely hard.

Anyways, after class 6 of us went on a piercing excursion. Four of us walked out with piercings. Katie, Kristi, Kaela, and I. I got my monroe pierced. I had two solid weeks of sobriety due to medication for my kidneys PLUS it was my birthday week (sort of?) so we all decided to be adventurous and get something done. It was a bonding experience for all of us, and we were all swollen for a couple days there after. My lip has finally gone down after lots of cleaning, tape and ice on the face, and much less aggressive Calcio playing this week.

Tuesday was a normal day, watched another depressing movie which I talked about in my previous post. I guess De Sicca was trying to convey Italy's misery during and after Facism, and he is doing a wonderful job. We are all left in shock after every film. But our teacher-Dibiagi-gets infuriated when we don't like the endings if they aren't happy. He doesn't understand why people always expect happy endings in the art of film because its not reality. He sees film as an art that is an expression of the world and reality. Artists are supposed to feed messages of reality through their own perspective and creativity, not just simply entertain. He says the real world almost never has happy endings which is absolutely true, we are just all used to Hollywood romantic comedies I guess. He is teaching me quite a bit about film, and its art, angles that the films are shot from. Its much more creative and deeply thought out than I ever initially expected.

Wednesday was calm until Calcio. Funny story though. Every Wednesday night at dinner they blast music in the cafeteria to pump everyone up to play calcio, its hilarious! People are jumpin around and making competitive gestures to the teams they will be playing against that night. Its a riot. Although, probably from all of the high energy and blasting music, the electricity in the cafeteria went out for the remainder of dinner hours. I have never eaten dinner in the dark but it was kind of exciting and weird and mysterious as to what would be put into your mouth next!

We had an 8:30 game and we played soccer in the rain! I have always wanted to play soccer for fun in the rain. Although like I said before, I was terrified of my face getting pelted with the ball so I was far less aggressive and actively playing this week compared to last week. We won though! Against the Marone team which I guess is brown? Gross. Anyways, we put up a good fight and won 4 to 3! Lauren and I skipped out on beer and pizza this week and headed home to get some homework out of the way. But since I had hardly broken a sweat in soccer I decided to go on a run... ME, running... WHAT?! I felt productive afterwards and showered for the undisclosed number'th time. Thursday and today (Friday) have been lazy lazy days. There was a wine tasting session that I had planned on going to, but shortly soon after realized I was still not able to drink... So I missed out on that excursion. Bummer, but I think my SLA said she would do it again, so I will definitely be attending the next time she coordinates it.

Today we had plans of going to H & M, and getting chinese food, but for some reason the rainy season has given us all a hard hit of fatigue and serious lack of motivation. So laundry, homework, catching up on the news were in the mix, and its going to be an early night as well. We are off to Florence at 5 am tomorrow morning! We hope to catch a 7 o'clock train and get in by 11 and explore the rest of the day! I'm very excited. We will hopefully go to Pisa on Sunday as well to see the leaning tower. I will write about Florence soon!

With much love,
Nora Claire.

P.S. This blog was obviously supposed to be posted on Friday night, but the internet has been overly spuratic and non-existent at times. So forgive the confusion. Hope everyone had a great weekend! TIme for another depressing movie tonight!