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Friday, May 02, 2003
I had my last "real" cooking class today - we made 6 dishes! I'm stuffed full of fennel and tomato.
It's been quite awhile since I updated, probably because things are slowly winding down here. I've been in Florence for the past few weeks, and will be until I leave on the 10th of May. Though it was a bit of a hassle, I was able to change both me and Leanne's plane tickets from the 25th of May to the 16th.
We decided that we have seen so much in the past 3 or so months that it was pretty much time to go home. Oh, and also, we don't really have any money left! So we scrapped out plans for Ireland. However, we still have a wonderful 5 nights planned on the Amalfi coast. We'll be staying at a place called Hotel Desiree in Sorrento, with a private balcony, roof terrace, and elevator down to a private beach. We've planned on days visiting Pompei, Amalfi, Ravello, Positano, the greek ruins of Paestum, and the islands of Ischia and Procia. We decided to go to those aforementioned islands instead of Capri, as we heard at this time of the year it becomes a small land mass filled 99% with tourists. We will go back early on the 15th and spend the day saying goodbye to Italy in the best way possible - by visiting some of our favorite sights in Rome. We then fly out on Friday the 16th around noon, and get back to our respective homes around 7:00 at night.
It hit me two days ago that I'll actually be leaving Italy in less than two weeks. Less than two weeks. It's insane. Even though I've still been a tad sick with a cold, the past few days have been really nice here. Yesterday I finally went up to Piazza Michelango, a big hike but an incredible view. I was walking home through Piazza Signoria, thinking about the timing of getting into Rome early enough on the 15th, and then realized it was my last day, and that hit pretty hard.
I already feel like the thing I'm going to miss the most is the view outside of my apartment window. The piazza that my view looks out to, Piazza Demidoff, is bursting at the seams with greenary now that all the flowers and trees bloomed. When I'm in my apartment reading or eating I have the windows open and get to take a piece of Florence right inside my studio apartment.
I'm thinking about all the things I will want to do when I come home, like drive, watch TV, use my computer NON STOP FOR DAYS ON END!!!, goto TGIF and have some good American food, and then the mexican restaurant nearby and have authentic Mexican again. I also cannot wait to see the new X-Men and Matrix sequels. The new Matrix movie is coming out the day I fly in!
I can't wait to spend time with my family again. I'm glad I'm getting in on a weekend so that we can all be together, without people being at school and work. I can't wait to cook too (though I've warned my dad that he better expand those taste buds of his!) I eat things I never thought I would eat, like raw tomato all the time, or eggplant.
I'm writing kind of a story type thing in the leather bound journal that Leanne bought me. It's great because I have so many thoughts that have built up in my head the past 3 months here, and I'm getting them all down onto paper before I leave and forget them all.
Here is our rough outline for the last days:
May 9: Classes end
May 10: Take a 11AM train from Florence (goodbye!) to Naples, then hop on a connecting short train to Sorrento. Spend most of the day in Sorrento and the beach there.
May 11: Spend the day in Pompeii and make the short climb up Vesuvius.
May 12: Travel to the neighboring towns of Amalfi, Ravello, and Positano
May 13: Visit the island of Ischia, north of Capri, and Procia. We're thinking of either getting a motorbike or bikes and going around the Island (I think you can circumnavigate Procia on pedal bikes in an hour).
May 14: Visit the Greek ruins of Paestum, about an hour or so south. The pictures of this place look really cool. Spend the rest of the day relaxing.
May 15: Leave on a 9:30 train from Naples to Rome. Visit the Trevi fountain and Palatine hill. Hope to stop at the first place we ever spoke Italian in and get hot chocolate. Spend the night at a well reviewed hostel right next to the train station.
May 16: Leave at around 8:00 for the airport.
I think that I'm going to come home, and miss here a lot. But I'm trying as hard as I can to make sure I don't regret not doing anything here. I know that I might look back and wish I had traveled more, but I know that I couldn't reasonably have done that with the money I had. I spent a lot of weekends inside the apartment or just sitting around Florence, but I've had the experience of a lifetime over spring break and some of the API excursions. I just look at all the folders of photos I have (Brussels, Paris, London, Verona), and sometimes can't believe that I've actually been all those places. I guess that I just have to take advantage of things as best I can with the resources I've been lucky enough to have.
Or, as my favorite poet of all time said:
what if a dawn of a doom of a dream
bites this universe in two,
peels forever out of it's grave
and sprinkles nowhere with me and you?
Blow soon to never and never to twice
(blow life to isn't:blow death to was)
—all nothing's only our hugest home;
the most who die,the more we live
posted by Jon at 12:51 PM
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