Florence November 27, 2009

Florence

November 27, 2009

It has been a truly wonderful week in Florence! I am realizing how much I truly love this city.

Tuesday I decided that I was finally healthy enough to start trying to run again every day after a month of being sick and having pulled muscles in my ribs. I went for an amazing run in the morning and was happy that my body seemed to remember the motions! I really like a route I made that takes me past the Accademia where Michelangelo’s David is and then along the Arno River. A majority of my route is in a residential area outside the city center so luckily there aren’t too many tourists to dodge. The part along the river is maybe one of the most gorgeous views I’ve ever seen, especially with all the fall colors! After my run I met Kelly for lunch. We grabbed paninos and ate them in front of Santa Croce Church. I just feel so blessed that Kelly is here in Florence too. We always have the most amazing conversations about our lives and faith. In the afternoon CEA arranged for us to climb the Duomo. It’s pretty funny that I live twenty feet away from it but had never climbed it! It is over 400 stairs to the top needless to say my legs were burning from my morning run already! But the view was well worth it! It starts getting dark so early now so by 4:30 the sun is already going down, so we were on top of the dome at the most beautiful time of day—it was gorgeous. I could have stayed up there all day. As we looked over the city, it was amazing to realize how well I know the city now and how much it has become my home…more than I ever thought a foreign city ever could. After having dinner Kayla and I walked around the city enjoying the window displays, Christmas lights and just really appreciating all the buildings and the river. I’m so glad that we planned most of our trips for the beginning of our semester here so that we can now enjoy the time we have left in Florence. It’s so easy to be lazy and stay at home at night, but we are really trying to get out and enjoy the city.

Wednesday morning my art history class went to the Uffizi Gallery, which was my third time since I’ve been here, but so great to have my teacher there to explain everything to us. After classes I ran again and am so happy that I’m not as out of shape as I thought I was because I ran almost an hour! Wednesday night American singer Ryan Cabrera was coming to one of our favorite clubs Cavalli Club (the one Roberto Cavalli owns) so our friend Gi got us tickets. Even though Ryan Cabrera isn’t a huge superstar, it was still fun to have a small taste of America by listening to a few of his songs that we love live. It was really fun too because we were literally six feet away from him while he performed.

Thursday….Thanksgiving! It definitely wasn’t a typical thanksgiving! I still had classes since it’s not an Italian holiday, but my classes ended up being so fun that day! For my food and wine class our assignment had been to bring in a food and wine pairing. My group brought crackers with brie and pear along with a chardonnay that had been recommended to us to pair with the crackers by a local wine shop. It was delicious! Every group in the class brought in different foods and wines so it was so fun sampling all of the nine groups’ pairings! It ended up being quite a bit of wine and most of the class including the teacher seemed to be quite intoxicated by the end! SUCH an Italian experience! Haha and so much fun! One of the groups brought in dates stuffed with gorgonzola cheese wrapped in prosciutto baked in balsamic vinegar…it sounded and looked disgusting but was insanely good! I surprised myself even by trying it, but loved it! My favorite pairing was an apricot tart paired with a Moscato wine. My next class of the day was Fashion Marketing & Merchandising and we had a field trip to world famous jewelry designer Angela Caputi’s studio. Her studio is across the Arno in the Santo Spirito neighborhood. Signoria Caputi talked to our class for over an hour about what makes her jewelry unique. She designs every piece, which is one-of-a-kind and has gained world-renown by word-of-mouth. All of her jewelry is made of synthetic materials, but a majority is fashioned out of fine plastics. I hadn’t ever considered plastic to be expensive or nice, but was informed otherwise. Her jewelry was beautiful and so unique! It was strange for me to see a jewelry collection without any metals. She took us to the workroom where women were assembling the jewelry by hand. Angela Caputi only employs fifteen people total, who are all women. She says she will never hire a man! Some of her jewelry is in a permanent exhibit in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

For Thanksgiving dinner my girlfriends and I signed up for a fixed menu Thanksgiving feast at a restaurant called Angels. The restaurant was in an old building, but very trendy inside. We had gotten all dressed up to make it special! All day it definitely did not feel like Thanksgiving, but the traditional foods made it feel more like home. We were given flutes of champagne upon sitting down, which was fun. Sitting there, it really finally hit us that we are adults. Kayla said a wonderful grace for us (her dad’s a pastor) and we just talked about how grateful we are for the lives God has given us and for the opportunity to be in Italy and for everything we have been able to see and experience. We expressed how thankful we are for our health and safety while abroad as well as all of our loved ones at home. We had an amazing time together at dinner. Not to mention the food was perfect! We started with a butternut squash soup with bread that was to die for then had turkey, cranberry sauce, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and steamed vegetables. The portions were perfect, we ended up being stuffed, but it was good it wasn’t ‘serve yourself’ or I would’ve definitely tried to fit more in! For dessert they gave us a sliver of pumpkin pie with a small scoop of chocolate ice cream. It was the perfect traditional Thanksgiving dinner! We needed to digest afterwards so we laid down for a little bit before going out for the night to Twice, which was really fun!

Today I was supposed to go to Certosa, a small town outside of Florence, with school, but ended up staying in Florence to finish a handout for my art history class that I have to use to present Michelangelo’s “Last Judgment” in Rome this weekend. After I finished I went for a beautiful run before meeting up with Kayla. We went to the Accademia where the David is since Kayla hadn’t been yet and I acted as the docent explaining everything at the museum since I am an art history pro now! We walked around after and popped into some shops along the way to Santa Maria Novella church. One of my sorority sisters Lauren Taylor and her mom are in town for the weekend so I’m going to dinner with them tonight. She is currently studying abroad in Madrid for the semester with SMU. Kayla and I are trying to squeeze in everything we haven’t gotten to do yet in Florence before we leave and one of the things was seeing Santa Maria Novella church. As we walked up to the church I couldn’t believe it, but there was Lauren and her mom! Florence really is small! It was so great to see her and they came with us inside the church to look around. Afterwards they headed off to see the David and Kayla and I did some grocery shopping. I decided to take Lauren and her mom to my favorite restaurant called Enoteca Coquinarius for dinner since it is close, authentic and really cute inside! We ended up spending three hours at the restaurant catching up! They loved the food and restaurant! The Italian dining experience is so unique in that they want you to stay as long as you want so our waiter did not bring our check until we asked for it literally hours later! It was so fun being with a friend from SMU and hearing about her abroad experience. It definitely made me feel blessed that I have had such great experiences with housing and everything here because Lauren hasn’t been as blessed. Her program does a home-stay in Madrid so she is living in someone’s home and her “Senora” is not the best to put it nicely. Seeing her definitely made me excited to see my SMU friends when I’m back in January.

I’m off to Rome in the morning with my Art History class, so I’ll fill ya’ll in soon!

Xoxo,

Kara