Class Ending

Today will be our last day of class (it's after midnight here). We'd like to continue on to the next level, but since my travel papers situation is still pending, we've decided to do some traveling in April. It's a tough decision as we've both enjoyed our teachers (the teachers move on with the class to the next level) and our classmates. I find it interesting that when everyone is working towards a common goal, in this case learning Italian, that it's easy to get along. My class has been a blast. I'm the only native English speaker and feel fortunate to interact daily with people from Europe, Africa, South America and Asia. Yesterday, I joked around with my group members - an engineering major from Egypt, a philosphy major from Tehran, a nun from the Congo, and a businessman from Montenegro. No hard feelings and everyone was entitled to their opinion in how to use cui - a cute Italian word that basically means "which" in English. I think we should get some of our world leaders to take a language class together. That's my deep thought for the evening.

In the meantime, we leave for Venice on Monday. A couple of days there and then we'll travel to Padua (Padova), Verona and Bolzano before crossing the border into Austria. We'd like to spend a couple of weeks out of Italy traveling through Austria, Germany and Switzerland. Perhaps we'll hit up the Czech Republic as well. It's nice that we can be flexible on dates. We just have to be back by the 22nd as Jessica has a friend visiting.

Any suggestions on places to visit? Post a comment or send me an email with suggestions. Seriously, we'd love to hear your thoughts.

Our First Visitor .. and some other things

Since it's thunder- storming and hailing in Rome today, I thought this afternoon would be a good time to add a little post. At the top of the agenda (no need for a drumroll), we had our first victim, I mean visitor. There's nothing like knowing two people in Rome so they can take you around and read the guidebook to you. Yes, that's basically what we did when Dan Shamir arrived last Thursday. Ok, so the "Jack & Jessica Roman Tour" still needs to be polished - we'll get there. Dan begged (not really) to have his picture added to the blog, so I've complied. Here's Dan (jet-lagged) and Jessica (not) in front of the Trevi fountain.

Dan helped to break the monotony of going to school every day. Though it's definitely been good for the both of us. And for those of you wondering, yes, Jessica moved up to the next level.

A couple of weeks ago, before we started school, we took a 3-day trip to Pisa, Lucca and Florence. I mean no disrespect to Pisa when I say it's boring. We did it in a half a day and that was too long. Yes, the tower is leaning and they had to add a sunken counter-weight a few years ago to prevent it from toppling, but I've seen it in enough pictures to know what it was going to look like. More interesting were the bapistry, where the security guard harmonizes with herself every half hour in this echoey cylindrical building, and the Campo Santo walled-cemetery, which suffered extensive damage during WWII but still houses some large 14th century Hell frescoes with devils eating the innards of the newly damned. If you go to Pisa, you have to hold up the tower. It's intoxicating trying to get the perfect picture. This is as close as we got before Jessica said I was being a dork.

Lucca is a quaint medieval town with a huge fortified wall surrounding it. The wall now serves as a park and we did the evening stroll with the locals before eating in a cute trattoria.

The next day we went to Florence and did the usual touristy things. Jessica hadn't seen Michel- angelo's David so we made sure to go the Accademia for that. I forgot how much I enjoyed that place. It houses David and I was, and still am, awestruck by the statue, but I forgot how it also houses some unfinished Michelangelo statues. Some were just started while others are nearly finished. It's really impressive to see how he brought these pieces of rock to life. We tried to get off the beaten path and so we trekked to the other side of the river for a view of the city. Here's a picture of Jessica trying not to steal the show from beautiful Florence in the background. Also, here's what David would look like if he had too much McDonald's.