Our two weeks in Rome were wonderful. After constantly moving around for the first few weeks of the trip, it was nice to get to settle in and stay in one place for a while. We’ve been busy, though. We spent most of our days touring, exploring the city’s 2700-year-old history first-hand. We’ve seen everything from the crumbling ruins of the Roman Empire to the impossibly beautiful churches of the Renaissance to the simpler (and hideously boring) architecture of Fascist Italy. We’ve toured churches and museums, seen some of the most significant art and architecture of the last few thousand years, and learned so much about the culture and history of this city.
Interspersed with all this touring are free afternoons and entire free days, and we’ve used this time to rest and to experience and explore the city. Between the 23 of us, we’ve spent countless hours (and countless euros) shopping, gone to mass at the Vatican, visited jazz clubs, gone dancing, strolled through open-air markets, gone on picnics in the city’s sprawling gardens, and gone running along the banks of the Tiber River. We’ve even gone to a professional soccer match and were amazed and overwhelmed by the sounds of cannon-fire and fight songs, the sight of massive red and yellow flags waving all around us …and the smell of cigarettes.
It’s surreal and wonderful just being here in this country, and being here with such incredible people has made this trip all the more amazing! In case you can’t tell, I’m more than a little excited about this adventure and the people with whom I’m sharing it. Everything about this trip has been wonderful! We’re almost four weeks into this Italian adventure, and I’m honestly still loving every moment. I still wake up every morning just as excited, just as amazed that I’m actually here. It’s actually really sad to think that our trip is over halfway over; I don’t want it to end!
You should be hearing from us a lot in the next few weeks, not only from the official blog writers but from our classmates as well, writing about their own experiences in Rome and the cities to come. Stay tuned! We’re heading to Florence next—the city of Dante and Petrarch, Michelangelo and da Vinci, the birthplace of the Renaissance. I honestly can’t wait! There’s so much to see and do and experience in this country, and I can’t wait to see what lies ahead!
– Brian
Blog Team
Italy 2012
