Under the Tuscan Sun (but for real this time...)

Ciao i miei amici!!!

**Disclaimer, I am terribly sorry for my grammatical/spelling errors. I go through it once, but usually don’t catch a lot of them. For example, in my last entry, I meant to say “Hitler’s bunker” instead of “Hitler’s butler,” if any of you caught that (it’s been corrected now…).

Cortona

Alright so this entry might be a little less eventful (and shorter…) than my last entry but a good amount of stuff has happened!!!!

Alright so on Friday of this past week I went on a fieldtrip to Sienna with my Saints and Sinners class (the one with the hilarious teacher Adrian Hoch).  Although I’ve already been to Sienna (remember the head??) it was cool to see it again. We met Prof. Hoch at Duomo di Siena. While we were waiting to enter the church we got to talking about young pop artists (like one direction- shoutout Jackie Layer!), and we asked Adrian if she liked Justin Beiber. She responded with “Are you talking about the animal?” This was an awesome way to start off the day.

Mah girl Adrian

Interior of the Duomo

We also visited the Crypt and the Cathedral museum. It was really cool to see all the stuff we learned about in class. After that we breaked for lunch on our own.  We walked around the main square where there happened to be A CHOCOLATE MARKET-like thing happening. This would have been amazing if I hadn’t given it up for lent. It was a little rough.

The group of us in the sqaure

Chocolate market........

But after lunch we went to the Palazzo Pubblico- which is the town hall, and learned a little about the history. We then headed to The House of Saint Catherine (owner of the head) and then eventually back to San Domenico (where the head is kept).  It was really cool this time because I actually knew about Saint Catherine and her life. After that we headed back to Perugia.

Statue of St. Catherine at her house

For some reason i felt like taking an artistic shot of San Dominico

Figured I'd throw her head in there one more time

The next day was relatively low-key. My friends Amanda, Dani, Diana and I went to the Saturday market in Perugia. I bought a lot of tomatoes and kiwi, a flower in a pot, sunglasses, and lemon honey all for under ten euro!! I really hope I can go back at least another time. That night my friends and I made a huge dinner (my contribution was insalata caprese- cant get enough of that stuff). We also had veggie soup, a pasta bake, and pears wrapped in prosciutto!

The market!!! With the Perugia hills in the background :)

The next day Diana and I decided to go on a daytrip. We had first intended to go to a place called Todi, but when we got to the train station we learned that apparently there were no trains to Todi from that station. So we saw a train was leaving to a town called Cortona in 5 minutes, so we decided, “what the heck” let’s go there instead! So 45 minutes later we arrive at this somewhat desolate town. We walked around for a few minutes until we realized that we were not yet in Cortona. To get to Cortona we needed to ascend a HUGE hill mountain-like thing. Now Diana and I are no strangers to walking up hills (see first entry), but this trumped anything we ever walked up before (See pics below).  It was also one of the hottest days yet. It was only after our climb that we realized we could have taken a bus. But that was ok, because we got to stop and take a ton of pictures on the way there. So brace yourself for all the pictures....

Starting the journey....

Making our way up the hill

Getting there....

It was getting hot...

Slowly ascending the hill- cool church

Even further up the hill

   

WE MADE IT!!!!

We even found an escalator!!!

Around an hour later, we finally summated the mountain that is Cortona. It was amazing. It was just the Tuscany you imagined Tuscany to be. You know why? Because this happened to be where the movie “Under the Tuscan Sun” was filmed!!!!!! ……..We didn’t find this out until after we got back to Perugia. But it was still awesome, and really peaceful with not a lot of tourists. We walked all around the town (got a lot of exercise- that place was even hillier than Perugia), had amazing hot chocolate, and people-watched.  It was great. After that we decided to take a taxi back down (it was dark by this time), and then headed back to Perugia. Overall, it was an awesome day.

Outside a church in Cortona

Still happy we made it

Cortona in the evening
 (would have done more pictures but i feel like I might have already overwhelmed you)

I wish we would have known...

So now it’s Thursday, and this week has been pretty relaxing. I ‘ve been trying my hand more at cooking recently, so on Monday I tried making a pasta experiment.  Let’s just say things were a little too al dente and a little too cold. But like a true scientist, I will perform another experiment again soon! (Im collecting a lot of recipes, Mom!).

Tomorrow I leave at 6:30 am (I KNOW) for my overnight fieldtrip to Florence and Milan for my Leonardo Da Vinci class. I am extremely excited for this because a.) We get to go to the Uffizi b.) we get to see The Last Supper c.) we get to experience the Milan nightlife and most importantly d.) this class is also with Adrian. We have endearingly nicknamed the trip “Ragedrian.” So very excited.

Alright amici J Devo andare adesso.

Emilia