First full day!

Ok, so I suppose this is my first ~real~ blog post. Yay!

Today was my first full day in Rome. Yesterday was good: had a great flight with Lufthansa (3 words: mini Ritter Sport), a fun car ride to the hostel, and a good dinner, then completely crashed.

Today was even better! I woke up early, got breakfast at the hostel, and then walked to Mass at St. Susana's with Mayme, Erin, and Cat. It was a really pretty church, and Mass was in English! Afterward we explored a little bit, and stumbled upon the church that has the Ecstasy of St. Theresa in it! That was really cool, especially since Mayme is doing her project on it and could tell us a lot about it.

The rest of the day was spent exploring the area around our hostel. Cat and I ventured off in search of pizza, and ended up walking for at least an hour before we found a place...which ended up being less than a block from our hostel! Woops! The pizza was really good, and cheap--we paid for it by its weight, not by the slice! I had one piece with cheese, zucchini, and tomato, and another piece with potato slices (yes, potatoes!) and sausage. The sausage in Italy is amazing, by the way. It's really nice to just walk around and look at all the neat buildings. There's always something interesting to look at! Cat and I ended up finding this garden place with a bunch of statues and stuff. Felt really American when I put my head on one of the headless statues for a picture. Teehee... Anyway, we got back to the hostel and took a lonnnnnng nap (all four of us, since Sheida and Allison got back from the Baths of Caracalla soon after us).

Finally woke up, and it was dinner time! It was Nick's birthday, so eight of us (there are a ton of us at the same hostel) got together for dinner to celebrate with him. We ended up walking for like an hour...somehow found ourselves in the Roman ghetto. There were a ton of locals just drinking and hanging out in a square, so Sheida went up to some lady and asked where there was a good restaurant nearby. We were directed to this restaurant called Porca Vacca ("fat cow" in Italian), which was my best experience in Italy so far!

We were seated in the back of the restaurant. As I walked through, I noticed that everyone in there was Italian. We also walked by this glass case that was filled with huge chunks of meat. Pretty much a vegetarian's hell...glad I'm a carnivore! After we were seated a waiter came up to us and asked if we speaked Italian ("Parla italiana?"). We got confused and just kind of stared at him blankly. He gave us an exasperated look and got an English-speaking waiter from a different section. It was a bit embarrassing, but I have a feeling that's not the last time it will happen...hopefully I will pick up some Italian soon! The second waiter was really nice and helpful, gave us advice on what to order since the whole menu was in Italian. I ordered gnocchi with pesto sauce and a salad. Most of the others got pizza (Mayme and Erin accidentally ordered one with a hardboiled egg on it!). We split 2 liters of wine (when in Rome...) among eight of us. Everything was delicious! Really great experience. It was just a lot of fun being with such a big group in an unfamiliar area, eating delicious food and trying to figure everything out! And the wine helped as well. :D

Ended up being like a 10 minute walk back. Woops once again! Tomorrow we check out and move into our apartments! Sooo excited. I haven't seen the Campo de Fiori (where the UW Rome Center is) yet, excited for that too. We also buy cell phones and get a free dinner! Anyway, I'm so tired, and this blog has taken a ridiculous amount of time to write, so I am off! Night!