Photo Credit: Eric Mathis

Wow, what a week. This has been the busiest and longest week that I have had in quite some time. Now, it is Friday afternoon and I am looking forward to a relaxing weekend...of studying and preparing for finals. Oh well, at least it is the weekend, and Sabbath will soon be here.

The first reason that this week seemed about three times as long as it should have been is because I had a report due on Friday of a book I started reading on Monday. I only had to read about 100 pages, but this was not a book with any sort of storyline, plot, or in my opinion, any point to it whatsoever. It was a book about the science of translation. I had to read this book because I am in the translation class here, and the name of the class pretty much sums up the point of the class. This was a book on how to translate; a book of more than 300 pages explaining translation, the science behind it, its history, and of course, its importance.  Let me give you just a thirty second synopsis of what I have read this week, and what I have learned from it: Translation is the art of converting a written or spoken work from one language to another, it has been going on ever since those knuckleheads at the Tower of Babel got all mixed up, and last but not least, it is important because it makes works and ideas in other languages more universal for more people to understand.  There. You have just learned all I have learned from 100 pages of the most boring book in the world. Not only was there no flow and no relevance from topic to topic, but of course it had words that are used just to make the author sound smarter than she really is, half of which I had never seen before.
I have woken up every morning at 6:30am pretty much every day this week to read that **** book. Now that it has been read, and my report on it has been written- which basically says exactly what I just told you about the book, just buttered up a bit for the professor, I plan to sestar (if you know a little bit about Spanish, you might get the joke. If not, don't beat yourself up- it's my kind of humor), play basketball, go on a bike ride, and shoot the breeze in my hammock.

This week has been the week of prayer here, and our praise band/ choir was responsible for Tuesday and Thursday. I have thoroughly enjoyed the week of prayer so far, and it has been a blessing, but some nights it was hard to head out there and keep my head in it when I knew that about two hours out of my evening were gone, and once I got back to the room it would be time to not only work hard, but try to make up some time as well. All in all, everything worked out, and we are here at the weekend, Gracias a Dios.

Another source of stress for me this week was our Flamenco class performance on Thursday. Of course the big question of  the week was, "are we ready", and of course we were all asking that until the performance. Brittney, my dance partner, and I felt pretty good about the dance we had to do, but of course, just one moment of forgetfulness can mess up the rest of the dance that all of us have worked two months on, and it can look like we just horsed around the whole time, but I guess that is just what performance is. All in all, everyone did very well in the performance, and we all had a great time, though we were all happy for it to be over with.

 Well, in four more school days, finals will be over, I will have a week off, and my dad will be here three days after I start school again. If I can just make that final push, it is all gravy after that. Happy Sabbath to everyone, and have a great week.

26-2-12 Recap of the trip to Barcelona and Andorra

Our trip started off with getting out of bed earlier than normal, an early breakfast, and of course like any great trip, a nice long bus ride.

Usually, I like to get a seat near the front of the bus. I don't know if that is just because that is where I always sat with my dad on Mesa Grande trips, or if I enjoy talking with the teachers more than my classmates, or if I just like de-bussing first. However, by the time I boarded the bus, the only seat left that I could find was in the very, very back- the very last seat.

The buses in Spain are a bit different than the buses in the U.S.; at least the ones I am used to. In the back, instead of there being two seats on each side and an aisle; the way I like it, there are five seats straight across the back. The seat I got was seat 4 out of 5 which means I was sandwiched between Casey, a much buffer and taller guy than me, and Eric, who was scrunched up against the window asleep for a lot of the ride. Also, the seats in Spain are closer together, which means there is more legroom in the backseat of my brother's Civic coupe than these beauties.

Within the first five minutes of the ride, I quickly remembered the reason I don't like sitting in the back of a bus; claustrophobia and squished legs. I tried sleeping, but when there is a guy sitting on either side of you, your knees are already crammed into the seat in front of you, and your seat doesn't recline at all, sleep is very elusive. With sleep crossed off of my list of in-bus entertainment, I tried for the number two candidate; reading. I read a good 20 pages in very good time, so I thought I would just take a little break before continuing. Taking the break was my worst mistake, because once it was time to get back into the book, I had absolutely no motivation to do it. That pretty much sums up my relationship with  reading.

So, no sleeping, and reading was not fun anymore, so I went to number three on my list; listen to music. Many times when I listen to music, I can find a song really quickly that I want to listen to, set my Zune on shuffle, and just let it do its thing. This wasn't one of those times. Somehow I wasn't in the mood for any of the music on my Zune; out of thousands of songs, I couldn't even find ONE that I was in the mood for.

 Finally, I just decided to put the music away, and just sit. After a few moments, I started doing what I do best; free association thinking. I don't remember exactly what I thought about, but with the amount of time I had, I am pretty sure I covered everything from the Dodgers to why humans drink cow's milk to my favorite Christmas gift of all time to why couldn't they invent better buses.

Just as my self-help therapy session was coming to a close, we stopped at a gas stop where we all ate. This was a funny restaurant because it only sold sandwiches with omelet filings. I paid about 4 euros for two huge slices of bread and an omelet- all smashed together. It wasn't exactly gourmet, but like everyone else, I was hungry, so I ate it and kept my mouth shut.

We boarded the bus again, I assumed my position at the bottom of the sardine can, and we continued. I must have been really exhausted at that point, because about five minutes later, I rested my head on the seat rest of the seat in front of me, and the next thing I knew we were almost to our final destination in Andorra.

Andorra is a really nice place to go, don't get me wrong, but getting there is murder. Andorra is in the Pyrenees mountain range, so not only is it an ever climbing road, but the road is also very windy. Being in the back of that bus took me back to the days when my family would drive up to Pine Springs Ranch for the church retreat, and how we would have to stop every fifteen minutes because we all felt nauseous. One of our chaperones offered us some motion sickness gum, and I took some not really because I was feeling nauseous but because I just wanted something to do. We had to stop a few times because some people were about to lose their omelets if you catch my drift.

Finally, we arrived at our hotel in Andorra. My room was on level 5 on the 6th floor- no elevator. That is one thing that really bugs me about hotels in Europe; when your room is on level 5, that really means that you have to climb up one level of stairs just to get the level 1. I can't wait to come home to elevators in hotels, and when I get a room on the fourth floor, I will go to the FOURTH story. Anyways, after we put our stuff down and got settled in, we walked around the city we were in for a few hours, found dinner, and met back up at the hotel.

The inside of Caldea

In the city where we stayed, there is a spa called Caldea, and whoever planned the trip arranged for us to experience it for 3 hours; I am very grateful to whoever planned that. This spa is absolutely huge. In the picture, you can only see the inside; there is a little "lazy river" that takes you outside to an area with another few spas, another lazy river, and more areas to lounge in- and you never have to leave the water. On top of all of that, they had a sauna, an ice room, another few luxurious ways to heat and cool yourself that I had never even heard of before, and of course, massages for an extra cost. It was a great experience, and I am really glad we did it. It was pretty cold outside the night we were there, but the really cool thing is that when you go outside, you are still in the water that is the same temperature as the inside, so we were still warm even though it was almost freezing outside.

There is only one thing I would change about the whole experience; the temperature of the water. The water at this place is all the same temperature; every single spa, outside, inside, everything except the sauna and ice water, was all the same temperature. If I could change just one thing, I would make each of those tinier spas different temperatures, because while the water isn't "cold", it isn't exactly "hot" either- it was lukewarm, which isn't a bad thing in itself, but I don't really consider a spa with cold water a "spa", just a really small pool. 

"Floor plan" of Caldea

Caldea from the outside

 

Outside portion of the spa

On the second day, we left Andorra and took to the mountains of Spain to see the Montserrat Monastery. This drive wasn't nearly as bad as the day before, partly because the view was just gorgeous, and partly because I grabbed a seat towards the front .From the second day onwards, I sat near the front where I "belong" next to Kristy, a girl from PUC that I didn't know super well, but over the course of the trip, I got to know her much better.

When we arrived at the monetary, the view was  absolutely gorgeous, and we were all glad to pile out of the bus. Dario, our history teacher, and for this trip, our chaperone, had studied Latin for quite a while, so as we were touring the monastery, he would tell us what all of the inscriptions meant in Spanish. At 12:00 midday, an all boys choir that is supposedly really famous came out and sang a few songs for us in the basilica. By the way, do you know what the difference between a cathedral and a basilica is? I just learned it on this trip, and apparently, if the sanctuary area is shaped like a cross, it is a cathedral, and if the sanctuary is not, it is a basilica. The boy choir was...cute, and the acoustics were pretty good, but as far as being "wowed", I have heard better at the MGA christmas concert. However, what did impress me was the level of discipline all of these kids had. Of course, doing this day in and day out, I am sure they know exactly what is expected of them. After we heard them sing, we took a little lunch break for about an hour, and headed down the mountain.

This time, sitting next to Kristy, I had plenty of room, and five minutes after we had set off, I was out like a light, and I was awoken later on to someone telling me that we had arrived at our next location. We arrived on top of the mountain known as TIBI DABO. Tibi Dabo is Latin for "I will give it to you". Tibi Dabo is a mountain that has a breathtaking view of all of Barcelona and the sea, and one of the reasons it is called Tibi Dabo is because there is a legend that says that this is the mountain where Satan tempted Jesus, even though that is believed to be in the middle east somewhere. We saw the view, and of course took tons of pictures.

After we saw Tibi Dabo, we headed to our hotel, and spent the rest of the day as free time. I walked around with Jarrel and Elizabeth, and we walked all over the area, stopping in many stores and stopping for food a few times as well. One of them got the idea to go to the movies, then the other one got the idea to just watch a movie back at the hotel on one of our computers. We all liked the second option better, so we headed back, and on the way, we stopped by the market and bought some sweets to enjoy during the movie. The movie was Invictus, and I really enjoyed it, and we all had a pleasant evening together. One of the rules is that when a member of the opposite sex is in your room, you have to keep the door open. Elizabeth was in our room and our door was closed- we forgot. When Loli, our other chaperone on the trip, came by to see if everything was alright, she opened the door, stuck her head in, saw the three of us lying on the bed watching the movie, smiled, asked us if everything was alright, and said goodnight- didn't even acknowledge that our door should have been open. In the morning, Dario thanked everyone for keeping the rules the night before very well; for leaving doors open, puntuality, etc. I laughed a little bit inside when he said that because I had remembered what had happened in our room.

The next morning, we saw some of the works of Gaudi', a famous architect in the Spanish world. First, we drove past a few houses that he designed. I am guessing that based on those houses, Gaudi was the type of guy that didn't like to fit in; those houses looked more like gingerbread houses to me. Nothing on them was in the least bit "boxy" or even really had an edge for that matter, and we learned very quickly that Gaudi liked nature, because he decorated all of his buildings, including the cathedral, with a very naturish look (e.g. with fruit baskets at the top of some of the towers and pillars that were shaped like trees). We then went to a park that had some of the architecture he designed, and it looked to me like it could have come out of Jungle Book or maybe Jurassic Park.

After our bus tour of the park and the houses, we saw the grand finally, La Sagrada Familia, a cathedral also designed by Gaudi. This cathedral is unlike any other cathedral in the world; it is actually gives off a "happy" vibe. First of all, it is very well lit, and all of the stone is white so it has a very warm feeling to it instead of the dark somberness of most cathedrals. All of the artwork, including the pillars, is modeled after nature, and all of the stain glass windows are very brightly colored. On top of all of the stained glass windows, there are also a lot of regular windows as well, so the whole thing is very well lit. On top of being very well lit, everything is  very brightly colored from the windows to even the tiniest decorations.

It was indeed a very different cathedral, but that doesn't make it my favorite. It was very busy decoration wise inside; very busy, and the outside was busy as well. It was impressive, but it wasn't classy. Sometimes, the beauty of a cathedral comes from its symmetry; sometimes from its size, sometimes from its classiness. The things that impressed me about this cathedral were the size, the inspiration, and the colors. Even though it isn't my favorite cathedral of all time, I am really glad we saw it.

Random facts for the day; Gaudi was killed by a train- not suicide- in 1926. La Sagrada Familia is funded only from donations of residents of Barcelona- or so they say. La Sagrada Familia is expected to be finished in the next 20 to 50 years; no one knows for sure.

For the evening, we went to a Picasso museum. I am not one for art museums, but this one was pretty interesting. The paintings were in chronological order, and it starts off with gorgeous portraits, scenes, and landscapes that were all very lifelike. As we continued, the portraits started getting a bit more abstract, and eventually, the paintings were all just boxes and squares- still representing some of the same people, scenes, and landscapes. I would like to venture a guess that Picasso went loco at some point in his life, and it kept getting worse as his life progressed, because towards the end, I felt like I could paint a better portrait using just the skills I have now than some of his works.

On the last day, we walked the streets as a group with Dario as our leader. He took us to a few old buildings, including some Roman ruins and a cathedral. After that, we had free time until the afternoon when we would embark on our journey home. I hung out with Kristy, Jarrel, and Alfried for the afternoon, and we all had a fantastic time together. Jarrel goes to La Sierra and lives about an hour out of Nashville, Alfried is our only ESDES student who is not American; he is from Germany and he already speaks English, French, German, and now he is learning Spanish. Towards the end of our time together, Kristy and I got to talking, and it turns out she is in the honors program at PUC, and her and Brittney, another ESDES student who is my dance partner in Flamenco class, went to Italy this last summer with Alex, one of my very close friends. Of course we had a big aha moment when we found our connections. Alex had told me of a girl who made up 10 words for her class project, and Kristy told me it was Brittney. I thought I would have a little fun with her, so the next time I talked with Brittney, I slipped one of her own words into the conversation, and she gave me a look of almost disbelief. She even asked me to repeat what I had said just to be sure. Of course the whole story came out, and we all realized just how closely connected we all are. We're Adventists, what can we say?

All in all, it was a great trip, I only wish it had lasted longer. In just about three weeks starts our "siesta spring", or so I call it, because from the 15th of March until about the 15th of April, we are on non-stop trips and breaks. The finish line is in sight, and it seems like we arrived here yesterday- what's up with that? I guess the old saying "time flies when you're having fun" really holds water here. Well, until next time...

2-12-12

I am going to change things up a little bit right now; I am pretty sure I have started off every single blog post up to this point with the word 'well'. Right now, I believe it is time for change; change is a good thing.

So, it is now 1:00 am my time, but since I took a three hour nap this afternoon, I am pretty sure that I will not be a victim of  narcolepsy before it is due time to go to bed. It has been a while since I have written anything, and that is not because I didn't want to blog, or that I forgot. OK, I will admit, I kind of did forget, but that is because these last few weeks have just flown by. We haven't had any huge "adventures" very recently, but that doesn't mean we aren't still having a blast.

Our next big "adventure" is a trip to Barcelona and Andorra in about a week and a half. After we go to Barcelona and Andorra, the next big adventure that I am looking forward to is when my dad, Ms. Mumper, and Eric's parents come out at the end of March during their spring break (just days after Las Fallas, a festival in Valencia that we get a week off for). Not even a week after they leave, we have one of our spring breaks, and a group of us are planning on going to London for a few days. The day after we get back from London, we go on a trip to Madrid and Toledo for another week. Basically, starting March 15, we have about  a month of break/trips with the exception of about a week and a half of school scattered in-between. After our trip to Madrid and Toledo, it will be about April 15 or so, and we will only have about a month and a half or so left before it is time to pack it up and return to the U.S.

Even though there haven't been any big "adventures" lately, that doesn't mean that stuff hasn't been happening around here. As I said in my last post, I have become very involved in the music, and over the last few weeks, there have indeed been plenty of nights full of music practice and performance, and I have been loving it. My little music group on Wednesdays have been going very well, and once it starts warming up around here, I would love to start doing it outside. Speaking of being cold, when I am in Walla Walla and it is 36 degrees outside, I walk around in jeans and a jacket. Here when it is 36 degrees outside (something I thought would not be possible in Spain), I do the exact same thing and many Spaniards constantly are asking me if I am cold- of course they are all bundled up in gloves, scarfs, beanies, etc. I guess the Spaniards and the Californians have more in common than we originally thought. Anyways, back to the music; last night and this morning, the praise band/choir performed for church and vespers. Half of our choir is away on a camping trip this weekend, so we have been few in number, but still doing just fine. One of the other ACA students here asked me to accompany her in a song for special music, and I readily agreed. The song was "His Eyes" by Steven Curtis Chapman, and we arranged it so that she sang the first verse, I sang the second, and we sang the third together. This morning, I am not quite sure what it was, maybe is was because we had some technology issues, maybe it was because I wasn't focused all the way, or maybe I just didn't know the song well enough, but for whatever reason, let's just say it wasn't my finest hour of performance. Of course, I felt like walking out of the church with my head buried in my hands, but even though in my mind I screwed up royally, many people told me how much they enjoyed it, and how much it meant to them. Today has been a great reminder that God can still work through us, even though we ourselves are nowhere near perfect or adequate.

Another subtle thing that has been happening for me is that I can definitely tell my Spanish has been improving. I can now think in Spanish at about the same speed that I can think in English, my vocabulary, speed, and overall flow during conversations has been improving, and I can understand many more people now than I could even a month ago. About a month ago, I could only understand about 10 people perfectly- most of them were my teachers and other ACA friends. It is much easier to understand someone that you are accustomed to hearing. Now, I have noticed that wherever I am, I am understanding the checkout person at the supermarket better, little by little, I am starting to understand the people with thick Argentinian accents, and even as I am just walking down the street, I am starting to be able to pick out little pieces of conversations of the people who are walking by. It is definitely a cool feeling to know I am improving, but as always, there is always more to improve on.

Today in Sabbath school, there was a couple visiting from Scandinavia; one went to school at Southern, one grew up in Ohio, and both are now living in Madrid... it's a long story. Anyways, one speaks fairly decent Spanish, and one only speaks English. Normally during Sabbath school, every last word is in Spanish. Today was very different, and very awesome. I got a chance to do a fair amount of translating, and that was cool, but really the best part for me was how we were "strongly asserting our opinions" (in other words, arguing), about the content of the Sabbath school lesson, and it was really great to have half of it be in English- and half of the people had not a clue what was going on, and the other half was in Spanish- and the other half didn't have a clue as to what was going on. We were arguing so quickly that we literally didn't have time to translate anything. It was definitely heated excitement. At one point, one of our guests made a point that I strongly agreed with, and one of the others strongly disagreed with, so when she had finished, I gave an example to defend the point the guest had made. I was talking to the guest who only speaks English, and Igor (one of my good friends; studies theology here and is from Portugal) was translating for me, because it is nearly impossible for me to say one thing in Spanish, and say the same thing in English, because many times I say things like, "I was caminando down the street this past semana and I turned the esquina to look for my zapatoes". Anyways, I was speaking in English, Igor was translating, and one of the Spanish speakers answered back, I heard the Spanish speaker respond, and with literally no thought; no extra effort, no nothing, unconsciously  my brain made the switch back to Spanish, and I was so focused on what I was saying that by the time I caught on to what just happened, I had already spoken about two and a half sentences to my English friend in Spanish. I now have a slight fear that when I get back to the states, I will be able to speak two languages: Spanish, and Spanglish.

That is sadly just about all I remember about the week, and sadly I am slowing giving in to the need to recharge my batteries all over again. Happy Sabbath and happy week.
Until next time...

1-22-12

Well, I am sitting at my desk on Sunday night with some homework to do...and I don't really want to do it yet. I realized that I haven't written anything since Christmas, so I figure I can kill two birds with one stone right now; procrastinate on my homework, and give you an update of what has been going on around here with me.

For starters, I started off this quarter with 22 credits. Before you ask me how I could be that stupid, I would like to point out that I am taking a class in Flamenco dance- a class easier than P.E., I am in a praise band that I get a credit for, and I have accepted the position of being the "Semi-Youth Pastor" of the Americans", which I also get a credit for. So I really only had about 18 credits of actual classes that require studying, and I started this quarter off in group C, which I felt was not challenging enough. When I weigh all of these factors, I can guestimate that I really only had about 16 credits of actual classes.

At the beginning of last week, I talked with the director of ESDES, and he allowed me to move up to group D, one level higher than group C. This meant that I would have to rethink my schedule a little, because that would be impossible for me. I ended up dropping two classes that I didn't really need anyways; a class on the history of Spain and a class on Spanish literature, and now that I think about it, why on earth did I sign up for a Spanish literature class?! I don't even like studying literature in English! Not only does this make my schedule lighter, but my class schedule now allows me to go into town on Wednesdays for the market in case I need anything. However, I have decided to keep my Flamenco class, my praise band participation, and my position as the semi-pastor of "los americanos". Now I have 18 credits, and am studying in a level a little bit more challenging, and a lot more fun for me.

As the semi-pastor of the Americans, I am basically the social vice president who was told to put a spiritual element into everything we do. my job is to think of stuff to do that incorporates the students into the church life. The teacher that offered me the position said that my first task would be to hold a small group for the Americans like the rest of the church was already doing. He said I could do whatever I wanted for that group as long as it had a spiritual element to it, but I had no idea what to do to keep these guys entertained each week. On Friday night, I filled in for Juan who does afterglow each week, and normally, when afterglow is over, everyone goes home. This week, we stayed longer and just sang songs until about an hour after it was supposed to be over. The students said they really enjoyed that and wanted more of that, and one even suggested we do something like this every week. Basically, in short, the idea for my weekly small group came from the mouth of that person. Now, we will be singing every Wednesday night at 8 pm in the Frontera (a multi-purpose type room).

Later on in the week, one of the deans informed me that the Americans who were supposed to be doing music for chapel on Thursday nights hadn't been showing up, and asked if I would do something about it. Now, my schedule is as follows: Monday night  is praise band practice, Tuesday night is the praise band performance, Wednesday night is my small group, Thursday night will be me and probably two or three friends each week doing the music for chapel, and sometimes on Friday evenings and Sabbath mornings, the praise band does music for the church services. Somehow the lyrics of a song I sang back in my good ole' days at MGA come to mind, "...my life goes on in endless song...", and I think those are very appropriate lyrics for right now. However, I am not complaining one bit- I am looking forward to seeing how it goes.

This last Sabbath, our praise band/choir did the worship service, and I discovered something revolutionary. Now, you might think this isn't even worth noting, but I think this is the coolest thing since soy milk. Here in Sagunto, there is only one printer we have access to on a regular basis, and it is in the school office. Whenever we have a new song to learn, I don't print it out because we are only suppose to use that printer for "more important" stuff like assignments, or airline tickets. My best option has been to just simply try to memorize each song, but that only goes so far sometimes, considering how often times we will get four new songs on Monday and we perform on Friday...and I have a life outside of memorizing music. This last week, I have found out that I can put the lyrics and chords on my tablet in PDF form, and just view them straight from my tablet like a song book- simply swiping side to side to change songs. Now, not only do I save myself the hassle of printing, and saving paper and ink, but now I can have my entire song book with me all the time without having to carry around bunches of papers. I was so excited on Sabbath to show the rest of the choir my newly discovered gem I had found...and no one really seem to care. Oh well, it still makes all of the difference in the world to me. I think I will continue this practice even when I go back to Calimesa.

One of the theology students studying here, who plays the bass in the praise band while I play his guitar, just bought a bow and arrow set from Decathlon, the Sport Chalet of Europe. For the last few days, we have had the best time shooting up his cardboard boxes, and I am sure we will continue to destroy more. One of the first times I saw him with his bow and arrow, I asked him, "Este es tu ocio nuevo?" Which means, "So this is your new hobby?", and he looked me square in the eye, and with all of the seriousness in the world he said, "Este no es un ocio, es un deporte", which means, "This isn't a hobby, it's a sport!". I laughed a little, but he was dead serious. So from now on, while I am with Igor and his bow and arrows, I will remember to call it a sport, even though I have questions about that classification.

Well, that is about all that has happened around here for the last week or so. Until next time!

Christmas Travels Part 3

Last night our month of travel and exploration came to a close. It was sad, because it truly was the trip of a lifetime, but the emotion I felt much stronger was relief. This year, Christmas break was backwards; usually, you leave school to go home for the break, and it is really hard to leave home when you have to return to school. This year, we left our ‘home’ to go travel, and when we returned, it is as if we returned ‘home’, making it much easier to come back. I must have at least tripled my traveling experience this month. It is a completely different world using the trains and metros daily, bartering for lots of things, having to figure out city maps, which I still need lots of practice on (just ask Josh and Eric), figuring out the best way to get to where we needed to go, staying every few nights in a different hostel, buying all of the food we needed, and learning about a new country and a new culture. It has all been an unforgettable adventure, but I am more than ready to be back in the café with food I don’t have to pay for each time I go, to have a place to call my home (for the time being), and to be with my school family. Our plane landed just after 12 a.m. last night, we didn’t arrive at the school until about 1 a.m., and I didn’t get to bed until almost 3 a.m. Needless to say, I slept in very late this morning. As we were driving through Sagunto, it almost seemed as if we left only one day before. That was easily the quickest month of my life. When I got back to my dorm room, it was the most inviting room I have ever seen, possibly with the exception of my actual bedroom in California. Aside from the joy we all felt from being reunited, this place seems a bit empty from all of our friends who returned to the US to pick up with their lives there. However, we didn’t say goodbye forever; we will see them in just a few months.

Ok, let’s pick up where we left off before my car had an unexpected reunion with its maker. The last place that we discussed was Rome, so let’s start there.

After Rome, we took a train up to Florence for four days. When we arrived at the station, it was cold and it was dark. We could all see our breath, and we didn’t know exactly where our hostel was. With our scarfs tied tightly around our necks, and our gloves on our cold little hands, we grabbed our bags and started marching. We walked down a few small streets, turned a corner, and BAM! As we turned the corner, we had a very unexpected surprise; a meeting with the Duomo, which was standing tall and majestic over us right in the center of town. It was indeed beautiful, but what was even more impressive was the sheer size of it. We walked around a bit more, and finally found our hostel. This was a very nice hostel, maybe because we got one of the biggest suites they had, but the downside was that the owner smoked like a chimney, so the lobby was always painful to be in. Every time we would arrive at the door to the lobby, I would take a deep breath, open the door, charge through there like a Navy SEAL on a mission, and close our door behind me as soon as I possibly could.

On our first day in Florence, the 24^th, we tried to do everything we could because we didn’t know how many museums would be open on the 26^th. On our first day, we saw the Duomo, climbed the Duomo tower, went to the Accademia Museum (home to David by Michelangelo), saw the Leonardo Di Vinci museum, and the Medici Museum. My favorite parts of that day were seeing David, and seeing the section in the Accademia devoted to musical instruments of the 1800s. I saw a few harpsichords, a few Stradivarius violins, and some instruments I had never even heard of before, like the Serpent; an s shaped tube with holes every so often in it.

For our big Christmas dinner, Eric, Josh, and I went out to eat on the 24^th, because everything would be closed on the 25^th. We had a huge meal at a family run restaurant that was both delicious and very reasonably priced; something that is hard to find sometimes in Europe. We ate like kings, and since the waiter/owner made a very small mistake in our order, he threw in a free tiramisu for us to share. In short, this tiramisu was by far the best I have ever had. Period. Afterwards, we went and got some Christmas gelato at a nearby stand.

On Christmas day, there were plenty of people in the street, but as we suspected, nothing was open. I woke up at around 7:00 am to skype with my family during their celebration on Christmas Eve, and that half hour made my entire Christmas. For a half an hour, I felt like I had teleported from the hostel right into the living room of my Aunt’s house and was participating in the festivities. As I was skyping with my family, Josh and Eric were both skyping with their families at the same time. After we all had skyped, we just hung out in the hostel and ate the food we had bought from the grocery store the day before until the afternoon. In the afternoon, we went out for a little walk that lasted about two hours, came back, and just relaxed some more. That was Christmas this year.

On the day after Christmas, we took the train from Florence to Pisa, and from Pisa to Lucca. Our entire stop in Pisa took about an hour; about ten minutes actually at the tower. We got off the train, walked for twenty minutes, found the tower, took about 5 photos, waited for the bus, and when it didn’t show up, walked back to the train station, and headed to Lucca. Pisa is a nice enough town, but it is overrun with tourists. If that tower wasn’t there, the town of Pisa would be a nothing town. My guess is that most of the money that keeps Pisa running is made in tourism. At any given time, you can look out over the masses that gather at the tower, and you will see about twenty hands up, posing for a leaning shot against the tower.

Lucca, on the other hand, was much more likeable. For starters, over 50% of the people inside of the walls were actual residents. Cameras weren’t so common, and no one was posing for anything. The town felt cozier; more natural. Lucca is a medieval town that has a wall around it for protection, but was never attacked. In Lucca, there were no sites to see, and no hordes of tourists, only a very well preserved medieval town that was both charming, and of course, gorgeous.

Leaving Florence on the way to Venice, we had purchased reservations for first class train seats. They cost the exact same as second class, so we figured “why not”. We were riding pretty until the ticket checker came around. He checked Eric’s ticket, Josh’s ticket, then my ticket. He seemed to be fine with their tickets, so I wasn’t worried because we hadn’t had any problems until then. Just as he was handing my ticket back to me, he pulled it back and said, “Wait a minute…”. He then told us that we had second class Eurail passes, and a first class ticket- a combination that shouldn’t have been. We had already gotten first class reservations a few times before, so we didn’t know it made a difference, but kindly and rudely at the same time, he told us either we pay 25 euros each for the difference or move back to second class. Of course we moved back to second class, and to be honest, the only real difference was that first class was full of pompous rude businessmen, and second class was full of everyone else; normal people. It really wasn’t much worse at all, in fact, it was better without some of those businessmen. Oops, now we know for next time.

We only spent about two full days in Venice, but they were definitely two days well spent. For the entire time we were there, we simply just walked around, took pictures, and got lost on purpose. Venice isn’t too big, so it is easy to get lost, but also very easy to find the way again. Eric and I became very experimental with our pictures trying out different combinations of effects, and different modes. Venice is just like every other town, except of course, on the water. This place is touristy simply because of its beauty- not much else. The big thing to do in Venice is to go shopping, which of course is very overpriced. On one of our days, we took a water taxi to the island of Lido. Lido is a normal city; not much to see, average beauty, and normally priced stuff. We walked around for the afternoon and returned. It was nice to be away from all of the other tourists and the tourist trappers.

Because the Eurail system is the way it is, we couldn’t use our passes to get a night train to Paris in time for New Years as we had planned. The way it works is that only a certain amount of seats on each train may be reserved by Eurail pass holders, and all of those spots were taken. In short, either we would have paid just over 100 euros each for about 15 hours on the train arriving January 1, or we could pay about 200 euros for an hour and a half on a plane and arrive early for the celebration.  Since New Year’s in Paris was what we were coming to Paris for, we chose the 200 euro plane option, and I am really glad we did.

When we arrived in Paris we went to our hotel, which was very nice, and just relaxed the rest of the night. In the morning, we had to move to a hostel on the outskirts of Paris because this hotel was booked for the next night. It took us a while to find our next hostel, and while we were lost walking around, it started to rain. Perfect. While we were walking, the handle on Josh’s carry-on broke clean off the rest of the bag, so in the rain, he stooped down, picked up the carry-on in his arms, and kept on walking. Finally, after much frustration, and realizing that we may never find it, we found the hostel. The hostel was named “Cheap Beds”, and in some ways, that name was very fitting, and in some ways, not very fitting at all. Because it was the night of the 31^st and most of Paris was booked, these “cheap beds” actually cost about the same as our nice hotel the night before. If you want to know about the state of the room we stayed in, it wasn’t “Cheap Beds”, it was more like “Practically Free” beds. When we arrived, there were hairs on the bathroom floor from who-knows-where, the only chair in the room was like a chair found in a classroom, except the seat wasn’t actually attached to the frame, so the first time I sat down I slid right off, the piping under the sink had a leak, so every time you ran the water, it would go into the drain, and straight down to the floor, and last but not least, the shower was a bathtub with no showerhead, but a hose connected to the low faucet with a nozzle on the end. It was anything but paradise, but the good news was that we were planning on being out late celebrating anyways, and we only had one night there.

After we got  settled in, we headed out to the party. There were about 20 ACA students on the cruise, and most of us planned to meet up again in Paris for New Year’s. At around 10 pm, we all met up at a metro station, and started heading out to the Eiffel Tower, and the Champs-Elysees. I am not sure exactly how to describe the metro ride out to the tower. A sardine can would be a start, but it still wouldn’t bring justice to that ride. I was standing next to Michelle, Eliana, Josh, and Daisy, and we were so packed, that I didn’t even have to hold on to anything, because there was nowhere to fall to- I was pinned upright by those around me. The most fun part of that was pulling into a stop with a metro that was already 120% full, and having to fit on about 15 more people at every stop. It was literally a bonding experience for all of us, even to the strangers on that metro. Of course everyone on that metro got off at the exact same stop, so it was like a large school of minnows swimming through a 1 foot diameter pipe, or at least that’s what I can imagine that I could compare it to.

When we arrived at the Champs-Elysees, it was much the same story. Trying to keep a group of about 15 together was almost impossible. The Champs-Elysees was absolutely gorgeous; there were lights in all of the trees, and of course at the end of the street, the Arc de Triomphe stood majestically. I am not sure why, but someone in the group decided that it would be better to go to the tower instead, and just like a flock of sheep, we all followed their lead. At this point in the evening, every other person in the massive crowd was drunk, and as the night went on, more and more people became more and more intoxicated. By the time we reached the tower, we had about ten minutes until the big moment, and in those ten minutes, we experienced a variety of things, including people acting ridiculously drunk, and homemade fireworks flying overhead, and of course, those fireworks boomed extremely loudly right over our heads. I truly thought someone would be killed from those things, or at least a massive fire would be started. When the time was right, the tower started blinking, and small fireworks went off in the distance. That’s it. No count down, nothing. Needless to say, we were all expecting a little bit more. The moment wasn’t very spectacular as we had been dreaming, but the after party helped make it up a little bit.

Up until New Year’s, I had always had an uneasiness around people who were drinking, or who were drunk. On New Year’s I learned that just because they were drunk didn’t mean I should be afraid or uneasy. In fact, I have learned that drunken people can actually be very fun to be around. A little disclaimer: I myself have no interest in getting drunk, and New Year’s further cemented my desire for sobriety in my mind. From what some people who have been drunk before have told me, while someone is drunk, they feel on top of the world. Of course while they are drunk, they act in such a way that they normally would not: often embarrassing, or damaging themselves or others around them without even knowing it. One of the guys who was with us that night had never been drunk before; he had tried alcohol in little sips, but had never drunken enough to make a substantial difference. That night, he bought a wine bottle of the $3.25 quality; the good stuff. I know next to nothing about wine, but I do know that good wine costs more than $3.25 for the bottle- even more than that for a glass. Anyways, he drank the whole thing, and about two minutes later, he was walking like a dizzy person, he became the most outgoing person I have ever seen in my life, and funniest of all, he had to go to the bathroom really bad. Normally, my philosophy is, “When a bro’s gotta go, a bro’s gotta go”, but when a drunk bro wants to take a wiz out onto the open sidewalk in the middle of a busy street as he did, we decided it would be best to hurry him along to one of our hostels so he could properly use the washroom. Despite the desperation in that situation, I thought the whole thing was absolutely hilarious, even though I was the one grabbing him by the arm and leading him around. Despite the funny people, there were also people getting into fights- drunk as skunks. There was a man walking in the same direction we were who just couldn’t walk in a straight line; he would drift into someone, go the other way, plow into someone else, and best of all, he plowed into a nearby fence, and started a fight…with the fence.

When we finally got to the hostel, we all had to use the restroom, for there had been none along the way. Guess who went first? Yep, you guess it, our very own drunken skunk. At this point, it was about three in the morning, and the metro that went back to our hostel didn’t open up until about 5:30am, so we just stayed at that hostel that was already jam packed before we arrived. I sat down next to the bed, put my head down just for a sec, and was completely gone. That’s where the picture on facebook came from (thank you Eric Mathis). If you don’t know what picture I am talking about, it is probably better that way.

At 5:15 am, I was woken up, and we caught the metro back to our hostel. When we arrived there, we crashed instantly. Once we all woke up at around 11:00 am, we packed up, and our next task was to find our next place to stay, which was a British woman’s guesthouse for the next three nights. The moment we arrived in her yard, she made us feel like family. She was very friendly, and she went out of her way to help us with whatever we needed.

Over the next few days, we saw the Louvre, The Eiffel Tower, The Champs Elysees, The Arche de Triomphe, Notre Dame Cathedral, and Versailles. When we arrived at the Eiffel Tower, we were debating amongst ourselves whether or not to go up, and because of the rainclouds overhead, the winds, the cold, and most importantly, the huge line, we decided against it. Not five minutes after we decided not to go, the winds started whipping up like crazy, and it started raining hard. Because of the wind, this rain was coming almost perfectly horizontally. My umbrella did jack squat out there. In fact, the winds demolished it when I tried to fend off the rain; it was broken in about 30 seconds. Good thing we didn’t decide to go up; we would have been on our way up, and the line to get down would have been even worse than the line to go up.

When our adventures in Paris came to a close, we packed everything up, and headed out to Normandy. Eric set up a tour for the three of us with a veteran in the airborne division who served a few decades after WWII. This was one of the most knowledgeable guys I have ever heard talking about WWII. We  started off the day in Saint Merecles where the Airborne division landed on D-day. A few nights before we arrived in Carentan (Normandy), Eric showed Josh and I the Band of Brothers series so we would get a little history before we went. It was very exciting to see where one of the guy’s parachutes caught on the corner of the bell tower of a church, and where he hung for at least 5 hours while Germans were shooting from inside that very bell tower (and that soldier survived). Our guide took us to a bridge where a major battle took place, he took us to Omaha Beach, Pont du Hoc, Utah beach, and last but not least, the Normandy American Cemetery where some of the American soldiers from D-day were buried. As I looked out on the sea of white crosses, it really made an impression on me. In history books when you read that 5,000 died, or 50,000, or whatever number, you think, “Wow, that’s a big number”, then you move on with your life and don’t give it another thought. When I was standing in the middle of that sea of crosses, the number had a much bigger meaning than just a number on paper. Every tombstone had a name on it, or a message saying that this was an unknown soldier. It hit me that beneath each of these crosses, there lay more than a soldier; there lay a man; a father, a son, a brother. For each man lying there, a family somewhere in the United States back in 1944 received a letter that that man wouldn’t be returning home. For each of those crosses, there was a man that was important to someone; to a group of someones. It is really sobering to think of the sorrow that a war like this brings, when the loss of even one soldier is very sad, but the loss of 5,000, or 50,000, or whatever number, is a million times worse. Since this was an American cemetery, for Americans only, there were American flags flying on tall flagpoles. After four months of seeing the Spanish flag, the Italian flag, the European Union flag, and countless others flying, watching those United States of America flags flying majestically in that cemetery with no others in sight, waving tall and proud in the wind, gave me a sense of pride to be an American that I possibly have never felt so strongly before, and often take for granted. Here in Spain, they try to push us to be like them; to talk like them, to think like them, to eat like them, and that is what we are here for, but in that cemetery, I was not an American trying to be Spanish, I was an American who was proud to be an American; not a Spaniard, not a Frenchman, not a Brit; an American. I have never been so proud to be an American than I was in that cemetery. Our tour guide knew the curator of the cemetery, and he arranged it so that we could lower our flag as the sun was setting. I have raised and lowered the American flag for Pathfinders many, many times; I have lead the entire conference in doing so on occasion, but this time meant a thousand times more than any of those ever will. To lower my flag in the spot where one of the biggest wars took place, to be in the company of thousands of men who gave their lives so that I could stand there in that fashion; it was a feeling I cannot put into words.

When our tour came to a close, we headed back to Paris, and spent the next few days just resting up and preparing for the journey back. We learned a lot about many different things on this trip, but one thing we learned about travel itself is that the trip is always more enjoyable when there are times when nothing is planned, and the only plan is to relax. As I have said earlier, this has been the trip of a lifetime. These are memories that I don’t think will ever be forgotten. To have travelled with two of my closest friends for a month over two continents will definitely never be done in the fashion we did it in ever again. This trip was great, but now, I am eager and more than ready to gear up for this next quarter, hit it hard, and conquer it. I have never gone into the beginning of a quarter of school with the finish line already in sight, but I guess there is a first time for everything. I am ready to conquer this quarter, and finish it off already. Maybe I am so eager to get this quarter over with because my dad will be heading out on Spring Break, maybe I just want the time to pass quicker so I can come home sooner, or maybe I am just pumped up to learn. Whatever the reason, bring it on winter quarter.

Until the next time…

12-27-11

 

Last week, I got the news that my car, my Volvo, for all intents and purposes, will be no more.  There is a myth that guys have a very strong attachment to cars. For all you ladies out there, I am here to say that this myth is completely confirmed. When I got the news, I quickly just said everything was okay, and tried to suppress my feelings. Today, my feelings couldn't be suppressed any longer, so here we are. Before I continue with this rather unusual blog post, I would like to say to the party that was involved that just because I am sad about it right now, it doesn't change the fact that I don't hold any hard feelings toward him or her, and that he or she is completely forgiven. 

Nevertheless, I still feel feelings of loss of what was my very first car, and what was my traveling companion for the last 3 years of my life. From Palm Desert for the summers to musical performances to the beach to school to sporting events to anywhere we could; we went everywhere together. We looked good together, and we enjoyed each others company. Earlier this evening, I called my dad, and we talked about my feelings of loss for my car, and he told me that those feelings are completely normal. I found out in my senior year of high school that my personality type likes closure. Unfortunately, right now I am in Italy and I won't get a chance to say goodbye, making closure more elusive. Nevertheless, I will do my best to try.

What is a car? A car is a motor bolted to a frame with a body bolted onto that. Inside the body there are seats, a steering wheel, some buttons and knobs, some pedals, some instruments, usually a radio, and possibly a gps device. Attached to the motor are shafts which have hubs at the ends which have rims bolted on, which have tires attached. Inside the motor, there are little pistons that explode very quickly to drive the drive shaft. All of these elements are combined to create something that is used to get you where you want to go. 

However, a car is so much more than a bunch of moving parts bolted together to help it move forwards or backwards. A car is a symbol of freedom. A car is what makes the difference between stuck at home and out to the beach for the day with friends. A first car, especially for a guy like me, shows a guy what freedom tastes like for the first time, becomes his partner in crime, his right arm,  his faithful companion that will go anywhere with him and keep him safe along the way, an extension of his soul, a keeper of secrets, a sharer of the desire to be a race car driver someday, and his ticket to anywhere-you-want-ville, all in one. 

When I had my knee surgery last summer, I couldn't drive at all. Everyday I would hobble on my crutches into the garage, and my car would be sitting there staring at me. It seemed to say with excitement, "What new and exciting place are we going to discover today Steven? ", and everyday I had to reply with great disappointment, "Nowhere. Not today". I can't tell you how depressing my knee surgery was because every day my car would just beckon to me for an open road adventure, and I had to say no. I was like a prisoner in my own house. I remember my first time driving her again when I got off my crutches. I backed out of the driveway carefully, and the second I put it in drive, I punched the gas and didn't let up until we got to our destination. One thing I will say about this car, it had spirit, and always had speed to spare. With lots of get-up-and-go, it was a very zoomy little car. In the car Olympics, it would definitely be a sprinter.

I can't count all of the good times I've had in my car. I can't count all of the places Diana and I went in high school, all of the deep conversations I have had with many various people over these last few years, all of the days I had on highway 10 going to camp with the radio blasting, the sun roof open, and the open road ahead, all of the adventures, and all of the experiences. This car will always be in my heart; it will always be a part of my story. It was the one thing I always counted on remaining unchanged when I got home for vacations. The furniture would be rearranged, there would be junk in my room that wasn't there when I left, my plants would be overgrown or sometimes dead, and the people changed; but the one thing that never changed was my Volvo parked in the garage eager for action.

This time, when I come home from Spain in June, my Volvo won't be in the garage waiting for me; ready for a new adventure. The garage will be vacant, and I will be car-less for a while. I am supposed to be taking O Chem at La Sierra this summer, and I am still trying to figure out how I am going to get there each day, but one worry at a time. 

I feel like I have lost my right arm, and my very close companion. I will be sad for a while longer and then I will move on. This has taught me that in this life, nothing is certain, and nothing lasts forever. Stuff happens. Stuff we weren't expecting, stuff we were expecting, stuff that hits us like a train, stuff that seems to crush us, stuff that seems unfair. When stuff happens, the only thing we can do is just make the best of it, and try to move on. I will eventually have to get a new car, granted, but no car will ever take the place of this one in my heart; my first taste of freedom, my partner in crime, my ticket to anywhere-you-want-to-go-ville just for the fun of it.

Christmas Travels Part 2

Since the last post, we have been to Izmir, Athens, and Rome. On the cruise, they sell "excursions" for every stop. The only time we actually prepared an expensive tour was for Israel, and that was well worth every penny. We went with a company that wasn't from the cruise, and maybe that made the difference. The name of the cruise was the "Holy Lands Voyage", and the only question I ask myself is why on earth did we stop in Izmir? I have a feeling that the only reason we stopped in Izmir is because the church of Ephesus is about 100 miles away or so- about 120 euro by taxi for round trip. However, the cruise sold a package probably in the $300 range for a tour of the highlights of Izmir. Our group, on the other hand, decided to just hang out in the city and maybe run into a few sights if we just so happened to do so.

On our way into the city, we met one of the thousands of taxi drivers there, and he offered us a tour of Izmir for 8 euros a piece. We reluctantly agreed, more because we just wanted something to do than actually see the sights. He called a few of his taxi driver friends, and we were off. I guess 8 euros is better than $300 to see exactly the same stuff. Now, I was in Peru this last summer, and I have made a few comments on the driving in Peru. However, in some ways, the driving in Peru doesn't hold a candle to the scariness of driving in Turkey. Those taxi drivers know the corners of their cars like the back of their hands, and at times, the back of their hands wouldn't even fit between their car and the next while speeding through the intersection avoiding the people in the crosswalk and avoiding other cars driving the exact same way. Our taxi driver didn't make us wear seat belts, but I became very faithful in remembering mine very early on.

Our drivers took us to some ancient ruins, a small castle, and a mosque. Before we entered the mosque, we had to remove our shoes and leave them outside. I am very fond of my shoes, and one of my only thoughts while we were inside was that one of the many children who were begging in the streets would come and take them, and I would be walking around the city for the rest of the day without shoes on. Luckily, I left the mosque with rubber under my feet, and leather over the top, and all was right in the world again.

Before we went to the mosque, we went to some ancient ruins and the castle of Izmir. Our taxi driver was also very conveniently our tour guide, but his English was very broken, so I only understood about half of the ideas he was trying to convey. The ruins were...well...ruins. I didn't really hear who they belonged to, how old they were, or what the real significance of them was, so to me, we saw a bunch of pillars, arches, and old rocks. Sweet. 

After we finished at the ruins, we went to the castle. This was a very small castle, but for how small it was, there was quite the bounty of people there. Most of them were begging children, and people selling souvenirs. When our taxi stopped inside the castle, a young child came up to the car door and opened it for me. I was very surprised, and just as I was saying thanks to this seemingly very well mannered child for the favor he hath done unto me, he said, "1 euro". My thoughts of how sweet this kid was vanished instantly, and I couldn't believe that he was trying to charge me a euro just for opening a door. Later on, we went up to the top of the castle, and actually walked on the wall. There was another kid there who did the same routine to everyone. First, he would tap you on the shoulder and say, " 'ello money", and I am 99.999...% sure that it meant that he wanted you to give him money. When you refused, he would follow you around pleading in whatever language the Turks speak. I will say, those kids have it down to a science: they don't really even need words because they do all the talking with their eyes. They are like puppies asking for scraps of food at the dinner table. When he had done this to about four of us, the rest of us caught on and just ignored him. When he picked up that everyone was just ignoring him, he started saying, "cheese" repeatedly, and really loudly. Finally, I thought, "well, why not", and I took his picture. He tried to charge me a euro. If I wanted a picture of a
Turkish model, I would have hired one.

I have very mixed feelings about the whole begging thing in general. On one hand, if Jesus were in Izmir that day, maybe he would have given each kid a euro until he didn't have any left and the shirt on his back was gone. When I see kids begging, part of me really does want to give each of them something until I have no money left, and no clothes on my back, but the other part, however, is that in a place like Izmir, if you give one kid a euro, the others will pester you relentlessly until they get their euro as well. Once one gets something, the others tend to expect theirs as well. Jesus says to give to the one who asks you, I acknowledge that fully, but when they are charging me for the privilege of taking a photo of them, or for holding a door open, my hand gets very comfortable staying inside my pocket.   Just one time, I would love to see just one of those kids just coming up to me and say something to the effect of, "excuse me, could you possibly spare some change?" If one went with that approach, I would be 100% more willing to pitch in. I am not saying that Jesus tells us to give only to polite people, but it certainly would make it much more appealing for me to give. I don't know if I made the right decision in Izmir, and I am not sure if I would do it differently next time.

After our guided tour, we walked around the huge market, and headed back to the boat.This market was huge; a city of it's own. One could easily get separated and lost in there, and spend hours trying to meet up with their party again. One of the interesting things about that market is that there were many coffee booths there, and they would invite us to sit down and enjoy a cup- right in the middle of the market- literally.



The next day, we landed in Athens. There were only two things I wanted to see in Athens; the Acropolis, and the Parthenon. Until the day of our little excursion, I thought that they would be on two completely different sides of town. When someone told me that the Parthenon sits on the Acropolis, I was blown away, shocked, and of course, really excited. One of the attractions of the Acropolis for me is that I am a big fan of Yanni. In 1994, Yanni released an album called, Live at the Acropolis. Guess where it was performed? It was really exciting to see the stage where it was performed. It is kind of sad, isn't it? There is so much Greek history in and around the Acropolis from centuries and centuries back, and all I cared about was the stage where Yanni stood 17 years ago. Even though I am not an ancient Greece history buff, I still enjoyed it thoroughly, and of course took a bounty of pictures. After the Parthenon, we walked around more, and saw the temple of Zeus, and the Olympic stadium used in 2004. On our way, we passed by a long line of souvenir shops, and up until that point in the trip, the only souvenirs I bought had been post cards. In Athens, I bought a small Grecian pot that was handmade and hand painted, and an 8x10 oil painting on canvas of the Parthenon. The real test will be getting that pot back to school in one piece.

On our last day of the cruise, the sea was very rough. Up until the last day on the ship, we had smooth, nearly perfect sailing. On that day for the first time, I, and many of my companions, felt very sick. The entire day, it was like a constant rolling motion that wouldn't let up. The only way to try to avoid it was sleep, but getting to sleep was near impossible. Despite countless motion sickness pills, it never seemed to get better. Normally when I feel nausea, I just roll down the window of the car, or in this case go out on the deck for some air, but the wind was so strong, it was hard to even walk in a straight line without getting blown away. At dinner, about 20 of us started out seated at the table, but one by one, we dropped like flies, and we finished with about 7 of us enjoying desert. When we woke up the next morning, everything was perfect again.

After we packed up and left the boat, we all took a bus to the train station in Savona. There, we all hugged, said our goodbyes, and all headed out on separate trains for different cities, countries, and for some, different continents. Our plan is for everyone to reunite in Paris for New Years.

For Devin, Eric, Josh and I, our next stop was Rome. To put it simply, I have completely fallen in love with Rome. We went to the Coliseum, the Forum, the Pantheon, St. Peter’s Basilica, the Sistine Chapel, the Vatican museum, a few other famous museums, the prison of Peter, the Trevi fountain, and many more places. What is it about Rome? Maybe it is the history, the beauty, the atmosphere, or maybe something else. Whatever it was, it was an unforgettable experience.

I found everything we did  over the past four days to be very enjoyable, and so far on this trip, Rome is my favorite city. One thing that made it very enjoyable was that a friend told me about a Rick Steves’ podcast that gave audio tours for all of the places we went, so when we went to the Coliseum and the Forum, I had a free, enjoyable, and educational audio tour that was probably better than the ones that could be purchased for 7 euros or so. The Coliseum was the most remarkable to me simply because of its sheer size. The size of St. Peter’s Basilica was impressive too, but the fact that the Coliseum is still standing from the Roman Period, even after the people yanked out the iron supports that were holding the bricks together and melted them down (something I learned from my audio tour with Rick Steves). Another interesting fact I learned from my audio tour is that back in the days when the Coliseum was used for Gladiators and gore, there was a crank/pully system that was used to bring the warriors (or victims) from under the stage right up onto it, having no idea what else would be up there when they arrived. There were apparently over 80 “elevators” to bring them to their glory or to their doom. Another fact l learned is that the court where all of the action took place is a ratio of 5 long to 3 wide, thought to be the perfect ratio by Pythagoras (Thank you, Mrs. Mumper, for the poster on the back wall of your classroom). 

On the first day we were in Rome, we spent the day in the Vatican. We saw St. Peter’s Basilica,  the largest Cathedral in the world, the Sistine Chapel, and the Vatican Museum. St. Peter’s Basilica was impressive and beautiful, but I could have sworn the whole time we were in there that the Duomo in Milan is bigger. Maybe it was the lighting. Even though it didn’t seem like the biggest to me at the time, that didn’t discount from it's beauty. It was indeed gorgeous. Right smack dab in the middle where the altar is, in fact right under the altar, Saint Peter is supposedly buried. The funny part to me is that in the little museum right outside, there is a relic with Saint Peter’s finger in it, and it looked more bronze than dead flesh. My question is did they hack off his finger right before they “buried” him there?

After St. Peter’s Basilica, we went to the museum, which turned out to be a maze that went straight into the Sistine Chapel. The museum was okay, but I must confess that it was so big that after two hours or so, everything started to look the same. We saw roman statues, Grecian pots, paintings, artifacts, and many other types of stuff. Finally, after about what seemed like all day, but what could have only been two hours or so, we arrived at the Sistine Chapel entrance. Maybe it seemed so long because we had been looking forward to the chapel from the start. Amazingly, there was no line whatsoever, which almost unheard of, so we just waltzed right on inside. The chapel was beautiful, but it didn’t capture me the way I was expecting it to. Don’t get me wrong, it did capture me, but it was more of a subtle growing feeling rather than the blow to the face I was expecting. That is, I was expecting to walk in and to be absolutely blown away instantly by the intricacies, the gold plated everything, the bling, and the fanciness. The chapel is bright and inviting, don’t get me wrong, but it is beautiful because of the work that went into it and its significance. When I say the work that went into it, I am talking about the years Michelangelo and the other famous artists put into it, and their representations of different Bible stories and the way they express them. The chapel is divided up into many different paintings called frescas, and each painter painted one or three. My very favorite painting is by Michelangelo, and it is covering the entire front wall of the chapelt, and it is called, “The Last Judgment”.  As a whole, it is a great painting, but the reason why it is my favorite is because of the way Michelangelo painted the dead rising. It excites me every time I think about the Second Coming and the dead rising, and I really enjoy how it is depicted. What makes the paintings by Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel even more impressive is that Michelangelo was not known for painting; he was known for sculpting. When he was chosen to paint, he was reluctant because he didn’t know if he could do a good job in 2d. Even so, he made masterpieces on the walls and the ceiling as well.

I have taken up a new hobby; a new past time since we have been in Rome, and that is bartering. Yep, it's a real past time, or at least it is now.  I have found that it is actually quite fun to find something you want and argue and bicker for sometimes quite a while about what price you think is right to pay. Let’s see, since we have been in Rome, I have bartered for an umbrella, a new satchel because my old one is giving out, little souvenirs here and there, scarfs for Eric and Josh,  and we even did a little bit of bartering for our hostel/apartment arrangement. The way I see it, if you can’t agree on a price, especially when you are in a place like Rome, someone has the exact same thing for sale just down the way, and the worst that can happen is you just walk away. There are only two rules I have had to live by so far to make it work; patience, and having the ability to walk away. Usually they go hand in hand, because once they see you start to walk away, they usually call you back and give you what you asked for. If they don’t, you just keep on walking to the next shop or market, and start over again. Just this afternoon, there were a bunch of guys walking around selling little souvenir glass blocks with the word Rome in the middle with a picture of the Coliseum or the Vatican under. I thought those would be great gifties for family and friends, but I already had plenty of goodies and didn’t really need to get any more, but we had time, and we all decided that we would split the cost, which would be about a euro each if I did well. I talked to about four different guys, and none of them would go lower than 1 for a euro, so I just kept walking away. Finally, I was able to talk the very last guy into giving me 6 of them for 5 euros. Now we all have little gifties for our families, but to be honest, for me, it was more about the opportunity to negotiate and battle rather than the booty itself. I came back to the others, who had been watching everything from above (literally), with a huge smile on my face because I had had such a great time…and got a deal on little souvenirs. 

Rome is definitely a place I want to return to when I get the chance, maybe in 5, 10, or even 20 years from now, but I definitely want to see it all again. Of all of the cities we have visited so far; Milan, Genoa, Olympia, Athens, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and Rome, Rome is my favorite. Now we are on the train heading out to Florence, which is where we will be for Christmas. I can’t wait to see what will happen next. Until next time…