View from the top

This has been quite a week for the BCSP. I guess the point of this blog is for me to go through everything I did for the past few days. But really I just want to go on a rant about food because wellll I am just in the mood to. But, first things first. After our wonderful day at the Agriturismo (the wine tasting/pasta making) we had a few more surprises. Thursday was a normal day of class and nothing else too exciting. On Friday we were told to arrive at one of the portas  (large gates that were once part of the walls that enclosed the city center) and from there we would go on a little walk. This little walk soon turned into a hike and then into a climb and finally we were on the top of a hill outside of the city overlooking all of Bologna. It was gorgeous, to put it as simply as possible. I literally can’t think of a better way to spend the morning than sitting in a field with friends and food, enjoying the sun and looking at this:

I will give you a hint. My apartment has a red roof. Find it. 

 On Saturday we all awoke early for a 9:00 train to Ravenna, a smaller town near the coast known as the "Mosaics Capital of the World. That is no joke. This town is full of mosaics. We saw some beautiful, beautiful churches- all significant for how they show a merging of the artistic styles from the Eastern and Western regions of the Roman Empire. I think. Generally I do pretty well with my understanding here but there are some Italians I have met who, when they talk, their words literally just meet my brain like it’s a brick wall and I just can’t. I just can’t. Our tour guide was one of those people. Oh yeah! I almsot forgot. We also went to see Dante's tomb since is was buried in Ravenna after he was exiled from Florence. Well, their loss, our gain!

Dante's tomb. I was in the same vicinity as Dante Alighieri. Pretty sweet

  After a day of sight-seeing, shopping and a delicious (and free!) lunch we headed back to Bologna just in time for a city-wide jazz festival that featured bands playing free concerts in little outdoor nooks all over the place. I saw some positively charming shows on my own because I couldn’t find the people I was supposed to meet up with. I didn’t mind because there was a group consisting all of old men dressed in white button-ups, red suspenders and hats and if there is anything that I love more than watching adorable old men having a ball playing music it’s watching that with an overly appreciative audience (people were just loving it. They were a show all on their own).  To top it all off, there were swing dancers too. Fantastico! I eventually found some people from the program and we went for a gelato. I will go into more detail than usual here because I particularly enjoyed our conversation. We picked up a conversation that they were having before I met up with them- if each person were a gelato flavor, what would they be? Normally I enjoy this game but this was taken extremely seriously which made it all the more enjoyable. They went into immense detail over personality and flavor nuances and soon enough I was salivating. After a ten-minute deliberation I was deemed Tiramisu (and pineapple was a close second). Something to do with being well-presented, sweet and multi-faceted. I’ll take it.  S

Sorry the picture quality is terrible, but this is all that I have. I think, however, the atmosphere is captured quite well. 

Happy Independence Day, indeed. 

Whelp. This ended up being a lot longer than I planned. I wanted to just talk about food. Humph. Well I won’t overwhelm you with the longest post ever so I will just stop here and leave the food for another post. Might even still write it tonight. My blog, my rules YOU CAN’T STOP ME. 

Ciao, ciao for now!