Welp, 8 days later, I swear I am alive. School work is getting legit and midterms start next week. Not to mention, I have a giant Italian test on Thursday that I really need to study for tonight or there will be a problem... Everyone who says study abroad classes are "fluffy" and "GPA boosters" and "easy A's" did not come to Umbra. I do more homework here than at Bonaventure. This week has been pretty busy homework-wise. Last weekend we stayed in Perugia but made the most of it in every way possible. We went to a different club every night and got a meter long pizza on Saturday. The earliest I got home over the weekend was 4:30am Sunday. This, and the STILL miserable weather are most likely the reasons for the surprise head ... read more

Hello, readers! I am back in Perugia from my wonderful adventure in Florence. I’m thinking how I should blog about this: I tool 142 pictures and have 4 day’s worth of things to talk about, but don’t want to make this extremely long and bore anyone. We’ll see how this turns out I guess. Maybe I’ll make it a 2 part thing if I really end up writing a lot. Work with me, peeps. So. On Thursday the 2nd ( Groundhog Day!) the 3 of us, me Carrie and Abby, had class til 6:45, but had a 7:39 train to catch to Florence. The Archaeological Discoveries class that I’m in with Abby brought us to this museum about a 15 minute walk from the school, so we knew we were going to cut it late if ... read more

Happy Wednesday! Even though it’s 12am on Wednesday right now. Anyway. This week has been so far so good! On Monday in my Food History class we had a surprise eggplant workshop! The syllabus said there was supposed to be a wine tasting that day, and a quiz the next day, but that was some reason not the case. I still got a 14/15 on the quiz (stupid mistake on my part) even though I came in expecting a wine tasting. So we take the quiz, and then continue on to our lesson. In the middle of that, the guy who works in the little grocery store right next to school runs in the room, smiling and yelling random things to all of us in Italian. It seriously seemed staged to me, but definitely wasn’t. He ... read more

So I Skyped with my sister, Maria, last night for over an hour and it made me miss her so much! I thought it was pretty funny when she told me she read this blog and noticed that the only foods I’ve talked about eating are pizza and pasta. Hi Maria, if you’re reading this! You are 100% correct. Basically the only things I have eaten here ARE pizza, pasta, risotto and gelato. Italian staples, yes, but I’m beginning to wonder if I’ll ever eat anything else here! Like are we passing some secret restaurant every day that we don't know about?? Yesterday was our friend Alex’s birthday. He’s another friend from Bonaventure. We were at a friend’s house 2 nights ago so we could celebrate at midnight with him. After, we went to 2 bars ... read more

"Thank God it's Thursday." Even though it's now Friday, that's my new favorite phrase to use here. Why don't we have 4 day weeks at school in the US? It's really just a better plan for everyone. Yesterday we finished up the first full week of classes. We went to dinner at a place called Il Falchetto which is right next to our school and not even a 2 minute walk from our apartment. We went with 2 other friends, all ordered pasta and split a bottle of wine. I got spinach and ricotta gnocchi but they sound better than they actually were. I got tiramisu for dessert because I just couldn't pass it up! After, around 11pm, we met up with more friends at a bar called Dempsey's, right in the main square. A pretty ... read more