Advertisement
Published: October 23rd 2007
Edit Blog Post
me and christie!
in front of the view from the villa Ciao tutti!
I’m back in classes after a wonderful weekend visiting Christie in Florence. It was not without its fiascos, as you will see, but it was totally worth it!
I took a 4:00 train on Friday, arriving in Florence at 7 pm because Christie and her program had a field trip and would not be coming home until late. So I got up to the villa around 7:30 and got a quick tour… and could not believe my eyes.
The Georgetown villa is in Fiesole, a small town next to Florence, on a hill overlooking the whole city. The villa itself was donated by the Rockefellers… aka it is GORGEOUS. 25 Georgetown students live in the villa, so there are bedrooms and bathrooms, a kitchen and a dining room, and a classroom. Plus there are beautiful courtyards and patios overlooking all of Florence; I could not even believe my eyes. There is a personal chef that cooks three authentic Italian meals a day, for free. Unfortunately, it is kind of a pain to get into Florence itself - it requires a
painful walk up a very steep hill to the bus stop, then a half hour bus
ride. But Florence itself is a beaaautiful city, with great sights and picturesque Italian streets and wonderful, hearty Tuscan cuisine.
By now I bet you are asking yourself: why would Jenna knowingly choose to live in an uglier city and have to pay for her own food and do everything herself when she could live in a beautiful villa in a beautiful city and have life be so much easier?
The answer is that, for better or worse, I wanted an authentic Italian experience. And I certainly got it - if it wasn’t for my roommates and friends I would go an entire day without speaking or hearing any English. It’s kind of cool to cook for myself and really get to know the city, which is much nicer than people give it credit for. Florence, for all its advantages, is FULL of Americans. As soon as the train left Bologna for Florence (the second leg of my train ride) they started translating all the announcements into English, something I have never heard in Italy. Then in Florence itself everything was in English, and there were so many American students I could not even believe it. We would
go into a store or a bar and only hear English and only see Americans. Statistically during the school year there are more Americans in Florence than Italians. I would get so frustrated!
ANYWAY, Friday night we had dinner in the villa and then went out into Florence for the night. Very fun! Then Saturday we went into Florence for the famous open air market in Piazza San Lorenzo, where they sell lots of great leather and other nice Italian products (and some other cheesy, not so nice touristy products). We stopped in this cute restaurant for lunch, and this is where things got ugly. I ordered spinach and ricotta ravioli with a mushroom sauce and I ate ONE ravioli and started to feel a little strange. I called the waitress over and asked if there were nuts in the sauce and she said yes, so I started to freak. My tongue started to swell and my throat started to get itchy, so I took a couple Benedryl and prayed to God that the reaction would not get worse. Unfortunately it did, as I felt my lips start to swell and my throat start to close, so I had
Christie call an ambulance. By the time the ambulance came my reaction hadn’t gotten any worse, and the EMTs yelled at me until I cried for being stupid and not checking what was in my food (which was deserved, I know. I just hate asking all the time! Oh well, lesson learned!). No one spoke English, which was very difficult because I know a lot of Italian but not medical vocabulary!
They put me in the ambulance and took my vitals and determined that while my allergic reaction was not dangerously severe, my blood pressure was dangerously low. So they sat in the ambulance and filled out paperwork for a good 15 minutes. Makes sense, right? Then they took me to the hospital and I sat in the waiting room on the ambulance stretcher for another solid 10 minutes. Then they took me into the exam room and made Christie leave (the poor girl was so freaked out, I felt so awful!) and took my blood to determine what my histamine levels were (to see how bad my reaction was at the moment). After the most painful blood draw of my LIFE (they took it from my wrist, where
you take someone’s pulse, and the nurse was god awful), I called my Mom and said, “Mom, please don’t be mad, but I’m kind of in the hospital…” THAT was a fun conversation. Then the nurse came back in and said the machine couldn’t read my blood, so she had to take it from the other wrist. I started crying, anticipating another horrible blood draw. This one was even worse because she couldn’t find the artery so she was going in and out with the needle and at one point the needle was perpendicular to my arm. I was SOBBING and probably not making it any easier for her because she kept saying “per favore non piangere!!” (please don’t cry!). Then they gave me a cortisone shot and sent me home, and I could not touch my wrists until a couple days later. My wrists are still bruised, and this all happened Saturday.
Christie and I then went back to the villa to rest (because I had so much benedryl in my system!) and then went out to a local pub for dinner with her friends. Then we had a dance party in the classroom of the villa… pretty
standard.
Sunday morning we woke up early to actually go to the market this time, and I bought the most gorgeous Italian leather purse and these amazing Italian leather gloves lined with rabbit fur (okay that makes me sound like a total cold-hearted-animal-killer, but really they are the most amazingly warm and soft things I have ever felt), and a cashmere pashmina. All for a pretty decent price! I was telling my Mom how grown-up and mature I felt, buying wardrobe staples like purses and gloves in real Italian leather. Hahah we’ll see how long I go before losing them!
After a quick lunch I got on the train back to Milan, and spent a lovely afternoon looking at the Tuscan countryside. Back in Milan, exhausted but happy, I realized that as much as I love Florence (and obviously as much as I love my Christie!) Milan really felt like home.
Look for updates early next week from my weekend in Madrid!! And GO RED SOX!!!! I wish I was back in Boston to root for them, because I can’t watch the games here and 3 of roommates are from Colorado! This should be interesting! Love you
all!!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.079s; Tpl: 0.014s; cc: 7; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0349s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
mom
non-member comment
Your pictures are beautiful. Florence looks much more impressive than how I remember it it! Take care of yourself