Siena and Chianti

     It has been over a week since I arrived in Italy, but it feels like it's been a lifetime. Already, so much has happened and it has been a bit overwhelming at times, but I absolutely love Italy! On Tuesday my roommate, Clairanne, and I moved in with our host mother, Carmen. She lives in a cute little apartment about a 20-minute walking distance away from Linguaviva. She also has a sweet cat who is "molto simpatico". I think I will enjoy living here.

     The first couple times Clairanne and I walked to school we took a few wrong turns and had to look at the map about a hundred times, but pretty soon we were able to find our way without using the map. Still, I find the streets here confusing and random. I'm not use to living in a big city since I grew up in a small town most of my life. I'm from a tiny cowboy town in Arizona called Wickenburg. Wickenburg consists of a population of about 6,500, a one-screened movie theatre, four stop lights, tons of horses, and...well...the desert. When I started attending Hope College in Holland, Michigan, it was a vast improvement from Wickenburg, but Holland is still considered a small town.

     So here I am in Florence; a huge(by my standards), noisy, crowded city. I know that I can expect to experience culture shock while I'm here, but right now I think I'm experiencing "city shock"(if there is such a thing). I don't like the narrow streets or tiny sidewalks, and trying to cross a busy street here sometimes terrorfies me. I miss the openness of the country and being able to see the entire sky without a bunch of buildings in the way. I guess that's one thing I've learned already, I will never be a city person.

     On a different note, yesterday we went on a field trip to Siena. The bus ride there was gorgeous; I was able to see rolling hills, vineyards of grapes, and I even spotted a castle! Siena itself is absolutely beautiful as well. While there we visited the Cathedral Complex. First, we went down to a recently-discovered crypt which had well-preserved paintings from about the thirteenth century all over the walls. It was quite fascinating, never had I ever visited something so ancient in my entire life. We then went into the sanctuary of the gothic-styled cathedral. Wow. That had to be that most beautiful sanctuary I had ever seen in my life! Incredible! I could go on and on about this, but I don't want to bore my reader by babbling on about cathedrals and art. You have to be there in person to fully appreciate it.

     At the end of the day, we drove to Chianti, where a wine festival is held every year. It was here that I went on my first wine tasting expedition. For 10 euro, we received seven tastes of wine and a wineglass that we got to keep as a souvenir. Unfortunately, we only had about 45 minutes since the bus driver had a schedule to keep. So we had to be relatively quick with the wine tasting. Whenever we tasted a wine, we had to give the seller our punchcard so they would be able to keep track of how many drinks we have tasted. The thing is, on several occasions, the seller wouldn't even punch my card, so I ended up with more like 10 tastes in 45 minutes. Not the best idea, but at least the wine wine was good and I ended up having a great time.

By the way, here is a photo of the big Cathedral we saw in Siena.