Sisilies in Sicily

That joke will never get old. :)

My sister and I flew straight from Rome to Palermo, where we met up with our couchsurfing host, Alessio. He picked us up at the train station and took us back to his four story beach house, where he cooked us a pasta with his mother's homemade tomato sauce. I really thought I was dreaming.
Normally, when couchsurfing, I take what I can get. I've slept on the floor, on air mattresses, sometimes I'm lucky enough to get a bed - but never in a million years would I expect to be offered a room in a four story beach house, right on the Mediterranean. It's Alessio's family's summer home, which I find pretty amusing... why on earth would a family living in Palermo need a summer home? They live in a coastal city on an island in the Mediterranean... their summer home is only a 15 minute drive from their winter home! It's a hard life, but somehow they manage.

Almost immediately after our delicious home cooked meal, we went out for a delicious restaurant meal. That's just how they do things in Sicily. We went to a cafe known for its traditional Sicilian dish, pane con la milza. It consists of a large bun, cut open and spread with lard, filled with lots of milza (mystery meat, at the time) and a strong, somewhat stinky cheese called caciocavallo. It actually looked delicious, so I was excited to try it. I tried a bite and was disgusted at the flavor of the meat - it not taste like anything I'd consider edible. As it turns out, milza is spleen. That explains a lot.


*** GROSS-OUT ALERT: Don't read this unless you really, really want to be grossed out. My sister was especially disgusted by the smell of the milza... she said that the only thing she could compare it to was the way the room smelled after her friend's dog had puppies. Basically, we were eating something that smelled like canine afterbirth. Awesome. She also told me this while I was chewing. Really awesome. ***

If you read that and are absolutely repulsed, don't blame me. I warned you.

Luckily, I was able to get rid of the spleeny aftertaste by eating a delicious Sicilian dessert called cannoli. It's a flaky pastry shell stuffed with a sweet ricotta filling - mmm. Delicious, and does not contain a single organ!

We met a lot of Alessio's friends, including Davide (a fellow couch-surfer who also organizes parties and events for foreign students in Palermo) and Katherine (an American who moved to Palermo the same day that we arrived, vegetarian, did not partake of the spleen). We spent pretty much the entire week with them, and didn't sleep nearly as much as we should have. One night we returned home at after 6:00AM, just in time to watch the sun rise over the sea. Sicilians definitely know how to party.

On Thursday, we visited the Capuchin catacombs in Palermo. I had read about them in my guidebook and they seemed like an interesting sight... I didn't realize that it would feel like we were walking straight into a horror movie. In the 16th century, the friars of the Capuchin order in Palermo decided that when they died, they wanted to be embalmed rather than buried. So, they created the catacombs in order to store the corpses. Then, since all the friars were doing it, other people decided that they wanted to be embalmed, too. Being embalmed and placed in the catacombs became a symbol of wealth, so many people wrote specifically in their wills that this is what they wanted done with their remains. This was a popular request from the end of the 16th century all the way through until the 1920's. Now, these catacombs are filled with 8000 corpses, all remarkably preserved. Some are lying in coffins and others are hanging from the walls. It's absolutely terrifying.

I felt strange about the idea of taking photos in the catacombs but here's a picture I found on Google to give you an idea of what it's like. It was definitely an interesting experience, and not like anything I've ever seen before... but I'm never, ever going back there.

On Friday, we had a slight less intense day. Alessio and Davide took us to a nearby fishing village called Cefalù. It was a beautiful sunny day, so we spent the first few hours lying around on the beach, playing guitar and singing. It was nice to relax after a crazy night trying to keep up with the Sicilians...

We got a delicious pizza (can't get enough) and then walked around the village. It was a gorgeous town, filled with tiny, winding streets which all somehow led to the beach. The people were incredibly friendly, too - my sister and I went into a bar to get a few bottles of water and after a long conversation with the owners, they gave us each a glass of dessert wine made with almonds.... mmmm!

We explored for a little while and then climbed up a hill where we watched the sunset over the incredible views of Sicily and the Mediterranean. We also took artsy pictures, because what else would we do on a hilltop overlooking the Mediterranean?


On Saturday, we stayed in Palermo and explored the city. No corpses this time, just beautiful cathedrals, theaters, beaches and parks. It's a gorgeous city - here's a picture of the view from Katherine's apartment.

For dinner, Alessio suggested a fancy trattoria in Vucciria (Palermo's fish market district) but there was a one hour wait, so we hungrily vetoed and found the next best thing. Located in a dirty back alley of Vucciria, overlooking a crowded piazza where street vendors argued loudly with customers, we found what was possibly the shadiest restaurant that I have ever seen. Since you probably wouldn't believe me if I described it to you, I'll show pictures.

Aren't the cardboard signs classy? The restaurant is called Shanghai, but not because it serves any type of Asian food. The name is strangely fitting though, because sitting on the balcony overlooking the dirty back alleys of Vucciria feels like being in some movie set in the Far East. As we walked into the restaurant, I thought for a split second that we'd wandered into somebody's home, until I saw the trays of antipasti set out on a side table. The mother, daughter and grandmother were working in the kitchen while the rest of the family gathered around a small television watching Home Alone. Nope, not kidding.

As we were looking at the menu, the waitress (the mother, I believe) came out to take our orders. She first proceeded to tell us what they actually had that evening, and when Alessio asked why they didn't have shrimp, she angrily explained that they can't be expected to have every fresh seafood item on the menu every day. She said that if he wanted shrimp, he could come back on Monday and they might have it.

I love this place.

We ordered every appetizer that they had, including Eggplant Parmigiana (nothing like the kind I'm used to), white anchovies, sardines, mixed seafood platters, grilled peppers, olives, bread, salami and cheese. Mmm. Then, we each got a first course of pasta and a second course of fish. I especially liked the swordfish but the squid was amazing - it rivaled the squid that I (or rather, Susan's dad) paid a ridiculous amount of money for in Barcelona. Top that off with all the wine we could drink, and we were up to a whopping 15 euro per person. Not a single item cost more than 4 euro, not even the incredible squid.

People definitely don't go to Shanghai for the environment! I personally loved it but only because it added to the experience of a great meal. If the food had tasted bad, it would just be a dirty restaurant in the back streets of Palermo. Since the food was incredible, it was more of a "cultural experience."

That night, we went out dancing at a club for foreign students (Erasmus kids are always the most fun) and then went to an outdoor reggae concert in Vucciria. Near the piazza where everyone was dancing, there was a street vendor selling some sort of grilled meat, and dozens people lined up waiting for their portion. I asked what it was and our Sicilians companions insisted that I try this "delicious" traditional Sicilian specialty that they called Stigghiole. Basically (to my horror) they take the membrane from the small intestine of an animal, usually lamb but sometimes pork or chicken, and they wrap it around strips of skewered heart and scallions. The heart is also "preferably" lamb, but I'm not sure these Vucciria street vendors were really playing by the rules. My Italian friend explained excitedly that there were probably several different organs of several different animals wrapped up in the intestine. Oh, delicious. Why exactly is there a line down the street for this stuff?

I told myself that this year, I promised myself that I'd try everything... but at the sight of the Stigghiole, I seriously considered going back on that promise. After saying a quick prayer to the Gods of food poisoning, asking them to spare me, I closed my eyes and took a bite. The taste actually wasn't bad. It definitely wasn't as bad as spleen, and was actually quite flavorful. The texture, though... oh, the texture was awful. How did this food manage to be crunchy, grainy, slimy, chewy and rubbery all at the same time? I don't want to know, actually.

On Sunday, we threw a barbeque at Alessio's house and invited the friends that we had met over the past few days. It was possibly the best barbeque I've ever been to - all kinds of grilled meats and veggies, salad, macedonia (fruit salad), lots of wine, followed by an attempt by the Americans at teaching the Italians how to play "spoons".

This American card game has always been one of my favorites, and my sister and I have been playing it since we were little. The rules are fairly simple and involve quickly passing cards from player to player, each person trying to collect four cards of the same value - when a person succeeds at this, they take a spoon from the middle of the table. As soon as one spoon is taken, the rest of the spoons are fair game and the other players can take one as well. There is always one less spoon than the amount of people playing so at the end of the game, one person is left without a spoon. When Ave and I were younger, this person was simply the loser, but now that we're older, the loser has to finish their drink.

Needless to say, it got a little crazy. Alessio seemed to be losing every round and, as a result, was becoming more and more intoxicated - after about a half an hour of him losing every single round, we finally realized that he didn't understand the rules. At this realization, he experienced what I like to call a "spoons breakdown" and started yelling in Italian and what he thought was English, telling us all to "go to the ass" for letting him lose for so long.

In another round, my sister and Davide fought over the last spoon and my sister ended up accidentally hitting Davide in the face with it. He said "Oh no! You gave me a punch!" and realized that his lip was actually bleeding. This is the only time that I have ever seen blood shed in a game of spoons, but I guess Sicilians are just more competitive than Americans. It was just a small cut, but it was so funny that Davide didn't seem to mind.

It was a great night, but we went to bed pretty early because we were planning a trip to Agrigento in the morning. Agrigento is a city on the southern coast of Sicily, famous for the "Valley of the Temples." It's not actually a valley as its name may suggest, but a ridge, containing seven Greek temples built in the 5th and 6th centuries B.C. Second only to the temples in Athens, they're the best-preserved Greek temples in the world. I felt like I had walked right out of Italy into ancient Greece.

Sicily actually has a lot of locations with this transporting effect, because throughout history, it has been taken over and controlled by the Greeks, Normans, Arabs, Spanish, and finally Italians. All of these cultures have left their traces on the island, which creates a very unique Sicilian culture of its own. I'm not sure which of the armies brought Stigghiole... I suppose I can forgive them, just because they brought so many other things. I think beautiful temples make up for the intestine-wrapped organs - or at the very least, it's a start.

It was very surreal walking along the ridge (with an incredible panoramic view of the sea, city and countryside) through these ancient temples. You may remember my crazy princess fantasies inspired by Granada's Al Hambra - these were quickly replaced by toga fantasties, eating grapes on a chaise lounge and riding in chariots. What else would I do? My sister tried to be as greek as possible in front of the Temple of Juno, while I just tried to be as tall as possible next to my two travel companions.

On our last night in Sicily, we had the best pizza I've ever had in my life. It was huge, first of all, unreasonably large for one person. Of course, this didn't stop me and I finished every bite - tomato, mozzarella di bufala, pesto, sundried tomatoes and tasty grilled mushrooms. It was perfect. It was at a relatively famous pizzeria so we paid more than we usually would for pizza, but it was so worth it. We barely said two words to each other at the table, everyone was too busy eating!

The next morning we decided to take one last day trip before our evening flight. We decided to go to Monreale, which is a small town south of Palermo famous for its mosaics. I was amazed at the inside of the cathedral - all of the walls were covered in mosaics depicting bible stories. Everything was there, the story of creation, Noah's arc, the crucifixion - all illustrated through colorful mosaics.

We saw a very young girl in a stroller looking at the mosaics and she understood what was going on! She was pointing at the pictures of Noah's arc and telling the story to her parents. The whole point of creating these beautiful mosaics was to find a universal way of telling these stories, and it obviously worked.

Michele, the Italian who was showing us around Monreale, said that he still remembers the first time he went into the cathedral when he was younger. He said he was almost moved to tears - almost but not quite because he's a big tough Italian man! Since he appreciated it so much, he was the perfect tour guide and we spent hours wandering around the cathedral and its beautiful courtyard.

By the time we got to the airport that evening, we were exhausted and absolutely ready to come home to Bologna, but I can't wait to go back to Sicily. We didn't make it to the east coast of the island at all and I've heard that the cities on that coast are incredible.

Oh, one last note about food (because I'm obsessed, it's a disease): Of all the foods that we ate in Sicily, my favorite was a 1 euro lunch called arancine. I have a friend here in Bologna who made them for me once, but the one I ate in Sicily was amazing. It's a traditional "fast food" consisting of a deep-fried rice ball stuffed with delicious filling, sometimes ragu (meat sauce), sometimes tomato and mozzarella, and sometimes ham and cheese. They're usually about the size of a softball and sooo filling. I'm actually addicted - my sister and I wanted to eat them for our last meal in Sicily but we were running late and almost missed our flight, sothere was no extra time for arancine. If not for the beautiful eastern cities, I absolutely have to return for more of that deep-fried ricey goodness.

What do the Romans do???

My sister and I arrived in Bella Roma on Monday evening, and met up with my friend Jarek who has a flat here. I met him a few months ago when he contacted me via couchsurfing and asked if I could show him around Bologna. We hung out for the few days that he was visiting and got along great, so in return for my tour-guide services, he let Avery and I stay at his place while we were in Rome.

We had great timing because Jarek just finished his study program in Rome and was getting ready to return home to Poland, so the night we arrived was also the night of his going-away party! The tiny flat was filled with people from all over the world (all studying in Rome), and we had a great time hanging out with everyone. Everyone especially loved Avery, and helped to teach her their favorite words and phrases in Italian (most are a bit inappropriate to post here). We were actually only planning on staying there one night but we got along with Jarek's roommates so well that we stayed an extra night! It was also great seeing Jarek again before he went back to Poland.

We spent our second day in Rome wandering around the city seeing the sights. We started at the Trevi Fountain because that's what Avery wanted to see the most. Like good little tourists, we threw coins into the fountain - rumor has it that if you throw a coin over your shoulder into the Trevi Fountain, you'll return to Rome. Hey, it worked last time!

Interesting side note: I read that over 3000 euro are thrown into the fountain every day, and the money is used to feed the homeless. Che bella!

We also sat on the Spanish Steps, lingered in Piazza Venezia and Piazza del Popolo, saw the Pantheon and the Colosseum just before sunset, and walked through the ancient Roman ruins. It's amazing how much history can be contained in one city, and how powerful the city still feels.

As we were exploring the city, we stumbled across this interesting art exhibit which illustrates the spread of the Roman Empire. I never really realized how powerful it became. At one point around 115 AD, Rome controlled over 2.3 million square miles of land, stretching from Scotland to Egypt and from Morocco to Turkey.

Oh, funny story. I borrowed a few different guidebooks from my study center before our trip. Along with the standards, Rick Steve and Lonely Planet, one of the books was "MTV's guide to Italy." Not kidding. Anyway, the guidebook mentioned that it's possible to sneak into the Colosseum after dark! It said that there is a spot on the gate where the bars don't quite reach the ground, and that a "reasonably-sized person" should have no trouble getting through. Um, midnight tour of the Colosseum? Yes, please!

We circled the Colosseum until we found the spot that the guidebook was talking about. Unfortunately the book is a few years old and new bars had been installed which cover the hole. I like to think that when that book came out, hundreds of American teenagers attempted to sneak into the Colosseum. I'm sure eventually one of them got caught and fessed up.

We were pretty disappointed but comforted ourselves by taking goofy pictures in front of important monuments like the Arch of Constantine.
On our third and final day in the city, we visited the Vatican. I had already been there, but it was still an incredible experience. The museums are incredible, and the Sistine chapel was just as breathtaking the second time around. My favorite parts of the museums included the Egyptian exhibit, a collection of ancient tapestries, and the modern religious art exhibit.

I've also always been fascinated by this sculpture fragment, known as the Belvedere Torso. It's signed by a sculptor named Apollonius, but nobody really knows anything about him. The sculpture may have been of Hercules, and is considered to be a masterpiece. It has influenced many other artists, including Michelangelo and Rodin. If you look at the shape of the body and muscles, you can definitely see the similarities to Michelangelo's male figures (including David) and also Rodin's "The Thinker."

I find it fascinating that a broken fragment of sculpture can be so intriguing and influential, especially when virtually nothing is known about the artist who created it. It's very mysterious.

After the museums and the Sistine chapel, we went straight to St. Peter's basilica which remains one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. It's amazing how much work went into creating that place. Every pillar is covered with tiny marble carvings of angels and cherubs, every wall is painting with amazing biblical scenes. I don't consider myself a religious person but walking into a place like that is always incredibly moving, because you can see how much work people put into building this basilica, just to honor something that they truly believe in. It took 120 years to complete, so the architects who designed it and the people who spent their lives building it never even got to see it finished. They literally devoted their entire lives to something they never got to see. Amazing.

The basilica is a piece of art in itself, but inside we also saw one of my favorite sculptures - Michelangelo's Pietà. I remember seeing this sculpture for the first time 2 years ago and being moved to tears. The piece carries such incredible emotion, and has such personal significance for me. Unfortunately it's hard to get close to the statue because in the 1970's, some crazy Australian guy knocked off the Virgin Mary's arm with a hammer. Now, the sculpture is behind bulletproof glass and can only be viewed from a distance. Silly Aussies!

It rained most of the time when we were in Rome, but we just used that as an excuse to duck inside for cappuccinos or pizza more often. In spite of the dreary weather, our three days in Bella Rome were wonderful and we can't wait to go back. After all, we threw coins into the Trevi Fountain so it's a sure thing that we'll return one day!

We also learned what the Romans actually do. After many creative responses, Jarek's was the one which we appreciated the most. When my sister asked him, he answered "they eat, drink, and scopa." After an angry glare from me, he told my sister the literal definition of "scopa" which is "sweep", instead of telling her the more scandalous definition. So, next time you go to Roma, be sure to bring a broom...

Brunch Americano

Last night, my sister and went to my favorite local trattoria and had a delicious, very Italian meal - bruschetta and stuffed olives as an appetizer, two pasta dishes, and tiramisu for dessert. We went out for drinks first, didn't even get to the restaurant until after 11:00 PM and left at around 1:00 AM, which is considered relatively normal here - maybe a little on the late side but still perfectly acceptable. Always the good influence on my little sister, I made sure we finished every drop of our 1 liter carafe of wine. Waste not, want not!

We were still full when we woke up this morning, so we decided to skip breakfast and fix an afternoon American brunch for all of my housemates. I left a note telling everyone not to eat because we were planning a "Brunch Americano" and we left to go shopping for supplies - when we came back, Andrea had written his replies all over it:

"Turn off the lights, cover the fires! Look out!"
"No! What is it, are they dropping bombs?"
"Indians, look out!!"
"Close the doors and windows!"

Yeah, he's very fond of Americans. :)

In spite of Andrea's comments, we started cooking and went all out - fresh squeezed orange juice for mimosas, french toast and pancakes with two different homemade toppings (strawberry or caramelized banana), hash browns, scrambled eggs and bacon.

Have you ever seen Italians eat brunch? Somehow I doubt it, so I'll go over the highlights.

As soon as we put everything on the table, Andrea picked up a piece of french toast, tore it in half and made a bacon sandwich. I explained in Italian "no, no, Andrea - you put either the strawberries or the bananas on the french toast" and he said "you want me to put strawberries on the panino?!"

I said "there IS no panino" and poured some strawberries on his french toast for him - at which point he started yelling that I was ruining everything, that the sweet food was too close to the salty food. He tried to say this in English for the benefit of my sister, and since "salty" in Italian is "salata," he said something like "The salad! It is too close to the sweet!"

Pier, on the other hand, was confused because there was no bread. I said that we didn't really need bread because we were already eating pancakes and french toast, and he picked up a piece of bacon and said "well how are we supposed to eat this, then??" I said "ummm by itself?" and he started shouting in Italian, saying things like "you crazy Americans, don't know how to eat!!"

Neither Italian liked the mimosas very much so they just drank the orange juice and champagne separately, and I think they were pretty disgusted by my attempt at hash browns. To be fair, they looked like greasy potato mush but I thought they tasted pretty good...

The whole meal was hilarious, with the Italians yelling that Americans are crazy, and my sister and I responding by saying that Italians are crazy... Marta (Portuguese) just sat by and laughed - her people were not involved in this American-Italian Brunch War.

Sisters in Bologna!

After almost 8 months, I finally get to be ridiculous with my little sister again.

It had been wayyyy too long.

We have lots of plans for traveling, eating, drinking and especially taking goofy pictures. I'll keep everyone posted. :) Yay!

Giardini Margherita

It's spring in Bologna, and I have nothing to do! I decided not to take classes fourth quarter in order to leave myself more time for traveling, reading, yoga, all the things that I wish I could do but don't when I spend all day in class.

This week, for example, I spent every single day at the park. It's only about a 5 minute walk from my house and when it's sunny outside, it just seems like it would be silly not to go. I take my guitar, a book, a blanket and some snacks, and meet anyone who feels like joining me.

The park (called Giardini Margherita) is really an amazing place. On the weekends it's completely packed with people, all doing something. In Berkeley there are always a few people doing yoga, a few others playing music of some kinda, but in Italy they really go crazy. The park is always crowded with jugglers, tight-rope walkers, drum circles, acrobats, capoeira, tai chi, people playing football of the American or European variety, volleyball, frisbee, unicycles, bicycles, tricycles and training wheels, dog walking, accordians, guitars, trombones, saxophones. Then there are the quiet ones, the studiers and readers and nappers. I usually fall into the category of people-watcher, daisy chain-maker or 1/2 of Kat and Kalen's street-singing duo.

On one particularly sunny day, Leslie came to the park armed with henna dye and proceeded to decorate all of us while we munched on fruit and cookies and played music. Beautiful!

Sometimes, when the sun is just too beautiful and the grass is just too cool, it's actually impossible to stay standing.


This leads to creative uses of the guitar, as demonstrated by James :)

Kat and I almost always bring our guitars to practice for our future street-singing adventures. I think we're pretty close to ready but we're still perfecting our harmonies on a few songs. Also, my guitar never seems to want to stay in tune... but I got it for free so I can't really complain!


Some days the hippie vibe really takes over, and there's just nothing that can be done except give over to it completely. No use resisting the peace and love!

The best part of being at the park on a sunny day is that I get to see all my friends, completely recovered from the Bologna winter slump that had us all feeling pretty dreary for the past few months. Everyone is smiling again, relaxed and happy. Of course I always love my friends, they're always amazing and beautiful, but the sun brings out the best in all of us!




And, finally, finally, FINALLY. I can juggle!

It only took me several months of practicing, but I can now "successfully" juggle - that is, for about 10 seconds until I get too excited that I'm actually juggling, and lose control. A little boy saw me the other day, though, and said to his friends "look at the juggler!" So at the very least, I'm a juggler by a 6-year-old's standards... which is good enough for me!

The wonder that is RyanAir

My amazing friend Kat (singing partner and travel guru) and I booked our next vacation today...

May 9 - flight from Milan to Fez (Morocco): 20 euro

May 15 - flight from Marrakesh (Morocco) to Barcelona: 42.10 euro

May 18 - flight from Barcelona to Cagliari (Sardegna): 20 euro

May 21 - flight from Cagliari to Pisa: 21.90 euro

2 friends, 4 flights, 12 days of adventure spanning across 3 countries? Priceless.

Or ya know, 100 euro.

How is this even possible??

Staying in Bologna...

So... when I said "I'm going to Stockholm" and "Woo!! Sweden, here I come!!"

Yeah that might not have been entirely accurate. Last night as I was finishing my blog, Marta got home from a party and said "so on a scale of 1-6, how much do you want to go to Stockholm in 4 hours?" and after some thought, I answered "2."

She didn't want to go either, so we called l'altra Marta and asked how much she wanted to go. L'altra Marta said she wanted to go, so my Marta and I decided that we would go too, and have a wonderful time.

I got about 2 hours of sleep and, in what was very possibly the most difficult feat of my life, got up at 4:00 AM to take a shower. After my shower, my Marta came to my room with the telephone and said "L'altra Marta is one the phone - she doesn't want to go."

So, long story short, we didn't go. The weather is perfect, warm and sunny in Bologna and below freezing and cloudy in Stockholm. I still have no ATM card which means I'd have to borrow money from one of the Martas. I am still recovering from a plague/fever/flu which I had last weekend. Yes, my first celsius fever knocked me out for 3 days - I was at 38,5 gradi which really doesn't seem high enough to do any harm... silly celsius.

Anyway, forget Stockholm.

I'm going to the park!

Carnevale in Venice

Carnevale.

That word has been on the tip of everybody's tongue since I arrived in Italy in August. All the best stories involve past trips to Venice for Carnevale, and it seemed like every party was just a preparation for the party, which lasts for almost the entire month of February.

After all the build-up, I obviously couldn't miss it, so I donned my mask (*ahem* bragging time - handmade mask, using only materials from the local dollar store...) and headed to Venice with a group of friends. My beautiful mask needed to make its glorious debut at Carnevale!

The minute we got off the train, I knew it was going to be an amazing day. There were people everywhere, almost all of them dressed up. People dancing and singing in the streets, artists painting peoples' faces, hundreds of vendors selling hats and masks, confetti covering everything, music and food and wine and concerts and Venice! Beautiful, beautiful Venice. It looked much different this time than when I visited last summer...

Finances allowed only a day trip to Venice, as couch-surfing was impossible to find and hostels in Venice cost about as much as a 5-star hotel in Bologna. I could have spent a week there and still not seen everything that Carnevale has to offer, but the time limit just added an incentive to see as much as I could! When we got off the train, our first task was finding vino. No, scratch that. Panino, then vino. No, scratch that again. Goofy hats and masks, then panino, then vino. No, okay: final answer. Bancomat (ATM), then goofy hats and masks, then panino, then vino. When you're traveling in a group of 15, that's kind of how decisions are made.

When we approached the bancomat, it looked like your average ATM. During the transaction, though, it showed its true colors and devoured my ATM card! Monster!! To add to my distress, (and I'm convinced that this was a part of the bancomat's evil scheme), it was Sunday and the banks were closed. There was nothing we could do, so I borrowed money from some friends and had my mom cancel the card.

Once we had successfully taken care of the next two items on our to-do list, (panino, vino) I was feeling much better - good enough to really enjoy the rest of our day. There were a lot of different events to see, but I think the best part was just wandering around and seeing all the amazing costumes. Venice was absolutely packed with people and everyone looked awesome - there were people walking around on stilts, dressed in full-body animal suits, and of course there were millions of different masks. My friend James got a lot of attention for his costume, a foam horse which he seemed to be riding. People were constantly asking to take pictures with him!

Venice is the perfect place for a giant festival like carnevale. The narrow, winding streets add an element of mystery - you never know what you're going to see around the next corner.

It's also hard to tell how crowded the city actually is, until you walk out into a huge open space like Piazza San Marco and see that it's completely filled with people, elbow to elbow. There were literally thousands of people crammed into Piazza San Marco for an evening show. The show featured a woman "dancing" in the air while hanging from a giant balloon. She was spinning and twirling to carnival music during a rainbow-colored light show. Amazing!

Most people complained that the show lasted too long (because yeah, how much can you do while hanging from a giant balloon) but I was so fascinated by it. I kept imagining how amazing the woman must have felt, spinning and dancing in the air like that - it must have felt like she was flying. I need to figure out how to get that job...

Every piazza had a different show or event going on. It's hard to choose a favorite, but I loved the open tango dancing (tried and failed - miserably) and one piazza with a really goofy band:

They were dancing with their instruments and it looked so much fun that we all joined in and danced with them. Perhaps, perhaps the wine had something to do with it, but they loved us! I think they were especially impressed with my rendition of the macarena.

Later on, I shared another dance with a tiny boy in a duck suit who was quite fond of my mask. I think it was true love.

I let him play with my mask for a little while but his mom made him give it back...

Even after the vicious attack of the bancomat, I had an amazing time in Venice. We stayed until the last train left for the night, and it was so crowded that we sat (and slept) on the floor for the 3 hour trip. I was exhausted, but it was one of the most interesting experiences that I've had since I arrived in Italy.

Tomorrow (in 4 hours, actually - technically today since it's after midnight), I'm leaving for Stockholm. I don't think wild horses could keep me in one place, but I have the entire world to see and just one lifetime to do it. Woo! Sweden, here I come!!

***All the photos in this blog were "borrowed" from friends - I unfortunately do not currently have a working camera. :(