I saw the POPE!!!

The Pope…
Now I know that a lot of people have their issues with the pope… and for some of his reasoning’s on life are very out there… but the fact that he came to Torino to give Mass was incredible! You couldn’t even believe the amount of people that were here. Our Italian friend Giovanni spent the night at our house and took us there the next day… well actually we took him there.. in our ride…!! We took the BUS! Hahaha! Now he HATES the bus, he says its full of sick and smelly people (which is why I got so sick this semester). So as we waited for the bus, the disgusted look on his face made it all worth while… the look that dad gets on the New York metro! Hahaha! I took pictures! SO amazing! As we took the bus he was grossed out by everything and all we could do was laugh! We arrive at Porta Nuova at 10:30am and walk with the rest of Torino to where you can see the Pope. Then all of a sudden we are in a huddle of old smelly people on an overcast day, it was a mess… a perfect non organized event (italy)! As we mosh to get just a sight of the guy, grandmas little NONNAS are like in my mid back—that’s how little these grandmas are, are shoving me… this one that stood behind micki and I and she was so short.. I don’t even know why she came to the event, she cant even see over people in real life situations.. did she think her destination had a step stool waiting for her everywhere she went?? Honestly this old lady was so short micki was like ‘Katherine, Katherine look behind you…. Does this lady think shes passing us? Or better yet seeing anything???’ hahahaha!! Sooo funny! So after the Italian MOB we finally reach air, after Giovanni told off this other old women… hahah I would have let her pass because she was talking to me in Italian, and god knows what she said but Gio stood up to her in Italian and told her, Signora, blah blah blah blah, but I understood it… he was like ‘Where would you like me to go? We are all waiting here.’ And she said something back at her but I didn’t catch it because I was laughing… he just told off a nonna.. they are treated like royalty here… give my seat up on the bus everyday, helping them pick up what they dropped on the street as I walk past them… ahh annoying ☺! Kidding.
So we finally break free from the sweaty smelly pit, and find a spot next to this television metal stand… we each took turns climbing up on it and looking at the ant like pope almost a quarter of a mile away… he was an ant… so far away.. I got a blurry picture and then said lets go! Hahah! After that we all walked home back to my apartment me, micki, gio, and becky micki’s roommate. It was nice. I realized that it would be one of the last times I would walk home from the train station.. and then my heart began to hurt. I was home and as I entered my apartment I took a big breath in and started to cry…. I will miss italy… I took a shower and laid in bed and fell fast asleep.

Italy is coming to an end…….

SIENNAAAAA(*&^%$# last trip in ITALIA

hey guys!!!!
i know this one is LATE but better late than not at ALL!!! sooooooo micki and i as you know dedicated this whole semester to traveling italy and we were so lucky to have taken our last trip together... we decided to go to Siena for an over night and see this beautiful city that everyone was telling us to go see. We woke up EARLY to go and catch our train at Porta Nuova, and surprisingly it was a NICE trenitalia train... so we had reserved seats, and of course it was with 3 business men. but one of them was in one of our seats soooo awkwardly showing them our tickets one of the guys got up and let us sit. But he STOOD there the ENTIRE ride to FLORENCE 2 and a half hours of talking in italian with SMELLY breath and micki and i were trying to talk over them, we only lasted an hour until we grew exhausted! hahah we got so over hearing them talk that micki went into my backpack and got my speakers and turned them on.... and they were silent... MID SENTENCE! hahahah! it was sooo funny! i actually had tears coming out of my eyes. As we sat there in silence, and micki and my wandered to the business men with a smiles on our faces… we couldn’t stop laughing!! THEN the worst of all things happened… they started speaking English to us… our jaws dropped! We didn’t say anything bad about them, but we just kept saying, “what the hell are they talking about? Could this conversation be so important that this guy has to stand over me for the duration of the train ride??” things like that :/!! So we talked to them and YES all THREE men spoke English… foot in my mouth… umm NOW! So when we arrived in Florence and McDonalds looked SOOOO good! But of course our train was leaving in 5 minutes… so we didn’t get it, we told ourselves that we would get it when we got to Siena. So we took the train for yet another hurtle of our journey, and finally arrived!
Siena is known for their meat, and wine… soooo it was my kind of city! We walked down the main shopping street (in the rain) and found our hostel. After putting our stuff down and going back out we found the FAMOUS piazza, it was sooo incredibly beautiful, Italians call it the upside down volcano because it slopes downward into this HUGE drain which I took a picture of micki ☺! But the ground the sectioned off into strips each with a different shade of brick, like 13 or something and was suppose to symbolize the important people in the city hall at the end of this slope of a piazza. It was still raining so we took our rick steves and sat at one of the cafes and had a beer and split a pasta and a pizza and read all about the famous piazza. We learned that it was famous in june and july for its horse racing! They clear out the piazza and on the outlining of it they lay down dirt and 13 let me say that again 13 horse line up with their jockeys and race around this piazza. People in the pit of the piazza and hanging from the windows and waving their teams flags and colors. Because there is only one winner 1/13 winning team rubs it in the other teams face for the 365 days to follow the race until the next year. HAHA ahh rick! While reading this and drinking our beer and just people watching micki and I looked over the whole year and couldn’t believe that it was over, looking at our lives for the past 9 months and thanking our parents and just imaging life not traveling, riding a bus, clubbing, we couldn’t picture it. Then the scared looks on our faces grew… I grabbed my beer and gulped. After the rain clamed down we walked in the piazza and took our pictures. We made our way down the main shopping street and micki of course found the FAMOUS TOUTURE museum, now if you are reading this and you know me at all I HATE SCARY anything! So we went into this horrible place, watching micki and I cringe at every little thing.. it was ridiculous… so many things gave me shivers and some almost made me vomit… it was so INTENSE! Ewww ahh yaa! So after that…. We walked down to the duomo and went inside… now this was incredible, it looked like the duomo in Florence by Michelangelo and it was gorgeous! Inside was a trip as well, with all the popes heads carved out all looking down at you… yes yet another scary sight! After micki and I read about the duomo and lit a candle for someone (mine was for family) we left out into the rain yet again. My socks were soaked so we decided to call it a day, the rain wasn’t giving us any breaks. We went back to the hostel and watched the news, and drew art work on each others hands! ahahHAHA don’t ask…. ☺! Then after that we got dressed we went out to get another light meal, and sat in the piazza and enjoyed an over priced appetizer and a salad and a liter of wine… the rest of the night you will never know… hahahaHAHAH!!
The next morning it was POURING and we decided to call it a trip, the town was sooo small and we had seen all the major sights and it was one of the cheapest trips yet! So we caught the train and headed home. On the train we met super nice people, they were giving us cookies and crackers… it was hilarious! They knew we didn’t speak Italian and micki and I were playing song games, and yes yet again making fools of ourselves, always! We fell asleep for alittle and as soon as we woke up this man gave us each cookies like a big round cookie with chocolate inside, and of course we ate them right after he gave it to us. And the other people in the cart waited and put it in their purse… (fat Americans)! We finally made it back to Torino and it felt good to be! Ohh and if you wanted to know the McDonalds was under construction in Siena sooo for two days we were craving it and then when we FINALLy got back to Torino station we got McDonalds and brought it back to my apartment where micki spent the night because all of our roommates were gone and we didn’t want to sleep alone. It was a GREAT way to end the weekend, in our city, with our McDonalds, raining outside, watching a movie cozy under a blanket… ahhh home.. nothing like it!

….. anyone want to hear how I saw the POPE in person!?!?!?