First Full Week in Rome

View of the shopping from the top of the Spanish Steps 

This week was our first full week of classes. I have the best schedule ever: 10-12:45 and 7-8:15 on Mondays and Wednesdays, no class Tuesdays or Fridays, and 10-12:45 on Thursdays. I'm taking Italian (Intermediate 2), International Marketing, Statistics, and Art History. My Italian class is impossibleeeeee, eeek. The teacher speaks in all Italian, and it's all oral stuff... which my old teacher didn't do any of. It's going to be very difficult. My International Marketing teacher is AWESOME. Our first day we just watched a full comedian show haha. The Art History class is an on-site class where we go to famous places (Colosseum, Pantheon, etc) and study how they were made, their art, and their history. I'm so excited for that class!

Valentino's apartment

I'm starting to adjust more. The bus system is so confusing here, and it seems like the second I feel like I'm finally getting the hang of it, I get lost again. It's so frustrating. This week we've mostly been hanging out and adjusting. Everyone is adjusting to having different groups of friends and making new ones, which has been fun. I've been trying to hang out with lots of different groups. We've been to the Spanish steps a couple times to do some shopping during saldi, a huge sale going on right now that happens twice a year. Everything is 50% off or more! We also went by Valentino's workshop and apartment, it's right by the Spanish Steps.

Colosseum at night

We've also been out a couple of times - we did a pub crawl which was really fun. It's fun exploring the city and seeing how different everything is here. Next week I want to really start finding cheap and free tours to go on so I can learn about all these buildings I'm seeing. The fascinating thing, and one of my favorite parts of being here, is how the city of Rome is actually built around all these historic landmarks. Everywhere you turn, whether you're shopping, at the grocery store, or on the way to class, there are beautiful buildings that are thousands of years old, and the city is just built around them. You can literally be walking down the street and turn the corner and be standing in front of the Pantheon. It's not like a lot of cities where the sights and historical parts are outside the city.

Cafe Latte, yum!!

Speaking of that, we found out that we are only about 3 metro stops from the Colosseum. We rode down on Wednesday on the way to class and walked around. The colosseum is hands down my favorite part of Rome (well, as of right now). It is just amazing. We walked around the entire Colosseum, then stopped for a delicious cafe latte in a coffee shop right next to it. It was so awesome being able to be there at night and in the winter when there were no tourists or anything. And also that we were able to do that on the way to class. I really want to spend more time there.

We are off to Tuscany and Florence early in the morning, and I'm so excited! It's a trip that is included in my program.

I am one of the luckiest people to be able to be living in Rome for an entire four months. This is truly the most beautiful city in the world.