Museums- Nemi, Gabii, and Praeneste

Today we went to several museums/ruins in three different towns. They were kinda cool, but I wasn't awestruck. Nemi was a ruinous temple near a beautiful lake, not a whole lot left except fields. In a museum build by Mussolini are two models of two huge ships that were brought up from the bottom of the lake. Nothing remains but reconstructions and miniatures, courtesy of WW2.  Gabii is an ancient settlement with a long back story, but the archaeology pails in comparison to Butrint (I've been spoiled on this one) and Praeneste is a medieval town with a huge museum and theater on top of a hill, which I hadn't seen before, except a variation in Siena, one of my favorite towns in all of Italy. The museum did have the Nile mosaic, which is the coolest mosaic I've seen yet and one of the highlights of the trip so far. I'm going to have to work on not comparing sites and trying to get something out of each of them. Here are some photos, to make up for the lackluster review of the sites.

Trying to Keep Up

So over the weekend I went with seven classmates to see Cinque Terre, a region of Italy on the Northwest coast that is somewhat renowned in the region for its hiking. It's about 1 am here, so I'm going to let the pictures speak for themselves on what we saw. Five towns, lots of hiking, beautiful day, missed the train home, was put on train immediately after, other than that, the pictures can cover the rest.

Gives you an idea of the size of the path

My Role at the Centro

So Wednesdays are internship and homework days, so not a whole lot of exciting things going on. For the internship, we're researching a collection in order to create an exhibit at a museum in Rome. We got to see the museum today, and while there was some neat stuff, none of it was revolutionary and warrants me uploading the photos on here. Thus, this is a text post.

I thought I would discuss the social dynamic of our 35 student group a little bit. This is always a precarious topic, as I never now who's reading, but I feel fairly confident that nothing I say will be offensive...but we'll see. So I stacked the deck before this program. Knowing that I would be here in the fall, I researched opportunities in the summer (go back and read the posts if you are unsure what I'm talking about) that would let me have a run at Rome before the real fun began. I know the city fairly well, much better than anyone in this program, and possibly better than the professors. One way or another, I'm comfortable in this city (not complacent, complacency is bad) and know how it runs. Thus, I seek to steal away some of my classmates experiences. These include getting lost, getting confused, settling for McDonald's because we miss dinner and getting pickpocketed. My goal, when we go out, is to avoid none of these things happen, so I come off as overprotective sometimes. Thus, I've earned the nickname Mama Duck, with all of the others being the baby ducks. I'm somewhat of the leader in the group, and I'm always alert and watching the group's back. Large groups of Americans traveling along back alleyways on a Friday night? Best believe I'm expecting trouble and watching every shadow from the moment we enter to the moment we leave the city. I've installed the policy that no girls walk home by themselves from the bars, meaning that one guy has to always be with them. Basically, I want to keep all the stories of this semester about all the fun people had, not a terrible experience that will be funny 10 years after the original occurrence. Thus, I'm Mama Duck, the planner, the leader, the protector. Not a bad gig, and at least when you're making the decisions, you know that they won't be bad ones. I was also chosen to be an RA for the semester here, so I report directly to Franco, the director of the program, and act as a go between him and the students. Finally, all the lunch ladies know me by name now, and they know that any extra food is to be brought to my place, and that as long as I'm at a meal, no food will go to waste. It's only been a couple weeks, but I'm already feeling quite thrilled with how the social game is being played. I've got friends, I've got respect and I'm making memories and connections that will last a lifetime. Hopefully this sunny streak will continue.

Two in a Row

So here's another blog post. Today we went to the coast and to the mountains. We explored a Latium site (pre-Romans, 5th century BCE ish) in the morning and then took our own chartered two hour bus to the interior of the Apennine mountains. There we visited a Roman colony from around 300 BCE (Alba Fucens by name, if you want to look it up). This was my favorite day trip we've taken, and I always prefer to be outside on site, than inside at museums, so I was happy. I also had time to explore on my own, instead of being tied to the group, which is another perk. You guys love pictures, so here's the photos of the day:

First stop, best preserved Archaic temple, still doesn't thrill me

He followed us around the first site. Would love to pet him, but stray dogs=fleas

In the mountains, as you will see.

Amphitheater

Main road through settlement

The Blog Posts are coming, the blog posts are coming

So I'm back at the blogger's desk, after a lengthy hiatus. I've been pretty busy at school, and I spend a lot of my free time hanging with all the new friends I'm making. I also am much more limited in the amount of day to day adventures I'm allowed to have, so life is pretty routine here. Give you an idea of my weekly schedule:

M- 8-8:30 Breakfast, 8:30 field trip, 1-1:45 lunch, 2-3:30 Greek class, 5:30-7 Latin class, 7:30 dinner
T- 8-8:30 breakfast, 8:30- 7:00 field trip, 7:30 dinner
W- Internship (more on this in upcoming posts) 8:30-12:30, ultimate frisbee in afternoon, dinner at 7:30
R- same as Monday's schedule
F- Whole day free

It doesn't seem like a lot, but we keep busy. After dinner is usually always hw, then cards and socializing, so the time I was using for blogging is occupied with making friends. I'm hoping to get in a routine, so if I can take 10 minutes to post daily, instead of 2 hours to post once a week, everyone wins. We'll see how this goes. In the meantime, some random photos I've acquired in our expeditions:

I still have no idea what he's looking at

If you ever take up sculpting, never make it boring

Questions? Fire away in the comments section. Also huge shout out to the Turks and Romanians reading my blog despite the inactivity. You the real MVPs