Carnevale!

Hello everyone! I haven't posted in a while, but I didn't really have much to say before now. This semester is going great. I love most of my classes, which are Creative Writing, Reading Literatures, English, Italian, and Game Theory. Yes, it's a lot of literature and writing courses but that's what I love to do. I'm currently deciding between a Literature major and being a Comparative Literature and Culture Studies (CLCS) major with a minor in Creative Writing.

This week is particularly exciting because I am going to Carnevale! Around this time of year, Italy and my canton in Switzerland have their Carnevale events, so I bought a weekend pass to go! This is quite exciting for me since I have never been to one before. Customarily people dress up in crazy costumes, ones more ridiculous than Halloween. Imagine a crazier Halloween that lasts for weeks, that's what I'll be experiencing! Have a good day everyone! I'll be sure to write how this weekend goes. :D


P.S. Yes, carnevale is spelled with an e in Italian, I'm not crazy :)

Arrivederci

   
    I know that I pretty much fail at blogging consistently. This last month has been truly wonderful. I spent most of my time surrounded by my friends that I love dearly, and studying for finals that I did not quite love as much. What I love the most will come in 3 hours, the moment when I lock up my room and catch a taxi to the train station, where I will catch a bus to the airport in Milan. From there I fly to New Jersey, Denver, and then Redmond. I cannot believe that I will be in the United States of America so soon! Of course I am beyond excited, but what will it be like? I haven't been in an English speaking country in four months, let alone seen my friends and family. How much have I changed? This adventure continues to prove exciting and terrifying. I'll enjoy every moment. <3

And with this I say:

Arrivederci Svizzera, e ciao gli stati uniti d'america!

Week Update

This last week has been by far the roughest week I have experienced at Franklin. Last week I received the news that my great grandmother passed away. The news of course made me extremely sad, but luckily I have a good support system here and back home. The roughest part has been being away from home and my family and friends during this time.

It turned out to be quite a busy week on top of staying strong. The game of Assassins is currently being played on campus here, which I have found to be quite distracting and entertaining. For those of you who don't know what Assassins is, each person who wants to play pays 10 francs to the school (as a fundraiser for my residence hall's Swiss living community). Each player receives a card with the name of another player, who is their target. Their job is to find their target (outside of the safe zones) and touch them with a spoon. It sounds simple, but keep in mind that someone is chasing you with a spoon as well. The game gets very intense because everyone wants to win the prize of a 100 franc gift certificate to one of the local grocery stores. I did not play, but I agreed to help my friends win. I aided them by getting them food and walking them to class to help them avoid the people trying to catch them. Unfortunately, both of my friends were caught within the week!

Another element to this week was a trip to Milan for my freshman seminar class. We went to Milan all day on Saturday to take pictures and videos of people in Milan using their cell phones or other mobile devices (I am in the mobile communications freshman seminar class). It turned out to be quite an enjoyable trip despite the freezing weather! I enjoyed Milan more than I thought I would, I pictured it to be the typical touristy Italian city, but it was very beautiful and had a completely different vibe from Florence and Venice.

Next week will be rough as well, so I'm hoping it will be okay. Through it all I'll be strong with the knowledge that I will be visiting Oregon in less than a month!

Picture discussed in the academic travel post.

Extremely exhausted by this point in the trip, but here I am in Firenze!

Torre del Lago! I can see how Puccini was so inspired.

My favorite city: Lucca!