Hello Friends,
First, I must apologize for my absence of blogging the past couple of weeks, but here is a new edition for you that will hopefully tickle your fancy. I was a little busy with stuff the past couple of weeks, but I now have time to fill you in. Before I begin, I will give you the abridged version for those of you who may not have all day to read, so here goes.
1) My friend Laurel came to visit me in Florence for a weekend.
2) I had midterms (hence the lack of time to blog).
3) I went to South Africa to visit Liz during my Spring Break. It was SWEET!
4) I went to Vienna, Austria for a weekend. Also sweet, but more sauerkraut-ish.
First thing first, my friend Laurel came to visit me in Florence for 3 days in March. She is currently studying in Switzerland, so we decided to get together for a few days and I would show her the sites. Not much to say about this experience site-seeing wise because I showed her places that I have already blogged about, but we still had a good time hanging out. Good story from when she was here: Laurel told me that she was getting into Florence at 6:30 am on Friday on the night train. This was cool with me, so I went to the train station to meet her there. I waited around for a long time, long after her train was supposed to be in. First I thought that we just missed seeing each other in the train station, then I thought that her train was delayed, then I thought that maybe the train didn’t make it in for some reason. After about an hour of waiting and looking, I went to the ticket box and asked where the train from Bern, Switzerland was. The lady said that it had arrived on time, but it had gone to the other train station in Florence. I was so stupid! I didn’t even ask Laurel what station she was arriving in. I took the first train to the other station (its about a 5 minute ride) to look for Laurel, but she wasn’t there. I decided that she probably was back on her way to my apartment since I gave her my address, so I would just wait there. You may be asking why we didn’t call each other, and its because Laurel doesn’t have a cell phone here. Convenient. So I made it back to my apartment, and just as I rounded the corner to my place, who do I see standing half a block away in front of my door: my dear friend Laurel. She had found a map and got to my apartment on her own, two hours after I was suppose to pick her up. Ooops.
Midterms at school were the week before break and I had a test in each of my classes. All of my class grades consist of basically two scores: my mid-term grade and my final grade. Needless to say all I did that week was study, which was easier said than done as it was beginning to get warmer in Florence and I didn’t want to be inside all day. It all worked out ok though, as I did well on my tests.
Immediately when I was done with my last mid-term I went directly to the airport to leave for my Spring Break in South Africa. Liz (my girlfriend, for those who may not know) is studying in Stellenbosch, South Africa for the semester and I thought it would be fun to see her and visit the country. After about 24 hours of traveling, I made it to Cape Town and the fun began. The first thing I did was climb Table Mountain outside of Cape Town. We got to the top at sunset, so the views over the Atlantic Ocean were awesome! It was pretty much the perfect night to go climbing.
The next day held one of the coolest moments of the trip, and probably my life. Liz took me skydiving! (I have an awesome girlfriend, I know!) This was something I have always wanted to do, and to have the chance to do it in South Africa where the view from 9000 ft is incredible, made it a very memorable experience. I took some video of it with my camera on the way down, but I am having trouble uploading it with my slow internet connection. Ill let you know if I ever get it uploaded. After skydiving, the rest of the weekend we spent lounging on the beach in Cape Town and just walking around the city.
During the week Liz had class, so we couldn’t go anywhere to much, but that was ok. It gave me a chance to see what school is like for her in South Africa and a chance to get out of the super touristy spots. Some of the cooler moments during the week included when I got to go with Liz to Kayamundi, the black township outside of Stellenbosch where Liz volunteers with an after school program. I got to help a bit, and the kids were a lot of fun. One day we also rented a car and drove to Kogel Bay to go camping, but we didn’t know we had to have reservations, so we just hung out and got some cool pictures of the ocean. Driving in SA was pretty exciting as it involved using a manual while driving on the left side of the road. We made it though, so no worries.
The last weekend I was there we took a river rafting trip down the Breede River with some of Liz's friends from school. It was a fun time to relax and float down the river since there weren’t many rapids to worry about. We stayed in cabins at night and all of the food was provided for us while we were there. It wasn’t quite rustic, but it was convenient.
Monday I left South Africa for Florence. It kind of sucked having to leave Liz again, but we are getting used to not being able to see other as this is the third time we have been on different continents while dating. When I got back to Florence, I had class for two days, and then I took an overnight train to Vienna, Austria with one of my friends at school to explore the city for a couple of days.
Having learned a little Italian, I have forgotten how much it sucks to know nothing about the native language of the country I am visiting. Austria speaks German, and I do not. It wasn’t too bad though as there were several people around who would help us get from place to place. All in all we visited the Stephansdom which is the big church in Vienna. It has a really cool roof and was neat inside. We then went to the Hofburg Palace which used to be a medieval castle, but now it has a bunch of museums. Inside we saw the medieval fighting equipments (knights armor and swords) and the historical instrument museum. After that we went to see the Am Hof and Freyung which used to be a joisting court, but now it’s a kind of town market area. There were a lot of stands selling Easter-ish things, especially decorated eggs. This is also where I tasted the best bratwurst and sauerkraut I have ever had, and of course, some Austrian beer to wash it down. On day two we went to see the Hundertwasserhaus and the Schonbrunn Palace and its gardens. The Hundertwasserhaus is a small village that an architect designed so it had very few straight lines. This meant that the buildings were kind of curvy and the painting was funky. It reminded me of Dr. Seuss. The Schonbrunn Palace had beautiful gardens, complete with fountains, a labyrinth, and a zoo. It was a good place to sit and relax for a while because it was a nice 75 degrees. After that we headed home on the night train.
Sorry again for the lateness of this update. I hope none of you were too concerned that I had fallen off the face of the earth. Look for more frequent updates from now on because I am planning on traveling most weekends and I will post during the week. Up for next week: Berlin and Munich, Germany.
Peace
