Ciao Bella! Or, Adrienne and Brianne find really old stuff...

Let me announce forwardly, and hopefully seriously, that I am officially moving to Italy. There are a series of reasons for this:
1. Pizza
2. Old shit just hanging all around the city (i.e. the Colloseum, Constantine's Arc, the Forum, and other things that I can't remember but photos will prove they exist)
3. Gelatto
4. Italian people in general.
5. The weather.

Roma was absolutely beautiful. The weather was perfect and was a much needed escape from all this ridiculous rain and cold and back and forth here in Paris. I think someone needs to decide if it's winter yet because I can't deal with these random bursts of 60 degree days and then 40 degree days and 30 degree mornings. One complaint I have about Rome - more than any other city I've seen in my brief stint here in Europe - is that there is ENTIRELY TOO MUCH GRAFITTI. Um, hello? Do you realize how important your city is? Please stop drawing shit all over it and defacing its beauty. Punks.

Adrienne and I started our day with delicious pasta. I won't tell you my food was amazing at every restaurant we ate at because that would be a blantant lie. But, it was cheap, and the two amazing meals and all the desserts outweigh the crappy pasta I had for my last meal there. I freaking love Napoleatano (sp?) style pizza. Anyone going to Rome needs to check out Da Ricci's (or, Est! Est! Est! to the locals) for an authentic meal that everyone in Rome apparently LOVES. Best pizza ever, ever, even better than Two Boots, but I might be the only one who still LOVES Two Boots. The rest of the day became a search for really old shit, as I put it every time, and our reaction was always "How old is that?"

Went to the Vatican, saw the Sistine Chapel, no big deal really... Except that it was and the Vatican is MASSIVE and I actually thought we were going to die Friday night from all the walking. Climbed to the top of St Peter's and really thought death was near... That hike made Sacre Coeur look like a breeze. St Peter's was beautiful and was my second favorite part of the trip, aside from the Coloseo, which was apparently not originally called that, thought I don't remember what they originally called it... Also, the pope was not present so I couldn't say hello, but I totally managed to use the Lord's name in vain at least 20 times. I think Adrienne was ready to hit me.

Seriously, I don't know HOW we did it, but I'm pretty sure we saw everything that most normal people see in Rome and then some. Thank God for my guide book. Also, leave it to me to happen to stumble upon the Jewish quarter in Rome of all places. Yes, it exists. No, I'm not making this up. You don't have to believe me. The square was called Jeruselum Plaza, no joke.

Let's talk about Gelatto. Went to Giolitti, where Audrey Hepburn goes in Roman Holiday, and got a chocolate, pignoli (pine nuts), and coffee gelatto cone and sighed. Hello, Italy, thank you for the gift of the best ice cream ever. The next night I went to Italy's oldest gelatto shop, which was right by my adorable B&B, and had rice, hazenut-chocolate that was not nutella because there were nuts in it, and tiramisu. HEAVENLY. The rice tasted like rice pudding. Who ever decided getting 3 flavors on a cone was a good idea is a genius. A genius. I hope to get to Ossining Pizzeria when I get home for some gelatto, unless there is a better place when I return.

I'm officially moving to the land of gelatto, pizza, and less pretentious women. The women were average sized, like me, and did not make me feel bad about the huge ass I have developped since arriving in France. Granted, I don't know how much of this weight is weight and not muscle. My legs are pretty stiff and I think it's from the stairs. Adrienne thinks it should have toned me down. I don't know if stairs do that but I imagine it wouldn't be as firm... I can't wait to get back to Palladium and be a real human being again.

On another note, our tour guide said something really powerful to us about Rome and world history. He said "Please do not think that this is just the history of Rome. There is no ethnic Roman. This is the history of the world. This is your history. You are all Romans." I thought this was really striking and it made me feel really connected to all the things I was seeing and made me understand the values of modern states and governments.

So go see your history. Maybe by the time you do, I'll have moved to Italy and you'll be able to stay with me and we can eat gelatto and I can live in a world that will probably only exist in my imagination.

I can't wait to leave France.

Versailles and the first week of the Intensive courses

My blog is named after my favorite man in all of history, the incredible Louis XIV. He was indeed the state, and his château, Versailles, just outside of Paris, is most likely the greatest single piece of real estate I have ever seen in my life. For those of you who have not ever been to Versailles I have two things to say to you: 1. You have no excuse UNLESS you've never been to Europe. 2. The only thing you need to know is that GOLD coats almost the entire building. It is incredible.

When Adrienne and I stepped off the RER - similar to the Metro North and LIRR for you New York Folks that acts as a Metro while it goes through the city of Paris, so I guess more like the Path to NJ, which I have never taken - I couldn't have felt happier. Versailles is a town that is all about this Paris. We had to walk through a mini street fair to get to the palace.

Now, I have visited the château before, so the reason for the visit was really just to see the gardens. OH MY GOSH, LOUIS, DID YOU DO ANYTHING WRONG? The most beautiful place, the most incredibly extravagant ponds, called "bassins" en français, and MORE GOLD AND MORE IRON. Hello, money. The fountains are not allowed to run constantly because France has water restraint laws and lots of issues with conserving water and energy. Electricity is more expensive than in the States, according to Madame. Anyway, could not have been a better day. The sun was shining on my face and it warmed my heart to see all the French children and tourists - who might as well be children - running around. What is more, is that NYU does this nifty thing where it lies on our ID cards and says we're Art History students so we can get into all the museums for free. All we paid was 6 euro for the gardens and 3 euro for the best fresh squeezed orange juice ever. In case you didn't know, which I didn't either, Versailles still has a small orange grove where it produces oranges to make juice for its tourists. How clever. Louis XIV, always thinking for the future.

The Hall of Mirrors had finally finished its reconstruction and looked incredible. I took vanity shots all over the place and took photos of photos and it was the most entertaining 20 minutes of my day. I felt it was appropriate to be so vain if I was standing in a place where Louis XIV lived and where the Coronation of Napoleon painting hung. The chandeliers reflected off the windows and I can only dream about what it would have looked like with real candles and not our tacky electric bulbs.

To continue our day trips to see old palaces, we went to the Luxumbourg Gardens to meet with some of Adrienne's friends, and it was fab. A jazz band was playing, and sang "New York, New York," which obviously made me homesick and also made me realize how badly I wish there were jewish delis in France. If anyone knows where I can find one, tell me.

This weekend I hope to find the techno parade (again if anyone knows about this TELL ME), and possibly get myself out to Giverny.

Now to start my homework because I have to intensively review grammar for the week. Ça ne me plaît pas.