It was only last week that 4 of my best friends on the program and I (we also refer to ourselves as a boy band) decided to make the trip to Amsterdam. I'll be honest I didn't know much about Amsterdam before the weekend except for its lenience over certain moral issues but after the weekend it became one of my favorite places in Europe.
And here it is, the final post. It's been a great ride, and hopefully at least one person has read my posts. I more or less gave my top insights in my last post (posted earlier today) and so this will be short and sweet. I want to thank everyone involved in my semester abroad. IES cheers for a top-notch program. Mom and Dad, thanks for helping me make this possible. And to all of my new friends, thanks for tearing up London with me, you're all the best and I don't know how the program would've been without you all.
One of the largest differences I have noticed between young Americans and young Italians is the different attitude towards school. This became especially clear and profound during a field study to La Sapienza, the largest Italian university.
On a three day trip to Greece, just about everything that could go wrong did - our trip to classical antiquity was marked with modern problems. Here are the three biggest problems and how we made the best of them:
1. Traveling to Athens on Easter weekend
A few weeks after booking our flights, we realized that Athens would be celebrating Easter during our entire stay. Furthermore, we read that many monuments, museums and shops would be closed and the city would be relatively empty as residents returned home to celebrate the holiday.
Playing host is challenging, stressful and wonderful. It also resulted in one of the best weekends in Rome and of my life.
Two of my closest friends from UNC came to Rome for three days over Easter from Dublin and Paris. What better place to celebrate Easter than the Vatican? I requested tickets to mass in St. Peter’s and we excitedly prepared for the experience.
As I sat in the hotel room looking at attractions in Venice, I decided to flip to the section about Rome. After all, I was basically a Roman local at this point – I’d lived in the city for almost two months! I could practically write the guidebook myself. Then I realized that I haven’t even seen a fraction of what Rome has to offer.
My first reaction was to panic about how I’ve wasted two months in Rome and how I really needed to buckle down and create a vigorous sightseeing schedule.
I’ve been lucky enough to have several friends and family members visit me during my time abroad. Here are my five favorite things about hosting guests in Rome!
1. Having friends visit allows me to continue my semester-long balancing act between being a local and being a tourist. I’ve been able to visit many of the tourist attractions (Trevi Fountain, Colosseum, etc.) with friends and had a great time snapping pictures among the crowd of admirers.