It has been far too long since I've written anything, I know I know, I'm sorry! As ever it's been pretty hectic (I am always v.confused as to how even though we have hardly any work I always seem to be dashing around catching up on stuff :s) After the Paris weekend I was meant to be going skiing for a few days, but sadly had to pull out due to being suddenly being struck down by the lurgy. I ended up spending the entire weekend in bed, watching far too many bad italian rom-coms, but at least I was then cured in time for the big trip to Rome the following weekend! I was heading down for 3 days to meet a friend from Edinburgh who's studying in Verona this year. We'd managed to get tickets to the Italy v Wales match (despite the fact she's Scottish!) so again, it was a pretty rugby-themed weekend.
I used to know Rome pretty well, having spent every easter there for about 5 years, but hadn't been back since the summer before starting Uni, so it was great to get back there. We did lots of touristy stuff as ever, and lots of catching up over cocktails! Match day itself was great - boiling hot, sunny all day and great atmosphere thanks to the thousands of welsh fans who'd flown over. I ran into a load of friends from home and also from Uni which was a lovely surprise, and added to the whole random feel of the weekend! The match was fun, if not too close for my liking, and later we headed back into town to get some food. In the evening Gemma and I decided to go on an uber touristy pubcrawl, which I have to admit, was great fun. Again, it seemed a v.small world when we met a group of students from Swansea who I knew through a friend at Siena on said pubcrawl! Later as we were walking down the street we also bumped into a friend from Edinburgh who's living in Rome this year - totally random, and again a lovely suprise. After the pubcrawl we ended up at a club which was lots of fun, although somewhat pricey at 12 euros for a vodka+redbull! I also wasn't too impressed as my camera went "walkabout" from my bag at said club. Hmmm.
The next day was a bit of a write off, and then on monday we came home. I found myself sitting with 2 old women and a priest on the train home. They all sat down and started reading their Bibles, and kept giving me v.judgey looks as I was reading "Il Diario di Bridget Jones"! Later though the old women fell asleep, at which point the priest went "oooh!" in a very camp voice, put down his Bible and got out a copy of Lady Chatterley's Lover!! It was hilarious!
Talking of priests, I had a bizarre encounter the other day. I was home alone one afternoon when the doorbell buzzed. I went off, expecting it to be one of the boys having forgotten their keys, but instead I found a v.old priest standing there, in full garb complete with swingy-orb-on-a-chain! (As I'm not catholic I don't know the terminology sorry!) He started talking at me extremely quickly, and unfortunately I understood absolutely nothing as he was so old he didn't seem to have any teeth. I eventually managed to work out he wanted to come in and bless the flat for Easter. I was a bit at a loss of what to do as I don't know the etiquette in these situations, so just kept telling him I was foreign in the hope he'd just give up and go away. He got a bit uppity and seemed offended I wouldn't let him bless the flat, but eventually resigned himself to the fact I was a thick foreigner, and gave me a leaflet telling me to call him if I changed my mind and wanted the flat blessed at a later date! Again, hilarious, and soooo random.
Erasmus life does seem to be very random, as you've probably gathered from these posts,and again last night was no exception. A wee group of us went for dinner at a mate's flat, then headed off to a house party. The house party was a graduation party for a friend of a friend of a friend... but apparently it's fine to crash these things so off we went. It was WEIRD. As soon as we arrived we realised we knew absolutely no one, and tried in vain to make friends, but as the Italians were already absolutely wasted we didn't get very far. The guy who was graduating was hilarious, kept trying to get everyone to join in with a congo line and then when "You can leave your hat on" came on the stereo he actually did a full on strip-routine. So so so weird but so so so funny! After a few hours the weirdness got a bit much so we decamped to Phil's to get wine and his guitar, and headed off to Piazza Santo Stefano. Santo Stefano is a really nice square in town where all the students hang out of an evening - a few hours of chilling, (and singing badly!) there was great, then it got a bit chilly and we ended up back at mine, attempting to sing badly again on my roof terrace. I'm not sure how impressed my flatmates or neighbours were about this as it was 4am... oops!
Tonight it's one of my best friends' leaving do', which should be fun but is also a bit sad as it'll be weird when she's gone :( Guess we'll just have to make sure she gets a great send off!
This month I've seemed to notice the cultural differences a bit more - possibly due to the sudden heightened presence of priests in my life! There are also some seriously weird things though that i'll never understand... such as how a song called "Luca era gay" (Luca was gay) can get to number3 in the charts, even though it's horrifically homophobic, and would have been banned back home. They also had a special day last week to celebrate fathers who actually involve themselves with their families and don't leave all the domestic stuff to the women. Yes, the macho italian stereotype is alive and well. I guess it's good that they're trying to change, but I find even the idea of rewarding men for spending time with their own kids very strange, and unbelievably old-fashioned.
Strange, but interesting nonetheless.
Until the next time, ciao!