Arriverderci Italia, Hallo Deutschland

My time in Italy is almost up! Its hard to believe that 5 months ago I arrived here to study abroad and now I am almost done! I am excited to be going to all these new places but I definitely enjoyed experiencing a lot of Italy! Even though at sometimes things really annoyed me! There are some things I am going to miss and some that I won't at all, and probably when I get home I will realize more that I miss than I thought I would.

Things I will NOT miss:

1. People constantly staring at you

2. People yelling "americani, americani" from their cars.

3. Annoying pre teens and teenagers that are way too loud!

4. The dorms and everything about them including the staff and the smelly track suit guy

5. Excessive PDA, and I mean excessive! Like practically having sex or actually having sex in public! GROSS!

6. Eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches twice a day

Things I will miss:

1. The people I have met here

2. The gelato

3. The fact that I could travel to cool cities ALL the time because they are so close!

4. The friendly cute italians
5. The experiences I had here!

Well this is my last week here and on friday me and Cassie will be heading off to Deutschland(Germany) and then to the rest of the countries on our 3 week adventure! I am so excited! But I am looking forward to coming home as well! Wish us luck on our journey! haha!

P.S. I changed the layout to this patriotic themed thing because I am actually REALLY excited to go back to the states!

Pictures from Sicilia

Where we were.

The duomo in Palermo
The girls on the beach!
Kelly, Nicole, me, Cassie, Amy, and Crystal

Nicole, Cassie, and me with our sweet shades

(5 euro each)

Nicole, Amy, and Me in front of the sea

View of the sea and cliffs

(Mondello)

Teatro Massimo
Arancini
(Amy and Me)
View from Monreale

Sicilia

This weekend I was able to go to Sicily for a few days! It was one of my favorite weekends I have ever had here, maybe even my favorite! Friday morning me, Cassie, Chris, Amy, Rob, Krystal, Kelly, and Nicole took the train to the airport and then flew into Palermo, which is the tourist city of Sicily. Although I didn't feel like there were that many tourists as compared to Rome or Florence. Anyways right when we got there we decided to get food, so we found a spot off the main road and ate lunch. After lunch Rob, Chris, Amy, Nicole, Kelly,and Krystal checked into their hostel and then me and Cassie had to wait a little while to check into ours. Once we were all checked in and didn't have to carry all of our luggage on us we began to wander the streets of Palermo and with no real plan in mind ended up seeing almost all of the major sites in Palermo. We even stumbled across a really good restaurant for dinner! I have some of the best bread and bruschette of my life there! After dinner we were all tired from the long day of traveling so we headed off to our hostels. Saturday morning we were going to try to rent a car but there were none available so we went to Mondello where the beach is and where not a lot of tourists go! It was so beautiful! The weather was perfect! We got some slushi type things from a little stand and walked along the sidewalk by the beach and ate lunch. After lunch we decided to go hang out on the beach some more and walk along the water. It was such a great and relaxing day! We headed back to Palermo and found a place for dinner and then went out for drinks for a little while. Everyone but me and Cassie were scheduled to go home on sunday but Chris and Amy decided to stay an extra day with us! Best decision of their life! haha! Sunday we went to a small town called Monreale, there was some sort of festival going on so they all these food vendors and other ones as well selling stuff and I tried arancini, which is really popular in Sicily. It is like this round ball that looks like an orange, I think it is fried and inside is meat and peas and rice, you can also get it filled with mozzerella. The first one I tried I didn't really like there wasn't rice in it and it wasn't warm but I tried another one with rice and warmth and it was delicious! Anyways we ate lunch in Monreale and had the best pizza ever and I had this really good sweet ravioli pasta! And we got amazing bread! Sicily seriously has the best bread in Italy! After Monreale we went back to Mondello and went swimming but it was colder than the day before so we didn't stay as long but it was still really fun! When we got back to Palermo we decided to freshen up before dinner and then went back to that amazing restaurant for a great meal! This morning we got to sleep in a little and then go to the airport to fly home. Sicily was so much fun! I wish I could have stayed longer! It was interesting though because it really felt like a different country than Italy. I didn't feel like I was in Italy, I felt like I was just in a different country where they spoke Italian. The people there looked like a mix of mediteranean and italian. Anyways it was a great trip and I would highly recommend going to Sicily if you ever get the chance!