Two weeks ago was the true beginning of my second semester with the start of my two physics classes at the University of Florence: Optics and Mathematical Methods. I’m really happy with both of the classes so far. They are both not too hard and not too easy (although the difficulty also depends on how well I’m concentrating that day!), which I was worried about since the American liberal arts college system is so different from the one of Italian universities.  The equivalent of our 4 years undergraduate education is the 3-year laurea triennale (high school is a year longer here, so the amount of time spent in school evens out).   Afterwords students move on to the level magistrale, equivalent to our master’s degrees. My Math Methods class is a second-year triennale while my Optics class is in the magistrale level.  Also, my fellow students in these classes are studying ONLY physics.

It’s great to have physics in my life again; it reminds me how much I’ve missed it. Getting back into the swing of things is a bit difficult, though, after a semester-long break, but it’s all slowly coming back. It’s also awesome to be spending time with physics students again! We are a unique group, especially when we’re all together. (I’ve experienced this at my summer research programs the past two years.) One of my personal favorite things that us physics students do when we’re together is point out physical phenomena that are happening around us, as a joke. (Not gonna lie, it doesn’t sound so funny when I write it… but trust me, it is!) I do this even around people who don’t study science, but it’s more fun to do around people who appreciate it! (Luckily for me I have plenty of people in my life who do, whether they are scientists or not.) Anyway, this happened to me this week at the end of my first Optics class. One guy tried to open the door but couldn’t and asked if it was locked. Another student tried and succeded; he then said (with a grin) that it had just been stuck “due to the pressure difference.” After so long of not hearing a joke like this, it literally made my day.

On the music side, I’m absolutely loving my class on Italian Opera at the Sede.  We just finished watching The Marriage of Figaro by Mozart and the Barber of Seville by Rossini – I really enjoyed them!  This honestly surprised me because up until now I’ve never been a real fan of opera.  My first year I took a literature/opera class for which I had to watch a bunch of operas and even went to see one at the Met in NYC, and at the end I had decided that opera wasn’t really my thing.  I think this class has already changed my mind!  I’m so glad I’m taking it and will make a serious effort to go to the Met next year to see an opera that we’ve studied.

]]> http://jyafirenze.wordpress.com/2010/03/12/le-mie-passioni/feed/ 1 jyafirenze http://jyafirenze.wordpress.com/2010/02/26/january-and-february/ http://jyafirenze.wordpress.com/2010/02/26/january-and-february/#comments Fri, 26 Feb 2010 12:22:23 +0000 jyafirenze http://jyafirenze.wordpress.com/?p=128 ]]> With this post the blog will be up-to-date!  Here’s what happened after I came back from winter break:  The next three weeks were truly stressful.  Upon coming back I had four eight-page papers to write plus three tests to take before the semester could end.  This whole to-do list became even longer with the addition of applications for summer internships like the one I did in Madison, which the AAS conference had inspired me to think about (I’ve finally decided, I’ll be spending the summer at UCLA!) and the fact that I got a really bad cold in the beginning of finals weeks and had to stay in my house for four days straight to get better.  Unfortunately, because of this I wasn’t able to finish it all before the program’s week-long trip to Sicily (!!!), but I was still able to forget the work and enjoy the time we spent in this amazing part of Italy!This trip was my second time in Sicily.  I had been once before in May 2008 with the Smith College Orchestra.  I loved Sicily the first time and even more the second time!  We went to some places that I had been before (Monreale, Agrigento, Palermo) and to some new ones (Siracusa, Segesta, Selinente).  Sicily has a really unique history: because of its prime location on the Mediterranean Sea, it has been invaded many times by many different groups of people.   That means that now you can see Roman mosaics, Greek temples, and Norman churches in the same region! 

Roman mosaics

Greek temple at Segesta

  For me, the most amazing example of this had to be the cathedral at Monreale and the Cappella Pallatina in Palermo: here you see mosaics with geometric patters, showing Arabic influence, and with scenes from the Bible, the Christian influence.  I also feel like I learned so much on the trip, from the reason why the Tempio della Concordia is the most well-preserved of the Greek temples at Agrigento (it was used as a church by the early Christians and later restored to its original form) to the reason for the beautiful baroque architecture of the facade of the Duomo of Siracusa and the whole city of Noto (a huge earthquake in the 1600′s, centered at Noto, destroyed so many of the buildings – except the columns of the old Greek temple being used as the Duomo of Siracusa, which stand still today – and so it all was rebuilt with the current style).  We even had beautiful weather and were able to spend some time on the beach.  I’ve officially decided: I WILL return to Sicily in my life-time.  There is no other place like it in Italy or the world.Since returning from Sicily I finished my finals and (simultaneously) started the second semester.  I’m taking Translation (Italian -> English) and Italian Opera at the Sede and will start Ottica (Optics) and Metodi Matematici (Mathematical Methods) at the University of Florence next week.  Thanks to the fact that only half of my classes have started I have had really long (4 day) weekends.  This past weekend I went up to Switzerland to visit my friend Johanna!  She was an exchange student at my high school during my senior year (a whole 3 years ago!).  Luckily the trip worked out for both our schedules last minute.  I went up to Zurich first thing Thursday morning to meet her; from there we went to her family’s house in the (REAL!) mountains.  They were all so sweet and I felt really welcome   The next day we spent at a ski place close by where we took pictures from near the top of the mountain and went sledding! 

Mountains and Sledding!

 That night we made the journey by train to Johanna’s home town (in reality, a big city of more than 100,000 people ) of Winterthur.  We spent the next day exploring the old part of Zurich, where we saw the evidence of the upcoming holiday, Fasnacht.  Johanna explained to me that it is a huge celebration with parades of musical groups to chase the winter away.  Some of this groups were warming up by walking around perforrming – I loved hearing the music! 

Me and Johanna in Zurich, with a church whose tower we had climbed earlier in the day in the background

We had dinner with her family that night and afterwords watched the Olympics (since I’m not in the U.S. and the Italians don’t seem to care much for winter sports – no soccer, after all – I am now a fan of the Swiss team!).  My last day her dad took us out on a tour of the BEAUTIFUL surrounding country-side, which in a way reminded me of Washington County.  

 The visit was over way too quickly… I will just have to go back!  

Once again, I need to apologize: it has been 2 and a half months since my last post, and I’m sorry! A lot has happened since then, but this particular entry just cover my 3 week winter break. I’ll add more entries the next couple of days to sum of the rest of what’s happened since then.

I had a very exciting Christmas break, during which I did just about no work (even though the first semester wouldn’t finish till the end of January). My family plus my good friend, Elise, came to visit for the holiday itself – it was really incredible to see them! We rented an apartment in an area of Florence that I’m not very familiar with because my host family’s house is on the other side of the city: it’s called Oltrarno, meaning across the Arno (the river that runs through Florence) from the original part of the city. It’s known for being the artsy part of Florence with a lot of artist’s workshops and not too many tourists. The apartment itself was beautiful and made even more so by a mini Christmas tree that I lugged from a market across town and that the land lady helped me dcecorate before everyone arrived (very late, all because of Alitalia). We did as much as we could in the city, considering so much was closed for the holidays, including seeing Michelangelo’s David and climbing the cupola of the Duomo, and had a big Christmas dinner in the apartment. I only wish they could have stayed longer!

From there Mom, Dad, and Elise left and Duncan and I started our journey to London for New Year’s! We took the train from Florence to Lausanne, Switzerland, where we enjoyed the old cathedral, kebabs, a clean hostel (our first hostel ever), ice skating, and the beautiful lake and where we spent the night, and then from there to London. In London we saw and did so much: tons of museums, including an amazing exhibit of J.M.W. Turner made particularly enjoyable by our audio guides (listened to in coordination, of course), the West End show Billy Elliot (so amazing!), Westminster Abbey, vodka tonics at a gay bar in Soho, Avatar in 3D at the Odeon in Leicester Square with Elise (who we met up with again in London), tea at Kensington Palace, fish & chips (twice), pub food with hard cider, and New Year’s fireworks and dancing in the street. Overall, it was an incredible trip!

Duncan and I right before tea at Kensington Palace

After an early early journey to Heathrow for me to catch my flight (and for Duncan to wait about 10 hours for his, with his broken suitcase dubbed “Chubs”) I left London (:-() and my brother (:’-() fir tge U.S. – not to go home but to go to D.C. for the American Astronomical Society conference. I was invited along with other students from my summer program to present a poster of my research. Getting off the plane and being in the U.S. was very surreal. Walking from the plane to customs, it hit me: I really had been in Italy for 4 months. Even though I didn’t go home, it was nice to get some of the things I’d been missing from America since I’d been gone: for example, the first thing I got after getting off the plane in D.C.? An Auntie Anne’s pretzel! The conference itself (my first!) was really interesting and it got me really excited about astronomy/astrophysics. It was great to see some of the awesome people that I had spent the summer with in Madison, WI and even a friend from Smith who I didn’t know would be there! Although most of my time was spent in the hotel where the conference was held and the blocks around it, I did get to see a bit of D.C.: I went to the Mall with Aisha, my roommate from Madison, where we saw a small art museum and the National Air and Space Museum and ate lunch with my Smithie friend, Erin, who works at the latter. Then at the end of the week I made a 24 hour journey (D.C. -> Detroit -> London Heathrow -> Rome -> Florence) back to Florence.

That’s all for now, I’ll add another post soon (I promise!!!).  In the meantime, check out my new place for uploading pictures: Picasa.  (We all know Google>Yahoo, right?)

Trip #1: Two Tuscan Hill Towns, Pienza and San GimignanoThis trip was with the whole group of Smithies, organized by our wonderful director and associate director, Giovanna and Monica, and paid for by “Zia Sophia.”  We went to these small towns because there harder to get to by yourself via public transit.  Both had some INCREDIBLE views of the country-side.  Pienza is particularly interesting because it was reconstructed during the 15th century by order of Pope Pio II and is said to be the first application of humanist urban planning.  Sam Gimignano has 14 towers, only one of which you can climb (the Torre Grassa or Fat Tower), and a wine museum where I tried Vernaccia, the white wine for which the town is famous. Highlights, Pienza: the cute streets and stores, cappuccinos with a beautiful view

Christine, Caitlin, Sofia, and Me (taken by Olivia)

Highlights, San Gimignano: GELATO (limoncello, white chocolate, and saffron cream), so good that I might take my family + Elise there over Christmas just to eat it again!

Me and Christine (taken by Jade)

Trip #2: Lucca Comics and Games 

I went to this festival, which was geeky as it sounds, by myself and had a blast.  The whole town of Lucca was absolutely filled with people, a big part of whom were cos-playing (see Flickr for pictures), and tents filled with tons of vendors.  Going made me REALLY want to go to Otakon next summer with Todd, Dakota, and Eric! 

Highlight:

Ash Ketchum from the town of Pallet

Trip #3: Chianti 

I went to Chianti with a small group of Smithies.  We took a tour with “Florence for  Fun,” a company geared towards American students studying in Florence.  It was a great deal: for a reasonable amount of money we got transportation to a town in the region, lunch and wine/olive oil tastings at an old villa that isn’t open to the public and that is owned by an old royal family, and a very goofy tour guide.

Highlights: Seeing one of the first editions of the encyclopedia and an Etruscan statue in the villa and the tour guide making some very obscure American culture references (ex: I Jizzed in My Pants)!

This past weekend we had Friday off (there are no Smith classes scheduled for Fridays – yay! – although the university class I end of auditing will probably by then) so I went with Alayna, Caitlin, and Christine to Pisa and Lucca.  I’m glad we went to Pisa, where we saw il campo dei miracoli (field of miracles) which includes the beautiful Duomo, the Baptistery, and, of course, the Leaning Tower.  The piazza was FILLED with tourists, most of whom were making the famous “I’m holding up the leaning tower picture.”  It was funny to watch!

The famous Leaning Tower picture, but from the wrong angle!

Next we took the train to Lucca, which I preferred over Pisa because it was much quieter and less touristy.  Since we were really hungry when we arrived we got some pizza and ate it on a spot on the medieval walls surrounding the city.  It was difficult to imagine that these walls have been around for about 1000 years!  They had an amazing view of the surrounding country side.

View from the walls

The walls themselves

We walked along them for a bit and found a store where we could rent bikes!  We took some out and rode all the way around the walls.  I’m SO happy we did this, it was the perfect day for it and we had a blast.

My bike-riding buddies: (from left) Alayna, Christine, and Caitlin. I took this picture while riding and it came out! WIN.

I think Lucca warrants a re-visit, hopefully for Lucca Comics and Games, a yearly festival that the city holds that happens a week from now.

This weekend promises to be great too… amazing, actually.  Friday night Christine and I are going to see La Vita di Galileo (The Life of Galileo), a play at the Teatro Verdi, one of the local theaters here in Florence.  I’m pumped for my first Italian play!  Then on Saturday the whole Smith group plus some friends is taking a day trip via pullman (charter bus) to two small Tuscan hill towns, San Gimignano and Pienza.  We were required to do some research about them before going and now I can’t wait to go.

Then Sunday’s awesome event required a little back story.  One year ago, the fall semester of my second year at Smith, I started taking West African Drumming (specifically drumming of the Ewe people from southern Togo, Ghana, and Benin) at Mount Holyoke.  Since then I’ve fallen head over heals in love with it.  The incredibly talented and kind teacher of the course, Faith, has a contact in Florence from when she did some drumming in Italy.  This man, named James, has a get-together once a month at his villa in the hills outside Florence for playing these drums.  I’m going to the next meeting, which is this Sunday.  I am SO excited, I’m sure it’s going to be amazing x ∞.

Last weekend on Saturday I went to Fiesole, a small city just outside of Florence.  It’s very close to my house, only 10 minutes on the bus.  While I was there I simply walked around: from the main piazza, which had an interesting sculpture exhibit, down a small street (labeled “scenic walk”), north towards the old Estruscan walls (which I didn’t see much of because you have to pay to get in), and up towards San Francesco church.  In my wanderings I found a couple small public parks, one with swings and both with great views of Florence.  To end the afternoon I walked down another small street from Fiesole to San Domenico, a walk suggested by my Time Out Florence guide.  It was beautiful!

View of Florence from a public park in Fiesole

On Sunday I watched the Fiorentina (our local soccer team) play Lazio with Christine at a bar.  There was small group of peole at the bar to watch the game, and we were all getting into cheering for our team.  I’d love to do this for all the games!  (If I’m not at the stadium seeing them that is.)

This Friday night I went out with a lot friends to celebrate the birthday of one of the Smithies, Victoria.  Then on Saturday I went to Rome to attend a manifestazione (demonstration) for gay rights in Italy, called Uguali (which means same”).  I went with 3 other Smithies and we all bused over with a group of people from Florence.  It was an awesome experience and very good Italian practice, from talking with people on the bus (specifically the older man sitting in front of us, who was very sweet!) to listening to the speakers at the rally.  The number of people at the demonstration seemed large to us, but apparently it’s even bigger and livelier for pride!

Demonstration in Piazza della Republica

Today I went with Christine to Via Gioberti, the street where our director Giovanna lives, for a special artists day.  The street was lined with tons of artists out to present their wares.  Some of them were even working!  We also at lunch at a very cute pizzeria and, thanks to Victoria and Chrysanthe, found a small local market at the end of the street.

All of the people on the street and a large piece of paper for kids to color on!

The last week and a half of orientation was also very fun: we cooked gnocchi (fresh pasta made of potatoes) one day and 4 types of risotto another day in cooking class, and went to Santa Croce (where Galileo’s tomb is!) and San Lorenzo for art history class.

Gnocchi with butter, cheese, and sage - incredible!

And with that orientation is (finally) over; classes start tomorrow!  I won’t lie: I’m pumped.  This semester we are taking 4 classes at the Sede and auditing one university class.  At the Sede I’m taking Survey of Italian Literature (required), History of Style (with Constanza, who taught a small class during orientation about living in Florence and is great!), Stylistics (a language class, with a teacher who I’ve heard is awesome), and Art History (which I’m seriously excited about, especially after three classes we had during orientation).  I’m currently looking for a university course.  It’s so fun to look at all of the classes offered!  (That is, once I’ve searched through the complicated and confusing university website to find them…)  The biggest question is whether to take a physics class or not, the biggest issue being that they take place very far away, about an hour by bus.  Right now though, it looks like the internship at the Arcetri Observatory is going to happen (yay!!!), so my current thought is to forgoe taking physics classes and take something in the Facoltà (school) of Literature and Philosophy, like a music history class.  All in all, I’m excited to start classes and to have a regular schedule.

The first day we trained from Florence to Riomaggiore, a three hour ride for only 10 euros roundtrip.  The train stops in a tunnel, but as soon as you get off and walk out of the tunnel there is a beautiful view of the ocean.  It had been so long since I’d seen it!

View from the Riomaggiore train station

We then walked from Riomaggiore to Corniglia, about a 1 and a half hour trip (plus time for taking pictures).  The first leg of this journey is called the Via dell’Amore and is covered with grafiti and other decorations in the theme of love.  We stopped in the small, sweet town of Corniglia for some refreshment, very necessary after climbing up the 365 stairs it takes to get from the path to the town.  I got a granita ai limoni freschi (fresh lemon smoothy) – it was so good!  We then started hiking from Corniglia towards Vernazza, when we kept seeing signs for a beach.  We decided to follow them, which eventually led us off the main path and along a more treacherous one down a cliff.  It was quite the adventure making our way down!  Once we arrived at the beach we learned that it was clothing-optional.  That wouldn’t have been such a big deal if it weren’t for a certain guy we came to know as Claudio…

First of all, when we arrived at the beach we decided to separate ourselves a bit for the rest of the swimmers for some privacy.  As we were getting ready to swim (stripping down to nothing for some, changing into a bathing suit for others) a man walked by us and sat down a bit too close.  He took off his clothes as well, and after a moment came over to us.  He approached Lenora (note: both are sans clothes at this point), who was sitting on a rock, and sat down next to her.   It was WAY too close for comfort.  To make things worse, I was sitting behind Lenora on a lower rock at this time, so when Claudio sat down next to her his butt was literally in my face.  I made my escape to another rock and almost couldn’t hold in my laughter.  Claudio then proceeded to introduce himself to Lenora and ask her her name and where she was from.  (Remember: they were both NAKED!)  After this awkward exchange, Lenora wisely left to go swimming and Claudio soon returned to his lounging spot.  He stayed there the entire time we were there and didn’t start packing up to leave until just after we left.

Photo by Lenora - we laughed about this the whole rest of the trip!

After this incident we left the beach and were led back to Corniglia via a much less difficult route by a kind Italian man, given the name Headband by Christine because he was wearing a large one.  This guy was really sweet and on the opposite end of the creepiness scale with respect to Claudio.  We abbiamo attaccato bottone with him in Italian, where attaccare bottone is a cute phrase that literally means “to sew on buttons” but is used to mean “to chat casually with a stranger” (like you and Bop, Mom!).

When we arrived at Monterosso al Mare we stumbled upon a wine festival, complete with music and dancing.  We checked in our hotel with Beppe (and his very strange haircut) and settled into our room (the most beautiful one in the hotel according to Beppe, terrace included!) before returning to town for a nice dinner.  Since we were exhausted from the day we went to bed fairly early.

The next day we awoke to a beautiful view of the town right from our terrace.  The weather was even better than the first day – not a cloud in the sky.  We hiked from Monterosso al Mare to Vernazza, which was a difficult hike relative to the others we had done – so many stairs!  But all the climbing was worth it because we got some incredible views.  When we arrived at Vernazza we swam again (this time at a normal beach!).

View of Vernazza from the path between Monterosso al Mare and Vernazza

Then, Christine and I took the train to Corniglia to get lunch.  I ate gnocchi al pesto (INCREDIBLE!) while looking at an amazing view of the ocean and then had a glass of Sciacchetrà at a nearby wine bar, a desert wine for which Cinque Terre is famous.

All in all, a great first weekend trip in Italy.

In addition we had activities to help us get to know the city.   For example, one day we went to a market where fresh fruit, cheese, bread, and meat are sold (similar to a farmer’s market, but more permanent and open more often).  I bought pecorino al peperoncino (sheep’s milk cheese with chili pepper – the italian version of pepper jack cheese) and went back today to buy more!  We  also had a caccia al tesoro (treasure hunt) around the city, in which we had to find certain sights around the city by using a map and asking people for help in Italian.  At one point we had to translate a label of a statue, but we didn’t know the word orafi.  Then, while walking to our next destination I noticed that we passed a hotel called Hotel degli Orafi.  It was perfect!  We went inside and I asked (in Italian, of couse! ) what orafi means in English, and we learned it means goldsmith.  Overall it was a lot of fun and a great way to practice speaking.

On Friday, I went with some girls from the program to see the Duomo (which you can see in the view from San Miniato above).  I pass this structure every day on the way to the Sede, so it was great to finally stop and see it!  We first went inside the church that the Duomo is a part of, Santa Maria dei Fiori – it was absolutely HUGE.  We then climbed all the way to cupola of the Duomo.  The view of Florence from the top was incredible and very worth the hundreds of steps we had to climb to get there.

View of the bell tower and church from the top of the Duomo

Also, I learned this past week that I might be able to do (astro)physics research and classes while I’m here!  I’m much more excited about this than I thought I’d be.  My original plan was to have this be a year off from physics, but I keep thinking how cool it would be to learn it in another language and another country.  (Also, I think Galileo inspired me!)  Giovanna (our program director) and I are going to meet someone this Friday about the research, so we’ll see how it goes –  right now I’m really hoping it works out!

(Look for a post about my weekend trip to Cinque Terre sometime in the next couple days!)

Il quadrino (little painting) that I bought

I’m still really liking my host family.  The food Marisa (and also Elisabeta) cooks has been great so far.  Each night we’ve had three courses: pasta/rice, something with meat, and then desert/fruit.  The first night I didn’t realize we were going to have so many courses, and so I ate enough to be full after the first!  (Of course, I still ate the rest of them because they were so delicious.)  We watched TV during dinner two nights ago, a show analogous to America’s Funniest Home Videos.  It was hilarious and we all laughed a lot!  We also had great conversation tonight over dinner, with a lot of laughing.  Afterwords Stephanie, Elisabetta, and I watched the end of an NCSI episode – in Italian!  The show was dubbed, as are a lot of shows in Italy.  Subtitles are very rarely used for foreign films here, they are always doppiato.  Their pronunciation of the names in the show, in particular Gibbs (they pronounced it “Geebs”), was very amusing.

I’m also bonding with our three gattine.  One in particular, named Blanche or Bubu (pronounced “boo boo”) for short, is very friendly:

Blanche sitting in a chair in my room

Blanche on my desk, being cute

Today a large group of students from the program walked around the Boboli Gardins, led by our incredible program director, Giovanna, and a friend of her son’s named Alisso.  Alisso lives in Florence and goes to school in the nearby town of Pistoia.  He was very kind to join us!  From there gardens there were some beautiful views of Florence.  On the way back to towards the Sede we passed by the house where GALILEO lived!  When I saw it I got teary eyed.  It was so incredible to see the place where a person so important to the advancement of our understand of the universe used to be!  Giovanna insisted she take a picture of me in front of it:

Me and Galileo (I am SO happy!)

Tomorrow we start our orientation classes at the Sede.  We have three whole weeks of orientation, so the real classes don’t start until the third week of October!  I’m looking  forward to finally starting class, even if there only orientation classes.  Also starting tomorrow we officially cannot speak any more English, even among ourselves.  (Up till now they’ve been lenient.)  I’m nervous, but I’m also looking forward to learning how to speak Italian!  It’ll be hard at first, but it will only get better with practice.