First Class Trip... What A Learning Experience...

Upon our return from Sicily, we had to pack up our rooms and head off to Assisi on a class trip... March 16th - 19th.

Monday the 16th our whole class loaded up on a train and headed out for Assisi and Perguia for a little learning excursion. One of our teacher's, Francesco, lives in Perguia and actually his primary job is giving tours of the area. So for the next couple days, he showed around and just may have taught us a thing or two...

Monday afternoon we went on a little walk through Assisi. This area of Italy is breathtaking, it's some beautiful countryside. In Assisi we saw a couple of the main churches of St. Francis and St. Clare. We have been studying St. Francis in another class, so it was nice to put everything we had learned to good use. After our tours, we had some free time so we ventured up the hilly town to a castle that was erected in early 19oo's for WWI. There was only parts of the castle left, but from this hill, we saw all of Assisi; every single field and house and yard; it was magnificent! We were able to watch the sunset over the far away hills and just relax.

The next day we took a short train ride to Perugia to visit the home town of Francesco. Perugia was more modern than Assisi, and there wasn't a whole lot of historical venues. Our tour was short, but we had a couple hours of free time to explore more on our own. Perugia is known for chocolate, so we indulged plenty and even took a nap in front of one the churches; also avoided some creepy wanna-be pick pockets... After that we just headed back to our hostel, and ate another amazing 3 course dinner. That week we ate some of the best food, hotel provided, ever!! But after dinner, we all decided it would be a good idea to go out and celebrate St. Patty's Day, I mean duh! There weren't any real irish pubs in Assisi, but we did manage to at least find a bar. About 20 of us went and just sat around and hung out, we were all pretty worn out so the night was pretty short...

On our third day, we loaded on to a charter bus to head for Norcia. It was about an hour long drive, nothing compared to the 60 + hrs some of us spent on one this fall. (Lady Raven's Soccer, HOLLA!) But we winded up some more hills and found ourselves in a small town to pay homage to good ole St. Benedictine. Norcia is his home town, so we saw the church he was born in, and where he worshiped. I don't know how many people get to see what/or who their school was named after, so it was pretty special; I guess.. Just kidding, it was great. We spent about 2 hrs walking around town, and ate our lunches in the center or town; just kicked back and hung out with Benny (his statue). After that, we headed back towards Assisi, but first we stopped at an old Benedictine monastary. We saw alot of our college heritage, and I think it all gave us a better understanding of how our school came about, and makes being a part of BC that much sweeter!

But that night, we just did some relaxing, and enjoyed not having actually class all week! The next day we just shopped around Assisi looking for more pointless knick-knacks, and then headed back to Florence...

That weekend, a group of us just stayed in Florence to actually see what all it had to offer, besides what we saw in tours. Also, we wanted to celebrate one of the girls' birthday. We went out to an irish pub, and she enjoyed the idea of being legal since she just turned 21. Then, on Friday, we all went out to eat and had sushi. Can't say that was very good, they swore to me that I should get the California roll and how amazing it was... LIES, ALL LIES!!! First, the top of it was covered in yellow, Nemo looking fish eggs, THEN it had like green plants sprouting out of the rice... It was pretty much awful... But the idea of us all out to eat, just hanging out was nice, even if my sushi sucked...

Staying around Florence the rest of the weekend was nice, a good change from traveling and rushing around. We spent Saturday just walking around looking at shops and enjoying the sites. That evening we went to an English mass in the Duomo; first English mass any of us had been to since we've been here. Talk about awesome, it was crazy to actually understand what was going on...

The following week, we did some presentations for our Art and History class and then took our final that Wednesday.... After that week, it's been smooth sailing, only 2 classes left to dominate!!

Don't worry, there's still plenty more too come... It's been a long process, and I'm trying to get all caught back up. Hope everyone enjoys my rambling... It's not very entertaining, but at least you kids know what were up!!!

Until the next post! CIAO