Lost in Utopia

Still slacking in the prompt department…

Anywho, this past weekend was quite eventful. For lack of groceries, we went out to eat… every. night. Got to be a bit excessive and expensive, but the food was good! Lots of pizza and pasta. Actually, thats basically all they serve. At one place in particular, I tried to order a cheeseburger. Yes, I miss American food. He brought me out a chicken patty with cheese and mustard… Definitely not what I ordered. So confusing. I attempted to tell them it was wrong, but since I can’t speak Italian I gave up on that one. Thankfully another girl didn’t like her spicy pasta and we switched. Besides that incident I’ve loved everything I’ve eaten. We can even get a full pizza for 3 euro! And they have these things here called rice balls. It is tomato sauce, rice, and mozzarella cheese stuffed into a ball and deep fried. They are soo DELICIOUS! Anyways, enough about food.

There are so many awesome bars around here. Campo de Fiori is basically a little city of bars. It’s awesome. My personal favorites are Scholars and Sloppy Sam’s. Scholars has karaoke. Seriously such a blast! But expensive drinks. Fortunately, we’ve gotten a ridiculous amount of free shots though. The bartenders just poor them for us. Probably because we are girls. But still! Never in America. Another one of our spots so far is G-bar. I have to say, the music they play is so good! Like the oldies but goodies. All the Above. Apple Bottom Jeans. Beamer Benz or Bentley. You get what I mean. A lot of fun! Especially because everyone knows all the words. Needless to say, the night life is great. Bars are open so late that sometimes we don’t even get home until 5am.

G-bar.

Orientation was a bitch. We had a new thing every day. And with the jet lag, it was exhausting. The only positive from the whole thing was the Navigation 101 session. Basically we learned how to navigate around Rome on our own. It was also like a mini tour of a small subset of the city.
The first monument I saw was the Altare della Patria. It’s definitely the biggest monument here.

The oldest ruins in Rome.

Also the cat sanctuary… Super weird. Technically called The Scared Area of Largo Argentina.

Sunday a few of my roommates and I decided to get up early and explore all the super fetch places around here. We tried using a map to get around but ended up just walking in directions where we saw a cool monument in the distance. Seeing truly is believing. Honestly all the buildings are so old. Some even B.C. and a lot A.D. It’s breathtaking. I never realized how much more there is around the world that I have yet to see. America is great and everything, but after coming here its almost as if Americans are “sheltered children.” It’s very uplifting to simply just walk around and observe everything that is here.
We first ended up at the Pantheon.

Mausoleum.

Spanish Steps.

Trevi Fountain.

Coliseum.

I couldn’t (and still can’t) believe that I was actually standing in front of these beautiful places of the world. Who woulda thought? It leaves me speechless. I feel so blessed to be able to embark on this journey and I’m looking forward to what is ahead. I already know that this experience will change my life!

Rome at my feet. This pic doesn’t do justice.