This past weekend in Florence was nice, if overpriced. I have grown accustomed to Perugia's non-touristy prices for "staples" such as gelato and pizza and panini, so I did not enjoy paying 2 euros for half the gelato I would get in Perugia. But I did have gelato di Nutella, which was probably the best gelato I've had so far (for those who don't know, Nutella is hazelnut chocolate cream that can be put on basically anything- go buy it now!).

I think I said about 5 words in Italian while I was there, so it didn't help me out in the language department at all. However I was able to read most of the captions and titles of paintings that we saw in the Pitti Palace, which made the paintings by Caravaggio, Raphael, Ludovico and Titian that more interesting.

While in Florence, we waited in line for an hour and a half to get into the Accademia to see Michelangelo's David, waited 45 minutes to climb to the top of Brunelleschi's Duomo, and waited about 5 minutes to get into the Medici's Pitti Palace. All of the waiting was worth it for two reasons: 1) the artwork and views one can see in these places are amazing and 2) out of the three sites, we only had to pay to get into the Duomo because it was la Festa della Repubblica, the day in Italy that celebrates the birth of the Republic and the end of the monarchy. Six dollars to see over a half a century of art seems like a good deal to me!

We had hoped that the Festa would mean lots of Italian nationalism and festivities, but all we heard about was a parade in the morning and the free entry into some national monuments (such as the Accademia and the Pitti Palace). Apparently, the Festa is a relatively new holiday, so it hasn't really caught on in places outside of Rome.

Now for some facts about Perugia, at the request of my grandfather.

-The population of the province of Perugia is around 610,000 in an area of 6,334 km². I'm pretty sure that's not a huge population, but I'll let you do the math. I live near the center of town, so I see a lot of people every day.

-It seems like there are a lot of cars here, and most of them are new. This is because people are just now making enough money to buy cars. I see a lot of Citroens, Pugeots, and Smart Cars. The Fords I see are all European models- I have never seen any of them in the US. All of the cars are tiny and they have to be, since Perugia is a medieval town with very narrow cobblestone streets. Most people walk around the centro, the center of town, because it is hard to find parking spots. Corso Vanucci, the main concourse, is filled with people walking up and down at any given time, but especially at night. Italians love fare la passeggiata, taking walks. In the day there are a lot of adults, and at night there are mostly teens (like at a mall).

-For being such a small town out in the boonies, there are a lot of minorities here, mostly from North Africa and the Middle East. Recently, the left-leaning government of Italy officially opened up the borders to immigrants. As a peninsula without a very efficient police force, Italy was pretty much already open to immigration. Now it's legal. Everyday we see lots of fake Louis Vuitton and Fendi purses, fake Chanel sunglasses and so on. One really has to be careful to watch her stuff (like a backpack of purse), because there are a lot of pickpockets here, and most of them seem to be these poor immigrants or gypsies. Pickpocketing doesn't seem to be regarded as a major issue to the police here, as they recognize that it is the means by which these people can scrape by. Pickpocketers targets Americans anyway, and the Americans will come to Italy with or without pickpocketing, so the police don't really go after pickpocketing. The investigator who spoke to us at the beginning of our time at Umbra Institute said that in Florence last year, it was only Americans who reported being pickpocketed. We just stand out as idiots, I suppose. The rest of the minorities here are usually students at the University for Stranieri (foreigners).

-It seems that aside from the poor immigrants who sell cheap fake goods on the street, most people seem to be at about the same economic status. There are some nicer stores, and some less nicer stores, so either there is a little disparity of wealth or some people are acting like there is a disparity of wealth. Italians will go pretty far to look the best they can and to appear like they have money, so the nicer stores could just be bait for that kind of Italian.

-Perugia is about 3 hours by bus north of Rome, and about 2 hours by train south of Florence. My teacher told us today that Florence by car takes about 1 1/2 hours, but I pointed out that you'd spend another hour looking for reasonable parking, so it's probably better to take the train anyway. Trains run to and from Rome to Perugia and Florence to Perugia about every hour, so it's not hard to get out of the city. My family did it without speaking a word of Italian- if we can do it, most people should be able to also. Since everyone at the Umbra Institute flew into Fiumicino in Rome, they are providing a free bus from and to Rome at the beginning and end of the sessions here. However, I think my group from TCU will leave early to be able to spend our last weekend in Rome, so we'll probably take the train down there. I haven't learned much about other trains here, but since Perugia is the capital and largest city in Umbria it has a decent sized train station with trains that run often.

-Perugia has three colleges- the Umbra Institute, the University for Stranieri, and the College of Perugia, which is the provincial college for locals. This means that there are a lot of people my age in Perugia. But there are also a lot of older people, since families stay put generation after generation in Italy. In the center of town I would say there are a lot more younger people than older people. In the periphery of Perugia there are probably more middle aged people and older.

Tonight I'm hoping to see Pirates of the Caribbean IN ENGLISH (yay!) at the local movie theater. I'll probably eat at Dalla Bianca, the great little restaurant across the alley from my apartment. I think I'll get penne alla norcina- yum! But I really just want a Large Bob from El Rancho :)

ArrivaderLa, Ellie