Roma

I LOVE ROME
It's such a wonderful city! It even smells good there.

I got there last Wednesday night and my aunt, I guess (she's the wife of my Nonna's cousin's son), picked me up from the airport, since I'd be staying with them. On Thursday, I went around and saw so much.  In the morning, I visited a lot of ruins, such as the colosseum, roman forum, and palatine hill. I took 400 pictures of ruins. It's just so cool to me though, because I've never been in a place with so many things from so long ago still in existence.  After a very long morning on my feet, I went back to the apartment, had a little bite to eat, then went out with my aunt to see the Pantheon, Trevi Foutain, Piazza di Navona, and Piazza di Spagna.  I also had real Italian gelato, and it was wonderful. 

The next day I slept in a little, then went to see the Vatican.  St. Peter's Basilica was a lot bigger than I actually imagined.  But the Vatican Museum was really cool, it has a lot of interesting things.  One of the things I saw that was most noteworthy would have to be the Sistine Chapel.  Silence is oligatory in the chapel, and it's forbidden to take pictures.

That night, we went out for pizza.  And one of the things they have a the resauraunt are pizzas called "coccodrillo".  Basically what they do is make a pizza and roll it up so all the toppings are on the inside, and it looks like a crocodile! (hence the name coccodrillo) They put olives on toothpicks for eyes and everything! It's so cute. then we had real Italian gelato again :)


On Saturday, we went for a little walk, not too far away from the house.  We went to the museum of the wall, which is a little part of the wall of rome by the door of San Sebastiano and tells some history about Rome's walls. It was cool. I got to go up outside on the top of the wall and I could see mountains in the distance! In the evening, we went to the Borghese Gallery, which has many works by Bernini and Carvaggio.  It amazed me to actually see the detail in some of the statues! It's incredible that these artists were able to carve marble as if it were butter, making it look like real silk or skin.  The detail is impeccable!


That night, I went out with my cousin and some of his friends to see a Muse tribute band concert.  That was a pleasant surprise too, because I didn't know what I'd be doing that night, and it's a good thing that I like Muse! :) So that was a lot of fun as well.  We got in sort of late that night, and I got up the next morning at 5:30a.m. to get ready and get to the airport.  My journey home was smooth, but I was very tired by the end of the day Sunday.

London, baby!

During the week of vacation we had at the beginning of November for all saints day, I went with a Rotary-organized trip to London for a few days, which was very cool.
On Wednesday afternoon I made my way to Tournai again to sleep at Greta's so I'd actually be able to catch the bus the next morning.  The bus was only stopping in 3 cities, none of which are near to me.  Thursday morning came around and we boarded up the bus and headed of to Calais, where we would take the ferry to Dover. The "ferry" is actually a monster of a boat.  I don't know how big it is, but it has multiple decks that can be filled with buses, trucks, and other vehicles. 
When we arrived in England, we got back on the bus and drove off (on the "right" side of the road - scary) to Canterbury.  We took an audio-tour of the cathedral there, which was actually quite interesting.
After that, we made our way to London.  The bus dropped us off at Piccadilly Circus, and there we had some free time to eat and do some souvenir shopping.  We met up at the bus again after this and went to the hotel.  Most of us stayed down by the bar and hung out and talked, and by midnight I was ready for bed. 
The next morning I ate a huge breakfast of toast and jam, cereal, bacon, fruit, yogurt, and a croissant at the hotel.  We then went of to Windsor Castle, where we also had an audio-tour.  Unfortunately, it was forbidden to take pictures inside the castle. 
After the castle, we had some time to grab a bite to eat before continuing on with the itinerary.  I always made a profit off of the money that Rotary gave us to eat by finding cheap places, or just having a little ice cream at lunch instead of real food because I was still full from breakfast :)
We went back into London and visited Madame Tussaud's wax museum.  It was interesting, but wax people sort of freak me out.  I did participate in this little X-factor thing, though.  It's basically Britain's version of American Idol.  I went in a little room with a microphone and my "team" of two other exchange girls, and we sang "Don't Stop Believing" It was fun, but sort of embarrassing to watch afterwards.
When we were done at Madame Tussaud's we moved on to the Hard Rock Café.  Before eating, we had a chance to look around the gift shop, and we got to go downstairs in a special little room with various instruments and costumes of great musicians like B. B. King, the Beatles, Elvis, Queen, David Bowie, the Who, Jimi Hendrix, etc etc.
After dinner, we went to the Phoenix theater to see a musical.  It was called Blood Brothers, and it was absolutely phenomenal!! So that was a good end to the day.
The next morning, after another big breakfast, we went to see and walk around the Tower Bridge, and most of the day was free time around London, with the exception of meeting up at Trafalgar Square to get organized and get into our groups for which museum we wanted to go to.  I chose the British Museum, which was an awesome choice! I just wish that I could have had more time there.  I could spend a week in that place.  But the most important thing was that I saw the Rosetta Stone :D
When we were basically ushered out of the museum because it was closing, we got a hot chocolate at Starbucks and figured out what we wanted to do before meeting up at 11pm.  At this point, I was with Greta, Maisa (from Finland), and Amaury (Belgian rotex guy), and we inspected the map and metro lines, and we went off to see the London Eye, then walked all the way down to the Globe theatre (because the metro line wasn't in service).  After trying a few places without any success, we found somewhere to eat, then headed off to the metro by London Bridge, to get back where we were supposed to meet up by Piccadilly Circus.  If you don't know where these places in London are, or how far apart they are, let me just tell you that we walked A LOT. But it was a very good day, so it was well worth it. 
We boarded back on the bus at 11pm and headed for home.  I didn't sleep well on the bus. After I finally got home, between being on the bus, ferry, bus again, train, waiting for my next train in Charleroi for an hour and a half, the train home, then the walk from the train station home, I was exhausted and slept all day long Sunday.