no longer a gorilla face.

i want to see your face.

Rain Rain Go Away, If You Won't We Won't Stay.

In the middle of the night I awoke to a burst bee's moppity-mop-it traveling hippie climbing into the top bunk of the Gorilla's bunk bed. We had been expecting our other mysterious roommate to arrive but we did not expect it to be at 4:00 in the morning. She started talking to us as if it were 4 in the afternoon, but still a little drugged from the tylenol pm I took last night (because I was about to kill the Gorilla with my snores the night before. I normally don't snore but I have a wee bit of a cold, and the Gorilla told me she didn't sleep at all last night because shnoze face me was growling the whole night) I remember briefly talking to her but then I dozed right back to sleep. She climbed right into the unmade pasty colored mattress and went to bed, no sheets no pjs. When our alarm went off the Gorilla and I showered and got dressed as soon as possible for fear our roommate might want to join us for the day. We were not sure if she was traveling by herself. Unfortunately it was raining so the Gorilla and I decided to take the late train home tonight so we wouldn't a. have to pay another night at the fema b. be in the rain all day and c. so we could come home to our own beds and enjoy a relaxing Sunday. We ventured around Venice all day, dodging umbrella tops and while drinking bellini's. We checked our bags in at the train station so we didn't have to carry them around. I discovered that my new favorite drink is the Bellini and I could drink it for breakfast, lunch and dinner. What a great discovery, something my parents will be so proud of, their daughter discovering her favorite alcoholic drink. Life changing! Miraculously we were able to get a cheaper train home and we even got a voucher for a free train ride to use at a later date. We boarded the train to Bolgna. Exhausted I went into narco narco state of being. We got off at Bolgna only to realize that our next train wasn't going to take us to the right train station in Florence. Typical. Rather than buying another ticket we decided to be the inferior Gorilla and sidekick and just hop aboard the train we wanted to go on. With no seating assignments and no legit ticket we picked a random cart with a sleeping artist/ former jazz club piano player (I am not sure what he really does, those are just my guess, if I had to choose). The train clicker came around, noticed we had the wrong tickets and then proceeded on to the next cart. It must have been a lucky ticket because I know the Gorilla and I are not lucky. We made it home safe and sound.

p.s. For those of you wondering...Venice is not sinking. I learned this weekend that it is actually the water that is rising and it won't be for another 200 years or more until it goes under. So those of you aka the Gorilla who told me that Venice was going to sink in the next 10 years, have no fear and you are wrong! But still go visit Venice. Best city in the world.

The Most Beautiful City In The World.

We were successfully able to take the number 4 four bus from the hostel to the airport and catch the number 5 bus to the train bus station and we were successfully able to make it into Venice. Although I lugged a whole bag filled with tuna cans, pasta, euro juice boxes and oatmeal, the Gorilla and I thought we deserved to eat some human/gorilla food in Venice. (our roommates told us that they had a kitchenette in their trailer but the only thing remotely close to a kitchen appliance was right outside our trailer...the freezing air. We stopped at the first whole in the wall pizza place and chowed down on a large slice of margherita pizza. Vorrei un pizza margherita. I am not quite sure where to even start on my day and I am sorry if things seem out of order or don't make sense. All I have to say is go to Venice during Carnival and you will understand everything. But if you can't make it in January, just go to Venice in general because it will change your life. For those of you unaware of what Carnival is, let me explain. Prior to going, I was informed that it was similar to our version of Mardi Gras and lets just say, no who-ha's were being shown for any beads, and even if they were, they would be insane and their nips would probably break off from the cold. Second of all, it is not nearly as crazy in the sense that everyone is playing the game of blackout or drunk skunk. Rather Carnival is like Halloween meets a masquerade ball and with thousands of people. As my roommate described it "you got the young, you got the old, you got the small, you got the fat, the attractive and the ugly, the masked and the unmasked, the drunk and the not drunk"(even though later she explained that she thinks she was the only drunk one because they decided that in order to stay warm they should play a little game of edward-forty-hands and drink themselves warm...don't worry the Gorilla and I are not insane, we just sipped hot wines, downed a few beers because we are legal and we can!) After pizza and with no plans ahead of us, we were off to explore Venice. First of all, there are no cars in Venice, and I think I saw one or two bikes sporadically riding throughout the city. Second of all Venice is rather confusing because every street looks like the next and at the same time every streets architecture, design and bridge are all different. There is a joke throughout Venice that when asking where you can find San Marco square you should take your left and point in one way and your right hand and point in another. They have million signs through out the city that "apparently" lead you to San Marco square or to the Rialto bridge, but the Gorilla and I found that we were constantly going in circles and it was like one big maize to try to find anything but I didn't hate it. I actually loved that it was so mysterious, it is what made the city so magical. In order to blend in, the Gorilla and I purchased masks, a blue to match my eyes and a red to match the Gorilla's scarf. And in order to stay warm, we treated our frozen little tushies to some hot wine. We finally found San Marco square and there are no words to describe its beauty and splendor. Every five steps people were dressed in the most elaborate costumes and masks and it was as if I had set up my dream photo shoot. My hands went crazy and my camera almost ran out of memory space. The Gorilla and I were getting a little cold so logically we decided the best thing to do was to eat. For some reason we decided that going into an Asian restaurant in Venice was a good idea. I think it was that they were offering free sitting with no service charge (usually if you sit down, you pay a service charge) but 18 euros after we realized that they didn't have a kitchen in the restaurant and that they had served us microwave pasta dishes. Despite the terrible food, it was a rather entertaining dinner. A Swedish family fell for the free service fee trap as well and their daughter was dressed in full flower power costume and by that I mean I think they cleared out the fake flower store because her entire costume was covered in fake flowers. Her head looked like a garden and her face was covered with a metal butterfly mask. From my description you might think this girl is what 5 or 10 years old. Yeah, no. I think she was at least 20 or older. She was a rather large and extremely tall flower giant. Her looks weren't the only funny thing, but rather than taking off her mask to eat, her dad held up one side of her mask while she shoved food under the opening. I almost died. After our not so lean cuisine we headed back out to San Marco square to watch little sperm men with lighting boults rocket power through the air (Men dressed in spandex silver onesies, did flips and splits off a trampoline contraption while fire works and loud music filled the stage. Only in Europe would this be acceptable) I forgot to mention that earlier in the day, they had a performance where they dressed volunteers from the audience in white willy wonka onesies and were instructed to paint a larger than life work of art. After ten minutes of painting, the hosts for the show (imagine the main character from "We Sing in Sillyville" on massive drugs and italian, with her sidekick host who in his past life was for sure a leprechaun, but in his present life was a bald headed 40 year old pot belly man in a velvet green suit) they revealed the grand painting but unfortunately they decided to paint a girl sniffing a blue flower ( I still haven't figure that one out but it was pretty cool) Two freak shows down the Gorilla and I were heading to a bar right near San Marco square when all of the sudden a stampede of 50 drunk college students dressed in zoo creatures ran into the bar, chanting some Italian cheer and downing, what I later learned were called "spritzers". Pigs, Zebras, Octopus heads, monkeys, superhero's and even two diapered babies filled the bar. The Gorilla and I watched through the window like two little children in in front of the toy shop in aw until two boys, one furry Gorilla and one Mask of Zorro were all of the sudden standing outside talking to us. The Furry Gorilla was actually a boy dressed in a Gorilla costume with coconut boobies, just to clarify the two Gorilla's. The Furry Gorilla greeted me with a cheerful hello and then all of the sudden grabs my hand as if he is going to kiss it. Slightly impressed and a little blushing, I smile back at him in hopes that he will actually kiss it but no. No he did not kiss my hand. Do know what he did? HE LICKED IT. HE GRABBED MY LICKED IT and then proceeded to gnaw on it. I mean what did I expect, he was actually a Gorilla, not a prince charming in the least bit. I am not sure if some evil mean girl has placed a "lick me" sign on my back but this is the second time in two weeks that I have been licked. A little weirded out the Gorilla and I proceed to talk to these boys for some odd reason and then head to the bar to test out these "spritzers". We later found out this cluster of farm animals and what-nots were a group of college students from Siena, enjoying their carnival celebrations by doing a pub crawl. We wandered around the city, but were pretty exhausted, so we took the early bus home around 9:30 to guarantee that we would not have to hitch a ride this time around.

posted friday february first two thousand and eight.

i thought thursday was over in the last post. but no it wasn't.

So where did I leave you. oh yes the bug lights, my eyes dipped in acid tired, and me facing the greece balled-freckle connecting Gorilla. oh well the story of my thursday actually just started right where I left off on my last post. We finally arrived in Venice a little "retardo" (no I am not being offensive, it is the Italian word for late) Having come ever so slightly unprepared, we got off the train and moseyed our way through what looked like Hogwarts train station.  In fact, the lady across from me on the train actually looked like Professor McGonigall's sister. The station was completely empty, no trains, just waves of fog and lost students with luggage at hand ( I actually think they filmed HP there) Thank goodness our roommates came Venice last weekend and thank goodness we asked them for directions literally two minutes before we left (in life two minutes might not seem that long, you brush your teeth for two minutes, my mom can sneeze for two minutes and it takes my dad two minutes to say one sentence in the heat of a story...but in Gorilla and sidekick time, two minutes can mean the world) and while two minutes doesn't seem like much those two minutes partially saved our lives.  We got on bus number 5 that was "apparently" going to take us to the airport, that would then "apparently" take us to our hostel. Venice is an extremely expensive city, so most hostels (aka a students five star hotel) are located all over the out skirts of the city.  Bus number 5 did indeed take us to the airport (one down) but little did we know that the bus from the airport to the hostel stopped running at 9:40 pm.  At 9:40 pm the Gorilla was listening to Brittany Spears on the train, while I was writing my last post. At 12:30 am, the Gorilla and I were trying to get on that same bus that stopped running AT 9:40!! Slightly nervous, slightly confused as to what we should do, we attempted to go inside the airport but our first test was a failure and the doors were locked.  At this point, I just wanted to cry and I thought we were going to be sleeping on our backpacks wrapped in our towels outside the airport.  But like in all Gorilla and sidekick adventures, the number one rule is to never give up.  We followed our motto and proceeded to walk around the other side of the airport and just was we approached the door a lady was leaving and we snuck in.  At this point, I was accepting that we were going to sleep on our backpacks wrapped in our towels inside the airport.  Right when we entered, I just happened to stop a rather young and charming airport attendee to ask him where we might find a number for a cab.  I explain to him that we missed the bus and needed to get to our hostel (I did find the name of the hostel by the way) He stops and instead offers us a ride to the hostel.  He told us that it was right on his way home and that he would have no problem and no charge.  A little hesitant at first, charming young man could tell we did not trust him and he told us that the cabs were very expensive. $$$ (but imagine those dollar signs as euro signs...and then you get a little dizzy...it could cost 80 euro and that is almost 160 U.S dollars and that is 80 things we could potentially buy at the euro store and that is 80 euros we were going to use to pay for our hostel and all of our food for the weekend).  As soon as he said that the Gorilla and I looked each other straight in the eyes and decided that death was better than an expensive taxi ride (and who knew if we could even get a taxi and who knew if Mr. taxi man would even be safe) Instantly, the Gorilla and I forgot everything we had ever learned since the day we could walk and talk at the same time and decided that we would rather die than pay 80 euro to get to our hostel.  So Ricardo, the airport attendee kindly walked us through the miles of fog (the fog was so bad, you could actually not see more than 10 feet in front of you) to his euro style Fiat car. The entire walk there I kept thinking of all the items that I had in my backpack that I could offer him/ attack him with if god forbid something happened.  I had a pair scissors, an exacto knife, really stinky farts, and the most important weapon of mass destruction...the GORILLA.  And I could also bribe him with an ATM card that is worthless without the pin code (hahaha), 20 euros and possibly he might want my janky cell phone (but probably not) Through the fog we zoomed in and out of the street and around a couple of rotaries.  With only a few moments of awkward silences, and sing-a-long to Amy Winehouse, we were able to tell Ricardo our names in Italian and where we were from and he gave us tips about going into Venice. [mother I know you are probably having a heart attack, but Ricardo was a kind young man, a safe driver and works for the airline company] More than anything, I was scared we might be road kill because it was impossible to see out of Ricardo's bitty mobile but he reassured us that he had done this drive for over 3 years now. Luckily Ricardo, the airport attendee was a nice young man, and an episode of Law and Order: International Crimes, did not occur. 20 minutes later we arrived at our hostel, Alba D'Oro (or as one of my roommates told me how to remember it, Alba, as in Jessica Alba) Now if  you think that our rendezvous with Ricardo was sketchy, just wait until you hear about the "hostel" we arrived at.  Our roommates had stayed at the same hostel last weekend and came back describing as being similar to a fema trailer park and their description wasn't anything shy of that.  We arrive at the gates slightly concerned we were a. at the wrong place and b. that we were not going to be able to check in but luckily pimp daddy nigerian hostel man was waiting for someone to arrive.  At this point it was now 1:00 in the morning and he told us that we didn't have a reservation but before I could start convulsing, the Gorilla found my name on the check-in list. In order to get a full understanding of what this hostel was really like you need to pull out your little imagination button and press it REALLY hard. Imagine a huge plot of land that has just been hit by a tornado, a hurricane, maybe even a tsunami, or better yet a crater from Mars followed by rain. Got that in your head, then imagine that the red cross came in for an emergency clean up and then habitat for humanity invested their money into purchasing trailers instead of building homes. I bet your imagination is going wild because my entire world has now changed since this experience.  Setup like small prison camp barracks, each individual trailer is designed a little differently.  You have the singles in one row, you got the doubles in another, the triples and so on. Okay, I am posting pictures but sometimes photographic images are not able to capture exactly how something might be and words are always good to use.  Exhausted from a full day of class, a 2 hour train ride, a quasi hitch hike car ride and a long check in, we hauled our stuff across the park and arrived at our pin. Pin number 27 (they called each trailer a pin) The door was unlocked, so the Gorilla made me go first.  While the Gorilla is a Gorilla, I am a little more brave when it comes to opening trailer homes at 2 in the morning when the door is unlocked.  A bunk bed, a cot, a remote control heater, a bathroom, a closet, two shelves and two blankets was what we got, but it was really all we needed. We truly paid for what we got. For 16.50 euro a night, I was pleasantly surprised. As a young girl growing up, my sister and I always fantasized that our dream home would be a mobile home that was parked outside of Disney World and in some bizarre way, I was fulfilling .00001 percent of the long lost desire to live in a mobile home.  Many people say that Venice is a fairy tale city and Disney is exactly that. Oh and one more thing to add to the day.  When we made our reservations online we could only find a three person room/trailer and we assumed no girl would travel alone, so we wouldn't have to worry but when we arrived we found out we would be getting one. Well I think that now raps up my thurs-day-night-fri-morn.  

p.s. I just "free translated" the word Alba D'Oro from Italian to English and it means dawn of the gold. I still need to do a little thinking about this one.

p.s.s. Mr. Webster you can add that word "free translated" to your 3,000 edition! 

Crazy Rice. Florescent Lights. Welcoming Venice Nights.

I am actually getting sick. Mom don't worry. I will be fine but for the first time in a really long time (aka since the snip snip of the tonsils tonsils) I have had a wee bit of a sore throat.  Luckily Thursdays are my favorite days so I was able to perk up a bit. In bookmaking I learned how to make my own book binding cloth.  I am so artsy fartsy these days...all I want is a Michael's and shopping cart because it is rather difficult to find the supplies I need here. But now I can take any fabric my little heart desires and make it into a cover using an ancient Japanese process using wheat starch.  I feel like a bubby but instead of knitting all day...I just want to make books and books. Guess what I had for lunch? Anna's! I stayed after class today to work on photog because I am heading to Venice tonight for Carnival and I have a project due the Tuesday I return. 5 1/2 hours later, slightly on happy pills because of the chemicals and the "crazy rice" I devoured while waiting for my film to dry, I finished only 3 of the 5 prints. (p.s. crazy chips are like coco crispies in the States but they look more like gerbil food and taste a little bit like coco-cardboard but they only cost 1 euro..oh how I love the euro store) After class the Gorilla and I rushed home to pack for Venice and gather enough food for the weekend so we wouldn't have to pay for food in Venice (our roommates went last weekend and said that it was rather pricey and that they didn't have a euro store) Right now I am sitting on the trainto Venice writing this blog of bloggy-ness while the Gorilla is playing connect the dots freckles astrology style and is connecting every single freckle on her arm. I kind of feel like I want to vomit right now because I am so exhausted, that kind of exhausted where your eyes burn and your fingers feel fat from traveling but I can't because they have lined the train with florescent lights or incandescent bug lights for those of you who don't understand the pain that I am in.  I am facing the Gorilla and she looks rather similar to olive oil head man because she forgot to wash all of the shampoo out of her hair today and I look like a cow that has been tipped over while sleeping and is discombobulated.  The man behind me is blasting show tunes but looks diabetic and depressed (The Gorilla wanted to offer him some gummies but she thought it might raise his blood sugar) Before getting on the train the Gorilla and I stopped by the euro store to buy three bags of gummies that was supposed to last us the entire weekend but the gummies here are like drugs, and 2 bags down, you could say we have an addiction to rasta pasta sours sticks and friendly farm animals chews. We really have no clue how to get to the hostel we are staying at tonight and I can't even remember the name of it but like all Gorilla and sidekick adventures, I know we will figure it out.  Nothing could be more exciting than plopping me and the Gorilla in Venice during the most crazy time of the year. We just arrived in Venice. Dear god, help me.

-ciao ciao

+written on the train to Venice on January 31, 2008 at approximately 22:00. 

Delausted.

Practically dead from the Gorilla's birthday celebrations, I felt pretty wah wah all day long and even started to do the "John Isenberg-during-any-dinner party-slash-all-late-night temple-services" head nod in my art history class. I almost finished my still life painting and hopefully will finish it sometime this weekend. In Italian lab this afternoon we had to sing a song about an Italian man describing a women as being hot like bread, pretty as a passport with a babies picture in it (whatever that means) and being as beautiful as a nude bride on her wedding day.  The Italian men are truly freaky but it was rather entertaining.  We also had to go around the room and describe our future/dream/perfect husbands in Italian using different adjectives. Listen up future hubbies. Con gli occhi blu, bello, alto, forte, robusto, abronzato, felice, simpatico, intelligenti, onesto, artistico, ricco, moro, divertenti. (go to freetranslation.com all you long lost lovers) Almost 100 percent exhausted after a full day of classes, the Gorilla and I stopped by the "asian market" (thats what they call it because it is run by asians however it has the most American food compared to all the other grocery stores) to pick up some spinach, eggplant and chicken.  We made a delicious meal. Erica and Sara finally arrived in Italy today and they live literally just a hop, a skip and a jump over the Medici palace. Early bed time tonight. Off to Venice tomorrow night for Carnival.

P.S. Despite what the Gorilla might tell you, she does snore. Rather she makes the earth rumble with her breath and shnooze. 

Now Legal In Every Country.

I forgot to bring bitty bot's computer cord so I just took a picture of the camera (bitty bot is the name of my small digital camera)

Don't Be Scared Children...It Is Just The Gorilla.

I found a Gorilla mask at the euro store and gave it to the Gorilla for her birthday.

January 29, 2008: Happy Birthday Gorilla!

I woke up early to decorate the apartment with the Gorilla's birthday surprise necessities from the euro store. I made her her favorite Gorilla feast but a little tired from the night before I dropped a few things like a pot and a fork on the floor while trying to make breakfast, so I think I woke the Gorilla up a little earlier than I had expected and a little earlier than she probably wanted to. We went to book arts and I finished my first hand made 40 paged journal. Remember I am starting a journal making company called Eanj + Fata so place your orders now..e-mail me at aji@umich.edu...if you want a one-of-a-kind-hand-made journal..just a simple email is all you need (because hand made things are always better made!) After class we went to Anna's for the usual (you should all know the order by now, so no need to repeat) and then we came home for a little nappy nap before hippie-hairy-mold photog ( I discovered my photo teacher has a rather large mole on her neck that has a small garden of hairs sprouting from it...delightful and very nice to draw). The Gorilla gave a presentation in class today and it was very interesting. Good job Gorilla!...you actually did something before me (mine is next week) Tonight we had an apertivo at our apartment. The twins cooked up a huge feast and our roommates decorated and bought more euro wine. It was an instant repeat of last night until our landlord came knocking at the door and obviously I was closest to the door. And obviously I was one the one who answered it. In a rather stern voice and violent arms motioning our land lord said "enough". And enough was enough. We had had enough. Well actually not quite enough...so we decided to go out. The masses of Americans have really started to go to our favorite hotspots. We headed to Beebop for a little Tuesday night grind to the Beatles but were could not even able walk down the stairs because it was so crowded with Amuricans and sweat waterfalls were dripping down the walls. I met up with Meredith (she just got to Florence tonight) and I also had another camp chi-jew-crew reunion in the middle of the street. By 11:30pm I was getting rather tired but the crew decided to head to JJ's. Thankfully it smelled like pee and it was too crowded that we were able to go home. HAPPY GORILLA BIRTHDAY GORILLA!

P.S. The night before @ JJ's we made the Gorilla wear an indian head dress and 2 guys bought her drinks. Tonight we made her wear a birthday cone hat. The bar tender questioned her as to how many nights she was planning to celebrate her birthday and she instantly told him that her birthday was a 24 hour celebration and then he gave her a free drink. She only speaks the truth. It truly was a 24 hour celebration and more fun than one gorilla and a sidekick could ask for.

A Night of Faces: Gorilla Faces, Volcano Faces, No Faces.

Because the Gorilla is not an average human being (she is actually a Gorilla) she had to have a Gorilla birthday. Not an average human birthday, but indeed a Gorilla one and thus it lasted 24 hours long. Last night I went to the euro store to begin preparing for the g-day. I bought all of the necessities in order to have the perfect Gorilla celebration. Items such as an indian head dress with multicolored feathers, 2 paper accordion lanterns, 1 dancing clown on a string, 3 bags of balloons, singing farm animals on a string of flags, 2 ballon patterned table cloths, candles in the shape of a 2 and a 1, streamers, blow horns and most importantly 10 bottles of euro wine. Just the basics. After class today, I stopped by the Centro (grocery store on my street) to pick up a few of the Gorilla's favorite breakfast foods so that in the morning when we wake up after a night of Gorilla celebration, and we can eat Gorilla food (my gorilla is a very special gorilla because she eats very high quality gorilla food...no kibbles and bits) Eggs, spinach, tomatoes, Special K with chocolate chips, and peach yogurt ( but we freeze the peach yogurt...we thought of this genius idea to quench our gelato cravings by buying huge cartons of yogurt and then freezing them to trick our minds into believing it is just like gelato...and it has worked..but sometimes we eat it as breakfast) Class class all day but after class we showered and got all dressed up to go this famous restaurant called Il Latini. Apparently they don't have a menu and people stand outside and the restaurant chooses you to come in. I say apparently because we never made it there. We were on our way out the door and I made the bold move to double check its location online and realized that in corner in small helvetica font it read closed on Mondays. Thats why I say apparently and thats why we never made there. This is not the only "apparently" moment of our evening but you will just have to wait for the next one. We decided instead to go to a restaurant that Ernest Hemingway used to go to to get his creative writing juices and a bunch artists are also known to have dined at this restaurant. Being the artists that we pretend to be, we thought it would be an appropriate back up to the "closed on mondays il latini". We ordered pesto with pine nuts pasta and a veggie pizza and the bar tender whipped us out two strong fruity + vodka drinks. Our dinner was fabulous, slightly lesbonic but wonderful. We were debating whether or not to get dessert but the waiter surprised us both with a drink and crumpet. He brought out 2 shots of what looked like foggy yellow pine sol and a small pastry, along with a rendition of happy birthday that sounded more like habby-de-birt-did-day what your name? AY DA-habby-de-birt-dey-too-ooo. Wowza the drink was strong and wowza the crumpet was delicious. It had this small little unknown fruit/veggie on top of it and when I tried it I thought it was a cherry tomato but the Gorilla thought I was an idiot. I think that I thought it looked like a tomato so I tricked myself in believing it was but now that I really analyze it, it was some type of berry. Tomato, Tomato, Potato, Potato. The waiter tried to convince us to go this bar called Amadaus and told us he would be there at 11:30 to buy us shots but we were on a mission to find this mysterious bar called Faces that apparently (note the word) had an open bar. Apparently you could pay a 10 euro cover fee and then it is "free" drinks all night long. 10 euro for endless drinks...impossible. All we knew about this Faces place was that it was on the other side of the Arno. We asked our waiter if he had heard of it but he said no and then persisted on us going to Amadaus. Like all adventures that the Gorilla and I embark up on, we do them determination and do not give up. We stopped at four very tempting gelatoris but no one had heard of it. We finally found a person who "apparently" knew where this open bar was. She said "oh yeah, open bar, faces, river" and a couple of hand singles followed by "yah, and ya's". We followed her "directions" exactly and arrived at an actual bar called "Open Bar", no not Faces, but a bar called "Open Bar". First failed attempt to find Faces (but second failed attempt to get somewhere as far as the evening goes) We decided to call our friend Max (who lives on the other side of the river) thinking he might know but he was more drunk then someone turning 21 should be. He met us in the middle of street and rocket powered the Gorilla into the air with ginormous hug. But we were a little worried that he was too drunk to hangout with us, so we walked him to his apartment and continued our adventure (side note: Max did not show up to our 9:30 class the day after..just to let you know!) Three bars down and a drink later we finally found someone who knew where it was. He pointed us in the direction and we were on our way but 5 seconds later he came running after us yelling "girls..it closed..it closed!". What we could gather from the cute little Italian munchkin was that it had closed because it had presumably gotten in trouble. But still curious and not satisfied with his answer (as all Gorilla's and sidekicks get) we decided to continue to follow his directions and we finally found the open bar, Faces (that at one point did exist) Almost as sketchy as the Florence ghetto, Faces, was once a hoppin club located in a small alleyway on the other side of the Arno with illegal black windows and small gold lettering on the outside. I freaked the Gorilla out by screaming because I looked in the window and it scared me so I screeched. Like the three little piggies, we "wee wee wee'd" all the way home slightly pissed but still in the mood to celebrate. We decided to bring the party to our apartment and with 10 bottles of euro wine, it was not hard to start. Surprisingly I am adjusting to my freaky roommates more and more and they actually joined us for an 80's power hour, along with Dina, Chatty and Kathy. 20 minutes into the power hour the clock stroke 12 and nutella birthday cake, pretzel shaped cookies, grocery story bought gelato filled the table and the candles were blown out with one monstrous Gorilla breath blow. Many pictures were taken, much wine was drank-en and then off to JJ's we did go. Unfortunately one of our roommates had never done a power hour nor did she tell us this until after it was too late and she threw up everywhere. I being the responsible roommate, took her home early which led to volcano vomiting all over her face. This was just not the night for all kinds of faces, but as a whole the night ended with a bang. While we didn't find faces, we did save 10 euros each on a night out.

Sundays are good days to do nothing (Amy Winehouse Style aka on *crack version*)

As you can tell I am little bit behind on my bloggy-of- bloggy-ness, so the next couple of days might be rather short BUT have no fear they are of the most important key and exciting tales about my glorious days in Flo-yo...Flor- to- the-ence. After my rather inter-licking-esting night, I decided that sleeping in was the only way to cure the severe (determinental) damages caused by last nights lick-scapade.  Jewish geography is pretty unbelievable.  If you are jewish you really just know everyone and their mother, literally.  Through another Camp Chi connection (that being a jew crew connection) my friend Jordan came to stay the day with me.  He is technically staying the whole semester and living with my friend Paul (who just happens to live down the street), however Paul was a taking un-tour-de-France this weekend and forgot to leave the key for him, so Jordan was pretty much homeless.  He hopped off the air plane and came to stay the day at the wondrous Via dei Ginori.  I didn't really do much today, but I did go on a run but on a different side of town.  While it was a great idea to go running on the other side of town because there were less people to ooo and ahhh at my badonkadonk, I am not so sure it was the best part of town to go running in.  I just happen to see a man pull down his pants in the middle of the street and hold on to the side rail and take a large poop.  While it is human to poop, we all do it (yes even girls poop..I can testify), it was rather disturbing and I actually had to cut my run a little bit short because I felt a little sick. After my poopy run, I came home and the Gorilla and I went out to dinner with a friend from high who we just happen to run into yesterday in Pisa and she is also studying abroad in Florence (her name is Hannah Paulsen for all you Shmeasters) Tonight, I prepared for the Gorilla's big 21 (on Tuesday the Gorilla becomes a legal a Gorilla, which is rather scary!) 

*and by crack I do not mean I am taking crack, nor did I write while taking crack, nor do I really even know what crack actually is.....I am just saying it is a rather speedy version. DO NOT WORRY BABS! I am not taking drugs, nor or my roommates, and no one is physically killing anyone, even though sometimes I do want to figuratively kill my roommates. 

Gorilla Hand + Prime Minister Orange = Gorilla With An Orange

I think I forgot to show you the orange the Gorilla stole. It started to rot 2 weeks later and the Gorilla tasted it but then got diseases. Well technically she already had them. This is the orange.

Just Like Heaven.

Just A Little Off.

Just A Small Comparison

Let Me See Your Shoulder Lean.

Pisa and Lucca. The oil farm schtick and men in winter still like to lick.

The alarm didn't go off at 7:00 am but rather the Gorilla went off at 7:24 screaming "ah what time is it?" "we are not going to make it" "allison, shit we are not going to make it". (The "it" the Gorilla was referring to was the bus that was living at 8 am that was going to take us to Pisa) 7:40: The Gorilla and I are half-way to the train station. 7:45: The Gorilla and I are at the bus station but we don't see anyone. 7:47: The Gorilla calls our friend Max to see if the bus had already left but he doesn't pick up. 7:48: We are the first people to arrive at the bus station for Pisa. If our apartment ever went into flames and we were told we had 10 minutes to get down stairs, we would be able to get fully dressed (in cute clothes, might I add), make up-uped, teeth brushed and even breakfast for the road and survive (granted the fire was on the other side of the apartment and it was a slow moving fire) . I decided that waking up for class an hour early is over rated when I can do it all in 10 minutes. Despite the fact the Gorilla cut her throat on piece of glass running there, and by that I mean, the air was so cold and we were so tired/slash getting sick, that it felt like she had cut her throat on a piece of glass. We got aboard the rumble-tumbler, and by that I mean, it was a short bus that had one wheel shorter than all the rest so it was rockin' and rollin', hence the name rumble-tumbler. Typical I narco narcoded all the way to Pisa. We get off the rumbler tumbler and arrive at the leaning tower of Disney Land, aka the leaning tower of Pisa. The tower was on the out skirts of the city because apparently back in the day they wanted to be "different" from all of their neighbors like Luccan's and Florentines and put their duomo and their baptistry on the outskirts to protect them from invaders. The tower was built to look out at the ocean and the land. Because the city is close to the water, and the land is unstable and they didn't build enough support to hold up the tower, thus the nice lean. Recently (and by recently I mean in the past 100 years..recently in European time can mean anything from 1 year to 100 years) engineers were able to devise a way to stabilize the tower aka. make its shoulder lean (let me see your shoulder lean). But they could of technically straightened that puppy out but that town makes nice money in the bank from all of the tourists. Obviously the Gorilla and I did what we do best and took the most ridiculous pictures in front of the tower. Look above for fun and games. After Pisa, the rumble tumbler quasi-took us to an olive oil farm/vinard located between Pisa and Lucca for another 5 course meal. I say quasi because we only got lost 4 times before we actually got there. Now I can not say for sure it 4 times, it might have been 5 because I was doing what I did best and um yeah I slept the whole way there. The olive oil farm was a small family owned farm, located on the most beautiful plot of land I have ever seen. The view was incredible. We took a small tour of the farm, but during the summer months families can rent part of the farm and live in a house with a full backyard, not to mention a private pool and free food. Apparently this season was not such a good one because some type of fly got into their olives and they were only able to make oil during the month of november for the entire year. Bread, followed by Risotto, followed by brushcetta, followed by beef and chicken, followed by grilled vegetables, followed by some more bread and concluding with 8 different flavors of pie to sample made up our lunch. The Gorilla and I met a pleasant group of girls this time around, and our entire table managed to finish everything they served us minus the freaky beef. After the last super-lunch, the tour continued on to Lucca. Unfortunately, because we got lost so many times going to the olive oil farm, we didn't have that much time to explore Lucca. BUT I finally found a pair of boots and they were only 24 euro. In honor of my mothers birthday, I bought myself some shoes. Happy Birthday Momma Jenny Isenberg! I got back from Lucca around 5, the Gorilla and I thought we should be normal American 20 year olds and go out. This is the part of the night where it just gets weird. Everyday something has to happen to the Gorilla and I that is either freaky or just plain old bizzare. This is that point in our day. We go to this bar called Astro or Aster or as the Gorilla calls it Asshole and we decided to go down in the basement to dance because I got my new dancin boots on and I needed to test them out. My freaky radar started ticking the minute I stepped down the stairs because of the nasty russian, hairy air pit mixed with piss and b.o. smell. The next sign of freakiness was that they had a fog machine. Finally the last clue of freakiness was the an extremely large population of young Italian boys (not men, but high school students) crowding the entire basement. Regardless all the freaky signs that my freak-o-meter of sending off, the Gorilla and I continued downstairs to dance. We start dancining with each other and then we start dancing with two other guys that seemed normal, but fun (normal, as in greecy hair, tight jeans, but not pelvic thursting and purring at you boys, thus making them normal) All of the sudden the boy that I was dancing with grabs my face, tells me that I am the most beautiful girl he has ever seen and then in no time at all her proceeded to LICK MY NECK. YES, LICK MY NECK. YUCK! I instantly wipe it off, give him the look of death and run away. I have a permanate non-visible scar bigger than Harry Potter's lighting bolt. After my freak-o-meter almost caught on fire, the Gorilla and I decided it was a good idea to head home and indeed it was.

New York has Harlem, Florence has Via Ponte alle Mosse

Fridays are wonderful and this friday was exceptionally wonderful.  Our roommates went to Venice for the weekend (yippie skippie doo) and the Gorilla and I had our Italian wonderland all to ourselves. After a rather long night, we slept in and by that I mean we woke at 5 am and stayed awake until 7 am while the devil did his damage at the gates of purgatory (aka my street) and then we went back to sleep and re-woke up at 12 pm.  I am not sure if you can technically count that as sleeping-in but we didn't get out of bed until then.  We made a delicious breakfast: our speciality, eggplant-spinach-tomato-omelet-in-a-pita delight and a big glass of black-as-death coffee (well, mine was more like black as death coffee with a side of milk, while the Gorilla's is straight black, she comes from the jungle and is thus able to drink death).  We decided to have breakfast on the roof because it was a beautiful morning. We met our neighbors, I think it was the same guy that saw the Gorilla's hoo hoo's the day before and we waved hello to the Duomo climbers. We decided to disinfect our house after the animals left, so as we used to do in the Isenberg household back in the day, we had a house cleaning party. I even mopped the floor and did a load of laundry.  Our weekend plans were up in the air (we knew we were going to go to Pisa and Lucca with our group on Saturday but today and Sunday, we were not so sure), but we were told to do all of the touristy things in Florence this weekend before the herds of tourists started coming.  Apparently in the next month the population of students/tourists in Florence is going to double.  The Gorilla and I decided that we were going to climb the Duomo and 460 steps later, and a little out of breath, we were standing on top of the world. Literally.  We could see the entire city, in the north we could see the snow on the tip top of the mountains and in the south the Arno was glistening.  I met my future husband on top of the Duomo but unfortunately he a. didn't know it b. he was studying in Rome and c. his friend had booger in his nose. After our Duomo workout, I finally went to the phone store to get a new phone because when shit happens, when water flows, when bags fill up with rain and phones swim in the streams, they stop working.  So, for those of you dying to call me...which I know you all are, my phone now officially works. The Gorilla and I were going to rent bikes and explore the city but by the time we got to the rental place, they only had one bike left.  I was willing to get a child seat adapter and pull the Gorilla around town like at a circus when the clown rides around with a monkey but they didn't give us that option, so we opted out of doing the whole bike thing completely.  By the time we made the executive decision not to play circus, it was already 5 pm. The rest of our day gets a little weird but it is a typical example of an adventure for me and the Gorilla. We decided to go to an apertivo because like all other nights, we didn't want to cook.  I geniously decided to google "best apertivo in Florence" and found a place that was supposed to be the best apertivo in the whole city.  I get the Gorilla all excited, we even get all dolled up. We started walking to this place called "Elliot Braun Bar", the Gorilla finds the street that it is located on on the map and we make our way there.  We assumed like all hoppin' places in Florence, that it would be relatively close but no it was not, not at all. I didn't even know that Florence had a ghetto, but I am a witness to it, and it does! We finally found the street that the bar was located on, only to walk for another 20 minutes, realizing at this point that we were no longer on the map. We finally get there and it was closed. We walked to the ghetto of Florence to eat at the cities (supposedly) best apertivo and it was CLOSED.  Come to think about it, it didn't even look like it had been open for over ten years. Probably because it was in the ghetto. The night only gets better.  We haul our hungry tummies back to our neck of the woods but obviously the adventure was not that easy.  We had to go to the bathroom really bad and peeing our pants was not an option.  We stop at one hotel because all of the coffee bars were closed but apparently the hotel manager tried to convince us that it was closed, even though we were standing inside the hotel. We walk another 2 minutes and go to another hotel. For the fear of being rejected again, I, in the heat of the moment, decided that it would be a good idea to throw out an accent when asking to use the restroom.  "Excuse me sir, my friend and I just missed our dinner reservation and we really need to use the restroom, do you mind?" was how I asked.  The Gorilla believed I sounded similar to a deaf Australian but it worked.  Either he pitied me for having such a bad accent or he was truly concerned that we had missed our dinner reservations and felt sorry for us (which doesn't really make sense why we needed to use his restroom, but like I said, it worked) On the way out, I made the Gorilla thank him. We finally found a pizza place somewhere between the ghetto and home because by then we were not too concerned with what we were going to eat for dinner (we wake up every morning saying that we are going to be "healthy" but that has yet to happen) We go to this restaurant, order pasta and pizza from a waiter who looks like he stuck his head in a vat of olive oil. Throughout our entire dinner, he kept stopping my to sing songs in my ear, give us free wine and make weird eye contact with both me and the Gorilla.  An hour later, and a little tipsy from the free drinks, we decided to leave.  Satisfied with both the meal and the price of the meal we headed home, leaving oil head a little tip.  We hadn't made it down the street before oil head comes running after us, calling for us.  At first I thought he wanted to get our attention and tell us something, then I realized he was holding something and I thought he wanted to give us back the tip we had left him.  I yelled back to him, "No, its for you". I repeated it several times but he still kept waving and calling for us.  Finally, I went back to see what he wanted and he was holding my ring that I had left on the table by accident (the Gorilla and I were romantically sitting together and she wanted to see a ring my mom had given me) When I met up with him, he gracefully put my ring back on finger and then he kissed my hand.  A little bit of oil dripped on to my hand in the process.  At this point in the evening, I was spent and the Gorilla and I came home and went to bed.  

The Devil Does Not Wear Prada and All Other Divine Comedies.

No. No. No. The Devil does not wear Prada but rather the Devil wears neon orange onesies with two white strip reflectors on his legs and sits in a bull dozer and has decided to demolish my street with his sledge hammer, pitch fork and all other loud machines that shake my building.  For a little bit, I thought the devil lived in my water heater but I figured out how to restart it if it god-for bid goes out again, so I know he doesn't live there anymore but he definately lives outside my window. In Florence they are always doing construction just like they are at U of M, but for some reason they believe that my beautiful street needs some work and they have decided to rip up the side walk on my street. I don't hate that they are doing this construction but what I do hate is that they only do the construction from 12 am to 3am in the morning and then again from 6 am to 8 am in the morning. Why? I don't know but what I do know, is if they don't stop I am a. never going to sleep again because apparently they won't be done until the end of February and b. I am going to kill them. I even tried sleeping with ear plugs in but the sounds eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee....zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.........AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH cannot be stopped by little orange pieces of foam.  Besides the fact that I woke up to a dream about Dante's Inferno ( because I have seen a million images of what hell looks like in the past couple of days) only to find out it was just Jack the Ripper and Mr. Hammerhead ripping apart my street aka the devil.  Besides that.... TODAY WAS THE BEST DAY THUS FAR. Life is good. I woke up for book making class, learned how to make photo transfers 4 different ways and then our class headed to see an exhibit on the illuminated scrolls. Talk about years of hard work. One monks' sole job for his entire life was to paint parts of the scroll red. I get attention deficit disorder just going to look at them, these dudes spent their lives doing the same thing. It was incredible to see the process.  My teacher is so knowledgeable and interesting to listen to (just the way she presents herself is fascinating and I might have to kidnap her and bring with me on all of my tours because the past few guides I have had have equaled = zzzz)  We got out of class early only to go eat at the worlds best sandwich shop...duh...Anna's.  The usual. Repeat after me. tomato, mozzarella and what...yes...you know it...Tuna on flat bread! The Gorilla and I introduced a few of our classmates to our second home.  Following lunch we strolled back home to kill some time before our next adventure of the day...TEA TASTING. We sat up on our delectable roof top, sun glistening in all and I wrote some e-mails, and the Gorilla painted. Zach and Cody...you think you live the sweet life...ya no...I do.  So about this whole afternoon adventure of TEA TASTING. Basically my program rockers my boxers off and has a million and a half free opportunities of fun.  This week is TEA TASTING. Did you hear that TEA TASTING (I for some reason feel the need to capitalize it because it is just so cool) There were supposed to be 6 other people for the tasting but only the Gorilla and I and our two (quasi-good) other roommates (the best of the 4) showed up and then our group leader dude (who happens to be very attractive but has an unfortunately small forehead, hopefully he will be blessed with a mans worst nightmare, a receding hairline because he could use a tiny bit more space up there) Anyhoo. The TEA TASTING was at this resturant called Mago Merlino something something (Magical Tea). We arrived there at 2:45 (granted I have class at 4:00) and are welcomed by a 65 year old hippie who owns the place and makes all of the teas.  The restaurant (which was actually a tea bar) had a main entry area and it was filled with stained glass Moroccan lanterns, indian rugs, incense in all four corners and an interesting display of color strings that were interwoven across the ceiling.  On one of the walls there was a map of the entire world with different arabian characters and illustrations on it. In the back part of the bar there was a lounge with large fluffy pillows surrounding the circumference of the room. No chairs. Just pillows. Apparently Mr. Mago Merlino is only open during the night from 10pm-3am and you can drink tea and smoke hookah, but upon special request you can come during the day (hence we went at 2:40pm) Mr. Mago (the hippie man..who now that I think about it would be great lover for my photo teacher if she was not an outright feminist lesbian) brewed us three different kinds of tea: chi, green, and then one that tasted like black licorice.  I have never in my entire life had such delicious tea. I think he put some type of drug in it because for the first time the Gorilla and I were actually enjoying our time with our roommates.  We told classic stories of ralphing, learned about Mrs. Rumplash's terrible decision to feed the class pet, a hamster, named Thunder, a piece of cheese because it died and the Gorilla shared a classic tale about her father killing his own cat out of love. We sipped tea and ate orange cakes, chocolate crispy yummy-ness-ness and ginger snaps. Mr. Mago was working up a storm to brew us these teas. He travels four times a year to different places like India and Africa to learn about different teas.  He was extremely interested in our perspective about the election and we got in a pretty deep convo with him about it.  He has the voice of a man who has been smoking for 50 years, a heart of a grandfather who loves his grandchildren and dresses in Indian gowns and wears slippers.  As I said earlier, we got there at 2:40 and we giggled and sipped our way through 3 hours of tea fun.  We missed 90% of our photo class but good thing, our photo class only has 6 people in it and three of us were at the tea tasting. We showed up to class 2 hours late and our teacher was so happy we went to the tea tasting, counted us present and thats the story.  I skipped my first day of class consciously, and I was rewarded with the mark of presence. My life is good. After my one hour of photog, I stopped by the il centro (grocery store) to pick up a box of spinach for dinner. (They sell pre-cooked spinach in a plastic box and it is wonderful...I was craving it!) Tonight the Gorilla and I and the bad "camera gamer" went to a bar called Rex to listen to our sweet innocent receptionist at the art school sing Janice Joplin.  Okay for one thing, never make judgements about your sweet little receptionist where ever you are because she probably has another ego, lives another life and is just sweet and innocent at the desk but the minute she leave she someone else. This is exactly how mine is.  We walked into the bar and screaming at the top of her lungs behind jail cell bars made out of rope, is our sweet little innocent receptionist belting her little heart out.  It was incredible.  Still in shock but in a good shock, I walk around the corner to find my Italian teacher with her hands in the air singing and dancing to the music with her fiance. This country is like fairy tale land and I love it.  Half the art school was there rockin out and I couldn't have been happier.  I love the students in my school much more than the kids on my program.  A old hip man, that might have been Richard Branson's brother, started talking to me aka hitting one me.  Apparently he and his wife just signed with Barney's and Nordstroms to sell a line of purses but he is also a producer and does something with music.  I overheard him talking to girls before me and all I could think of is a. what are you doing here in this bar b. where is your wife and c. you could be my dad.  Thank god the bar was slowly closing and we peaced out of there because I smelled a huge fat lier and I don't like talking to my dad at bars unless you are my real dad nor do I like lying old men trying to be cool when really they are hitting on girls half their age. We stayed there until 2 and then realized we were on the same street as Mr. Mago's tea place so we knocked on the door and went in for some tea.  Well I realized something really important, only go to the things that are free because they are free for a reason. IT WAS 8.50 PER PERSON for a pot of tea.  I love you Mr. Mago but 8.50, come on. But I did have sweat dreams. 

New Popes and other hopes.

all the girlies stand in the line for the bathroom. 

New Cape. New Face.

New Kicks. New Tricks.

oh wait and remember when...

Remember when you watched Rear Window 4 nights in a row and still haven't finished it.

Remember when you bought a pope candle from the euro store. 

Remember When..

Remember when I woke up and the heat was out again.

Remember when I walked by Aliza's computer and had a seizure because there was so much pink on it.

Remember when Emily sat outside our door talking to her boyfriend until three in the morning.

Remember you face planted.

Remember when you had a hair ball in your throat but it was really peanut butter.

Remember when the prime minister saw your tits.

Remember when you waved to him the next day on the roof.

Remember when you left your ring on the table and thought the waiter wanted to give you your change back.

Remember when you saw pigs sitting at a table.

Remember when you saw pigs sitting with a head dress.

Remember when you were walking through the meat market and saw you could have free samples of Volasorapter.

Remember how every time you walk through the straw market the same man tells you he likes your shoes and all you can do is look at him dumbfounded and say "really...is that what you like..did you even see my shoes today?"

Remember when your secretary at your school had another life and freakily danced and sang to Janice Joplin.

Remember when your dad approached you at the bar and proceeded to tell you he was basically Richard Branson.

Remember when you sang the lion king song out the window holding the orange you (the Gorilla) stole from the prime minister's house. 

Remember when the "barbie of america" came and you still don't know who they were talking about. 

Remember when you so were hungry and wanted to eat gelato but instead you opted for special-k.

Remember how you got the special-k...oh yeah..the il centro guy knows you because you come in every day that he convinced his manager to let you in after hours.

Remember when you got the special-k and decided that special-k with chocolate was better than regular special-k and then proceeded to eat the whole box.

Remember when you told the American girl you didn't speak english.

Remember when every time you walk down the street you pretend to don't speak english.

Remember when the kick back made you do a face plant.

Remember when you went tea tasting and the hippie tea man pulled your toe to wake you up.

Remember when Mrs. Rumplash fed Thunder, the hamster, a piece of cheese and he died.

Remember when your dad loved his cat so much that he killed it.

Remember when Nick had an unfortunately short forehead...excuse me have you seen me forehead?

Remember when you met Alex the Australian on the street and named him Ralph because he Ralphed all over the street.

Remember when you walked to the ghetto in Florence for food and you didn't even know there was a ghetto of florence...but there was.

Remember when you walked across town to eat 5 euro gelato.

Remember when your photo teacher yelled at the man walking on the street "excuse me"

Remember when your roommate told you that she was concerned that if she lost her weight she would loose her boob weight.

Remember when your roommates went out of town and you were so happy.

Remember when you pooped your pants. 

Remember when you drank white stuff and you wondered if it came from a human.

Remember when you got masks from the euro store and danced with the tambourine and took pictures.

Remember when Jack the Ripper, and his side kick Mr. Hammerhead sat out your window at 6 in the morning to rip apart your street.

Remember how everyday you go to Anna's to eat in order to avoid cooking. 

Remember how you ate so many gummies that you thought you were going to throw up.

Remember when you opened the bottle of wine and it rocket powered into the sky.

Just remembering is the best thing in the entire world. 

-enaj and fata 

Vorri Un Cono da 2 euro.

Every week for an hour I have what is called Italian lab. It is a required class where we are supposed to practice our Italian and learn about Italian culture.  There are only 4 kids in the class and my professor is the cutest little Italian fashionista.  In class today we learned how to order gelato and the names of the different flavors.  This class session was highly imperative to my success in learning the Italian language and was truly educational. How will I become Italian if I don't even know the most important words like how to order gelato? In order to get the full experience of ordering gelato, we obviously had to go out in the real world and practice, hence we went to a secret gelatoria that only Italians go to.  For those less experienced, there are two types of gelatorias, one for the tourists and one for the Italians.  You will have to come to visit me in Florence and I can show you the secret "real" gelatorias. As a test we all had to order gelato in Italian or else we could not get any. I obviously aced it...and I will have no problem taking on this test in weeks to come.  Apparently every week we go on a different field trip or watch Italian films.  I love this city. On a more serious note, my future husband, the beloved Heath Ledger passed away today and much grief was felt in the Via Dei Ginori this evening.  Like the shot heard around the world, a bomb hit our apartment and the Gorilla and I were truly devastated.  In order to give Heath a true moment of silence, it was necessary to escape our apartment because we knew that Heath would not appreciate a mourning service with the worlds most annoying people.  The Gorilla and I escaped to mourn for our loved one. We went to the Arno with a bottle of wine, a jar of peanut butter (it cost 5 euros for a small jar...that is 8 dollars American, but for Heath Ledger's memorial service we were willing to do anything) We sat there and ate the entire jar of peanut butter and reflected upon his finest moments. After, we decided we should go to our favorite hang out spot since we were so close. The Gorilla finally got new converse high-top tennis shoes, white euro style and they ended up being a little too cumbersome for her Gorilla feet. Aka I did a little black boot kick back, like a bikes kick stand, I kicked back and the Gorilla flew back aka a straight up face plant, it wasn't anything short of a face plant.  I am proud to say that I am the first person to make a mark on her brand new kicks, needless to say that the next day the Gorilla made a mark of her own and dropped a huge tomato on them...BUT I WAS THE FIRST! We then went to our favorite spot only to find that tonights entertainment was a poetry slam.  Granted it would have been wonderful if a. we understood Italian or b. if it were in English. Again the cultural barrier wall went up and we were out of luck.  A little wino-ed out we went home and went to bed. RIP Heath Ledger. 

if you take away the positive all that remains is the negative.

this one is a negative but i think it is positive.

mommy i procrastinated. and it felt good.

Book making gives me ants in my pants and all I want to do is sing Frank Sinatra at the top of my lungs ands make journals/books all day long.  I started to make my first 30 paged journal and I will hopefully finish it this week (and yes, a picture of this one will be coming soon!) As I mentioned earlier this week, I am truly sticking to a non-stressful, go with the flow lifestyle while I am here, so after my morning class I went around town with the Gorilla to start and finish our photo assignment that was due today.  Some people in our class started 5 days ago but my inner photog vibes were not radiating until 2 hours and 20 min before it was to be done.  I only admit this because never in my entire obsessive compulsive, high anxiety life have I EVER done a photo project 2 hours before it was due! and DAMN it felt gooood! The assignment was "symbolism" (zzzz snore) and there was no way in h-e-double hockey sticks that I was going to go around this city and take pictures of all the religious symbols or of the thousands of penises this city has to offer (it would take years) nor was I going to do what my other roommate did (no not the Gorilla..the one that is not good at the "camera game") and take pictures of graffiti (snore snore what a bore). So I defined my own form of artistic symbolism and decided that anything that had a frame around it (that being a picture frame) was symbolic.  At home we hang art work on the walls, put pictures of our family on our grand pianos, and proudly post our diplomas from college (as if they are worth much) in pretty shiny frames.  They are symbolic because they have value and they are of the utmost importance. (this is what happens when you go to art school where all they teach you is to pull down your pants, bend over and make a nice warm poop...basically thats what I just did with this project, expect I like how they turned out) I went around with a big wooden frame and either made the Gorilla hold it up in the air ( if a scenic view was interesting) or approach people on the street if I thought they were worthy of becoming the new face for high art.  Along my journey, I met the most beautiful old woman, probably 90 years old.  The Gorilla and I asked to take her picture and she invited us into her apartment.  She lived in a ritzy apartment with a large courtyard, with a rather large collection of nice cars (I am not sure if those belonged to her or not...but wooo!) Her name was Anmanula. She wanted to do all of these different poses and wanted to find the perfect spot where the sun hit beautifully on her face to insure the photo was going to be top notch.  She was just wonderful.  The Gorilla and I are going to go back over there after we develop our film to bring her a copy and bake something for her (and by bake I mean, possibly buy a nice treat. we haven't tried to make sweets yet...so we shall see) We just want to befriend her because she seemed a little lonely and was excited that we wanted to take her photograph. We made it to photography on time, with a divine roll of film in hand. Anna's for dinner..typical. 

the aura.

t e x t

he.had.this.aura.around.him.but.no.one.knew.why.he.had.it.or.where.he.got.it. he.didn't.even. know.where.he.got.it. the.only.person.who.knew.was.now.lying.in.his.grave.dead. 

i know. -->

new week. new niche.

A new week. I still love Florence but this week even more.  My art history class met at Santa Croce today and we got a tour of the church where Dante's and Michelangelo's memorial graves stand.  I was also able to see the original crocefisso by Cimabue.  I am not into the religious aspect of any of these works but their history from an artistic perspective is fascinating. I am just on a little Jesus overload right now but is still incredible (when you are used to 8 nights of Hanukah and barc ata adoni is all that you know, Jesus on every corner, in every city can become a little overwhelming for a challah back girl.) Each day I find myself adapting more and more to the culture here and I am really going to try to learn the language because that is the one thing I should of actually considered studying before coming here (stupid american!) All I want to do is walk into a cafe and have some man say "Come potrei aiutarla? (how may I help you)" not "Yes yes, hello hello, what you like?" (in a butchered english accent) and then I would be able to respond in Italian. I have only been here for 2 weeks and have only had 3 full days of Italian class, so I think I can do it before I leave (like the little engine that could...I think I can...I think I can) On to my day. In painting class, we painted our hands and I will take a picture of it next class so you can see my masterpiece. I love to paint and I forgot that I knew how to. After painting the Gorilla and I still had to pick up supplies for our book making class so by the time we were done with everything we opted out of cooking and went a cafe on our street called Anna's. We love the sandwiches there and the barista slash owner loves us. We wave hello to him everyday even if we don't stop in. Tuna, mozzarella and tomato on a warm flat bread is the perfect dinner. Tonight I think Mr. Barista had a little too much to drink because he was quite the jokester.  It didn't end up being a bad thing though because some how the exact same sandwich and a diet coke we bought last week was 3 euros less this time. 4 euro for a large sandwich and a diet coke might be a solution to never having to cook again! (I like, I like) Right now I am sitting at the magical coffee bar I discovered yesterday.  I am high on life. I am sipping a hot latte on the second level of the shop that over looks fabulous art that is sporadically placed on the walls and I am observing the worlds most interesting people. Surrounded by shelves of books, intelligent men with Johnny Depp glasses, facing the Gorilla as I write my blog and watching her make art with colored pencils (an artists most prized tool) Wowza..what more could you want. I may never return to the other side of the Arno. (aka to my apartment) Right now a band is setting up to play a little diddly.  I am over looking a huge cello, a bar piano and four scruffy men preparing to play me some jazz. I used to want to live on top of Lake Louise in Canada and bake the worlds most delicious pie but now I am thinking I might want to own a bookstore-coffee shop-non-smoking bar on the other side of the Arno that invites local artists to display their work and bands to bring the towns spirits alive at night. I just can't decide. 

Oh and I am starting a journal (book) company with the Gorilla. It will be called Eanj + Fata. If you want a handmade, one of a kind journal please e-mail me at aji@umich.edu. Forget moleskin journals, Eanj + Fata is the new way to draw, write, think and be happy. 

Ciao!

P.S. (p.s.ihateyou should becoming soon. so excited. woot woot)

ginori road.

capturing tid bits and nips from bologna

sunday is a good day to do nothing when you have nothing.

We were going to go to Pisa and Lucca today and/or Cinque Terra with Paul, Chris, Chatty, Kathy and crew but again we woke up with no heat, no hot water and thus no energy to really move at all.  Instead, I made oatmeal and got right back into bed and organized my life. We all know that any organization in my life does not really exist, so what I really did was write emails, make a few designs for the Duds and some Addison Station fun. The Gorilla (I can't take any credit for this) found us a flight to Malaga, Spain for our Spring Break.  Anyone who wants to come, we have two bedrooms, just let me know! I finally got out of my warm bed, the only semi warm part of my apartment, at 1:00.  I was too cold to go to the store for grocery so I stirred  together a concoction for lunch and by concoction I truly mean a concoction (like a witches brew you make when you are five) Some canned tuna, a few garbanzo beans from a can, a scoop of white beans also from a can, topped off with tomato paste and caramelized peanuts on the side for dessert. Now don't you wish you were all here to join me for this fine Italian meal. A little nauseated after lunch, I climbed right back into bed to warm up.  It wasn't until 4:30 when the Gorilla and I thought it might be a good idea to start our photography project that should be half way done by Tuesday. I am no longer on the Allison-gets grey hair-stress ball schedule...so if I want to get out of bed at 4:30, so be it. Sundays are both the best and the worst days to wander the streets of Florence.  It is good because if you are like me and have an extreme staring problem and find yourself admiring the simple pleasures of life like people french kissing on the Ponte Vecchio or little kids in fur coats, then Sundays are a perfect opportunity to stare away with no shame at all because there are thousands of people out and about and they don't know that you are watching them. If you hate having to wait in line to walk down the street, then maybe Sundays should be indoor painting days for you.  But you can avoid the Disneyland line by being a little risky. Forget about the sidewalks and play a game of 007, hands up against the side of cars, its a simple game of dodge and pause.  We happen to stumble upon a gelatoria on our Sunday stroll and by stumble I mean we saw one at every corner and convinced ourselves that we had been walking long enough that we needed gelato.  1st stop: a Gelatoria filled with Italians; we knew this one was the real deal because across the street all of the Americans lined up for "ice cream". Anyhoo we finally got in line and realized that they cheapest gelato was 4 euro and that was far too expensive compared to the mouth watering gelato we had had in Siena the other day for only 2 euro.  With so many other options, we knew we could find a better place for a better price.  We skip out of line and head back by hour apartment because our freaky roommates were raving about a gelatoria that is only open on the weekends. We hauled our gelato craving butts across town. Keep in mind that this walk was solely guided by the burning desire to eat gelato, even though we had convinced ourselves that we were going back towards home so we could cut across the city and go to the park to exercise.  We finally made it there and ordered a half mint (mento) and half coffee (cafe) gelato on a sugar cone but only to find out after we ordered and after we tasted the gooey deliciousness, that it was 5 euro. 5 EURO! We weren't even planning on eating gelato today and when we decided to get some there was no way we were going to spend 4 euro and we wound up spending 5.  It only took me 1 minute to realize that those were the best 5 euro I have spent thus far and as I have learned in Italy, you get what you pay for and that gelato was worth every last euro cent. Our plans only continued to go through the roof from there on out. We walked to the park like we had planned after we scarfed our gelato down but by the time we got there it was pretty dark and I read somewhere that you are not supposed to walk in parks at night (actually I just used my brain and figured it wasn't a good idea). Instead we walked along the Arno and actually discovered a hidden coffee shop treasure. It is a two story coffee shop that is also a book store and on certain nights it entertains its visitors with a wide array of live bands. We are going to go there tomorrow night after class to read, write and do art, so I will let you know how it goes.  We finally got home around 7:30 and desperately needed a shower but Apollo (the god of sun, who is supposed to bring heat to the earth) had not shown up at our apartment yet so I buzzed Paul to see if we could shower at his place. You don't realize what a five minute shower can do...it changed my life, my looks and my smells in just five minutes (five minutes because that is how long Paul's shower stays warm) The Gorilla and I lucked out tonight because the twins invited us over for dinner.  All day I was a little worried as to what the Gorilla and I were going to do for dinner after our lunch concoction. Thankfully we did not have to cook. We had risotto, chicken, and broccoli with a side of wine and bread settled so beautifully in my tummy tum. I thought the night was going to end peacefully. Gelato had played so pleasantly with my walk and the warm shower followed by risotto made me so happy.  On the way home from dinner I envisioned that my landlord would be back from his weekend excursion with his family and he would have already fixed the heater an hour ago so I would be able to feel a little heat, and I would even be able to take a bubble bath if I wanted to and then I would be able to get my laundry. (Oh I forgot to mention that the washers are different from those back home and they don't allow you to open the door at all what so ever after you press the start button...so if you forget to add that one sock in the load...tough luck.  Well in my case it wasn't a missed sock, rather it was yet again another heat related issue.  Because the washer needs heat to finish its final cycle, the laundry can never finish until it gets its dose of hot h20 and since there is none of that stuff around here, I can't open the door until it does.  I didn't think about this when I put all of my underwear in one load, hoping for it to dry by Tuesday because supply is running low and demand is high...(hot water is a necessity) Where was I...oh yeah, so back to my envision...(yeah no matter how hard you think about something...it might not always come true) So I come home to find no hot water, no heat, no finished laundry and to top it off no internet.  God must be mad at me but I am not really mad about all of this "outage" nonsense because I was able to shower today, someone else cooked and cleaned my dinner for me and not to mention I am in the best city in the world.  I am the happiest 20 year old in the entire world. Early bed time tonight because tomorrow begins another week of school. Bed time story tonight: the beginning part of Rear Window because that is as far as I got yesterday before my eyes started to rest. Buonanotte! 

no baloney in bologna.

I woke up at 7:00 to find that not only was my hot water still out, but I geniously put two and two together and realized that the reason I started shivering last night and had to hide under my covers breathing in and out to warm myself is because the water system is connected to the heat and when the hot water is out, that also means the heating in the apartment is out.  Even if they are not connected in real life, they are connected in my apartment. I met up with my group at the train station at 8:00 and the train left at 8:22. Again with my narco tendencies, I fell asleep from the moment the doors closed to the moment they opened in Bologna. Bologna is a much more industrial looking city than Siena and thankfully not as touristy as Florence. Today was unfortunately cold (granted that I slept in a freezer last night and was never able to warm up throughout the whole entire day) and my four layers of shirts were just not enough. Our group (even though there were only 20 of us there were supposed to be 40 - the other 20 just didn't show up) split up into two groups and the Gorilla and I were luckily able to escape our roommates (for more detailed information including personal documentaries and photographs from two first- hand witnessess please look forward to a new blog written by two anonymous writers called p.s.ihateyou.blogspot.com...coming soon!) We went to two cathedrals. One had two sculptures done by Michelangelo in pre-David days. The cathedrals were so cold inside that I think I lost a lot of my brain cells to remember all of the historical details but I wrote them down in my other journal so I will revise this post later.  For lunch we went to a beyond delicious buffet style restaurant. Bologna is known for its food and the concept of American bologna comes from a version made in Bologna...imagine that! (bologna: the nasty, processed, pink stuff, non-jewish mothers give their children for lunch). Pasta Bolognese and tortellini also grew up in this small University city.  Bologna houses the 5th largest Cathedral in all of Europe  (behind Florence) and it is just a spectacular city.  Back to lunch...I don't think a lot of people on our program like the Gorilla and me too much because we are always doing freaky things like taking pictures and drawing, so at lunch no one sat by us but the tour guide asked if she could sit with us instead.  Ends up, she went to Shawnee Mission East, had Mr. Royer (the same pre-calc teacher I had) and went to the same middle school (Indian Hills) and elementary school (Prairie, pre-fire days) as the Gorilla.  She now lives in Florence and is married to an Italian. When we first asked her where she lived she mumbled Kansas City but then the Gorilla and I replied "US TOO"...she was in shock...she could not believe it. It is a small world after all. After lunch we were given free time to explore the city but the Gorilla and I were rather cold so went window shopping. Everything is on sale or "saldi" in Italy right now because they are only legally able to have sales two times a year. However that really didn't help me out much when the dollar is pretty much worth nada. After window shopping, we sat in a cute chocolate cafe and sipped lattes (with smiley faces on top of them...see picture above) and drew pictures of things around us.  On the way back to the train station we discovered a straw market. They were selling shoes for 3 euro and I almost bought an extra large Winnie the Pooh child's nightie because it gets so cold in the night but I realized that the texture was similar to a sleeping bag I once had that used to catch on my toenails and I decided that gagging while you try to sleep is not the solution to the cold.  The train was leaving at 4 so we didn't have too much time to shop around. The Gorilla and I tried with all of our mights to avoid sitting by our roommates on the train but some how (how, I am not so sure) two of them ended up sitting facing us.  Luckily the Gorilla and I were in a giggly mood or else I might have literally died on the train. One of our roommates (the one who yells at the top of her lungs "What Up B*tches" every time she enters our apartment) decided that it would be fun to play the "camera game". For those of you not familiar with the "camera game" (I was not either...so don't be ashamed), my roommate sets her camera on self timer for either 2 sec or 10 sec (you can decide) and then she allows you that time to strike a pose or do something crazy. Then you look at the picture and laugh...ta..da...that's how you play the "camera game".  Clearly the Gorilla and I dominated the "camera game" (I was technically the winner because I am the worlds most unphotogenic person) One of our roommates is functionally challenged.  She can't seem to do much but stare and then make sassy comments.  When it was her turn to play, she just sat there, no movement at all what so ever! The inventor (the "what up" girl aka the inventor) kept giving her more chances to win...but five rounds later, she still proceeded to sit there.  Finally in a rather loud voice the inventor goes "PRETEND YOU ARE SUCKING A D*CK" ( I am sorry for the x-ratedness of this story but if I almost pee my pants, a story must be told, no lies, no cover ups) As a matter of fact, it did get her to slightly raise her arms but she still lost. After the game I was pretty tired, so I slept the rest of the way home. I decided to stay in tonight and make pretty pictures and watch Rear Window. Still no heat or hot water. Stinky and cold.