One word: OBAMA!

Although I could not be in the States to celebrate the great day of our country, we had a rendezvous with a lot of us and watched the inauguration together! It was amazing, I was definitely in tears. We came to the mini-residence where 4 people from our program live...this is where we always come to use the internet and hang out with each other. It was great because there is a TV here and we had CNN going and champagne bottles popping! It was nice to be around people who were equally excited about the change and about Obama!! Elena *our amazing program director* came over for a little bit to watch and be with us. We were talking with her and she said of course the Italians are very happy about him taking office. A few of the girls made some t-shirts on Monday night and wore them all day yesterday to classes and around town! A few of the quotes;

"Obama e` il mio ragazzo" .... Obama is my boyfriend.
"Ti amo Obamo" ... I love you, Obama. (slight change for the rhyme)
"Oggi....ho visto la storia" ... Today, I saw history.

Today, I woke up at 6:45am as usual and got ready and headed to the university with the girls. This month our classes are at the newly refinished Universita per Straniere di Siena located near the bus and train station. We walk there everyday and it takes an average of 20-25 minutes. I had class from 8:30am-1:30pm. My class has maybe 30 people in it and the teacher, Maurizio, is a good guy, very funny. There are a lot of people from Saudia Arabia in my class, along with a lot of people from Chile. Then there are some from Lebanon, Norway, etc. I have learned so much about other cultures just from sitting in class, which I really like. Sometimes it is frusterating because Arabic and Spanish are spoken so frequently and it messes some of us up and I wish everyone would make more of an effort to stick with simply Italian. Besides that it's good and I am glad that I did switch levels because now I do not stress going to bed at night and enjoy going to class. Today I gave a pretty brief oral presentation and spoke about visiting Anna Lisa and her family this weekend.

The day started off pretty dreary with some drizzling rain but by the time we were out of class it was clearing up. We have been pretty lucky with the weather, it has not rained too much and the temperature always seems to be around 40 or above which is SUCH a treat compared to New England. Sorry for you guys burried in the snow over there, I wish I could give you some of my nice weather.

So, on Friday I went and visited Anna Lisa for the weekend! After school I met her friend's son Pietro at the bus station. He commutes from Cavriglia everyday and helped me buy a ticket and get on the right buses, thank god! It took about an hour to get there and Anna Lisa was waiting for me at the bus stop....it was great to see her again, she looks great. The bus stop was close to her house so we walked there and I saw Lucio and looked around the new house! She moved since the last time I have been in Italy and they are having work done on the house still. She felt bad it was a little in disoray but I did not mind one bit, it is going to be beautiful, I really like the house. We ate some delicious cheese with honey and I tried my best to speak in Italian and Anna Lisa was practicing her english a bit. Then we went to pick up the boys from school! We got Matteo, 4 years old now, and then Francesco, 10 years old. They are adorable! Pretty shy at first but completely understandable of course. Later Francesco went to basketball practice and Matteo went over a friends house for a bit. Later we had a nice dinner together and I was ready for bed pretty much right after! The next day Anna Lisa had to work so I woke up and hung out with the boys for a bit then went out with Lucio. We took a nice drive and stopped by his work so i could check it out and he could grab a few things. He works in a very nice nursing home and it was very cool to see. I wish the nursing home I used to work in was half as amazing as this one. After that we took a drive to Anna Lisa's hospital where she was working. We walked around a bit and a secretary to Anna Lisa took us to a room and gave us delicious pastries and blood orange juice and panini! Then Anna Lisa was done and we stayed at her office for a bit and then headed home. It was strange to be driving in a car for the weekend, I am so used to buses now! Later Anna Lisa, Matteo, and I took a drive and went to a small town pretty close by. We went for a walk and checked out a small little art gallery there and got Matteo some pizza from the shop he remembered visiting the last time he was there. I got some pretty pictures but it was pretty late so we did not stay that long. We then went to San Giovanni, the town next to Cavriglia, and spent a good 20 minutes racing around the streets trying to find a parking spot! The Italians are crazy but we finally found one and got out. We went to a piazza in the center of town where there was a wicked colorful merry go round with kids everywhere and a group of boys doing boy scouts. There was also a church at that Piazza that we went in and looked around in, very cool. After that we headed to the grocery store then went home and started to make dinner. We all ate together and it was wonderful. Besides the delicious rissoto and meat we had I ate delicious oranged from Sicily! I think they helped ward off my sickness- I felt bad I was a little out of character the weekend because I had been fighting off a fever and cough for a few days. I hardly had an audible voice but being in a house with 2 doctors was convinient! Anna Lisa is so sweet and wrote me a prescription before I left for anti-biotics in case I needed them. We watched an italian show called THE X Factor....essentially an american idol-esuqe show, which was cool. Sunday morning we woke up and ate a pancake breakfast then headed to church. It was definitely an experience for me. I sat by myself because we were late and could not all sit together, so I more or less just followed what everyone else was doing and admired how pretty the songs were that everyone was singing. I donated some euro when they brough the basket around and wished everyone Pace. The church had a nice tower and the inside art work was very pretty. It was nice to go to a small town church. After la messa we went to Rosalba's house, a family friend, for lunch. It was deeeeelish!! Her mother cooked and she was a complete sweet heart to me. We had antipasto, lasagne con carne, le patate e pollo arrosto, insalata, frutta, e tiramisu! Talk about being well fed. We hung out for a while and then Anna Lisa, Lucio, Matteo, and Francesco drove me back to Siena. They gave me a tiny tv/radio for the room which is amazing and we have already been putting it to use. They were so sweet and generous and it will be nice to go back and I hope to be able to speak more Italian!

This weekend we are taking a group trip to Rome!! I am so excited about it. We leave on Saturday morning, stay over, and come back to Siena late on Sunday night. We got our itinerary from Elena and we will be taking group trips to see Campidoglio, Colosseo, Foro Romano, Fontana di Trevi, Piazza di Spagna, Cattedrale di San Pietro, Musei Vaticani e Cappella Sistina. I am going to be a very diligent picture taker! Faro` molte fote!

I've been having a really nice time though. My skype name is JuliaDomenicaDillon and I would love to talk to you guys on there. It is hard to believe it is almost the end of January, yet it does feel like I have been living here for months already! One day this week or next week I am going to climb the tower in the Piazza del Campo which will be amazing. A few of the girls already did and the view is breath taking, it is exactly what you see on the postcards. Then I am going to finally visit the Duomo here, which is breath taking.

This is officially a complete novel so I am going to end it here but I will def. keep posting and try to get some pictures up onhere, I am still figuring out how it works.

Vi voglio tanto bene!! Tutto il mio amore.