Charlotte Skyline

Charlotte Skyline

Monday, July 28, 2008

Musical Explosions

This past weekend was our last in Sorrento and we spent it enjoying the musical culture of the area. Thursday evening, we took a chartered bus to the town of Ravello, about an hour long (nauseating) ride along the windy coast of Amalfi, to watch a concert that was part of Ravello Festival 2008. Apparently, every summer, Ravello hosts a series of concerts and other artsy stuff. The concert was conducted by Jeffrey Tate and featured the Orchestra del Massimo Napoletano from the San Carlo Theatre in Naples (the longest fully running theatre ever) along with an opera singer during the second movement of the second act. The stage was set to a backdrop of the ocean and coast of Amalfi, definitely classy. The music was enjoyable and the opera set heartfelt. I guess I can like opera, but only in moderation.

Saturday Night was a Tarantella show down in the fishing village of Marina Grande. Tarantella is the traditional folk dance and song show of the region and is accompanied by a festival-type atmosphere. There were lots of candy selling stands, a moon bounce, bungee thing, and other craziness. We had dinner in the village, even though it´s known for being a bit pricey, but we were determined to have fish and chips. We found a nice restaurant with no cover fee and had a nice dinner, but when we paid the bill, they didn´t give us back the right change.. we tried to tell them but the language barrier made it difficult, in the end, after much confusion, we ended up only paying 9 euro total.. because we quickly walked away when they gave us more change.

Sunday.. we didn´t do anything except read and sleep.

Sorry I´m so delayed in blogging, but I´ve been distracted by the end of the program (i.e. papers and exams and stuff) and a trip to Rome left me with no computer for a while.
I´m now in Barcelona and will update the Rome trip in a bit.
CIAO

Monday, July 21, 2008

Erupting Volcanoes under the Capri Sun

Salve mi amici,
This past long weekend was spent with the entire class and professor. We went to the ruins of Pompei, the island of Capri, the ruins of Ercolano, and the city of Napoli.

Pompei: Disaster waiting to happen.
It is said that Mt. Vesuvius experiences a great eruption every 2000 years. The last huge eruption occurred in 79A.D. and wiped out the entire city of Pompeii (English spelling) with falling debris and ash. It's now 2008, so this next eruption can happen anytime, or so the professor told us right before entering the city. Comforting really. We had been to the Pompeii exhibit in San Diego and the one in Naples, now we were finally going to the actual scene of crime. The place was massive, incredible even, much more so than I had ever imagined. An entire city covered with ash and poisonous gases, killing all who stayed, burying them almost perfectly. We were lucky to have a Napoli native and anthropolgist show us around the site, giving us additional insight into the historical area. The forum, gymnasium, many villas and shops, etc. had all been excavated and preserved. I walked down the streets and through houses and imagined how daily life could have been for these ancient people. Casts of the final resting place for many Pompei-ians were found all over the grounds, in varying positions, most being in huddled fetal positions, no doubt trying to shield themselves from the fatal gases and debris coming from all sides. The most tragic cast I saw was one of a mother shielding her child in her arms. We had a long, full day at the ruins and were rather exhausted when we came back. Pompei is definitely a site one must visit if ever in the area, hopefully before the next great eruption of Vesuvius.

Capri Sun.
Okay, not really, the island was shrouded with clouds when we arrived in the morning, which wasn't a bad thing as it controlled the temperature for us. We hopped on a morning ferry and docked in the port of Capri after the half hour ride. We took a lift-type thing and were greeted by our professor's gregarious friend Maurizio. Maurizio has a house on the island and is very familiar with the trails that connect Capri to Anacapri and was willing to be our personal tour guide for the day. Now, the island of Capri is known to be a vacation getaway for the rich and famous from all over the world, not a field trip destination for a group of poor college students. However, with Maurizio's help, we got to see the island's true beauty, off the beaten path. We were treated to an expansive hike through the villas in the hills and to the top of the mountain between Capri and Anacapri. Amazing views all around, one can definitely see why the rich come here to get away from it all. To clarify, Capri is the tourist side of the island and Anacapri is the side where the locals live. We had lunch/dinner at a small trattoria (kitchen/restaurant) and were happily surprised when the professor decided to use our funds to pay for it. I had a wheat crouton and olive salad, which was a refreshing change from all the nutella sandwiches I've been having. After our meal, Maurizio decided to show us one last place before we had to head back to Sorrento. He led us up a path, through a filosofica garden and to the edge of the world. Or that's what it looked like anyway. This place was a small look out on top of sheer cliffs that looked directly out to the ocean. An ocean sight that was untouched by any landmasses, thus making it look like the end of the world. I will indeed post pictures when I can, but they won't be able to capture the full immensity of this place.
Ercolano: A Forgotten City.
Saturday morning began with an early train to the city of Herculaneum (Ercolano in Italian). This town was dirty and smelt of garbage and was supposedly not the best place to be at night, at least that's what our landlord's son told us. Why, then, did we want to visit this area? The volcanic eruption of 79A.D. that preserved Pompeii under layers of ash had covered Ercolano with molten lava. This place was thought to be lost until the 1700s when some kings decided to excavate the area. It was because of the cover of volcanic debris and extreme heat that the city was preserved so well, however, once excavated and exposed to air, the ruins have begun to deteriorate. So, the current focus for officials here is to preserve what they have already found. It was amazing to see how well these buildings and artifacts were preserved knowing that they were once covered with lava. They even found skeletal remains of about 55 people around the shore area, clustered there in an attempt to flee by boat. Ercolano was a smaller and wealthier town in comparison to the trading port town of Pompei, the main physical difference being the presence of a sewage system. But enough history, the place was immense, but not as much as Pompeii because it's still not all excavated. We stayed until the early afternoon, hopped back on the Circumvesuviana, and headed toward Napoli.
Napoli: My Chinese food Mecca.
Our small group of nine had been talking about food for three straight days. We were tired of bread, nutella, pasta, tomato sauce, sandwiches, and whatever crap we throw together in a sad attempt to make a balanced diet. A few of us had been craving Indian food, but upon walking down Corso Umberto (the main street in Napoli) we were disappointed to find no Indian food, we were about to give up and settle for another friggin pizza, but Eureka! I spotted a Chinese ristorante. Chang cheng jiu lou (translation: Great Wall Restaurant), I knew there was Chinese food in Naples, I just had to find it. Though it was not Indian food, I think we were just yearning for ethnic food. This place was better than the first Chinese restaurant we went to a few weeks back. The setting was nicer, cleaner plates and utensils, Chinese pop music playing quietly in the background.. Awesome. I shared some curry chicken and shrimp with bamboo shoots with Khadjia. We were greatly satisfied. I even had a sweet mantou for "dessert". I'm not too sure what was in it, but it was delicious. We visited the Castel Nuovo after, which we had skipped on the first time we were in Naples because of the 5 Euro entrance fee, but now we had our Artecards, which give us free entrance to most museums and monuments in the Campania area. We wandered around the 13th century fortress for lack of anything else to do, we were really just waiting for our boat back to Sorrent. We were tired from the full day of ruin walking. After awhile, we just sat down in the courtyard area to chill for a bit. Not long after sitting down, an Italian lady came up to me and asked if I was Japanese, before I could answer, she asked if I ate cats. I really hoped I was hearing wrong because it was all in Italian, but she gestured while saying "mangiare" which means eat and "gatti" the plural form of cat, and proceeded to bite the air in front of my face. All I could do was shake my head no, and before I could wrap my head around the situation, she walked off. I guess she really thought the Japanese ate cats, although she had a crazy look in her eyes...
That's how my third weekend on this program went, we don't have much planned for this next weekend, just a trip to Ravello for a music festival and maybe we'll splurge for a seafood dinner.

Pictures now, enjoy!

Weak jumping picture in a forum in Pompei.

Perfect statue.

Class photo in Pompei with Mt. Vesuvius in the back.


Eating in Capri, we could only afford thin breadsticks.
At the end of the world in Capri w/Maurizio in the background.

Chilling in a male bath in Ercolano


Jumping picture with the professor in Ercolano.


The entire Sorrento crew at our sweet apartment.

Monday, July 14, 2008

Bread and Nutella: Trial and Errors in the North

This past weekend consisted of our trip to Northern Italy. We took a night train to Venice Wednesday night to Thursday morning, spent the night at a budget hotel in Venice, Friday afternoon we took a train to Florence, spent two nights in Florence and took a train to Pisa Sunday morning. From Pisa we took a train to Rome, from Rome we took a train to Naples, and from Naples took the Circumvesuviana back to Sorrento, all on Sunday.
Let's start with the train ride to Venice.
The first half of the ride went rather smoothly, our ticket specified the wrong car number so we just assumed our seats were in the next car over, because they were in numerical order, then, at around 2:30am, a group of Italian guys start banging on our door (we were in one of those enclosed seating areas with six seats) saying that we are in their seats. We show them our ticket, but realize they have the same seats, they start harrassing us while we try to get the conductor (who NEVER came). The harrassing consisted of a constant bang on the windows, pointing and laughing at every little thing we did, and just overall rudeness. This continued on for the good part of 2 hours, after which they disappeared somewhere, never to be seen again. I hope. We arrived in Venice at approximately 5:30am, sleep deprived and hungry. The city was asleep and gorgeous. The view that greeted us as we stepped out from the train station was like a picture on a postcard. Bridges spanning over the Grand Canal and boats floating around. There were backpackers asleep on the steps, but that was cool, just gave me ideas on how to save money next. We sat on some steps and ate bread with Nutella before walking through a maze of alleyways to reach San Marcos Square. We got to see the quiet side of Venice. The Venice sans crowds of bumbling tourists and pushy souvenir hawkers was refreshing to say the least. St. Mark's Cathedral was beautiful with all the gold leaf and other religious art and the Guggenheim Art Collection was just cool. I got to be all artsy staring at Picasso's, Dali's, Pollock's, Kadinsky's, Brancusi's, and one Modigliani painting. Within the 24 hours we were there, I felt like we saw a good portion of Venice, enjoyed the atmosphere, RODE A GONDOLA, and had good sandwiches. A definite must see for those thinking about going to Italy. We wanted to explore the night life, but there was none! Everything closed at about 7:30pm, so we caught up on our lost sleep. The next day we shopped around a bit and got to the train station early. We people watched a bit while eating our pizzas and hopped on the train.
Train ride from hell to Florence.
Okay, maybe it wasn't that bad, but our train experienced engine failure and stopped in the middle of a tunnel for about an hour before dropping us off in the middle of nowhere (Grizzana??). We got on a train to Prato and changed trains to Florence from there, this whole train business took us most of our day and left us only time to watch all the shops close as we got into the city. We took a few buses (our train stop was not in the center of town) to our campsite and the bus dropped us off in Piazza Michelangelo. This piazza greeted us with a huge statue of Michelangelo's David and an incredible view of the entire city of Firenze. This campsite we stayed at, really was a campsite, we stayed in tents with beds, next to families camping out in for real tents and RVs. There were young people getting drunk in there bar/food area, so it was a lively atmosphere. We met this guy from New Zealand, who tried to get us to go out to the bars around there, but we decided we would just go the next night, as we were really tired by then. We got up later than I planned the next morning and set off for the center of town. First on our unplanned itinerary was the Uffizi Gallery. We had to wait about 2 hours to get into this art gallery, but it was worth the wait. I got to see Botticelli's Primavera and Birth of Venus in person! Both those paintings were huge, much bigger than I had imagined them to be. I saw a lot more Botticelli, lots of Carravaggios, some Da Vinci's, some Michelangelo's... basically every Renaissance artist you've learned about at some point in school. That took up most of the day and we left the gallery only to discover how incredibly hot the sun had become. We quickly made the decision to visit the Duomo, supposedly the most perfect Dome, ever. Before arriving at the Duomo, we stopped for some lunch at a kebab place, BEST food I've had since coming to Italy, really (I'm sick of bread, mozzarella, prosciutto, pasta, tomato sauce..) Anyhow, with stomachs full, we headed toward the Duomo. When we got there, we were sad to see that it had closed, but decided to go around to get some pictures. As we rounded the corner, we saw one of the guards signalling to some people to quickly come in. He let us into the cathedral! and we got to climb 463 stairs to the top of this thing. I only remembered my fear of heights when we stepped outside onto the terrace on the roof of the Duomo. Climbing up the stairs was no small feat and images of monks running up and down during the 14th century flashed in my mind's eye.. weird. We were treated to a magnificent 360 degree view of Florence and stayed until they kicked us out. It was peaceful up on the dome and I would go back if given a second chance. We shopped around a bit after that and walked around, passing many more chieses (churches), and the building containing the actual David statue. I didn't feel like shelling out 10 euro to see the thing, so I didn't. I used my haggling skills and bought a belt, as my pants were in danger of falling off (lack of dryer has stretched out my clothes).. I didn't buy too much more here and was pretty good about not buying random crap. yay. We discovered the 99 euro cent stores and bought some beer to drink back at the campsite and headed back after walking around for what felt like forever. We played King's cup back at the campsite and headed to bed early, in preparation for our 4am wake up call..
A hurried Sunday.
I awoke to find that it was already 5:30am and we were in danger of missing our train. We all grabbed our possessions and ran out the door without brushing our teeth or washing our faces. Took a long hike/run (just for me though) to a bus stop that took us to the central train station. Ended up that our train was late and we made the train, but it didn't leave so we had to take another train from Florence to Pisa. In my haste, I forgot to validate my ticket (get a time stamp on it or something) and after much arguing with the train man, got fined 40 euro (80 USD!!!!). I totally got gypped, as the people before me only got fined 10 euro (which I only found out later, thanks for the heads up [SARCASM]) and I was told by our prof's wife that people can also just write the date on the ticket. damn you Italy, you got me this time! I was really frusturated for the first half of the day, but reasoned that it was just a really expensive lesson in watching out for yourself first, because no one else will. Anyhow, after that little incident, we went to see the leaning tower of Pisa, a.k.a. the bell tower of Cathedral. This mistake in architectural engineering leans because someone forgot to take into consideration the looseness of the soil they built the tower on. In fact, most of the monuments in Pisa have a slight tilt because of this soil impediment, but they won't admit their shoddy planning.. Anyway, we took the picture that EVERYONE takes at the leaning tower and were finished with the place in under an hour. Really, the only thing to see there is all in one place. I bought some souvenirs and we headed toward the train station. We caught an earlier train back to Rome, during which I fell in and out of consciousness. We arrived in Rome and I took one step outside of the train station just so I could say I've been in Rome.. I bought some bread at the supermercato there and utilized my Nutella, again. Got on the train to Naples, got off, got on the train to Sorrento, and arrived back to our small town of Sorrento. The town of Sorrento has some new lighting additions, which makes me feel as if I'm in some sort of movie or something..
Anyhow, recap: Loved Venice, loved Florence, amused with Pisa, angry at Italian trains.
More about prices later...
Next: Pompeii, Capri, Ercolano, and Naples (again)

Monday, July 7, 2008

Weekend Wanderings

Ciao mi amici!
My first full conversation with a non-shady person living in Italy took place yesterday in Naples with the waitress at a Chinese pizzeria, in Chinese and Italian. It was quite an experience. Sundays, as we know, are holy days, and especially so in Italy because EVERYTHING was closed, including food places, except McDonalds and the Museo Archeologico Nazionale food cart (Yes, I went to that museum again). The only thing I could afford at McDonalds was the 1 euro McToast, which is just 2 pieces of very flat toast with a slice of ham and cheese in the middle. At this point, we were all starving, but because I had been without food so long, this flat McToast was able to fill my SHRUNKEN stomach organ. We then ventured up large hill to the Capodimonte Museum, old palace of the Bourbons, where we wandered for a few hours. After much art musing, we were, again, very hungry. We had all been craving non-Italian food all day (not to say Italian food isn't good, but bread and pasta everyday gets old, really fast) and were overly ecstatic to see that a Chinese Pizzeria Ristorante was open. We hesitantly entered the establishment and were immediately confused. Loud Hindi(?) music was blasting from the speakers and brown people were dancing around, apparently a first communion celebration or something was going on.. at a Chinese restaurant. Geo was trying to speak to the waitress in Spanish, because that's what he uses instead of Italian, and the lady did not understand, at all. Then I spoke up with a, "Do you speak Chinese?", in Chinese of course. The waitress, very surprised, replied, "Yes! You speak Chinese? Are you Chinese because I only thought she (pointing to Aimee) was Chinese." Now, Aimee is Japanese, and no one ever thinks I'm Chinese, except Italians, because they think the only Asians in existence are Giapponese and Cinese. So we were able to get through dinner with my less than fluent Chinese, and it was a rather satisfying meal, albeit, expensive for sweet and sour pork with rice. I'm going to have to suck up my economical instincts and just be willing to spend money for food, the prices (and exchange rate) aren't going to change for the better. In all, yesterday was a unique experience and a perfect example of globalization (and switching, for all you linguistists).

The rest of the weekend (Thursday to Saturday) consisted of a good deal of walking, a lot, really.
Thursday:
We went to Positano, an hour bus ride from Sorrento along the coastal cliffs of the Amalfi coast, stunning views, just amazing. We hiked down the windy roads to the "beach" and swam in the ocean. The water was amazing and the sun beat down, but the rocks were painful and burning hot. I had a sandwich at this little deli called Vini e Panini (Wine and Sandwich) and attempted to eat it on the steps of a church, but was promptly shooed away by the five oh. We got back and felt we didn't get enough use out of our 24 hour bus ticket, so hopped on the next bus to Marina Grande. Marina Grande is a very, very, small fishing village next to Sorrento, accessed by some steep roads through a cliff. Smelt of fish.
Friday:
Happy American Independence Day! We walked (or, rather, wandered) to a neighboring town by the name of Sant'Agnello. Also beautiful beach views, but also many lemon growing houses or complexes or areas. I was very tempted to knock lemons off the trees, but was convinced half of them were run by the mafioso.. iono.. or not. The walk was long, but enjoyable, to me anyway and we got back in time to take a nap before gathering for a 4th of July potluck. I brought some not-very-well-seasoned pasta that I managed to cook up our electric burner and a limone torte. We drank some white wine before heading out to check out the Sorrento nightlife. First place we went to was called Danielle's Bar, which boasted "karaoke and dancing". The place was half dead and those there were either around 15 years old or 45 years old. I stupidly decided to get a drink, which ended up being 7 euros (wtf), and had a grand old time singing a Backstreet Boys song to the entire club, with help, of course. The club was lame and I very much regret dropping 14 bucks on one drink. We decided to hop on over to a place called English Inn. There was a huge crowd waiting to get into the place, so we thought we wouldn't get in, but then I noticed it was only guys waiting around and realized that girls got in easily. We walked straight through the crowd and through the doors without even trying. This was where we got to experience where Italian men get the stereotype of being.. very forward. At least we got to practice our Italian.
Saturday:
Started late as we were all recovering from the night before. We took a bus to Meta, another neighboring town, and quickly got right back on the return bus. There wasn't very much in Meta and we wanted to save a bus ticket by riding it within the 45 minute time limit our tickets gave us. We got off at Piano di Sorrento (if I remember correctly), which is past Sant'Agnello and walked around, we walked so much we ended up back in Sorrento. We didn't get to shop or anything because we were there right during siesta, which is the time between 1pm and 4:30pm where people eat and nap. We ended the night with gelato and window shopping before sleeping early to get up for an early start in Naples.

What: 45 minute bus ticket/24 ore bus ticket
Where: purchased at any Tabacchi shop
How much: 2/6 euro

What: McDonald's McToast
Where: any Italian McDonald's
How much: 1 Euro
Experience: McDonald's is overpriced here, it's better to just save yourself the frusturation and disappointment, and not go. It doesn't have anything that's really unique (like taro pies or rice patty chicken sandwiches) as in other country's McDonald's.

What: Museo Capodimonte
Where: Via Capodimonte in Napoli
How Much : 7,50 Euro (I think, at this point we have a Campania ArteCard that allows us access to most sites in the Campania area)
Experience: Huge museum, worth it, be prepared for lots of walking.

What: Gelato
Where: Most gelateria's in Sorrento
How Much: 2 Euro for a piccolo (small)
Experience: Delicious, over all, at least all the flavors I've tried.

What: Clubs in Sorrento
Where: Sorrento, there aren't that many
How much: free entrance, ridiculous drink prices.
Experience: Danielle's club was extremely disappointing, small venue, lame crowd, lame music that is interrupted if someone wants to karaoke. LAME. English Inn is better, larger, outside venue, more of an Italian feel (aka skeezy and/or suave Italian men), better music when they actually play hip hop (though they usually play techno or house or whatever crap). You can also just chill off the dance floor.

What: Circumvesuviana train ride from Sorrento to Naples and back.
Where: train station
How much: 5,20 euro
Experience: 1 and a half hour ride on a bus covered in more, colorful graffiti than any place in L.A.

Thanks for surviving through the long post, or not. Bye!

Next: Weekend up North.

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

I made your sorbet, limone.

Buon giorno,
The gelato factory i went to yesterday was, as I had very much suspected, just the back room of the Gelato place we were shown the other day. Another student and I got to make Limone Sorbetto, not gelato, but it's okay, I guess. We squeezed half a liter of lemons, added 2 different types of sugar along with some water, mixed, and dumped it into the mixer machine, which then twirled around, scraping ice into the mixture until it became sorbet. It was delicious, if I say so myself, pictures will be posted sometime... We were stranded for a bit in the gelato store because it started to pour, for the second time in three or so days, but we didn't mind because we had gelato. But, now I have to redo my laundry because I had clothes out on the balcony, waiting to dry. lame.
We've made friends with the waiter who served us our first meal in Sorrento. Funny guy, he has the best lines for luring in the patrons. He's helped us perfect some of our Italian phrases.
Every Tuesday, a type of farmer's market is held in Sorrento, half an hour walk up a hill from our place, a lot farther than we thought. They sell clothes, fruits, vegetables, candy, bread, meat, etc.. stuff you'd find at any farmer's market, but much cheaper. I got some fruits and pastry things. The guys that sell the pastries load your bag up with what ever you point to, even if you say you only want a little.. Aimee's total came to 8 Euro, yikes. We then went to class and learned about plurals.
Last night, I was determined not to get a new mosquito bite, so I wore long pj pants and covered myself up to my head with the bed sheet. I awoke an hour later to the sound of a buzzing insect and itchy/painful fingers. I also realized that my eyelid felt very heavy. I turned on the light and saw that the little fucker got my left pinky and right thumb, along with my right eyelid. Needless to say, my right eyelid is puffy and uncomfortable and my thumb is numb. MOTHERTRUCKER. This was the same eyelid that got bitten when I went to Nanjing in the Fall, where my entire right side of my face swelled up. This time, I took some Benadryl right away, and the swelling isn't as bad, but still swollen. fucking bugs.
Sorrento is a beautiful place, but filled with tourists. It's an expensive place to live and I'm beginning to question the soundness of my choice to go here for school. The program we're on is much more disorganized than I ever thought any UC program could be and there's almost zero accountability when it comes to where our money has gone. But I digress, this is a fun blog.
The views here are amazing, especially from our balcony. Out of the four apartments where students of our program are staying, our's has the best views. The front balcony has a view of the main square and the ocean. And the rear balcony (yes we have 2 balconies) has a view of the mountains and our neighbor's yards. I'll definitely have to post pictures of those soon.
I must apologize for the lack of photos. I did not bring my laptop with me and I'm still debating whether or not these computers we're using have the capacity to upload the amount of photos I have. Soon though, soon.
We're in the midst of planning our weekend excursion, hopefully we can come to a concensus about where we want to go. I'm rooting for Sicily.

Ciao my friends!

Next: Weekend excursion.

Tuesday, July 1, 2008

Sorrento: Hot Hot Heat

The heat and humidity just does not let up! At least I'm getting a good tan. Classes have started, four hours a day of linguistical magic. Aiya, I have a degree in Management Science, which has NOTHING to do with what I'm studying here, however, I am learning a great deal and have, kind of, gotten interested in some of the material. Mostly the gesture class where we get to people watch for class credit. The people in my small program are cool people, but they're going to have to do a lot more to get up to my Shanghai people level of cool. haha. I'm going to a gelato factory now, so I'll have to update more later.

Bye!