Paris holds the key to your heart! No, seriously.

Sleepy and hungry, my friend Jenny and I walked through the quaint Parisian town that our accommodation was located in and stumbled upon a fast food Greek-American restaurant from which we consumed our first meal on French soil. This was complete with “French fries” and a soda and ended with happy tummies and smiles on our faces. After only having Italian food for 3 + months it was a true gift to my taste buds.

On our first day in Paris we went to see the Louvre. It was a tiring expedition in a labyrinth of nudity and depictions of Jesus. A highlight was definitely seeing the Mona Lisa in person- woah.

We left the Louvre and were stopped by two French guys who started out making general pointless conversation with us which progressed to a scene from the film “Taken.” We quickly exited the meeting and went on to find the Notre Dame.

The Notre Dame was located very near where we were staying and that area of the city became our favorite and the most frequented. The Cathedral was closed, so we admired the architecture, re-enacted some scenes from “Hunchback of N.D.” and were off to find some grub.

Boeuf bourguignon was on my heart’s menu and I had my first encounter with Mr. Bourguignon and he forever has the key to my heart. On our way back from dinner we heard exclamations and music and followed the sound to find British actors performing some street theatre outside “Shakespeare and Co. bookstore.” This performance began with two guys fight dancing while a girl poured buckets of water on them from a window above them, and ended with a girl screaming at a stuffed aardvark. It was awesome.

The Panthéon was the start of the next day’s adventure, followed by a Pain au Chocolat and a coffee, and then to Notre Dame. The Notre Dame is my favorite cathedral that I have seen in Europe so far. It is very beautiful but also feels more cheery than many of the other cathedrals I have visited. Later we saw the Arc de Triomphe and went shopping on Champs-Élysées.

The Eiffel Tower is a sight to behold. Once inside, I could not believe how absolutely massive it was. Overlooking the city from that viewpoint was incredible. Later that evening, my soiree with Confit de canard (duck confit) proved to be a memory I won’t soon forget. To end the night, we went to a bar where we met some Italians (go figure) and Parisians. At one point I was switching back and forth between a decent conversation in Italian and a mediocre one in French. This was exciting!

The next day began with a crepe- specifically, a nutella and apricot crepe. Yum. We then traveled to Moulin Rouge, Sacré Coeur, and walked around Montemartre and had delicious Croque Madame. This was followed by an expedition in Père Lachaise cemetery to find the graves of Marcel Marceau, Oscar Wilde and Chopin, among others.

On our final day in beautiful Paris, we explored Musée d'Orsay where I gave a shout out to Van Gogh, Monet, Renoir, and Degas. This ended the adventure that was Paris, and brought us back to Roma, which felt like going back home. It was odd to feel this way- to almost experience relief that I was back where I could understand people, as if Italian were my first language. So, this made me realize that I have made progress with my level of Italian comprehension and conversation. Yay me!

This week our group left Roma and went to Parma and surrounding areas, and now we are in Bologna starting a three day weekend. Wooooohoooooo!

Roman Holiday

It has been awhile since my last post because internet is sparse here on the wide open road in Italia. But, now I am living in a flat in Rome for the next three weeks, so I am a bit more stationary at the moment. YAY!

Since I last posted our team has had many adventures. We were tucked away in the beautiful mountains in the small town of Paderno del Grappa. I fell in love with the city of Padova and the charming town of Vicenza. I wrote on the wall at Juliet’s house in Verona and touched her (well, the statue of her) breast for good luck. We trekked up to a castle found in Soave and watched the sun set over the city. We spent a day in Firenze enjoying the sun and admiring the gorgeous Duomo.

We have been in Rome for a week now and it has flown by! I LOVE Rome so far, what little I have seen. There is a really nice park close to our flat that is a sea of green and daisies, with ancient trees, people playing football and dogs running free and playing together. Over the weekend we walked downtown by the Colosseum and the Spanish steps and the Pantheon. It was the perfect sunny day to walk through Rome pretending to be Audrey Hepburn in ‘Roman Holiday.’

We have had some pretty good schools since arriving. One day in particular we played jump rope games in the schoolyard with the kids and it was so much fun! Later that day we were in the mountains of Nemi which overlooked a crystal-clear lake and we sat outside in the sun eating wild strawberry tarts and gelato- perfetto!

Every night since our arrival in Rome, the sounds of tribal drums have been echoing through the neighborhood where our flat is. Curiosity had been building in me to find its source, so Abie and I went on a run (the night of the wild strawberry tart day) and began a mission to find the source of the drumming. We followed the sound to this old building and tried to ask some children outside (in very poor Italian) what the drumming was about. Luckily, some English-speakers walked by soon after and told us we were invited to come inside the building to check it out. Inside was a group of young Italians who were rehearsing West-African dance and drumming for an African festival later this year. All the men were drumming and the women were dancing. Abie and I asked if we could sit and watch, and then they asked us to dance with them. It was really lovely and so fun… all of us were in a circle, and one woman would start a repetitive movement and then it was a ripple effect where everyone in the circle would join in and do the same movement until someone else wanted to lead something.

Well, I must be off!

Con tanto amore

Spotting George Clooney

Our group is on the Triveneto tour right now and it is EXHAUSTING. We are driving a lot and seeing a lot, but do not stop very long before we’re off again. We haven’t stayed in any one place for more than two nights for the last three weeks. It has definitely been a test of everyone’s degree of flexibility.

But, despite being tossed to and fro we have been able to see many beautiful things in the past few weeks, including Carnevale in Venice which was as picturesque as I had imagined it would be. It seemed that every corner we turned looked like a scene from a film. It was so neat to see everyone dressed head to toe in various costumes, men and women, young and old, alike with elaborate face paint and masks on prancing around.

We also traveled to a small town called Cividale de Friuli where we stayed in a nice B&B with a breakfast we have not been able to get out of our minds- a breakfast made up of the usual biscuits, yogurt, and brioche, but also with a homemade cake, homemade jam, eggs (unheard of so far), meat, and cheeses. It was scrumptious. Cividale de Friuli is really beautiful, with a crystal clear river running through it and snow-capped mountains in the distance that give the entire place “The Sound of Music” feel. This is fitting, since lately our group has been performing an a capella version of the entire “Sound of Music” soundtrack during our lengthy car rides.

Over the past few weeks we have been able to meet up with a few different groups along the way and hang out which has been nice. It’s great to see familiar faces here and there and share our experiences with each other.

Abie, Briony and I went to Lake Como last weekend and had a magnificent day! A day that was complete with a delicious two-course lunch, a carnevale parade, shopping, a boat ride in the lake, and ended with some lush crepes that we won’t soon forget.

Well, for now I have to hit the road. But, there is more to come.

Con tanto amore!

Not another gurney

We found out that we are moving to the Triveneto area near Venice this weekend and we will be there for a month! Then it is off to Rome for a month! My group is super excited!

Well, this past week I got kind of sick, and on Friday I had to leave a performance early and be taken to the ER to see what was going on. I ended up spending 7.5 hours in the ER waiting to be seen by a doctor, accompanied by my good friend Camber, who kept me entertained with classic games such as, "What's in your wallet?" and "Try to remember what you bought from old receipts lost in your purse." We also made some videos to document the waiting process, during which we were sure to cut away whenever we spotted a gurney in the ER- and in tandem would yell, "Gurney, gurney, gurney!" It was a long day. I finally got in to see a doctor that night, which lasted all of 7 minutes... so, that was reassuring. But, I am hoping my medicine will start to kick in and make me feel normal again.

My group and the group we are living with in the Milan flat had to work this weekend for an English camp at a school. It was super exhausting and a lot of work, but it was fun and a nice change of pace from our usual day to day routine.

Saturday night some friends and I went to the Inter vs. Cagliari football match, and it was really fun! It was an experience for sure, and I definitely want to go to another match while we are in Rome.

Today my group had an English day- which meant that we only had one performance, and went to a school and basically taught a class for 4 hours. So, it felt like being a teacher on a small scale. It was really tiring... because we obviously do not have the kids in desks for that time, we are up and moving and running around. But, it was a really satisfying day and I think my students learned a lot and had a lot of fun.

Where for art thou, Rome?

So, just found out this week that our group would be leaving for Rome next weekend and spending a day or so in Florence on the way… then just yesterday were told that we may be in the Lombardia area a little longer, and then go to Rome in a month or so. So, we probably will not know what our tour will be for sure until we are in the car and headed in a specific direction. These kinds of quick changes are good for me, because I am such a planner and a control freak. I like to always know what is ahead so that I can plan accordingly for it. So, I am hoping that through these next few months I will adopt the flexible attitude that is innate in most Italians and take it away with me when I leave here.

Workshops. Workshops. Workshops.

When I walk into a classroom to conduct a workshop the students are usually told to sit in their desks and they repeatedly hear, “Silencio!” from there teacher. But then the first thing I say to the students is, “Hello everyone! Move your desks to the wall. We need to make a big circle.” This is usually accompanied by several gestures to help with comprehension, depending on the level of English. Typically the students will move their desks to the surrounding walls, and then sit back down in them. I have to tell them repeatedly to come into the center of the room and form a circle, and this idea appears to be completely foreign to them. For the entire time that these actions are being performed, the students check in with their teacher (if the teacher is in the room) to make sure that it is ok to be doing what they are doing. More often than not, the teacher looks as confused and distressed as the students do during this furniture rearrangement. After the students have formed a circle with me, I begin the workshop.

In this introduction to the workshop it is troubling to me that the students are staggered by this action of getting out from behind a desk in a classroom to learn. Since I have been working here, each day I am struck with this same thought and it seems to be continuously circulating in my head… The importance of seeing beyond the way things appear to be, and seeing the potential that they have. Basically, the main point being to color outside the lines. This concept may not seem to be an important one, but I know in my heart, and from observation that change does not come from one operating the way that they always have, but by going against the grain and perceiving life in a different way. This is a generalization, but for the most part I feel like Western education does focus on learning through doing, but in Italy, one could study a subject and only be taught through a book and not through experience. I feel that in some small way I could be altering the way that the students think about learning, and possibly bridging this idea on a much larger scale- changing the way that they perceive the world around them.

I feel very blessed that I was raised to not settle for the mediocre and to not become complacent or satisfied with the way that the world around me is presented, but to question things, and to see beyond the way things appear to be. I think that very often, especially in school settings, this ideal can be confused with a rebellious nature. However, in this context, I feel that it is only an expansion of one’s self and exercising the right to think independently.

So, yeah… these are the things that I keep thinking about.

On a lighter note...

This past weekend, my friend Camber and I spent the day in Milan and it was lovely! We shopped, and had the best cannoli ever! And, this was on Chinese New Year and a parade began as we were walking downtown and we were amidst it all. We also went to a carnival that was near the "castle" downtown and it proved to be an experience as well. A fun weekend indeed.

This blog was super serious and wordy.

Milano Gelato

I have been staying in Milan for over a week now! Time is flying by. My group of four and another group of four is staying in the company’s flat in Milan which is not equipped with personal space and is quite cramped- which certainly makes it feel like an authentic European living experience. Even though we are crowded here, it is nice to get to know this group of people really well and we kind of feel like a family here.

Milan is definitely not as beautiful as sunny Sanremo, but it is nice here. Our second day here we went to Milan’s duomo- which is the hub of the city. We did some shopping and toured the world’s largest gothic cathedral.

Our first week has definitely had its ups and downs. We have been in great schools with awesome kids, and we have been in not-so-great schools with not-so-awesome kids. On our third day of work, my teammate Kyle and I had to travel back to Sanremo to make our appointment with the Italian police to get fingerprinted regarding our visas. The short trip was fun. It’s strange because the entire three weeks that I was in Sanremo it didn’t even feel like I was in Italy because I only went out at night after rehearsals when most things were closed, and traveled in big English speaking groups. But, this time it felt like Italy and I was able to really enjoy it. After our visas were sorted, we walked by the sea and it was so sunny and beautiful and was such a relaxing day. It was nice to be in Sanremo again and to experience it the way that I did.

On Thursday of this week we performed in a school and the children were really difficult and it was a terrible experience for all of the actors. It was a mental and emotional workout for sure- there was no classroom management, and the kids would not listen to or follow instructions that we gave them during workshops, they were out of control. After that day, I was worn out and thought to myself how much I didn’t like my job. But, then on Friday all of my excitement and love for the job was restored when we performed at the nicest school and had the best kids ever. All of the kids were really intelligent and so interested in everything we said in workshops. It was so refreshing. Usually at the end of workshops, I have a question and answer time with them to close the workshop. These kids wanted to know everything about America and they shouted out all of the bands and TV shows that they liked. When I would leave a workshop the kids would all get sad and ask me not to leave and all wanted to give me high fives. I did not want to leave this school. After this day, I thought to myself how much I love this job and how much I would love to do it long-term.

Arrivederci!

I have been here for two weeks now and I still cannot believe that I am in Italy and I am doing what I love and I am being paid to do it. It still seems completely surreal. It still doesn't quite feel like I am in Italy yet.... It does at times, but I think it won't really sink in until we are on tour and we are having to fend for ourselves.

My tour starts next Saturday/ Sunday and I cannot wait! As it stands now, our tour will be starting in Milan and we will be staying the company flat for 4 weeks and touring a lot of the Lombardy area. Then we will be going to Rome and be in the Lazio area, then Tuscany and surrounding areas, and ending in Triveneto, which is the Northeastern part of the country. We have been told that our tour will most likely change and could look completely different once we are on the road, but right now we know for sure that we will start out in Milan.

My friend Caleb left me with a quote just before I moved here and it is really a testament to how I feel about what I am doing. This is a quote from Diane Sawyer's father, she said that he told her to always live by these three things:

1) Do something you really love

2) Do it in the most adventurous place you can do it

3) And make sure it helps other people

After sharing this quote with me, Caleb told me that through this program I would be living this out, and I really believe that I am. I truly feel blessed to be able to have this experience.

Ciao for now!