Lunedi!

Sheesh.. if these days get any longer, I don't know what I'm going to do with myself! It's incredible how much we've crammed in to each of these days so far!
Today was Monday, the first day of classes, the first day of work for me, and the first day of official on-sight class.
Monday started off bright and early, had a quick breakfast and then classes started. Bible was first with Dr. Miller. I'm really looking forward to my first class with him, he seems like an awesome teacher. I also think the material is going to be a lot of fun. We'll be studying the life of Paul. :) in Italy. ((so cool.))
Next we had our first humanities class which will normally be with Robbie but he had to be at a meeting today, so we watched a movie on the Medici family and the construction of the Duomo. It was SUPER cheesey, but it had a lot of interesting information that came in handy when we actually went to the Duomo later in the afternoon. It helped me to appreciate it even that much more, so all in all, it was a good humanities class.
After humanities we had our first Italian class with Mona. Learned the alphabet, we learned to count (to 49), we worked on our pronunciation of many different words. It was a lot of fun. We also learned another song... and it was hilarious. It was similar to Old McDonald had a farm.. but it was about Uncle Tony or something like that and we listened to this high childlike voice singing it and then we had to sing along. Good times :)
So this is completely random, but I'm sitting at the cute little table in my room looking out one of my windows at the city lights and it is just breathtaking. It distracts me, and I end up just staring out the window trying to wrap my head around the idea that I'm living in Italy. THe city looks awesome at night, and the twinkling lights makes it seem even more like a fantasy.
Back on track now! When we were finished with Italian we had an abbreviated chapel and then it was lunch time. It was a four cheese pasta today, with roast beef and bread and fruit and green beans.
I was on clean up duty for lunch, and so I got my first day at working in the kitchen. It is pretty simple work, the process they have for washing dishes is an interesting one. They fill up the sink with soapy water. You wash the dirty dishes in the water (which quickly becomes disgusting because there is only one sink so you can't rinse them before you wash them, it all goes into the water), and then you put them in little trays. Once the tray is full you put it into a steam cleaner similar to a dish washer, which takes somewhere between 3 and 5 minutes. Once that is done you take the tray out and let the dishes air dry. The you put them away. There are always plenty of dishes so one person usually washes and puts them on the tray and the other person puts the trays in and takes them out of the steam cleaner and puts them away when they're dry. You also take out the trash when you're done with the dishes.
I didn't get to finish because we had to leave for the duomo but it was a good first day. :)
I ran and grabbed my stuff and then headed out to the first van down to the train station. Dr. Miller was driving us, and he is still getting used to driving the vans. He's doing good, he just doesn't go crazy fast like Robbie and Kyle. He had to run inside, so he parked the van and just as he got back in and sat down, Kyle was behind us and feeling impatient. He was driving the other van, and about a minute later while Dr. Miller was getting situated he gave us a little bumper bump. Okay, he ran into us, but it wasn't a hard hit. It was a love tap. Or a GET GOING tap. lol. Dr. Miller turned around with a funny look on his face and asked us all, "Did he really just hit me??!" It was pretty funny, crazy Kyle.
We took the train in to the last stop and walked to the Duomo. OH. And may I just say, the wind here is like nothing I have ever experienced. And that is saying a lot considering I lived in Wyoming and played soccer at PPCS in Colorado Springs. (if you've ever been to a game up there, you know how wicked the wind can be.) It is bitter and comes in HUGE gusts that knock the breath out of you and blow the hood of your coat off and threaten to blow you off in a direction. Not my favorite part of the day, ha!
We waited for the rest of the group to join us outside the baptistry, and attempted not to freeze. We took a group picture, which I think this is the third group picture where you can't see me and honestly, it's okay haha. Then we met with our guide, Cindy, who was actually a HUF student herself before she decided to move to Italy and is now a tour guide. I learned a lot and it was INCREDIBLE.
Today, I got to see the works of Donatello and Michelangelo. I also got to stand in the exact place where Michelangelo commissioned the original David. The thought gave me chills when she told us that fun fact. It's crazy, being here. I've learned about these artists and now I'm walked the streets they walked and seeing the work that they created and left for us so many years ago.
We saw the baptistry and the inside of the Duomo and the museum of the works of the Duomo. It was incredible. If you can, check out some of the pictures I posted on Facebook. Unbelievable..

Just a thought, but the dome of the Duomo (which doesn't mean dome, it means cathedral I believe) is huge, freestanding, and 250 to 300+ feet off the ground; can you imagine being one of the artists hanging by a rope painting the fresco on that? You were literally risking your life to paint. Or the men who built the dome? With the bricks? If you get a chance to research how the ended up completing the Duomo, do it. It's incredible.. especially considering when they were finishing it, and the lack of modern technology.

Anyway, we finished up the tour at the museum and then headed to a restaurant for dinner. And guess what... WE HAD HAMBURGERS!!! hahaha :) oh cooked meat on a bun, how wonderful thou art. lol. :) just kidding, not that dramatic, but it was nice to mix it up. (it's a good thing I love italian food!)
After that, we had the choice of hanging out in the freezing cold Florence or head home to the nice, warm Villa. After a long day, and considering the fact that I'd just downed a glass of water and a full can of sprite {if you know me well, you understand how important this small detail is in my decision making} I decided to head home to the Villa. And I still haven't got any dollars changed to euros and it was so incredibly cold and I was exhausted (excuses, I know). Anyway, Jordan and I decided to head to the train station and try and catch Kyle or Robbie with one of the vans before they headed to the villa. So we took a nice (freezing cold) walk to the train station and then up to the vans. We met up with Kyle and Britt on the train (as we were walking off, haha) and headed up to the villa.
I've been relaxing and uploading pictures (and playing ping pong & piano with Grant and Laura (the Miller kids) since I got home. Now, it's got to be close to bed time. 11:30 is a reasonable time to go to bed when you get up at 6ish and have a day like this, right?

Welllllll.. I suppose it is about that time. Hope you enjoyed hearing about my day!!

Buona notte!

Kortney Alacyn