Mah, gli Stati Uniti...

I had an assignment this week to create a photomontage (basically a combination of two or more pictures).

This is what I'm turning in tomorrow.

I'm really happy with how it turned out.

musei vaticani

The Vatican Museums had a promotion going on for September/October called "Night at the Museums" where you could visit on a Friday evening for a discounted ticket price. We decided to take advantage.

One of the first areas we were in had a gorgeous view of the dome of St. Peter's, all lit up at night. As an aside, I think Rome at night is especially magical.

There was much to see - we spent hours making our way through the open parts of the museums, culminating at the Sistine Chapel. By the time we got there, though, my neck was already strained from looking at the amazing ceilings throughout. For some reason, I expected The Creation of Adam to be bigger than it was, but it was impressive nonetheless.

One of my favorite parts of the museums was the Egyptian section. I love that stuff. And there were actual mummies!!! (They still had hair - eep!)

See the rest of my pictures from the Vatican Museums in my second Rome photo album, here.

catacombe di san callisto

A group of friends and I trekked to the catacombs this morning.

There are many, many catacombs in Rome. We went to the Catacombs of St. Callixtus, a huge tomb most notable for containing the Capella dei Papi (Crypt of the Popes).

We couldn't take pictures inside, but it was basically a giant tomb with tunnel after tunnel and turn after turn whose walls were covered in rectangular holes once occupied by the bodies of Christians. Some of the rectangles were very small, which we were told meant they held the bodies of infants or children. It's haunting enough to see people's former graves; it's much more chilling when you know they belonged to children. None of the bodies/bones are there anymore; most have been moved elsewhere over time. Still, it was interesting to see - and fortunate that we had a guide, because the catacombs are huge.

italiano... e la bloggista che mai scrive

Had my first quiz in Italian today. Think it went well.
Also turned in my first composition, completely in Italian. In case you're interested, here it is:

Da tre settimana sono arrivata a Roma. Abito in Trastevere con quattro altre ragazze. Frequentiamo l’Università Americana di Roma. Io studio communicazione, ma anche ho lezioni sul italiano e inglese. Vado a scuola in autobus e qualche volta a piedi. La mattina, esco all’otto e mezzo.
Quando ho tempo libero, scrivo lettere ai miei amici negli Stati Uniti, parlo con il mio ragazzo, o cocino. Preferisco mangiare a casa, perche non ho molti soldi a spendere in un ristorante. Le mie amiche e io cociniamo pasta o pollo insieme per la cena. Facciamo la spesa a un supermercato o un alimentari molto vicino a nostre appartamento. Questo alimentari ha pesto bellissimo; lo compro spesso. Anche compro formaggio, pane, e prosciutto in alimentari. Compro frutte e verdure al mercato.
La sera faccio i compiti, e nel fine-settimana, viaggio. Scorsa sabato la mia amica Smrithi e io siamo andate a le Cinque Terre. Anch’io esco con mie amiche per caminare, ballare e mangiare gelato. Dopo, torniamo a casa all’undici e vado a dormire.

There are likely some mistakes; I'm only just learning, after all.

ALSO...
Sorry I've been so lax about posting in the past week or two. You know - not enough time to write about things I'm doing because I'm too busy actually doing them!
Below you can find a bunch of new updates, dated according to when they actually should have been written. Enjoy! I'll try to post more regularly from here on out. :)

L'ho fatto in classe

This is a simple poster graphic I made in Photoshop for an ungraded exercise in COM 215.
We're learning how to use various technologies that could prove useful in media-related fields (see video and description in my post about my classes, dated 9-17).
We were given really loose guidelines (circles, text). I just started playing around and liked what came out.

Permesso di Soggiorno

I just got my Permesso di Soggiorno (Permit to Stay) squared away. It was the last step as far as documentation goes. So... I'm legal in Italy now! Yay!

Le Cinque Terre

Yesterday, my roommate Smrithi and I hopped a train to the Cinque Terre, which is a national park on the upper west coast of Italy in the Liguria region (here's some info about it!). We connected in La Spezia on the way to Vernazza, which is where my dad and nonna and I stayed when we were in the Cinque Terre in 2007. It was amazing to be back; I really love Vernazza. After getting a gelato (sugar boost!), we started hiking up the trail. The steep parts started to hurt my knees after a while. Not the up parts - I can handle those - but the down parts. My knees had just forgiven me for the beating I gave them hiking the Oyster Dome before I left Bellingham, so they were not happy with me for Cinque Terre. Oh well. I'll hobble for a few days if it means I get to see this:Just after we passed through Corniglia, we found the trail closed off - probably because the sun was going down. So, we backtracked a bit and found a rocky beach where we could wade in and cool off.
Then we headed back to Vernazza to enjoy some gnocchi with pesto. While we waited for the train, we talked with another American whom we'd encountered on the trail earlier (he'd taken our picture at a lookout). He was named David and it turned out he'd worked at Microsoft for 10 years! Yay for Northwesterners! Anyway, I'm glad we went back to Vernazza to eat because that city is SO beautiful at night. We had some time to kill, so we sat on some rocks that jutted into the water and enjoyed the view.

We had a long wait at the station in La Spezia because our train back to Roma was a night train (cheaper). Snoozed on the floor for a bit. Awkward train ride back with four random Italians in the same car as us; we all had to sleep so we made it work. Got back at 6:30 this morning! All in all an amazing adventure.

I took 93 pictures - more than I can possibly post on here! So... here's a link to them: Fotografie delle Cinque Terre!

mio padre vecchio

Today is my dad's 64th birthday!! I'm kind of bummed to be missing it, but that's okay - he's coming to visit me in October, so we'll celebrate then. Meanwhile, I'm sure he's enjoying himself - I'm told he's golfing today. :)

i corsi

I've just finished my second week of classes! Here's a little rundown, class by class...

BUS/ENG 307 - Writing for Business
Some days I like this class and this professor, and some days I don't. It's still a wait-and-see situation.
So far there's been a lot of reading about how to prepare to write a business document... and writing a bunch of memos about said reading. It sounds dull, and it is at times, but I'm hoping it'll curb my addiction to pretty prose and help me be more concise.

ITL 102 - Elementary Italian II
We took a placement test the first day. The second day, my professor told me I was one of the two people who were actually ready to be at this level. Thanks, 3-week intensive Italian 101 course!
Seriously, though, I need to e-mail my Italian 101 professor and thank him.

COM 209 - New Media
Lots of talking about the changing media of our time and what's new about new media and what's new for society as a result of new media. Instead of a textbook, we use a blog that our professor updates continuously with articles, links, etc.
Buzzwords: digitization, convergence.

COM 300 - European Mass Media
I wish I lived an Europe and I wish I knew more about European history; both would give me a boost in this class. The book (Mass Media and Media Policy in Western Europe by Peter J. Humphreys) can be dry at times, and it was written in 1995 so some things are outdated, but overall I'm finding it fascinating.
Buzzwords: pluralism, dominance.

COM 215 - The Computer as a Media Tool
So far, lots of Photoshop. I'm almost done with my first project, which is a poster design. Maybe I'll post that on here when it's finished.
Today we learned a video technique called "light writing." It's actually done with still images, taken with a very slow shutter speed to let in lots of light (or at least, that's how I understand it). Have you ever seen those videos of a city scene where you see the clouds move across the sky, it gets dark and you can see the headlights zoom down the highway? It's the same concept as that. Just to mess around with it, we made this short video in class today and exported it using QuickTime:

La Chiesa di Santa Maria in Trastevere

To save time, effort and money, my roommates and I sometimes have "family dinners." It's pretty cute.

I enjoy wandering around my neighborhood (Trastevere) in the evenings. Nothing like friends, gelato, and the Tiber to bid farewell to another day in Rome!

Today we went to a church tucked back in our neighborhood: La Chiesa di Santa Maria in Trastevere. Like all the churches here, it's old and filled with beautiful things. There was a baptism in progress when we visited, and a concert going on in the piazza outside.

La prima settimana

I arrived on Tuesday, September 1 without incident. Flew from Seattle to Philadelphia to Frankfurt to Rome. That last leg meant flying over the Alps, which was unbelievable.

My apartment is in the Trastevere neighborhood (so named because it's across the Tevere a.k.a. the Tiber River), and I can walk and/or take a tram and/or catch a bus pretty much anywhere I've needed to go so far. It's three bedrooms/two bathrooms, and there are five of us living here.

Tuesday night our program directors took us out to a welcome dinner consisting of ten courses. Most of us were not prepared for that.

Wednesday we had initial meetings for obtaining a permesso di sogiorno (Permit to Stay). In the afternoon we had program orientation followed by a bus tour and then a walking tour all around Rome.Yesterday morning we visited the Colosseum and the Roman Forum, both of which I've seen before but both of which are amazing no matter how many times you've seen them. In the afternoon my roommate and I came home and promptly had a siesta away from the oppressive Roman heat and humidity. Last night we ate pasta with pesto we got at a little shop next to our apartment, then sat on our balcony watching the sun set over the hill.

This morning I got to Skype with my friend Veronica, who is currently in Australia. Then we had orientation at the university, which they breezed through quicker than I'd hoped. Oh well. I found the rooms my classes are in, so that's a start. I'm hoping I can figure things out as they come.