Rome sweet home

Today, after way too many hours of traveling through three airports with two huge red suitcases, I found myself in ROME. This flight was the first international flight I've slept at all on, so that was a perk. We got here at about 8:00 am and collected our luggage in Fumincio Leonardo da Vinci and went to our apartments at the Medaglie d'Oro. Our doorman's name is Fabrizio and he is really nice- he already gave us advice on which international calling card is the best value (Europa, if you were curious). Hm. Right now I'm exhausted. After we were dropped off at Medag, we showered, relaxed for a bit, and unpacked until 3:00 pm.. we then walked the route from Medag (located north of Vatican City by a few blocks) toward John Cabot University, my ND away from ND this semester. We stopped in St. Peter's Square for awhile, took pictures, went inside the Basilica, which will never not amaze me. Then we continued onward to Trastevere, which is a neighborhood of Rome that is absolutely gorgeous. Trastevere means across (tra) the river Tiber (Tevere in italiano) and is such a colorful and quaint area. It's beautiful. Umbrella pines decorate the Roman hills in the background and cobblestones, shutters, and earth-toned buildings rise up around the Tevere. There are statues that look as alive as people everywhere, frescoes and dark-haired italiani everywhere. Visited JCU, had this awful orientation that I hardcore fell asleep during (wasn't a problem, apparently a good handful of other ND kids had the same experience that I had), and then ate pizza. Roman pizza= always good. A group of us took the bus back to our neighborhood but stopped for gelato. I finally got to speak italiano to the nice old lady at the bar just down the street from Medag and ordered un piccolo cono con fragola e cioccolato, senza panna (strawberry and chocolate gelato, no cream on top) and corrected the girl behind the cash register when she shorted me 50 cents Euro. I must admit that I felt sort of like a rock star. That leads me to now-ish. I'm sitting on my bed in my apartment whose balconies overlook cobblestone streets and look into the balconies of other brownish-red Roman apartments on this balmy summer night. Rome sweet home. Ciao ragazzi! So much love from Rome- I miss you all quite terribly (seriously).