Updatepalooza: January-February 2009
July 1, 2009
This morning I got up and hiked up a mountain in the Tuscan hillside to go see a castle. I walked through the Cyprus trees that make the hillside so spiky, past the rows and rows of olive trees that dot the land, past a few run down buildings that were once the place someone called home, until I reached the castle. It only took me 20 minutes from the apartment so I grinned to myself and kept on walking. I walked and walked, farther and farther up the hill until I reached a stop sign 20 minutes later. It seems that, like Forrest Gump, I need a sign to tell me when to stop.
You see, I’ve been feeling a bit like a chunky monkey lately (following a week of eating characterized by non-existent will power) and I’ve been a little frustrated that I can’t just take off running the way I used to. You know, baby and all. So I decided today to go conquer walking, following all my normal running routine stuff. What I found in hiking up the hill, my iPod cheering me on (thank you Aunt Lisa!), was that my legs were burning, I was sweating profusely, I had to work to control my breathing, I wanted to quit, I wanted to cry, and through it all I had a profound sense of satisfaction that I didn’t stop, that I didn’t cry, and that I had done it. It seems walking can be a substitute for running. Huh, who knew? I guess you just have to climb a mountain.
I can’t complain too much though, it was a beautiful place to torture myself. Chris and I are living out next to I Tatti right now while we cat- and house-sit for his boss so my walk wasn’t the usual stroll down the Arno or climb past Piazza Michelangelo. In fact, I didn’t see a single piece of dog poop on my walk so I knew I wasn’t in Florence. The air smelled like pine needles and olive trees. There were birds chirping and the air was filled with almost constant buzzing of weird forest insects. On my way back (mercifully downhill after my 40 minute climb up) I passed a clearing in the trees where I could look out over the valley in which Florence sits. Right there, right in the middle, was the pride and joy of Florence: Santa Maria del Fiore, the Duomo. I giggled to myself and thought, “I love this place” and kept on walking.
So that’s how I started my day today.
Updatepalooza continues…
January: Time to work
I didn’t have as much time for sticking around America as I’d hoped to have at Christmas time. The time flew and before I knew it, the day had come for me to say goodbye to everyone, Chris included, and hop on a plane, go over the great big ocean, and find myself in Florence once again, only now as a teaching assistant and not a student.
And it was really my working as a teaching assistant for the Masterpieces class that was my big news for January. Along with the new job came a whole new way of dealing with Florence and relating to the Captain, who was now my boss, not my professor, and Ciambella, who was my fellow teaching assistant. I was a little nervous on my first day of class, but not too bad. The first time I spoke up in front of everyone was nerve-wracking, though all I was doing was asking them all to sign the attendance sheet. They were a new group of strangers who knew nothing about me, what I did last year, or what I was going to ask of them during the semester and frankly, I don’t blame them because I didn’t really know either.
My routine was this: Monday morning Ciambella and I would meet the Captain for coffee and pasta (remember, that means a pastry) before class. Class on Monday from 11-12:30. Tuesday and Wednesday, Ciambella and I would split the onsite lecturing, each of us taking a 45 min block. We would lecture at different spots around Florence, like the Piazza della Signoria, the Church of Santa Croce, the Spanish Chapel at Santa Maria Novella, and places like that. On Thursday mornings we would go through our lectures for the following week with the Captain and that might sound familiar to those of you who followed my blog last year. Last year Ciambella and I did provas, where we were guest lecturers for the Masterpieces class. I did mine last April, I think it was. You might remember that it was one of the most stressful things I did all year. Anyway, as a TA I got to do them every week, but they became less and less stressful as the semester went on.
Ok. So that was my basic routine… and I absolutely loved it! Minus the weekly provas, of course. I was surprisingly busy and surprisingly attached to the students. I couldn’t believe how quickly that happened! Of course, they were my first class ever and I’ll never forget them.
And that’s how I spent most of my January. It wasn’t until the end of the month the Chris came over, joining the ranks over at the newly-christened Casa di Carciofi. I’m sure it wasn’t much of a treat for him to live with three very busy, usually stressed out silly girls.
February and the little surprise…
At the beginning of February something seemed a little funny… with me. I don’t really know how to explain it except that I felt I had been sprinkled with CGI fairy dust and I couldn’t fight the feeling that something had changed with me. And I had a pretty good idea what it was, though I couldn’t really believe it. I was pretty sure that Chris and I had a little surprise on the way, say in about 9 months or so.
For most of the month of February I went back and forth between “I am, I’m sure of it” and “there’s no way I could be, I’m not.”
Padua
My CGI fairy dust feeling was on my mind when Chris, Ciambella, Lara, the Captain and I all boarded the train and headed to Padova on the 7th to see the Arena Chapel, also called the Scrovegni Chapel, decorated by Giotto. It’s one of the most important works of art in western art history and I was thrilled to be seeing it for the first time.
I wasn’t disappointed. When I first walked in I actually teared up. It was so amazing.
Our trip was quick, but wonderful. And I was still wondering at the end of the day… “hum… could I be?”
Rome
The 13th and 14th of February I went down to Rome with the Michelangelo class for my second private tour of the Sistine Chapel. I felt good because that morning I had decided that there was no way I was pregnant and I was relieved to free of the constant chatter in my head.
Since Ciambella and I had already done this trip with the Michelangelo class we decided to go off and do our own thing. A sciopero, or strike, made us cancel our reservations with the Borghese gallery—annoying—but we managed to fill our time with other things. At the end of our busy day, but before the private tour, we were headed to the Castel Sant’Angelo when we got distracted by a ice rink right next to the Tiber. We had to.

After paying for our lockers and skates we hit the ice. Ciambella used to play ice hockey so we’ll forget about how she was skating circles around me while I wobbled around like Bambi on ice. I did better than I expected, but I thought I’d die so saying I did better than expected is not really saying much at all. While Ciambella was off getting her camera to document our fun I did the one thing I was hoping to avoid. A group of unruly Italian children around the age of 7 went zipping past me doing triple salchows, sit spins, and double axels. Those little snots cut me and off and next thing I knew I was flying through the air in slow motion, feet to the sky, arms flailing, as I went crashing down butt first with a mighty thud on to the cold, hard ice. Fortunately for me, Ciambella wasn’t back yet, so neither was her camera. I took it easy after that.

The trip to the Sistine was stunning, as it had been before. (Uh–look at that picture! Do you see how empty that place is? Incredible!) Afterward, I joined Lara, the Captain, Carol the librarian, and Carol’s friend for dinner at Armando’s next to the Pantheon. Lara and I mistakenly ordered plates of melted cheese (don’t ask), which caused serious GI distress and a lot of nagging from the Captain, but all was made better by the desert. It was maybe the most delicious pie, Lara’s apple pie notwithstanding, that I’ve ever eaten. Oh, happy.
My second day in Rome was spent in the Pope’s gardens (where you can get some great views of St. Peter’s from the back) and checking out some other churches before heading back to Florence. Oh, yeah, and Lara and I accidentally got on the wrong metro at one point and ended up running at full speed from Piazza Repubblica to Santa Maria della Vittoria to see Bernini’s Saint Theresa in Ecstasy. I guess I didn’t really take it that easy.

Siena and San Gimignano
My next big trip in February was on the 20th to Siena and San Gimignano. This was business though, not pleasure. For this trip I was traveling in my official capacity as co-TA for Masterpieces. That meant, among other things, that I was in charge of lecturing to a small group of the students (Ciambella and I broke up the class according to which side of the bus they were sitting on, giving us each about 22 students) in the Cathedral and Cathedral museum and then in San Gimignano to the whole group. It was amazing.
We had some small problems when we first arrived, but they weren’t that big of a deal and the trip went pretty smoothly, aside from when we almost left one student and Ciambella in Siena because the student was late to the bus, Ciambella ran after her, and we had to go to stay on schedule. In the end, everyone was accounted for and we were off to the beautiful hill town of San Gimignano.
I lectured in front of the Collegiata, which used to be the city’s cathedral, but no more, my friends. They lost their bishop (how embarrassing) and now it’s just another church. At the end of the day we were all exhausted—I was more exhausted then I should have been and thought, “hummm….”—so we headed to a bar for a glass of Prosecco. I wondered if I should drink my, you know, just in case. I was still playing the guessing game. Mind you, I’d been playing the guessing game for 18 days by that point.
By the time we were all heading out to the bus, the day was clearly a success. The only casualties I have to report from this trip are my mp3 player, which mysteriously stopped working, and Chris’ camera, which also mysteriously stopped working. But the students were happy and the first field trip of the semester was over.
Pistoia and Prato
The Sunday following Siena, so the 22nd, Chris and I took a quick trip to Pistoia and Prato, two cities just outside of Florence and very easy to reach by train. The trip turned out to be a bit a bust, but not a total loss. In Pistoia we found almost everything closed, which is what you get when you go to a small town in Italy on a Sunday, but we met up with Scott, one of Chris’ co-workers, who lives in Pistoia. He showed us around and turned out to be an excellent tour guide. I really enjoyed the Giovanni Pisano Pulpit in Sant’Andrea.

He was accompanied by his two little kids Isa and Samu (Samu is how the Italians shorten Samuel). They were so adorable and we were all delighted by Samu’s “penguins and dogs” comments throughout the day. (Samu is learning both English and Italian and at times they get a little jumbled. For instance, after calling everything in sight either a penguin or a dog, Samu spotted a building covered in scaffolding and proudly announced, “Penguin!” Scott laughingly said, “yes, that’s very much like a penguin except that it’s not like a penguin at all.”)
After Pistoia it was off to Prato where our main goal was food. Prato has the largest Chinese community in Italy and, since it’s only 20 minutes by train outside of Florence, it’s a popular place for real Chinese food. We didn’t run straight to the restaurant though, we were good. First we stopped into the cathedral for some art—blah blah blah—and then we ran to the food. The food did not disappoint, let me tell you. I mean, it was no Flying Tiger, but it was really, really good.
After dinner I could barely function. I was so tired I thought I wouldn’t make it. Hum… why am I so tired, I thought. We’ll just see about that.
Hum… is right!
My inner turmoil about the CGI fairy dust grew during the month. Something was a little funny, that was for sure. I knew that there was a magical test that could tell me if my suspicions were correct, but I was so afraid I was wrong that I didn’t want to take the test. What if I failed? I just don’t think I could handle that kind of rejection. (That was a Back to the Future quote for Josh.)
After consulting about 15 people—I’m not so good about keeping things to myself—I finally set a date in my mind for the day of the test. When that day came I chickened out. I was still too afraid. I’d wait one more day, I told myself. But then an amazing thing happened… on my way home from work on Thursday, February 26 I found myself walking into the Farmacia at the corner of via degli Artisti and via Pier Capponi and asking the man at the counter for a prova di gravidanza, a pregnancy test.
Gasp.
The thing, with the delightful brand name of “Lady Friend,” burned a whole in my bag the whole way home. I played little games like “if I see three babies in strollers before I get home I’ll take it… ok… two babies in strollers… ur… if I see someone with a child under 10 before I get home…” Stuff like that. When I got home Vanessa Avery and I chatted a bit until I could no longer take it. I pointed out my new Lady Friend on the dresser and she shrieked that I had to take it right away. I tried to fight her, but she’s very demanding and there I was, spending some time with Lady Friend.
Only three surprisingly short minutes later I had my answer: Si! Sono incinta! (That means “Yes! I’m pregnant!” for anyone who might be confused.) And there it was. Waiting for Chris to come home was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.
And that’s the story of how I learned to listen to my body when it was trying to tell me something.
Milan, with baby.

The very next day Chris, baby, and I left to join the Leonardo class on their trip to Milano. We’d never really been to Milan, only the train station, so we were pretty psyched. We also went to Parma on the trip. It was so wonderful. I was tired, as had become my custom, but was on cloud nine the entire time.
The highlight of the trip for me was our visit to Leonardo’s Last Supper at Santa Maria delle Grazie. It was so amazing. I was really surprised at well conserved it is. It was one of those “oooh!” moments from my Italian experience. So incredible.
My second biggest highlight was the Milan cathedral. I had no idea that Italian Gothic could be so amazing! It was spectacular! The piazza was full of adorable children in costume—I have no idea why, Carnivale was long over—and there were balloons and confetti everywhere. It was so festive. My favorite part was climbing onto the roof, where baby and I had our first official picture together.

And that was the end of February.
Updatepalooza to be continued…
July 1st, 2009, posted by Sarah














Ok.



























