So two weeks ago, my school and I went to Florence aka the Heart of the Renaissance aka Italy’s little America aka the last field trip in SYA aka TOO MUCH DAMN WORK.
Usually on every trip we have (Except the first one) we did school works and projects. In Sicily, we had the 30 % worth of our grade Ancient History project (while STILL doing art history) and now….Florence was the big art history trip…
and boy was it.
The whole time we were there it was constant work work work. Not that I mind work but it would have been better to see paintings and sculptures without having to make sure everything is nice so it can be good for the final draft of the project.
Last year, I heard that since Ms. Mazurek was in a bad mood, they barely learned anything and the didn’t have to do a project, but we did.
I have no understanding of this logic…
BAD MOOD = no project
GOOD MOOD= project?
isn’t it the other way around?
Anyway, we got it done and it was exhausting, and most likely I will be thanking Mazurek after this, but then (and a little now) I hated it.
However there were things I did enjoy about Florence was the art and the history but also miscellaneous things:
-Waffles and Nutella SANDWICH (Cost me 6 euros but worth it)
-Ben and Jerry’s
-Americans (you know, to make fun of)
-Size (never really got lost, because you past everything like 15 times in one day)
-Culture of people (there were some lookers, and no they were not Italian)
-Hipsters (made playing the Hipster game well worth it)
However, I still love my amazing relationship with Rome. As much as I liked Florence, the size and I sacci dei turistici (sacks of tourists) I was bothered and claustrophobic.
BUT if you want to see and experience some of the most amazing churches, Renaissance pieces (such as Botticelli’s Birth of Venus which is MUCH bigger than I expected) Florence is for you.
Rome is more for the sculptures and the history…but definitely Florence is for the paintings.
Picture Time!
To start of with the American part…I did go here and I did enjoy it….I miss ice cream…and I know you guys will say “gelato’s better!” but when I was in Florence I had a surprise on how they actually make gelato (and my favorite: cioccolato) and I was devastated. I can never look at gelato the same way (even though I still eat it)
Palazzo Vecchio in Piazza Signorina. Did you know that this building is on top of an ancient ampitheater? neither did I but apparently I had to locate it on a map at midnight when I was finishing my project….
One of my favorite sculptures in the Loggia. I love the twisting of the figures…
Ahh Santa Croce. Didn’t go into this church but it was one of our stops and a “aha” moment for English class because Lucy is abandoned here in A Room With a View. There is also a creepy man that wears a suit that lurks on strange foreign girls that I had the pleasure of seeing not only once but twice on my passing by the Santa Croce….it was lovely.
Now this is nostalgia. When I first came to Florence during the summer of my freshman/sophomore year at Pike, we came to this restaurant and sat in the corner with all my best band buds, now three years later, I came back with my SYA group and ate dinner in the same restaurant (not at this table though)…the memories
Also during our “fun” trip to Florence we had two le caccie ai tesori to do. One in the Uffizi (no pictures because they are not allowed) and one in the streets of Florence. When the team arrived in Piazza della Republica, they had to do funny poses and situations that was just pure entertainment for the teachers in a building across the street on the roof. Thanks guys.
This was funny too.
How could I forget about the duomo? This is a HUGE site on the Florence trip and always our meet up spots. Never got to go inside because it cost about 15,00 euros (no thank you) but I really love its almost gaudy façade.
On one of the days on our trip we went to Fiesole, another English stop from A Room With a View. It was a cute small town, and so we hiked up for about 45 minutes to the top to get an “artist’s perspective”…but in reality the hike had no point (thanks SYA teachers)…however the endless walking paid off and everyone got 12 hours of wellness hours for it. THANK YOU.
During my time, I also had Italian homework (and English, and Latin…) and I had to interview Florentines about what they think about Florence and Italy in general. Here are guys at a clock shop that were really nice and help fix Amelia’s watch (so always ask her what time it is). They were super nice and they always translated the Italian to English for us (even though noi possiamo capire l’italiano).
I always have to get a hipster picture…and no this is not a random stranger…this is Max--- I mean Tate.. by the way H&M sells hipster glasses for 5 euros…
At the end of the Florence trip we were able to go to the Masaccio chapel. It was very nice but the pre-video was exhausting (fell asleep five minutes in to it while flipping between Italian and English audio parts). I studied both these paintings last year (and also this year) so it was really cool to see this in person…
Ciao for now,
Maya
