Buon Natale, Frohe Weihnachten, Joyeux Noel

So winter break-I guess it's been about a month since I've written. Hmmm...

First Anne, Brett, MT and I headed to Austria to spend Christmas in the Alps with the ND/SMC Innsbruck kids and some girls from SMC's Maynooth, Ireland program. It was absolutely awesome. We skiied in the Alps! Enough said? Maybe... but one day, Christmas Eve actually, we took Anne up to the top top of the mountain, which takes 1 gondola ride and 1 lift ride, a total of about 23 minutes or something crazy like that. Our wonderful hotel was right on the side of the mountain, so we could ski in and ski out, but it was foggy most of the time since we were lower, towards the valley. So we took Anne up for her second day skiing- ever- to the top of the Alps. Haha... so we had to coach her down, but she did remarkably well. The best though was coming out of the mist in the gondola and being able to see the sun suddenly, mountains all around us, breaking free of the cloudy, damp mist.... "Um... you guys, are we going into heaven??" It was so beautiful at the top. You could see all the peaks very clearly (I think I might have seen the Grinch up on one of them, I was convinced I saw his house up there) and the clouds were below us. Between the peaks it looked like there were cloud ponds and lakes... really cool.
We also went on a day trip to Salzburg. We ate Austrian stuff at the Chistkindlmart (xmas market like in piazza navona), saw Motzart's birthplace and house, and Mirabel Gardens where part of the Sound Of Music was filmed :) We had a blast skiing, making new friends, trying gluwein (hot spiced wine), had a delicious like 7 course xmas eve dinner, sing carols, went to midnight mass in german, and got attacked by the KRAMPUS! Ask me about that crazy story sometime, it's too weird to recount here. Brett left early to be with her parents, Anne left at like 4am on the 26th, and MT and I travelled back together for many long hours (20 all together?) to get back to Rome.

My mom, dad, and Scott came got to Rome the same day we did. I opened the hotel doors to a typical Lopina family reunion, my mom yelling loudly, everyone being very confused, and of course with lots of hugging. We hung around Rome and then went to Florence to visit an old friend (ok, mad crush) of my dad's from like 40 years ago. Papa (my dad's dad) was stationed in Italy during WWII and got to know an older couple and their children in Florence. Vanna was the granddaughter of the originial people. She came to visit the US for a summer back when she was 21 and my dad was about 17. She and Papa still kept in touch somewhat, but nobody had seen each other since then. So we came to Florence and surprisingly found her waiting at the train station for us! It was so nice. We at dinner that night, New Year's Eve, at her house with her, Paolo, and her friends Laura and Paolo. We found out that it's traditional to eat a late dinner for new year's eve in Italy, and finish around midnight. We had an amazing dinner. If they ever come to visit us in the States I don't know what we would serve them... we had a bunch of courses, including hand-made ravioli from one of their friends, sooo good fresh sauce, olive oil that Paolo made from his trees in San Gimignano, and wine made by the other Paolo and Laura, who own a vineyard and everything, also in San Gimignano. YUM! We also had lentils, which stand for money (wishing for money in the new year, etc.) We of course had champagne at midnight, and then panettone and gelato for dessert. Vanna showed us aroung Firenze... the Duomo, Piazza San Marco, the Ponte Vecchio, Fiesole, etc. It was great. Back in Rome I took Scott to see "the bone church," this crypt which is decorated entirely in bones (really cool) while my dad who was too freaked out went in the church above. We went to this restaurant reccomended to my mom on the plane, by who else but a new friend she made by chatting, twice. It was sad to see them all go, it felt like they had just come when they had to leave. We missed Chris during the week, but hopefully he will get to come visit me on his own later!

Then it was off on a solo adventure for me since everyone had gone back to the States for break except for Brett, who was with her parents around Italy. I killed sometime in Pascucci's and the bookstore, reading books so I wouln't have to buy them, and then getting some for the week ahead, all the while putting off the decision til the last moment of where I wanted to go. I ended up at the train station around 6pm and after standing in line in the cold decided I needed to go somewhere warmer. So I picked Nice, France. Of course, with my luck I had 6 hours to kill before my train left so I went and saw the movie Nights In Rodanthe all in Italian (first time I did that). It sucked, so it was ok that I didn't understand everything. Then I took a bunch of trains over the next 12 hours and finally got to Nice, went to the tourist agency, booked a room, and headed straight to the beach to read and dip my toes in the ocean. Yes, Nice was nice. I sat on the beach and read, ate, saw a couple movies in english with french subtitles, failing tried out my old french, took pictures, and chilled. Random cool thing: one night in a cafe I was the only one in there besides the people who worked there, and they had a little party for the Epiphany and gave me a piece of what seemed like King's Cake for Mardi Gras. They were so nice to include me and tell me about their traditions.

Although France and the French language were my first loves, I had to realize that I sadly lost a ton of my French. "What am I doing here," I thought to myself? "Heck, I'm going back to Italy!" I loved it too much. So I decided to go to Milano. Of course, it was absolutely freezing there, with lots of snow. I had the Pinacoteca Ambrosina museum basically all to myself, ate some yummy African Etrurian food with my hands, travelled 7 hours roundtrip on a fruitless quest to see Otzi the 5,000 year old ice man only to have the museum closed because of late trains. At least I got in a full day of reading. Had someone else been with me, I/we might have been annoyed, but as it was, I had a fabulous time just reading, which is secretly all I had wanted to do that day.

Then I decided I wanted to do something chocolatey. So I did some research and went to Perugia with hopes of touring the Perugina chocolate factory. Yummy. So I arrived in Perugia in the dark, took a really long bus ride out to the middle of nowhere, and tried to find my way to this farmhouse hostel. I had to walk down a dark, country road at night all alone. It was scary, but I didn't feel like I was in that much danger. Haha. I think I was the only one staying there. The owner guy gave me a ride to the chocolate factory on his way to work the next morning, which was really nice of him and made up for the fact that this hostel took forever to find and get to. So I jumped in on an Italian tour going on. We got to walk like above the workers down below, and saw lines of chocolate eggs, Baci candies, and other stuff going by... all with the sweet smell of chocolate wafting around. Mmmmmmmm... then I bought some chocolate of course. I asked the lady for directions to the bus stop and she gave me some free chocolate! Sweet! Literally.

I was SO excited to get back to Rome. I had had enough of travelling alone. It wasn't hard, and I proved to myself that I could do it, which I had kind of wanted to. But, I would rather be with someone to share the experience with. I had a huge smile as I got of the train, then bus, and got the to hotel to see Brett and head to Pascuccis.