Praha...Where Everything is Cheap

My past two weeks have been filled with far more homework and other activities than I have been used to. Last week, I spent my days at the boathouse, in class, and doing homework. Far more things to do than I thought. On Thursday of last week, my friend Freddy and I, as well as our other friend Annika from the boathouse, went out together on the town. We went to a couple of different bars and then Freddy slept on the couch of our apartment because his house is quite far away from where we were.

On Friday morning, we got up and Freddy had to run to grab lunch with his Uncle and grandmother at his Uncle's house. I stayed at home and did some homework and chores and things and then headed to the boathouse at 3pm. Following the boathouse, I grabbed a shower and and made some dinner. That night, I was very tired so I went to sleep kind of early.



On Saturday morning, I slept in and then headed to the boathouse in the morning. Afterwards, Freddy met up with me at the boathouse and came back to my apartment while I got a quick shower and got ready to head to my open studio for oil painting class. There, I finished my most recent painting of a still life in class and then headed back to my apartment and went to bed after dinner. Sunday morning, I woke up to explore Florence on my own. It was fun to walk around by myself for a couple of hours into areas that I had never been and take pictures of things I had never seen. Then, I did some grocery shopping, and homework for the rest of the day (finals are coming up and it stinks).






My week started off on Monday with my Italian class. After class was over, I went straight to the boathouse and did a lifting session with some cardio. Once that was finished, I had a lot to get done, so I ran home to grab a quick shower. Then, I threw some food in my bag and ran to the main student point to meet up with a girl in my Italian class and finish up an oral assignment. Once that was finished, I had a whole list of things to get done which lasted until dinner time where I was far too tired to stay up any later so I went to bed early.

My third Oil Painting (finished)

Tuesday started with my Oil Painting class (as usual), and we were all expected to start our final painting which is a 50x70cm piece of a cropped picture of a famous painting found in a museum in Florence. Our largest to date. I chose "Bronzino Ritratto di Eleonora di Toledo col figlio Giovanni" which is a painting of The Dutchess of Toledo, Eleanor, with her son Giovanni. This is super overwhelming especially when combined with the fact that I have only 2 class periods to paint a piece that will require 20+ hours of work. When I left oil painting (fairly stressed from the amount I have to do), I headed to my cooking class. In cooking, we made sea bass with roasted vegetables (I forget the technical name but thats not important). Tuesday night I took home my painting from earlier in the day and posted up in the living room for a very late night of painting. I ended up painting from 9pm until 2:30am and I was nowhere close to getting done.

The original

My final painting so far

On Wednesday morning, I woke up to go to Italian class. There we learned more about demands and descriptions of things so that was pretty cool. Following Italian class I went to the boathouse and got in a moderate 10k workout before going home to get ready for my drawing class. I got cleaned up and took a short nap before heading to my drawing class. Andrea was Andrea and I'm still not a fan of him. He looked at one of my drawings and still did not like it but honestly I am no longer concerned about that. I still have 4, 4-hour drawings to do for my final project. When Krista and I left class, it was pouring outside. I am determined to not purchase an umbrella from one of the 20 people that bombard me in the 3/4 mile walk to my apartment.

When we got back to our place, I made some food and then set up my painting in the living room again to stay up and get some things done. Another 3am night set me up for a tired day on Thursday. When I headed to design class on Thursday morning, I had three of my five final projects ready for review before they are actually due this next week. Once my five-hour class was over, I headed to the leather market in order to get some stuff done for Christmas shopping as well as gifts for my friends.

A Print shop in Florence (SO COOL INSIDE)

With much negotiating, I was able to get things for pretty good prices, only now, my bank account is VERY sad. I then headed to my apartment and got things packed up to send them home in the mail. The process of sending a package at an Italian post office TAKES SO LONG. To top it off, I had to take wine out of the packages I was sending because of customs, and then they wouldn't accept any form of payment other than cash. Cutting it close, I ran back to my apartment and grabbed a shower and some plain noodles for Thanksgiving dinner...elegant I know. I then packed my bag for the weekend in Prague and headed to the Santa Maria Novella train station to meet up with Bus2Alps for our trip.

The bus ride started at 9pm and we ended up arriving at 10am. It was a long night. But, all in all, I got my own two seats, so that was nice. As soon as I got to Prague, I checked into my hostel and dropped my stuff off before meeting up with Zach. (YES, I GOT TO SEE HIM). First, we walked around the city and Zach took me across the Charles Bridge (the most famous bridge in Prague) to see the John Lennon Wall. On the way there, Zach and I ran into a few of his friends from Miami. We got pictures at the Lennon wall and then walked around Prague some more with his friends. 

The astronomical clock

The candy heart I was given

On the walk back, we ran into my friends who were there too, and we witnessed an engagement! Then, while we were all exploring, we found a candy shop where they were making hard candy by hand. We talked with the two guys rolling the candy and it was awesome to see. The one guy cut off the end and then made a heart out of it and gave it to me...it was adorable.


We all bought some of the candy before leaving the store. Then, Zach and I split off and grabbed some food at an asian noodles place, which was super good. Then we walked around some more and I got a shower and we got ready for the night out with his friends.

Fish and Chips dinner with Zach

The "Prague Pub Crawl" is the most well-known pub crawl in Prague. We started off at their central location and they walked us to the first bar where I got to meet all of Zach's friends, who were super nice. They all continually said, "you are so lucky, he always speaks so highly of you" and "he always talks about you", etc. It was pretty great. We then headed to the second bar which was short lived and not my favorite place. Then we got the group rounded up and headed to the third bar. On the way there, we ran into one of the guys rolling the candy from earlier in the day (the one that gave me the candy heart)! After talking with him some more, we found out his name was Thomas and he was excited to see us. After chatting a little bit, we had to run to catch up with everyone to get to the third bar. We stayed there for about an hour and a half and it was a blast.

Looking from the bar

The bar is ice...

My cup

Inside of the Ice Pub

Silly faces

At 12:15am we all started walking to the largest club the the Czech Republic (possibly even in Europe?). This five story club had an ice pub in the basement that Zach and I totally wanted to hit up. We went in and it was SO COOL. Even the cups were made of ice. In fact, it was so cold that you were required to wear a provided fleece-lined poncho and gloves.

 
The next floors each had a different genre of music and it was cool to dance in different genres. Zach and I left the club at about 1:45am and walked to grab a cab back to our hostels. The following morning, Zach had to leave to get a plane ride home to Luxembourg so after saying goodbye to him, which is always so difficult to do, I met up with my friends and we explored some of Prague for the day.

 I picked up Zach and I's shirts for the pub crawl and we found the Christmas markets to check out. Then we headed to the highest point in Prague which was a smaller replica of the Eiffel Tower. We climbed to the top and got some great pictures! Afterwards, I headed back to my hostel and hung out because the week had taken a toll on me. I went to bed early and then woke up at about 8:30am.  

Yesterday we got on the bus to head back to Florence at 10am. The day was long, especially considering it was mostly spent on a bus, but I've come to the sad realization that this adventure of my semester is really coming to an end. I only have 12 more days until I will be at my house in Mars, PA. and while it is going to be awesome to be home, my sense of wander has only grown immensely and I will SURELY be back to Europe many more times in my life.

I wish I could spend a second semester in Florence. I've fallen in love with this city and I know I will be a wreck the day that I leave. Its funny to think about how scared I was when I first began this adventure. I spoke with some people I find pretty important, about it...Katie Anderson, Alycia Kime, Bella Hildebrandt, Zach and his family, my coworkers this summer, my family, and many more people. Now though? I don't want to leave this experience. To say that this has been the best semester of my life would be a severe understatement. I am thankful, humble, awed and amazed at everything I have experienced, everywhere I have been, everything I have seen, and all of the wonderful people I have met and who helped me to make it happen. I know that my outlook on life has changed and I would like to think that I have changed for the better. So go. Travel. AS MUCH as possible. Keep an open mind. You really never know what the possibilities are in this life unless you take a chance.

So, here's to my final two weeks in Europe, next weekend when I get to spend a day with my teammate Eileen in Florence, and the rest of my time soaking up as much of this place as humanly possible!