Stumbling into the Spanish Steps

So yesterday me, Danielle, Sara, and Alex had to wake up for an extra PC orientation, which actually ended up being really short. Luckily, I got the chance to switch around my classes before everyone in the program. I switched out of photography because honestly, I'll be taking pictures all the time anyway, and taking it in a class doesn't make it any better quality than taking it as a tourist. Just seemed like a waste to me, especially because I wouldn't be learning anything of value to me in a basic photography class. I want to learn about the actual art surrounding me in Rome. Instead, I'm taking the Angels & Demons art history class, which Chiara, the academic coordinator, told me I absolutely had to take. You get to go to all of the museums and everything, and learn about the back-history and conspiracies behind the art. I love that stuff. I'm also taking two theology classes- one that all CEA students are required to take in our program called "The New Testament in the Eternal City," and one about the Church and other major world religions. I wanted to take the one about the history of the papacy instead, but it conflicted with the art history class. Then I'm taking a business operations class (to take care of a business core for PC), and Italian. Right after the orientation, we were able to sign up for all the events that CEA is doing for us that are included in our tuition. We signed up for:
1. The overnight trip to Venice at the end of January.
2. The day trip to Florence, but we marked that we are going one-way because we have a lot of friends in the city and plan to stay the night.
3. Pasta-making class
4. Pizza and gelato crawl
5. The ancient ruins bike trip
6. The ballet Giselle
7. The opera (since we signed up for the ballet, we have to wait and see if there's room for the opera. You had to choose a first choice. I want to go to both if there's room for me!)
7. St. Peter's Basilica Dome climb
8. and a bunch of other ones that I can't remember!

cappuccinos

After the orientation, we left and went to a bar on the corner of our street for some cappuccinos and croissants (again, only a euro for a cappuccino!). The men in the bar were super nice, and they asked me where I was from (in Italian, I could barely understand), and when I told them New York, they automatically assumed the city and tried to ask me about. I just nodded and said, "Si, si," even though I had no idea what they were saying.

Around 4 pm, we left for the walking tour that CEA was supposed to take us on. Unfortunately, we got lost for the third time. No one gave us any advice on the bus systems, and we didn't even know what number bus to get on. Finally, we walked over to the Villa Ferretti and got on the 62 line there, and still didn't really know what stop to get off of. Already a half an hour late (the tour was supposed to start downtown at 5 pm), we decided to just get off when we still had no idea where we were and walk around. We wanted to walk around the Colosseum, but never ended up finding it.

'White' - GELATO!

Instead, we stopped in a gelato place called "White" and had the most amazing gelato. It was my first time, but definitely won't be the last. I couldn't decide which flavor, either tiramisu or coffee or chocolate, but ended up settling with the chocolate. Best thing ever. I got piccolo, which was the smallest size, but it was HUGE. The sample cup looked sooo tiny, I almost got the size bigger, thank God I didn't. When the server did Alex's, he laughed when we were like, "That's piccolo?!"

We took our gelato outside because we were pretty sure they would make us pay to sit down, and walked up the cobblestone street. We took pictures wandered around, window shopping. Eventually, we reached this kind of circle with a bunch of beautiful buildings, and everyone was walking in the street. Up ahead, we could see this huge obelisk that was clearly looking out over some kind of skyline. It looked kind of important, so of course we wanted to take pictures. The view looking down in front of the obelisk was looking out over these huge steps and a fountain and what looked like great shopping. In the distance, we recognized one of the domes as St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican!

The Spanish Steps

Finally (I can't believe it took us so long to figure it out), we realized that we had just casually stumbled upon the famous Spanish Steps. Apparently I wasn't paying good enough attention to the Lizzie McGuire movie.

Prada and Gucci in front of the Steps!

While we attempted to avoid the annoying rose vendors, we snapped a bunch of photos and marveled in the windows of Chanel, Ferragamo, Valentino and Prada. Exhausted from our long afternoon and evening of exploring, we made some leftover pesto and a Caprese salad, and hung out for a wine night and some Catchphrase.