HI HI HI!
I am on a really tight schedule since I am trying to catch a train from Riomaggorie, the first of the five towns that I traveled yesterday, to Florence! Tuscany here I come. Btw i have used no contractions with I am because I cannot find the appostrophe button. I had the best travel day yesterday and I must tell you the adventures I went on yesterday but right now I am rushed. I also lost my computer plug so I can not use my computer anymore! ahhhhhh okay I GTG see ya ciao!

Biassa

        I have successfully arrived at my Ostello (Hostel) without getting lost or killing myself woohoo! The three hour train ride was successfully smooth and all...very scenic too!

Right now at Ostello Tremonti it is a small cute village where everyone lives on the edge. Well everyone here is like 60 years old or older but the houses look as if they are about as close to the edge of the mountain as physics will allow it to be without the house falling off into La Spezia. The hostel is not in Cinque terre but rather it is up high in the mountains and there is a shuttle that the hostel has that will connect me to Rigamattorie... the first town of the "five lands". Biassa is a little unknown village/town up high but the crumbling houses are just sooooooooo beautiful to me, I love it!

My pictures are quite bad in artisticness because I had chocolate all over my fingers...not a fun story. 

This was so much prettier in real life...really far you can see eve more mountain/hills...so nice. 

Also at my hostel I'm in a room with four beds but tonight it seems there is only me and another girl. She is from Argentina and speaks VERY good English. Btw she speaks french AND Italian as well...amazing. She has been traveling for more that half a year...sounds like my dream. She is super oober nice and very easy to talk to. We talked for a while and her adventures involve a WHOLE LOT of luck on her part. Crazy how lucky she gets.She meets the perfect people...I asked her if she was lucky at 18 and she said no,...so maybe I have to work up to her luckiness. She's already got a job so she's significantly older than me. She was Au pairing all over the place France, Italy, New zealand. Went to Portugal ... I don't even remember all the places. Out of the farm for a few hours and already meeting great people! I hope I stay lucky! Okay I gotta figure out and plan my day out for cinque terre tomorrow! See ya! Ciao 

<3 Em 

trenitalia

Marco says he hates saying goodbye so instead he said bye. hahah do not cry baby...it is so funny how he says this in his accent. There are so many people that come and go on the farm. it must be quite sad and exciting , sending off what seems to be parts of yourself back to where they "belong" and all over the world. Within these past two weeks i have had to say goodbye to so many people that ive grown to really like.
but rather than looking at the coming and going of these people in my life as goodbyes...i feel it is more appropriate  when i say that i look at them as moments i can keep and new parts to myself in forms of  opinion, fact, knowledge, and personality..even music. or especially music.
omy i just remembered i had a very strange dream. i will talk about the bits and pieces i recall before I forget! sooooo
i was climbing up some weird ancient matble stairs, very narrow in width, and Cloudia was hurrying me up (cloudia was like the teacher-mother of my group on my teaching trip in taiwan last summer). Anyways when i got there i realized i was late for my work study at ucla. supposedly i was given the job as pizza cooker in the cafetieria! i was working with all the athletes since the one thing we had in common was that we were all undeclared ( this was a deja vu of my orientation in which i was in a group with many athletes for exactly this reason). then one of the track girls nicely/bitchily said to me.."youre sooo late. but i kneaded your dough for you." she jumped outta what was now my station as pizza maker and i apologetically started to make my pizza...with all my buff athlete co workers doing other very seemingly strenuous cooking activities. the heat was killer in there and when we were cooking the pizza in the oven it felt more like we were all working in a coal mine instead. this part of my dream must have had something to do with the fact that while cooking in the hot kitchen with Francesco, the other day, he laughed, saying that this heat in front of his huge stoven, in his more than warm kitchen, on a 100 degree day was his prepartion and training for hell. thats why they got hells kitchen from probably. okay out of reality and back to the dream..next i was in ancient rome/ china. There were roman bells in chinese temples and we were in a desert like mountainous area. then i was in some game room or super market and noel and hannah joo were there and there was some sort of get tohether or competition we were playing for some event.. i am very confused and cant remember this part at all...so weird.
i said i felt sick got a fake call slip from my dad and went away... somewhere.
omy the train is heading out of parma into la spezia as i speak! so excited and nervous that i am on the wrong train i have buterflies in my stomach. but dude they just said la spezia on the speaker so im good plus i asked like twenty million people to confirm.

i am being super distracted and very lengthy in writing since i have nothing better to do on this two hour train. i am in disbelief that my stay at the farm is over. my ciaos ( the goodbye ciaos and not the hello ciaos...its like aloha) well my ciaos to everyone, i felt like they should have been said louder our longer or i dunno they needed to be special because i am really going to miss Francesco, marco,and lucca and theyve been only kind to me and fun and very loving. however my ciaos were cheery and short hahah and  yet i guguess thats what life is!  I rushed marco and had him stop eating  to take me to the train stationafter i finished speed eating my lunch  for the first time here. i gave francesco and marco a handmade card. a pan of pasta and a watermelon is what i respectively drew for each them.

holy crap i am really diggin into this blogging train activity arent i! i think ill tale a break. i feel like my organization was like a very complicated movie it kinda started and ended in the same place..and i went into dreams and back to reality haha inception.
okay ciao. im going to do some other train activity now.

Ciao!

CIAO CentroFiori Fattoria (100 flower farm)!

<3 !!!!

Last time

Bon Appetit!
My last breakfast here at the farm! Cookies, Biscuits, with coffee! How I will miss this sweeeeet breakfast hahha <3.
Hopefully I can help Francesco prepare the lunch before I leave....and of course help him eat it too!
Today I shockingly woke up a little cold; there was a lot of wind last night...just like the first night that I came. I suppose I come and go with the wind...or at least that's a nice way to think of it.
      Last night I had a beautiful dinner since the day before was the festa! I picked a green melon from the field myself and it was satisfyingly sweet and crunchy! Hehehe! I also picked tomatoes and pepper to add to our pasta that we cooked. For dinner there was still eggplant, chicken, baked tomatoes, cheese tomatoes, rabbit I think, and zucchini...quite the feast..but it was just Lucca and me last night.

We still sat outside and I'm glad we did because the wind was SUPER..yes it was just super...not super anything, just super!  I felt very content and happy with this last peaceful dinner. Marco is now back since it's the morning but he was at his parents house last night and Sophia left to go home yesterday too.
     I am leaving at 2:33 pm but I insisted that I have to work. I would not want my last day on the farm to be too easy, or I'd miss it too much. hahha just kidding. I'll miss it just as much.

WAH

            So I am finally leaving the farm tomorrow. It was actually on short noticed because I realized I have so little time left and I would love to see other things as much as I love love love life on the farm (minus the mosquiotoes... those little effers). Today is Sunday and I will be packing up to leave for Cinque Terre! One of the most beautiful places....EVER! I've booked my hostel for two nights: Monday and Tuesday. I am quite excited about my alone time adventures and hope everything goes well! on wed and thursday i'll be in Florence or Sienna and on Thursday I 'll be arriving in ROMA! I'll be staying with Rachel and Sarah and on if I make it on Thursday night I'll be going to Sarah's open mic night at some Irish pub! Woohoo!!
           I will dearly dearly miss not being able to have dinner here tomorrow and the day after and forever after that. When I leave this place, there will definitely be some farm times in my heart that I will never forget...and even more, many lessons learned. There was ANOTHER festa last night and I think it really topped them all.  I had a great time. I understood many of the jokes...except for the crude ones...so good thing. I looked at all the dishes Francesco made last night and was satisfied to realize I recognized all the ingredients to his dishes and had made most of them with him at one point or another! Also I picked all the vegetables that were there as dishes last night. Then we had this AMAZING lava cake brownie thing...super awesome. We drank wine and we said cheers and everyone was joking or serious about how I would now have to return to the States and wait 3 years to drink wine again :( hahha. Btw I learned a lot about alcohol here. It is very casual. We don't drink to get stupidly drunk...or even drunk. We have it at dinner, at lunch and we have it with food. We have some more after dinner to enjoy an easygoing conversation with music and relaxation all around...tranquillo is the word. No one makes a fool out of themselves and everyone is relaxed. Alcohol is great if you can learn to respect it and not abuse it. hahaha this sounds so cliche but there it is. Never drank in high school but here I am in europe learning that if I shall do it, I shall do it right.
        My wwoofer friends told me about all the drinking games i should avoid in college..but actually it was just avoid all drinking games hahha.
     Well today I'll be spending my day packing up and seeing what I need to do on the farm. It's sunday so I don't think there is any big dinner. Lets see what i can whip up...I think however that the only thing I have truly mastered is a freaking mean fresh salad hahhaha very sad. I need to practice my other dishes more!
Okay I REALLY need to go clean my wasp infested restroom and my hurricane-ed up bedroom. There is literally a circle of dead wasps aligned around my toilet....i have no idea how they die themselves but they usually are alive and healthy in the morn and I find another dead one on the floor at night. Scary wasp murder in my restroom!
AITE CLEANNING TIME BABBY!
CIAO!
<3

Life is goooooood

I haven't been posting for 3 days probably because it's SO HOT that I do not think of approaching my computer...and exerting extra energy...hahaha I'm only kind of kidding.
Anyways last three days have gone by super fast and I can't believe it's been another week. Now the two American wwoofers, Rachel and Sarah, are leaving!! :( I didn't travel anywhere with them because we all stayed on the farm for the week but it has been a lot of fun getting to know them. They are both nice and super funny. They give me great advice...on life...we play 20 questions..and we simply hang out on the farm during down time.
 Marco asked for water....so I splashed just a tiny cup of water on him as we were standing outside...and then we had a HUGE ASS water fight yesterday. HE ran and got a huge waterbottle... then he upgraded to a bucket and rachel, sarah, and I were dead wet in a few seconds. So we all got bottles and marco attacked EVERYONE on the farm, Siad, Sandro, etc...until there was only Francesco. Who he pretended to be plotting against with us (the already wet people) and then instead he was actually plotting with Francesco. Who came running at us with some big blue bucket he pulled outta nowhere...and I ran but once I got engulfed in the water I turned around and he was under Sarah sprawled on the floor laughing because he completely slipped. and he himself was also soaked. hahhah water times. Btw Rachel and Sarah are always saying things as "times" like ______ times. We walk through a bunch of mud...."Aww man...mud times". we talk about a past dinner. "Food times. Food times." hahha there's always a new lingo i'm learning here.
Last night all the wwoofers ate together in this one room since there were police men having family parties outside at the bbq. It was like being in a slave quarter...eating disgracefully indoors hahha it was quite funny.
For the last 3 nights we've been making our own dinner. Cous Cous, and fresh salad. mmmmmmmm so good :) and everything was literally picked right off the farm.
Today we had a bbq and it was DELICIOUS. Red wine to top it off... i think we stayed up till 1 or 2, listening to Ella and Louis outside under the skyyyyy. I also realized how great it was to be here when I had said...wait up guys i don't think we have enough lettuce...I'll just bike to the lettuce patch! I cut off a lettuce head and we cut up tomatoes that we JUST picked and had a DEFINITION-OF-FRESH tomato salad. I hated tomatoes until i came here. Now I LOVE LOVE LOVE them hahaha. probably will hate them back in the states though.
After work today we did various activities and sports by the lake....:) skipping stones and reed-lance throwing, rock-shotput throwing, and some hiking to get to a nicer view.  OMG Its 5 am. I think I'll take a nap and wake up to see what we're doing this saturday!
<3 em

Harvesting

So today was intense harvesting morning. I got up and started harvesting courgette and zucchini . Then we harvested melons and lettuce. While we were harvesting lettuce, Marco and I saw a huge hare in the patch and Marco literally ran, chasing after it, while the nets around the patch worked surprisingly; the hare got tangled in the net after charging at it multiple times. Eventually, however Marco was cursing and proved that he was no competition for the hare and its powerful hind legs...This vividly reminded me of the old stories I used to read as a kid...Peter the Rabbit. It was a very scary children's story of a rabbit going onto a farmer's lettuce patch and ALMOST getting caught...Today was my child story being played out right in front of my eyes in a matter of seconds! haha...quite terrifying for the hare I must say.
     Now is 1:00 PM...I wonder what's for lunch. Yesterday being Francesco's cooking assistant was intense because some people from the speed track came and ordered a lavish dinner and on very short notice. Maybe I'll go down and help him for lunch in a few minutes. And maybe today I will bike to Modena. We'll see.
I plan to use the hero recorder sometime this week and show a video of the farm area and stuff...that would be quite cool!
kk ciao!
<3 em

New day

         Yesterday...hmmmm what did I do? Well ummmm Sophie is back! Also the two new wwoofers came the night before last night and one is called Rachel and the other is called...I forgot. Whoops. Anyways they are brilliant; both of them have graduated from college and have lived in Rome for 4 years! Their Italian is crazy fluent. One of them is originally from Pensilvanyia and now is an English teacher at a summer camp.  Originally however, she majored in music at University...for singing..How awesome is that?! The other, originally from Seattle studied Archaeology and graduated NYU, and after coming to Italy to study abroad, she now manages a tourist thing in Rome and teaches I think.
         Right now is 6:30 am but its nice and cool here. Yesterday was really hot and I had the best time harvesting potatoes. It was really inefficient however, even Marco admitted. We were cursing every few minutes, because the shovel/hoe's we were using to dig were stabbing perfectly beautiful potatoes and we no longer can sell those. Lucca asked me how we harvest potatoes in LA...and I was like, "I got no clue..." I better start my research. Plus I am thinking about finding a farm near LA when I get back to spend some time on and maybe learn a little more about all this. Potato digging was an adventure and a thrill because it took a lot of energy to shovel but it was SO exciting to uncover from the crumbling soil, a few unscathed potatoes; it was literally almost like finding gold/treasure!
        It's surprising how fragile people are when they are in nature though. I was trying to harvest the potatoes without gloves at first and in a few seconds I was being stabbed by sharp weeds and had needles in my foot. I tried to pick up a potato but more weeds in the ground were attacking my thin padded palms. I yelped...it felt like my hand was a water balloon. I was prone to being pierced and harmed by these small and seemingly immobile creatures. I put on my gloves. It was then that I remembered this one movie, in which some wise old man said humans are made of water and when pierced ...it comes out and we die...well something of that sort anyways.
Oh and the farm got a few bikes yesterday, so maybe I'll be able to use one of them, even if they are all man bikes.
Also props to my girls basketball team, because yesterday the two new wwoofers loved the Contact game that I showed them, the one our team always plays on the bus and for long rides and stuff. It was pretty fun. The two wwoofers didn't get enough work yesterday and were playing 20 questions for a while. hahah
Anyways we ate pizza and went to bed late. And when I told the two wwoofers that I was going to visit Rome later on in my stay, they immediately started asking my plans, and came to offer a room at their place. The other one also threw in the fact that, if I wanted to do more than wander the streets, she could work something out, "I mean..I manage a touring business." she said. Hahha, these girls are great and I felt like all of this was too convenient so I'm quite excited, but we'll see how everything works out! They'll be gone before I am, since they can only stay for a week.

well it's a new day and I need to get to work soon. The bells on the farm just rang so that means it's 7:00AM!
<3 em

Suckers

I passionately hate mosquitoes and they are all I can think about as my body itches all over from stupid mosquito bites.. so heres to you TIGER MOSQUITOES!  

                                                                                             

                                                                                  HI, 

                                                                                       also i took from a little surrealism that I   

                                                                                 learned from Peggy Guggenheims 

                                                                        collection...this picture is up to your interpretation lol 

A SUCKY POEM FOR YOU SUCKERS        

or
HOPE THIS POEM SUCKS... cuz YOU DO! 

You are my enemy yet now my sister*

Your blood is mine and I want it back

 You’re a thief who I’d kill, rather than catch

 You prefer perfecting ambush over attack                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

Your feasting place has become my disgrace

My self destruction then soon occurs

I scratch…and still it hurts

The more I scratch the more I curse

I will spray but I’ll never be safe

From you there is simply no escape

I’d rather a vampire show up when it’s late

At least I can see his long billowing black cape

Striped… so they call you tiger**

But you’re an invisible monster

I’d rather be eaten whole as a tiger’s jungle food

Than be sucked slowly to death by something like you

I hate you, I hate you, I hate you

But hey, you haven’t won.

I’ll stab you. I’ll smash you. I’ll smush you.

You SUCK. In more ways than one…  

*all mosquitoes that bite/suck your blood are female

**the striped mosquitoes here in italy are called tiger mosquitoes


Jie... is mine better than yours?

Super Sunny Sunday

It was the hottest day of my life. That's probably not true but today I walked all the way to Rubiera, a "nearby" town under the blaring heat of the unforgiving sun...it is definitely as dramatic as it sounds; and that's why I will deem today, the hottest day. My throat was so dry and with no room on the itsy bitsy skinny streets for pedestrians it was slightly terrifying. There was a good 6 inches between me and any passing car.....I know I exaggerate a lot, but I'm serious...it was either 6 inches our less. So of course to not freak out and give up on my trip to Rubiera I sang Adele songs and songs I made up about dying... very loudly and badly for a whole hour on my trip there...I was so thirsty, I got there and downed a coke, a water, and a frizzy water back to back.  
    Oh  wait before my adventures today however, I woke up at six today to say goodbye to Lisa and it was wayyyy toooo early to be sad :(...but i'm saadd.
I wrote her a note with games to play and random stuff...like pictograms and pick up lines to use. .you must know how long and horrible Italian train rides can be in order to understand what a great gift I gave hahaha ;)
Ok so I woke up thinking we were doing strawberry stuff today but really that's tomorrow. Today was free so I actually lied(is it lay?) in bed for 3 hours until I went downstairs and stupidly tried to bike the bike/motorbike that was illegal to use on the streets; one of the farmworkers said i could ride it around on the farm. I was innocently planning to only use the biking aspect of this hybrid jigmajig and I started to bike it with the pedals, when all of sudden it started blaring up and motoring! holy shizz! I was motoring around on the farm until I realized I didn't know how to break. I dug my foot in the ground and jumped off the bike, but it was still going so i just ran along side this bike that was driving away from me. It was like trying to tame and calm down a wild horse...so the farmer guy came and turned it off...very easily. I still want a vespa when I get back though...however traumatizing this experience was. :)

    Anyways I wanted to go shopping at that huge mall/supermarket because it was too hot to be walking outside in Rubiera. It's a super charming city however! It would be really fun if I actual saw people that were outside on the streets...to prove that people were actually living... but it was a Sunday and Italians literally do NOTHING. NO shops are open, maybe 1  out of every 30 shops are open. I was trying to get to the supermarket now because I had already enjoyed the backstreets as much as the heat allowed. I asked some dude where to go...it was apparently in the opposite direction and I started to walk...after 30 minutes I thought I might be fried by the sun and I had no water. The same man I asked for directions stopped on the side of the road. STAY AWAY FROM STRANGERS..my "taken" instincts yelled! "I'm going to Grand Emilia...do you need a ride? I'll take you there." I'm sure this is not close to what he said...he could not have said all this with the less than basic english skills he had.it was so hot that I have no recollection how understood anything. Anyways I said NO right away and he was like "ohh okay" and was about to leave and then I ran after him and was like "Wait OK!"
So I got in and was freaking out as I did, making sure, however I could, to check if this guy would be a weirdo or something...I've never done this test on anyone but I made up my own theories.  I also had my hand on my seat belt the whole time in case I needed to jump out....I had my french teacher in mind the whole time...Once, she got a ride from a creepy stranger and bolted at a stop light. I deeply regretted getting in the car after because I thought of all the ways he could kill me, but seriously.....everything was good. I did my own way of checking up...if there was anything wrong. First of all...scanning the car, I see a baby seat in the back! that's good right?! Then I kept on confirming the direction and talking about where is the market and stuff. Then I ask him about his family... you don't look Italian, where are you from? Sri Lanka. Good you wouldn't be a foreign murder...that's too complicated. Why are you going to the market. Just to buy water. That's a perfectly sensible reason to go to the market. Where is the market now? Right there... he points to the left! YES I"M ALIVE and I was saved from the heat!

God knows, it would have taken me at least an hour or two to get to the market....with all the winding roads and  stuff... I was very thankful. And today I was reminded that not everyone is trying to kidnap and sell people. It's still scary though and hard to know when to trust and if you should trust people, so I think... I will just be aware of signs and be safe but also open. It's very hard actually to be all of this at once hahha, you just have to do what ya gotta do. Anyways I bought drinks, drawing materials, and something else. I can't say what it is just yet...but anyways I bought it. Okay so I've got the fan that used to be in Lisa's room so I am in a good mood. The two wwoofers are coming tonight and I don't know what to expect. I just know now that one is an American girl but she now lives in Rome...weird. We'll see anyways tomorrow.
Good night/day!
<3 Em

A DAY IN THE SUN

...like literally a whole day. We went to Rubiera's huge pool today and lounged from 1pm to 7pm... I didn't stay in the sun, but it was a day lying under the umbrella going in and out of the 3 feet deep pool where the men (who only wore speedos) and the women were so tan they looked burnt. No tourists here; it's a hidden place for locals but there we were an Irish and American...not fitting in at all.


Lounging....

 Cafe Monte Bianco at the pool cafe

Also it's pretty awesome that Marco has a rock band. hahha...I right now, listening to him and his band play rock music on a farm is just so out of place that I love it.  I just got back and I'm pretty exhausted from not doing anything the whole day. Weird how that works out isn't it? I think I might take a jog on the farm later, to the lake or something. Sophia, Marco's girlfriend was gone at the beach this whole week but she'll be back to take me out tomorrow; tomorrow is also the day Lisa is leaving....:(




HOWEVER apparently Marco said he totally forgot but there are two wwoofers that are coming...WHAATTTT THEEE ? !!! right? They are from the US! It's going to be a very weird situation around here, because I'll be able to communicate properly. They speak Italian too though!
I mean, yes Lisa speaks English but since she has a Dublin accent it's almost like another language sometimes; they also have many different word usages and phrases.
You know Colin Ferrell is from Dublin?!
Okay so I'll be cleaning up my Italian and going for a jog.I've been here for more than a week and it's going by lightning fast. Plus I think I haven't done much farm work; maybe once Lisa is gone I think I'll be working a lot more! Oh yes! Tomorrow there will be lots of work actually, because Marco says we'll be planting strawberries!!! YAY!

Venice...in 6 hours?!

Venice in 6 hours....

Venice is one of the most beautiful places. That's why trying to cover the multiple islands in 6 hours was not so great of an idea. Lisa and I got really lucky by getting a train to Bologna and Rubiera without waiting even a minute!

We got out of the train station and were amazed by the view of the Grand Canal. Heading for San Marco's Piazza we went for a 30 minute walk because we didn't want to spend money on the boat. 

And really it's crazy because cars are all replaced with boats here. There are taxi boats, UPS boats, Gondolas, bus boats, normal speed boats-it is all so cool. But this form of transportation that Venice ran on was new to us as well as pricey. We got a slice of pizza from the cafe and set off to find San Marco absolutely astounding!

The San Marco's Basillica is the church with the multiple domes while the tall thing on the right is the San Marco watch tower.

We took a few pictures among the pigeon paradise in the middle of the Piazza, but we were running from them as they dived from the sky that we couldn't get any decent pictures. Maybe Lisa has one or two; my camera is dying.

Then we wanted to see the Doge's Place. We got a museum pass for four museums in the Piazza but we literally are so guilty to say that ...uhhh it was really boring. The art was wonderfully beautiful but we took a fifteen minute roundabout and knew better than to tire ourselves through the 87 rooms awaiting us in the HUGE museum. The doom was foreshadowed in the faces of the tired, pissed and unhappy British family sitting in the Museum cafe who had just finished the museum tour. It was too funny and sad at the same time, Lisa and I had to run out of there.
Anyways our next goal was the MUST SEE Peggy Guggenheim Museum. A collection of her favorite paintings and sculptures, her museum competes with her husbands: the Guggenheim Museum in New York. Well, actually it's probably one of the SMALLEST museums but it was great because Lisa and I bought the audio to the Museum and listed to how the abstract art of Max Ernst was always seemingly depicting naked women and symbolizing his affairs etc. It was really interesting to become experts on cubism , surrealism, realism and all the isms...Ugghh I'm so distracted... I'm trying to kill a mosquitoe that is eating me alive as I type.
Anyways we spent loads of time going through that museum and we didn't really have time to explore a lot of the backstreets of venice though we did have a good main look around the bridges, cross the Grand Canal by a big bus boat, and buy some painting/post card stuff. It is such a charming place, especially in the piazza with music playing and pidgeons flying; I must say they really do make the beauty of the scene....when they are not flying at your head, two inches from your face.
Lisa and I learned a lesson in the end however, do not procrastinate. You would have thought thousands of late night cramming for tests and projects would have done the job and taught me to be smarter. But no... we didn't buy our tickets back from Venice and we missed the train we needed to take. Instead we took a train an hour later and then realized there were none to the final destination we needed... it was all very complicated and scary, but we ended up transferring to Modena and waiting for Lucca to pick us up. Lisa and I had a seat by the corner of the street. I started to teach her the southern accent, because we were talking about the movie Sweet Home Alabama. "...Fried Chicken and Apple pie" we were laughing out loud while we perfected our southern accents... then all these old men (in their 50's i'd say) went up to the girl next to us and started being shady....she had boots to her knees and ripped stockings...shoulda knew.. Lisa and i started being as unprostitutely as possible talking southern some more to scare the men and quickly walking away as they looked our direction...ugggghhhhh... it was disgusting.
Lisa and I were kind of really disturbed but then as we were shuddering I asked her if she watched "Pretty Woman." You never know, maybe this girl is gonna have her fairy tale ending like Julia Roberts...or at least, lets just think of it that way.
okay anyways we got home safe. And Lucca gave us a scare because it took us 10 min to start the c.ar once he got here...I'm so tired. Today was an adventure. I am glad we went to Venice, but next time I gotta have more time hahha
aite good day and good night ...whatever the time is where you are or I am.
<3 Em

I WORK OUT.... on the farm

        Compared to the Italian, my family's dragging two hour dinner at whatever restaurant we go to is only too short. Here the dinner starts at 8 and ends at 12. We eat, we talk, we drink, and we talk more, we listen to music, sometimes sing music badly, then joke about...crazy things, relate fruits to sex, take out the godly melons for desert and   finally....drink red wine while talking some more.
        Today I did a lot of work. I woke up and went straight to putting on a face mask and overalls, forgetting about the routine coffee and biscuits. Rita, one of the few girl farmers, is a healthy, strong, and grey haired lovely lady. She is a grandmother and yet she's doing the shiz; I can barely do what she does. First she taught me to use that huge razor mower that looks like a huge metal detector and I went around doing that. Soon I got to using Edward Scissorhand work for a few hours...didn't cut anything fancy like a dragon or a roman sculpture...but I accomplished in sizing down a fairly large row of bushes.
Then we composted stuff on the farm. After, Lisa, Lucca, and I both claimed a row in the spinach patch and weeded the hell out of the area. Finally I picked fresh pomodori ( tomatoes); I was one with nature and didn't use gloves for the first hour. Interestingly picking Pomodori is one of the ugliest jobs. Your hands come out looking like you're the hulk... i swear i will show you a pic next time...but for now imagine your hands hardening and stained a completely wicked-witch-of-the-west-green.

    Anyways I really had a work out today. I was taught some stuff about tomatoes and more things about melons. Being one with nature is great; knowing how much hard work is being put into the product of a beautiful slice of a tomato on your hamburger is enlightening. Note that your tomato really does come straight out of the earth, live among ugly and beautiful insects and animals, webs, and dirt; know that they were probably picked by "wicked"green-rough looking hands, and a person who is being eaten alive by mosquitoes. I think the girls basketball team should go work out on a farm instead of going to the weight room. Carrying baskets of Pomodories ( tomatoes )= weight lifting. Scissoring bushes = upper arm workout.  Shoveling= upper body. Mosquito bites= persistence and discipline. We'd be working out and helping out at the same time. :)

alrighty tom Lisa and I are heading to Venice! wish us luck!
<3 M

Oh dear, I do apologize for my horrible post last night. It sounds like a fifth grader wrote it....

Ferre l'augosto

Today, we tried to sunbathe on the farm. Today Marco and his band played hard rock and it was fun. Lisa and I escaped the area however because we were singing and making our own music! We walked further into the nature of the farm and sat in the middle of the hay and dead grass to play and sing. Finally we had another party with the friends and band members of Marco; there are 3 men. With a grill outside, they made dinner and we ate wonderful steaks, beef, and bacon. We spoke English together because they spoke it well. They were so funny and easy to joke with. We even had some time to show them the uke. I am a little out of it right now...drank wine at the party. I need to sleep. good night. I really liked today. Ferre L'augosto. I was spelling it wrong the whole time. I shall tell you more about meeting Marco's Friends when I am awake and not weird. Buono Notte!
<3 Em

FESTA!

I am so used to having back to back tasks and things to be done all the time, during school or even in the summer, that I am running to Marco asking if he needs help... and he is always telling me to calm down. A phrase that Marco always says out of the few English phrases that he has perfected is, "Not a problem." Nothing is a problem for him. Everything is good. :)
But yesterday we did work harvesting for the market that is taking place today, Wednesday. I harvested Watermelons, tiger melons, other melons, Zucchini, chili pepper thingies, and also I threw away rotten melons into the compost bin. You know, it was amazing because some of the zucchini's were the size of baseball bats...you could kill someone with it; sadly we can't sell them though, since they are too huge.
So moral of the story learned on the farm yesterday... bigger is not always better.

After this, I worked in the kitchen with Francesco, the cook, to prepare the lunch! It was my first time and I think I failed but Francesco said I was a good assistant! hehe. I grilled zucchini and I grilled eggplants and I made a tomato baked dish. I am super excited to learn more, but I was quite satisfied with my cooking yesterday!
Finally, I took a cold shower; there is only cold water here. It is very scary to take a cold shower btw, it takes me 30 minutes to convince myself that, yes, I am freaking dirty and that I NEED to shower, even if it means freezing to death.
Lisa and I got a lift to the  Grande Emilia, that super huge market with Ipercoop and everything.
I needed to get a local phone plan for emergencies and she needed to buy gifts since she is leaving soon.
It was quite fun and we accomplished our goals. I even bought one of those coffee makers for home woohoo!!
We had to catch the bus home and we were dreading it since communicating with the bus driver usually turns out to be a disaster. However, it was surprisingly easy this time. The bus driver was a smiley guy and he talked to us for the whole time...or at least with Lisa because she at least had some Italian speaking skills. I just smiled and laughed. He even told us not to pay, but I had already put the money in! We got to the farm in five minutes and we were soooo happy!
We made sure we walked by all the farm workers just to let them know...wassupp we're still alive and we got back all by ourselves!!!
OH and Festa is party...so you should know that last night they threw a huge party for a friend of a friend of Marco's...Her name is Valentina. There were about 25 or 30 people last night here for the huge festa and so Lisa, Lucca, and I, for once dressed up and were not wearing farm clothes. Oh and right before we went down for the party at nine, we had some free time and Lisa and I had a jam session in her room. She really misses singing, since she is like a hard core musician and lives in a house of musicians in Ireland. I never really heard her sing before because we would like sing softly at the train station, but deear lordy lord I was amazed. We did, "Dream a little Dream" and she was bustin it out!  hahha it was really great. She's done more than a few gigs and has a little band. Anyways we were even joking about doing happy birthday on the uke for this Valentina girl we didn't even know, but after really thinking about it...we thought...better not.

The festa was perfecto! The candles were lit, as we sat outside under the stars, hearing Louis Armstrong in the background of the night while enjoying a beautiful Italian buffet. However there were some disturbing parts of the dinner; like when I found that my foot was prodding a half dead pidgeon for half the dinner...in which I initially thought was someones bag under the table. Also when Marco decided the best way to get  a beetle away from him was to flick it onto me...hahha
      It was a great night and finally we said Buono notte and I did the Italian-kissing-on-both-cheeks to about 15 people as I said Ciao and good night. You really had to make a statement about which side you were going to start on for the polite goodbye kisses, because I almost ran into a few peoples faces and straight up kissed them on the mouth because I was indecisive about which side to start on. Oh gosh i make it sound so hard and like a challenge but really its very easy to warm up to people quickly here in Italy.  

Modena

Darn, I missed journal-ing my journey on Monday.
I was too tired! We planted at least a hundred some little plant thingys...I never remember what anything is called; I will start putting a pen and paper in my back pocket at all times.. so I can write everything down! Anyways we did that and it was quite the work out. Wait! I think it was called Finnochi! Ok, then it was a pretty laid back first official day of work because this week is "Faire L'augosto"- that Italian holiday made just so everyone can have a break from the heat. Lucca, Lisa, and I went to Modena, met up with Irena, who is one of the worker's daughter, and we took a tour of the city. My legs are now sore from walking so much, but it's a pretty small town and it's cute! Yesterday the city was pretty empty and the free biking store was closed (it's closed until August 16).

Lets look at the city of Modena!


Irena says this is one of her favorite houses in Modena! This whole yellow house stretches out even longer towards the back for about 3 blocks! The grapevines that you see growing atop the balcony level are rare and one of the last grown in the 20th century! Sadly no one lives in the house because the two brothers who own the house are arguing what to do with it!....

This is a Roman Gothic church, one of the first of it's kind!
 And even though most other things in the town were closed for the Holiday, Irena said the priests don't take vacations, so we got to have a look inside.

 It says Jan here and there is a man sitting there trying to make a fire for the winter. This little picture thing is carved on the pillars next to the entrance of the church to inform the illiterate of the things they do each month...on top of this Jan carving is then Feb and so on and so on, the pic are different for each month.











I thought that this looked like Curious George but anyways this is the August picture, the month we are in now; so that is me working on the farm. 

 GELATO TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
There were two of these spinning flavor machines....So many flavors i just chose randomly...

 I'm Rue! That's right, tree climbing in the park!
little kids climb these trees, since they are so easy to climb with all the sturdy branches. When I was up there, I got pretty high and I asked Irena if anyone ever died falling off this tree. And she said that of course no one had fallen, but once a man tried to hang himself from the tree...that's when I freaked out and rapidly started to descend the branches without even knowing I was doing so...









Anyways lots of free time after working in the fields, because we don't work when it gets hot so I've just been drawing some Italian stuff. This is a hand sculpture I saw somewhere and the bottom is the coffee maker I use to make awesome Italian coffee every morning!

A Lazy Sunday

So I rested a lot today since we just came back from Verona in the afternoon.
Lisa and I, then went down to make some dinner. She was going to make us some pasta and since I know nothing about cooking Lisa said I should just get the uke and entertain hahaha. It's great because she knows nearly all my favorite artists...Ingrid Michaelson, Regina Spektor, Jack Johnson, Adele, Florence, Taylor, even the oldies. I was so excited and it's so fun talking about music together or singing songs with each other.; she's really good. But anyways, I sang songs and played my uke while she cooked the pasta...however I did cut the chicken and cook it along with some vegetables, so I wasn't completely hopeless. Lucca came and he never played the uke but he fiddled with it like he knew how to play! He says he plays the guitar and I'm guessing he could play classical guitar. We finally finished cooking and ohhh the pasta was goooood hahahha. The three of us sat talking about our travels and other fun stuff and we ended up playing cards. We each taught a game of our own and it was brilliant because it was so international...Lucca from Italy, Lisa from Ireland, and myself from America. Our games were all different. Lisa showed a game called Rummy, Lucca showed us a game similar to Rummy but it was called....uhhh Spechaizia something... I totally forgot, but yeah. And I of course showed them how to play Egyptian War hahhah. It was fun learning these new games, but it was tiring too. Haven't used my brain that much since summer school statistics. Hehehe. Well, it was a good night so good night! Buono notte!
<3 em

"REBELIOUS SUBJECTS, ENEMIES OF PEACE... "

"...throw your mistempered weapons to the ground!"
It was about six years ago when I angrily yelled these words of Shakespeare "in the streets of Verona" (which was actually the mpr of Leal Elementary) as Prince-ss Escalus. Hehehe, well, you'd only know if you went to Leal with me six years ago...it was our Romeo and Juliette play! And here I am again, yet for the first time in Verona's streets, where Romeo and Juliette  (which is actually spelled Guilietta) fell in love and tragically died. Well, I'm back at the farm now, but I was there yesterday and I had the best time in Verona...it was ridiculous!
Verona was only the first of the famous cities that I visited, but I have a feeling it will be up there as one of my favorites no matter what.

So basically our trip started at 10:00 am.
Lisa and I took the train from Rubiera (20 min drive from the farm) all the way to Bologna. Then we transferred to Verona. I am not going to try to explain how beautiful and cute the city was. The best I can do is show you:
We ate pizza to fuel up for our adventures...the three hour train ride had really drained us hahha.

After a whole pizza each, I think we were now super excited to discover the city!



First we went to see "La Casa de Guilietta," where Romeo climbed up her balcony to profess his love. Oh but wait, Romeo and Juilette are fictional characters! Heehehe, forgot that didn't you?! Yeah, but someone decided to to make some money off of lame romantics/tourists like myself.  And that's why "La Casa de Guilletta" is in quotes, it's only a hypothesis as to which house Shakespeare might have drawn his imagination from for the famous setting of the love story. It was awesome though. Lovers and couples come from everywhere come to immortalize their love for whomever, along the walls beneath the balcony of Juiliette.

Everything is legal here...look at all this vandalism. Lisa and I took this chance
to carve our names in the walls as well!

Someone wrote a sad love letter to Juliette or his girlfriend...it was quite confusing, but it sounded quite bitter sweet. It held the key to a lock that was on the wall of a bajillion locks that couples wrote their names on together..


oh and it's apparently good luck to rub the right breast of the Guilietta statue in the courtyard...Lisa and I  were already foolish enough to be here so of course we did that too.

Then we went up to the watch tower in Piazza del Urbe; there are many Piazzas in the city and they are basically square plazas.
Here's the view...we climbed all the way to the top.







Also on the way climbing down the stairway we ran straight into a pigeon. so freaky... somehow it got into the tower. hahaha


Then we went into a fountain!



Then we spent money...




We walked around a lot. saw a lot of great stuff, drank a lot of great stuff, and visited l'Arena. It's an outside arena, like the Colusseum, but now it's used for operas. And you know, we wanted to see the Opera SOOOO BADLY but there was no train line open after the opera, which finishes at 12:00AM. What to do?!?!?!?...we sat there, both of us indecisive, until we both said out loud, something along the lines of, " Shit, we're in Verona...when are we ever going to be in Verona again to watch an opera?"
We bought 9:00pm tickets for the opera that was playing: Turandot.
We called Marco and said we wouldn't be back until tomorrow. We were staying overnight in Verona, who knows where, but we were staying; we HAD to watch the opera. hehe

One of the most amazing experiences of my life must have just simply been in the Arena, watching this opera. Both of us knew nothing about Turandot by Puccini and could not understand it, even though we got a translation playbook. It was still beautiful as ever and we got the main gist of the story....which was an asian love story, all sung in Italian. I recognized one very famous song in it called "Nessun Dorma"...and I think many people would know it ...it goes like..."Vincero!!!Vincerooooo!!!!" You might have heard Pavoratti sing it before.
Ok so  here are some magical pics of us in l'Arena...So Exciting!








We brought some wine and enjoyed the breeze of the night while listening to some amazing singing and very dramatic acting...it was absolutely lovely.
This picture on the right is of the arena while people were getting seated. The orchestra pit is on the very right of the picture. They are right beneath the stage!

Here is the arena right before the opera started. Some people had candles so that's why there are little lights in the seating areas.
Down where there are no lights, that's the EXPENSIVE area, and the fighting area of the arena  in the past.

Then here comes the rough part....finding the hostel. It took us two hours looking around to find the "Youth Ostello." But finally, tired yet satisfied we crashed atop these shabby little bunks in the ostello!
Like we say in girls' basketball.....

 Go BIG or go home. 

And we did exactly that.
We went BIG and stayed at an ostello...
YAY!

A picture of the calm river that runs through the city of Verona.

PS. Here is my breakfast for the next morning (today) at Bologna, while waiting for the train back :) PS
YUMM.

le mercato.

PLEASE DON'T READ THIS UNLESS YOU ARE VERY BORED WITH YOUR LIFE........ it is SUPER LONG...as you can see, it's almost a novel ...
    I wrote this one mostly for me; it's written, journal/diary style, no dark secrets or anything though.
     

    I woke up at six, I didn't even need an alarm, paranoid that I would miss the work; I was ready to do some hard labor and all that good stuff. La casa, the house, which is four stories high (the three wwoofers on the third level, Sophia and Marco on the second level), was instead silent and still. Everyone was sleeping. I read my UCLA book hehe, I softly plucked at my uke, I went on the computer, I studied Italian; finally at 10AM, everyone was awake. I made coffee in this amazing little tin contraption you put on a stove that is exactly the opposite of our coffee makers in the US...I want to explain it but I'll just show you a picture of it tomorrow.Today I was so enticed by my work I didn't take any pictures.

Except this one, a (6:30am) picture of the outside of the restaurant and where we eat:

 And for the record, the coffee is so amazing, I am buying an Italian coffee maker to bring back! I told Sophia, who is Marco's girlfriend, that I drink Starbucks and she scoffed, saying that drinking Starbucks is like drinking water. It was great. Haha.
Then after a satisfyingly sophisticated breakfast of coffee, milk, and a variety of biscotti, one of which is called Stella something, I was very content...and NOW ready to work. However Marco wanted me to rest and so Sophia took me to the hugest SUPER DUPER market in the region of Emilia Romagna: Ipercoop.
It was a mall, plus a supermarket like Walmart the size of 2 Costco's...I hope that makes sense, but what I'm saying is its style is more like a Walmart, its size more like a Costco... or two.
I mean, the workers there were wearing roller skates to get around...they were also wearing striped red and white skirts...so I guess this place was also like Ruby's.There were too many choices, so it made my head spin just trying to pick which bread to buy or mosquito protection to use, it was kind of like being in Forever 21.
      I realize I am using a lot of comparatives to things in America, but ironically Italy and America are completely different.
    It was fun shopping with Sophia; she's really really nice. It was also funny because we were looking to buy me a watch, but when we asked a worker where to find it, he just said it was where the perfumes were...so now we were looking for the perfumes in order to look for the watch.

     Anyways, after that, I went home and picked some Fragalini with Lisa (the wwoofer from Dublin), ate a beautiful and heavenly lunch made by our chef Francesco, and prepared for the market, or in Italian, le mercato. It was so small, le mercato, half the size of cerritos farmers market...but it was because right now is faire l'augosto, basically an italian holiday, a week of freedom simply bestowed upon the people by the unmerciful heat. But then again, if you are Italy it's the whim for the win. If you own a shop and you don't want to work, just flip the sign over and that's it. You are closed if you want to be closed.
        Everyone migrates to the beach this weekend, so the Modena market was very small today. I was so tired and I've never been able to not talk for such a long period of time. All I got to say was, "Grazie" and "Ciao" and "Sorry, I'm from the states". I am really going to study Italian hard core every night here. It's very crazy to stand there and for once be the one thinking, " Goodness, he's talking way too fast. I don't know what he's saying; wish he'd slow down." hahhah I apologize when I speak fast, I shall slow down...from now on. But then again its another language...I kept on accidentally speaking french hahaha ( FYI, the Italian don't have much love for the French).

     Oh and tonight is "stella cadente", the night of the falling stars,  but we had a great feast ready when we came back. It lasted so long I just came back to the room and didn't look at the stars. Francesco made grilled pork, chicken, ribs, zucinni and cheese...again a beautiful meal. I had lots of wine and got really sleepy...basically the stock for alcohol here is endless. The wine was made on the farm and this just made it feel like it wasn't alcohol hahaha it was red wine, and tasted quite nice.
We had dinner with a many other guests, the chef's wife and son, three other farm workers, and  Alberto, one of the most passionate people I have ever met. He and us Wwoofers exchanged opinions as he brought up things like permaculture, failed revolutions, the disgusting invention of the interest system, corruption of the bank... the world, lies of the Vietnam war, lies of 9-11, lies of Kennedy's assassination, the mafia, the Illuminati. It was great. The wine had made me sleepy, but I could not sleep while this guy was talking. Firstly he was brilliant and second, he was Italian and his hands were all over the place, showing his frenzy.
Marco got in on this too...when it came to talking about "the fucking system", and while he was at it he made sure we didn't forget about his obsession with his melons.
   "This," he said, holding up his beautiful sweet smelling melon, "take this"; he handed Lisa the melon.
"Now take this."
He smiled as he placed a 2 Euro coin next to her.
 "Now eat it. Which one you eat?"  His English wasn't beautiful, but his point certainly was.

Capitalism, has ruined everything that really makes sense in the world...It's just crazy;a farmer can barely make a living by making what people NEED to live: food. An athlete makes a bajillion times more on throwing a ball, sure it's entertainment, but is he creating something that people need in order to survive?Mental support of it being entertainment is simply not enough to defend this case. Too bad some people just don't see it this way...:( or it's just easier to not see it this way I guess.

I mean, people can try to eat the Euro if they want, but I told Marco that I would eat the melon.
heh

Btw it is soo late again, but today's story was too interesting to forget. Tomorrow, since it's Saturday, I'll be going to Verona with Lisa. Wish us luck!
<3 Em

ARRIVO SPLENDIDO!

  It's so late, but I'm so happy that I can't really sleep. I took a stop at Munich in the afternoon and finally got to Bologna at around 10:30PM. At the Munich Airport there were some quite interesting things.

Napcabs for instance... here you could sleep in this "private" cabin and have a "private" desk under what seems like scary UV rays. It looks very private...especially with the huge window that people constantly look through.

 Here it is :

I did not buy this meal (right) ; I was very tempted to have a go at someones leftovers at this German restaurant but I resisted. I just took a picture instead. I mean,come on!!Ughh...food/beer wasters. I am even legal! Next time I'm going for   the left overs. 

Cool German restaurant... I'm guessing it says "Cafe"...

I watched "One life" on the plane, an animal/nature documentary, something my sister might have forced me to watch. Anyways, I just chose it spontaneously because I literally watched every movie on the list, except for the German ones of course; i wasn't spontaneous enough to watch one of those. And I'm being serious when I say everyone should watch "One life", IT'S SO AWESOME!
It was full of horror, action, romance,and inspiration. I think it was the Venus Flytrap that seriously contributed to a lot of the horror...so scary.
  I have gone off track... the real news is that I am finally in Italy and I haven't been "Taken" yet! Wooohooo!!! Gotta celebrate for that! The people here are awesome, and my hosts, Marco and his girlfriend are the nicest people you can meet. However, I haven't seen anything except the Bologna Airport since it's so dark around here, so I can't say Italy is beautiful yet.
There are two other Wwoofers! One is a girl and she's is a Junior in college and lives in Dublin, Ireland; her first language is English so we get along pretty well! She is very cool. Then there is an Italian boy who doesn't really speak English, or so I'm told. I haven't met him yet, because he came in the afternoon.  By the way, It's pretty hot at night but right now there's a nice breeze coming in.
And here's how my splendido room looks like:
                                       
(please excuse my creepy look haha)

Oh and Marco says he loves watermelons and that the farm has the best of them: yellow ones, red ones, blue ones; I'm not too sure if he was joking when he said "blue", but we'll see. And lastly before I go to sleep I must be thankful..I dunno how the wwoofing is going to go but either way I am grateful for this trip!
Thanks Emhwang for introducing Wwoof to me!And thanks to all my friends for wishing me a safe trip...I think that really contributed to keeping me from being taken. Hehehe... And lastly I have to thank my parents and my sis for letting me have this big break before I go off to LA!!! Y'all the best! Love ya!
Well, I'd better get some rest for my first day of wwoofing!
Wish me luck! hehe :)

-EM