Toscana con degli amici

Through this class, I have been lucky to find a couple intelligent, nice, like-minded people to hang out with! As you know, I went to Torino with Katie, an American girl from Minnesota (of all places) who is here with her Italian boyfriend, Marco. One of the other people from my class that I'm getting to know better is Ieva, a girl from Latvia who is living here with her Italian husband. He teaches in Pisa every Saturday, so one day Ieva invited Katie and I to come along and drive down there to spend the day. I agreed with no hesitation, as did Katie.
So off we went, Saturday morning at the lovely hour of 5:30am for the two and a half hour drive from Lombardia to Liguria and finally to Toscana. After a quick breakfast at a cafè, we left Ieva's husband, Lorenzo, at the school and set out to take some pictures of the famous torre pendente--leaning tower--and the beautiful Piazza dei Miracoli--miracles--and then took a walk around town. It really is quite a beautiful, quaint town but after a couple of hours we were out of things to do without spending money on museums. Since we had a car with us, we had the option of going to see another town, so we decided to drive to the nearby town of Lucca. I had heard from a couple people that is was a beautiful town, so I was completely content with our plan.


Lucca is a city similar to Ferrara in that it is still completely walled. On top of the walls there is a beautiful, wide pathway with plenty of people biking, walking, and running. The town itself was simply stunning. It is now one of my favorite Italian towns that I have been able to visit. The streets are narrow and bustling with people going to stores, cafès, or restaurants. We walked up to the top of one of the towers in the town that was unique because of the trees they had growing on the top. From there we got to see a wide, clear panoramic of the city and surrounding hills.

Katie, Marco, Ieva

A statue of Giacomo Puccini near his house

We stopped for lunch and I must say that the food was some of the best I've had as well, or at least the most suited to my taste, with choices such as lentil and spinach soup and pasta with rabbit ragù. I ended up with the soup and was not disappointed. After a little more meandering, we drove back to Pisa to regroup before deciding to make one more stop before the return to Milano. We made a quick, 30 minute drive to see the small ocean town of Viareggio. The town wasn't anything special, but it was an opportunity to see the ocean, even if it was right after the sun went down. All in all a great day with an opportunity to see three different places in Toscana as well as getting to know people from different places in the world!

Here in Milano, just had my second exam at school that (hopefully) went well! Giovanna's has been nice enough to cook some tasty Thai food twice in the past week for Livio, her, and me with the skills she's acquired from some cooking classes her in Milano! I got to go with her to shop for the ingredients at the market and then watch a bit of the process--as much as I like Italian food, a change in flavors was very welcome!
The girls are finally feeling back to 100% and the family is getting ready to head to the mountains for a week. I won't be joining them as I will be taking my own trip next Wednesday to Paris to find a certain Minnesotan!