the little details

One concern that I had before coming here was what the weather was going to be like. While everyone at home got bombarded with the 8 inches of snow this weekend, the weather here has been in the 50s every single day. The students in the graduate program said that this is unusually warm but I'll keep praying that it doesn't get any colder. I can definitely live with this rather than it being 20 degrees back in the good ol' 'burg. 

As for our house...not only is our home-stay mother an amazing cook but she hardly speaks any English. She forces us to practice and I love it. We have the best dinner conversations, passing a dictionary back and forth. She says that she loves us and that her students last semester never even tried to talk to her and that she enjoys our company. :) 

The food here is absolutely amazing. I know everyone says it, but it truly is so fresh and delicious and tasty. For any of you that heard that the pizza is not that good here, that's false. Gustapizza, which is located right by our school is delicious and the same family also owns a panini shop right down the street called Gustopanino, which is also the best panino we've had so far. 

The people here drive like maniacs.. so when people say New York drivers are crazy, come to Europe.. they drive three cars in a lane, with vespas, all over the place! My first architecture class was cancelled because our professor got hit by a car when he was on his way to school on his bike...wild! 

Today we did some journeying of our own, walked in the Duomo and ventured to the Piazza di Santa Croce and then sat along the River Arno (below)

Tomorrow we have our first day trip to Siena, so excited to see another beautiful city in Italy! Ciaoooo