Monday, Oct. 14, 2012: Siena, Italy

The day started off once again with pastries, not one, but two delicious, flaky pastries while sitting in front of the Santa Maria del Fiore.

Once I finished breakfast, we went to look at the cathedral. We took pictures in front of Ghiberti's famous doors and marveled at their significance. Then we went inside the cathedral to view it like normal tourists. The Duomo in Florence is really inspiring and awesome (in the literal sense of the word) mostly due to the gargantuan dome that balances on top of the cathedral withstanding the test of time.

As we stared at the huge dome, we noticed people walking around on ledges up at the top. We decided we wanted to do it, so we paid the 8 euro and hiked the many steps to get to the ledge. It was awesome. Also terrifying because I am afraid of heights. Even with the big plastic barriers to keep anyone from tumbling over the waist-high wall, I was nervous. I thought of the people who worked to build this dome, even the people who died for it, and it made my heart flutter.

But did I stop there? Never! We saw people on a ledge even higher, all the way up to where the paintings started and decided to go there. There were more stairs, obviously, but they seemed to wander to them. It got to the point where I was questioning if we were even going to the second ledge. We weren't; soon I saw a little opening in the ceiling above some stairs and outside was sky. We were at the top of the dome. 

I don't know why, but landscape heights don't freak me out. So I ventured all around the edge in slippery rain looking out at the beautiful city and countryside. Tuscany is lovely when it rains. The wind... not so much. In the first batch of pictures my hair is all over the place making me look much more hardcore than I really am.

After exploring the Duomo, we went back to the Palazzo Pitti to see the gardens. It was raining pretty hard when we got there so we decided to stay inside and look at a costume exhibition in the hopes the rain would calm down. The exhibition was really cool and they even had some really tattered clothes from Cosimo de'Medici. Also, Makenzie said my new skirt isn't vintage because it's from the 80's, but they had clothes from the 80's in the exhibition. If it's old enough to be in a museum (excluding modern art exhibitions) it's old enough to be vintage.

When we went out the gardens the rain got progressively lighter until we were able to walk around without umbrellas. How fortunate. The gardens were big and green and I wish I could have a picnic there. It felt so European/Pride and Prejudice to walk through them.

After that we decided to go back to the Fossil store where Amber wanted to buy a bag. The most beautiful Italian man helped her. And I loved his Euro-cut and his Italian accent and everything about him. What will I do when I go back to Provo and there are no beautiful Italians to gawk at like a teenage girl?

     Later in the day I decided I wanted gelato. I don’t know what it is about waffle places, but they trick every time. Maybe it’s the warm feeling, the cinnamon sugar smell, but every time I go to Florence, I can’t help going to one. I asked for a small cone. She gave me a cup and then said it cost 5 euro. Excuse me miss? 5 euro for a small gelato? The verdict is still out on whether she also messed up my size since the cup was a little bit bigger than what I’m used to, but even a large gelato shouldn't cost that much. Anyway, my advice to anyone travelling to Florence is to not be fooled by the sweet, sugary siren song of waffle stores. Amber and I just had a pretty intense discussion about what you would call a place that sells waffles in English. Waffle store was the best we could come up with.

     When we finally got back to Siena it was raining. A lot. A ton. Just sheets of rain pouring and pouring. There was a group of people huddled under the awning at the bus station. We ran over and crammed into the edge of the group, but we were still getting pretty wet. Since we didn't want to walk home in the rain we tried to figure out the bus schedules. To the best of our knowledge the only bus that would take us home had stopped running. After pondering and staring at the rain with an overall sense of doom, Amber had the brilliant idea to take a taxi. So we drove home safe from the downpour, the puddles and the misery.

Saturday, Oct. 22^nd, 2012: Siena, Italy

    It took a long time to convince myself to get out of bed this morning. Even after I had woken up and eaten breakfast, I lounged around by surfing the internet and reading my book. If you really must know, by the time I actually got out of my pajamas and left the house, it was already lunch time. In my defense, I’m still recovering from a cold.

    We went to the Chinese restaurant again. This time we only ordered one plate of rice and one entrée since last time we ended up throwing out the leftovers.

    After lunch we went to the bookstore. Two bookstores actually. Books have kind of become a big deal here. Because of the really slow internet, I can’t waste endless hours online or even download a movie without wanting to punch everything in frustration. So I read books. Which is a much classier thing to do anyway. I used to read a lot when I was younger, but high school got me out the habit. Ironic, I know. But books make me so excited here. I’ve been really blessed to find things I’m interested in and I just devour them within a week. Anyway, that’s why we spent a good amount of time looking over books in one store, deciding there was nothing we wanted to spend 12 euro on there, walking to another store and gazing at the shelves of English paperbacks there. In the end I bought two more books for when I’ve finished the one I’m on now. It’s really ridiculous how excited I am for them.

    After the book shopping, we went to find the church of San Domenico. We heard there was a preserved head there. Not just any head but the head of Saint Catherine of Siena. Oh, also one of her fingers. When we went to look at it there was an Italian man by us who was looking at it too. Then he just said, “Boh,” which in Italian is kind of “Eh,” or “Whatever.”  At least, I think that’s what he said; it kind of seems like a sacrilegious thing to say about her poor finger. Then he launched into some spiel that I didn’t understand. Either way, it made me laugh. While we pondered why St. Catherine’s head looks so small, I wondered where her brain might be. And who even verifies these things are real. In the church there’s a sign that says it’s the REAL head (seriously, it’s written in all caps) but how do they know? It’s fascinating and a little humorous and while I feel bad for chuckling about St. Catherine, I wouldn’t mind so much if it were my head in a relic and people were curious about me.

    We continued our day of morbid fascination by going to the torture museum. We’d talked about going to it for a while now and for some reason it never crossed my mind it might make we pass out. Thankfully, nothing happened, but in the end I couldn't read any of the plaques explaining the methods of torture and we briskly walked around the museum just to fulfill the nees to say hadn’t wasted our 6 euro admission fee.

Sunday, Oct. 21^st, 2012: Siena, Italy

    Since I can’t go out for lunch on Sundays, on Saturday I buy bread and fruit and, if I’m feeling particular, chocolate. I can’t ever get too elaborate with my meal planning because we don’t have a refrigerator or microwave easily accessible. So despite many efforts to find something more appetizing, I always end up eating fruit and bread all afternoon. 

    The situation is hard in and of itself, but it’s made especially difficult when the Taddei family eat their lunch and the smell wafts upstairs and into our room. I’ve told Amber about how I often feel like we’re the unwanted step-children, quarantined in our rooms nibbling on bits of dry bread while they feast on who knows what. It sure smells delicious whatever it is.

     I don’t actually feel that way, and I know they aren’t responsible for our lunches, so I’m really just kidding, but it kind of is a funny scenario.

     Today at church we had a bunch of changes. I was kind of wondering where the Elders had gone, but didn’t think about it a whole lot. When Sacrament rolled around, they announced Anziano Smith had been released and the Siena Branch had a new president. He’s a senior missionary here with his wife.

     There were also two new sister missionaries. One of them for sure used to be a BYU student on a study abroad to Siena like we are. She shared her testimony and talked about how blessed she feels to be able to come back to Siena now, two years later. I guess sister missionaries are really rare in the Siena branch, so she felt even more blessed. She talked about how God is aware of us and her being there was a testimony of that. Another man talked about an experience he had were someone took care of a pretty hefty fine he had to pay. Then he talked about the mercy of the Lord. It was beautiful and heartfelt. Overall, Sacrament meeting made me feel a lot better about some things I’ve been trying to cope with here. And that’s always a good thing.

     After church Amber and I were waiting at the bus stop when a group of students came around with Brother and Sister Call. One of the girls asked where I’m from and when I said Bakersfield Sister Call said, “You have to be kidding me you’re from Bakersfield. We grew up there.” So we talked about my hometown and how much it’s changed since they lived there. What are the chances right? Actually pretty high when you're from good ole' Bako...