Ciao Ciao Papa!

A Catholic...in Rome...during Holy Week! Is there anything better?! I think not. The picture is from the top of St. Peter's Basilica; we climbed 551 steps up just to get that view!

So I touched down in Rome Wednesday, April 8th, and met up with Brie and Lauren (and later Josh, who took a small trip to Naples before meeting up with us), all friends from Penn. I realized that four is the perfect number of people you want to travel with: big enough to have fun and always have something to talk about, and yet just small enough that you can easily appease everyone's wishes. The weather during the week was blue skies, warm and sunny: Spring was in the air, trees were sprouting leaves and green.

On Wednesday evening, we took it easy, just the three girls, hangin' out. Brie and I went for some carbonara and wine and later met up with Lauren when she arrived. We went to a 24 hour super cheap bakery, where I got a chocolate bomba (a donut, filled with nutella); as a side note, I proceeded to go to this bakery probably every day I was in Rome. We walked along the Tiber River and caught up on each other's lives. Afterwards, we went to Old Bridge and grabbed some amazing gelato. Old Bridge happened to be right next to the hostel we were staying at, so needless to say, we went to Old Bridge practically everyday.

The next day was another easy going day. Brie, Lauren, and I looked around a flea market, grabbed some cappuccino from a Bar (what they call cafes in Roma) and walked to the Basilica of St. John the Lateran. Apparently, this, and not St. Peter's Basilica, is the official ecclesiastical seat of the Bishop of Rome, the Pope. We then walked by the Spanish steps (the longest and widest staircase in Europe, falsely named Spanish steps: they were built by a Frenchie) and towards Brie's school, a whole ONE BUILDING in Rome, haha, and had lunch on the rooftop of some museum nearby. We then took a mini-bus (about the size of a van, since the roads in Rome are too small to have too many regular buses) right past the Colosseum back towards our hostel. We bought fresh pasta (so fresh, I watched her put the pasta into the cutting machine!) and went grocery shopping for dinner. We had a pretty easy going night, drank wine, and watched Gladiator (a must to see before heading to the Colosseum).

Friday morning, Josh, after heading to Naples for a short trip, met up with Lauren and me in our hostel. We walked to the Vatican to take a tour through the Vatican museum. It's an incredible museum, including the Sistine Chapel, the coolest fresco painting I had ever seen, and paintings like the School of Athens among others. The Vatican is indeed beautiful with its plentiful courtyards; it made me rethink possibly becoming a nun, haha. Afterwards, we grabbed pizza for lunch (not Josh, since he is Jewish and it was passover, meaning he could not have any leavened bread products...yeah, I don't know what he was thinking coming to Italy during passover!) and met up with Brie to take a tour of St. Peter's Basilica, a massive massive Basilica! While it was our intention to climb to the top of the dome on Friday afternoon, we walked into the basilica at the beginning of Good Friday mass and got to catch a glimpse of the Pope (not really, since too many people were shoving to get in front of us, and being nice people, we let them). Afterwards, we took a bus to Trastavere, an off-the-beaten path part of Rome with relatively cheap eats. I found one of the many Roman fountains to fill up my water bottle, undoubtedly one of my favorite aspects of Rome. We saw a silly street show about a bee and a man (not kidding here) and grabbed some dinner. At dinner, I had mussels and clams with pasta and the waiter kept picking on me, saying things like "take your time and dip the bread into the liquid." It was kinda creepy, though amusing to the rest of the party. We found some Duff beer, which unfortunately, I did not try.

The next day, we walked those 551 steps up St. Peter's Basilica to get a great view of Rome. We then met up with Brie and Lauren's former Penn TA of ancient greek/roman history (or something like that) at the Forum. He gave us an incredibly thorough tour of the forum, the center of the Roman empire where ancient Roman civilization developed; so cool since the Forum would have been completely boring without the tour. I can't imagine how incredible the Forum must have been at its height. We spent hours walking around and soaking in the sunlight as well as the history. Seth also took us to the Pantheon, one of the coolest buildings in Rome. It's a dome shaped building that is technically square. It's a perfect 144 meters high and wide inside. Way back when, the Catholic Church owned it and it remains today, a very well-preserved Church. After the tour, we went to a famous coffee shop (I forget the name), and then to Giolitti, where I had the best gelato the entire trip! It was so good, we went back every day, even though it was completely out of our way most of the time. After a great tour and many awkward jokes, Seth, Brie and Lauren's former TA, left and we went to grab real Italian pizza, definitely the best pizza I had on the trip. This time, our waiter, picked on Brie the entire night. After dinner, Brie took us to Trevi Fountain, which marks the terminal point of the "modern" Acqua Vergine, the revivified Aqua Virgo, one of the ancient aqueducts that supplied water to ancient Rome. Here, Josh, Lauren, and I threw some coins into Trevi Fountain. One coin = to come back to Rome, Two coins = to fall in love, Three coins = to get married in Rome. Approximately, 3,000 Euros are collected in the fountain each day!

The next day was Easter Sunday, and somehow, Brie got us tickets/seats for Easter Mass with Pope Benedict XVI! This was such a memorable experience...thousands and thousands of people in St. Peter's Square, all celebrating the Resurrection of Christ. Mass was mostly in Italian. We received the body of Christ from a priest in the Vatican and stayed around for the Pope's blessing to the world in different languages. Surprisingly, his English accent was probably one of the worst accents relative to the other languages he spoke. He said "Jesus Christ be with you all." according to Lauren (since I didn't really hear it, haha, no surprise there to those who know that I am practically deaf!).

After Easter celebration, we went for some lunch and had to wait a few hours for a rude waiter to serve us; typical Italian, not really caring about customer service. It was worth it since the food was relatively cheap and pretty good. Josh made friends with the much friendlier cook inside the restaurant. haha.

We then headed to the Colosseum and then for more Giolitti gelato! Unfortunately, Lauren lost her ticket and couldn't go. I have a fun picture of them digging around the closet for their tickets but I won't post it to spare Lauren. hah. The Colosseum is still magnificent, even though it's now mostly robbed of all the marble that once covered it. The Colosseum is an old stadium where gladiators once fought. It was finished in 80 A.D. and only took ten years to build! Josh pointed out that our stadiums today still have the same layout as the Colosseum does. It would be pretty neat to have a concert inside the Colosseum, but unfortunately, most of it is pretty worn down and it would be impossible to hold any event inside without the Colosseum falling apart. After the Colosseum, we headed back to Brie's apartment for dinner. We (read Brie) made risotto for us...I tried this recently, pretty good and pretty easy!

The next day was my penultimate day in Italy. We didn't do much: had some lunch at Brie's place, more gelato at Giolitti, walked around the city and took pictures at the Spanish Steps. We soaked in the sun and beautiful city of Rome. On our way home, Josh, Brie and Lauren picked up some Roman souvenirs. We haggled a bit and got the price of some of the items down. I went back later to also pick up an Italia jacket for myself. Josh left on Monday evening and Lauren and I left Tuesday morning.

So with that ends my amazing Rome trip. Cheap cappuccinos, delicious desserts, amazing pasta, free water fountains to fill up your water bottles...just a few of my favorite things about Rome!

Alles, alles, alles!

I'm going to apologize ahead of time for the length of this post...it's mostly for me to print out later and put into a scrapbook and remember everything I did.

Bonjour! Je m'appelle Diep, Je suiz American! (This was about the extent of my French.)

I went to Paris a few weeks ago, at the end of March, to visit Sisi, a friend from Penn who is studying at HEC (apparently one of or the best B-school in Europe). Unlike Wharton students, who still compete at the highest level, HEC students realize they are set and party....A LOT!

I'm going to forewarn you that my Paris trip was entirely about food. Hah, no surprise there, I'm sure. My first day there, I went to a fantastic creperie in Versailles, since France is famous for its crepes. Afterwards, Sisi left me for school and I toured the famous Château de Versailles (Palace of Versailles). The weather was a bit ugly, unfortunately, but the palace is indeed beautiful! According to Wiki, since I can't remember any of the history I read at Versailles, the expansion of the château became synonymous with the absolutism of Louis XIV. King Louis XIV wanted to keep his advisors and provincial rulers close him, to make sure they would not revolt against him. Others also resided at Versailles and aided in its current day construction, including King Louis XV and Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. I'm adding a few pictures to give you an idea of how incredible Versailles is...if you include its gardens, Versailles stretches for miles. It's so massive, I had to spend an entire day just touring Versailles. These pictures are the front of Versailles, the famous Hall of Mirrors, and the gardens/fountains/lake of Versailles.

The next day, I had duck confit...duck boiled/roasted in its own fat...yum! Then, to work off that food, I walked to see the Moulin Rouge theatre (where they still have interesting shows *wink*) and hiked up a hill to go to Sacre Coeur (Sacred Heart Church) and to get a beautiful view of the City. Here are a few pictures for you.
Even though the weather was a bit ugly, it was a beautiful view of the city! We also heard random gunshots or something here so we quickly departed.

Next on the trip, we walked down Avenue des Champs-Élysées, the most expensive strip of real estate in Europe! Here, there were tons of high-end stores (much like Fifth Avenue, NYC) including the flagship Louis Vuitton store, which I went into hoping I could afford something for Chi, but to no avail. This street was definitely worth the walk, because I had a pistachio macaron (not to be confused with macaroons, an English dessert) from La Duree! It was so good, I went there again later in my Paris trip. Towards the end of the strip, we reached L'Arc de Triomphe (Arch of Triumph), which honors those who fought for France, especially during the Napoleonic wars. There's a cool eternal flame for the unknown soldier under the arch.

I know, it seems like there was no end to this day, we continued on to go to the Louvre, which was formerly a palace and is now a gigantic art museum. I saw Da Vinci's Mona Lisa, but to be honest, there are so many cool paintings there besides the Mona Lisa. A little tip, the Louvre is free on the first Sunday of every month and for those under 26 on Fridays from 6-9p.m.! By the time I was finished walking through one wing of the Louvre, an hour or two had already passed, and my legs felt like they were going to fall off. Typical me, I demanded we leave and grab some food. Hah. Here's a cool nighttime shot of part of the Louvre.
The next day, Sisi, Cat (one of Sisi's friends from HEC), and I went to see Notre Dame Cathedral (Our Lady of Paris Cathedral) and did not see any hunchback during our visit. It's a beautiful Church, here's a cool view of it from the side. Cat and I played on the seesaw in the back of the Church and then we grabbed some food. I had pate, steak and fries, and some appletart...apparently typical French!
After our tour of Notre Dame, we went to the Tour Eiffel (Eiffel Tower, obviously). It's an iron tower built beside the Seine River; it stands as the tallest building in Paris...much less impressive than I had hoped it to be, probably because I decided not to go up the tower. After the Eiffel Tower, we ended the day with Chinatown and had some Chinese food, which was probably the funniest meal I had the entire trip. Since my friends spoke Mandarin, they proceeded to speak to our waiter in Mandarin; however, we had several waiters and only one spoke Mandarin. As I knew neither French nor Mandarin, I proceeded to order in English. hah. We were indecisive about what we wanted to eat for our entree and dessert, and probably called the waiter(s) to our table at least 10 times! I'm pretty sure they thought we were absolutely insane.

On my final day in Paris, Sisi left me to attend to schoolwork, and I wandered around the French Tuilleries, which is a huge garden that I'm sure is much more beautiful during the summertime when the plants are actually alive. I had some hot chocolate from Angelina's, which was a bit too heavy and rich for me, but others rave about it! Since there was no Sisi and I had no map of Paris, I searched for a hour or so to find the Pantheon. So of course, it would be my luck that by the time I find the Pantheon (which is located at the Luxembourg Gardens stop, which by the way, is a beautiful garden and actually had live flowers and plants!), my camera runs out of battery! It's a cool building that houses the remains of some famous Frenchies, including Voltaire, the Curies, Braille, etc. There are a lot of empty spots; I guess the French thought they'd have a lot more famous French scientists and philosophers and other contributors to the world. hah. After the Pantheon, I tried escargot (snails)...they're okay.

Okay, so to say the least, I did a lot in France, which explains why I came back to Rotterdam totally sick!

I'll write about Rome, my favorite trip thus far, pretty soon.