GL 350 Week 3

Week 3 in Roma during my study abroad was not as exciting as the second but it was just as fun. We went to my favorite place thus far on Monday, the Catacombs. They were breathtaking, I could not wrap my head around the fact that so many people were buried there and they had been buried there so many years ago. The Catacombs, if you are not familiar with them, is a place where the earliest of Christians were buried when it was not okay in the Roman empire to be a Christian. They are underground below a church and they are 4 levels down. It was cold down there and some people were freaked out by it but I was amazed with them. We were not allowed to take pictures or else I would show everyone the amazingness that I fell in love with. We had a tour guide and she was the best that we had had thus far. The tunnels of Catacombs are 11 miles long and it is a maze down there so as you can imagine, we stayed very close to the tour guide so that we did not get lost.

That same day we had a student-led tour by David and Emily, they did a fantastic job. That Tuesday, we had a free day since we were all exhausted from traveling to Venice the following weekend but we had Italian class that night. A few students, along with me, played Pine Cone Bocce Ball. It is like Bocce Ball in the states but instead of a ball, you use a pine cone that you pick out. It was a lot of fun and Mike even gave us Jif peanut butter for playing, yum!! And that night we had a campus movie night and watched Bridesmaids, that movie gets me every time, it is so funny!

Thursday, we got back to educational things as we has a free day on Wednesday as well since we are scheduled to have Wednesdays off. We had Sociology class with Professor in the morning and then caught the train into Rome for our guided tour of the Aqueducts, they were amazing. If you do not know what the Aqueducts are, they are where the water that Rome drinks comes from. The Romans had built them when they were in power so that they could have clean drinking water. It was a very good tour and we all thought that they were very interesting. That night we had my roommate's parents for dinner, they are really enjoying their time in Italy.

That night we checked our for our free weekend, my group and I went to London, England!! I was so excited, I couldn't even contain myself. We had to fly into Germany to have a short layover and then we continued our journey to London. We had such a great time, we stayed in a hostel there and it was not too bad. There was a bar right under our hostel so we went and had a few drinks and met some other people that were staying there as well. England was my favorite weekend so far and I cannot wait to go back again someday. I bought so many souvenirs, I could barely fit everything in my suitcase, so if you are family, you can probably be expecting something from London for Christmas! We flew back through Germany on the way back and then finally got back to Rome. It was a great weekend but it was very good to be back at our temporary home once again.

Now on to the educational part of my blog. In the Smiles of Rome, our textbook for class, we read sections of St. Peter and on St. Paul. The section of St. Peter discusses on pg. 75, keep yourselves free from the selfish passions that attack the soul while you are visitors or pilgrims. I am seeing this more and more during our stay in Rome, we must act as though we are foreign diplomats. Our actions will be judged not just personally but for our whole country and for Walsh University. We will be judged on our actions and it is important to act the way we would like to be seen and I would say we are all doing a great job so far. Just from reading these sections, it is very religious and this can be seen everywhere in Rome. I have strayed from my religion the past couple of years and I am taking advantage of this experience to make myself come back to my religion and so far it has been successful. We have mass every Wednesday and I have been attending and it is becoming more and more comfortable again. I can't believe it but we are in week 4 now, so here goes nothing!!