Today we went to Sienna for a
daytrip. We saw a preggers dog waiting for the bus and it was the cutest thing
ever. The town is beautiful but there isn’t really much there. Our tour guide
told us the coolest things about Sienna though. The town is separated into 17
different districts and each district has a different area of town and a
different mascot. People from the districts only usually marry others from
their district and then their babies are baptized in the same district they
were born in. The districts are clearly marked in the city by flags when you’re
walking from district to district and by little tiles on the street corners
when changing districts. Usually the districts are kept at peace until the
Palio rolls around twice a year. The Palio is a horse race which lasts only 90
seconds but decides the whole fate of the district. A track is built in the
center of town near Sienna’s political square and the horses and jockeys are
placed between two ropes to line up on their own. The jockey’s ride bareback
and they only have to ride 3 laps. 90 seconds to decide the fate of a district,
WEIRD! But what is really strange is that nothing really comes out of the Palio
but a painted flag and the “bragging rights” until the next Palio a month or so
later. Anyways, after our city tour, we ate some pizza. I had the weirdest
pizza with some kind of sausage on it. I didn’t see that it said onions on the
menu (but apparently it must have, I think they lied though) and it came out
with onions on it too. It was pretty good once I took the onions off. We walked
around a bit after that and I drank a hot chocolate which was really just
melted chocolate pudding. We also tried these cookies called Ricciarelli or
something like that. I could only drink half of it but apparently that’s how
all hot chocolate is in Italy.
It kind of makes me miss the powder stuff from back home! After the hot
chocolate, which was not very satisfying, we had gelato. I had my
lemon/strawberry combo again. Nothing else compares! We all felt so incredibly
full after the gelato so we just kept walking, and shopping. I didn’t buy
anything which was impressive but after our shopping, we had to power walk back
to the bus. And, then it was too full again like the way to Sienna so we had to
wait half an hour to leave. Morgan, Katie and I went to use the bathroom and
had to pay 50 cents! We thought we got to go for free because some guy was
cleaning and told us to go a different way, not through the money eater and then
we came out and he was like “fit-ty cents per favore.” Jerk, not free bathroom.
I fell asleep on the bus ride home, so that was a great nap. When we got home,
Katie, Morgan and I went looking for Fabri Fibra CD but could not find it at
FOUR stores. He is a rapper who we heard with Francesco and at a store we went
to today. We also wandered around the train station mall. It was weird because
it was all under ground but it still felt good to walk after all our food. We
walked home and I ate two grilled cheeses. They were delicious, but I need not
say that. After eating a lot (like always), we sat around and watched Grey’s
Anatomy. Finally we decided to go out around 10:30
because Crystal wanted to meet up
with Sandro. We got ready and went to Lochness and it was extremely busy.
Apparently when we go around 10 for the 2 for 1 drink special, it’s not very
exciting, but more people show up around midnight.
We stayed there for a bit and then decided to take a taxi to Space Electronic
which Sandro had told us was cool. They had an upstairs and a downstairs;
upstairs was techno and downstairs was hip hop. The weirdest part about the
whole club was that there were about 5 million more boys there than girls.
Usually that would be ok if the guys weren’t CREEPY like they were. Morgan and
mostly just danced with each other while Sandro and Crystal danced, and his
friend Valentino and Katie danced. There was a guy that looked like Will
Ferrell (except creepier) who kept trying to dance with Morgan and I but he was
really weird. When I first saw him, I thought O-M-G, Will Ferrell! Funny
moments of the night: Morgan falling up the stairs on our way to go watch Katie
and Crystal dance, dancing on the balcony and meeting the two boys who danced like
fairies, and dancing on the little “cage” thing and then having 3 boys try to
come dance with us and us leaving them there alone. After we danced for awhile,
Morgan and I were just getting to creeped out and decided to go home. When we
started walking, we didn’t really know where we were going but we kind of did
and we were so proud that we found our way home by ourselves! Usually, the two
of us rely on others for directions so we were pretty proud we could find our
way.
