Hi everyone. This will officially be my last post. You read my blog from bottom up. Thats the order it goes in if you want to start from when I first arrived last September 07. The newer the posts, the closer they are to the top.

Studying abroad was one of the best experiences of my life. I've become more independent, more confident, more cultured, and more appreciative. I have the confidence to brave another country in which I don't know the language or culture. Because its a challenge. And I love being challenged. When we are comfortable, we aren't challenging ourselves enough; we are not learning and growing. I've also been able to step back from our American way of life and take an outsiders point of view. When you put yourself in someone elses shoes you can understand how they feel. Its so important to assimilate into any culture we encounter...even if we are just "tourists." To take on their language, their dress, their behaviors and mannerisms. I am not proud to be an "American." I tried as hard as possible to not be an outsider and not be complacent and take on the easy typical "Im American" attitude.

I've also realized how important life means to a lot of Europeans. We work 60-80 hours so we can have a huge house, a nice car, a beach house....but in reality what is important to me is enjoying life. When I look back in forty years from now what do I want to remember? That I worked and slaved? I want to have made an impact and have actually enjoyed life. And enjoyed is not in a selfish sense. I will enjoy life by serving others. And there they have smaller houses and appts, but they all go out as a family, and they all have more time together, and sit down at every meal. It really is a wonderful way to live.

Studying abroad has also opened my eyes to other cultures and religions. I realized I had always been one minded and never thought anything else besides what I was raised as. But now I have a passion to study Islam and Judaism and Buddhism and other religions. To dive into what others believe and why. To even question my own faith. And that is one area I have seen the most change in myself since coming home. I enrolled right away in a Judaic studies course and was involved in a three hour Islamic interfaith discussion every Friday. My beliefs were questioned and it really made me dive into different texts to find proof....for other people but more for myself. It really has been fascinating, and I know I wouldn't have had as much appreciation for history and religion the way I do now, if I had not lived in Europe.

Going abroad has been a blessing in disguise. I'm going back this summer with my sister for two weeks to Rome, Cinque Terre, southern France, and Greece and then I'm staying and heading up to Poland to Warsaw and Krakow to studying and see WW II events. And next summer I really want to spend a month in Haifa, Israel at their university studying different religions and history. If anyone has the opportunity to study abroad, I would highly encourage it. We don't realize how much of a bubble we live in until we go out and explore the world and embrace other cultures.

So not only did they lose my luggage on the way over to Italy, on the way back was a disaster. First the man I checked in with didnt speak English well, and tried to make me pay 200euro for my extra luggage weight, but I kept telling him my final destination wasn't Geneva Switzerland, it was JFK. But somehow he never understood it, and took one of my bags and "checked" it, and then gave me a pass and told me to go to another line. So I wait in another line, and when I get up there she goes "okay 200 euro extra weight charge." AND i was like "NO!" Between both luggages it evens out to my weight capacity for an INTERNATIONAL flight. She was like "OH he only checked you through Switzerland, so your other bag is going to stop there."

Great.

So she calls a ton of people and tells me they got my bag back. They really didnt. She then takes my last bag and tells me to go to my gate. I get to the gate and get onto skype and talk with mom and dad leisurely. Then notice my flight is delayed an hour. WAIT? My connection to Geneva is less than an hour! I NOW AM MISSING MY NEXT FLIGHT!

So I go to the woman at the counter and tell her I m going to miss my flight. She looks and says, "Everyone who was suppose to go to JFK has already been rerouted. Why havent you?" And looks at the system. THEY STILL ONLY had me as my final destination as Switzerland! So okay..my luggage is going and staying in Swtizerland. I tried to tell her Ill go to Switz and then figure it out, because last time they departed me with my luggage it was a mess. All I wanted was my luggage.

No. She told me she called for my luggage to come back. That I had to go wait in a line. Then go to carasel # 3 and wait for it.

I wait. I wait. I wait. Almost an hour later as Im sitting onthe ground I decide Im not getting my luggage back. Ill just have to figure how to get myself home.

I wait in the 'new flight' line for almost an hour. Finally I get up there. She was awesome and spent a good half hour on the phone trying to locate both pieces of my luggage which are separated and floating around the airport or in Geneva.

She rebooks me on a straight flight to JFK BUT ITS LEAVING SOON!

SO IM AGAIN RUNNING.

I head in through the line and an Israel/US security is there with guns. The women goes "where is your luggage?" And I almost start crying and say "I DONT KNOW!" AND they start to flip out! A SECURITY BREECH! Oh man. I explain to her how desperate I am and that Ive been in the airport since the day before.... practically.

Now im in the security line. My little wheely thing couldnt fit all my new clothes that I had bough in Paris so I had strapped on to the outside a bag with tons of clothes and shoes in it. A big black man goes "excuse me mam, come with me." So now I have 20 mins to make my fight...and the security line is a good 20 mins long. Not happening.

He tells me I need to somehow fit everything in that attached on Louis Vuitton bag into my little rolly suitcase. Well that was clearly impossible. So the next best solution?

I started taking off my shoes, my jacket, emptied the entire bag all over the ground. Put on shirt 1, shirt 2, shirt 3, sweater 1, sweater 2, sweater THREE! I have a total over EIGHT layers on and I put on my huge boots and hold the other pair. THERE. Everyone was looking at me like I was crazy. Then I hopped back in line....sweat was dripping down my face. My hair was getting wet. I felt on fire. But I had no choice.

I get out of security and start RUNNING! I run to my terminal and I was the last one to board! I give the woman my ticket and tell her she needs to check to see if my luggage is on. She types some stuff into the system and says "yes." BS. Im sure she just was fake typing. They always look like they are doing things really productive. Well I was confident they had my luggage.

Eight hours later, no sleep, and Im in JFK. Mom and dad are worried sick because they have no idea where I am at. And they decided they wouldnt drive down to New York b.c a huge snow storm was hitting us. Luggage. I wait. I wait. No one is left. I keep seeing this tiny brown suitcase come around and around and around. I am mad at this little brown suitcase. Why cant it just be MINE? And where is its rightful owners? I would be tackling my luggage if I saw it by now.

I go to lost luggage. For like the hundredth TIME? But the weird thing was it was the first time I didnt need to try another language when I was asking a question.

I get a little replacement "towel toothpaste" pack. I check into CT limo whose suppose to bring me home. They tell my a half an hour, just wait there. So I go to the bathroom and 1 800 collect my parents and then all of a sudden I hear "THERE YOU ARE! WEVE BEEN LOOKING FOR YOU AND CALLING YOUR NAME! YOUR LIMO JUST LEFT!"

nice ash. Im stuck in JFK for another four hours?

So I just slumped on the ground. I had been in airports now for almost 36 hours.

But the only GOOD thing that actually happened that entire trip..... the limo man circled back and picked me up 20 mins later.

I slept the entire ride back and when I wake up in at the Southbury drop off point. Its clearly a Northeastern out. IM finally home.

And mom and dad pull up in my Honda, and had even put back my radar detector. It was so nice to be home.

:)

For the next week I was sleeping my like 7pm and up at 3 or 4am. My body was so off. Going there was a lot easier, but maybe because the day after we arrived we were on an all day going going going schedule.

lunch in the park and the Christmas shopping

When I arrived back at her appt we ate our leftover broccoli and pasta with chopsticks. At this point it was kind of hilarious. And I was exhausted.

So I was originally suppose to be in Paris for three days with Tara. Our last night we went out to a bar and were just talking and ordering beers, and then the bar tender is giving us free drinks and talking with us, and then all of a sudden hours later the bar is closing!?! We look around and there is no one else there! Where did all the people go? So its like 2am and we catch a taxi back to Taras place, and all the alarms are set, including a phone alarm by my airport taxi pickup. I was suppose to be leaving at 5:30am.

Instead of going to bed, we continue to dance, make pasta with hot sauce, and watch a dance off movie. And we go to bed almost near 5am......at that point we should have just stayed awake.

I wake up...light coming into my room. The first thing I think is crap. Ive missed my flight for sure. Its look over and its 7am. I have an hour. I wake Tara up and we run around and she calls an emergency taxi which arrived in 10 mins! And he booked it! I arrived at Charles d'Gaulle at 730...and my flight leaves at 8! BUT I was dropped off at the wrong terminal. I waited in line to check in, and they told me it was through their sister carrier down at the OTHER terminal! So I started to run BUT I physically couldnt carry/drag all my stuff! It was just so heavy! Almost 150lbs total of luggage! After lots of running, sweating, and waiting in lines... I missed my flight. I waited in lines for the next three hours.

Finally I called Tara and I paid for another emergency taxi back. This is now like 400euro later within a few hours. It was A LOT OF MONEY.

It was amazing to go out with Tara at night to chic modern bars and restaurants. And while she worked during the day, I enjoyed actually living the French lifestyle and spending hours at cafes writing in my journal, and stopping in little art museums and people watching. :)

Champs Elysees. Christmas time. Beautiful. Madonna and Kylie Minoge were there. And ALSO a couple hours before I went to the Louvre, the president of Iran or Syria or somewhere that is very controversial....was there and apparently it was a HUGE deal in France.

The Eiffel tower lights up every hour for ten minutes. Tara's view from appt is of the tower. Its pretty amazing.

This little boy was so cute. I just sat in Jardin Tuileries taking pictures after walking around the art district that most tourists dont know about.

I spent hours just walking around doing a self headphone tour of the Louvre b.c last time I was here with my family, we just saw the big pieces. It was nice to go at my own schedule.

GOODMORNING FRANCE! I took an overnight train, stayed with 3 Asian girls, and two French older men, in a TINY 6 bed bunk. I had a suitcase which was 75lbs and a backpack that was 60kg and had to leave my suitcase outside our room for the night.... I just trusted that no one would take my heavy suitcase. I was probably way too trusting but I had no other choice.

Random ppl were very nice helping me getting my suitcase AND huge 60kg backpack up and down the subway steps as I was trying to get from the train station to Tara's appt near the Eiffel tower.

my last view of Italy before taking off to France :(

I visited Victor and stayed with his Aunt and Uncle on my way from Switzerland to Paris in Verdello, Italy...a little East of Milano. It was wonderful to have amazing Italian homemade food, talk with Marco and Fioralba, see an "italian home" and just spend some quality time. It was very relaxing...I wasnt running around sight seeing...a nice transition after the semester of PDG was over.

B A C K to I T A L Y

bergamo, italy

THEN it turned into a blizzard and whiteout! I joined in with this guy named Sam and another guy that I met at our hostel, b.c they wouldnt let me board myself since literally there were cliffs that you could just go right off of and die.... and we ended up going to the TOP OF JUNFRAU which is the highest point in ALL of europe...and when we got up there...it wasnt groomed b.c no one would dare to go there...and I was stuck. Just stuck with my board in FEET of snow. Couldn't move. IT WAS SO HARD. I almost just wanted to give up....take my board off and walk down. I finally got down in the powdered three feet high blizzarding snow. Oh man soooo hard. Of course the guys had skis which can ride on TOP of the snow. Not a board!

I didnt take this picture, my friend Ken did. But after Tess left, the next day I went snowboarding in the Alps, and IT WAS AWESOME and gorgeous! trails are so much harder than VT or even Colorado!

Interlaken, Switzerland

Its name means "between two lakes"

It is 2 huge lakes with mountains all around them.

Absolutely beutiful and Tess and I would have gone hiking if it had not rained that last day.

So Tess's last day b.c it was just pouring, we watched about 5 movies and chilled around all day at our pretty awesome hostel until I walked her to the train station that night at like 10pm.

The town of Interlaken was really quaint. A nice small town with shops, cafes, and amazing swiss fondu that Tess and I went out and ate. mmmm BUT it rained almost every day we were there.... thus the pictures of us soaking wet. That was a great day b.c it wasnt bad when we left, but as were walking downtown..... it just started POURING. we basically gave up trying NOT to get wet.

Tess and I hoped on an overnight train to Interlaken, Switzerland. We had our own room in the car, thank goodness, so we didn't have to share it with anyone. We left a cool 50 degree environment, mid December.

I remember when the conductor woke us up the next morning to bring in our cappuccinos and we had not seen any snow in Italy except the top of Monte Grappa on some early mornings, but we looked outside and it was a complete BLIZZARD with snow swirling by and WHITE everywhere! I was so excited. I don't think I have ever been that excited to see snow. A truly amazing morning.

That night in our hostel room in Interlaken- Bombers..... we finally cracked open our last Prosecco bottles to remember our Veneto region...and just spilled EVERYTHING about what happened all semester... we knew we wouldnt be seeing too many people any time soon hahahha
CELEBRATION!!!

Tess jumped first out of our group of 30! And I went second! I t was sooo cold. I wasn't nervous to jump...but as soon as I jumped..and after 2 seconds of free falling I completely lost my breath. It was the scariest thrilling experience of my life. Then the harness caught and we bounced and swung and then I finally could scream and get "noise" out of my lungs.

Tess looking down into the canyon and the glacier river below us....oh crap.

Tess harnessing up :) So let me just give you a little description of this guy... dreadlocks....a total swtiz snowboard junkie....told us that we sign a waiver if we die we dont sue-oh man....then did some snuff....and jumped off the ledge into the canyon superman style! N U T S!!!

On our way in the van to go JUMP OFF A CANYON CLIFF!!!!

Switzerland: I remember that day, us all piling onto the buses to take us to the airport, Chad's face as the bus he was on pulled away from the second group of us, standing in the courtyard of Universite Phillipine. He was balling and had both hands on the window. It was really sad yet funny at the same time. Maybe I wasn't as sad because I knew I would be spending the next couple days with Tess and would be seeing Victor again before we all finally departed our own ways.

I can't tell you how weird it was in those last two weeks. Not only did A LOT go on in general, but it was this weird mixed feeling of readiness to go home but a sadness for leaving the friends that we had built such close relationships with over the past three months. Although I was still traveling for another week after the program, it was really sad. I felt that the time had flown by, and that I had taken it for granted. I would never be in this place with these people again. Sure I can visit, BUT IT WILL NEVER BE THE SAME. So this last week we bar crawled and just spent tons of time with one another, as the pictures portray.

last night out with my peeps. :( miss it.

our last night out at La Piazza, signing yearbooks and clearly Menken is just ballin like a baby... awwwww

Our last Italian class. We had the best row. By far. And the funniest was def the morning after Halloween when we all were SO late for class... and then "dick in a box" walks in - Mat and Ben..... the entire class was laughing so hard b.c they were still in their outfits from the night before...and Professoressa Marin was like "what?" oh man.

So one night Salvail, Mike, Trace, Dane and his friend, Ish and I took a cab back to Bassano del Grappa to hit up a few bars and then go to an underground club. Well lets just say that you order your drinks on this paper card they give you when you enter. If you lose it you pay a fine. And at the end of the night they charge you. Well we keep buying drinks on this card, not knowing how much. I lose my card, but had no bought any drinks on it...and they just told me it was okay. So the end of the night comes...after TONS of fun and dancing...and the cards added up to 600euro for just Trace and Salvail! AND I was charged with a 100 euro fine for "losing" my card. I stood there...as the last person...and in my broken Italian explained to them that YOU told me it was okay. Well I had to pay. A bittersweet night. But a lesson learned!

On our train ride back to Paderno, I was working on the movie/slide show for our program and I figured out in my Mac photobooth. Mike and I started playing around with it...and as were making weird faces into my computer, people who were sitting across from us just thought we were nuts. But we had such a great time!

the most attractive i've looked in ages!

So on our last day in Rome, this would be my second time trying to see the Pope. Well we get up really really early, take the sub over to the Vatican, and see this HUGE line. So we wait in line. Almost an hour late the line starts moving and finally we get into St Peters square. And we see everyone running up to the basillica waving tickets. WHAT? Turns out we needed tickets to actually attend mass. Otherwise we would have to sit outside, watch it on the screens, and maybe see the Popes appearance at noon. So we headed back to sleep a little, and near noon we said we would meet Mary and Mike there to see the Pope's appearance. Well Tess and I get on the wrong sub going in the WRONG DIRECTION. And we could NOT stop laughing!!! I think we laughed for a good ten minutes till our stomach hurts. Because we TRIED so hard and obviously the Pope just wasnt feelin it! oh ma too funny . :)

Our hostel in Rome... I always wondered why Tess and Mike would walk four flights of stairs. I always took the sketchy lift. I saw this sign on the last day there! hahahah ...summarizes hostels for you. This hostel Mike also got lucky b.c it was us four in a random room of 8, and the other four turned out to be BEAUTIFUL brazilian girls who just would CHANGE right in from of us! Mike loved it! lol

This guy was really good! Emotionless and actually one of the best ones we have seen!

Do you see how the green door is a lot higher up than the actual steps? You can see the layers and the hundreds of years between building. Originally the steps and columns were built, but with years of flooding and silt deposit, 20 feet compiled and the new "ground" level was there the door started. And when the conquerors tried to tear down the palace, they put ropes on the top of the columns to pull those down first, and as they pulled, they couldn't get the columns to fall. You know why? Because little did they know that the columns really went another 15 ft below their "ground" level. And here we are actually walking on the original ground. The Roman forum was awesome.

Rome was very chill. We didn't go out. After long days of tours we just wanted to relax. One of my favorite parts of Rome was Hill where Ceasar and all the rich people lived. It was one of the seven hills of Rome. Up there you could see all of Rome and it had old structures that they used to stay in, as well as lots of grassy areas where we could lay out. Next time if I go back, Ill bring lunch up there and lay there all day reading. Its so beautiful. And the weather was perfect.