Life Abroad in Firenze

This past month in Florence has been an invaluably enriching experience. Becoming immersed in a culture not your own is not an easy task to take on, but the rewards you reap outweigh most any obstacle you might encounter on your journey. As someone who had previously never gone outside of North America, I find that every day brings something new and exciting. Whether it be trying a new food or taking weekend trips outside of the city, I can sincerely say that I am indeed having the "time of my life."

Photographing temple ruins in Pompeii

The street I live on.

Climbing Mt. Vesuvius with clouds directly overhead.

The island of Capri taken during the boat ride from our hostel.

Cotton candy vendor in Piazza Annunziata during The Festival of Paper Lanterns

The sheer beauty of my new home never ceases to captivate me. Even something as simple as walking the same path through the city everyday to class is an opportunity to discover some new building front or feature that you might have previously overlooked. This new change in scenery has opened my eyes to a new culture and way of living, and also has helped to re-evaluate my outlook on my own country.

The Need to Coalesce

Buildings looming, streets turning nothing is the same but a sense of false familiarity allows for function in its basic form. Life is perceivably gridded, sequenced, mapped, people flow in unison, patterned. they have a familiar rhythm a routine. We do not. We have stepped into the current and forced them around us, bending their lives to ours or is it us bending for them as our old routines slowly ware away. we have been handed an idea, loose parameters. We search for the lines, the our, the tangible, the stable. we come from individuality, self identity, revolt, rebellion and now we strive to coalesce. We need to know before we can think, to ground ourselves before we can move. We want to know the absolutes, the always, the expected so that we can start again to form our sense of identity within this grid, to diverge from this, or embrace it.

Ciao

Its been three weeks since we have all arrived in Florence, and it honestly feels like forever ago. I'm so happy of the people that I came with, we've all become a giant family. Classes are definitely different from UConn and the studio we draw in is beautiful. Its such a nice change from the Art Building in Storrs.

This past weekend the family (us art students and then some) all went down to Naples, Pompeii, and Sorrento. It was one of the most amazing trips ever, and we all found it difficult to leave and come back to busy Florence. Traveling here is so cheap! We've all started planning new trips around Europe

Hannah in our drawing studio

Goofing around at Gino Capponi

Raymond and I climbed the Duomo. The view of all of Florence

Sorrento

our family in Pompeii!