Where I am right now, and what I'm doing must remain a mystery for a moment. I have to back up and cover last weekend, and my last, saddest week in Siena...
Sunday the program took us to the beach, near Grosseto (do you remember Grosseto? Where I spent a sleepless night waiting for a train), and it was lovely! Sand, sun, more sand. More sun. Woo. Only it was deceptively cool, with the wind, and I definitely burned my legs. Sadface.
Maya and I tried to build a sand replica of the Palazzo Pubblico in Siena, which almost worked except for Torre del Mangia, which ruined everything. Ah well. I made up for it by kicking butt at beach football. And by "kicking butt" I mean not sucking the worst. I "tackled" (two-hand touch) Trevin twice (he claims he doesn't remember, but that's a lie) and Rory once. I did fumble the ball once, and passed to someone who was not open, but tackling! It was a lot of fun, and our team almost won. And my knees took a serious beating from all the running and slipping and sticks on the ground, but it was for a good cause.
The beach had these weird little bugs though, that if you sat down, farther up the beach, out of the wind, climbed everywhere. They were sort of half flying half not bugs, and it was pretty gross when you were trying to eat your sandwich without getting sand in it.
After fun-beach-sand-times, we went to this tiny town called Castiglione della Pescaia for gelato, which was great after a day at the beach. We also saw "Via dell'Amore" where the story goes that these lovers fell in love at the well at one end of the road. They wanted to stay in love, so they walked up the road backwards, to keep the well in sight, and if you want to be lucky in love, you should do that too. So I did! The well disappears almost immediately though... But either way, I'm officially 'lucky in love'. So clearly my Italian soulmate is going to appear at my doorstep any day now, having been bewitched by me in the train that one time.
The last week was pretty durn sad though. It felt like I had to devour every glance, every breath of wind, everything and feel it completely, so as not to waste a moment! And I didn't really want to do anything except wander around in Siena and feel melancholy, which was not really and an option since I did actually have exams and stuff. And a paper. Which I wrote out by hand because my computer died, and I left my charger at school. So value your technology, kids! And you grown ups should hush. Yes, you had to write papers by hand, backwards while licking the roads clean, right? I thought so. It's all about what you're used to.
Thursday, the last night, was the saddest. I started to tear up just waiting for the bus! What is wrong with me!? Everyone was really tired, so a bunch of people turned in early, and I was mostly just very sad. It was so hard to say goodbye to Siena, which I have loved, and has been so good to me. I will come back, but I don't know when. And it was hard to say goodbye to the non-Lewis&Clarkers who I may never see again. People claim they'll visit, but it's hard to do, and they can't be blamed. And I was struggling to express to my Nonna how grateful I was for everything she'd done, and how special she is to me, because of the whole language thing. I think I did okay, though. I plan to send her a picture of us and some letters. I will miss her! And her cooking and her doing my laundry and folding it and her cleanliness. She is the cleanest. She even airs out her shoes every day. What.
Friday was anticlimactic, in some senses. I waited around in the house for hours with nothing to do, because I had packed already (you'd be proud to see how well I stuffed everything in there). And then the bus to Rome was super late. Because Fiona, Marli, Kate, and I were the only ones flying out as soon as the program ended, we were bussed to Rome, then had to catch a train to the Rome airport, then a shuttle to the hotel. So it was a long day, especially with all our bags. The hotel was very nice though...
Since Fiona, Marli, and I flew out at 6.15 am, I stayed up until about 1, woke up at 3.30 to be at the airport by 4. So that was gross. And then there was a surprise fee. Which was my own fault - someone told me I could check two bags on my Lufthansa flight to Seattle via Frankfurt, which wasn't actually true, so I had to pay €50 to check the second bag, which is too big to be carry-on. And the plan from the beginning was to have a second bag to fill with souvenirs and stuff from Italy. I don't think I would have minded so much, except that I didn't know beforehand. I just like having time to digest having to pay money. Oh, and did I mention that my flight from Seattle to Portland doesn't let you check any bags for free? Yeah. Don't fly Alaska.
On the plus side, not only did I have two whole seats to myself for the 10 hour flight (hooray for sleeping for 6ish hours, and in a horizontal-ish position!), but customs was relatively painless. So hooray for that! Now I'll let you know where I am - sitting in the Seattle airport, on their free wifi, waiting another hour and a half before I board my flight to Portland. I gave myself way more time than I needed here, but it means I get to write you a blog post!
I've come full circle... from writing a blog in the Seattle airport on my way to Italy, terrified and excited! Now I've done it, and my prediction that it would go too fast has come true. It's hard to feel that when you're in it, but it's the most true - it feels like yesterday and also an eternity ago. I'm still processing coming back, so you don't get any conclusions yet. But it's weird hearing English spoken, being able to eavesdrop, and trying to get back into remembering that 99% of people can understand us when we talk.
Anyway. That's about all I can manage for now. I'm still kinda shell shocked... it's 10pm Rome time, and I left the hotel at 3.30am. I did actually sleep a bunch, so it's not tired as much as just... empty. I'm in Travel-Rachel mode, which means 'get stuff done, and think later'.
So close to home! And yet so far... 3 more hours until touch-down in Portland.
Love and misses (and anticipation to see you all)!
<3
I AM SO EXCITED YOU ARE ALMOST BACK TO PORTLANDDDD
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