Pancakes, Picnics, and Pajamas

Pancakes
My roommates have been requesting that I make pancakes for a while. So, the other Thursday, I fulfilled their wishes. After buying the most expensive bottle of maple syrup of my terrestial existence (imported all the way from Vermont), I woke them up with "American Breakfast." They were enchanted, and began taking pictures right away. They especially like the Mickey Mouse pancake, and I found out there's an italian version of the "Mickey Mouse Song."

We had also decided to speak only in English, which meant I told stories, very slowly, with lots of hand motions and footnote translations. As it was only fitting, I instructed Vicky, Serena, and Ania in the grand folklore tradition of America: Paul Bunyan and Johnny Appleseed. Then somehow we ended up talking about McDonalds... Just a note, Vicky's a nutrition major. I went from "I'm proud to be an American" to "Can we change the subject please?"

Nevertheless, they very much enjoyed pancakes, although they all swore they wouldn't be able to eat anything else for the rest of the day. And quickly Facebook statuses were changed to announce the news, and jealous italian friends stared at posted pictures longingly.

Picnic
The weather here in Bologna has been pretty great up till now: mostly sunny, mostly warm, mostly beautiful. That is, until we decided to have a picnic. As Murphy's Law would have it, it started raining as soon as we all met at the bus stop. Not to be discouraged, and also because we still wanted to eat, we moved the festivites inside the BCSP office, at which point the sun came out. But I had already drawn a sunshine on board, so the real thing was just redundancy. Bread, meat, cheese, fruit, but the greatest things of all were the italian-style brownies (only slighty more solid than pudding) and the prosecco with lemon gelato. But soccer will have to wait for another time...

Pajamas
It's every girl's dream to have a three-day sleepover with her best friends, and this past week I was lucky enough to be able to host one. Katie, Christen, and Lenore, along with new friend Sarah, crashed into Bologna on Tuesday night. Katie and Lenore went to class with me the next day, we all took walks around Bologna, we ate gelato and cookies and crepes, went out to dinner in my new favorite bolognese restaurant, got haircuts, watched movies, and most of all chatted about all things girly. Another fantastic thing we did was explore some of the churches in Bologna: San Domenico, San Francesco, and San Stefano.

San Domenico is airy and bright, with richly decorated side chapels, one for Our Lady of the Rosary, and the other housing the tomb of St. Dominic. We probed into every open door we could find, and even gained access to the interior courtyard of the convent. I noticed that while the interior of San Domenico was very white, which seemed to mimic the dominican habit, and the interior of San Franceso, of somber browns, reminded us of the Franciscan habit. San Francesco is very open. It seems a little more simple than San Domenico, but not less elegant or beautiful.

San Stefano is composed of seven different buildings, all connected to religious activity dating from Roman times, when it began as a temple. Now it is a Catholic church, and a really neat one, at that. All the girls and I wandered through, winding from room to room, building to building, seeing the oldest parts, the parts still in use, the parts in the dark, the parts outside, The museum, gift shop, and church. A unique feature of the church is that the entire altar area is raised about (and I'm terrible about quantifying distances) fifteen feet above the congregation. you can then go under the raised area to find another small chapel. Another great thing about San Stefano? It's right down the street from one of the best gelato places in town: Sette Chiese. Of course we stopped. Praying makes you hungry, you know.

We went to daily Mass at the church right around the corner, Santa Maria, and after the first evening, Padre Lorenzo came up to us afterwards. He was impressed that we all sang, and commented on how bright and joyful we seemed, how willing we were to share our voices. Italians, on the other hand, stop singing because they feel someone else might be better than them, he explained. The next evening, after Mass, Padre Lorenzo introduced us to his friend, who also happens to be an opera singer. Of course, we asked him to sing for us, and Sarah produced amazing piano skills to accompany him in "Some Enchanted Evening." Fabulous. Then Lenore finished the concert with an a cappella version of "Ave Maria." A wonderful evening, to be sure.

Sometimes it's hard to be a tourist in the city you live in, so I took advantage of the awesome company I had and saw Bologna with fresh and eager eyes.

Signed,
the Sengenblogger