This week class has been good. We studied the past tense and had a quiz on Friday. I joined the gym here and they have a great wooden floor studio upstairs and peaceful garden. I like walking there it is ten blocks from school. Today, Sunday, we figured out how to use the bus system finally. My roommate and I went to the Boboli gardens. We finally found a used book store. I found a book and now I’m about to start collaging it. After the Boboli gardens we met up with Zoe and Steph to go to the American cafe near Via Fume. We had french fries that reminded us all of the US. The owner of the cafe had photos of himself and different rappers. He owned the shop solo and was taking like twelve orders at once. After we were done eating we stopped at the grocery store and looked at some sneaks.

Yesterday we went to Siena and the Chianti wine festival. Siena is a lot different than Florence. The city is built upon three large hills and the buildings are built along an entire different set of codes. The two main government towers are large and tower above everything else. Most of the buildings follow a three color pattern: yellow, orange and red that when illuminated by the sunlight are radiant, warm and welcoming. The streets curve and wind, up and down the hills. Most of the buildings have three aperture windows as opposed to the regular two aperture windows in Florence. They also regulated that the buildings must be composed of brick everywhere and I liked when Gail explained the fishbone patterning of brick laid in the center. I think my mom would have liked Siena: she’s always liked brick houses.

Driving to Chianti the path was beautiful. I still love the fertile black soil of Iowa better than any other soil I’ve ever seen. The sunflower fields looked thirsty and even the grape fields were a light brown as opposed to the black-brown rich midwest soil. We purchased passes and tasted lots of different wine. I figured out that sweet wine tastes like pure maple sugar: it is too sweet for my taste. I was at first attracted to it because it looks like honey and I don’t like bitter wine. White soft silky wine is more my forte. Red wine is always too rich and bitter or sweet for my palette.

It was a long day and all through it I was congested and sick. I laid down for ten minutes when we got back and then it was time for dinner. My roommate and I are both pretty sick at this point. I hope we can get rid of it this week.