Bologna

This morning I woke up early and got ready for my day trip to Bologna with some girls from my program. Fabio and Chelsea ended up having other plans, so I met Casey, Jenny, and Jessica at the Modena train station and we left for Bologna just after 10 A.M. The train ride was really easy-- it took about 20 minutes and it was only 6 euro for a roundtrip ticket to Bologna.

Once we got to Bologna we had absolutely no idea where to go. Simona told me that there would be information desk at the train station where we could get a map, but apparently everything (including the information desk) is closed on Sundays. Jenny's host mom did print off a small map of the city from Google, but it wasn't very detailed so we just kind of went with the flow and navigated the city as best we could.

Even though we didn't know what any of the monuments and statues were, it was still a lot of fun because everything was so beautiful! As we walked around aimlessly for a bit we somehow came across a huge outdoor market, which was just off of the main road. We had a great time browsing around the market, looking at all of the jewelry, trinkets, and food for sale. As much as we enjoyed looking around, we were all very grumpy because we were so hungry (side note: I was not the only one who was moody). It took us a while to find a decent restaurant where we could sit down and enjoy ourselves, but we finally settled on a place called Ristorante Victoria. The food was amazing and it came very fast so our moods turned around very quickly once we got some food in our stomachs. We also had fun speaking in broken Italian and English to the waiters. One waiter in particular, Francesco from Napoli, was funny and very eager to talk to a table of American girls. He kept coming over and asking us how old we were, where we were from, etc. He also told me, 'Sei belissima,' which means 'you are very beautiful.' I responded 'Si.' Whoops... Even so, he still seemed pleased to take some pictures with me.

Once we finished lunch we returned to the outdoor market. I bought a lot of presents for friends and family (I'm not going to say what!) and the guys at several of the booths even gave us discounts. They were also very eager to talk to us and one even asked us to go out with him and his friends tonight in Bologna... yeah right. Luckily we had a good excuse since we aren't staying there.

After we finished at the market we made our way to Università di Bologna, which is the oldest university in all of Europe. It ended up being somewhat of a disappointment because the buildings were all COVERED with grafitti and flyers; it was definitely not the picturesque university I imagined it would be. It was interesting to see though so I'm glad we were able to visit.

Once we made our way back to the center of Bologna and stopped for a mandatory gelato run, we started to walk back towards the train station. On the way we actually ran into Chelsea, who has just arrived in Bologna with her host sister. It was definitely a fun surprise to see someone we knew!

When we got to the train station we had a bit of trouble figuring out what train we needed to be on. Thankfully we got it right, but it was a bit hectic for a few minutes! Boarding the wrong train would not be a good thing to do in foreign country.

After a long day of sightseeing in Bologna we were very proud that we made it back to Modena successfully. The city of Bologna is beautiful and I'm so glad we had a chance to visit, even if only for the day. Because Bologna is much bigger than Modena, there are many more tourists, which also means that many more people speak English. Obviously being able to communicate made it easier for us to get around and it was nice to be able to talk to Italians for once! Even though I can understand a lot of Italian at this point, the language barrier is still very difficult. Being in Bologna today amongst English speakers was refreshing and it made me even more excited to visit the bigger cities in Italy, like Rome, Florence, and Venice, where more people speak English. We have a busy week planned, but this weekend is our trip to Florence and, obviously, we are all anticipating a very fun weekend in Firenze!