Madrid

Hola! Just got back to the hotel after a long weekend in Madrid. It was a great trip. Really awesome to see my good friends Sophie Mair, Cameron Harding, and Chandler Duff, and Pierce Ganassin. Good feeling to see some random Loyola faces. We started out Thursday leaving campus around 5:30PM via taxi. For some reason, the driver took a random route through the city to the airport instead of taking the highway, and we arrived at the airport at 7:10, and the gate was supposed to close at 7:15. We lucked out, and got rushed through passport check and security, and they didn't even start boarding the plane until around 8, but it was a pretty stressful start to the trip, and by far the closest I've ever been to missing a plane. But the flight was good, and we got into Madrid around 10:30, and we were immediately greeted by a smiling (and almost crying) Sophie Mair. She and her boytoy Walker took us by bus to the plaza where our hotel was supposed to be located, and we spent the next hour and a half or so asking for directions and trying to find the hostel without much luck. Eventually we stumbled upon it and put our things away, then went for a quick beer at the Irish pub down the street called O'Connel's, and then called it a night. The next morning we met at 10:30 in Plaza del Sol and went on our way. We started the day by going to see the palace of the king and queen of Spain, which was pretty cool. We hung out outside there for a while. We got on the Metro to walk to a giant park (don't remember the name??) by Walker's apartment, and unfortunately, Paige got her wallet stolen, so that was a damper on the morning. But then we picked up some bread and cheese and a few bottles of wine and had a picnic in the park, then rented a rowboat to take out on the lake in the middle. The weather was gorgeous, and it was an incredible afternoon. We met up with Cameron Harding there, who I was quite excited to see, and we walked to a random building downtown that you could pay 2 euros to go to the top and see a view of the whole city. That was pretty incredible, and then being true Americans, we went to Taco Bell, which was really delicious (pathetic right?) having been deprived of fast food for a month and a half. After that we went back to the hostel to take a siesta and freshen up for the night. We hung out with everyone there for a while, then went out to a sangria bar where (according to Walker) Hemingway had written a novel or something. It was packed, so we had a pitcher of sangria then split. The girls were tired, so we took them back to the hostel, and I continued to an Irish pub with Pierce, Sophie, and Walker which was called Dubliner's. I had a drink there and met some of the Madrid crew's friends, then walked back to the hostel and crashed. We slept until 11 the next day, and woke up basically without an agenda. We wandered the main shopping street called Grand Via, and I was dragged by the girls into H&M and a few other places. Then we met up with Pierce and he took us to an area with some smaller more retro stores and such, and we walked through there for a while, and we met up with Chandler Duff! It was a pleasure to see her, a fellow Marquette Hall fourth floor veteran. We walked with them for a while then grabbed a Nutella crepe at a corner store and then parted ways. After that we went back to the hostel to get ready for dinner, and we went to a place called El Tigre, which was packed. You paid for a beer, and then they brought you all the tapas you could possibly desire, which were delicious. So that was a nice authentic Spanish dinner. Then we went to a couple of random bars for drinks, and Cameron posed the challenge to me to try to get pictures with 15 Spanish girls throughout the night. He taught me the correct phrase (Puedo sacar una foto contigo?), which I will probably remember forever, and we had some fun attempting that for a while (see Facebook for products). I didn't get anywhere close to 15, but it was pretty funny. We just wandered the city for most of the rest of the night and then made our way back to Plaza del Sol. There, Cameron and I had the best crepe of my life. Kinder bars, chocolate chips, and Nutella, all in one delicious bundle. I think my life was changed forever. Outside of the crepe shop, three Italians walked up to Cameron and handed him a bottle of gin, vodka, and rum. Cameron was a little bit confused, and he asked them "Con Rufies?", which may win quote of the trip award. But I got to work out my Italian, and the man explained that he was very drunk, and simply did not want the drinks anymore. Cameron didn't trust him, and forced him to take a drink of each before he would accept them. The man obliged, and we spent the next half hour or so talking to them outside of the crepe shop. They were kind of creepy towards the girls (as typical Italian men are), but overall they seemed like nice guys, and I kind of impressed myself with my Italian (even though there were lots of ums, uhs, and pauses). They wanted to go out, and we were headed home, so we parted ways and went back to the hostel. The people above us were having a party, so I didn't really sleep for the whole night. We checked out of the hostel at 11AM after about an hour of sleep total, went to Sophie's apartment and set our stuff down, then went to the big Sunday outdoor market. On the way, we met a guy from New Jersey who said he'd just gotten out of the army in Israel. His name was Yair (spelling? pronounced Yah-ear), and he tagged along with us for the rest of the day. Nice kid. Said he was just traveling Europe by himself and finding places to stay at night as he met people or finding hostels. Sounded like he was having some serious adventures. We went for Tortillas Espanola (Spanish omelets) right by the market, then walked through the market very quickly, stopped for empanatas, parted ways with Cameron and Yair, and headed back to Sophie's apartment. We picked up our stuff, said goodbye to Sophie, and picked up a bus to the airport. Everything was smooth this time around, until it came time to land the plane. I'm not a great flyer as it is, but there was tons of turbulence, rain, and lightning as we started to descend, and me and the Italian woman next to me were having a pretty good freak out. The plane landed in the rain, and I think my heart stopped a few times, but I'm here to tell the tale. Got back to campus, ate a quick dinner around 9, skyped my parents, Conor Duncan, and Rachel Haller, and then came back to the hotel here. Now, I am headed to bed. Good weekend. Up this week is a big outline for a research paper as well as a philosophy midterm, so busy week, then Tunisia begins this weekend!  So excited. Also, we started the soccer league last Wednesday (5-3 defeat, rough loss). Looking forward to another game this Wednesday. Have a fine week. Arrivederci.
-Ryan

Rest of Firenze, etc.

Before I even go into Sunday... http://espn.go.com/mlb/spring2012/story/_/id/7592459/mlb-day-1-renewed-cardinals-title-defense OPENING DAY IS SO CLOSE. Let the countdown begin. But anyway, the rest of the Florence was good. I woke up at 10:30, went back to the duomo and walked from there south to the river. I got some gelato and a panino, and walked some more and looked in some shops. I sat in a plaza in front of a church for an hour or so just people watching, then made my way for the train station. I bought a cardigan in a shop outside the station, and then found the schedule for my train and just hung out in the station. Overall kind of uninteresting day, but relaxing and worth the stay. On the train ride home I ran into the girls coming back from the Orvietto study trip, and I caught a cab back with them from the station at Termini. Got back to campus and ate dinner, skyped the family, then Mikey and Jake, and then got some shuteye. Great weekend overall. Did I mention how excited I am for Cardinals' baseball? Distance makes the heart grow fonder they say. Anyhow, have a fine week everyone. I shall post as it progresses. Ciao!

Firenze Night One

Assuming nothing too exciting happens between tonight and going back to Rome tomorrow, I figured I would post here from my hostel in Florence while everything is still fresh. I've taken some pictures with my phone, so I'll post those on a second post later. Started the day out leaving at 10:30 from the Rome center, and missed my train by about 2 minutes, so I bought a ticket for the next one, and was into Florence by 1:30. Stopped by the hostel, called Archi Rossi Hostel, and dropped off my stuff and was reaaaally impressed. I have a private room with a bathroom, two double beds, a TV, a computer, a closet, and a spectacular view for a pretty decent price. So I was happy from the get-go. I started off in Piazzo Duomo, got a piece of pizza in the shadow of Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore. I think it's my second favorite church of all time to the St. Francis church in Assisi. Architecturally gorgeous, and I paid 8 euro to climb up to the top of the duomo. It was an incredible view, and I stayed up there for probably a half hour to 45 minutes. After that, I ran into a couple of girls from Loyola, which was kind of funny. I said a quick hello to them then started roaming the city. I went to Ponte Vecchio, the famous bridge here that has a ton of jewelry shops on it. Brought some serious deja vu from when I was here in high school, more so than the duomo for some reason. I did some more walking around from there and stumbled into a market dedicated solely to chocolate. It was pretty awesome, and I bought some white chocolate with cranberries in it, which I am still working on. I then headed for the Mercato Centrale, which is where most of the leather and silk and such is sold. Did some shopping there (Mom finally got something for you) and then some more roaming, and headed back to the hostel for a short break since I had walked forever and climbed up to the duomo. I stayed in the room for half hour or so, then set out on a journey for a nice meal. I decided to splurge a bit, and went to a restaurant right next to the Cattedrale and had a 3 course meal with dessert. For antipasti, I had bread with melted mozzarella and prosciutto, delicious. For pasta, I had the house lasagna, delicious. For main course, I had Tuscan beef in some sort of sauce, delicious. Had a glass of the house chianti to drink, which was also delicious. Then, finished it off with a ricotta cheesecake with wild berry sauce. It was the single best piece of cheesecake man has ever created. It was a long day of telling myself "It's just money," but really worth it. I had a great day, and some seriously needed alone time. After dinner, I walked around a bit, then went to an Irish pub to watch the first half of the Juventus soccer game and have a Guinness. That was very nice, and here I am back at my hostel by 10 o'clock. I feel like an old man. So tired. But it was awesome, and I'm happy, so good times. I'll write again when I get back. Blues are up 3-0! Yeah, buddy. Buonasera!

The Daily Grind

Been a busy week with school and such. Had a great start with karaoke night Monday night. From 9:30PM to 2AM a great majority of the 200 students on campus gathered in the cafe (called Rinaldo's) and sang and danced. Anyone who knows me well knows that this is right down my alley, so naturally I participated extensively. They served us wine, which was really kind of odd at a school sponsored function. You'd think I'd be used to being legal after a month, but I think I associate dances with people trying to sneak drinking before or in the bathrooms, and it was strange to see people just openly drinking. It was a blast though, and there were some pretty funny performances (including 2 football players from John Carrol performing "I Got You, Babe"). One of the most fun nights I've had in Rome. Tuesday began studying for this morning's Art In Rome test. It took forever because there was an incredible amount of information, but I think the test went well. Tomorrow, for my history class, we are on site at the Victor Emmanuel II monument, affectionately known as The Wedding Cake here in Rome, because of how the monument looks. Anyone from SLUH Eurotrip junior year will remember this as the monument that the massive gay pride parade was in front of. It will be my first time going inside, and I am excited. Tonight, my philosophy professor is taking us to dinner in Trastevere as opposed to having our make-up class tomorrow. He is lazy like we are and has no desire to have class on a Friday. Valentine's Day went well, and being single and bitter, Jim, Andrew, Julia, Julie, Mandaline and I decided to celebrate by having a few beers and watching The Lord Of The Rings. It was a good night. Jim and I also enjoyed the Cuban cigars we bought in Brussels. I'm not smoking cigars all the time, but the US really needs to get on lifting that embargo. I suppose the biggest news of this week is what I'm doing this weekend. Everyone's been telling me I need to take a trip by myself for the experience, and quite frankly, I'm getting to the point where I'm crabby because I'm seeing so much of everyone here, so I booked a hostel in Florence and am taking a trip there by myself Saturday and Sunday. I am a little nervous, but I am really looking forward to it! I'm planning to go see the David and the big church there (name?) and do some leather shopping. I'm a little curious what I'm going to do at night, being that it maybe kind of weird to go to a bar or club by myself, but I guess we'll see. I'll be sure to update on that one when I get back. Via e-mail I've been keeping in good touch with Conor, Mikey, Suzanne, Olivia, Cath, Nic, Mary, and my good friend Sarah Moore, and I am loving it. If you're reading this, e-mail me. It's great hearing from home. Also talked to my cousin Liz Buhn back in Chicago this week, which was very nice! I am really looking forward to going to Madrid on February 23 to see my good friends Sophie, Cameron, and hopefully Caroline and Grace. After that, the next trip I have planned is the school trip to Tunisia for Spring Break. It's ridiculous how fast time is going. I think when I graduate I want to apply for the SLA (basically the same thing as RA) position here and maybe spend some more time getting to know Italy (don't freak out too much, Mom). Who knows. Anywho, lunch time. Have a great week, and to anyone who is still bothering to read this blog, thanks. Arrivederci!

Belgium

So, this weekend was Brussels. It was incredible. Left very early Friday morning (I slept on campus in Jim's room and woke up at 5:30AM to get a cab to the airport) and got in to Brussels around noon. We took a bus from the small airport about an hour outside to get to Central Station at Brussels city center, then took the subway to the suburbs to the apartment where Linda lived. Linda is a family friend of my good friends Allie Faust and Elizabeth DiMaggio, and via Flannery Bohne's communication, she was nice enough to allow 6 of us to stay in her home. She was hysterical. She bought us pizzas and made us breakfast, and she told us to come back as late as we wanted. She is originally from the UK, but has lived all over, and lives in the US during the summers, and winters in Brussels. She had a thick British accent, and endless amounts of energy. Her boyfriend Tim was a 'jolly' fellow who I had a nice time talking football and rugby with. I digress. After we dropped off our stuff, we went to downtown Brussels and saw the Grand Plaza, which was beautiful, and Manneken Pis, which is a statue of a little boy peeing that Brussels is famous for (a little weird? Yes. I thought it was weird until I saw the statue of the little girl peeing on the other side of town. Weird Belgians.).  We got some Belgian waffles, mine covered in Nutella, and they were delicious. We walked into about 20 different chocolate shops, but I was waiting for the one that felt right to make a purchase. More details to come. After that, we just kind of roamed around, but got cold quickly. We sat down in a very nice bar that used to be some sort of landmark in Brussels. It has a big statue in the middle, an art gallery around the outside walls, and it was nice and quiet. Had a beer there, then got some Thai food for dinner. After Thai food, we went to Delirium. Anyone reading this who likes beer needs a trip to Brussels for this sole reason. Delirium is a bar with 2500 (not a typo) different types of bottled beer, and 27 types of draft beer. The girls had chocolate beer, pear beer, passion fruit beer, and pumpkin beer, which were all delicious, and they were happy. I tried Addrian (sp?) Brouwer Dark, which was pretty good, and had Delirium Nocturnum, which was a darker house beer. Jim tried Leroy Christmas, which I thought was disgusting. But it was a really cool, very crowded place. After that, we tried to find a place to just sit down and relax, but after a long day of traveling, we gave up in favor of going back and getting a good night's rest. We woke up the next morning and met our other friends in Brussels at the train station and caught a train to Brugges. This is a smaller city in Belgium, but I think it was definitely my favorite city I have been to so far. My sister's friend Lauren Smith from Sheffield suggested that I go there, so I think I owe her a thank you! It was a beautiful little town with small winding cobblestone streets, and several large bell towers that were big tourist attractions. We walked around for a while before stumbling upon THE chocolate shop, called Depla Chocolatier. I can't really describe the beauty, but the chocolate was just too goodlooking for words. I will try to steal a picture from one of my friends and put it on Facebook, as I still don't have a camera. Needless to say, I bought a half a kilogram of assorted chocolates and tried to ignore the price tag (good advice from Brad Zandstra: in Belgium, go to chocolate store, buy now and think later!). I've only tried two so far, chocolate with cherry liquer and an almond inside, and chocolate filled with dark chocolate mousse, and they were delicious. After that, we went to a small shop to get hot chocolate and sit for a while because it was freezing. Space was limited, so we had to split up. My friend Julia and I sat down and I ordered a white hot chocolate, and she ordered dark. We were surprised to receive a cup of steaming milk and a plate of chocolate and biscuits. The waitress explained that we simply pour the solid chocolate in and mix. It was hands down the best beverage I have ever consumed. The restaurant and hot cocoa were perfect. Julia just kept saying "This isn't real. It's too perfect!" Then, to make the experience better, an older British couple sat next to us, and we got to talking. The woman, Geraldine, was a teacher in Manchester, and her and her husband were checking out Brugges in preparation for a trip her school was taking there in the spring. We talked for a half hour or so, and at the end they gave us their e-mail address and said that if we're ever in the UK we have to contact them, and we could stay at their house. Best day ever? I think yes. After leaving there, we did some shopping and wandering around, then split up into two groups, and Jim, Julia, Julie, Mandaline and I went to a small bar for a drink and snack and then went to a chocolate museum. It was pretty interesting. Chocolate originally came from South America for anyone who didn't know, the Belgians just did a damn good job of perfecting it. After that we made our way back to the train and headed back to Brussels. We went back to Linda's place and made some pizzas, had a glass of wine, and met her for the first time (she was at work when we went Friday, and was up and out before we were up Saturday). We had fun talking to her, then got ready to go out. We started the night at Delirium again, and then made our way to the 'dance on tables' bar. Everyone kept calling it that. No idea what the real name was. We got there around 11:30, and we were informed that at midnight, people would start dancing on tables. It wasn't a joke. 12 o'clock sharp every table in the entire place was crowded with people dancing. Anyone who knows me knows I'm not much of a dance-on-tables personality, but I even participated for a while. It was a blast. From there, we went to Celtic, an Irish pub and hung out for a half hour or so, then made our way back to Lindas, where we promptly crashed. We woke up the next morning, had breakfast with Linda and Tim, and then said our goodbyes and thank-yous and headed out. We met Laura and Luke and went to Atomium, which is a big metal monument shaped like an iron atom, which was pretty cool. It reminded me of the Arch and St. Louis!  After that, we went back to the train station, caught a bus to the airport, and got to the plane just in time. Flew home, and here I am. Really incredible weekend. I think my friends think I'm cranky when we travel. Possibly inherited from my dad, I get a little stressed out when traveling. I feel responsible for making sure the group is there on time and such, so I'm pushing everyone to go, go, go and double check and blah, blah, blah, and everyone is like "Dude, shut up. It's going to be fine." I always laughed when my Aunt Lillie said she was a worry wart, but I guess I picked it up from her a little bit after all. Other news from the week, I wrote an article for the monthly Rome campus newsletter called Ciao, Roma. I titled it "My Right Way To Study Abroad" (clever right?). Basically, I wrote about how I'm glad I am studying abroad by myself. I miss my friends so much back home, and I think they know that, but I'm meeting new people and branching out and being challenged. I like it alot. Julia was a bit offended when she read it, as she's here with a few of her best friends, but I didn't say it was the single right way, just the right way for me you know? It was a realization that came out of the first few weekends of travel. Anywho, this quickly turned into a novel. Hope all is well for anyone who took the time to read this whole thing. Have a great week, and I'll write more when I need to. E-mail me! Arrivederci! -Ryan

Promesso & Snow

So, today was the final step of the "permit to stay" (permesso) process for staying here in Italy. We had to go to a really sketch government building about an hour away and get fingerprinted. Lots of fun. Had no class today or yesterday because of the snow, so that was nice. Headed to Brussels Friday and still haven't gotten a new camera. Yuck. But in other news, for anyone who hasn't seen my Facebook page, I am taking a hiatus from Facebook, so you can contact me via e-mail (rbedell@luc.edu). Please do contact me via e-mail. Love to hear from people back home! I will post again after Brussels. Arrivederci.

Amsterdam

So before I get into Amsterdam, a bit about the week before. Went to a chocolate bar in Trastevere, which was awesome. They give you a chocolate shot glass, and the shots are topped with whipped cream, and then you just eat the whole thing. Cool little place tucked in a corner on a tiny Italian street! But Thursday we just kind of hung out and watched The Big Lebowski since we knew we had to be up early Friday to catch our flight. We left at 6:30 AM from here at the Rome center, got to the airport around 7:45, and we were on our plane by 10. The flight went smoothly. Ryanair is pretty funny. They play a little trumpet at the end of the flight to celebrate "another successful Ryanair flight" and everyone cheered. Once we got on the ground in Eindhoven (about an hour and a half from Amsterdam), we went outside to catch the bus to Amsterdam. If I thought coming to Europe meant avoiding the winter weather, I was sadly mistaken. It snowed all of Friday in Amsterdam, and the bus ride ended up taking 3 and a half hours as a result. We got to Amsterdam around 5, checked in at the hostel, and went out for dinner. The hostel was a lot nicer than I expected. At 20 euro a night, I thought it would be flea-infested and sketchy, but it was nice. There were 20 people in the dorm, and the four of us guys (me, Mike, Jim, Andrew) had beds right by each other. The majority of the other inhabitants were college students from around the world. We had clean sheets, felt safe the whole time, and got breakfast each morning. After dinner on Friday, we basically just went from bar to bar until about midnight, when we all hit a wall from the long day of travel and went back to the hostel to crash. Saturday morning we were up at 9, and then started out our day at the Anne Frank Huis (House). I think this was my favorite part of the trip. I hadn't read The Diary Of Anne Frank since about 5th grade, but it quickly came back to me. The house was fascinating and moving. I am currently half way through rereading the diary, and I suggest it as a read! After that, we went to the Van Gogh Museum, which was also very cool. Got to see a lot of famous painting that I had seen or heard about in the past, and learn a little bit about his life. Then we grabbed some lunch, and went on the Heineken brewery tour, which was a lot of fun. We got free beer at the bar inside after and hung out there for a while, then took a free canal tour from there to right by our hostel. We got Chinese food for dinner, and then went to a nearby bar. We went back to the hostel after this to drop off souvenirs from the day, and then went out to a bar to watch some live music. Sometime during the music, I realized I didn't have my camera, and I never found it, so that was really the only downside to the trip. I'll have to go buy a new camera sometime this week. Bummer. Regardless, had a blast. The flight today was delayed about 4 hours because it snowed a few inches in Rome, which basically puts the whole city in a standstill. I talked to the guy who works in the cafeteria Lorenzo, who is a really nice local fellow, and he said that it snows in Rome only every 25-30 years or so. There are trees down everywhere, fallen on cars, in the street, and thus far no effort has been made to do any cleanup. The bad winter would come when I get here right? Next weekend is Brussels. Ought to be fun! I'll try to collect pictures from others for a look at the Amsterdam trip. Arrivederci, people.