July 4th- 7th, 2009 – Independence day in a foreign country and a little bit of Homesick. Bleh.

It was time to leave the big city and head to Arezzo where we would be staying for the month. On the way out we stopped by the Borghese to see some great art by Carvaggi (?) and appreciate some sculptures that rich people in Rome acquired in the past. At this point I had been being a tourist for quite some time so I was kind of over it. Regrettably over it, but over it none the less. It was a beautiful museum and the house was really elaborate and had gorgeous gardens. No one lived in the house, they just used it for parties, but it was very opulent. Not necessarily the Biltmore, but very over the top! After the Borghese, off to Arezzo! I passed OUT on the bus. I love sleeping on buses. It always just knocks me out and I feel so refreshed when I wake up. Anyhoo, we finally got to Arezzo and checked into the convent. The group was pretty much divided in half. The dudes and a couple girls went to one side of the convent, and the rest of the girls were taken up to a different part of the convent. I was pretty bummed we would be so far away from everyone until I saw the rooms. They share really awkward bathrooms with each other, and we have our own per two people! Ours were recently renovated and are super duper nice and have internet, and theirs don’t. We totally scored! We went to Kirks house for a good ol’ American grill out to celebrate the fourth. He has the cutest little boys that we played with for a little while. They both speak fluent English and Italian and are learning French. I felt like an idiot. These five and seven year olds are borderline trilingual and I can barely speak English. It was a pretty good little cookout, and afterward we headed to Arezzo’s one bar to celebrate in the style of ‘Merica. After a few cocktails we heard popping outside, ran out, and it was fireworks!! There is a guy here from Chicago who runs a performing arts school and apparently puts on fireworks every year. Fireworks are my favorite, and I was really bummed to be out of the country on the fourth, so this made my night! The next day, homesickness set in REALLY bad. I wanted ice cubes. I wanted AC. I wanted a real freaking pillow/queen size bed. I wanted Dr. Pepper. I wanted SVU/House/Travel Channel. I wanted my best good friends and family. I realized I left my camera on the bus, converter blew on roommate’s hairdryer, and the fun touristy part of the trip was over. We had about 60 pages to read for Monday’s class, and reality was eating my lunch. I was pretty unhappy for a bit, but talking to some people back home made it a little better. Monday sucked too. Once we got to class we learned that the curriculum was for Harvard MBA students (two courses mind you), and we were expected to do well in it in three weeks. Wtf?! After being assigned about 70-80 more pages to read and  questions to answer in less than 24 hours, and a novel to read by two weeks from then, I wanted to kick some one. Hard. Went straight back to the monastery to begin work and finally finished around 10. Working in groups really helped. The fact that we all wanted to kill him helped too. Misery loves company! I took a couple of breaks, but pretty much worked straight through from 1-10. Some vacation.. When we got to class the next day, we learned that that was our hardest day so far. Everything else would be a little more spaced out. Thank god! We discussed the cases, which was really fun. It is a class where we read about problems with new businesses and decide what we would do in their situation. The cases are from real people’s ventures and we aren’t allowed to look on google to see that they actually did. It gets pretty frustrating, but it is fun to work out all the problems and hear everyone’s different ways of dealing with the situations. This is basically all class is. Arguing, Jim playing devil’s advocate, more arguing. Oddly enough, it is really fun. I was still feeling pretty blue after class, but as the day progressed things got a little better. We hung out with a foreign exchange dude at OU who told me about a friend of his in Arezzo so I met up with her for lunch. I love her! They have exams right now so we wont be able to hang out much, but I had a great afternoon with her, She brought some friends from Uni and we all talked and walked around while they told me more about Arezzo and asked questions about Americans. It definitely lifted my mood! We had a corporate visit the next day to Pagani, Ducati, and Ferrari and no stinking reading to do, so we hit up that bar again! Wasn’t a crazy night or anything, but we were all getting to know each other better so it was a fun night to just hang out with everyone, I used my iPhone (still doesn’t work over here!!) and was DJ for the walk home and it was a pretty fun night!