Rome!

We got back from Italy last Wednesday and it's taken me a while to get adjusted again, but I'm finally updating my blog and putting all of my pictures on facebook.  The first city we went to in Italy was Rome. We got there on Saturday May 7, very early in the morning. As soon as we got there we dropped our bags off at the Hotel and then went to have our first authentic Italian meal.  We had different types of pizza and pasta with an eggplant sauce.  Then we went to the Coliseum and the Roman Forum. I was surprised at how huge the Colesium was!

The girls right after arriving at the hotel.



The guys.



The Colesium

The first restaurant we ate at.



Mushroom pizza



Pasta in an eggplant sauce

Our hotel in Rome was nice, I had a great view from the room… Also, I’ll be including a lot of pictures from meals we ate, unfortunately I didn’t take pictures at a lot of the best meals because they were so good I forgot!



View from the room



On Sunday we had a free day in Rome, I spent it site seeing with classmates.

Then on Monday the 9^th, we had a tour of the Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel.  There was a huge line the lasted for blocks to get into the Vatican, but luckily we were able to skip the line with our tour guide.  Everything at the Vatican was beautiful, but Mark and I had a little confusion with our group when we were there.  I wanted to go with to the post office to get Vatican Euro Coins for one of my coworkers who collects coins so we left the tour and were supposed to meet back up at 12:45.  We went to where we supposed to meet, but our class was running late with the tour so by the time a couple guys from class went to find us at the meeting spot, Mark and I had already thought we went to the wrong spot and we left.  So then we left the Vatican trying to figure out where our class was supposed to have lunch, right after we had no luck asking one of the policemen if he knew how to get to the restaurant we turned around and saw our class walking by!  I was so happy we weren’t lost for the day, because we still had to visit a university that evening.  The last thing we did on Monday was go to Sapienza Universita, for a lecture with one of the marketing professors.  It was interesting to learn about how Italy markets to tourists, and the was farmers market their products (specifically wine).  We had to find our way back to our hotel on our own without the professors, which took a while, but eventually made it.  I liked walking for a long time from one site to the next in Italy because we always seemed to come across even more unexpected beautiful sites and buildings.

On the last day in Rome our class visited the clothing manufacturer Brioni.  We worked on a case study about the company for class, and I enjoyed learning more about the high end retailer.  I hope I’ll be able to afford one of their suits one day!

This was sooooo good!

We surprisingly had a lot of french fries (or some sort of french fry like potatos)... I would have rather had pasta.

The women's bathroom someplace where we went out in Rome... notice no toilette seat, the short height, and it was out of toilette paper :/ 

Best gellato ever!! I got chocolate with hazelnuts with a scoop of a different flavor in a conolo cono every night!

Some meats and cheeses at lunch with the folder from Brioni.

The delicious pinapple slices with tinee tiny strawberries... it kind of tasted like a fruit roll up.