Under the Stars of Firenze

My titles are becoming more 'floofy' I think. I don't know if I like that or not.

A picture of the Florence skyline tonight.

Today was a pretty lazy day. I woke up and went for a walk, came back and watched a movie, and then Dan randomly showed up so we went to the English mass at the Duomo. This was a good choice for multiple reasons, but it was a great decision because I was asked to the second reading. Talk about a once in a lifetime experience. The whole place echoed with my voice and I could hardly believe that I was doing a reading inside the Duomo in Florence, Italy. We stayed after a little while to talk to Don Mario and Dylan, but after that we picked up some dinner (I had a delicious sandwich with ham and cheese and eggplant and mmmmmmm) and now I'm about to go outside to drink wine and smoke cigars with Dan and Bridget. This has turned into a quite relaxing weekend and I'll be wanting more of these after the next two weekends that I have in store.

Until next time, mi amici, God bless!

Saw this on Facebook tonight and really liked it:

Everyone longs to give their self completely to someone,

to have a deep soul relationship with another,

to be loved thoroughly and exclusively.

But God, to a Christian says,

“No, not until you are satisfied with living loved by Me alone.

I love you, My child,

and until you discover that only in Me is your satisfaction,

you will not be capable of the perfect love that I have planned for you.

I want you to stop planning, stop wanting,

and allow Me to give you the most thrilling plan existing—

one that you cannot imagine.

I want you to have the best. Please allow Me to bring it to you.

Just keep watching Me, expecting the greatest things.

Keep experiencing that satisfaction knowing that I AM.

Keep learning and listening to the things I tell you.

You must wait.

Don't be anxious. Don't worry! Don't look at the things you want.

Don't look around at the things others have gotten or that I have given them.

Just keep looking to Me, or you'll miss what I want to show you.

And then, when you are ready, I'll surprise you

with a love far more wonderful than any you would ever dream of.

You see, until you are ready

—and even to the minute, to have both of you ready at the same time—

until you are both satisfied with Me and the life I prepared for you,

you won't be able to experience the love that exemplifies your relationship with Me

and is thus, perfect love.

And dear one, I want you to have this wonderful love.

I want you to see in the flesh, a picture of your relationship with Me

and to enjoy the everlasting union of beauty and love.

I am God.

Believe and be satisfied.

- St. Anthony of Padua, 1247 -

A Trip to Remember

Have no fear! I almost forgot to update tonight, but, alas, I have remembered. Lucky you.

The tomb of Dante Alighieri. Sadly, his body isn't there because of a political fallout while he was alive.

So what did I do today? That's a very good question. For the first time since I've arrived, I didn't have Italian.  Both a good and a bad thing. Instead, we had a class on Italian culture and history. We had a theoretical background of what we were going to do in the afternoon -- a two part class. Venturing down into Florence, we visited the Duomo and the Baptistery. Francesco, our guide, was fantastic and gave us the incredible history of Florence. The picture above is from the Cathedral of Santa Croce (Holy Cross). It houses some of the greatest minds Florence had the honor of birthing. Galileo Galilee, Niccolo Machiavelli, Michaelangelo, and, as pictured above, Dante Alighieri. It's hard to fathom how many great minds came from this one city, but it's absolutely awesome at the same time.

We saw beautiful art all afternoon, even if it was a little bit chilly.

The crucifix made by Donatello.

I felt honored to be in the presence of two Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles today.

Heroes in a half-shell... TURTLE POWER!

Ok, now that I've got my geekdom out of the way, we can continue to the rest of my night. No, really, no more 90s references. At least I don't think I'll have anymore. *shrug*

Anywho! We came back to Settignano through the Chocolate Festival, where they were giving out free samples of various chocolate liquors. I thoroughly enjoyed my time in town today. Of course, there's still a lot for me to do in Florence, since I still have yet to find a shoe store that will actually sell me shoes for less than €90.

This is the Cathedral I was talking about earlier with all the paintings and tombs. The Chocolate Festival are the tens to the right.

Oh! But my Spring Break has officially been booked. Or at least the first part of it. We fly out of Pisa on Saturday March, 5, to Hamburg, Germany. We will spend one night there since it will be quite late when our plane finally lands. In the morning we will take a bus to Berlin and spend two nights there. From that juncture, our group will split into two. Three will go int Poland, and David and I will head further South into Germany. We will hit Nuremberg and Munich before we take a train across Austria to Vienna. I'm really looking forward to it and glad that I will be able to see a country I have always wanted to visit.

One more thing! My Florence album in the top right will be updated with all the pictures I have taken in Florence. So you might want to check that album every now and again to see if I've added anything. In the past few days I've added seventy or more photos.

I think that's all for tonight, though. God bless!

An Adventure into Florence

Well... today was interesting... again. I really don't want to talk about classes again, so I won't.

Part of our group at the St. Thomas Moore Society.

So we went into town to do a St. Thomas Moore Society, a local Catholic group in Florence, meeting. It was great eating dinner with fellow Americans studying abroad who were encountering the same kind of issues that we were. I absolutely loved hanging out tonight. Dinner. Wine. Good company. Gellato. Bellissima! Oh, but I also got some Italian pharmacist's number -- she was kind of hitting on me at the bus stop. It was very interesting... anywho...

God bless!