Torino.

So this past weekend, I went to Torino with Stefanie, Laura, Danielle, and Leanne. We left at about 6 on Friday. Well, that part was actually interesting. We knew there was a train heading to Torino at 7:24 or something like that, but it wasnt leaving from Santa Maria Novella which is our train station, so we got to the train station early because we didnt know where we were going only to find out that the people working at the train station were on strike! so we are wandering around, finally buy our stupid one euro train tickets and sprint over to the train thats leaving in 2 mintues...we could have easily waited for another train that was leaving in 5 minutes because nearly every train stops at this stop, but of course we didnt. lol. so we get to this other train station, and there is no one working there either. on strike. and the only machine that you can buy your ticket from is broken. so we go to the lone information girl who tells us to buy a regional ticket from the machine (with cash for like 20 euro) and then when we're on the train, pay for the rest. So we do that. and we wait around for it to show up on the screen with what track our train is on. so we get to the train, only to find it absolutely packed and that everyone else has seats on their tickets! so stef, danielle, and laura find seats near each other, and i find another seat, so i have leanne sit in. There was one english speaking girl who told me that i was on the right train (thank God cuz it had already started moving!) and that people are giving me looks because with this train, everybody usually gets on and has a seat reserved, so i ask her what i should do, and she said to find one of the guys that checks the tickets. so i go and leave my stuff with stef, and run through 5 carts, no joke, trying to catch the ticket checker.

so once we are in the last car, he turns around and i seriously have no clue what i was saying. the guy sittin gin the last seat who had been at the train station with us was laughing at me, but the guy seemed to understand what i was saying. so he has me paying for the ticket. and hes like va bene. and im like no! where am i supposed to sit. nobody was letting me sit with them. and he said that i am allowed to sit anywher ei want. so i go walking all the way back to stef to get my stuff...and i tell them. and i end up askign every person who has an empty seat near them if i can sit there, and they seriously all glared at me and said no. i ended up in the very last car where the guy was still checking tickets. the man i sat with was very nice, so it was ok. i did some homework, fell asleep and when i woke up we were already past pisa and the man was gone. i ended up talking with this carabineri and some kids. and actually, everybody around me thought i was italian, so i figured id actually seem italian if i didnt open my mouth to speak all that much. but the kids were cute. loved them.

so then we get to torino. its like midnight. (it was a really long train ride.) so we get a taxi to take us to our hotel. it was a nice hotel. definitely had an italian feel. and it was a lot nicer than the hostels and stuff. stef and i got there and basically passed out. We woke up at about 8:20 on Saturday. had our free breakfast. and of course took some to go with us for snacks. We picked up our torino pass and the woman working that morning at the hotel was very very helpful. Definitely recommend that hotel. so we go to the historical center of town, where there is a chocolate festival! apparently it was the last weekend too. it was crazy!

so we decide that we would hit up the chocolate festival later in the day when we dont think its so gross to be eating so much chocolate. its only like 10:40 at this point. so we start walkign and we head towards the egyptian museum because thats what everybody says is good in Torino. on the way we passed by a medieval castle. pretty sweet stuff....and an H & M - i wish we had one in florence. lol. So we get there, and it was ok. there was one really cool room....if you saw night at the museum...it was set up similar to the egyptian room in the movie. all dark with mood lighting and stuff. very cool. from there we went to look at the theatre that i found in the book...we wanted to go inside and possibly on a tour, so they told us to come back at 3. so we went to the Cinema museum to blow off time until our tour. This place...man, it was crazy. Seriously my favorite museum ever. You go in and its like dark with movies playing all over the place and in the middle there are two big screens and two sets of these big velvety red chairs that are reclined and have speakers in the headphones so you could just sit there and watch the movies. and then all around the outside of this, there are these other rooms that are set up so you can watch movies that are playing in those rooms. one looked like a fight had just ended up in a western bar. chairs and stuff tipped over and stuff...another had a big round red bed type thing with lots of pillows and you lay down on it, and the movie screen is in the ceiling. then there were some with mirrors all over so you see the movie everywhere. there was one with toilet seat chairs. haha. we took pictures there of course.

then as you go up there are pictures of famous actors and actresses and props from movie sets and scripts and stuff, and then there are interactive things. like if you stand on the circle or the feet, there is a camera on you and you are actually projected into the movie. there was one, where you stood on it and there are like tvs all over the place and there were about 7 or 8 different cameras on you from different angles, so you see yourself on all these screens.

we loved it there. so then we go to our tour. buy our tickets. get inside. and we're standing there. attempting to understand this woman who is going to lead us around on this tour for an hour and forty minutes in italian! so we sit down and we're listenign and we're trying not to draw attention to ourselves, and then stef's cell phone starts ringing. so then everybody gets up so we follow, thinking we're actually going to be getting to see some stuff now. but no! we only were moving to a different section of the entrance way! so we're standing there and i lose it and start hystericall ylaughing and couldnt even tell stefanie the reason, which was...that iw as about to ask her what language her tour in the Globe Theatre was.....the globe is in London. so she starts laughing and im like crying, but we're trying to be really quiet. and then laura comes over and she starts dancing for no apparent reason. you know those times when you have to be quiet so it becomes harder to stop laughign...well yea that happened. so i finally calm down...and then it hits me that we've been on this tour for like half an hour now and dont speak italian! an di lose it agian. its just so random. but we got to see a lot of cool stuff. we saw the theatre, and then we went on the stage...it was set up for oedipus rex. from there we went to the dance studio and then we saw the small theatre in the basement. and then we got to walk throughthe place were they were making the costumes. that was really cool. we did go to some other random rooms, but i dont realyl know what they were because i was not in the mood to concentrate and try to understand her. from there, we went back to where the chocolate festival was by the Po river. and looked for the boat the woman told us about...for a tour. but we missed it. so we searched for someplace to eat.

after sandwiches, we went back to the chocolate festival where stef and i bough blocks of dark chocolate with nuts on the bottom and just attempted to eat the whole thing. she did. i ate like 3/4s of it. it was intense. we just hung out there for a while. then decided to eat some more....pizza. with olives! was actualyl the first time i foudn them in the past 2 months that ive been here! so then we decided to go back to the cinema museum cuz we loved it there...and we went on the lift...which took us to the top of the dome on the building, and we got to see all of torino. it was beautiful. then we sat in those chairs watching tv. at about 9:45 we decided to leave because we wanted to see the Tango at the chocolate festival. but we got there and they were only on the poetry reading which was supposed to be at 9, so we just left cuz we were tired. On Sunday, we decided we would go shopping cuz we saw everything we wanted to see, but foudn out that all the stores are closed on sundays, so we just left and came home early. it was better that way cuz we were all beat and had classes in the morning.

it was a fun trip. we laughed a lot. laughed so hard we cried a lot too...hadnt done that in a while. so tonight, we're going to the movies. nice and relaxing. its in english which is good, cuz im still tired and would probably fall asleep if it was in italian.

then tomorrow Stefanie and I are doing a day trip to Verona and Padua. Wednesday i think we're hanging out cuz Kim has a friend over this week. and Thursday we leave for Switzerland and will get back Sunday night, then Mon-Thurs is midterms. Fri and Sat is visit Aunt Sharon and Uncle Bob in Fiesole, Sunday is the family arrives!!!!!!!!

Gonna be a crazy couple of weeks.... :-)