on the third week of christmas (break) AFS gave to me.....

That last entry made my computer bug out, I think out of the longevity, possibly. (It was kind of making me bug out as well). Before it did, I began telling a story of one of the day trips that AFS and my family took over the course of a week. From December 29th to January 7th, here's what went down.

Gita #1: Mineo, Sicily.

On December 29th (amazing how I actually have gotten so behind that I have to use actual dates now. It's only out of business.....maybe.), AFS planned a day trip (almost) to the town of Mineo, an hour and a half's drive southwest of Catania. Being completely lost in life, generally speaking, I woke up 45 minutes too early, so I sat in my room and basically fell back asleep until we were all ready to go. All seven of us, since Hektor was still with us (if you haven't read about that Swiss kid and you honestly want to know who he was, click this thaaaaang).

Before leaving Catania and entering "la campagna" (the countryside), we had to drop my nonna (grandmother) off at her house and meet up with the friends of my brother, because we were following each other in a different car (there were originally 9 of us in one van, it wasn't going to happen). So, we met up and my host parents got a coffee outside of the apartment of my brothers friend, and then separated into our cars, my brother (who was in the other car) gave us the finger as they drove past, and we were off to Mineo for the day!

What made Mineo so special was the Christmas presepe (nativities) set up around the town that we were going to be touring that day. There were two types of these nativities, one being permanently a part of the town and the others being artistic, or only there for one year. To give you an idea of one of these, here is one that took 2 months to construct:

These nativities were set up in little nooks and crannies all over the city. There were arrows with numbers leading our way, but our way was very schizophrenic. At one point, our whole group had to go through this. THIS IS A STREET. A BLOODY STREET. I HAD TO WALK SIDEWAYS TO GET MY BUTT TO FIT THROUGH IT. THIS IS WHY I WALK 4 KILOMETERS A DAY FOR SCHOOL, PEOPLE.

This was really just what our day way, presepe and a beautiful view of Sicily from the town. There's not much else to it. 

Notice Etna in the left side of the picture. She's covered in snow.

Siblings.

The only picture I personally have of me with a family member. This is my brother, Mattia.

It's impossible for Roosa and I to take a picture without looking like we just woke up.

These random people are Gabriele, an AFS volunteer that was Hektor's liaison last year, my host sister Celeste, and Hektor, the Swiss kid, himself.

Gita #2: Taormina, Sicily.

On the fourth of January, the chapters of Catania, Ragusa, Giarre, Siracusa, and Messina all went to the town of Taormina, nearing Calabria (the toe of the boot of the Italian penninsula) but still on Sicily. Taormina is about a 2 1/2 hour bus ride from Catania, and we were literally the only people on the bus. Roosa and I just sat and listened to a collection of our weird/crappy/old music on our phones and talked for most of the bus ride (who knew Finns like Zac Brown Band?) But anyways this was the view from the piazza in Taormina.

Annnnnnd this sums up my friendship with Ari (Danish Faroe Islands) perfectly. 

Taormina is a very touristic city that is beautiful, yet pretty tacky. Being in the way that the whole set up of the city and the streets is so iconic Italy-esque, but those buildings are filled with tourist shops and expensive crap that you could get so much cheaper and in better quality in any other town. The way it is set up is all of the city is in the north (the city is on a hill), and in the south is where an island is, called La Isola Bella (the beautiful island). We were only in the north this day. So as usual, I ganged up with Roosa, Nano, Hiroshi, and as a step-in for Lucy who had to return to Guatemala in the beginning of December (she was here for the same time frame that Mattia was in Belgium), was Veera, another girl from Finland. We were given freetime to roam, as usual. Which didn't result in much, just pictures and nothing else. We met back in the piazza to go to the Greek/Roman theater that afternoon.

I had already been to this theater with my first host family, so I knew what to expect (slightly). To go into detail, the theater was made my both Greeks and Romans (the Romans came into the picture slightly later). This can be told by the types of stones that are seen in use. The Greeks didn't use square or rectangular bricks in building. They used more crude stones, so they weren't perfectly angled. The difference in the seats also changes, as well as the fact that the columns at the front of the theater were added by the Romans. 

The typical Kara and Gabriele picture.

The typical Kara and Nano picture.

After the theater we had the option to either go to the Villa (city park) or roam around some more. I really just wanted to have something organized for me to do so I chose to go to the Villa. Maeve, also from America, went to the Villa as well. We walked together and basically had all of those deep, philosopher thoughts come out in rivers as we don't talk much in English anymore so they were bottled up. We also sat on the bus together going home where even more of these thoughts were released. It felt good to have someone just understand me completely. 

Gita #3: Villa Romana del Casale

On the 6th, it was my host mom's birthday and Befana (kind of like a version of Santa, only with stockings and it's really an old woman with a broom and black cape and glowing red eyes who is not a witch). But anyways, after waking up to my host dad's sock hanging on my door handle filled with candy, my family set off for Villa Romana del Casale, about a mile outside of a town called Piazza Armerina, in the middle of Sicily. What made this our destination was that Villa Romana del Casale was a gigantic Roman Villa, with the floors completely done in all in hand-laid mosaics. 

Remember in the 6th grade, when you learned about Pompeii or the Roman empire, when there were the public bath houses and toilets and saunas all in one building? This was what one of them was. Because my computer/blogger hates me (plus pictures were forbidden there anyways so I shouldn't be showing them to you), it will take too frustratingly long to upload pictures now. But from google, this is what it looks like. 

 

This was a bath. The door on the left was used for common people, the door on the right was used for the higher class and the family that owned the Villa.

This was the dining room. It was so big because the Romans laid down as they ate. The picture depicted in the mosaic is the triumphs of Hercules and the fall of the mythical creatures he defeated (I remember the very top is red giants). 

And this is the most spectacular mosaic of them all. It is called "Great Hunt", and depicts the capturing and shipping of animals in Egypt and shipment to Europe, which happened through Sicily. Elephants, buffalos, ostriches, lions, are all shown being pulled by men onto the boat, while others are being hunted. It's truly a miraculous mosaic. All done by hand. All of them. And each piece is about the size of your pinky nail. Let that sink in.

I'm sorry for the lateness of this post that I said was going to be so soon after my last one. But hey, I uploaded a ton of pictures even though blogger was being mean! Hope you enjoyed this last one. I don't know of anything else exciting coming up that you should look forward to, so.....

ci vediamo!