Thankful Thursday: Thanksgiving Edition

On this Thanksgiving, I am thankful for: (in no particular order)

My Pop. 99 years and 9 months. God-fearing, hardworking, lovable, funny. My inspiration.
My Momma. Best friend. My  hero.
My Dad. My rock.

My boyfriend. My love.

My nephews. Teach me new things every time I'm with them. Let me experience the world through their eyes.
My extended family. Who love me like I'm their own.

My high school friends. My first understanding of true friendship.
My college friends, who have become my "adult" friends. My confidantes. My grounding force.
My Riva friends. My world travelers. No matter how long it's been since we've seen each other, it's always the same.
My faith. My health. My job.

Happy Thanksgiving!

European Tour: Europe with Family - Riva and Bellinzona

After leaving Venice, we got on the train and headed towards Switzerland. I got off at the Riva stop and my parents continued on to Lugano, where they were staying. The next morning, I walked back to the train station to meet them and bring them to Riva.

Lake Lugano in the background

Me and my parents :)

I gave them the tour around Riva itself, showed them the 3 bars, ristorante, pharmacy, bank and stopped at the lake for a photo shoot. The lake is Lake Lugano, where we went during the warmer months to hang out and swim after class. They have a swing set and slide in the little "park" there.

After the park, we headed to the Casa where I showed them around, and we had another photo shoot in the garden. After being at the Casa for awhile, we walked back to the train station.

Bellinzona

This is when my dad had his infamous temper tantrum. He went to go buy the tickets for the train, but it wouldn't accept his credit card. It kept asking for a PIN, and my dad kept screaming at the machine that he didn't have a PIN. Then he didn't have enough Swiss Francs on him to pay for it all in cash, so I had to run back to the Casa (literally, run) and get my debit card to try it. I thought he was going to have a heart attack because his blood pressure was so high. After I bought the tickets, we got on the train and headed to Bellinzona.

With Bellinzona's castle's in the background

Castlegrande

At Castlegrande

Bellinzona is known for it's castles, there are 3 of them. Castlegrande, Sasso Corbaro, and Montebello.  We walked around the castles for a bit, inspecting the outside of the castles and enjoying the view. We then went inside to go through the museum and see the medieval artifacts and learn how Bellinzona has grown. It was cool to learn about how they dug through the Alps (Bellinzona sits at the foot of the Alps) in order to make the tunnel.

After touring the castles, we went down to the village to eat at a local cafe and get some really good pizza and wine.

Train ride back to Lugano

After lunch, we got back on the train to head towards Lugano. There were people smoking weed in the compartment in front of us, and I think we all might have gotten a contact high because we started giggling and could not stop. Uncle Joe went to stick his head out of the window to get a picture of the countryside and almost got in taken off as we whizzed into a tunnel...which set off more giggles.

After our train ride, we got back into Lugano, where we walked around the Casino and the Lake for a little bit and then went to dinner.

After dinner, it was time to say good-bye. My parents and Aunt and Uncle were off to Milan the next day and I had to start classes again. I had an amazing time with them, and got to experience some amazing stuff (thanks Dad for spoiling us!) and was sad to see them go. I just kept in mind that I would be back stateside in a few short weeks...

To be continued...Next Up: European Tour: The Casa

European Tour: First Days in Riva

When we finally got to the Casa (what we all called the house), we were given an orientation and a tour. We picked roommates and whether we wanted to live in the Casa or an apartment in town. The downside of living in an apartment: no internet, have to walk to the Casa for class and meals (rain or shine). The downside of living in the Casa: our "RA" lived there (he got fired later however) and you were more supervised. After Kathryn and I decided we should live together, we chose the house.

Our room, and Kathryn

The Classroom

Which I'm glad we did, considering there were many a day we were woken up by our professor announcing that class was starting in 2 minutes. I would fly out of the bed, put on some slippers, grab my stuff and get into a seat. Taking the bathroom break time to brush my teeth and get something for breakfast later...so good planning on our part, Kathryn.

Anyways, I did the obligatory pictures for Mom and Dad and oohhed and ahhed over the cool things in the house.

The classroom was a big room that had a balcony at the back (straight across from where you walked in), it had 4 bedrooms coming off of it. One to the left, bottom of the picture, which was mine and Kathryn's. One to the top left was a 3 bedroom where Steph, Meg and Courtney were. 3 bedroom to the top right where Eric, Rob and Ben... lived. And then a 2 bedroom @ the bottom right where Rex and Todd were.

Road leading into town

Looking towards the town

 From the balcony that was off the back of the classroom you could look side to side and see the main road that went in and out of Riva. You can also see the mountains that were on either side of Riva San Vitale, which were part of the Swiss Alps. That's right, I said Alps...

After getting settled down a little bit, we decided we should christen the town and go out. Now, Riva is not a hotbed for Saturday night activity. There are 3 in the town, you can sit in the front of one and see the other 2. The population is 2,489...and they definitely notice when 30 some odd college kids roll into town. I'm pretty sure the bars are open for us (being the VT students) and of course the local drunks who became our friends.

 

 As you can see from the pictures, we literally would take over the bar when we entered. I would say that at least 5-10 people went to a bar every night (minus the nights before midterms or finals). The locals would dance with us, and Karoke night was definitely a favorite...even when the local lady took over to belt out Italian Opera. While the rest of us were singing Britney Spears...

Some pictures from our tour de Riva, where Jeffrey (the aforementioned fired RA) that took us through the town and gave us some history.

Oldest church in Switzerland

Center of Town

To be continued...Next up: European Tour: Lugano

European Tour: Getting There

I'll start @ the beginning (always a good place to start), we left out of Dulles Airport. And since I'm from Northern Virginia, not only did I have my parents there (like most of my fellow students), I had my entourage. I think it totaled 9 people: Brad, Victor, Richie, Jay, Bobby, Ashley, Christy and my parents. A little excessive, no? But that's okay, I knew my friends loved me and were sad to see me go. We took the obligitory picture while waiting in the long line to check in.

Christy, Me and Ashley

After checking in, making it through security, hanging out waiting for the plane and boarding...we were finally ready for Europe. If you know me, you know that I'm usually asleep before the plane even taxis onto the runway. But this time I stayed up for a little bit, probably a combo of the nerves and the excitement. The inner photogropher in me snapped this shot of the sunset from the plane.

How puurty

We made our way from Washington, D.C. to Paris, France and Charles De Gaulle. I have to say that it's probably my most hated airport (and that's saying something because I despise Atlanta). But I don't think we had many problems on the way there...mostly on the way back, so we'll cover that later. We had a bit of a layover in Paris, so we did what any big group does. Found a corner and piled all of our shit in it. Asking people to watch it as you went to the bathroom, got a magazine to read, food to eat, etc. Some people decided it would be a crucial time for a nap...

Kristin (with her mask on) and Kathryn catching up on sleep.

Bryan and Maggie hitting the hay.

I had already slept on the airplane, hence me not sleeping in the airport and being able to snap embarrassing pictures of people sleeping.

I won't lie. I don't really remember the plane ride to Milan, Italy. The next thing I really remember is walking through the Milan airport to get our bags. There was a Nun waiting at the baggage claim. She tried to talk to me (and a few others) in Italian. Now, they did try to prepare us for the trip...they made us take a semester of Italian before we went. However, the teacher was like my grandma and I wrote in Spanish most of the time and still got an A...so the whole conversation in Italian wasn't working for me. I just smiled and nodded at the Nun and ran away as soon as I got my bags.

We then made our way to the charter bus that waited outside to drive us to Riva. I remember being scared @ some points on the drive cause you're thinking "Is this HUGE bus really going to go under this little bridge?" or "Are we really going 60 mph around this curve?" but nevertheless, we made it there safely.

Out of all the things in my blurry memory that I remember the most was the feeling of pulling up to the Villa Maderni and just being in awe. Amazed by how cool it looked, amazed that I was in Switzerland and would live there for the next 4 months and amazed that the girl who doesn't like change, or to be away from her friends and family had actually signed up for this.

To be continued...next up: First days in Riva