2 more weeks!!

Well it's offically less than two days and I'll be back on American soil and I couldn't be more excited! My mom and I have already discussed what my first meal back in America will be and after she said no to my idea of One roll of sushi, a salad from California Pizza Kitchen, Queso from a Mexican Restaurant, and BBQ we decided upon one of our classic Pulli family recipes (we settled on having a roll of sushi though!) I also told Justin how all he has to do is be standing there at the airport with a Starbucks and I'll be the happiest girl in the world to see two of my favorite things!

Since my last blog we really have not had much happening in our courses except the usual classes and daily field trips to small towns. We did get to go to the beach after going to the Sicily/Rome American Cemetary in Anzio. Apparently after American forces landed in Anzio in order to help allied forces, the Germans found out and attacked and killed thousands of Americans. The site was absoloutely breathtaking with crosses to represent each American that was killed and beautiful gardens. There was a book listing all the names of soldiers killed and I found 4 Berryman's so I made sure to say a prayer for my fellow Berryman's who died.

After the cemetary we were able to go to the beach which was only about 5 minutes away. After only 3 hours at the beach and seeing many of naked kids (apparently in Italy/Europe it's okay to have your kids run around naked...even though they're 5) all of us were burnt to a crisp and ready to head back to the Palace. Myself, along with 8 other girls got ready quick and headed to the airport for our three day weekend in Barcelona. We had such great expectations about Barcelona since the other half of our group had went a month earlier. It ended up being the weekend from hell and ended with one girl getting pick pocketed on the metro and having her wallett with all credit cards and her passport stolen. Needless to say she spent all weekend at the US Embassy and Police Station and was finally given a temporary passport only an hour before we had to leave for the aiport. Barcelona was not all bad though, they did have a beautiful beach and an amazing KFC and McDonalds that we ate at 3 out of our 9 meals. Oh how I miss mashed potatoes and fried chicken :) The stress of constantly making sure my purse was in front of me and zipped and that two girls missed our bus to the aiport and almost missed our flight contributed to the fact of why I did not go to Budapest this weekend.

Last week we also had the chance to go to an Opera. I was very excited and the main reason I wanted to go was to finally get the chance to dress up and wear one of my fancy dresses. Well, after all of us dressed to the nines our bus pulls up to a theater that's outside and we were the most fancy out of everyone. As my mother always taught me, it's better to be the most dressed up than the least so I was fine with it. But four hours later and after 2, 45 minute intermissions there were 3 girls asleep and I was almost one of them. We knew the plot of the story, but it was a rather gruesome one....it ended with all the characters dead and held true to the statement, "it's not over until the fat lady sings." I am glad I went just to say I have been to an opera, but I told Justin he should be glad I went because now I'll never beg for him to take me to one! I did get a beautiful picture of the sunset though which made it all worth going!

This weekend has been so great. I stayed back in Ariccia with 11 of my closest friends and we've just been finishing our 10 page paper that's due next week and bonding over card games and cheap wine. I also accomplished packing one suitcase and getting all my last minute souvenirs together. This week is going to be so exciting and since our classes are coming to an end, our director decided to make our daily events very fun. Tomorrow we have a cooking class with a great chef, Tuesday we have classes, Wednesday we have a pool party and cookout at one of our teacher's house, Thursday we have a field trip to a beach, and Friday we have more than half of the day off! Now that my paper is completed I enjoy every event to the fullest and not have that procrastinating feeling hanging over my head like I normally do!

14 more days and counting...... :)

See you all soon!

-Rach