Ciao, Roma...

Time goes by so quickly.

It really shouldn't be surprised anymore at how fast it travels, but it still manages to amaze me.

My time here has been surreal….



Things I will miss about Rome:



1. Having easy access to wonderful places (Athens, Pompeii, Capri, Switzerland, just to name a few…) at such a low rate.

2. The intricate detail on the building surrounding me.

3. The rich history in so many beautiful buildings and ruins.

4. The FOOD. Yum, yum yum.

5. The Fountains. There isn’t much better than sitting by a fountain on a gorgeous day in Rome.

6. The Villa Borghese, and all it’s beauty, largeness, and confusion.

7. Being able to see amazing artwork (like the works of Caravaggio) in person.

8. The Weather. I am NOT excited to come to the freezing tundra that is the Midwest.

9. The Inspiration this place gives me. This place shines a light on my mind and reveals itself in my cooking, my music, my art, and more.

10. Simply being outside my box and doing something new and exciting. It’s wonderful

11. Being able to get away a little while… it made me think a lot about myself and

who I want to be and where I want to be, and everything. I don’t know how or why, but this place has managed to change me a little bit. Hopefully it’s for the better.





Things I won’t miss about Rome:



1. Angry old ladies! They need to chill, and stop starring at me and judging, and yelling at me in rapid Italian. It get's old, ladies. Real old.

2. Being away from my Family and Friends. Eh, not ok.

3. Personal Space, or lack there-of.

4. Blatant Stares—and often more---from creeper men. It seems I am a creeper magnet. I’m not a fan.

5. Pickpockets. Don’t EVEN get me started.



The good definitely outweighs the bad by far, and I hope to return someday.

London again tomorrow, then home on Tuesday! I am excited to give my family one giant hug...



Love,



Pj

Venice, It's about time I talk about you...

I reaaaally am excited to write about Greece.

I just got back today, and it is by far my favorite place I've been to...ever. However, making up for lack of blogging is quite important so I will proceed with a few ramblings and a photo attack of epic proportions of the beautiful Venice!

Melissa and I traveled to Venice and met up with another friend of mine from school, Gaby. I was blessed to be able to see the beautiful Venice with two beautiful people. This city is SO unique because of the water, water everywhere! I've never seen any place like it!


water alley! how cool.


Realto Bridge.

This place was, for a lack of a better word....enchanting. It was so amazing how the whole city just seemed to float on this body of water.



Venetian masques! I want to host a masquerade ball in Friley... It would be splendid.
Me taking a picture of Gaby taking a picture of me taking a picture of....


It's hard to take a bad picture of this place.
A night in Venice...
I see this boy with the frog everywhere on posters in Rome... I never knew what it was called or where it was until I got here. Apparently, it is creatively called "Boy With Frog" by Charles Ray.


How romantic... ha.



Take care!

Love,

Pj

This is Embarassing...

Really?

Have I REALLY not updated in almost a month?

How Disappointing.

Meanwhile, I've been traveling around Europe.

I know it's a little sad that I'm updating about my North Field Trip, when I've already had my South Field trip that was a month later...but I assume you'll be okay :)


We were forewarned about the Nastiness that is Naples. They were right...but the pizza there was utterly DELICIOUS. only 1.5 euros for a pizza slice way to large for me to eat... I don't even know what was on it...but it was more delicious than any of the pizza I've had in Rome...ever. That's saying alot. The amount of pizza I've had since stepping on Italian ground is mind-boggling. I wish I had a picture, but I was too busy having the most delicious pizza I've ever had. Anyways, Naples kindof smelled...apparently some of my classmates got harassed by some rude Napolians...we visited a museum with some Old Pompeii stuff and called it a day and headed towards our next stop: Sorrento.





We ate at the most DELICIOUS restaurant. I realize i've almost only talked about food...but such is life. It was the first meal I had over my 10 euro limit and it was divine. 4 courses. Delicious. Wonderful.

In the middle of our stay in Sorrento, we made a trip to Capri!


Capri was too beautiful for words. We went on a chairlift, walked around and really just soaked in the beauty of this place.










Then...Pompeii!
Many years ago, when I was homeschooled and my mother taught us about Pompeii I never actually even thought I'd ever get to actually go there.

It was pretty cool to say the least.











I actually have walked the roads of Pompeii.

That fact still takes my breath away.



Venice, Parents Visit, Northern Field trip, still to come... but for now..homework.
The amount of homework they give is here is absurd. I'm just putting that out there.
However, It must be done.


Love,

Pj

I am an Original Masterpiece...

Sifting through old unread messages in my gmail account,
I came across a link that my adopted Uncle (Mr. Beckley) sent me.

http://www.tangle.com/view_video?viewkey=849dc7c803281df74bb2

It featured a skit about how difficult it would be to chisel out everything that is wrong and unGodly out of our lives. It got me thinking...how much would I have to "chisel" out in my life? Sometimes I worry if there would be anything left...

It's scary to think how much I would need to take out of what I consider "me". It's scary to see if anything recognizable of "me" would remain. The skit assured that what would be left would be an original masterpiece. The masterpiece that God intended for us to be when he created us.

I place "me" in quotation marks, because I wonder if this "me" I think I am is my old or new self, or some combination thereof? Have I truly died to my old self? Should I really hold onto these features or parts of what I have accepted to be my personality if they are not of God?

I feel that one of the biggest thing I struggle with when trying to get closer to God is fear of losing myself. I'm afraid that I won't be the Original Paula that I've grown to like over the years if I relinquish these bad things and personality traits in my life.

But if you really think about it...that's stupid. Why wouldn't I want to be a better me?
Why wouldn't I want to leave my old crappy self behind?







But I guess if it were easy, it wouldn't be that big of a deal.



Love,

Pj

Cribs....Roman Style

Finally, it's the long-awaited episode of Cribs! I finally got around to editing it...
I thought I'd give you all a chance to see where I stay here!

Love,

Pj



p.s. We made the beginning like that because when we first arrived at our apartment we couldnt get any of our keys to work (well, except actually mine...) we've now figured out how to jiggle and turn them so it only takes a minute or two to enter... And our buzzer doesn't work for our apartment, apparently...it instead connects to another one? oops..

O, Oded...

These past few days were a blur. As I mentioned in my previous entry,
Oded Ezer came here to spread some of his typographic knowledge by giving us assignments and lectures. I got really excited about this workshop because it was more open and allowed me to work with video! Print work becomes so dull to me now that Video has entered into my life...

Yesterday we were asked to create yet another letter. This time, we worked separately.
Each of us chose one letter, and had do choose a person whose name started with that letter. Then, we had to reflect that person's style, essence or look or personality in the letter form in 3-d. Also, we had to represent this 3-d typographic sculpture in 2-d as well.

I chose "O" and Oded for my personality. I wanted to convey his style of design work (how he chooses to peel off letter forms often) as well as his layered, frayed, and densely packed personality. It was a lot of time spent into both creating the letter and the video. I presented this morning, My project and video went over really well... here it is:

This Entry is Brought to you by the Letter H.

Oded Ezer, a famous experimental typographer ( http://www.odedezer.com/ ) made the long trek from Israel to here to work with us for the next few days on typography. We were asked to do a project before he came. We were assigned to create a letterform out of any material, take it somewhere where it clearly doesnt belong as well as somewhere 'ordinary' and document it and people's reactions via photograph or film. I ofcourse chose film...

You're beautiful, Assisi...it's true.

This post is long overdue. I can readily admit this.

Upon entering Assisi it was evident...this was the most adorable town I have ever laid my naked eyes upon. Everything is cute. Peaceful. It makes Rome look like an obnoxious cousin that has a "wonderful personality".

The light here was perfect. Such a pure light...

Picture attack:

















Serendipitous Sorrento, Nasty Naples, Poor Pompeii and Captivating Capri this past weekend... oh, that'll have to wait another post! A real one. with more than a few sentences...

Love,

Pj

Packaging, Primo, and Parents.

Life has been busy. The majority of this business is filled with ridiculous amounts of homework.

The first portion of my week/last weekend was spent on this beaut:



This might look easy enough to do... but trust me, around 30 laborious hours of designing a pattern, cutting, redesigning, failing, redesigning again, and cutting....

It was rough to say the least. We only had 6 days to complete it! We were asked to draw 2 class-suggested nouns from a hat. I "Flip Flops" and "Pantheon Dome", Immediately throwing out Flip Flops. I love the Oculus of the Pantheon, So I knew I wanted to make sure that was conveyed as well as the elaborate and delicate detail in the interior of the structure. It was convenient I knew so much about the dome already because of our Densely packed Art History class, so research was already done.

I am not a fan at all of packaging, making things out of paper really isn't my forte. Because of this I have to work extra hard...so it was a struggle, but definitely worth it.


The second portion of this week was filled with a "Packaging workshop". Primo Angeli, world famous Designer from San Fransico, came for a 3 day visit here in Rome to work with us on a packaging project. We were divided into 6 groups, and were asked to select an Italian product and redesign and innovate the packaging.

OK, so this is kindof cool. Really really cool actually. However, the crazy thing is they expect a phenomenal finished innovative package redesign that should take weeks or even months to do.... in. 3. days.

So this means 3 very restless days and nights. This means 3 days of shirked real meals. This means 3 Late nights at the studio. This means 3 days of rough, intense, depressing, crazy, stressful, rediculousness... But I liked how everything turned out. Primo (or should I say Mr. Angeli, He's old enough to be my grandfather) is a hilarious, blunt and kindhearted and sometimes harsh man with phenomenal experience and an eye for talent and innovation. It was great to work with him, and I was astonished to see how blown away he was with all of our finished projects. It was a great experience, and although I am exhausted I'm really pleased that we had the privilege to have this "workshop".


2 very time consuming projects in the last week. I'm spent. But it's off to Assisi early tomorrow morning for a day trip. Pictures will ensue.

Love,

PJ

P.S. My parents are coming to visit me next month. While I don't want to rush my stay here, I am beyond excited about seeing their lovely faces. I miss 'em.

P.P.S. "Cribs" Video to come soon, so you can get a nice tour of my apartment! I'm half way through the editing process...

Food, food, foooood.

Food in Rome is delicious.

Delicious, but....well, expensive.
Too expensive for College Student pockets, so I tend to cook at our apartment we call home.
We all generally cook our own meals, it just makes the most sense for our varying
tastebuds and wallets.


This is a typical meal that I fix for myself:

This meal featured Chicken Egg Salad (complete with Asiago Cheese and Spinach) on a toasted Croissant bun. Added is a side of grapes, fruits are definitely a staple in my diet here. My beverage of choice is Cucumber Lemon water, which is Inspired from my oldest brother and sister-in-law with a little twist. For dessert, Biscotti and Nutella...yum.

It seems that ever since I have arrived here I have been utterly obsessed with food presentation. Perhaps it is because I am inspired by the beauty around me. While this often means I am the last one in the kitchen, I think it's worth it because I enjoy my meals so much more when they are both visually appealing and scrumptious.

I am definitely enjoying playing around in the kitchen, it's becoming a hobby of mine.

Take care, loves!

Pj

Church Home in Rome?

Yesterday morning I was waaaay more excited and nervous than I have ever been walking to a church for the first time. I decided to hit it full force, Sunday School at 9:30am followed by Service at 10:30. I heard about this church from my instructor, but I'm sure I could have just googled "Protestant Church in Rome" and this would have come up as one of the very very few (if not only) results. Rome is the home of an astounding amount of beautifully clad Catholic churches and aren't exactly known for their blooming population of Protestants.

I was pleased to find when looking at this church on a map that I was very familiar with the location, and although a bit of a trek was a reasonable one. It would be about an hour and a half walk, however my small knowledge of the public transit aided my walk to make it a mere 45 minute commute.

On the way to church I spotted a shop that sells guitars! soooo tempting. A brand new guitar for only 50 Euro! I still can't bring myself to buy it, come se dice "used instrument store" en Italiano? I think a guitar or some sort of stringed instrument would make me feel completely complete here. My callouses are fading, and my heart is aching for more guitar...

As I arrived to church, I was greeted by a friendly looking middle-aged American looking man. We struck up a short conversation, that turned into Iowa State and football and...failure. During our conversation, a younger kid came up and struck a conversation with is. He introduced himself, and I soon found out he was from Penn State with the Architecture program! Penn State is close to my heart because it's my oldest brother's Alma matter. We talked, and made our way upstairs to Sunday School for the young adults (or, "young singles"...). We were greeted by a very inviting woman. More students piled in, which included African-Italian locals, and more Penn Staters. Class was good, and it was really cool to see how on fire for Jesus some of the people there were, including the Penn State kid I just met. It was truly a blessing.

Upon going to service, I saw the middle aged man approach the podium and I realized that he was the Pastor! The service was good, I sat by my new Penn State friends singing contemporary hymns and listening fervently and all in all I thought it was too short! When all the guests stood up at the end I looked around and saw that 1/4th of the crowed were standing up! many of them were students studying for the semester.

Everything was great except for the creepy (maybe older 50's?) guy came up to me after service and asked me if I liked spicy foods and to check him out on facebook. shuuudddeer. He also basically told me he didn't like my hair and that I should get it done by some people he knew. I told him more than 3 times that I loved my hair, I did it myself, and would like to leave. I must avoid him and his stinky breath next week.

The 4 Penn Staters invited me, and a grad student from Notre Dame (Which is adjacent to my OTHER brother's school! If that isn't a sign and a blessing from God to make me feel more at home, I don't know what it is!) to lunch, and we dined at an inexpensive place in Piazza Navona. Piazza Navona is beautiful, and a wonderful location. They all lived there, they showed me the window to their apartment! all of them...in one apartment. All SEVENTEEN of the Penn staters in the Architecture program, male and female... all live in the same place. I don't even comprehend such insanity.

Going to church, seeing God work in people in a whole new place, meeting new friends, eating good food... All in all, it was a very good day.


Love, PJ

Roaming Rome Alone

Yesterday a project was introduced to us titled "A Thousand paces". We were instructed to start at the Pantheon, and walk a thousand steps in any direction, documenting what we saw heard and smell along the way via sketching, writing, and taking pictures. 300 steps into the project I looked around and realized that, because our class had all dispersed into our own alleys and streets, for what seemed to be the first time... I was alone.

I took a deep breath and realized that I felt free.

Don't get me wrong, I love my roommates/friends. They are beautiful souls. But I have been with another being almost 24/7 of this entire trip and didn't realized how much I missed my alone time sometimes. Wandering almost aimlessly caused me to heighten my senses, instead of relying on someone else to navigate me through the winding Roman cobblestone paths. I missed that strong, independent, freeing feeling.

Every side street and alley seemed to have it's own personality, and instead of the creepy alley's in Chicago there was an abundance of quaint, antique, and beautiful corners and sidestreets. I didn't stop to look at things like that when traipsing around with a group. It's nice to be alone, every now and again.

I'm enjoying the splendor that Rome has to offer to my eyes and ears, but my next mission is to get to know some Italians. I don't know any, except for our Italian Instructors! How am I supposed to truly do as Romans do if I don't know any Romans? Hopefully I'll safely stumble into a friendship or two without having to try, really... This seems to be difficult with all this homework!


I liked this door... so I took a picture

My favorite alley of all time. I just want to walk down this red carpet...but without having to go to the restaurant and probably having to pay a ridiculously high fee for delicious food.
I would like a moped. But traffic in Rome is mostly insane, so that is entirely insane to even think of renting one.
I believe this is their Parliament building?

This mirror was high. Who is it for?
This is the Pantheon. It's kindof beautiful and amazing and majestic, even though it's a former pagan temple turned into a Catholic Church.
The Oculus (open hole) inside the Pantheon.

A pretty fountain at the Villa Bourghese. This place is the most breathtaking place I've seen so far in Rome.

This is a chalk pastel I did of Herberto, our apartment mascot. He's kindof a big deal.





Thanks for reading. I love you, and you and you.

Pj