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

Thanks Paris (not Hilton)

Sorry if it seems I have been neglecting you, but classes are starting to get in full swing! Yes, I actually have work to do here, it's not all fun and games!

Let me catch you up a little bit.


Paris, Paris! I haven't talked about Paris yet! It seems like so long ago! Paris is...beautiful. However, being there for only 2 days it all seemed like a blur. It seemed like we were going from site to site, with little time to stop and "smell the roses."


People like to travel differently. I'm the type of person that wants to go places and get submerged in the culture with ample time to relax and soak it up. So it was a bit taxing for me to have to go from place to place with little time to enjoy it. Not that I'm complaining about going to the Louvre and Eiffel Tower, it just would have been more enjoyable if it was over more than just 2 days.

However when we did have time to sit and smell the roses...it was sublime. I felt that Paris really gave me a chance to be in awe of God, his greatness, and my smallness and insignificance in comparison! Seeing God's beautiful creation in the various gardens was more than I could ask for. It was more beautiful than all the paintings in the Louvre (especially the very unimpressive and very small Mona Lisa.) Going to the top of the Eiffel tower reminded me of how insignificant I am and how amazing that in this world full of all these people that God still cares about me as quirky and silly and sarcastic as I tend to be. Paris also let me to have conversations with my lovely friends here about God and "religion" and things, and it made me see how little I talk about it. It reminded me to remember to integrate God in more aspects of my life again. And it's reminding me again of doing so by writing this blog.

So I guess Paris really is the city of love. Though I was kindof hoping it would be with one of the suave Parisians that Tameka warned me about, It instead rekindled my love with our Creator. A far better love I'd say.

I have a lot of Paris video footage on video, but haven't edited yet. I don't think I took any pictures, which is weird.... So expect videos soon!

As for Rome...We'll save more for another time.

Ciao!

So little time, so much to edit...

Dearest Friends and Family,

Roma is a wonder. This City is beautiful in so many different ways, the people are as well.
I feel that classes may actually be fun, our assignments require us to truly go out and see Rome.
There is much footage to be edited and placed on here, I'm working on it folks! Just letting you know all is well, life is good, and I'll have better updates when I get caught up on my video editing!

Enjoy this video from London as we see the changing of the guards.

Love ,

PJ

Rome is the closest it will feel like to home...

Hey there!

I'm sorry I wasn't able to update in Paris, I had no internet access aside from a very brief internet cafe visit to check in with the loving parents. A long, detailed France post/video to come.

But for now, I am in Rome finally settling in for the semester. it is wonderful not to have to live in my suitcase anymore. It's nice to have a semi-private bathroom too.. And this apartments and city is beautiful. While I enjoyed London and Paris, I feel that Rome is the closest I will feel to feeling "at home". It just seems right that we stay there instead of the other two cities. Each city had it's own charm, this one somehow seems...warmer. Literally and figuratively. It is ridiculously hot here, but I wouldn't have it any other way.


More later, but for now a little video including London Travels for your viewing pleasure...