Yup, it was one of the best experiences I've had over the course of the entire exchange. So here's the story:
We left Saturday morning from Cagliari, and arrived about an hour outside of Venice. We were a group of exchange students from all around Sardinia, 12 in total. We took a bus into the heart of Venice, where we met a second group of exchange students, for a grand total of something like 23-24 people. I was absolutely amazed at how fast we aggregated at became friends. I firmly believe that there truly is something special about exchange students in that regard. As far as I've experienced, they are the easiest and most fun people to have as friends. So after getting lost in the maze that is the city of Venice upwards of four times, we eventually found our way to the grand Piazza di San Marco. The central city square. It was packed with an insane number of people all dressed up in festive carnival gear. After socializing and picture taking there for a few hours, we headed to our hotel. A train, a bus, and 2 hours later, we got there. Dinner was a very welcome pizza feast followed by more socializing with all the students (both groups) and generally staying up 'till about 4:00am.
The next morning, we went to the beautiful city of Trieste. We never actually went back to Venice, much to the disappointment of several, myself included. In Trieste (technically we were just outside the city limits in a neighbor city) we saw a massive parade with lots of music and crazy costumes. Again, lots of pictures. We were fairly northerly however, so the temperature was much colder than any of us Sardo kids were used to. But there was nothing that Italian coffee couldn't fix. Yum. ^_^
We also had the wonderful opportunity to go and see the greatest WWI memorial in Italy. Right on the border of Austria, it was a gargantuan hill of stone carved all over with the names of the soldiers who had the misfortune to perish there. The sheer magnitude of it all was the most impressive thing. It left quite the lasting impression.
But by far the greatest experience I had the pleasure to enjoy was a 2 hour ski trip that we made on the third and final day of our trip. I have missed skiing more than almost any other activity with the possible exception of playing the piano. And so to have that opportunity was for me, one of the happiest points on the trip so far. I feel that I earned something of a reputation among the other students as something of a zealot, but it was very worth it, and I was very, very happy. The fun was dampened quite a bit however, when one of our exchange students from Mexico, Javier, broke his collarbone whilst snowboarding. We were all somewhat vexed as to how he managed it on the bunny hill. But last I heard, he's doing okay, and we all wish him a speedy recovery.
And that was my trip. I enjoyed every moment of it. We had quite some trouble with the return flight; we were delayed from 9:00 pm until 2:30 am. Bleh. But we got home without too many hard feelings and I can't wait for the next opportunity to go see more of the world, which as it stands now, will be a full Euro-Tour to a dozen or so cities in south-central Europe at the end of the exchange year. We're all looking forward to it with quite some anticipation.
I apologize for not including any pictures in this blog, but I post again tomorrow with just pictures of the trip. With this and that, they'll complement each other quite nicely I hope.
Lots of love to everyone, I miss you all, more than I think I've let on, and I can't wait to see everyone once I come back near the end of June. Ciao!! DFTBA.
-Caleb
