Popsicle Palace and the Pope

Ciao friends!

So today was probably the most amazing day of my life....

but before that came yesterday, our first full day here. It was crazy to say the least. we definately went to st.peters square and got scorched by the sun, dang that place gets some SUN! ha but we waited in line and totally got blessed by the pope! it was so wild! everyone like stood and clapped and screamed for him when he came, def. not like prophet, its like a more celebrity thing with him. way weird. so anyway he blessed all the groups in the big place kind of like the conference center only smaller and not as cool. The cardinal reading for him even said "we welcome the pilgrims from Brigham Young University!" ha! crazy hunh! soooo amazing. so the guy speaks like 7 different languages, talk about talent. and Ive decided that the people from spain are freaking annoying! everytime one of them was mentioned it was like i was at a soccer game and they were cheering for their team, dang gina it was OUT OF CONTROL! so yeah Pope=amazing old man in white robes. Also the freaking saweet swiss guard who dress in these outrageous midevil jester costumes in like purple blue and orange and yelllow. no joke funniest thing ive ever seen.

K so then we went home and napped ha. i was out like a light. Did i mention that i have my own room and bathroom? no one claimed so i jumped on that! shooottt it is way nice having a little time away from everyone. i was freaked the first night, but its not that bad though a little freaky since i basically have to keep my window/door open to keep cool. I try to shut it though and its got bars on the door. yeah not gonna lie we live in the ghettoooo of Rome. We've been all over the sity and our spot is the grungiest and sketchiest. But its big and open and we have a great little living room and a huge open porch patio thing that has big tables and chairs and plants and potted plants and stuff. Its like out of a fairytale only ghetto ha!

anyway i got side tracked. So that night we went to the Piazza Novona which was absolutely amazing. Its just this big open space with a giant fountain in the middle and tons of artists displaying gorgeous oil paintings and photos and people drawing portraits of tourists and restaurants and bands and ugh its just amazing and wonderous. Then we came home and made this awesome meal and sat on our porch and ate by candlelight. So then that night I was kind of down and wanting to go home cuz I was so tired and worn out and you know how the first few days are just hard? Yeah it was like that. But I fell asleep and all was well the next day.

So today we went to the Colosseum and the Roman forum. Wow talk about the most amazing places in the world. These are so ancient and the history and views were so rich even thought the colors were all worn away. There was this awesome garden type thing where there was a line of goddesses statues and it totally reminded me of Hercules! Ahahahha I loved it!! Anyway everything was bigger than life and so beautiful. And we walked about 12 hours straight so my feet are falling apart and I may be wearing my nikes from now on…pathetic and ugly. Love it.

So we also went to the Jewish ghetto today bahahhaha it was so awesome. And I got these two amazing rings from this random guy on the oldest bridge in Rome (B.C status) and he totally like sized them for me right there! One is this big rose on three metal bands (my wedding ring dream for real no joke) it is SO BEAUTIFUL you will all love it. And this other funky loop one. They fit like gloves.

Ok so you all know that im a total whimp so our group is like going on this big trip to Florence and theres like a group of people who want to go live in hostels for three nights and then theres this little group of us who are like, uhhhh no hostels lol. We are all for hotels, ugh we are whimps but I think theres a group of four girls at least who want to go to florence for the day then go to Venice that night and stay in a hotel then spend the day in Venice then just train it hoomee. Ha I love it. Im just not into the whole camping out in hostels thing, though we might end up doing one in Florence with a huge group of guys and girls. Who knows!

Ok im pooped I don’t know what else to say. Um we went to the Greenwich village of Rome and had delicious food. I had spinach and cheese ravioli that was like heaven and it was a tiny hole in the wall and they barely spoke English except one of the guys we were with spoke Spanish which was great. Ok now for some pics. Love you all!

Popsicle palace= the home of Caligula