Now that I blogged about mine (and Brian’s) weekend in Rome, I decided to do a separate blog for the rest of our week together. We spent Saturday night with my friends at our local favorite bars, Demphsey’s and Shamrock. It was a lot of fun, and I particularly enjoyed just being able to spend time with Brian and showing him what a typical night in Perugia is like. The next day we walked all over the city for a couple of hours. We walked to all my favorite view points in the city and had a great time showing off my small, but beautiful Italian home.
Unfortunately during the week I had class, but we made the most of the time when I wasn’t in class. Everyday we met for lunch and ate on the Duomo (cathedral) steps in the main Piazza. Brian fell in love with the kabobs here, which are similar to gyros. But I still made sure he tried lots of different Italian foods as well. We had prosciutto and mozzarella piadini’s (sandwich) a lot during the day as a snack, and went out almost every night for dinner.
On Monday we went to my favorite pizza place, Mediterranean and after to Rock Castle for Monday night karaoke with all my friends. Tuesday a big group of us got a meter long pizza for my friend’s birthday. Wednesday myself, Brian, Megan, Jamie and Jenna went to Luna Bar for aperitivo. Aperitivo is a very common, popular thing for bars to do in Italy. You go around 7:00 and buy a drink, and they bring you lot’s of free, delicious, appetizer-type foods. We had different bruschettas, cheese, meats, pizza, risotto, olives, and lots of other yummy snacks. After aperitivo we went to John and Lupi’s apartment for a house party. Another night of dancing and drinking (typical nightlife of Italy) that I got to share with Brian. On Thursday a large group of my friends: Megan, Jamie, Jenna, Brittany, John, Lupi and Andreas joined Brian and myself for dinner at Dal Mi Cocco which I have blogged about before. It’s the restaurant that does 5 courses for 13 euro, but the catch is that whatever they are making that day is what you are having. It was delicious again, all traditional Umbrian and Perugian foods.
On Friday, since I didn’t have class, Brian and I decided to make a day trip to Assisi, a small town about 20 minutes from Perugia. It was so incredible. We had a walking guidebook (RICK STEVES’!!) given to Megan and myself by Claire (thanks Claire!) that proved to be extremely helpful. It led us all over Assisi, showing us the Roman Amphitheater, the Basicilica of San Francesco, Basilica of Santa Chiara, etc, and giving us really interesting explanations at each. My favorite parts of Assisi were the incredible views and the tombs of St. Francesco. He is one of the Saints of Assisi and was born there. His story is fascinating; he gave up all his material possessions to live a life dedicated to God. St Claire (who’s tomb we also saw, very cool) was one of his followers and started the “Poor Claire’s.” Assisi is a very popular pilgrimage place for Catholics and it was really interesting to see all the history. Brian’s favorite part was the Temple of Minerva. It’s a fairly small and basic cathedral, but what he liked about it was it’s original use. It was a temple used for animal sacrifices, and the drains for the blood were still intact on the floor. Creepy, yes. But still a pretty unique thing to see.
That night, upon arriving back in Perugia, I took him to the secret restaurant that I previously blogged about. We had an incredible meal, antipasto plate, primi’s, secondi’s, side dishes, and wine. Basically enough food to feed a large family, well not a Klose family, but still a lot. The weirdest part of the night however, occurred at the end. This very drunk/insane woman come up to our table and asked us about our preference of flowers in Italian. I pretended I couldn’t understand her so she would go away, and then she revealed she was English. Well then she asked for some of our wine while she “waited for her cocktail and her potatoes.” Yea, seriously. So I, of course, lied and told her we just poured the rest of the bottle into our glasses. A few minutes later she was back, WITH A GLASS, and this time addressed Brian! He just ignored her, which she took as, “please help yourself!” Which she did. We pretty much finished our glasses, paid, and got the heck out of the ASAP. It was entertaining, but highly bizarre at the same time.
Saturday was Valentine’s Day, which was really nice to be able to spend in Italy together. In the morning we went to a giant outdoor market, which sold everything from clothes to produce to pets to kitchen equipment. The rest of the day we shopped around Perugia, got gelato, took a nap, did more shopping and went to dinner. Big day for Brian though, he bought a gorgeous leather jacket!! I know I already bought one, but I was still jealous. He did buy me a beautiful dress though, so I was quite the happy camper as well.
Sunday we didn’t do much, just enjoyed our last day in Italy together. Walked around, ate some delicious food, tried to go to a soccer game but failed (don’t ask), and then went to Rome that night since his plane was the next morning. It was really sad saying goodbye to him Monday morning since he is being stationed in Okinawa, Japan. But it was absolutely incredible to have him here and be able to show him Italy.
In a week or so Mischa and Nora are coming to visit us! I can’t wait to have more visitors and show them Italy also. We are planning on doing Capri, Pompeii, and Sorento with them over spring break. And after that my parents are coming! Yay for visitors! Scarily enough, after that it will be April and I’ll only have a month left. This weekend I’m going to Venice with Megan, Lupi, and John for Carnival, which should be incredible. I’ll make sure I blog all about it when I come back from that too. And I promise I won’t wait so long in between blogs this time!
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