Nuns, Monks, and Priests

I took lots of pictures of nuns on this trip. I think they must be really amazing women. This picture was taken in the hotel where we stayed in Siena. The nuns lived on the 2nd floor, and the hotel was on the 1st floor. This woman probably makes all her phone calls from a telephone booth, right? The idea of leaving the mainstream to live a life of devotion to the things of the Lord and service to God is such a respectable calling. I took this picture while walking by the phone booth in the hallway. She never knew I took it. I hope it doesn't seem that I am being disprespectful to nuns. That isn't my intention at all.
















Above are some pictures of some more nuns and monks in Assisi. When Josh and I were in Assisi, I took a break for a cappuccino, and Josh went on to spend some time in the basilica of St. Francis (pictured below).

Cappuccino


Basilica

Well, Josh later told me that he overhead a priest from the U. S. talking to a group of American tourists about why he chose to go to school in Rome. We saw him again at the train station in Assisi, eating his dinner before getting on the train to Rome. That was July 28th. On July 30th, Josh, Deb and I headed to the Vatican on a public bus. After a few blocks, guess who steps onto the bus? Yep, the priest we had seen twice in Assisi two days prior. Okay, I guess it's not that weird. I mean, we were in Italy, and Rome and Assisi are two places that attract a lot of Americans. But, what are the chances that we would see the same guy three times within 3 days? When the priest got on the bus, he wasn't wearing the same black suit he was wearing in Assisi. However, he was wearing Docker's, so I knew it must be him. Long story short, he ended up offering to give us a tour of St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican. Not only that, but another American priest friend saw us as we approached Vatican City. He walked us all the way to the front of the line, helping us to avoid who knows how long of a wait to get in. I guess he had special connections. Joe (the priest) provided us with an abundance of information that really made our trip to the Vatican much more meaningful. It was just another event that added to the perfect-ness of our trip. Thanks Joe!


Okay, I have to add this. We saw a group of nuns leaving Vatican City, and they were all laughing and having the best time throwing water on each other and squealing like little girls. It was sooooo cute! My memory card was full at the time, so I couldn't take their picture. If I could have, it would have looked something like this:





(I googled "nuns having fun" to find a photo similar to what we saw. This is the first thing that came up.)



This is a funny story. By the time Josh and I arrived in Rome, we had been in Europe for a week. Something we had learned to appreciate unexpectedly was a nice cold bottle of water. The most we ever spent on a bottle of water was 2.5 Euro (@ $4 U.S.!). The least we spent was about .13 Euro at a local market it Paris. Here are some pictures of bottles of water we consumed in different cities. And, yes, these were definitely worth taking!
Paris

Siena

Venice

Anyway, you get the point. Oh, another thing - more than once, Josh and I thought we were buying water, when actually we were buying carbonated water (with gas, as they say)...Yuck! So, a nice bottle of clean, cold water without gas, was a special treat, in any city. Until we got to Rome. In our Italy tour book, there is a little blurb about drinking water. It said this:

Unlike many Mediterranean cities, Rome benefits from a constant supply of fresh drinking water, piped down from the hills through a system of pipes and aqueducts that has change little from ancient Roman times.

Cool! Since we would be staying 4 nights in Rome, this would definitely save us a lot of money, and we were excited about the possibility of always being hydrated. Look, lots of people took advantage of the fountains in Rome. The book was right!
The long line of people waiting to fill up their bottles.

And, here I am filling up bottles for Josh, Deb (Josh's sister who met us in Rome), and myself.











Now, it all happened so fast. We were thirsty, saw the fountain, remembered what we read in that book. Deb trusted us. As I was filling up the last bottle (mine), Josh and Deb were already guzzling their cold water. I looked to my right and saw a tiny little sign that
read "Agua Non Potabile."
It really was tiny.

Everything started to make sense:
1) Bystanders were laughing at us, and
2) No one else was filling up their bottle in THIS fountain (just putting their feet in it!!).

Later, we went back to that Italy tour book to show Deb what it said. Much to our surprise, the last sentence in that paragraph stated:

Only if there is a sign saying acqua non potabile is the water not safe to drink.

Oh. Whoops. The rest of the day we joked...rather, I, joked about how Josh and Deb had drunk the non-drinkable water. Josh seems to think that since he grew up in Ecuador, his stomach is invincible, which I guess it is, because he never had even the slightest tummy ache.

Everything was my favorite

I just wanted to share pictures from this special day. I am way behind on blogging. Sometimes I blog in my head because I am too sleepy to post. Trust me, I have at least 10 posts in my head on France/Italy. (Too bad I am comparing thinking to blogging, right?) Nevertheless, I wanted to share pictures and thoughts from this special day. AB started her first day of Kindergarten today. Today, I remembered the first day I started teaching, two years ago. Two years ago, I didn't get to take her to school, nor could I pick her up. For two years, my wonderful husband made two lunches everyday, dressed two every morning (three if you include that he dressed himself, too). Oh, I guess now I have to add that sometimes Josh even let J. Ross sleep in his next day's outfit. He thinks this is so ingenius. I shudder at the thought. I am sure Josh thought many times (about me), "what she doesn't know can't hurt her." He picked them up (with the help of our sitter) everyday, even when they were at two different schools. He's the babysitter-scheduler, the check book-balancer, the yard mower, and the list goes on. And he's not even a stay-at-home dad. I am so thankful for lots of things: God's provision for our family (constantly!), a pretty sweet job for the past two years, schools where my children love to go...Oh yeah, that reminds me. This was supposed to be about Anna. So, I felt really proud this morning as I drove up the really pretty road to OUR schools. I reminded her that this is the first time I have dropped her off on her first day of school. We both smiled. We talked a little, but mostly just listened to Nickel Creek. We arrived as the bell was ringing to let the children in the door. We quietly walked down the hallway. The tension in her heart started to rise, as I was pretty sure it would. She was quiet when we got to her classroom. We quickly found her special desk, and she asked her teacher if she could have a different color playdough. Sure! So, my little pink-bowed, pink- backpacked, pink- lunchboxed girl got to use pink playdough on her first day of school. What a great teacher. She wasn't sad when I left, and guess what? I wasn't sad either. I wondered to myself if I am a bad mom because I didn't cry on my daughter's first day of kindergarten. I even emailed Josh once I arrived at my school (which is right next door!) to ask him what he thought about me not crying. I could not be more happy. I thought about her a lot today. She rode the big bus from her school to my school. When she got off the bus, she ran to greet me, excited as ever. She told me some stuff, and I asked her what her favorite part of the day was. "Everything was my favorite," she said. I couldn't agree more. Here is a link to some other pictures I took of this special day.

Business Class

Well, so much for blogging my trip. We are back now, and I am in the process of downloading the tons of pictures that we took! Until I am finished, though, I wanted to share one of the experiences that is still so very fresh in my mind. First, let me begin by sharing our itinerary:

Friday, 01August
Depart Rome 8:20 a.m.
arrive at Frankfurt Hahn 10:15 a.m.

Saturday, 02August
Depart Frankfurt 2:25 p.m.

So, the only reason we had to fly out of Frankfurt was that was the only city in Europe that had available frequent flyer seats. The mistake we made was giving ourselves over 24 hours in Frankfurt. By the time we got there, we really didn't want to spend any more money. We were ready to go home, and we missed the kids. We had already called American Airlines to try and change our flight to fly out of Frankfurt on Friday at 2:25 instead of Saturday. Not only did they say the flight was full, but that we also could not fly stand-by on an international flight. We did not lose hope. (My alternative was to sleep in the airport in Frankfurt. I was willing. Being willing to sleep in the airport is much different than actually sleeping in the airport. For example, before we went on our trip, Josh made me tell him I would be "willing" to sleep underneath the stars one night in Tuscany. You get my point.)

We arrived in Frankfurt safely, only to realize that we would need to take a one and a half hour shuttle bus to a different airport in Frankfurt. Okay. 24 more Euro. We made it to the airport, found the American Airlines people, and they happily placed us on the standby list to fly out of Frankfurt that very day. Yippee! Did I mention that the airport people in Germany are very sweet? So, we had plenty of time to go eat before heading to our gate. During this time, I am already becoming more positive about the whole sleeping in the airport thing. The Frankfurt International airport is very nice! I even saw reclining seats in the waiting area. We waited, waited, and waited at our gate. We watched us other presumably stand-by people boarded the plane, looking happy. Finally they called our names. "We absolutely cannot seat you together." We don't care. "We're gonna put you in business class if that's okay?" Um, sure! Let the giggles begin. I cannot express how thrilled we were to make this flight, and in business class, no less! Whatever happened to the lady on the phone that told me we could not fly stand-by on an international flight?

Anyway, for those of you who have flown or always fly business class, please stop reading. It all happened so fast - the flight, that is. My memory card was full at the time, and my battery was dead, but I kept the menu so I wouldn't forget the service we received. We were served some kind of food or drink 11 times within our 9 hour flight! The menu is too hard to read from the scanned version, so here is what it says:

1. TO START
Warm mixed Nuts OR Marinated Cheese Antipasto

(I chose cheese, and Josh chose nuts. We shared. Oh, I forgot to say that the man sitting next to Josh saw that we were together, and switched seats so we could sit together!)

2. APPETIZER
Grilled salmon, hot-smoked salmon and grilled shrimp, served with a marinated roasted vegetable salad.

3. SALAD
Fresh seasonal greens and an assortment of fresh vegetables offered with Roasted Red Pepper Dressing or premium olive oil and balsamic vinegar

4. BREAD BASKET
Assortment of Gourmet Breads offered with choice of butter or premium olive oil.

(I have to add that when it says olive oil or salad dressing, they don't just put it on for you, they give you your own little miniature olive oil bottle. So cute! Also, they gave us our own miniature salt and pepper shakers!)

5. MAIN COURSE

(We had a choice of rack of lamb, fillet of salmon, roasted chicken, or pasta. I chose chicken and Josh chose salmon.)

6. DESSERT
A selection of gourmet cheeses offered with flavorful dried fruit and assortment crackers
Ben & Jerry's Vanilla Ice Cream with a choice of Hot Fudge, Butterscotch, or seasonal Berry Toppings, Whipped Cream, and Pecans

(By the time the dessert came, I could barely restrain my giggles. At first I was trying to act like a seasoned traveller should, but I'm afraid it was extremely obvious to the flight attendant that we were SO out of our element. I also didn't want it to be obvious to the other business class people that we were stand-by people who didn't pay a dime for this royal treatment! So, I just said Thank You A LOT. It didn't help that every time I looked at Josh, he made me smile even more. I'm sure our expressions were priceless. It wasn't just the food and the service though. The way the food was presented was so, what's the word? Fine-dining-ish. Like, they spread our miniature "table cloths" on our trays, and they gave us utensils wrapped in what seemed to me fine linens that looked like they had never been used. The seats are another story. See pictures below.)

7. TO FINISH
Assorted Lindt Chocolates

8. MID-FLIGHT SNACK
An assortment of gourmet cheeses offered with flavorful dried fruit and assorted crackers

9. LIGHT MEAL
(On the menu it states in italics "a light meal offered prior to landing," cute!)

UNO's Farmer's Market Pizza - A Chicago-style deep dish pizza, topped with fresh spinach, eggplant, sun-dried and plum tomatoes, caramelized onions, and a three cheese blend of Feta, Mozzerella, and Romano, flavored with fragrant Basil Pesto, accompanied by a fresh green salad tossed with English cucumbers and cherry tomatoes.

10. DESSERT
Fresh fruit or cookies, freshly baked on board.

(We got both cookies AND fruit, AND another cup of coffee).

11. PRE-ARRIVAL BEVERAGE
Chilled Sparkling Beverage with a fresh citrus garnish (that means lemon).

That flight did not last nearly as long as I had hoped. Josh watched three movies. I watched two. I have never been more entertained, nor have I eaten as much within 9 hours as I did on this flight. The food, service, comfort, topped off with a warm moist towelette at the end was a great end to a fabulous trip. My advice for flying business class on a budget: Get to the airport a day earlier than your flight is scheduled for, and ask nicely if you can fly stand-by. :)