Italy, part 2: Genova

Genova is where Niki's family lives. It's a sweet little city in northern Italy on the western coast. Genova is the home of focaccia, pesto, and Columbus. The air is pretty much always salty (my hair found this interesting...), and it was hot (but it's summer in Italy, so that's not really surprising).

Niki's family... look at all that pesto.....

This is Mimi... I'm totally in love with him, he's so cute!

Genova city center

OMG PESTO. Best. Pesto. Ever

Antonio Canova, The Magdalene

You wish you spoke sea turtle

I love the Mediterranean

It's so BLUE

At Portofino

Cute little houses...

And the bay....

And it was warm, really!

This is Paolo, the octopus

Ocean picture

My 300th gelato of the trip

My hair seemed to like the salt in it after my swim...

Italy, part 1: Venice

This summer, I will go to Italy twice. I've already been to Venice and Genova, and next week I will go to Florence. These are the pictures from Venice! I loved Venice, it was a perfectly normal city without very few streets. There were ambulance boats, and police boats (I didn't see a fireboat), and bus boats, and all sorts of other boats. There were also lots of really pretty things to see.

My train pulls into Milan, 20 minutes late

The biggest canal in Venice

I found waldo :)

Niki decided he couldn't not have a picture of himself riding a lion

It was hot. You would have done it too, I promise

I'm not sure I entirely trust this tower not to fall...

I'll send a chocolate bar to anyone who can guess what I'm feeding these pigeons (btw, they're all named Hungy)

We're cute, especially with a canal in the background

St. Marco's. It looks like they built one, and then decided it was too small, and built another... and then decided it was too small..... and...

I found a kitty

Baaaad Kathryn. Knocking down towers???

München

These are the long ago promised pictures from my one day in München. I went because Kelsey was coming to visit her parents and sister for spring break (her dad had a temporary job there, so they all lived there briefly, and are all back home now). For those of you who are wondering, München is about a 5 hour train ride from where I live, if the train is on time (and it's Germany, so it probably won't be).

Kelsey discovers I'm there

Airport hug

Group photo, awaiting food

On the s-bahn to somewhere

Me doing what I'm good at

Best friends :)

Best train picture ever

We weren't really sure what the massive square was for, but that didn't stop us from improvising

What I miss about Germany...

Hey, that's MINE!! I guess you can have a bit...

Awesome girls with awesome backpacks

Awesome girls, continued

I can't believe we're here, together, in Germany!!!

But unfortunately, I have school tomorrow...

So, bye for now!

Fasnacht

So Fasnacht is part Karnival, part traditional swiss festival to scare away the evil winter spirits. In the Canton of Zürich, where I live (in case anyone missed that memo), which is a protestant canton, it is basically an excuse to be loud and get very drunk. And dress up like a crazy person. Here is a video to demonstrate some Fasnacht activities. :)

Here are my pictures from Fasnacht:

Me showing off my super awesome makeup...

And super awesome hair....

Eating a pretzel before getting a train to Zürich...

The restaurant where we ate, complete with crazy saxophone band....

Traditional Swiss Rösti with Spiegeleier (fried eggs)

Looking cute on the train home.... believe it or not, he was totally willing to be seen in public with me... =)

New Room!

So I finally found a place, and moved almost a month ago. I'm really (!!!) late posting this, sorry..... I'm living in the top floor of a family house that has been turned into an apartment for three students. We will have our own kitchen up here as of the end of this week, and share a bathroom. It's a nice place, I love my room, the other living spaces are clean and nice, and I'm very close to the train station. :)

My desk...

My closet...

My bed.... (note my short hair.... long story)

Or maybe not my bed.... (those are my concert clothes he's sleeping on)

Niki petting another of the cats. I'm not supposed to show this picture to his dog...

Bedroom floor picnic.... once upon a time I was being shy about cooking in the downstairs kitchen (they'll finish building the upstairs kitchen this week), so he brought me food.... Awww.... :)