Final Entry

Back home, at long last, in Seattle, Washington, USA.

I'd just like to thank you all for your love and support and for helping make this opportunity possible for me. This year was by the far the best year of my life and I'm blessed to have had such great friends and family supporting me from home.

I love you guys! Here's to the next adventure.

Liz

"I believe like a child that suffering will be healed and made up for, that all the humiliating absurdity of human contradictions will vanish like a pitiful mirage, like the despicable fabrication of the impotent and infinitely small Euclidean mind of man, that in the world's finale, at the moment of eternal harmony, something so precious will come to pass that it will suffice for all hearts, for the comforting of all resentments, for the atonement of all the crimes of humanity, for all the blood that they've shed; that it will make it not only possible to forgive but to justify all that has happened."

— Fyodor Dostoevsky

Less Than 24 Hours Left

Last day on this continent.

Wow.

Be seeing you all soon!

"God will have begun to do serious work through us."
--Glen Argan

That's A Wrap

Indeed, things are wrapping up fast. Finals start tomorrow. People are already packing. Our plane leaves early Wednesday morning. How is this possible???

Our final Gala took place last night on the rooftop of the beautiful, 4-star Grand Hotel Baglioni. Everyone dressed up and snapped pictures as twilight fell over the city. The view was incredible – you could see for miles, and we were so close one felt they could almost reach out and touch the Duomo. Dinner, speeches, and awards followed; we laughed a lot, cried a little, and toasted one incredible year.

Today we hiked to the top of the Duomo and took even MORE pictures of the surrounding city. We climbed over 400 spiraling stairs and finally emerged into the sun, dizzy and panting, hundreds of feet in the air…

The weather has been amazing and I’ve been putting on the pounds thanks to even more delicious food than usual.

Happy April Fool’s Day everyone! Go out and prank your friends…I definitely did…

Love to all!

"If we find ourselves with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that we were made for another world."

--C.S. Lewis

6 Days and Counting...

Wow, it really has been quite a long time since I’ve updated this thing. Sorry for the delay! Things here have been busy and stressful as usual, to say the least. (“Busy and stressful” being a major understatement.)

Oh, how time flies…we officially end our sophomore year of study abroad in just 6 short days. I can hardly believe I will soon be going back to a life of normalcy in the states. No more wallets full of eight different types of currency? No more sprinting through foreign airports? No more getting yelled at by speeding vespa riders? No more pasta, twice a day, every day?

These past few weeks have been a blur of travels, exams, and other typical adventures. I’ll be heartbroken to leave, but excited for a much-needed BREAK.

Since I last wrote:

-Making funny videos in Rome

-Spending spring break in the beautiful cities of Athens and Santorini (Greece!)

-Standing on Hitler’s would-be WWII victory celebration stage in Heidelberg, Germany

-Climbing ancient castles at midnight

-Snoring through an Italian opera in Torino

-Lots and lots of chocolate festivals

-Relaxing in the SUN!

-Daytrip to the beautiful Lago di Como

-Getting stuck in Bologna over night

-Shopping in Milan

-Spending time in our beautiful home city, Florence

-And much, much more :)

I’ll try to do a better job of blogging these next few days. Hope everyone is well! Can't wait to see you soon! Love and prayers to all.

-Liz

"Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow where they lead."

- Louisa May Alcott

"The vision of a culture lies in what becomes its major institutions, in what it remembers as its most impacting events, in who it sees as its heroes."

- Joan Chittister

Turkish Baths!

Let me describe this process with a bit more detail, so you really get the full affect.

No one really knew what to expect when we found out we would have the option of participating in a traditional Turkish Bath experience. All we were told was this: You go into the bath and get scrubbed down by a professional Turkish bather person. Oh, and you're naked.

Here's what happened.

We're each handed a plaid bath towel, underwear, a pair of slippers, and a scrubber at the door. Girls and guys separate to go into their respective chambers. We enter a large, warmly-lit circular room and walk up the stairs to a series of locker rooms, where we are given lockers and keys. We change into the underpants (nothing on top) and wrap ourselves in our towels, stuff our clothes in the lockers, take our scrubbers, and head to the bathing room.

It is even warmer and steamier in here. There is a giant, smooth, heated marble slab in the middle of the room. All the women are lying on it, and the ones on the outside of the circle are covered in suds, being scrubbed down by professionally-trained turkish women in swimsuits. We find room amongst all the bodies and lay out on the heated slab, which is very relaxing. Everyone's naked on top but it is, surprisingly, not awkward. (We're all girls, after all.)

When it's my turn, the nearest Turkish women pats my booty and scoots me over to the edge of the slab, where she begins to scrub my entire body. She then dips the sponge into some sort of special soap and COVERS me with suds, then scrubs some more. Every inch of me is polished when she's through. She pats me again to signal that she is done, then leads me by the hand to a small fountain on one wall. Here she lathers my hair and washes it and my face and neck. Then she shows me where to go next: the jacuzzi room.

It is a small room off the main one that contains two jacuzzi pools. One is like a normal-sized hot tub; the other is the size of an actual pool, and about as deep. The water is hot and there is a fountain at the far end. We hang out in this pool for a long time, swimming laps and washing off the last of the suds.

And that's it. We get warm, dry towels and dry off. Change back into our clothes. We're offered drinks and facials. Everyone feels warm and relaxed - a perfect end to a long day of walking.

Conclusion? Operation Turkish Baths: SUCCESS!

Turkey anyone?

"Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To God's holy people in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus..." -Ephesians 1:1




This semester our educational field trip was to the great and beautiful land of Turkey, a country famous for being "halfway between two continents". We flew into Istanbul early Tuesday morning and then from there took a short flight to Izmir. We spent one night in a nearby tourist town and the next day toured the ancient city of Ephesus. The ruins were incredible. I can't believe my friends and I got to walk the same streets Paul did only shortly after the resurrection of Christ! WOW.

We spent the remainder of the week in Istanbul, which to me seemed like a city straight out of Star Wars with its towering mosques and palaces and sparkling waterfront. We even got to take a ferry up the Bosphorus Strait and cross over onto the Asian side.

We shopped and bargained at the Grand Bazaar, where you can get beautiful accessories for as little as one turkish lira (about 63 cents) but have to deal with creepy storeowners telling you they've seen you on TV, grabbing your hand, and assuring you they have exactly what you need. We sampled tea and tobacco at the Spice Bazaar and stuffed ourselves full of baklava, fresh pomegranate juice, and turkish delight. We also toured the mosques, visited the sultan's palace, viewed his jewels (including a one-of-a-kind samurai sword), got scrubbed down in a traditional turkish bath, saw how turkish rugs and pots are made, and watched the prayer of the whirling dervishes.

It was a trip quite unlike any other.

"People like you enrich the dreams of the worlds, and it is dreams that create history. People like you are unknowing transformers of things, protected by your own fairy-tale, by love." -Ben Okri