Florence Florence, you are so.....

Well, I guess it's time that I make my debut on this blog. So, here are some random bits because quite frankly I'm not sure what Kristine has written here recently.

We are in Florence right now. Last night we had this wonderful plan to wake up bright and early and go to the Accademia before all the other tourists arrive and crowd our space. So we did! And it totally didn't work. We stood in line from 9:30-12:40 until we were finally let in. Although I must say that seeing the David statue was worth the wait. I never realized just how large and detailed it is. Very very impressive. They also had an exhibit on Italian baroque musical instruments, which I liked.

Besides that we've spent a lot of time sitting in various Piazzas both here and in Rome, sometimes with a bottle of wine, sometimes with gelatto, and watching. It's just so pleasant. Marilu says: "The pigeons are amazing. Highly recommended." Marilu and Joe spent several minutes today feeding the pigeons with this Italian potato-chip-in-stick-form snack called Sticki. What a wonderful idea- all the pigeons came to hang out with us. Kristine enjoyed it thoroughly.

Our last night in Rome we sat around in Piazza Navona with some wine. There were a couple of neat street performers, including this girl that dance with a fire hoola hoop. Marilu haggled with this woman for a scarf (see quote in previous entry). At some point all the street vendors suddenly ran out of the piazza with the speed of light because the cops were coming. It was quite hilarious. It was so fast I could't even get a picture, just this horde of vendors with all their bags jetting out of the piazza. Joe got a picture though, so you'll see it in a few weeks.

The night before we tried going to some bars. We got a card advertising some specials at some bar so we decided to check it out. We went there, and were pretty much the only people in the bar. At first Kris tried to order the special which they seemed not to even know about, but they gave it to her when she showed the card. Then the rest of us waited to be served while four bartenders were standing behind the counter talking to themselves and clearly not wanting to serve us. From the little we understood we're pretty sure it had something to do with us being American. Yay for discrimination. Did Kristine write this story already? I don't know. Oh well. Then we went to another bar called "bitch boulevard." We walked in and the two bar tenders were just fighting and yelling at each other. So... we walked out and went back to the Drunken Ship, another bar at the Campo di Fiori which caters to mostly Americans, and the occasional Italian. Wasn't quite my style, but at least we could, you know, order drinks.

Earlier that day Marilu and Joe went to see some ruins (Roman Forum, Colosseum etc.) Kristine and I had already seen them and were pretty Romed-out by that point, so we sat on a rock in the forum and talked for an hour and a half. Andrew, a wonderful nice traveller from Canada whom we met at the hostel, was also a part of many of the above Rome stories. We are at a hotel now, so we probably will not meet any travel buddies here, although we do get to talk to other backpackers in internet cafes and while waiting to get into museums for 3 hours.

Some more info on Morad (a.k.a Borat, or so Kristine likes to call him) - we had a little falling out with him on the last night after Kris told him to stop petting Marilu like a cat, and Joe pretended to make out with her in order to avoid Morad. He was not pleased, but we were not pleased with him either, so whatevvvzzzzz.

OK, we love you, internet costs mucho €€€€€€€€€,
XOXOXOXO
Inbal and the crew!!!!!!!!