Montebello, Capodimonte, Viterbo, Carnevale in Italia!!

Ciao! (I have been working on this post for a while so it's old. I apologize for my recent disappearance from the blog!).

So the past week or so has been busy as usual! The snow has finally all melted, and this weekend it's supposed to be around 63 degrees! Perfect timing for our rescheduled trip to Umbria and Orvieto. I can't wait.
The dessert featured this week in our house was ravioli....the sweet kind :). This is essentially a ravioli with sugar and ricotta cheese inside, topped with powdered sugar. Of course I was in charge of sprinkling the sugar and managed to get it all over my body. No surprise there. Unfortunately our cooking class was cancelled because our professor was sick, but in wine class we got to taste four wines instead of three. We are really learning how to pick out the exact fruit/herb/spice scents in the wines which I think is a very important life skill.

On Wednesday I went to Montebello, my host father's hometown (about a 10 minute drive into the country). He always jokes with me and tells me that the town is huge, just like Mount Everest. However, it is a beautiful countryside. We went for a mini-field trip to check out the museum of Cesetti and well as the work of a French painter who is living/working there. Check out this painting of a man who lives there and has been working on this painting for two years, and is still not finished! It was really cool to see an artist's work in progress.

This side depicts lots of famous figures and is almost in the form of a religious calendar. There were so many intricate details. He explained that someone pointed out there there were no women figures in this painting. So....here is the other side, depicting many women and signs of birth...

Friday we went to Viterbo and toured around the town with Massimo. For those of you who don't know...Viterbo is the capital of the province. Fun facts that I learned:

1. Viterbo was actually the host for the elections of of several popes in the 13th century. We were able to see the conclave.
2. There are lots of really pretty churches there including the Church of the Holy Trinity and St. Agostino.
3. Cappuccino gelato is unreal.
4. Never order a burger in Italy at a fast food restaurant. I was starving and we were in a hurry, so I decided to give it a try. I proceeded to pry the burger off of the cardboard box it came in. I had a feeling that something wasn't right when we proceeded to immediately hand me the burger when I told her what I wanted.

That Saturday, we went to Capodimonte for a quick little visit. It is on Lake Bolsena which is the largest volcanic lake in Italy. The view from the town "castle" was beautiful, and we saw a neat marina on the shore. We decided to grab lunch at a cute little restaurant. We had bruschetta and lasagna that was yummy. Here's a photo of me, Connor, and Allie at the marina in the town.

Then, came one of my favorite experiences so far: Carnevale in Italy!!! Carnevale is essentially Italy's version of Mardi Gras in the United States, but it is much more creative and exciting. On Sunday the 19th, I was in the Tuscania Carnevale parade with some girls from school. We were told that they needed more people on the floats, so we were more than excited to help out. We were told to dress like farmers to fit the theme of the float. When we arrived to the meeting point decked out in our farmer gear, we discovered that we were the oldest participants by about 10 years (besides the chaperones). Initially, we were wondering what the heck we got ourselves into, but we ended up having an amazing time. We filled our cowboy hats with confetti and rode on the floats all throughout the town while the music blared and we threw the confetti in the air. When we approached the main street, I could not believe how many people were there. I didn't even know Tuscania had that many people! I picked out my host family from the crowd as they smiled and waved back at us. We even rode through the historical walls (even though the float got stuck between the Etruscan stone a few times). Here is a picture from the festivities:

On Fat Tuesday (or Martedi Grasso in Italian), the festivities continued with a huge party at one of the local bars. I'm pretty sure that almost all of the LdM students were in attendance. We all wore masks and had a blast. The bar was packed....surprisingly with lots of children. And no not just little kids but infants. And of course they were dressed up too! It was a great night. Here's a picture of me with my mask and my friend Sara: