My uncle Ross and aunt Teresa visited me last weekend! The first of few visitors who are coming from home. Ross and Teresa were unexpected and it was such a great surprise! I got a message two days before they were here...saying "by the way, were going to be in Rome where would you like to meet?" nice! I loved seeing them and hearing their unfortunate events of driving in Naples and getting gas. They treated me to lunch near the Pantheon on Sunday where we sat and chatted forever! I think our waiter came back 5 times to see if we were ready to order and we hadn't even cracked open the menu.

After lunch, we went into the pantheon with the millions of other people who also

had the same idea. We took a few pictures and hanging out with Ross and Teresa was great entertainment. My favorite moment of hanging out with them was when we were by Raphael's tomb (the famous painter) which was in the Pantheon and there was a statue of a head above his tomb.

After Teresa read the sign, she told Ross and I that 100 years after Raphael died, they opened the tomb to see if his body was really inside, which it was, and the statue is a replica of what he looked like. Ross then says...."Oh, so he was black?" haha!! so much fun.

My roommate Alyssa and I were bored tonight so we decided to get our workout on. We popped in Gaby's pilates DVD on my computer, laid down a large comforter in our room and lasted about 20 min. We then treated ourselves to Nutella and Banana crepes..so much for the workout! Not to mention the crepes had a whole jar of nutella on it....and it was extremely sweet..alyssa couldn't even finish hers (hers had caramel on it also). Nothing can top those nutella/banana crepes we had in isla mujeres! mmmmm!!

Maggie with her nutella banana crepe

one more day til Bridget, Patti and Tay are here!

ciao ciao.

Great friends, family, Rome and Sno

I went to Rossana's jewelry shop (mom's good friend) today..finally! They were happy I came. First, it was just Rossana and then Luana (her daughter) came out. I attempted to speak to them in italian/english for a bit, they opened mom's gift and card (which they loved), and then Arturro came out from the back as well. It was hard to communicate because Rossana and Arturro do not know english but Luana knew a little so she was able to translate some. Arturro said "your mom speaks italiano, why not you?" He said that in Italian and I actually understood him! He was just giving me a hard time, he was fun and they were all so nice. They said all of mom's children are so beautiful. Arturro loves my dad, and also kept asking about him and Justin. At first I thought it was weird when they asked about Justin but then it all clicked when they said they remember him when he was so small. I forgot he was there when he was 3 years old and they have met him before. It's always nice to meet people that mom grew up with because every time I mention her name their face lights up and they yell GIUSTINA and always give me a big hug and kiss. Their shop is closed for the next 10 days for remodeling, but when Tamara is here for the weekend we will be meeting up with them-I'm sure we will go to dinner or something like that.

Luana and Arturro

Luana, Arturro and Rossana in

their jewelry shop

Rossana and Arturro

Yesterday I took another cooking class with Chef "thanks god" Andrea. He is so fun to cook with, I like him a lot. There were only 3 people in the class: Maggie, another girl, and I. It was a "vegetarian" menu and we went to the fresh food market in Campo Di Fiori to get our ingredients. We cooked enough food for 15 people so we all got to take home leftovers after we ate. It was nice to get to eat all different kinds of vegetables, it made me feel healthy again and was a good break from pasta. We had a pumpkin soup for our first course which was DELICIOUS!! it was my favorite course that we made. Second, we made spinach risotto which was good and then we had ratatouille. I never had ratatouille before and all I could think of was the mouse movie. Ratatouille is basically a mix of vegetables cooked in the oven with oil and bouillon. It was a fun experience and he gave us the recipes to take home.

Chef Andrea with the pumpkin soup

Spinach Risotto

Ratatouille before it was cooked, so colorful!

Me, Maggie, and I wish I could remember her name- mixing up the vegetables...

We were not posing. at all.

Maggie with the finished product of Ratatouille

My friend sarah is here from back home and we finally got the chance to get together (she lives near Vatican City so it's kind of a hike to get to eachother's places). She is studying abroad here in Rome for half a semester through St. Ben's/St. John's (in St. Cloud) and then goes to Greece for the remaining part of the semester (if all works out..hopefully I can visit her when she is there! I would LOVE to go to Greece). She is traveling with a large group of students from her school as well, around 30 people. We met for wine in Piazza Navona which is absolutely beautiful at night!! It was fun to meet some of her friends from school too.

Sarah and I

Tay's in Germany....I am impatiently waiting for her arrival here in Rome! I got a message from Teresa (my aunt) on facebook that her and Ross (my uncle) are in Rome this weekend. what a nice surprise!! I get to see them tomorrow. We are planning to meet in Piazza Navona and get some lunch..hopefully I can take them to meet mom's cousins and also see my apartment/school. I can not wait to see family!!

That's all folks. I will continue to update.

baci! xoxo

-Sno

The Capponi's

Cousin Andrea and girlfriend Camilla

Last night I finally had the chance to meet with my second cousin Andrea and his girlfriend. He sent me a text message and told me that him and his girlfriend would like to meet me at campo de fiori, and since some of my friends and I were already planning to go out there-it worked perfect! I met them there and they are such wonderful people! Very nice. I really liked his girlfriend, she spoke english well and she is going to college to become a translator. She knows english, french, russian, and spanish and she is working on another language. WOW-impressive. Andrea doesn't know english as well but he was trying and his girlfriend was translating for us as needed. They are both 19 years old, and they have been dating for about 5 months now. They were both really tall, I honestly felt like a midget. Andrea graduated from highschool and he said he's done with school. In January, he is going to become a swim instructor. He said he has been swimming since he was 6 years old (same swimming pool that mom swam at) and also played water polo growing up-so cool!! They tried to help navigate me to places in Rome. They told me some places to go and they were really excited when they found out that Tamara and Brad were coming over. They would like to meet both of them, and said they want to take Brad and I out to eat at their favorite restaurant which happens to be right down the street from my school (sorry Tay...) But they said they will be around the weekend that Tay is here and I'm sure we will have lunch or something with them. It was so much fun to get to know them a little better. It's finally the weekend for me! Tonight I will be staying in-I'm going to a cooking class in the morning with Chef Andrea. After the class, I'm hoping to make it over to Rosanna's shop finally! Tay, Bridget and Patti will be here next weekend, I'm so so so excited!! It will be nice to see family/someone from home. I'm looking forward to their visit :)

FORZA ROMA!

Me in front of the Vatican

The Vatican

Alyssa Kristen and I at the soccer game

The top of the Castle

Buongiorno!

Last night we attended the Rome vs Florence soccer game. It was so much fun! Definitely a highlight so far. As you probably know, Italian soccer fans are CRAAZY. In the past years, there's been games where people have died because of riots, etc. Knowing this before the game, I was a little nervous. Especially when we were walking to the game and saw the squads of policemen all around! They were wearing helmets and had metal shields that said "POLIZIA". It was kinda scary..but other than that seeing the olympic stadium was so cool! It was an outdoor stadium and it was a perfect night for a soccer game. They had a lot of statues outside of it from when they hosted the olympic summer games in Rome. There was olympic rings everywhere! It was very cool to see. When we got there, we couldn't read our tickets so we really didn't know where our seats were. We couldn't enter at first because you have to scan your tickets and each time we scanned our tickets it gave us a red X and wouldnt let us through. We looked like idiots basically...and finally I asked someone who was walking in and he spoke english and told us where to go. We were at the opposite side of the stadium--so we got in and walked up the stairs and into our section. Perfect timing because the game started like 5 minutes later. We had awesome seats!! The fans were so fun though...everyone gets into the game and the energy in the stadium was insane! Roma beat Florence (Florence was ranked above Rome) 3 to 0. It was fun to watch the fans do all their rituals even though we really had NO idea what they were saying except when the guy next to Alyssa kept yelling "Pass-eh La Ball-o!" We could figure that one out. The one part I didn't like was when smoke bombs/fireworks went off during the game (in the middle of the bleachers) because I thought someone had a gun and was shooting up the stadium!! ha, other than that though it was such a great experience, I'm planning on making it to another game soon.

This past week of school we went Monday-Friday (friday was a makeup day for when we don't have school on thanksgiving) so the week seemed like it took FOREVER (we usually go Mon-Thurs) it was nice though because everyone from my school stayed here for the weekend and we did a lot of walking around Rome and relaxing in our apartments. I walked with a friend to Vatican City and we toured the Vatican and the tombs of the popes (underneath the Vatican) on Saturday. Bad idea to go on Saturday....SO MANY TOURISTS!!!!! lines were sooo long and there were tour groups everywhere!! We managed to sneak our way through though since there was only 2 of us. We also did the castle of St. Angelo which is right down the street from the Vatican. It was cool...we payed 6.50 euros to get in but we didn't know what we were looking at. It was awesome to go on the Terrace and view Rome from the top of the castle though! We wanted to go into the Sistine Chapel as well but it was 14 euros to get in and I'm waiting for Brad to come to Rome before I do all the museums since I'm sure he will want to see it as well.

Other than that I am looking forward to this week being over...too many tests and papers due this week, very stressful! I will finally be meeting with my friend from home who is also here studying abroad, but she lives in Vatican City and goes to a different school. Otherwise, I am taking another cooking class this Friday, will be staying in Rome this weekend and going to Rossana's jewelry shop, the area where mom grew up and also mom's beauty shop. My next planned trip I have is the middle of October-I will be going to Tuscany for the underground vineyards and 4 course home cooked traditional meal in the gorgeous setting of Tuscany's hill tops!

Thats all I have for my update.

Happy 30th birthday to TAY!!!!!

miss you guys back home...and chipotle (would kill for some), my job and I guess even Eagan?

:)

Love, Sonja

SNO WAY! of course this happens....

So the one and ONLY day I decide not to bring my camera with me, I encounter something I need to take a picture of!! Julia Roberts and James Franco are here in Italy filming a movie. I learned of this last week when Gaby informed us about it at dinner. She had spotted the movie set in Rome. Anyway, I was walking to class yesterday in Trastevere and I passed a restaurant on my way to school with huge vans, and lights and video recordings. A couple people were stopped on the side watching and I realized...this is the movie set!! I stopped and watched for a couple minutes but couldn't stay long because I was already running late to class. I saw the extras of people in the windows above the restaurant with water pails, but no Julia Roberts or James Franco in sight. I also saw a couple of the actors do a walking scene in the neighborhood. So cool!! but so incredibly angry I forgot my camera...never again will I not bring it with me! 

Cinque Terre, Italy

CINQUE TERRE

L to R: Alyssa (my roommate), Katie, Kristen and I.

I spent this past weekend in Cinque Terre, Italy. What an amazing place!! It was absolutely beautiful. It's located at the no

rthern part of Italy, off the coast of the

 Mediterranean Sea. The water is so clear and SO blue...no words can even begin to describe it. Cinque Terre is made up of 5 villages, each having something unique about them. One village specializes in wine, another in Pesto sauce, one in beaches, etc. I can't remember exactly what every village was. The only way, besides train, to get from

 one village to the next is to hike. We chose to hik

e the coast (which I highly recommend if you ever find yourself in Cinque Terre). They also have the option to rent a mountain bike and take the higher trails. If we had more time we would have done this. We took a train into Cinque Terre on Friday morning, leaving Roma train station at 

7 am! We camped at a city right outside the 5 villages called Deiva Marina. For wha

t we paid, it actually turned out well. Since Cinque Terre emphasizes in the beauty of nature, camping while visiting Cinque

 Terre only enhanced the experience. There was a lot of traveling

 students also at the campsite and it was a perfect 

fit for us. We had tent cabins...it was basically 2 single beds on wood

en floors with a tent over our head. The first day we got there (traveling by train for the first time went smoothly) we settled down and headed into the villages, starting with Riomaggio

re. Trains come maybe twice an hour, sometimes only once an hour. We caught a train from Deiva Marina after waiting for about a half hour. Whi

le on the train, Alyssa was looking for her camera to take a picture only to discover she didn't have it and she left it at the train

 station. We got off at the next stop (which was about a 5 minute ride) and waited to 

catch the next train back. The only problem was the next train was in 45 minutes. So we waited at the station, finally got on a train, and headed back. She went to the tourist information and they had her camera!! What a relief..wow! We then figured out the next train into cinque terre wasn't for another hour and ten minutes!! we walked the town of Deiva Marina w

hile waiting, but that set us back a few hours. We didn't get to Rioma

ggiore until around 6 and we hiked the coastal trails. endless beauty. Riomaggiore had the via dell amore (which is in a movie..not sure which one) and had locks everywhere to symbolize people in love who bought a lock from there and put it somewhere on the fence.

 It was cute. We hiked to Manarola, 

which had a cute little town on the coast and this is where everyone was cliff jumping. After that we did the hour hike to Corniglia which is where we c

aught the sunset. beautiful! We took the train back to Riomaggiore and ate dinner at a cute little restaurant in the village and then headed home for some much needed sleep and to regain energy for the full day of hiking on Saturday! We got up early Saturday and started out at Corniglia and walked to Vernazza (specializing in Pesto Sauce). The hike took us around an hour and a half and it was mostly stairs. We had to stop a few times to rest because our hike to the top of the mountain was so tiring! What a GREAT workout though. And the view from the top of the mountain made it all worth it. We then got to Vernazza, walked through the 

village and took the train to the next village, Monterosso. The hike to Monterosso was 2 hours long and much harder and there was no way we would have made it because we hadn't stopped to eat anything yet. We got to Monterosso, the beach town. Th

e beach there reminded me of a beach you would find in

 Mexico, except mountains surrounding you. Here, we got the chance to kayak for 6 euros a person for an hour. First time kayakin

g was done in Cinque Terre-doesn't get much better than that! We kayaked to a point on the coast and then headed back to the beach. After that, we decided to go shower and get dinner in Deiva Marina. We found a small restaurant, ate dinner, then went back to the campsite for more sleep. We were so tired...katie and alyssa somehow managed to fall asleep in the train station while we were waiting for the train. We woke up super early Sunday morning to hike to the southern point of Cinque Terre and went to a small swimming area in Riomaggiore where we got the chance to cliff jump (we did this on our own..) What an adrenaline rush, but so fun! We met some people there from California who were going to Culinary School in Italy. I've never known you could do this, but what a perfect place to study to become a chef. We headed back to Roma around 4 pm via train and got in at about 8:30. Long train ride and exhausting weekend, but so worth the trip! 

Here is my attempt of capturing the beauty of this place...but it doesn't even come close to seeing it in person. 

Hiking the trails at sunset

The town of Corniglia

A stop at one of the train stations

The beginning of the hiking trails

Only the beginning of the steps on the hike...this was about 380 steps.

Hiking to the beach

Got to get to class....will continue to post more pictures on the next blog! 

Arrivederci! 

Figs: my new favorite fruit

At John Cabot, there are probably around 200 students total. Some are degree seekers-but most are study abroad. With that said, there are about 8-12 students in each class..so you get to know everyone in your classes really well and even the professor. The style of John Cabot is very laid back, you learn new things every day about the subject you are studying but you also share your own experiences you may have on the streets of Rome. The professors, I feel like, are kind of a "guide" to this city of Rome for students from an American stand point. I first learned of how laid back John Cabot is when I was in my marketing class the other day. My professor, sitting down in the student chairs with us (we were in a half circle) was teaching us about marketing procedures when her phone started to ring. The phone was in her purse, which she wears the entire class period every day (it's a cross-shoulder purse). Normally, a professor would turn it off and apologize. Instead, she answered it! haha, I couldn't help but laugh. So much different then what I'm used to at St. Thomas! It was one of her italian friends and they were just chatting away for about 3 minutes about how he has his basket of fresh figs for her (it was a local grower). She was so excited about the call she received she promised to bring in fresh figs for our class to try. Today...she brought them in for everyone! The last 5 minutes of class we had "fig tasting" and we each got our own fig. I've had figs before but none like you get here! Freshly picked from a local fig tree...doesn't get much better than that. I have now decided that figs are probably my new favorite fruit and I can't wait to get to the open market next week to get my own!

taking the bus in Rome..

Today, I traveled to the train station via bus to purchase my train ticket to Cinque Terre for this weekend. I took the bus a couple times before this and I think I'm starting to be able to find my way around Rome...it's the metro system that I really wanna figure out! One thing that I have noticed is that Italians have no sense of personal space nor do they respect it. It's actually quite aggravating! I go with a friend to the train station and we get on a bus...which took about 20 minutes to get to our stop to pick us up. Being super cautious of gypsies I take my backpack off and put it on the ground. We have to stand because there is literally 10 seats on this entire bus. After a few stops an older guy gets on with a newspaper and decides he needs to stand RIGHT behind me. His hand is right next to mine and he's towering over me. If you've ever been on a bus in Rome, you know its not the smoothest ride and the bus drivers either are slamming on the brakes or pushing the pedal to the ground..theres no in between. Needless to say, you are jerked around the entire time. So this guy standing right behind me keeps kneeing me in the thigh or bumping in to me somehow over every turn, bump and any other kind of movement the bus does. I get so annoyed I keep turning around to look at him but it's like he doesn't even know he is hitting me. Finally a bunch of people get off..so there is more room. More space! after about 10 seconds, I feel his knee in my thigh again!! I don't understand!! He has all this room behind him. I decide to keep moving a little bit further forward, but so does he-at one point his hand even overlaps mine! And he's just minding his own business the whole time..looking out the window and even humming to the music!! grrrrr. I'm sure he didn't even realize he was doing it because Italian people don't seem to have personal space and it's completely normal for them to be close to everyone to the point they are touching (ie: kissing cheeks instead of handshakes). I guess it's something I have to get used to!
Anyway, as I mentioned before I'm going to be in Cinque Terre this weekend with 3 other girls from my school. We found a campsite that is very similar to hostels except it's only 2 people in each cabin tent and it comes with actual beds and linens. It got good reviews, so we are hoping that everything goes well! Next Wednesday morning, Maggie and I are going to the Pope's general blessing to the public where you can buy a rosary to get blessed by the Pope. Let me know if any of you want one! I can't wait to see that. School is going really well and I love my classes. I've been keeping myself busy at night with home-cooked dinners (with my roommates Gaby and Alyssa) and homework. The days are going so fast..and I am looking forward to Tay, Bridget and Patti's visit to Rome in the beginning of October.

that's all for now

a presto!

Just call me chef sonja

I had the amazing opportunity to cook up a traditional Italian meal (for only 10 euros)!

 It was a four course meal (course meals are very popular here) and there were about 12 students divided into groups. Our team got squash blossoms (soooo good, I can't wait to cook it at home). Squash blossoms are squash flowers (we used zucchini flowers because they don't have squash in Italy) stuffed with prosciutto and mozzarella then deep fried in a beer batter. We also had some kind of thin sliced beef wrapped around prosciutto and 

mozzarella with sage leaves, which ended up being my favorite! I forget what it's called......mom?? Anyway-Bucatini noodles were our 3rd course with homemade bacon pasta sauce (mmmm! and I don't even like bacon). And for dessert we had small wine cookies, all this topped off with some red wine!! malto buono!! The instructor was a local chef who owns his own restaurant right by where I live. He usually holds his own private cooking classes for 50 euros a person. He was hilarious, his strong accent topped with "thanks god!" when he was trying to say "thank god". Such a fun time!

I attempted a run yesterday along the Tiber river right before sunset. Gorgeous night, but I didn't quite make it to the river! I ended up getting lost on all the side roads and eventually finding my way when I was right by school. I actually enjoyed getting lost. I now

 know my way around a little better, plus I discovered new places and on top of that I ran a lot more than I was planning on! Something I find interesting here is nobody goes for runs-and everyone stares at you when you do!! The only exercise going on is walking, and sometimes biking...and I have yet to see an obese person. That's odd especially with all the pizza, pasta and gelato eaten here! Actually, everyone (especially girls) are so skinny. Take that as a tip America.....all you have to do is WALK! Classes are going well..I really like my teachers. My Italiano professor Rosa Napoli reminds me of mom with her accent and the way she writes. I keep seeing Anthony everywhere I go! All the italian guys look alike (like karate kid) and Anthony falls in that category. Today was supposed to be beach day since it's been 90's and so humid (and we dont have air conditioning) ! But we woke up to rain...first rain day since I've been here and of course it's on the day we decide we want to take the hour train ride to the beach. 

Here are some pictures from the cooking class:

My group..with some squash blossoms. It was sooo hot in the kitchen, we were sweaty and uncomfortable.

The meat course before it was cooked, I wish I could remember what it was called! 

mmmm!! so delicious!! 

Bucatini noodles

The wine cookies

This picture is blurry of Maria and I but it shows the beautiful view of Rome we have from the roof top of our school! (also where the cooking class was held)

The dinner table 

Chef "thanks god" Andrea

topped off with the biggest bottle of red wine I've ever seen!

Another picture of the view from the rooftop of our school..amazing!

ROMA TI AMO! 

ciao ciao