firenze~finally

that is my hostel! its called ostello archi rossi and its a bit too cool actually. its a huge place, and you always have to have your keys and check in with a lot of people all the time. its almost like we're only known by our numbers. but either way it is still very nice. free internet, webcams(which is used to take that picture), free breakfast, encouraged grafitti, and paintings of classic works of art, and other random paintings.

getting to florence was quite a bit of trouble. first the trains out of zurich were overbooked, then the heat in our car was broken, then rather than get on another overbooked train and stand for 3 hours we hopped on the closest one. ofcourse no one spoke english(another plus of switzerland, spriechen sie englisch!)- but a lot of people reassured us it would stop in firenze. BUT it was sort of broken, so we were waiting on that train for about an hour and a half before it left the station- slowly as well. we said ciao to milan, along with a crazyish old italian woman and a little boy that we befriended. he taught us some italian and was named massimo. we gave him paper and he drew pictures for us and everything was great. the old lady befriend the man and woman who were with him and we all sat in the same car. THEN THINGS CHANGED. he became a devil child. screaming at us, hitting and kicking, and he pulled my hair, then made fun of me. abra and i think he called us buttheads. he also kept taking more of our stuff and trying to throw it away. sometimes his parents(?) would scold him, or give him little slaps. but other times they were just in the corridor and we had to totally fend for ourselves. and none of them spoke any english. and the train kept stopping and being really slow. and it was ridiculous. the whole time we were unsure if it would actually stop in florence. when it finally did, it was at the wrong station so we had to catch another train to the right main station. and then we had to walk to our hostel.

but then we got to have a nice dinner, use the internet, and go to sleep. we woke up to free breakfast and rain. which lasted all day. my feet still feel soaked and cold. we saw david, the duomo, the baptistry, san lorenzo and the museum with the actual door panels of the baptistry.

unfortunately the ufizzi was closed, and it will be tomorrow as well. so our trip has been shifted(once again!). but it is all ok. we comforted ourselves with gelato!

we don't have real plans for new years yet, but i'm sure something fun will turn up. though we already got randomly acosted by a drunk italian who tried to give us a piece of plaster, and called us ugly. i just want to wish a happy new year to everyone who is reading this! i love you all!