I somehow managed to survive the trip to Arezzo and you know what it might have been a little reckless and stupid but I'd probably do it again, cause it was kind of fun. I managed to help some America who were about to get off at the wrong train station (Florence has 3 of them) and they were pretty thankful. I'm like a seasoned traveler now (that's definitely a joke). Well I got back from Arezzo and decided after a long journey like that I needed a gelato, so I stopped and got a delicious chocolate gelato because I'm in Italy. Afterwards I decided to just chill before getting ready to go to the Fiorentina futbol match. They were playing a team from up north and were expected to win. Fiorentina was 4th in the league and this team was 18th. The group was meeting at a piazza I had never heard of to walk to the game. So I left 40 minutes in advance. Turns out it was a 10 minute walk to the piazza, so we stopped at the local grocery store and got some brewskis to get ready for the game cause we're reckless Italians. It was actually a little weird cause we were sitting and waiting for our group in this big park while children were playing and their parents were staring at us as we were drinking these huge beers. But we just rolled with it:
Then we marched to the stadium which is like a 40 minute hike from the piazza. The security was pretty good and you need your ID to match your ticket to get in:
I had been given some tips before the game. Like bring ID, don't expect cheerleaders, the stadium is really small because the city council owns it and the team and Italians don't care about their seat, they sit wherever they want in the right section: do the same. All of these were accurate except the stadium was a pretty good size:
We had decent seats and I sat with John-Paul and Mathias. Luckily I brought my trusty Fiorentina scarf:
The game was really fun and we won 2-0. The stadium went crazy when we scored and despite the great security fans had fireworks and set them off after every score. It was really cool, I tried to join in on the cheering but my Italian pronounciation is so bad that I got a lot of weird looks everytime. Afterwards we tried to get into the diner so I could get some pancakes. The wait was over an hour and we weren't feeling that so we went to the osteria for some good food (they know who we are now) :)
I got the bruschetta sorella which is toast with fresh cheese and tomato on it and it was really good:
Then I got the spaghetti alla carbonera which is spaghetti, cream, cheese, bacon and a little pepper. It was amazing. Like I'm sorry Mom and Grandmom if you're reading this, it was the best pasta I've ever had in my life:
Later throughout the night I started having strep throat symptoms (I refuse to blame the amazing spaghetti so don't make any reckless allegations like that). Plus I really needed some French toast. I really decided strep throat is terrible during this point in time. I coughed (which is really painful with strep) for about 2 hours while I was trying to sleep. Thankfully I packed Nyquil which was heavenly and knocked me out in like 6 seconds flat. I was out so hard that I missed my alarm the next morning and Lauren rang my doorbell (which woke both me and my roommate up) and I had to get dressed and ready in approximately 7 seconds. But the French toast was worth it. It actually hurt to eat with my throat but it tasted really good anyway and I got a milkshake so I felt like I was living on the edge. The a French toast was 6.50 Euro and the milkshake was 5 Euro. That converts to $8.45 for the French toast and $6.50 for the milkshake. They were good but not that good. I had a meal voucher for the restaurant so I didn't have to pay. Still the diner was pretty sick:
Afterwards I went back to sleep cause I felt like I needed it. I did eventually wake up and run because I was feeling a lot better at this point in time. After running I took a shower and tried to some homework; I was unsuccessful. While I had just about given up on the homework, I got a good distraction. Three of the girls that live in the six-person apartment (Kathleen, Lauren, and Vicky) came to my apartment, because the electricity was not working at their apartment. Kathleen had to shower (because she had no hot water at her apartment), while Lauren and Vicky crafted an email for AIFS to come fix their electricity. Afterwards we all left and got gelato, which was very tasty, and I saw this Jeep in Florence, which I think is always cool to see in a different country.
Afterwards we went to the Golden View restaurant in Florence for Matthias' 21st birthday. It was very fancy and had an amazing view of the Arno river and the Ponte Vecchio. It was amazing. At first they brought us out a champagne/ white wine thing that we learned on our wine tour is not only tradition at many fine restaurants but it is also designed to make you think you're hungrier than you really are so you will order more and thus buy more. I didn't order an antipasto (appetizer), instead I skipped right to the Primo Piatto (first course or literally "first plate") which was this amazing meat and pasta dish:
The meat and pasta dish was phenominal and for my secondo piatti (second course), I got Lemon flavored chicken. It was actually much more lemony than you would ever guess. That is actually just lemon juice and butter I think in the sauce around it. There might have been a dash of Garlic in there as well. While there might've been a powerful lemon taste to the chicken it was not too much lemon and it actually tasted really good.
Of course they brought a special dessert to Mathias and say "Happy Birthday" to Mathias in English and in Italian. It was kind of funny but he said it was really good. Also we got the house white wine with dinner and it was scrumptious:
After dinner we headed out to Friends bar where Mathias had his first drink as a 21 year old (we weren't counting the wine), which was a rum and coke. Then we got some gelato and I headed to bed. It was a pretty good day in Florence.
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