Saint Leo University

This weekend was Thanksgiving and although they don’t celebrate Thanksgiving in Italy, our school is American so they gave us a long weekend. I went on a trip to the Alps right near the spot where Italy meets Switzerland and France. Around 40 students representing 3 study abroad schools went on this trip so I met a lot of really cool people from all over the world!! I had a nice, relaxing weekend which reenergized me to get through the last two weeks of classes. We went sledding, ice skating, built a snow fort and a snow man, and I made my first real snow angel ever (I decided not to go skiing because I didn’t really want to humiliate myself by face-planting on the mountain). Oh did I mention that it snowed all weekend so that by the time I left the snow was up to my knees!!! Since I am from Florida everyone got a kick out of my reaction to that much snow and all of the mountains. The village we stayed in was a quaint little Alpine village that could have been packed up and put right into a Disney movie (it helped that at the ice rink they were playing Disney soundtracks). We had a Thanksgiving Dinner on Thursday that was very good despite the fact that we were all freezing and the food for the rest of the weekend (which was provided by the hostel and the company that sponsored the trip) was really good. I had so much fun and met so many new people that I really hope to stay in contact with even after this whole adventure is over (Oh my gosh… that is only 16 days away!!!). Right now I can’t wait to get home and see my family and friends (and earn a little extra cash!!!) but I know that I want to return someday with my family so that I can show them all of the amazing things that I saw and experienced while I studied here. I really missed not having Thanksgiving dinner with my family and watching the Macy’s parade and the endless football games that follow but since I had to give those things up, this weekend was a very good substitute.

The Alps for Thanksgiving