Soirée and Italy!

The night of the 20th was a fun one, albeit quite American. The Nice group joined us at Club Nautique along the St-Laurent-du-Var beach line. We had a nice French dinner with a live band singing a mix of familiar and unfamiliar songs before heading to the beach for some pictures; then the real fun began--we began dancing, which was quite fun. Still, it wasn't until Cyrielle, a Nice program instructor, plugged in his iPod and sang his heart out to Adele that everyone became entranced in the music. (Cyrielle apparently came in 4th place on X-Factor France!) And then we just started partying and dancing to American songs. It was absolutely a blast, especially since I love dancing, especially especially to music I know. We got home at midnight to get some sleep for the surprise trip of the month... To San Remo, Italy!

Like all other Mediterranean villas, San Remo offers a beach and shopping, palm trees and awesome food. But all in Italian of course. Others were raving and dreaming about Italy but to me, France is just as cool, with just as beautiful of a language and history and culture. Anyway, back to Italy. 

It felt a little weird to be in a foreign country whose language I didn't know. At least in France, I could communicate in French. On the other hand, I don't even know how to say yes and no, hello and good-bye in Italian until today. When we went shopping, I felt a mental barrier when I realized that I couldn't really communicate what I wanted to. In France, I could whip out whatever I wanted to say to store owners, no problem...here, a mere 1.5 hours away...I couldn't. It felt a little weird! Imagine traveling to Washington D.C. and having to speak a different language? Europe is just so diverse. 

At San Remo, I lounged at the beach, ate authentic gelato (pistachio and this black cherry flavor), and, for dinner, ate bread with sauce, pesto pasta and tiramisu. So Italian. And so delicious. Although I'm still a little sad I didn't get to taste the pizza or cappuccino here. But there's always a chance to go back for a longer period of time (rather than just a day.) and I'll definitely be prepared with a guide book and phrase book if I do. 

Ciao!

Cyrielle!

Italy

Lovely pesto pasta

And of course, the delicious tiramisu