Is That It??!

Occasionally, things surprise me. Sometimes in a good way...and other times well...it's surprising.
We went to Pisa yesterday. Left right after class and ran over the the train station to catch the train that left in 10 minutes. Somehow we made it there on time..I have no idea how. But we got on and much to our surprise (disappointment) the train was not air conditioned...surprise numero uno. But we're still excited to go, because it's Pisa, and I'm pretty sure it's just one of those things you have to see while in Italy, like the Colosseum and David (neither of which I have seen yet).
The train ride was an hour and a half long, which seemed to take forever. But the three of us (Nora, Missy and I) had fun. We talked, joked around, and were entertained by two young Italian girls who were either quite high or very drunk. We couldn't tell.
Finally the train stops in Pisa, and we get off in a hurry (the train was hot, and some how it was cooler outside it seemed). As we walk across town to the Leaning Tower, we stopped to get Missy something to eat and check the map just to make sure we were headed in the general direction of where we wanted to end up. Nora gets excited, "we're almost there" as she jumps in the middle of the street, "I think we should be able to see it from here...or maybe not". So we walk a little further down the street, and it comes into view. Just as it does, all three of us stop and at the same time say "Is that IT?!" It was tiny. Well I mean still much taller than I. But they make it look HUGE in pictures and postcards. And it's really not that large. No wonder we couldn't see it from further down the street. Surprise numero due. We were all laughing pretty hard, because we couldn't believe that this tower got that much hype. As we get closer we realize how many people are surrounding it. It's insane! We're still laughing in disbelieve, this is what we came to see? But it was fun. We did all the touristy things, we took pictures, we held it up. Which is SO funny to watch other people do. Everyone looks ridiculous! It was a pretty good time until we got shooed off the grass by the police. Hmm...lets do something else then I guess. We contemplated climbing up the tower, but then really what would we see and the next entrance was over an hour and a half away. Not really THAT interested. So we just walked around. Looked at all the little shops, with all the tiny leaning replicas. Laughed at all the postcards with the tower falling over into a crumbly mess and oh the many boxer shorts for guy....Must I explain? No. I think you can get it.



So after a while we're done. There isn't much else in this poor little town other than the tower. We hop on the train back home. Which is air conditioned!! Yay! And will take about an hour. Another YAY!
We're back in Florence by 9:00 and exhausted. I have laundry, packing and homework to be done. I leave for Athens Friday morning (4am) Hehe. Missy and I just head back to the apartment to do everything we need to do, and relax a little. We found A Little Princess on our kitchen table while eating dinner, and were super excited to watch that. (A favorite of mine!) The movie made me think of home, my daddy and being a kid. It was great.