Week 7: Making New Friends and Getting My Hands Dirty.
- asaustin
- Mar 4, 2019
- 3 min read
Updated: Mar 10, 2019

Saturday 02.03.2019 & Sunday 03.03.2019:
Family friends from home came to visit this weekend, they were traveling all around Italy and decided to take a weekend trip to Rome to visit me. The timing couldn't have been any more perfect. I was just starting to get home sick, finishing up my first month here, and having all of these negatives experiences happen to me (sprained ankle, phone getting stollen). I spent the weekend with the Ahren family traveling around Rome's city doing tourist activities. Since being here I haven't really gotten the chance to just be a tourist. I have running between internships and when I have down time I am either doing homework or resting from the busy week.

I finally got to visit the colosseum, Vatican and the ruins. Its crazy to think about what it would be like to live during the roman times. The buildings were so large and all of the architecture was insanely detailed.

Monday 04.03.2019:
I worked at Linaria today. My onsite supervisor was not there again today so I worked one on one with the other employees. I also got to work with one of their private clients. We had to go to a store to pick out the product she wanted her floor to be made out of, and then we delivered it to her house. It was pretty neat to be able to see the inside of a local's house. It was incredible. It seems that architecture is really valued here in Rome still today.


Friday 08.03.19
I finally got to get my hands dirty in some soil this week. At the end of the week at my internship Linaria I was asked to help weed and clean up the gardens around the house of the migrants who work at Linaria also. Even though this was a small task it was something I would have been nervous to do prior to this summer due to my gardening job. I am always nervous about pulling up the wrong plant, or too shy to ask what something is. After completing this job I felt proud. I jumped right into the garden and got dirty with no hesitation. I think that being in an environment like this where you art afraid to mess up really makes the difference of the experiences I am having here. Since my friend from home was still here visiting me I had asked if I could bring a guest, worrying again that they would say no and think it was unprofessional, but to my surprise they answered me with the phrase, "the more the merrier".

Working hands on in the garden I learned more about the biodiversity in Italy than I ever could in a class room. I got to observe using my senses at my own pace and to my surprise fell in love with a little blue beetle that was painted a shade of blue I have never seen a bug painted before. I also ran into a type of weed that I really did not enjoy. Although I never got its name, I will be sure to point it out in a crowd of other growing plants. It was like no other weed I've seen before. If you brushed up against it, your body was sting for a few seconds-one minute, leaving little red bumps behind.
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