Il giorno ultimo!!!!

Buon Giorno, Tutti!

Wow - I can't believe it's our last day in Siena! How time has REALLY flown by!!! Yesterday was a "free" day for the kids - some did a little shopping at the market, some enjoyed hanging around town, some caught up on e-mails.

Today, the kids will be taking a test in class. I absolutely LOVE how they handle examinations and grading here (it's how I think we should do it) - the teacher scores the test, and considers the student's improvement as an individual (not on a score of 1 - 100), and decides if the individual has been putting in the effort to learn something.

Can I just stop and say how many times the kids' teachers have told me how impressed they are with our group's performance this year?

This afternoon, we all return to our homestays to get everything packed up (mettere - it's such a great verb - with one verb, you can make the bed, pack your suitcase, clean your room, and organize papers) before we meet at 4:45 for the festa di pizza, where we'll make pizzas and dessert from scratch, then enjoy it together. It's so much fun, and we'll be getting lots of videos and pictures of the kids making everything. Oh, and they can enter the kitchen, only after they are able to conjugate the verbs "to have" and "to be". What a great last-night-in-Siena experience!

Tomorrow morning, we meet at the train station at 8 AM, and take a private bus (thank you, SPI) directly to our hotel in Rome, which is in an AWESOME location (thank you, again, and even more, SPI). We will tour all the ancient stuff of Rome tomorrow - the Imperial Fora, the Colosseum, the Forum, the Mamertine Prison, the monument to Vittorio Emanuele, the Theatre of Marcellus, the Forum Boarium, the Bocca della Verita) - it's a sweat fest, but very interesting. When I used to get homesick when living in Rome over the summers, I'd always find comfort by sitting in the Forum, reconnecting myself with my ancient Roman family. Friday night, we'll eat at a great restaurant - Pancrazio - which is located right over the foundations of the Theatre of Pompey, where Julius Caesar was really killed (not in the Forum, as according to Shakespeare).

Then, on Saturday, we get to take a nice morning stroll through the center of town - the Mausoleum of Augustus, Piazza del Popolo, the Piazza di Spagna (Spanish Steps), the Cappucin Crypt, Fontana di Trevi, the Pantheon, and then stop for lunch at the Piazza Navona. Everyone gets Saturday afternoon to do their own thing - I'll encourage most people to go to the Vatican museums with Dana, but I've got an idea for those few others who have already been to the Vatican. In the late afternoon, we'll meet up at the Vatican to suffer the security lines and enter into the beautiful Basilica, then return to the hotel for showers and a last night's dinner at a great pizzeria, Montecarlo.

Oh, and Tartuffo at Tre Scalini will happen sometime in there, too.

Then, the flight home on Sunday!!!

I want to thank all of you for blessing me with such a great group of kids this year - really, this has been the best experience for me, in all seven years I've done this. I can't wait to show them around Rome - my second home.

Grazie tanti,
Laura