The sights, the smells, the friends you meet along the way, the experiences, the aura— everything about Italy makes you want to stay forever.
The trip started off exhausting. I woke up at 4:30 a.m. and traveled the thirty minute drive to Chattanooga, Tennessee. Next, I left the comfort of my mother and traveled another two hours to Atlanta, Georgia. From the Atlanta airport, I had the longest plane ride of my life, until my group of three friends and eight acquaintances landed in Milan, Italy. My group, from rural, southern Tennessee, was scheduled to travel with a large group from middle California. The tour guide was a native Italian named Fabiana, who over the next week would become one of the group's closest friends, and the bus driver, named Georgiano, hated each and every one of us.
Each Italian we met furthered our experiences. The coffee and croissant for only one euro, the friendly faces, the chattering of fast Italian, the smells floating throughout the air, the sounds of footsteps hitting the cobblestone, every little detail contributed to the amazing experience I knew I would never forget. We traveled by train almost everywhere we went and ate all the gelato we could buy; honestly, that’s where most of my money was spent. We did our best to navigate the foreign language and had a blast throughout the entire trip. We stayed in places without Internet, places that were most likely haunted, and made new friends every place we traveled.
The food was to die for; antipasta, carbonara, alfredo, basil, oregano to the hearts content. The entire group was constantly well fed. The Italians were all light-hearted and cheerful, constantly making us laugh and smile. There was never a dull moment when the Italians were in charge.
Sadly the trip ended, and the hillbillies from Tennessee and the urban hipsters from California parted ways with many tears. Another long plane ride, only this time we dreaded the arrival home. If I could do it all again, I wouldn’t change a thing. If ever I get the chance to travel again, I would smile and say, “Take me back to Italy.”
On Wednesday, August 25, an earthquake of 6.2 magnitude struck central Italy and has so far killed 241 people with hundreds more still trapped or missing. This is such a beautiful country with so many beautiful people, now decimated by natural disaster. Please pray for the people of Italy as they go through this hard time.
If you want, there are options to donate to charities helping Italy. Julia Glum of International Business Times published an article titled, "How To Help Italy Earthquake Victims: 8 Ways to Donate Blood, Money And Goods For Relief" (http://www.ibtimes.com/how-help-italy-earthquake-v...) or you can go to Christopher Dawson's article on CNN titled, "How to help the victims of the Italy earthquake" (http://www.cnn.com/2016/08/24/world/iyw-italy-eart...).
