Rome, Italy

When we finally got from Volterra to a town called Cecina, which was a journey in itself, we got on the train for the 4 hour ride to Rome. Luckily, I had a word search book to keep me entertained and there were beautiful sights sporadically. Examples? We got to watch the sunset over the ocean, we got to see giant windmills in the country side... I tried taking pictures but since the train was moving and I already have a problem taking still pictures without the flash, they didn't turn out so hot :/

When we got to Rome, we had no place to stay and no idea where we were going. We got off the train, wandered into the nearest grocery store and found some lady who told us that, if we wanted to stay somewhere in "the center of things", we should head to Plaza de Spagna.

She told us to avoid taxis and that we could take Rome's version of the Tube. SOMEHOW, we found our way there and walked around until we found some hotels. We haggeled with the people at the desk but at 4 am, not many people had their wits about them.

We were lucky and found a great place for a low price :] We rested, and then hit the ground running.

Day 1 we decided to be complete tourist and head off to the Coloseum!

J and I are both history buffs so we spent a good couple of hours there, reading all of the signs and looking at the trinkets they have picked off the floor. It really was incredible and I would suggest it to anyone with the slightest interest in Roman history. We grabbed some pizza and went back to the hotel to rest a little before making our way to the Trevi Fountain!

Being the complete girly-girl-myth-observing person that I am, I made J throw a coin into the fountain with me and I caught it all on film! There were people with Polaroid cameras wandering around offering to take pictures of us but when we politely declined, they offered to take pictures with my camera. We got a good amount of pictures there (most of which I'm making a funny face in) but they wouldn't accept any tips. I still wonder what they were doing there but I won't complain.

The next day, sadly, it rained ALL DAY. Seriously. I'm talking howling winds, flooded streets. I had only brought my Toms with me which are hardly good rain shoes so J and I set out to find some more appropriate footwear. Needless to say, we didn't find any. I spent my day in soaked jeans and even more soaked shoes. But we're troopers! And we made it out to see an assortment of different things:

We kept walking and running into beautiful things. It got to the point where I didn't even know what we were looking at anymore so I forced J into a little touristy shop and read one of the travel guides in the corner, comparing the sights with the book so I could figure out what all this greatness was about :] I'm so ridiculously cheap, I know.

Now I still have Day 3 to cover and our horror story stay in Frankfurt SO I think I'm just gonna go ahead and put that in a new post so this one doesn't become obnoxiously long.

LDR

So as I mentioned at the very beginning of the blog, I'm in a long distance relationship for one more week with my wonderful boyfriend of 13 months, J. The plan was that he would come next Tuesday but the date has been pushed back to Wednesday and I could not be more impatient and excited!

This is our second time doing long distance. We met last May and because we lived four hours apart when we weren't at school, we decided we were just going to talk and be friends and see where we went from there. Not too long after, we become exclusive and we become "official" when we got back to school. This summer, we were separated at the beginning of May and finally, FINALLY, he's almost back! And we're almost to London!

For those of you going through a long distance relationship of any type, here are a few things I learned. My advice on advice? Take it all with a grain of salt.

1) Trust is hard. But it's important. He's never given me a reason not to trust him and yet there were some nights where I would worry, very randomly. I'd always call him and we'd talk things through. Trust is important though. If you're not going to have it, why even try in a relationship?

2) Communicate. Appreciate :)

3) Everyone loves getting mail!

4) Don't waste in-person time arguing about silly things.

5) Brownies are always a nice gesture.

6) Some days will go by fast and some days will go by unbearingly slow but, rest assured, they will all go by. time will pass and eventually, your separation will be over.

7) Stay entertained! Don't sit at home, filing your nails all day.

8) Celebrate the little milestones.

9) Live and let live

10) When things get rough: remember, it'll all be worth it in the end.

Again, I'm no professional. This is purely anecdotal. And I'd love to hear your stories about long distance relationships! How long were you separated and how  did you get through it?