An Actual, For Real Update

I apologize for the horrible “update” I gave you the other day upon my arrival in Orvieto. I hope that this will help bring you up to speed a bit.

The past two days have been filled with scrambling to construct a rough orrery of the various spheres of our lives here in the cliff-top town. If a sun must be named, it is our food around which (so far) our days mostly are measured and charted. We take our meals at Locanda del Lupo, a restaurant about a 4 minute cobblestone walk away from the monastery. The meals, served at 12.45 and 15.45, are delicious and filling. Every morning we all gravitate out of our rooms (all located along the long third story hall of the monastery) into the tiny cucina, where we make espresso, eat fresh apples, and scramble eggs for our light breakfast. I’ve discovered today that my tolerance for caffeine is not what it once was; tea and espresso within several hours has made me jumpy and augmented the acid in my stomach. Thanks for the Zantac, mom!

Each night a group of us has gone out after our evening meeting to walk around the town and share a bottle of wine. We are already beginning to get to know the town landmarks; where the clocktower and town center are, the Duomo right up the street (I can see the back of it right now as I sit in my room), the post office, bookstore, and gelateria.

The monastery di San Paolo is beautiful and simple and cold. We are all adjusting to our surroundings fairly well, in spite of the cold, flooding showers and reluctant faucets. This is a great place to learn about conservation in a very practical way, instead of just talking about it, as happens so often in America. We cut corners wherever possible; window shutters are opened and doors closed so that the sun can assist the all-too inadequate radiators, which are turned off at certain times in lieu of warm showers. “Warm” showers. While the individual arrangements are more spartan (exception: the bed is surprisingly warm and comfortable), I do not foresee any problems. All my clothes and books and shoes are in order, and the power adaptor is working fine. It is nice to have a room that is not necessarily intended for being the main living space, as it pushes us out into each others’ company. I will say, though, I definitely miss the soft, warm futon that Nathan and I shared in our room last semester.

My roommate is a nice guy named Chris (from Gordon), and while we’re fairly different we’re getting along pretty well. The whole group of students here is just fantastic, from the moment some of us met in Philly to everyone sitting together in a large circle in the Dulles terminal laughing and getting to know each other, we’ve hit it off in grand fashion. I anticipate some really great friendships being formed…it is also wonderful to be completely surrounded by people who also see creation as their entire purpose, whether it’s through writing, theatre, or art.

When we arrived in Orvieto, we hauled our luggage up a hill to San Paolo and were given a short tour by Matt Doll, our program director. The rest of that day was mostly taken up with learning where the restaurant was, cleaning up, organizing, the evening excursion to a small wine bar, and much needed sleep. Yesterday we all headed out at 9.15 for a tour of the town, led by Alessandro, a local who has been involved with the program from its inception. He led us around part of the cliff, up the clocktower, into and out of a pastry shop, and to chiesa di San Giovenale, a church directly across town from San Paolo. Here we celebrated mass between walls built just over a thousand years ago. I was surprised with how, for a high church liturgy, there was a degree of informality seen in the guitar-led choir and the involvement of the children that made the place seem very homey and welcoming. Afterwards we walked out into the newly consecrated sun and air to walk back to San Paolo.

Today was our first day of class, which will be studying the relation between Protestantism and Catholicism. It is taught by Tal Howard and his wife Agnes, and will, I feel, be intensive and rewarding. The two years of historical theology that I had in high school were fascinating, and so I am looking forward to be back in that discipline. It is great, too, that the entire group is taking this class, since we come from some pretty diverse theological backgrounds (especially the two Columbian students!).

It seems like we will pretty regularly have internet access for an hour every day from 17.00 to 18.00 (or 11-12 in the States). I know this isn’t a real convenient time for most of you, but if you want, IM or Skype me (blacklooksbest). I also (drumroll) receive texts for free! However, the cost to send them back is prohibitively expensive, so I won’t be replying. Still, I would love to hear from you and I will definitely read them, so send away! You can find out how to do that by reading the post a couple down about all my contact info.

I need to go to Italian class now…ciao ciao!