Uni Life

So, I'm back to being a student, which is a change but something very familiar. It didn't take me long to adjust, and the thing that I love about this uni is that there are people from all around the world that have come here to learn Italian, so by getting to know these people you are also treated to know other countries cultures not only Italian, so it's another aspect I'm enjoying. But another aspect of the student life is enjoying the time outside of class by exploring the town of Siena and other nearby places in our free time and sharing the experience with other people, but the difference for students as opposed to tourists is trying to fit that in around work, but even in a small town, there is no shortage of things to see, and it's going to take me a while to get through all the things I want to do, but I’m getting through as much as I can

Palio

Well, this post is a bit late, but better than never. As mentioned before, Il Palio was on the 16th August, and there was such a lead up to this event, I couldn't wait to see what the actual event was like, but this year was a particular weird year. The one thing that I know which made world news was that there was a French man that died here during the festival of Il Palio. For those that didn't hear, leading up to 16th, each contrada has a dinner on the 2 nights before which is open to anyone from the contrada (unofficially not to foreigners, but I did go to one for dinner on the 14th), but on the 15th August at contrada Civetta during the dinner (which had about 500 people in Piazza Tolomei) towards the end of the dinner a piece of concrete broke of a balcony on a building above and landed on a 77 year old man from France and he passed away, so the town was in shock from this event, the following day I heard accounts from people at that dinner and it was freak accident that could never have been imagined. Also on the 16th one of the flag bearers from Civetta was injured when he threw the flag in the air and when it landed it hit him in the head, so Civetta wasn't having the best of luck for this Palio, and added to that, they came second in the horse race which is the worse position to be because you are so close but get nothing for second, it's actually better to be last than 2nd. Anyway, my professor told me when there are 4 contrada's in the Palio that have green in their flag it's not meant to be a good Palio, and this year there was that case.

But in the actual race, the contrada that won was Tartuca, and it was an experience I'll never forget, and I recommend people if they want to see it, try and get here and see the lead up to the event for at least the previous 4 days, you won't regret it.

Here are some photos



Flag bearers in front of the duomo



Piazza Del Campo 4 hours before the race, so get there early for a good spot



At the start of the race, everyone is looking at the start line, so all you see is nothing but the back of heads



But if you turn around, all you see is faces



The winning horse

Religion

Only when you come to Siena and stay here for a while do you discover a new religion, which is known as Il Paglio. Surprisingly, all it is is just a horse race, but it's one of the most famous horse races in the world, but to the people that live here, it's more than that, it's a way of life. If you do a quick search on the internet, you can easily find the history of this event so I'm not going to repeat it, but what isn't written anywhere is the emotion associated with it, people from rivaling contrada's (each contrada covers a particular area of the town and each contrada has one horse which represents it) can discuss the event for hours if they have nowhere else to go, the festival's that each contrada has covers nearly the entire calender year, so there is always something happening, and I was fortunate enough to have a friend of a friend who is a part of one of the contrada's that had their annual festival the first week I was here in Siena, so I was fortunate enough to be invited as a guest to these events, because they aren't open to the public, for example, on the final night of the festival they do a massive outdoor feast in the main piazza of the contrada are there is between 300 to 400 people, and only people from the contrada can buy tickets, so it's not a case of what you know but who you know. After experiencing the hype of this event, I can't wait to see the actual event, which starts on the 13th August with the actual race on the 16th

Siena

Well, reality is finally kicking in, i've finally unpacked my bags, put away my luggage as I will no longer need them for a while, and I've started my uni course, so it's a bit hard to adjust to being a student again, but it's something that is very familiar. I'm surprised at the mixture of people, but I'm still yet to find someone from Australia, but still it's very interesting to meet people from everywhere without having to travel to those countries. I've very quickly fallen in love with this city, I didn't know what to expect exactly before I came here (even if I did visit this place briefly last year), but there is a big difference to living somewhere and only visiting. I'll try and upload photos, but I have barely used my camera since arriving as I feel like a local and don't feel the need to photograph the place but instead just live the experience, but i'll put some up to share.



Piazza Del Campo at night




My favourite piazza at night - Piazza Salimbeni

Calabria

3 flights, 3 taxis, 3 buses and 2 trains in less than 24 hours, that's what it took to get from my hotel in Ibiza to my apartment in southern Italy. Even though the flights were all paid for, I don't even want to think about how much all the other transport's cost (i.e. expensive), plus there was a public transport strike in Italy that day (what else is new), but the following morning when I opened the windows in the apartment and are greeted with stunning views of this untamed coastline and beaches that very few know about, you quickly forget about what you had to put yourself through to get there. I may have taken next to nothing photos this year, but that's because I have such a backlog of photos from previous years, and nothing in this area changes very quickly.