January 21, 2020: exactly one month since I returned from Rome! Will time ever stop flying by like this?
Today was the first day of classes for the Spring 2020 semester. I’ve moved into my room at Holy Cross and am off to a new start!
Even though I am back the United States for the rest of my time in college, unpacking for this semester feels a bit like unpacking my suitcases in Rome. How odd it feels, to be unpacking without jetlag (or hearing Italian everywhere)! Despite the cold (it’s below freezing in Worcester, brrr!), this fresh moving-in experience does feel like move-in day last semester.
I think it’s because I’m starting a new adventure of sorts. I may not be new to Holy Cross (I first moved into the dorms in August 2017 – almost three years ago!), but I am starting a fresh journey with a brand-new perspective.
This is my first semester returning to campus with the knowledge I gained in Rome. I look forward to seeing how my experiences from my semester abroad will affect how I view my remaining semesters at Holy Cross.
One of the first people I saw after everyone was back on campus was my study abroad advisor. I was so happy to see him – it’s been seven months since I saw him in person! He was happy to see me as well, and he was even happier to see the souvenir I had bought for him: a Temple Rome luggage tag! I love starting my semesters with some cheer on campus. It makes me smile to see other people happy.
When I decorated my room yesterday, I made sure to include some of the many postcards I had collected in Italy. I also brought two sets of photographs I took in the fototessere (photo booths) at the Metro stations Rome. I found a set of pictures from September 20 and another from December 20: exactly 3 months between the two photo shoots! How I’ve changed: I have a better sense of fashion!
A little bit of Rome makes this room feel like home!
This is my 30th (and final) post on this blog. It was a true pleasure to be a study abroad blogger during my semester abroad in Rome. Thank you for joining me on this adventure.
I admit that there were some days where I had initially planned to update my blog, but ran out of energy at the end of the day. But even on the most exhausting days, I still find the motivation to share my experiences because of the kind feedback I get from you, whether in person or online.
I’m glad I could answer your questions on my Q&A – I had no idea how many questions I was going to get, and you really delivered!
I hope you enjoyed reading my blog as I have adding to it! I thought of myself as more of a photographer than a writer before I applied to be a study abroad blogger, and the months of maintaining this page has made me more confident in my work. In addition to the countless extrinsic joys I’ve derived from my adventures abroad, I have also gained a more intrinsic sense of self-esteem through my experiences.
Arrivederci, tutti! Adesso, torno all’università per continuare le mie avventure.
Goodbye, everyone! Now, I return to college to continue my adventures.
Sincerely,
Hui Li
College of the Holy Cross – Class of 2021
Temple University Rome – Fall 2019
Time really flew since I returned from my semester abroad, and I admit that I’m feeling a bit Rome-sick! Maybe it’s the chilly Boston weather and lack of Italian on the streets that make me miss the Eternal City.
Besides unpacking (and taking a lot of naps because of my jetlag), I spent my winter break re-acquainting myself with my home city. I went to see a special exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts, a place I’ve loved since I was a child. I’m glad I made it to the museum before the exhibition closes on the 20th – it was a wonderful experience!
Long time, no see, Museum of Fine Arts! One of my favorite places since my childhood.
The exhibition was called “Ancient Nubia Now” and features artifacts uncovered during joint excavations between the Museum of Fine Arts and Harvard University in the 1910s and ’20s. Ancient Nubia was a civilization in Africa that covered what is now south Egypt and most of Sudan.
According to the information in the exhibit, several scholars have overlooked or even completely dismissed the artifacts, focusing instead on ancient Egypt. Several panels in the exhibit address the historical biases against the civilization and state how the museum strives to move ancient Nubia into the spotlight it was denied decades before.
Went to see a special exhibit on ancient Nubia in the museum!
I was blown away by the first room of the exhibit – so many objects that, despite being created millenia ago, are so well-preserved that they look like they were made recently! I loved the turquoise-blue pigments on the stone.
The museum knows how to make a first impression! The bright turquoise pigments still shine in the stone!
The main site of the early-20th century excavations in Sudan was Kerma, an ancient Nubian city founded in 2400 B.C.E. It was the center of the civilization for centuries and holds a plethora of artifacts and cultural remnants still being studied today.
The ancient Nubians rivaled the ancient Egyptians and fought with them in the mid-16th century B.C.E., after which the Egyptians conquered Kerma. Since then, the ancient Nubians were incorporated into ancient Egypt and adopted cultural influences from their neighbors to the north. The center of Nubian civilization was no longer at Kerma and was instead situated in a city called Meroe after Egypt occupied Nubia until the first millenium B.C.E.
I wonder how they moved all these huge statues into the exhibit.Nubian statues standing among museum-goers in the 21st century.There was a lot of cultural overlap between the ancient Nubia and the ancient Egypt.
Further in the exhibit, I read about how this assimilation may have contributed to negative opinions of the ancient Nubians in the past. The scholars who dismissed the findings at Kerma were more focused on ancient Egypt, the civilization which they saw as the more powerful body in Africa. Some did not even consider the ancient Nubians as a separate people from the ancient Egyptians because of the cultural incorporation. Furthermore, the Nubians were seen as enemies of the ancient Egyptians and were portrayed negatively in their records.
“Ancient Nubia Now” was a wonderful chance to get a closer look at an overlooked civilization.
The Museum of Fine Arts seeks to rectify these past biases. There were videos of archaeologists speaking about present work on ancient Nubia and of people who were moved by this new perspective of an ancient civilization. There were photographs and excerpts telling the story of the excavations as well. I found these helpful in keeping these artifacts in the context of the interpretations of the findings.
One of the last things I saw in the exhibit made me smile. It was a display about the influence of Greco-Roman art on ancient Nubia. It was fascinating to see artifacts that looked similar to the things I saw while I was in Rome.
Hello again, ancient Greece and Rome!
My experience in “Ancient Nubia Now” made appreciate the education I got in Rome last semester even more. In particular, I am grateful for the opportunities I had to explore so much of the ancient world in my Race in the Ancient Mediterranean class.
The exhibit in Boston reminded me of the exhibits on other ancient peoples I saw in Rome. From my off-campus lessons, I learned to examine narratives from different perspectives. The information on the ancient Nubians reminded me of what I learned about the ancient Etruscans at the Museo Nazionale Etrusco di Villa Giulia in September.
The ancient Etruscans formed a civilization in the Italian peninsula before ancient Romans did. They were eventually incorporated into ancient Rome, which became the civilization that is more commonly studied today. The ancient Nubians created an early civilization that was incorporated into ancient Egypt, which was seen as the major power in the academic spotlight. Both the Etruscans and the Nubians were overshadowed by the ancient Romans and ancient Egyptians, respectively.
The exhibit also reminded me of the temporary “Carthago” exhibit at the Colosseum. I think the ancient Nubians are similar to the ancient Carthaginians in that they were perceived as the “enemy” in another power’s eyes. Kerma was destroyed after the ancient Egyptians conquered Nubia, and Carthage was destroyed after the Romans won the Third Punic War. Both “Ancient Nubia Now” and “Carthago” display the remnants of the two obscured cultures from a lesser-known perspective.
Had I not gone to Rome, and had I not taken Race in the Ancient Mediterranean, I would not have been able to enjoy learning about ancient Nubia to this degree. I’ve gained not only more knowledge from a different point of view, but also more advanced critical thinking skills. I’m proud of how much I got out of my museum visit back home. I know someone who will be amused by adventures here as well.
In my last post, I had just arrived home and started to reflect on my semester abroad. There is so much to unpack from my time in Rome, both figuratively and literally!
I’ve been asking my friends, followers, and viewers online for questions they’d like to ask me about my time abroad, and let me say that you all did not disappoint! Thank you for your questions! Here are my answers to them.
Question: How did you choose a study abroad program?
When I was on campus, studying abroad was a something I hear a lot about! As a first-year, I heard older students talking about how they either planned to go abroad or had just returned from their time away from campus. I attended the Study Abroad Fair and got to hear first-hand accounts from students who had studied in different places. I learned more about specific programs through formal information sessions and through one-on-one appointment with the Office of Study Abroad.
I worked with both my Study Abroad advisor and my academic advisors to find a program that was right for me. I took into consideration my goals for the future. As a double-major, I had to look through multiple program catalogs to find one that would best help immerse me in another culture while still keeping me on track with my academic plans. I created several courseloads that would work with my two majors and looked at programs in more detail from there.
I chose Temple Rome because Rome was the best fit for my plans and interests. As a Classics major, I had always wanted to see the things I had studied for so long come to life in front of me. I started learning Latin in middle school and delved deeper into the world of the ancient Romans in high school. I loved seeing ancient artifacts and learning about the people whose language I was studying in museums.
At Holy Cross, I expanded my views of the ancient world beyond Rome: there were so many other cultures and peoples to explore in the ancient Mediterranean! I knew from my ancient history classes that ancient Rome had expanded into the largest civilization in the region and incorporated the cultures and histories of the lands it covered into the empire. And I had a chance to study in the city that was once the center of such a large expanse of land. I wanted to go to Rome not only to learn about not only the ancient Romans, but also to look for the influences of other cultures in the city and beyond.
I learned a lot about the diversity of the ancient world in Race in the Ancient Meditterean, a Classics course that included a lot of field trips to museums. This picture of the Rabirii relief in the Palazzo Massimo, where we had our last off-campus lesson, captures the multicultural world that was ancient Rome. The two people on the left have Greek names while the woman on the right was thought to be a priestess for a foreign deity.
My other major, psychology, impacted my decision as well. I learned about the beginnings of developmental psychology in my introductory psychology classes, and a name I remember seeing often was Montessori. I looked up this name, and it turns out that Maria Montessori was an Italian physican who devised the Montessori method of education for the underprivledged children of Rome in the early 1900s! I was lucky enough to have seen where the method had started in the San Lorenzo district in the city, an area I had explored in not a psychology course, but in my political science course! I’m glad I got to walk through history for not only my Classics degree, but also for my studies in psychology as well.
I saw Maria Montessori’s Casa di Bambini (House of Children) with my own eyes in Rome! A major turning point in the history of psychology.
Question: What was the most unexpected experience you had during your time abroad?
There were so many unexpected things that happened while I was abroad I don’t know where to start! I had two travel-related mishaps, one when I missed my bus to Pompeii because of construction on the Roma Metro (a misadventure I made the most of here) and the other when my flight back to Rome was pushed a day back because of aviation strikes (transportation strikes are common in Italy) and I stayed an extra night at a hastily-booked room in Catania, Sicily.
An unexpected experience I had in Rome was when I used three languages in one day while walking through the Nuovo Mercato Esquilino at Piazza Vittorio (an adventure I wrote about here). I heard a lot of the merchants say “Ni hao!” (“Hello!”) to me in Chinese (a language I didn’t think I would hear much of in Italy). My professor’s friend, Omar, who works at a butcher stand in the market, asked me a few questions in Chinese! It took me a moment to switch from English to Chinese to respond to him, and even longer for me to switch back to English to talk to my classmates, and later from English to Italian for Italian class! I was not expecting a trilingual experience that day!
Question: What are some highlights from visiting Florence?
When I went to Florence for a weekend in October, I liked seeing how different the place was from a city like Rome! The streets were less crowded and more colorful, with distinct architecture and art from the Renaissance. My favorite place was Ponte Vecchio, where I got to see an amazing sunset! The pictures I took from that short trip are some of the best ones I took from my entire semester abroad. The photo of the sunset in Florence was also one of the prints I gave away for my fundraiser; it was very popular in the Temple Rome community!
This photo, which I call “Bridge to Dusk,” is of the sunset I caught near Ponte Vecchio in Florence. It was in high demand in December!
Another highlight from my trip to Florence was the food. I had heard of Tuscan cuisine in the United States, but I had never tried until October! I tried charcuterie for the first time in Florence and loved the local pizza and pasta as well. I even got to try something new in the Mercato Centrale on my last day there! One of my former professors who read my post about Florence said I was “adventurous” for trying fried rabbit there! It’s fun to try new things.
Question: Did you have a new favorite food you tried?
This is a hard question: I had so much good food abroad! While I loved trying regional dishes in the places I visited (cannoli and chinotto in Sicily, sarde in saor in Venice, and so on), I have to say my favorite food from the semester is a tried and true Roman classic: carbonara. I tried the dish of pasta, eggs, pancetta (pork belly), and pecorino cheese (the local sheep’s cheese in Rome) several times, both near Via Flaminia behind campus and farther away from the center of the city. My favorite carbonara was at the seaside restaurant I went to in Ostia. I giggle to myself every time I think about the ingredients, because I can imagine trying to make an omelette from bacon, cheese, and eggs at home!
Carbonara: a tried and true Roman classic! Hope I can find it in the States. Maybe the North End in Boston is worth a try.
Question: What was your favorite lunch place around campus?
Yet another hard question! So many good places to eat lunch around campus. Almost every day, I looked for places to eat along Via Flaminia and tried a few different ristoranti (larger places to sit down and eat) and trattorie (places to get a quick bite of pizza or sandwiches.) I’d say my go-to place behind campus was Alice Pizza, a pizza chain with a lot of choices! I got to try classics I’ve tried in the United States like the margherita (tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese) and tried new toppings like prosciutto (sliced ham) and roasted melanzane (eggplants). Orders are priced by weight and heated up in the oven while you pay.
A photo of Alice Pizza’s selections I found online. So many kinds of pizza to choose from!
Question: Any activity recommendations besides just sightseeing and eating?
A very important question! While there is so much to see and eat while abroad, it is also important to get involved with local activities at school as well.
When I was at Temple Rome, I got notifications about upcoming events and could access places I could sign up for them. We all signed up for Italian cultural labs, which could be anything from exploring in the historic markets of the city to learning Italian with dogs to listening to Italian music!
Some of my classmates volunteered at local places like high schools near campus or the refugee center further downtown. Others signed up to play calcetto (soccer) or basketball after classes. I was lucky enough to sign up for the last cooking class of the semester. Making pasta by hand was hard, but it was lot of fun and definitely worth it in the end!
Made pasta by hand at the last cooking class of the semester!
We also got to attend special lectures on campus about issues we wouldn’t have learned about otherwise. I went to a discussion about race in Italy and met Susanna, an Afro-Italian activist who shared how she found her identity in Rome. I got to plan my own activity on campus through my fundraiser for QuestaèRoma, the organization Susanna works with. (Read about how I planned this project here.) I’m grateful to Temple Rome for their support through my independent project. I’m glad we could make something wonderful happen for the holidays!
Those are all the questions I got for this Q&A! Do you have anything else to ask me? Leave a comment below, and we’ll see if I get enough questions for another short Q&A next month as well. Happy New Year!
That’s right: I’ve returned home after my semester abroad! It feels strange, not writing this from Rome. The last time I published a blog post in the United States was back in September, on the day before I caught my flight to Fiumicino Airport.
Arrivederci, Roma! Adesso, a Boston! (Goodbye, Rome! Now, to Boston!)
As I unpack the many things I brought with me from Rome, I’ve been thinking a lot about my experience abroad. So many sensations – sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and touches – from just three and a half months in another country! The whole semester was a lot to take in and a lot of fun to explore!
I had a hard time packing my suitcases on my flight back to Boston, I can’t believe I got so much stuff! I paid a little extra for my checked bag because it was over the weight limit.
I’m slowly but surely recovering from jetlag. There is a six-hour time difference between Rome and Boston. It took me three days of naps to readjust to Eastern Standard Time.
I miss Temple Rome already. I smile every time I think about the people I met there. A lot of good memories! How time flies.
Miss you already, Temple Rome!
In the three days of re-orienting myself to my hometown, I looked through all of my previous blog posts and all of my favorite photos. I decided that it would be a waste not to combine the two and create a digital record of my experiences. Why not make a video of my adventures this semester?
On Christmas day, I did just that! Check it out right here!
One of the last things I saw in Rome before I left for the airport. How festive!
As I continue to reflect on my time abroad, I think it’ll be nice to hear from you, my readers, about what you would like me to write about in my next post. (I’m thinking about publishing a little Q&A based on what you would like to ask me.)
Leave a comment, and I’ll either respond to it on this post or include it in the future as I continue to look back on my experiences. It may take a little bit for comments to appear on my post, but be assured that I do take every bit of feedback I get! Can’t wait to hear what you would like me talk about as a study abroad blogger.
Happy holidays, everyone!
I’ll leave you with a picture of the Christmas tree in front of Piazza Venezia in Rome.
Finals: the official end of the semester, right before the holiday break. This isn’t my first finals week, but it is my first and only one at Temple Rome! It’s a special one, too!
At the beginning of the month, I submitted two of my favorite photos to be displayed outside the faculty offices on campus. I’ve gotten a lot of compliments on my work and even heard members of the community say that they were interested in buying prints of my pictures!
This gave me an idea: in the spirit of the holidays, why not give out prints to the community and raise money for a good cause? Why not give the gift of giving at Temple Rome this holiday season?
I approached Temple Rome staff with my idea, and I am grateful for the administration for supporting me. I managed to get approval from Temple Rome and from QuestaèRoma, the organization that planned a special discussion on race in Italy at Temple Rome in October, to move forward with this project. I also had support in obtaining prints of my art. (Read about my preparations here.)
I am happy to write that after two successful days of collecting donations and giving out prints during the week of December 9, I got to continue my project during finals week as well.
In addition to collecting cash for my photographs, I accepted donations through Venmo as well. I also gave away free candy and holiday cheer at my special table in the Temple Rome lobby. I saw a lot of smiles as my classmates found their favorite kind of candy and saw me cheering for them before finals.
I am excited to announce that by the end of my project today, I had collected a total of 320 euros in donations for QuestaèRoma! With this gift of funds, the organization will be able to expand their reach to address racism and discrimination in Rome! And those who donated and took home my prints have unique presents for the holidays: a picture signed by the photographer herself!
I’d like to thank everyone at Temple Rome for supporting me through my project. This is the first time I had organized anything like this, and I couldn’t have done it without the kindness of the community. I’m so happy that we did something great together! Happy holidays, everyone!
Thanks for your support, Temple Rome! Glad you liked my photos and were happy to help s
