Introvert Abroad
Pushing Myself to Experience the World
11/5/2018 0 Comments The "Study" Part of "Study Abroad"As you may have noticed, I’m a fan of lists. Not only is it a good way to organize all of the thoughts that I constantly have going through my brain, but it’s a good way to write some blog posts! Last month I spent a lot of time travelling to different places in Europe. It was incredible, and I’m so happy that I got the opportunity to do and see so many amazing things. As a result, I’m currently low on money and energy. Travelling so much is exhausting, so I’ve recently been spending my time just relaxing in Florence. It’s so nice to just hang out and take things really slowly. I know this isn’t everyone’s favorite thing to think about, but it’s also given me the time I needed to catch up on some schoolwork that I was pretty behind on. Working on things definitely got me thinking about what it’s like to be going to school in Florence. After all, half of our study abroad experience is going to classes! So here are some things to appreciate and take advantage of while being a student in Florence. 1. Museums This one’s gotta be the most obvious one. I don’t know if you’ve forgotten, but we just so happen to be in the birthplace of the Renaissance, one of the most significant eras for art and architecture of world history. As a result, there are a ton of museums in Florence that hold significant works of art of all kinds. The Galleria dell'Accademia, Galleria degli Uffizi, Palazzo Vecchio, just to name a few. It’s such a fantastic experience to see these works of art in person instead of just in a textbook. It’s surreal to be so close to some pieces that I’ve learned about in classes before. And for those science-lovers, there are some gems in Florence like the Galileo Museum and the La Specola Museum of Natural History. Not only is it accessible to us, but there are sometimes student discounts! The best discount I can think of is getting into the Gucci Garden for free with a student id. And don’t forget about free museum day! There’s free admission for everyone for certain state-run museums on the first Sunday of every month! Fantastic! These are all such fantastic resources, not just because they’re interesting, but because they’re essential for a well-rounded education. And as an art student, I’m particularly stoked about being surrounded by all of these masterpieces. 2. Architecture So this kind of goes hand in hand with the first item on the list. Architecture is a form of art after all, and a lot of the museums in Florence are impressive works of architecture on their own. But what I’m specifically talking about here are cool things like churches and public spaces in Florence. If you want to find a place to do some sketching or painting, a church or other public square is actually a pretty great place to go. Many public buildings in Florence have fantastic frescoes, sculptures, or other ornamentation that are the perfect things to study and learn from. One of the best ways to grow as an artist is to examine how the masters did it, and being a student in Florence, we’re surrounded by beauty and masterpieces. Like oh yeah, don’t mind me, my homework was just to go out and sketch this beautiful medieval building that’s a 5-minute walk from my apartment, no big deal. And even if you aren’t an art student looking for the perfect landscape, the architecture is just great to take in. Why do you think the Biblioteca delle Oblate is such a popular place to study? It’s so cool to get to sit at a patio and do homework with the Duomo right there as the view. Not only that, but Florence is full of cool cafes with other students working in them. I don’t know about you, but when I’m at work in Le Murate or Libri Liberi, laptop out and coffee in hand, I feel at least 20% cooler than I normally do. It’s the perfect atmosphere and you almost don’t even mind having to do your homework. Almost. 3. Professors Ok, so I happen to love most of my professors at my home school, but I know that normally we wouldn’t think of our professors as something really cool to take advantage of. However comma, my professors in Florence are also actually pretty cool. At Florence University of the Arts, our classes are in English, but not all of our faculty/staff are native English speakers. In fact, two of my professors are Italian professionals in the field. My apparel design and hat/bag professor are both professional designers for the Italian fashion world. That’s crazy that I get to learn from them when they’ve had so much cool experience in the international field of fashion. I would highly suggest talking to your professors and maybe asking them about their experiences. And if you’re a student looking to specialize in an area from one of our specific schools, like fashion or culinary arts for example, you have some great contacts for the future! How cool would that be to go back to the US with a recommendation from an Italian professional? Even if you aren’t looking to go specifically in an art field, it’s still so cool to get to meet these people and hear about their lives working internationally. 4. School Resources Alright, so this one depends more on how your home school is, but to me, FUA has some amazing resources. I don’t go to a fine arts university, I got to a big state school with so many different majors. My theatre department is pretty small, and my fine arts department isn’t the biggest either. I didn’t have to pay for half of the materials for my foundation oil-painting class, which can get expensive in case you didn’t know. A lot of things are provided for us as FUA students, like facilities like Ganzo or photography equipment, or I don’t even know, so many things. Just as an example, my apparel design class is a fashion design course where we make our own collection based on Emilio Pucci designs. And get this, when we make our collection we get to use actual vintage Pucci printed fabrics. That’s crazy. I love Florence. So those are just a few of the things that I think about when I have those imposter-syndrome moments relating to being a student. You know, the moments where you sit down and go “Oh my god, what even is my life, I can’t believe that I’m actually here, this isn’t me, somebody else deserves to be here, how did I even get here”. Well, we’re here. We made it to Florence after all of the hurdles of visas and plane tickets and forms to fill out. Not everyone gets the chance to be a university student in Florence, Italy, so we might as well take advantage of it!
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