Delusions of Glamour: The Time I Went to Spain and Told Lies to My Boyfriend

Ch. 7: Dear AJ--Partying at the Olympics in Italy!

SPAIN!: The Olympics!

Hey handsome,

What are you wearing? Hehehe

So this letter is a little overdue but I´m definitely on “Study Abroad Time.” As in, I have an incredible weekend with a shitload of sweet experiences, but then just the random Monday following is so cool that I never get around to writing about the weekend. Whatever, you get the point.

But it´s about time I told y´all about my wild adventures at the Winter Olympics in Torino, Italy.My outrageously fun junior year roommate Neva and her childhood best friend Kyle are studying in Torino for the semester. What luck! Somewhere to stay during the Olympics! We three bought tickets to a hockey game back in November before we even left for Europe, and finally, the time had arrived to kick it Olympian style.

The trip started out well. I ate red meat for the first time in a month on the plane ride there. Took a little snooze. Thoughts of glee for my first trip to Italy, my favorite country I’d never even been to yet. Then I landed in Italy and everything changed to “Italian Time.”

I arrived Thursday night. My luggage arrived Sunday night. I left Monday. Now, being the ridiculous, ready for anything babe that I am, I wore my Sexy Red Pants and Suggestive Stiletto Boots on the flight there. Alas, this was my outfit for the whole weekend. Walking around the Italian sights? Sexy Red Pants. Trekking through the snow? Suggestive Stiletto Boots. Kyle offered to loan me his Vans, but I was a champ in my boots. Needless to say, the very sophisticated, all-black wearing Italians got a kick out of me.

Italy was just as I always imagined it would be. Incredible food, beautiful buildings, charming people. It was heaven to actually WANT the food in front of me after jamón, jamón, jamón in Spain (interesting factoid: I´ve been told the reason Spaniards eat so much ham stems from the Inquisition, because eating ham proved you weren´t Muslim, thus sparing you from the cruel and creative horrors of the Inquisition).

Torino isn’t on most people’s Italian itinerary (I hadn’t heard of it before the Olympics hullabaloo), but the city is definitely worth a look. In 1861 it became Italy’s first capital city, and home to the House of Savoy, Italy’s royal family. So city center is over-the-top beautiful and ornate. Torino lost most of its political significance after WWII, but has since become a major industrial center; the FIAT and Alfa Romeo factories are headquartered here.

I also read that Torino forms a ‘white magic triangle’ of mystical energies along with Lyon and Prague, as well as a ‘black magic triangle’ with London and San Francisco, if you’re into that. Which I am. You can also catch a glimpse of the Holy Shroud in the Torino cathedral.

The Olympics have definitely arrived in the city; I felt a thrill when I first saw a banner displaying the famous Olympic rings. The airport was packed, the buses were packed, apparently unusual for the bustling but off-the-beaten track city. The games lent an air of excitement to everything, seeing the banners with athlete’s faces on them, the festive lights and Olympic rings everywhere…it felt magical and special just as I imagined it would to be at the Winter Games, and it’s always a pleasant surprise when reality meets your expectations.

Neva and Kyle even live above a pizza place, how perfectly Italian is that? They live in the cutest little apartment, wood-paneled, cozy, which they’ve nicknamed The Shire because it´s tiny like for Hobbits. We cooked a big American breakfast everyday to save money. Well, that´s all we did during the day because at night we went crazy! Friday we started out eating apertivo at a really swank restaurant. Apertivo is like tapas in heaven, you buy one drink for six euros then can help yourself to an endless buffet of Italian delicacies. Buenisimo!