About time I updated my blog!

Hello everyone, sorry for the delay, I have been working a lot in my projects.

So I have been working in my mosaics. I finished one already and now I am almost done with the second one. The second one is already sold! The owner of a gelato place I frequent is buying it, and he told me to give him bussiness cards. So we'll see how that goes!

 

 This mosaic is made with marble, a technique that is rarely used, because of how expensive it is. I have had the blessing of working with such a fine material. The next one I'm making has glass and marble. The glass is made in Venice! I am having a lot of fun in this class.

Next is my stone sculpture class. It is going very well too. my design has changed with time, but it is getting slowly were I want it to. Here are some pictures.

As you guys may know I am a tour guide at the Cathedral Santa Maria del Fiore, and that has brought a lot of good moments with tourists. The internship is going very well, and I feel pretty confident with my knowledge about the cathedral. I am still doing more research about it, and it has been fun listening to people's stories. Here's a picture of the Cathedral at night.

Allison is coming tonight, and tomorrow we are going to do a day trip to Venice and see some of the cite's there, should be fun!
Today I was amazed once again at the fact that if you look at prices, groceries can be a lot cheaper. I was looking for some bread to make sandwiches for tomorrow, but the budget for bread was 80 cents. I looked and the lowest price was 95 cents. But that was on the side where all of the sliced bread is. When I looked at the fresh bread they make everyday at the grocery store, it was 71 cents, yay for bread. Money is tight right now so every cent I can save, is good. God has provided a lot for me to be able to come here, and I know he will keep providing the rest of the time.

So I would like to add some prayer requests:
-That God would provide for the rest of the time, and going back to the US.
-For my friends here, that they might keep growing in faith
-For my church, that it may keep growing, not just in numbers but also spiritually
-For my roommate, he wasn't feeling well in the past few days.
-For the people at the market, that I may be able to reach out to them too.

Well i'll try to keep the posts coming as the weeks come along, thank you for reading.
-Omar Flores

Allison in Roma with Mozzarella!

Hey Ya'll,
So last weekend Sept. 10-12 I went to Rome to visit my girlyfriend Allison. So my train left Florence at 5:50am and I got there at 9am, it was some nice time to sleep and rest. Once I got there we met at this ruins and I discovered "the water fountains." So it turns out there are water fountains in Rome everywhere you go. So buying drinking water is not necessary. Here's a picture!

After that we went to the Pantheon, and a couple of the more tourist-y sites. Then she had class so we went to rthe ISU Rome studio. It has an ISU feel to it, but it's different. After that we went to the Hotel were I was staying, that was like an hour bus ride from Allison's apartment. The Hotel was cozy, and classy but not exhuberant, so I felt right at home. After checking-in is was already getting late so we decided to call it a night and Allison returned to her place. On Saturday, we went to this park that is shaped like a heart, (Awwwww) and we rented this golf cart that has pedals. Least to say, I drove, and we went off roading for a bit (I don't think the tires were too good for off roading) and at one point we had to reverse, but the cart doesn't have reverse, so it took us like a minute to reverse that thing, and people were watching, it was great! After that we ate lunch prepared by the one and only Allison Goebel, and then we went on a row boat in this mini lake they had in the park. Then we walked around and stuff, and went back to Allison's apt. were she lives with 6 other ISU girls. We made pasta and then we went to this Hill to watch the sunset, but then realize that the sunset was blocked by all this buildings, but we had a good time. So in this hill there's all this flower vendors that literally stick a flower in your hand and make u pay for it. You almost have to punch them for them to leave, but oh well they were quite funny. On sunday we found a church for Allison to go to, so we went and visited, and they sang himns and stuff, and Allison loves himns so she felt very welcomed. After c hurch we went to Allison's apt and made Pizza from scratch, and we put way too much leavening, so we had this DEEP Dish pizza, hehe, but it was delicious, i took a piece home! After that it was already time for me to go back, so Allison went with me to the train station, and we said our goodbyes. So that was my trip to Rome, i'll post more pictures when I figure out how to! Ciao'

First 2 Weeks of Classes with Tomatoes

Hello Everyone! So here is my second post. I shall be talking about my first two weeks of class at Scoula Lorenzo De Medici in Firenze, Italia, and life in general. Here we go!

• So first of all I am taking 5 classes here at LDM, 3 of them meet once a week for 5 hours (these are studio classes), Begineers Italian, and I got an internship! My studio classes are Marble and Stone Sculpture, Fine Art Mosaics, and Web Design Fundamentals. 

 

• In marble and stone sculpture we take a block of marble and shape it into whatever form we want to give to it. This picture was taken the first day of class when we were practicing how to use the hammer and chissel. It is a very slow process since marble is very hard, and by the end of class I ended up covered with marble dust and pieces. So showering is recommended afterwards.

• Fine Art Mosaics is a fun class for me. It takes me back to 8th grade when I discovered the art of Mosaics with Mindy Perez and Chiri (High School Art teachers). When I did it back in high school we used tiles, but now in this class we are using marble and glass from Venice. It's a lot harder but I'm getting used to it.
•  Web Design Fundamentals is a class were we learn how to create our own website, and learn how to write HTML, Javascript, and CSS5. So hopefully by the end of the semester this blog will look awesome!
• Internship: So I applied for an internship through the school and after the interview I got accepted! I am going to be working at the Florence Cathedral (Duomo) as a tour guide. If you see any pictures of Florence and see a Huge Dome, that's were I work. The first three weeks are training, and then I start giving tours in English and Spanish. I am very excited for this!

• Life****
• I have been slowly adapting to life in Florence, it is very different from Ames, IA but it is very similar to Old San Juan, PR, so it takes me back to my childhood years living in San Juan. Florence is a very safe city, with a very low crime rate, you see cops everywhere and people are very helpful. One thing I would say is that people here will help you a lot more if they see that you are at least trying to learn Italian. In the last few days my italian has gotten better and I have seen that change.
• Do I miss home yet? Yes, I miss Puerto Rico, Ames, and Minnesota. I think what I miss the most is being able to know where I am, and feeling part of the culture. I also miss being able to see friends and family in person rather than in a computer screen.
• So How's Allison (My Beautiful Girlfriend)? She is great! We have been able to talk regularly (at least once a day), and last weekend I went to visit her in Roma. I will make another blog post about the visit, and post some pictures. It has been a blessing that we are in the same time zone and country. There's 3 trains I can take, one is 4 hours, the middle one is 3 hrs, and trhe fast train is 1 hr. I take the middle one because it's cheaper, and I am on a budget. This last week I sent her some flowers to her studio, and she seemed to be pretty happy. Here's a pic*
 

photo curtesy of Liping Vong http://lipingvong.tumblr.com/

• I am enjoying Florence, and I'm looking forward to the rest of the year thanks for reading!

My first Pizza blog!

 

Hello everyone, and welcome to my first blog ever...

So I will start up with a little overview about the past few days and how I got here. I hope this is as encouranging to you as it is for me writing about it. I go to school at Iowa State University for the Fine Arts program. Currently, I am studying abroad in Italy in a design school. Since the idea of studying in Italy came into my mind, there has been quite a few instances where I couldn't have done anything without Gods' help. I will share one of the most recent ones with you guys. About four week before departure, I was told that my student loan was denied. So I tried every option possible that I could think off, but nothing would come through. As the departure date got close, my impatience got higher and higher. After plenty of visits to the financial aid office and a lot of prayer, it looked like I was going to have to cancel the trip. By this point I was very furstrated with myself and I asked God, why would that happen, why? He promised before I came  that He would take care of everything, but I just wasn't seeing it. All of the sudden, we got a response for a scholarship that my dad had applied for me. It was a yes, I had won a full scholarship that would provide for the money for the trip that I needed, and also for the Spring semester.

When this happened I was just amazed at how God works. I didn't have to take any additional loans for the trip, and I have the Spring covered too! 

So back to the present... I had quite a few experiences already here in Italy. First of all, people think I'm Italian, so even Americans start talking to me in Italian. The only problem is that I am neither Italian nor I can speak Italian. I do can speak Spanish, so I understand most of the thing the say, but that's just about 56% of it (Don't ask me how I came up with that figure). Second is that the food is amazing! Even the cheap food! Except for the wine, the cops told us not to buy cheap wine, because it's bad for your health.  It was quite interesting. My girlfriend is in Italy too! you can follow her on http://web.me.com/allisongoebel/Site/home.html (make sure you follow her stuff, she's awesome)

The apartment I'm living in, is like a museum, sometimes I feel, I shouldn't be touching the wall because someone might jump out and as me to stop touching them. We do have common appliances and stuff, so cooking shall be awesome times!

Sorry for the random thoughts. 

Today it's my birthday! So to celebrate I went and got gelato, then some free food, and then I partied it up! So they were giving a bar tour, where you go to different bars and get Free drinks, so my roommate wanted to do that, and I went with him and some other friends from the school here. Since I don't drink I was the designated driver (just this time it was on foot). I do have to say that I tried the champagne, but after a sip, I reallized how much alcohol it had, so lesson learned - no champagne for me! Then we went to a club where there was dancing going on. I had fun taking pictures for my friends, and kinda keeping an eye on the group I was with so that we didn't separate too much. The walk back home was quite entertaining, since none of us knew where we were. But after asking a few people, we got home safely. So that was my b-day. 

Tomorrow I am going to get some fresh produce at the market, and then I shall start looking for a place to be with other believers. This is all for today, Ciao.