I’m in Termini, perhaps for the last time of my life. This is, of course, doubtful, but nonetheless a definite possibility. I can’t imagine not being back before too long.

I’m tired. It’s 17.34 here, and my train leaves at 21.15. I got tired of moping about the mostly empty campus this afternoon and decided to just head on down here. I’m meeting Anne at the traditional meeting spot in Termini: The McDonald’s that overlooks the tracks from which you can drink a McBeer and watch the board for your train to appear.

I ate at Spizeco, only I doubt its spelled properly. It is the Italian equivalent of McDonald’s. It’s fast food pizza. Not Pizza Rustica, but just.. greasy fast food pizza. It’s difficult to explain. It’s also hot here.

I’m exhausted. I finished my last paper yesterday afternoon, turned it in and slept a bit. I slept through convocation mass, and got up in time for convocation. Our special Rome campus convocation. Girls (and some guys) were quite teary-eyed. We listened to one last lecture from Dr. Crider, he gave us our farewell speech. After all the talking and thanking and present-giving was over, we headed up to the mensa to find–WHOA! Vino! UD bought wine for us one last time, but in the mensa. Every other time they’ve given us wine we’ve been out to eat. Dinner was actually surprisingly good, they even gave us potatoes that weren’t yellow. Tasted… good.

Dr. Crider asked us, rhetorically, what were we going to say when asked, “So, how’d your Rome semester go?” I don’t know how I could possibly answer that question in a meaningful way. This semester has changed me more than I think I’ve realized. I’ve been noticing things about myself lately that I’ve not noticed before. We were warned that everyone back in the states would be expecting the same person that left in January. Yeah, right.

I’ve learned more this semester than any other at UD, and made worse grades than I have in my life. Are the two perhaps related? I think so. I learned, I think, what my school sent me here to learn. Everything we’d been doing for our core classes all somehow comes together in Rome–so much that it’s hard to tell whether we’re in an Art, Philosophy, or Literature class.

In a somehow fitting experience for my last day in Italy, I tried to mail a package to myself in the states. I succeeded, but it took over two hours and $50. And I didn’t sleep last night. My endeavor wasn’t helped when the power went out in the post office while I was signing about 16 different forms and writing the address I was sending it to at least a dozen more times. After I took the package to the Cartoleria where I got it wrapped in brown paper, and taped. She taped the heck out of the thing. So much so that I couldn’t find a spot to write the address on. Apparently it was supposed to be tied in twine as well…

I left a lot of stuff in Rome. And I’ve still got too much stuff on my back. A tent, a sleeping bag, toiletries, a pair of pants on me, a pair in my bag, a shirt on me, three in the bag (one longsleve), and about 5 days worth of socks and underwear. Also a G.K. Chesterton book on Aquinas, and two guidebooks with places I won’t be going to ripped out. Then my waterproof jacket with a lining, my journal and a camera on top. And it’s all still too freaking heavy and huge. I don’t know what else I can comfortably take out. Carying around the tent and sleeping bag is what’s tough.

There was much party and revelry last night, our last night together in Rome. Bird’s bathtub was full of beer and.. ICE (?!? We still don’t know how he got it. Ice doesn’t exist in Italy as far as we knew..), there were bottles of wine, and professors cooking and mingling with us. The night was a blast. The professors smoked Romeo y Julieto cuban cigars, much to our amusement as they are constantly chiding the UD population about their smoking habit. (This is a topic of conversation for a different letter. Something about an intellectual campus induces smoking or vice versa. Over half of UD students smoke. It’s quite disgusting.)

There was also a pig. Italians do weird things with pigs. They cook them whole, then just slice into them and eat them. I find it a bit revolting because I’m just not a big pork fan, which makes one of my actions last night most peculiar.

Justin Chopin was cutting on the pig, and held out a chunk of meat in my direction. “Eat,” he commanded me. So I did. Let me point out that it was dark, and I’d had just enough beer to trust Chopin, always a mistake. As I was chewing I noticed that nothing was happening. It was like… Chewing rubber. Not really tough meat, nor fat. Rubber. It didn’t taste much either. “What am I eating?” I ask, a little confused. “Pig snout,” Chopin reported, simultaneously exploding with laughter. I spit it out rather quickly.

This is a couple days after the prankster herself, Meg Hamlet, was served justice for many a prank she’s pulled this semester. A couple of guys bought a pig’s head and put it in her bed. It gets better. She didn’t discover it for three days, despite the stench, and the fact that she slept with it. She’d left her dirty laundry on her bed, and was sleeping on it because she was too lazy to make her bed, and so just attributed the smell to her dirty laundry.

I have five minutes left on here. I think I’ll go read or something.

Anyway, no one really went to bed, and a big group left on a bus at 7:15am to catch their flight back. After they took off, I collapsed in the soccer field for a couple of hours. At 10am, I got up and went to Albano to mail my package and pick up my glasses with new lenses and a pair of sunglasses.

And it’s off to Copenhagen. I shall write more later, I’m sure. (Provided I can handle a Scandinavian keyboard.