Ciao Bella!

I am officially in love with Italy!! Who knew that they really did eat pizza and pasta for almost every meal? Suprisingly, I am still not sick of it at all. I finally acheived my dream of going to Venice! It was so cool. We started out with a walking tour in the morning and saw Saint Marcs square (sorry if punctuation is off, these foreign keyboards are difficult) and the Doges palace. St. Marcs square is the one that is photgraphed often and has all the pigeons in it. St. Marcs church supposedly has the relics of the gospel Mark inside it. After that we went to a reall venitican glass blowing factory. It was amazing to see how talented they are and how quickly they can create beautiful pieces. I had lost my earrings the night before and bought a really pretty pair of Venitician glass ones. Later on in the day, 5 of us girls took a gondola ride through the canals. Talk about cool! OUr gondola driver had the striped shirt and hat with the ribbon on it and everything. Venice is such an interesting city. The "streets" are just basically allyways and some are only 1 meter wide. All of the transportation including ambulances, trash collection, taxis, and UPS are all done by boat. I didnt see one car, motorbike, or bicycle the entire time.

Okay, now for the juicy story. Dad, Steve Kuptz, Uncle Bob, you might want to skip to the next paragraph :) haha, dont worry its not that bad. So I ran inot my friends Amanda, Caitlin, and Brittany sitting along a canal and having a glass of wine. They told me the only reason why they stopped was because of Paulo...and as soon as I saw Paulo, I knew exactly what they were talking about. Paulo was a tall, tan, dark haired, bright blue eyes waiter at the restaurant (dont worry, I have a picture). Lets just say that within the first 10 minutes of meeting him he has given me a tiny kiss on my lips...in the restaurant!! He actually gave us all a tiny kiss on the cheeks at one point too. He was really nice and was making eyes with me the entire time we sat there. On our way out, we stopped by the bathroom and he gave each of us a hug. When he hugged m, he told me I was beautiful and kissed me again. Now here is the kicker...so on the way out of the restroom, I was the last one out and thus, the last one to say a final goodbye to Paulo. I went to give him a final hug and he proceeded to put his hands on my waist, lean me up against the wall of the hallway between the kitchen and the bathroom and plant a big one on me! Like a makeout! IN the restaurant that he was working in!! When I walked out of the restaurant I shouted "I love italian men!" and all the other girls were jealous of my kiss. I think it might be one of the best stories of the trip so far.

Now we are in Rome. If ROme was a perfume, it would be a combination of sewage and BO. Even thoguh it smells bad and is kind of dirty, it has so many interesting things to see. Today we went to the Vatican. We had to wait 3 hours in line just to enter Vatican City. I saw the Sistine Chapel. All I can say is WOW! Did you know that is where the cardinals meet to elect the pope? The painting of "The final judgement" which is on one of the walls is absolutely amazing. We also saw St. Peters church and it was absolutely breath taking. They have a bronze altar in the center that is voer 60 ft tall. It is the lngest church in the world with a length of over 200 meters. After leaving the Vatican, we went to the Trevi fountain (which is one of my favorite spots now), the Pantheon (which was built in the 2nd century and is still kickin), and the SPanish steps.

Throughout Italy I have had more pizza and gelato than I ever imagined I would eat. However, we walk everywhere so it gets burned off really fast. To all you girls out there, if you ever need an ego boost because ou are having an "ugly" day, find some Italian men. They honk at you, whistle, shout, say hi, blow kisses, and flirt with you. Jane, it is like 10 times what we got in Mexico. Even the guy working at the gelato stand told me I was "bellisima". Once again...I love Italy! Tomorrow we are going to the collasium and the roman ruins. I love and miss you all!!! Ciao!