Location 
This past weekend, Umbra students from HSRC 330: Roman Civilization and Daily Life trekked through the ancient, and once buried, cities of Pompei, Herculaneum and the Oplontis Villa. Professor Giampiero Bevagna took his students through family homes, stores, arenas, public bath houses, and more. As a special treat, students spent an afternoon along the breathtaking Italian coast in Almafi, laying on the beach while trying their famous lemon sorbet. The fun, informative class field trip wrapped up in Naples at the National Archaeological Museum to see the excavated remains of Pompei. The museum has has the world’s largest collection which included pottery, sculptures, frescoes, and many other artifacts. No trip to Naples would have be complete though without a classic Neapolitan pizza and pastries which received rave reviews by the students before heading home to Perugia.
Month: March 2012
Just in time for gorgeous spring weather, the kind people at the newly-renovated and -expanded San Francesco d’Assisi International Airport (also known as the Perugia airport) have decided to grace us with an enormous number of new destinations. Most of these will run until either the end of August or the end of October, depending on popularity:
- Barcelona, Spain
- London, England
- Brussels, Belgium
- Milan, Italy
- Trapani, Italy (Sicily)
- Calgary, Italy (Sardegna)
- Bergamo, Italy
- Olbia, Italy (Sardegna)
- Full List and Schedule: Translated into English — Original Italian
The beauty of the Perugia airport is that it’s fifteen minutes away by shuttle (navetta), which has the following fixed schedule:
From Perugia:
Departure Piazza Italia: 6.15-12.50-16.50
Departure Train Station: 6.30-13.00-17.05
Arrival Airporto: 6.45-13.30-17.25
Departures from Airport:
Departure: 14.40-17.50-21.50
Arrival Train Station.: 15.10-18.20-22.20
Arrival Perugia Piazza Italia: 15.15-18.30-22.30
It also has departures from Piazza Italia and from the airport that are timed to coincide with the flights. I’ve personally never waited more than 15 minutes for a shuttle after landing, but to check the departure times the best thing to do is to call their hotline (numero verde): 800 099 661. The best way to ask is “quando parte la navetta per l’aeroporto da Piazza Italia?” (When does the airport shuttle leave from Piazza Italia?)
This week all the Italian classes are visiting the famous Perugina chocolate factory right here in Perugia. During the tour, students learn about the process of chocolate making, the history of Perugina and the origins of the chocolate, the cocoa bean..in Italian! The enticing aroma of chocolate greet them as they enter the tasting room where everyone samples the freshest Baci chocolates they will even have, straight from the factory floor. At the end of the tour, students to do a little souvenir shopping for lucky family and friends. Umbra students even took a photo in front of the replica of the world’s largest chocolate candy ever made according to the Guiness Book of World Records (13,000+ pounds!).
Interesting fact: Perugina produces over 1,400 per minute for a whopping total of over 1,000,000 per day.
Two members of the Medical Ethics Committee of the Region of Umbria were at the Umbra Institute yesterday to discuss the ethical issues surrounding the definition of life and to present current Italian legislation on living wills. Doctors Linda Richieri and Antonio Perelli were invited by Professor Michael Chiariello, professor of philosophy for St. Bonaventure University, Franciscan Heritage Semester Study Abroad Program, and senior Umbra faculty member, organized the encounter as part of his course “Medicine, Ethics and Law: An International Perspective.”
The course familiarizes students with the outstanding ethical and legal problems facing medicine today, as well as giving them a broad, international perspective on questions of medical ethics. Students grapple with end-of-life issues, using real-life examples like the Terry Schiavo case, as well as similar Italian cases like the “caso Englaro.” Dr.Chiariello’s guests gave an overview of the Italian viewpoint on the current debate about whether brain death should still be the legal definition of death. The two doctors also had an animated discussion with students about living wills and whom should vested with the decision of when life (or quality of life) ends.
Participants in the discussion included Ms.Judy Chiariello, assistant director of the Program, as well as dottor Francesco Gardenghi, Umbra’s Assistant Director for Italian Institutional and Community Relations, who coordinated the visit. Professor Chiariello commented later that “the course is intended for students interested in law or medicine. My hope is that it will help them become professionals with a greater awareness of ethical issues and their philosophical foundations, and a more global intercultural appreciation of their practical reality.”
This post is guest-written by Roberto, an Italian engineering and architecture student who studied at Umbra in the spring of 2011 and then spent the following fall in New York.
I spent four months in NYC as a guest of Baruch College (CUNY University) to write my masters thesis. It was a wonderful experience, not only regarding my studies or life, but also and especially because I could visit some of my best American friends: Gabriel, Laura, Lindsay and Chelsea. I knew them the last year at Umbra Institute, in fact, I attended the class of Italian Cinema with Prof. F. Burzacca. I think it was the best experience of my life: I spent one day with Chelsea in Washington D.C., Thanksgiving with Gabriel and his beautiful family, Christmas Holidays and more days with Laura, her sweet family, and Lindsay. (more…)
An Umbra alum on her return after her experience abroad in Italy creates a blog for her Global Interpersonal Communication class, to talk about her experience studying in Perugia, Italy and to help current and prospective students that make the decision to study here.
Here is her introduction to the blog:
” My name is Marie Galetto and I was a student at the Umbra Institute in the fall of 2011. Upon my return home, I took a course entitled Global Interpersonal Communication in which we discussed as a class the ways we succeeded and failed to be interculturally competent during our abroad experiences. This blog was an assignment for that class and combines much of the research and topics discussed over the course of the quarter.
Although it started as an assignment for the class, this blog has evolved into something more personal and meaningful for me. In this blog I share some of my experiences, struggles and growth that happened during my months abroad. I hope that this blog can help those who are considering Perugia as their study abroad destination. I 
hope that it can be interesting for those who are currently living in Perugia to read about my experiences and see similarities and differences from theirown. I hope that this blog can also be enlightening for those who have already returned home because, for me, that was the part of my experience for which I was least prepared. I am still discovering new things about how my experience abroad has shaped me and I hope that this blog stimulates those who read it to do some reflecting of their own. Happy reading and happy traveling! ”
Check her blog at: http://lifeinperugia.wordpress.com
Students from BSEU 390: Business in Europe and BSIM 390: International Marketing have joined forces with the Umbria regional government’s Office of Internationalization for an exciting service learning project. The project is based on helping the regional government preserve and promote the region’s traditional, high-quality handcrafted artisan products (ceramics, textiles and furniture) in Italy and abroad.
Both classes met with the Office of Internationalization’s director and manager and last Friday, students visited several artisan companies in Città di Castello, a picturesque town near Perugia. Having interviewed company managers, students now have a better understanding of the products’ rich history and their business operations’ strengths and weaknesses.
Now, the real service begins. In class, students will brainstorm and strategize how to promote these incredible artisan goods in the United States. As innovative young Americans, students will apply theories from class and their own creativity to preserve truly old Italian traditions. This real-life case study has practical benefits for everyone involved and is a great example of collaboration between different generations, languages, cultures and countries.
If you’ve every tried to find Mexican food in Italy — and especially in Perugia — you’ll know that the offerings are sorely lacking. The students from The Business of Food in Italy are aiming to change that by running Trattoria Tortilla, a small Mexican restaurant, as their capstone project!
For just €10 (or €9 if you reserve as an eight-person table), you get to dig into a four-course meal — served, of course, all’italiana:
Antipasto: Chips and homemade salsa
Primo: Chili-roasted Sweet Potatoes
Secondo: Beef or Veggie Burritos
Dessert: Sopapillas (fried pastry served with honey)
They will be selling tickets at Umbra in the library this Wednesday, Thursday, as well as next Monday and Tuesday from 10 am to 2 pm.
TICKETS WILL NOT BE SOLD AT THE DOOR, SO BUY YOUR TICKETS NOW!
This is a student run project for the BUFS 380 – The Business of Food: Italy and Beyond class which is a part of the Food Studies Program
Don’t be fooled. These aren’t paintings…they’re stained glass masterpieces.
House museum interns from the INIT 350: Academic Internship and Seminar course explored a small treasure here in Perugia called the Studio Moretti Caselli. Established in 1859, the Studio Moretti Caselli is an important workshop and museum devoted to stained glass production. Student interns interviewed the museum curators and artists to learn about the motivations behind the museum and to understand their target audience. The interns were thoroughly impressed by their works of art as well as the historical and social impact of this artistic craft. For their final project, the interns will provide suggestions of activities and initiatives to help local museums in Perugia promote their incredible collections to an international audience.
Students studying at the Umbra Institute Food Studies Program were highlighted in a recent SBU news article. The Food Studies program, a new initiative directed by Professor Zachary Nowak, was written up in an article on the Saint Bonaventure website.
It dealt specifically with the capstone trip in which all Food Studies participants take part, an overnight that brings students north to visit a salumificio (which makes Parma’s famous prosciutto), a Parmesan cheese cooperative, and a well-known artigianal acetaio (which makes balsamic vinegar).
“For Teixeira, Wozniak and their fellow students at the Umbra Institute in Perugia, a central Italian city known for its chocolate and its 35,000 university students, the trip to the cheese cooperative was a once-in-a-lifetime learning experience. ‘I was really surprised at the large amounts of food that could still be produced with a few workers and no huge factory,’ said Wozniak. ‘The whole trip was awesome.'”
The next step is a course on food ethics, which would take place in January and would be team-taught by Dr. Chiariello and Professor Nowak. Dr. Chiariello commented that such a class would “cover such topics as the responsibilities of the food industry; the moral dimensions of diet choices: a meat-based vs. plant-based diet; the environmental aspects of food production; factory farming; genetically modified food production; and, of course, our responsibility to the hungry of the world.”
Interested in more information on the Food Studies Program or the Umbra Institute’s Academic Programs? See some blog posts about it here.