So I’m starting this blog because I know that everyone is dying to hear about what I’m up to and this is definitely the easiest way to get out any news about what is going on with me to all of you poor schmucks still living in America…haha jk. But seriously this will be the easiest way for you to keep updated on my life so definitely keep coming back.
These first few days have been incredible. Obviously, as anyone who’s ever been overseas can attest, the whole flying for 8 hours across the ocean thing does suck, and it was even weirder for Stacey and I when we left from Detroit to Paris because most of the people on our flight were French and we hardly ran into anyone that also spoke English…we could barely understand the announcements they made during the flight! However…the one good thing about the French is that even though we couldn’t understand them, they gave us all the free champagne and wine we wanted on the way over which was great! You don’t get that kind of treatment on American flights...haha.
So we finally landed in Paris and made our way on another flight to Florence where we were both pleasantly surprised to find that our checked bags had made it ok! Thank God, we were definitely prepared for the worst. The drive from the airport was interesting…definitely makes me never want to drive in Italy, I thought we were totally gonna hit something/someone like 10 times. Check in at SAI was normal and I got my cellphone! If anyone wants this number you can just message me on facebook and I can give it to you. It’s pretty great cause I get free incoming calls and texts but I just can’t call you cause then it’s like 28 cents a minute.
After check-in was over, they paid for our taxi to take us to our various apartments. Mine is in a place called the Piazza San Spirito and it is incredible! I was a little worried because it is across the Arno river from the main part of Florence where my school and the Duomo is and stuff, but it’s really not that far away at all. The great thing about it being across the river is that it is not very touristy at all which I am definitely grateful for because some of the parts we were driving through on the way to the school from the airport were just filled with Americans, which is not something I want on my Italy experience lol.
Anyway, my apartment is right off of this little square that’s in front of the Piazza San Spirito Church. It’s really pretty with a stage set up so that people can play live music there and there’s trees surrounding the courtyard so it’s shaded and stuff during the day. We also live right next store to this amazing gellatari, I had some yesterday and it was so good! Definitely not what I expected gelato to be like at all though, I thought it would be more like sherbert but it’s more like really creamy and rich ice cream. There’s also a bunch of caffes and restaurant right near our apt and it’s really neat cause if you go out at night there’s always people just sitting on the steps of the church drinking wine and chilling out, it’s awesome.
So here comes the only sucky part since I’ve been in Italy…I had to take my bags up to the apartment by myself and we are on the 5TH FLOOR! That’s right…no elevator…just five flights of steep Italian steps to walk up…it was horrible, I was so dead by the time I finally reached the apartment. Which by the way is amazing! Once you get up here it’s so nice, when you first enter you see a little living room area that has a couch, chair, and to my surprise a TV, although I don’t really expect to be using it that much since none of us know what’s on Italian TV and we probably don’t even have cable or anything. Then when you go to the left directly from the front door, you see two of the bedrooms, one with three beds and one with two, that look out onto the Piazza. If you turn right from the front door, you see a bathroom (which surprisingly is pretty big on your left hand side and if you keep walking straight you will first see another bedroom with two beds on your right (for those of you who didn’t count just to inform you that is 7 beds for 6 people, so we definitely have an extra bed for anyone who wants to come visit!! J ). Then if you keep walking straight you come to the kitchen that has another door on the right that gets you to a small balcony that overlooks some lovely Italian rooftops and is also connected to the bedroom near the kitchen. If you then walk through the kitchen, you find a small back room that is completely bare but that we will probably use to dry our clothes once we need to. And then through that room there is another bathroom which we have taken to calling the “back bathroom.” And that’s our apartment, it’s so big and amazing! And I’m definitely going to have amazing calves by the time I come home, what with walking up those stairs multiple times a day!
After a quick call to Mom and Dad, I decided to join the four of my roommates that were already there and take a nap because I only got like two hours of sleep on the plane ride over. Once we were all done napping (at like 7:30) we decided to go to the supermarket to get some food and wine cause we heard it closed at 8. The supermarket was pretty small but it had all the essentials and was only a few blocks away. We are thinking about trying to find one that’s a bit bigger that still isn’t too far away though. After the supermarket, we just hung out, drank wine, and shared stories in the apartment for a while. My roommates are great btw, they are so much fun and really nice, also we all kindof have the same view of what we want to get out of our time in Italy which is really cool. Their names are Maria, Joanna, Kristy, Ali and Katie. At like 9:30 we were tired of waiting for Katie to arrive so we could go get dinner, but right as we were leaving our apartment, Katie finally arrived! So we just dumped our bags and all went to dinner together.
We went to this great pizza place that’s only like 2 blocks away called Gusta Pizza…it was definitely the best pizza I’ve ever had and it was only 5 euro for their original pizza! The owner Francesco was also super nice and he tried to teach us some Italian phrases but I don’t think it stuck that well haha. Most people here are pretty nice about the language barrier and do speak some English, I’m trying to work on my Italian but I haven’t had too much a problem yet getting across what I want to tell them. While we were at Gusta Pizza, we met this really nice American guy who showed us around some of the bars on the other side of the river. It was a lot of fun, but don’t worry family, we all stuck together and were in control the whole time…I have seen Taken and that will not happen to me haha. When we finally got back to the apartment it was like 4 in the morning and we all went right to sleep cause we had to get up for stupid orientation at 9 am. We were all really tired this morning, but also pleasantly surprised when we walked out of our buildings door to find that there’s an open air market selling fresh food and various clothes and stuff. We asked the guy and he said that they’re there every morning. The fruit and vegetables looked incredible! I can’t wait to shop there probably every day haha. Side note for Mom—the cherry tomatoes they had looked soooooo fresh and good! I’ll let you know how they are cause you know I’m going to get them a lot! J
Finally made it to orientation and it sucked. It was super boring and so far away…my sperrys have been ok so far with walking, but while I’m breaking them in I’m getting blisters on the back of my feet and they hurt so bad! I tried wearing bandaids with them but that didn’t work so if any one has any suggestions just let me know cause my sperrys are definitely by best walking shoes aside from the fact that they make the back of my feet hurt.
Orientation was like 4 hours long and after it was over we all took a nap and I woke up just in time to go to the welcome reception for SAI, it was over by the Duomo at this beautiful Palazza Bhorghese (I think that’s how it’s spelled). Our coordinators were telling us that it’s not like a museum you can go into and you can only see it if you rent out the space for an event like ours. It was so beautiful though, it makes me wonder if all big buildings in Italy look like that on the inside. After the welcome reception we all just walked back to the Santo Spirito and Maria and I decided we wanted to just chill and get some unpacking done so we went back to the apartment. After a while I finally decided to get on the internet which you will all see if you saw my facebook status last night, I also got a chance to have my first skype convo with Kendy which was great! I really miss her!! I wish that her and all of you are going to be able to come to Italy cause I would love to share this with you, it is so beautiful here!
Soooo that’s all that has happened so far. On the radar for the next couple of days…we have to go to another part of orientation today to pay the Italian government 75 euro to get our permit of stay for our time here. We are also planning on checking out a free pub crawl tonight that our new friend Chase (the guy we met at Gusta pizza) told us about, he’s a promoter for the event so hopefully it’s pretty legit. Again…don’t worry I’ll be careful! Don’t really have any plans for Saturday, but I was reading in my Florence, Tuscany and Umbria book (if you’re reading this Aunt Leslie it’s the book you gave me for Christmas and it’s been such a great help, thanks again!) that there’s a jousting festival in a city called Arezzo on the first Sunday in September…which is this Sunday! I think I definitely want to check it out especially since I don’t have any classes on Monday, the book said it was like an hour and half bus ride so I’m planning on looking up some bus tickets later. Hopefully they’re not too expensive so I don’t have to feel bad about going! Anyways, I’m gonna get ready for the day now and head down to the market to grab some fruit for breakfast…it’s so cool that I can say that! J more posts to come…
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