Adventures of the past two days

Well yesterday was Cinque Terre. The actual place was beautiful but the format of the trip was NOT what I was expecting. I thought it would be mostly with Centro Fiorenza students, meaning people from all over who were in Italy to learn Italian and about the culture. Yeah, not so much. It turned out to be a group of about 50. One other girl was from Centro Fiorenza, she is Swiss and is a native French speaker who knows about as much Italian as me, some German, and little English. That's all cool but I just have to say it because... the other 96% of the group was all..... AMERICANS! Americans from various universities who didn't speak Italian, at all. I know it sounds a little ridiculous to have such a negative opinion of my peers from my country, but I must explain.

I am here in Italy to speak Italian, to live as much like an Italian as possible, to blend in. But yesterday I was with a large group of the stereotypical Americans... And the three guides all spoke English to them basically the whole day. Cindy was the only person with whom I could really speak Italian... so we stayed together the whole day. And we had to do the whole, group waiting thing, and on the train ride home they were just so... LOUD. And it was English, the very language I am trying to avoid speaking and hearing. I mean when I write here, and when I keep in touch with you all, of course. But out in daily life Italian is what I want to be speaking and hearing. And above all, I just wish I had known what to expect. Otherwise I might have done Cinque Terre on my own or with a small group. All that said, the place was beautiful and I am glad to have been there already, only a week into my time here. And the whole day was a reaffirmation of the more independent (and more truly Italian) way in which I am doing study abroad.

Today (Monday) I got up at 9, did my homework, haha, and then got ready to go. I met Lucia at the Scienze Politiche facolta at noon. Getting there was an adventure... or at the very least, exciting. Cristina and Federico told me I could take the bus from Piazza San Marco. I went online, and found out that the walk would take 20 minutes or so and that there was one bus at 11:25 (arriving at my stop at 11:45) and one at 11:40 (arriving at noon, our meeting time). So I left the house slightly after 11, and did the walk. It all went as planned except I walked around a certain piazza on the way instead of through - that might have saved time. Anyway, I barely missed the 11:25 bus... I thought about flagging it down but figured I could just wait til the next one. So in the meantime I went to an ATM to get some cash. Somewhere in that time period, my brain decided the next train was at 11:45. So a bit before 11:40 I decided that I had better go back. I turned the corner to see the bus pulling away... and remembered it left at 11:40, not 11:45. This time, I flagged it down while it waited at a nearby light. Thank goodness fortune (and the bus driver) were merciful. Finding the facolta went fine after that. Lucia has a friend who works at the library, and she showed me around a little. There are TONS of computers, and the library along with the whole complex, seems really new. We checked for course listings online to find that... alas... the list for this semester which starts a week from today, yes, Sept 15.... is not yet up. Lucia said last year they had their act together at this time and she hoped it would be so again, not so much. At any rate, she took my documents/copies for registering me, and is going to do that this week I guess. After that I'll get all the official documents including my library card, which will allow me to get into the library on my own.

Then we ate at the "bar" (bars are more for food and coffee than alcohol here) and she showed me where the actual cafeteria was... that might require a bit more registration and such but we'll figure it out later. It felt good to see the place where I will be taking all my classes and move a bit... even if it was just a tiny bit... toward being registered and all.

In class at orientation school this afternoon, we had two new students, they both seem a little older than the average student there, maybe 30s or so in both cases. The man, Philip, is from Ireland and is only here for a week, taking the course to refresh his Italian. The woman (I didn't completely catch her name) is from Austria and is here for 4 weeks. Both of them are married. Trinita (my teacher) came into class and introduced herself, then handed out the newspapers she gets for us every day. She told us to turn to a certain page, where it said that today was the one day in the year that the terrace on top of Il Duomo was open to the public, 10-4. It was about 2-2:30 pm at this point. She was like should we try to go? And we were like sure! And she said, okay, let's go! Have I mentioned that Trinita is awesome?

So we went, it was free, and after a wait in a line we went up all the stairs. The stairway was all stone and narrow and cool. It didn't feel dangerous or anything though. The view from the top was amazing... and it was such a beautiful day. I could see all of Florence as we walked around from one side to the other. It was incredible, and I feel so lucky I got to go. The only sad thing was that I didn't have my camera! Ohhhh well. At least the image is in my head.

Tonight I after dinner I am going to meet Franz and Maire from my class somewhere near the Ponte Vecchio. Yay for finally doing something social!

So those are the past couple days... pretty eventful all in all. Ciao!