Firsts of many

*Cooked our first meal at home

Ok so really Tealy made dinner, I more just got the pot boiling. The spinach ravioli only took 2 minutes to boil! Super fast since the food is sooooooo fresh.  It also goes bad so much quicker.  The milk only stays good for like 4-5 days at most.  Less preservatives, but it is delicious.


*Got my first international phone
      -any calls in are free for me, just cost money for you... email me for the #


*Got lost for the first time, and then a second time... 
     -We had got lost trying to find the Ikea by walking.  I had looked up the address on the Ikea website with their store locator and the address they gave me online was wrong.  Thus I accidentally had the group walking for an hour because we couldn't find it.  We did pass by a few historic buildings (left), the train station and the cute Lithuanian Consulate (right).

*Met our first real Italian boy, man? I don't really know.  His name was Giovani.  We stopped by his tiny coffee bar to ask for directions to Ikea and get out of the cold.  We bought a few warm cappuccinos while Tealy, Sarah and Monica proceeded to ask him about the Italian night life.  It was quite funny, but at least we figured out where we should go at night and where NOT to go.  He also helped us call for a taxi to the rest of the way to Ikea.  The taxi arrived and we were confused as to why there were not two since there was 6 of us.  The next thing we know, the driver is opening the trunk, pushing the 3 middle seats forward to be able to pull up two hidden seats in the floor.  


Italians KNOW how to cram in a lot into a tiny space. Hence the narrow streets that are all basically alley ways with tons of buildings surrounding them.  But no matter how narrow, the cars & buses still are able to fit despite the people, bikes, vespas, and cars parked on the sides.  It is really un-nerving to watch at times because it looks like they are going to hit something or someone, but they don't.  I think if I were to drive here, everyone would honk at me because I would be going like 5 mph, so careful not to hit anyone or anything! 


*We did finally make it to to Ikea.   My first time there would be in Florence; Go Figure.  It was a tad overwhelming because every Italian and their mom, and grandma, and children were there. OH so speaking of children, while you are at Ikea there is a place where you can drop off your kids while you shop.  As my apartment-mate Amy says, "It is like a coat check... for Kids".  HILARIOUS!  Also, the food court inside was super nice!  Way nicer than the ones at Costco or Garden Ridge... I haven't tried the food yet, but I have heard it is delicious.  


*My first skype call with my parents and brother was today... 5 days since I have been here.  It didn't even work until an hour after we originally planned to have it because their computer crashed.  Murphy's Law I guess.  Eventually, they figured it out by using my dad's mini laptop.  THANK GOODNESS. 


overall it was a good day :)

Our last quarter has now arrived

Our fourth apartment-mate has arrived :)


Welcome to apartamento 51!!!


Earlier today we had to get our permit of stay... so now we are LEGAL to live in Italy :)  At least for the next 3 and a half months.  Teal and I ordered our first italian breakfast pastry this morning and ate it standing up at a counter.  In Italy, it is culturally accepted to have cookies and cake for breakfast... oh boy.  Also, usually it is extra to pay for a table thus the standing.  Felt sooooo Italian!  


GROCERY SHOPPING @ the COOP:
We were able to go grocery shopping today, thank goodness.  I don't think I could have made it out of the apartment to eat dinner tonight because I was so exhausted, so I am extremely glad to have some food here.  Grocery shopping was very similar to shopping at a Central Market in the states.  Although, here you MUST have a glove on when picking out your fresh fruit and vegetables.  Oh and if you forget to weigh it and get the price sticker... they get really angry, make you lose your place in line and go weigh it.  THANK GOODNESS Beth, our program coordinator informed us of all this beforehand.  Another point about shopping for food in Italy is that everything is INCREDIBLY fresh.  They have day old bread, cheese and meat discounted for sooooo cheap.  It is not even bad, but is not as fresh as the stuff baked, cut and made that day.  When ordering fresh break, meat or cheese, YOU NEED TO TAKE A NUMBER.  According to Beth, you could be the only person in the supermarket, but if you do not take a number, they will NOT serve you.  They have their system and it seems to work.  


It is cute to people watch at the supermarket.  There are so many cute old people that bring what looks like a small rolling backpack to put their groceries in after they buy them all.  So they store their rolling food backpack (not sure of the actual name for them) in a little cubby that they rent while they shop for groceries.  After they finish shopping and purchase their groceries, they go back to their temporary locker/cubby and get their rolling food backpack, load their groceries and go back home.  Also they have these scanners that I THINK (mind you I am not for sure) you can check out or rent out to scan all of your groceries and see how much you're spending before you arrive at the check out.  An old man got frustrated with two of my friends doing the self check out because they did not have a scanner thingy.  Hmmm.  We also thought it was possible that older people use the scanners to pick out all their food and have someone else come by and collect it all since we saw this very adorable yet frail elderly woman without a basket just going around and scanning stuff.  


Teal and I ended up getting a sizable amount of food that will probably last us 3-4 days.  We did not realize that the walk back to our apartment with this amount of groceries was going to be so brutal.  Italians do not usually shop for main meals except for the day of, otherwise the fresh food would go bad and it would be an unreasonable load to carry back home through the winding streets of Florence.  We both had brought one reusable bag from the apartment and had to get another plastic bag each to carry everything, but we definitely stuffed them to the brim.  So we did not look ridiculous since it was only 2 bags and a purse, but the weight got to us even after 10 blocks and we weren't even half way back yet.  [I may have looked a tad bit funny carrying the carton of 6 eggs in my hand since I did not want them to break bouncing around in the bags]  We successfully made it back and we were very proud of our Italian grocery shopping.


Today we finally visited where the main building of Lorenzo de Medici is located :)  The buildings are scattered throughout the city; fortunately for us, Florence's city center is not that big.  We did take our first interior design italian picture  :D

Well that is all for now... arrivederci

La Chica Dell'Apartamento 51

I am in LOVE... with my apartment.  Yeah there may be a funny sewage smell at the entrance to the apartment complex and like 4 doors I have to open before I actually get into my apartment along with a very very sketchy corridor, but it is TOTALLY worth it.  


Before even getting to the entrance of my apartment there is an adorable italian courtyard that I can not wait to spend time in when it gets warmer.  My apartment is on the 2nd floor, but in italy the 2nd floor is called 'il primo piano' (the 1st floor) because the 1st floor to us in the states is called the ground floor here or 'pianterreno'.  
So we open the door to our apartment which leads us to a staircase up to il primo piano.  

This floor has the living room, dining room and kitchen combined into one along with a huge 2 door window that over looks the courtyard.  My bedroom and bathroom are also on this floor.  I share them with the lovely Teal Johnson :)

It really is unbelievable that we are finally here and moved in.  Of course, as teal says I'm the 'mom' of the group, I may deny this multiple times on the trip, but I will admit that I already have a list going of things we need to get for the apartment such as laundry detergent, hand soap for the bathrooms, groceries, etc. It is a pretty hefty list that will be accomplished over the next few days.  


I am sad to report that I left my cute (small enough for my face) $10 imitation Ray Ban sunglasses on a roof top terrace overlooking Il Duomo this morning :(  We went up to take pictures on the top of our hotel and I had set them down on the ledge because I was positioning my camera for a timed photo.  I got distracted, picked up the camera and left the glasses there.  Did not even realize it until this evening.  Will definitely try to be WAY more careful the rest of the trip... and I guess that gives me an excuse to buy new ones here ;)


In other news... Today, I caved and bought my first thing that was not food.  I bought a bag that would hold my laptop along with a few other things for my academic trips.  It even matches my long boots. As Tealy says every time we pass a store full of boots or leather jackets... "Oh, I'm in trouble."  I don't want to break the bank when I am over here, but lets be honest, I am going to buy somethings because 1. I am a girl and 2. I am in freaking ITALY!

We went on a walking tour of the main city center of Firenze... unfortunately no real site seeing just yet, but I do know where the english speaking doctor is, where to buy a temporary european phone, where there are 24 hour farmacia's (pharmacies), that tip is included in the price for food and other convenient things to know in Italy.

Tonight, 8 of us went out to dinner for Monica's 20th birthday.  We ended up at a nice sit down Pizzeria which was extremely american friendly.  All the menu items had smaller text in english and the waitress spoke english very well with a cute Italian accent.  Thank goodness the food was still very ITALIAN.  We ended up getting a liter jug of white wine and one large bottled water to share between all of us.  In Italy, the house wine is usually cheaper than the bottled water and they do not serve free tap water at restaurants.  Also to the shock of many of the people at my table, when ordering a pizza in Italy, you do not order them by the slice, you order them whole.  The crusts are not as thick as normal to-go or delivery pizza and they are a manageable size that would probably give someone 6 slices if they did want to cut it.  Most Italians also eat their pizza with a fork and a knife rather than cutting it into slices and eating it with their hands.  I can understand why this would be good if the pizza is extremely hot, but when you are a group of jet lagged and hungry college students, cutting every single bite of the pizza just TAKES TOO LONG.  Needless to say, the food, water and wine was delicious, just like the other 3 meals I have had here.  This could be a problem considering there is only so much walking can do in a day, especially after classes start. 

SOLUTION: ask Beth [the program coordinator] where it is cheap to go to the gym, to do laps and possibly pilates.  

well ci vendiamo amici e famiglia

Journey to Firenze

So I ended up only getting 4 hours of sleep the night before I left due to packing and excitement.  I figured the lack of sleep would help me pass out on the long plane ride.  Anyways, we end up leaving my house an hour later than planned... as Ethan says "in true Veronica fashion".  The airport people were so nice that they even allowed my mom to get a pass through security to wait at the gate with me.  


The 2 hour flight to Atlanta, Georgia wasn't too bad except for the turbulence.  Coincidentally, I ran into Samantha Shircliff and Beth McElhannon at the Panda Express in the airport so we had a quick last meal in the states before our 8-9 hour flights.  They were headed to Rome first then Florence whereas my layover was in Paris, but we were all going to arrive within an hour of each other and share a cab; or so we thought...


(to be continued)

Packing & Info

About 36 hours left until my flight leaves from San Antonio and I am just now beginning to pack.  Good job Veronica.  


FLIGHT INFO:


So the plan is to arrive at the SAX airport around 8:30 am on Tuesday.
I leave around 11 am from the San Antonio Airport for a 2 hour flight
to Atlanta, Georgia, where I have a little less than an hour layover
then I fly to Paris, France, on almost a 9 hour flight... oh goodness.
Once I arrive in Paris around 6 am, the time zone is the same as Italy so that is good.
My last flight is about 2 hours to the beautiful Firenze, Italy (aka Florence). 
By this time, it should be 9 ish in Italy on Wednesday and about 2 am Texas time.


Basically it is 24 hours of travel time. I really need to prepare myself for the possibility of getting bored on the plane considering I got bored on my 2 hour flight from California after returning from the Rose Bowl.


CLASS SCHEDULE: