First Days Here

Door to our apartment!

Woohoo, I was able to survive the 17 hour trip here along with my first two days of living in Florence! There is hope for the rest of the semester!!! I think I am going to like it here... :)

To sum up the plane rides here, it was a long hot journey with little sleep, gross food, heavy bags and confusing airports. You do the math. However, I was very pleased to have come across somebody in my program at the airport for our connecting flight, along with many other students in other programs all over Florence! Everybody was so nice right off the bat, and it was comforting having some others there to navigate through the foreign airports with and to arrive in Florence with. I was so relieved to have met our program staff as soon as we got our bags (which, might I add, I am sore today from carrying around!) and we were transported directly to our apartments.

The statue of Ferdinando
in the Piazza S.S. Annunziata 

Much to the dismay of my tired eyes, it was suggested that we didn't go to sleep until night time to avoid jet-lag the next day. (Which would be today, and the jet-lag is still quite evident. Here's to hoping that tonight is the night filled with sweet dreams of flowing wine and endless biscotti.) So, I just showered and started unpacking and waited for some more of my roommates to arrive to begin touring the city! 

Our apartment is pretty nice- there are more amenities than I thought and it is larger than I expected for a European apartment. We have a very tiny washing machine (with basically one setting) and a lovely drying rack outside for clothes. There is no air conditioning inside most of the buildings, which is a huge adjustment. It is very expensive in Italy to pay for gas and electricity so they are very conservative with it here. They are also very big on recycling! And this time of the year it is hot, hot, HOT! (And this is coming from an Arizona girl). The humidity makes it worse, so you always feel sticky. Windows and fans are my new best friends! I am excited for fall when the weather will be much more comfortable :) And hopefully fewer mosquitos munching on my quite tasty and very itchy skin.

Basilica di San Lorenzo

There are seven of us sharing the apartment, with two girls per room except for one single room. All of my flatmates are really nice! My roommate, Kelsey, is from Australia and so is another girl in our flat. Another one of my roommates is from China, and the rest are actually from ASU! Who knew. Our apartment is in a pretty awesome location, too- just down the street from the Basilica della Santissima Annunziata and about a ten minute walk from the Basilica di San Lorenzo! We didn't get a chance to go inside of them yet, but I fully intend to sometime soon. Just outside of the apartment is really pretty, too. Ours is one of a bunch of different apartments all in a row. The doors to them all and the buildings themselves are all so beautiful! And there is a sidewalk across the street with trees along it and the street feels very "homie". There are more pictures on my Facebook of our apartment and of the area in general, too :)

Outdoor Vendors- Why hello,
gorgeous leather jackets!

When we headed out to explore, my first order of business was to try out some pizza we saw in a window. Soooo good! It's nearly impossible to walk more than five minutes without passing a gelato stand, pizza stand, deli or pastry stand. Especially gelato, it's everywhere! And oh so delicious... :) Anyways, we continued wandering through the square through the Piazza del Centro Mercato, which is a big marketplace with vendors selling all sorts of leather goods, scarves, hats, purses... anything of your heart's desire. We looked around a little bit but continued onwards on our mission to find the Italian cell phone shop, TIM, to get our cell phone situation here sorted out. Lo and behold, the most gorgeous Italian guy in the world was working there. Good thing we will have to return in the future to add more minutes to our plan when we run out ;)

There was a little market close to the shop so we stopped in to get some basic stuff for our apartment. It's a bit of a brain exercise since we aren't yet used to the Euro exchange rate or brands of food and stuff that they have, but I managed to come out with some water- (naturale, of course! Frizzante water is very common here and I have mistaken it for regular water several times. What a shock to the taste buds...), yummy cookies, some delicious fresh peaches and a few other necessities. It was a bit expensive since it was right near one of the main squares, but next time we plan on trying one of the less touristy outdoor markets for some cheaper and even fresher groceries. Then we were all pretty tired and decided to turn in early back to the apartment, grabbing some gelato on the way :)

Today, we got to go to orientation which was nice because we got to meet some others in the program and some of the staff. It was mostly talk about safety and rules and regulations, but I am more excited for tomorrow's part of the orientation because we will finally be getting our schedules and signing up for the optional trips and excursions! All the fun parts! :)

View from out bedroom window!

Other than orientation, today was mostly spent exploring the city some more and relaxing. I had my first few experiences (of many, I'm sure) trying to communicate with Italians that don't speak English. It was sort of a fun challenge trying to remember the bits and pieces that I learned in Italian 101 and piecing together a conversation. All of the people have been super nice and helpful and willing to try and communicate despite the language barrier. I hope to start using it more and more as I learn more this semester in class! ...Because right now I am beyond terrible. 

At night we decided to go out for our first real sit down meal at a restaurant, and it was absolutely delicious!!! I got a simple penne bolognese but it was really good. And, I got to pair it with a really good red wine that I was actually able to order on my own! Woohoo! My first wine I purchased at a restaurant and I don't even remember the name of it... but it was really tasty! I anxiously await the wine tasting excursion in Chianti... ;) But for now, I shall turn in for the night and (hopefully!) dream of that wine and biscotti extravaganza. Buonanotte!