I'm finally in Italy!!!! After all these months of waiting and dreaming here I am. It was nothing like I expected it to be. It's a land trapped in time and everyone is so nice. They even say ciao to each other in the street. Either Gorizia is really small or it's just the Italian way of life. Anyways, I love it.
My travel to Italy was surprisingly eventful. I left Denver at 6 PM and on the flight I was served dinner (rather good for airplane food) and I was able to watch a bit of "The Avengers" and all of "The Hunger Games"! Plus it was free. I don't remember if I slept. It's like being on a bus to a cross country meet. You close your eyes and you know that your moving but you still get enough rest to be able to run at the meet. That's how I felt. We arrived in Frankfurt at 11am (5 am Denver time) and I had two hours to catch my flight to Munich. Here's the thing; I had to get my passport checked and then go through a security line. Gah!
By the end of that I had an hour so I went to get a calling card. I got the 10 euro card for free. Story goes I walk into the bookstore and I ask the guy if he sells calling cards. He says yes and then goes onto tell me this guy bought the calling card then decided he didn't want it and gave it back. So I ended up with a free calling card. Sweet!
I then go to my gate, look up and see it's not the right name on the gate. I ask the person at the desk and he says "Oh it was changed to gate A18, don't worry you have half an hour." I end up half running/jogging to my gate because it's about a quarter of the way down the terminal. I get there, sit, drink some coke while the kid across from me (he looked about 16) drinks a beer. Oh Europe.
Plane from Frankfurt to Munich is an hour so I finished my book and then at the airport I walked around a bit. European airports are like malls back home. There are so many shops! And good, nice shops. I pretty much steered clear away from those. Again I found out my flight changed gates and that it was leaving later so I had a nice conversation with a guy from outside of Boston.
The plane to Trieste was like a plane from Denver to Eagle. Short, bumpy and boring. I read
Into The Wild so I could try to escape. Ended up having a short conversation with the guy next to me from Belgium going to Udine for a chem conference.
Then we got there. I was so ready to meet everyone. Then my bag never showed up. Here I am, almost zombie like, pulling out my phrase book to tell the lost luggage people, "
Il mio bagaglio รจ stato perso." Waiting in line, I'm near tears because I just want to know where my bag is and get a hug. Right as I get up, a group holding a UMN sign come up and there like are you with us. No sorry, Rotary. Then a women and girl come up and the women says "Annie?" I just about lost it there. Claudia, super host mom to the rescue with side kick/host sister Carla. She helped me figure out the luggage problem. (It was still in Munich) Meanwhile another older women whom I didn't know comes up, hugs me and gives me dried lavender. I assumed her to be my host nonna. (grandmother) Nope turns out she's my tutor's wife, Annamaria. Still, she has that nonna vibe. I think it's great.
Once everything was sorted out, I went out the doors from baggage claim and met my host father, Marco, host brother, Nicola, tutor, Luigi and my second host parents. (I regret to inform you that in the heat of the moment, I forgot their names.) Then I got to go home. My host family owns a Fiat and that makes me so happy! It was pouring outside, Claudia said it was the worst storm of the summer but the rain is much needed. My mouth from the time I got off the plane to the time I went to bed was in a constant state of a gap. It was amazing! Even in the dark and rain, it was amazing. I was able to talk in a bit of Italian with everyone and I've been getting most of it. I just need to pay attention really well.
I have my own bedroom, over looking vineyards and the house is so old. It's sooooooo cool! I was never able to imagine my house and here it is exceeding expectation. The mountains next to us, yeah, that's Slovenia. Talk about close.
Today, I was able to get my suitcase and unpack. They say don't over pack, I think I under packed. Oh well, I guess now I have to go shopping. (Not bad at all) Plus I went to the store today and in the deli they cut the meat right in front of you and they have the bread out and when the guy put the tongs on it to pick it up, you could hear it crunch! Ahhh! We stopped by Nicola's basketball practice and I got to meet one of Sara's (their oldest daughter who's in Iowa right now on exchange) friends. Afterwords, Marco and Claudia took me into Gorizia this evening and I had my first taste of gelato. (Strawberry) There was a concert going on in the park so we listen to that for a few minutes and then we walk all around town. I got to meet a lot of their and Nicola's friends. So many. Then we went to Marco's brother's house and I got my first impression of what it's like to be an exchange student. Talking slowly and loudly in English doesn't help me. Talking slowly in Italian will help me.
Well, I had my first "I'm an American and I don't know how this works" moment. It was with.... the toilet. I didn't know how to flush it. So I went with what I did in the airport and pushed the button above it and... it flushed!!!! Now, to figure out the shower.
Tomorrow is Marco's birthday. I have no idea what to expect. I did bring him a gift though so hopefully it goes well. I'm also going on a run tomorrow around San Floriano. Nicola says it's about 3 k or 2 miles. Just have to deal with the hills.
There's no Internet on my laptop so I'm using Nicola's. I don't know when I'll have time to write now so I'll try to keep it as updated as I can. No promises.
