Arrival

Well it wasn't easy...

I left my boyfriend with a car seat full of dirty tissues and dragged myself into the airport on Tuesday morning at 6. I was relieved to see my classmate Kim in the exact same situation. The trip actually started out just fine. We were able to change seats so we could all sit together and even ended up an hour early to New York. The problems began there. We only had two hours in Rome to go through customs, get our bags, check back in, go through security and get to the gate, so when our flight ended up leaving an hour late we knew we were screwed. Once we stumbled off our 8 hour plane ride (on which I was befriended by my seat mate, a 12 y/0 boy named Kevin who ended up falling asleep on my shoulder at one point) no one wanted to help us with our now dire situation. "You have to speak with Alitalia about that" "You made the reservation with American, you have to do it through them" "You have to talk to the help desk upstairs" "In terminal 1" "In terminal 5" "You have to take a bus to get to the terminal you're going to" "The train for your terminal leaves in a minute" "I can change her ticket but no one else's" After no less than 12 responses like this and we were trudging around like sedated sloths. But that's nothing a good 9 hour wait in an airport couldn't fix.

We decided to take full advantage of our time and really live it up. We sampled the local McDonald's cuisine. Well, Ross and Cassie did, Kim and I wanted to be a little more ethnically legit and got airport pizza (think Pizza Hut with salami instead of pepperoni). We then tested the comfort of the chairs by napping in them the rest of the time. Frankly I've seen more of that airport than I've ever cared to.

The next problem was our airport-home transport. It had been set up for us through the school but we never had a chance to tell them we were coming on the later flight. But then as we walked off the jetway, we looked amongst the sea of names printed neatly on laminated signs and saw a hand scrawled "South Seattle" paper. Boy were we excited. We asked how she'd found out about the switch and she said she'd gone to ask about what happened to our flight and where we were and when they told her it was confidential information she cried and they decided to tell her. She grabbed us cabs and we were finally on our way home. The cab ride reminded me that there is absolutely no way I will ever drive in Italy. Our cabbie told us in detail about this being fashion week with all the seasons new Dolce and Gabbana, Dior, Gucci, Prada having fashion shows and that there would be a lot of sexy people walking around the streets. He made sure to look at us straight in the eyes through the rear view mirror while doing this, demonstrating the Italian stress on in depth conversation, and lacksisity on attention while driving. He would accelerate through extremely crowded tiny streets, and whenever he almost hit bikers and pedestrians, which was often, he'd then yell at them out the window like it was their problem.

The apartment itself is a sight to behold. A super long narrow hallway leads to 4 extremely high ceilinged bedrooms, a family room, a kitchen area and 2 bizarre bathrooms. Let me explain the bathrooms. #1: you open the door to a room which is barely wider than the door itself. It is dark marroony red with a toilet and a shower head. That is all. #2 is about twice as long as a bathroom needs to be. It includes a washing machine which has a tiny short cord that leads to nothing. The one outlet in the bathroom is right next to the door which means anytime the washer is to be used, it is to be moved. We'll see how that goes. The bedbug situation is curious. I don't think we have them but mosquitoes we do. Michelle was covered in bites this morning- I nagged that they could be bedbug bites... but she was convinced they were not. Oh I hope she's right. We bought repellent so if they're gone then we'll know.

Day 2 was today and my jet lag has yet to lag. We picked up school issued phones today and walked a little more around the city. We explored Il Duomo, and the Ponte Vecchio and some cuter quieter areas further away from the touristy center. This was a big relief. I know I haven't been "living" here long at all but I'm already annoyed by other tourists and can't stand being categorized as one (though I know I am). But the hordes of people, the pushy sales people on the street, and the over priced food was a little much.

Though the weather here has been a little more like warm Seattle weather so far than the scorching hotness we were expecting, were introduced to some plague like weather today when in a matter of seconds it went from breezy and dry to thunder and lightning, sideways winds and torrential rain and quarter sized hail. The entire piazza fled into doorways and we hid out for the minutes that it lasted. When we could have no more and were literally drenched to the bone, bone marrow even, we decided to brave it and just go home as we weren't that far away. And after wading our way through deep puddles in sandals and a little dress we arrived home just in time for the rain to subside.

And that is one reason why now I'm exhausted. You don't want to know how I smell or how my feet look. With that image, ciao!