Day 2: Beginnings

Last night after I posted, I wound up going out for Gelato with Roia and Alanna. Alanna is also attending LdM and will be my housemate for June. Roia is only here until tomorrow, but she's been in Florence for two weeks so she showed Alanna and me around.

Alanna and me with our gelato. I'm still running on 3 hours of s

leep here.

Roia took us to this fabulous Gelateria— Venchi. It was amazing. I had strawberry (or "Fragola" in Italian) gelato and we walked along the Arno and Ponte Vecchio. It was amazing.

Today I had my orientation session for LdM. Talk about boring. I figured out where my classes are and how to get to them. I hung out mainly with these two guys (Brian and Patrick) that Alanna knows from school. She attends the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Before they left, her program had three pre-departure orientation sessions that were a couple hours each so they all kind of got to know each other (compared to our one and a half hour orientation during which I met no one).

Ponte Vecchio

In orientation, the adviser handed us a packet then proceeded to tell us that everything important was in it. She still went over all the details. I would have rather just used the time to read and then be done.

We went to lunch after the program ended around 1. We found pizza at a little cafe. It was really good-- I had basic margherita and something with prosciutto and basil. I couldn't finish it all. Diet Cokes over here are very pricey. Probably will try to find a cheaper lunch drink.

After lunch we walked around for a few hours and ran some errands. I got a notebook and pens for school— I realized last night that I didn't have anything to write with.

I'm looking into getting a museum pass— they're 40 Euro but you can get in anywhere with that card. With museum tickets around $10 a pop, I think it might be worth it.

I'm hoping to run this evening. Going to take a little nap/watch TV now, but I'd like to get a run in before dinner. After dinner I think Alanna and I are going to head out and see what the Florentine nightlife is like.

Today was fun, but I really am going to have to get used to the insane amount of walking here. There's a lot of walking in Chapel Hill, but this is even more of a walking city.