Syd Rich: Ciao da Italia: Traveling and First Day

Welcome to the first of many blog posts about my Italy adventures!

Let’s start with traveling. I woke up bright and early on Friday so I could go to the airport to catch my 7 am flight. Along for the ride were my mother, my sisters and Zach. After a confusing check in, some pictures and some tears I was finally on my way.

My first stop was Chicago, Illinois. The flight to Chicago was not too bad, I had a window seat and I was able to sleep through at least some of the trip.

The Chicago airport experience was definitely interesting. I had a scheduled four-hour lay over to just chill at the airport. Luckily, my departing flight was in the same terminal as my departing flight, so I didn’t have to travel across the entire airport. I ate some lunch at the airport, walked around and eventually just sat down at the gate. I thought ahead of time to wear an Arizona shirt, so other people who were apart of the study abroad program could find me and we could be friends. Well it definitely worked, one by one girls trickled into the gate, and even Dr. Soren, the program director found us and joined us.

As I said earlier, I had a four-hour lay over planned before my flight to Rome, well due to maintenance on the airplane, four hours soon became four and a half, then it became five, then it became five and a half when we finally boarded the plane. But I sat on the plane for at least an hour before it took off. It was ridiculous.

So this flight to Rome was seven hours long and I was in the center aisle. Luckily, there was a buffer seat in between me and the other person in my aisle/row. I tried really hard to sleep on this flight because when I landed in Rome it would be morning, so sleeping on the flight would be crucial to preventing jet lag. Well…. I slept…. But for probably only 2 hours total…. And not a consecutive 2 hours, it was very spread out. At the beginning of the flight I positioned myself perfectly on the tray in front of me with a pillow and a blanket. If I could have remained in that position, I would have slept the entire flight. But no, after about 5 minutes in the perfect position, the lady in front of me leans her seat backwards, pushing the tray closer towards me, resulting in me losing the sweet spot and never being able to find it again.

Since this was an international flight I had entertainment for the 5 hours that I wasn’t sleeping. They played Into The Woods, an episode of Parks & Rec, an episode of the Mindy Project, some movie with Justin Timberlake and gambling, and a few other random shows. In between all the shows, music was playing, and it was actually fairly good music, so that helped me fall asleep sometimes.

Seven hours later I landed in Rome! All the study abroad kiddos huddled together as we navigated the airport. After going through customs and baggage claim we met up with some more study abroad people who came on different flights and one of the Italian coordinators for the program, and then we hopped on a shuttle to the city I will be staying in for the next month, Orvieto.

The shuttle ride was about 2 hours and it was very boring, so I ended up taking a wee nap. While I was awake I just stared at how green Italy is. All the green was such a fun sight, because it’s so not common in Mesa or Tucson.

When we arrived in Orvieto, the landlords for the various apartments that the students are staying in picked us up and took us to our apartments. My apartment is pretty stinkin’ cute, but also pretty stinkin’ tiny. There are only three of us living here and I get my own room with a huge closet, so I am satisfied.

So my two roommates are Brandi and Danielle. Brandi was on the flight with me from Chicago to Rome, so we arrived in Oriveto together, but Danielle had a later flight and didn’t arrive until much later because she had to take the train.

While we were unpacking our things, Brandi tried to plug in her power strip to an adaptor and then to an outlet… I guess it started to spark so Brandi screamed and we tried to figure out why it did so. Little did we know that a bigger problem happened, with the spark, Brandi blew a fuse, so none of our outlets were working. We didn’t know what to do, so we tried calling the Italian program coordinator, Alba, but we couldn’t remember the correct extension to use for Italy. So instead we started to explore Orvieto a little bit and hopefully find someone who could help us along the way. Along the way we went to a little café and I had my first slice of Italian pizza! It was kind of cold and not very fresh but it was still very delicious.

Unfortunately we couldn’t find anyone to physically help us, but we did find another student who told us the right extension so we were able to call Alba and fix the problem when we got back.

Eventually my other roommate Danielle arrived and then the three of us went to a mini orientation/mini tour of Orvieto with some of the other students and coordinators. During the tour our coordinators showed us the markets, the bars, the pharmacies, the ATMs, and the best gelato shops in town. After the tour we went to this little café and our coordinators treated us with some drinks. My roomies and I got hot chocolate and OH MY GOSH you cannot begin to comprehend how good the hot chocolate is here.

After the tour we went to a bar (no, I did not drink). Bars in Orvieto are so different from in the US, it’s more like a café, so I didn’t feel uncomfortable not having a drink in my hand.

After the bar we went to the market to buy some essentials like water and Pellegrino. Did you know pasta is so stinkin’ cheap here? Like 50 cents for a whole box. #carbsforlife

I also got my first gelato tonight! I went with chocolate chip and vanilla, it was so delicious. If I could live off gelato for the entire month and be healthy and not die, then I totally would.

Let me tell you people, this little town called Orvieto is the coolest place in the world. Everything is made out of stone, so it makes you feel like you’re in a castle, or at least in the village surrounding the castle. The castle would probably be the Cathedral. It’s so huge and pretty and striped! I thought that was the coolest thing.

It is very cold here, and I wasn’t expecting it to be at all. It’s been raining all day, but that is kind of refreshing. Alba said it’s not supposed to be like this cold and rainy for long, it should be sunny within the week.

And now some pictures (I didn't whip my camera out today because of how much it was raining, so I don't have toooo many pictures, but I will explode you all with more over the next few days)