This starts my adventures in Italy for my Spring semester abroad with St. Mary's College of Maryland's program in Alba, Italy.
It started with my 5:50pm flight from Dulles to Frankfurt. It was about 7 hours and 10 minutes long. I knew one of the girls going on the trip because we had an English class together last semester and I knew she was flying on the same flight so I sought her out at the gate and we stuck together until we got on the plane. I got pretty lucky with a window seat and only one other person in the three-some section--the middle seat was empty. However, I did NOT get so lucky on who sat behind me...There was a three year-old Indian boy (the smallest I've ever seen) sitting behind me who was the most obnoxious thing ever. He would open and repeatedly slam closed the tray on the back of my seat and even climbed on top of the tray and jumped down onto the seat a couple of times. I looked disdainfully at him through the reflection in the window.
View from the window after taking off from Frankfurt.
Needless to say, I didn't sleep much. The movie shown was Fame and it was pretty cute for something so closely resembling High School Musical. We landed in Frankfurt around 7 in the morning and quickly found our way through Frankfurt's not-so-easy airport to our next gate where we immediately picked out the rest of our group who had flown from Philadelphia. We American college students stick out easily. Apparently it's all the North Face outerwear...
Our second flight was much shorter and in a much smaller plane. We had to take a bus out onto the tarmac and get into the plane that way! It was pretty cool. There was snow on the ground all over the Frankfurt airport and it was really pretty. It was really refreshing to be out in the cold, too.
We got to Turin's small airport without much of a hitch but one of the girl's had her bag misplaced but the airline located it and is having it delivered tomorrow. We met up with Dan, our RA (Resident Assistant) and clumsily loaded our baggage into a small bus for the hour-and-a-half trip to Alba. We took pictures along the way and barraged Dan with questions. When we got to Alba we headed to our apartment and dropped off our baggage before heading to lunch.
There are 6 girls and 3 boys total here with St. Mary's, including me. The 6 girls are in an apartment together in three rooms of two. The girl I knew from class (Kate) and I are sharing a room with two large loft beds. It's a really nice room and we have the biggest beds!
View from my window!!!
Kate and (part of) the room.
View from ONE of our TWO balconies (out back).
After leaving our stuff in the apartment, we went to the Mensa for lunch. It's a big public cafeteria that is reminiscent of a middle school cafeteria (middle school children included!) but with way better food. This is where we eat lunches during the week. We all had a prosciutto pasta thing which was really good and filling.
Taken while walking to the Mensa.
Then we walked back to our apartments and I stopped along the way at the grocery store to pick up a few things like pasta, granola bars, water, and a fleece blanket. Back at the apartment, we started to unpack and get our computers hooked up to the internet. And power. The whole power conversion thing is so much more complicated here in Italy than it is in the rest of Europe (where it's hard enough to begin with!). It's not very interesting so I'm not going to elaborate.
Around 4, Dan came and picked us up with the boys and we headed to the Campus Center where our classes are held and the St. Mary's office is. We got a tour of the building and received our cell phones and some other important things. Then we headed back to our apartments to rest and get ready for dinner at 7.
Dinner is paid for with meal vouchers valid at 5 local restaurants. Tonight we went to VinCafe on the main drag. It was delicious and the waiter, because it was our first meal there this semester, just brought us food as a sampling rather than giving us a menu. The main dish was spaghetti with pomodoro sauce and it was really good and really filling. They have large portions and lots of courses so it's hard to not eat too much...It's going to become a problem. Dan ordered two bottles of wine for the 10 of us and I even had a little (for those of you who don't know, I don't really enjoy drinking alcohol because, so far, I haven't found anything I enjoy drinking). It was a very nice start to our semester here in Italy and bespeaks of good things to come!
Now I'm back at the apartment, anxiously awaiting my episode of House to finish streaming so I can watch it and pass out in my big bed. Tomorrow we are meeting at the Campus Center at 10 for a tour of Alba (pictures to follow) and other stuff? No idea. Stay tuned!
Also, for those of you on Facebook, I have more pictures posted there.
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