Ciao!

Thursday September 25, 2014:

I have made it to Milan!

I left Charlotte airport at 1:20pm to JFK where I had a lovely 3 hour wait until the next flight. I didn't feel like carrying my (heavy) carry on bags around the airport so I walked to the first place I found which happened to be a convenience store and Baskin Robbins/Dunkin Donuts combined. So, I had chocolate icecream for dinner. I ended up with a window seat on the plane which was great but the only TV screens were in the middle aisle hanging from the ceiling so that was a bit unfortunate. On the way to JFK I had a window seat too and nobody was sitting in the middle seat :D We took off about 20 minutes late because there was an overhead compartment a few rows ahead of me that wouldn't stay closed so maintenance had to come fix it before we could leave. The flight food was decent; I had chicken and potatoes and then talked to the nice lady next to me for quite some time because she accepted my salad gladly. She was a huge Harry Potter fan and enjoyed hearing about Quidditch. Rio2 was played on the TV but I tried to sleep. It sort of worked. We landed and the customs line was surprisingly quick. I was interrogated upon arriving at London & Helsinki: "Where are you going? What are you doing? How long are you staying? How did you meet this friend?" etc. The Italian officials looked at my passport, stamped it, and handed it back. Easy as that. Alisa was waiting for me with my name on a sign (I felt important haha) and thankfully watched my luggage so I could use the bathroom before the trek to the city. I couldn't figure out how to work the hand dryers and neither could anyone else in the ladies restroom so we gave up. Sadly, a precious hand sanitizer (the glittery one too!) leaked during my flight. Oh, and my medical bracelet snapped too. Gonna have to get a decent one instead of the one from CVS I suppose.

To Milan! We took a bus (more like a charter bus/coach) to the main train station in Milan from the airport where we then caught a city bus to Alisa's apartment. Thankfully she had bought tickets and led the way! Her apartment is absolutely lovely (I have 2 beds, heheh) with many flags of all the countries she has been to and cute furniture. The bathroom is different, the toilet flushes weird. It's like a handle to flush that is a shower handle but instead of controlling temperature it controls how much water is used. I got on facebook, checked some emails, sent some texts (yo, I don't get charged for texts or data usage so feel free to keep in touch! calls are 20 cents a minute but that's what we have skype for, right?) then we went to a pizza place right around the corner.

I ate pizza with a fork and knife. This might be one thing where I have to say screw it, this is easier to eat by hand! The pizza was delicious though! I had plain cheese (: We got back to the apartment and bought train tickets to Florence for tomorrow morning. We are off to visit Marina (she taught my Italian 101 class). I then took a much needed nap and tried to watch Cloud 9 on twitch but the internet was going in and out so I gave up and slept. Thankfully they won both of their games :] I chatted with Alisa a bit and then with people back home because they were up and moving finally :p I now know where and when Quidditch practice is on Saturday and Michele and Valeria offered to meet up tonight. Michele came by and picked me up since I didn't want to walk alone in the dark in an unfamiliar place and we met Valeria at a pizza place (I'll have to get the names of these places eventually) that ONLY serves margherita pizza (plain cheese) and drinks. You know the pizza is gonna be good when the line is out the door and it's all for some cheese pizza! Michele ordered for me, the only options were small or large (he ordered large and I definitely couldn't eat all of it). It was thick crust unlike the thin I had at lunch and super cheesy and amazing. The fork and knife worked much better with the thick crust but I still think hands are best. We then went to an awesome gelato shop and it took a long time to make a decision of what flavors to try. I tried dark chocolate and bacio (milk chocolate with hazelnuts, baci are a type of italian chocolates that are amazing, Martina brought them to my Italian 102 class to share). Valeria had bacio and mint while Michele had mixed fruit and lemon. Everyone is super friendly and keeps paying for things for me (though I tried to pay). I didn't know how to order at the gelato place. I'm definitely going back because there were plenty other flavors I want to try!

Michele and Valeria walked me back to Alisa's apartment and made sure I could get inside before leaving. We took a car part of the way to the pizza place but it was more hassle to find parking. It's kinda like zipcar. Tonight I sleep some more and wake up to get on the train to Florence! I couldn't be more appreciative and thankful to everyone who has helped me get this far (Alisa, Marina, Michele, April, etc). We'll see if I can fall asleep with so much excitement (and caffeine & gelato).

Buonanotte,
Alex