Latest Updates from Firenze

Basically, I've been too busy and lazy to post on here since I've gotten here, partying almost every night (well, we watched a movie last night, but still we were up talking until 3:20 am) and with orientation it's even less time to be on here. So I'm just going to copy what I wrote my parents to tell you what has been happening the past couple of days. Bear with the wording, because I didn't direct it to a general audience, and a lot of the stuff has been edited out by me. (too personal) =)

------------------------------

.......Sorry I didn't log on last night, but we were out busy
buying groceries with a huge group of people after all of our
orientations, as well as getting cell phones and doing research about
them. So yes, I bought a cell phone yesterday after being strongly
recommended by the administration here to get one. It wasn't too
expensive, only € 75,00 with the € 10,00 pre-paid card. I haven't yet
set up the voicemail because all of the instructions on how to do so
are in Italian, but once I call Vodafone (the service provider, if
you're interested their website is Vodafone.it and there's luckily an
option at the bottom to read the site in english) to get them to
switch all of the programming into english I'll set it up. But my cell
phone number (calling from the US) is 011 39 3466191534. One really nice thing about it is
that incoming calls are free (for me of course) and you can buy more
pre-paid minutes from the phone as long as you're in the vodafone
service area (the best coverage in all of Europe and GB). Oh, and the
phone I bought isn't anything special, but if I were to switch to
Cingular, Sprint, AT&T or Tmobile in the US I could use it back there
too. (Verizon is a pain because they have internal SIM cards, and use
a different network than in Europe, which uses GSM, so my phone
wouldn't have worked over here even if I had brought it). Oh, and the
other thing I learned at the cell phone orientation yesterday is that
the calling card I have requires you to dial a 1-800 number in the
states, and that's not possible from anywhere but inside the country.
Complicated, I know, but I'm just mainly going to use the phone for
emergencies, text messaging (only 15 cents to send text messages,
which is really cheap; incoming are free) for incoming calls, and if I
somehow get really lost and need to call friends to get directions.

In other news: I bought batteries at the grocery store yesterday, so
my camera is back in operation (finally)! Today in about 15 minutes
our CRA's (Community Residence Assistants) are taking us out into the
city on a walking tour to all of the best grocery stores, the best dry
cleaning places, the best gelaterias, the best restaurants for bargain
prices, etc. So I'll be sure to take lots of pictures for that.

Survival Italian yesterday was very interesting; our orientation
teacher spoke only Italian to us and I was actually able to understand
most of it when she spoke slowly. I was able to find out that her
husband is from Los Angeles, but they've lived in New York for the
past 7 years (all in Italian). The cell phone orientation was good,
and that's where I learned all about the phone networks, plans, etc.....

------------------------------------

2 days ago

....Ah, it was nice actually hearing all of your voices again, and I can't
wait until I can see you all again (hopefully soon!) I still haven't
had a chance to go into the city to buy batteries for the camera, but
if you could see the room right now you guys would be impressed at how
clean it is, even though there's 5 of us in one room. Well, our room
has also become the "hang out" room for a bunch of us in Natalia. I'm
sorry to hear about Sandy and her strange behavior, and I hope she
realizes that I'm gone soon so she'll stop. I'll definitely say some
prayers for the business...that sounds good! Well, after all of the
orientations tomorrow I'll have to send you an email/chat with you.
Once classes start on monday, and I find out whether or not I'm going
to work on campus, we should be able to set up a schedule to
(hopefully) video chat. Well, I'm getting ready to go to bed, because
survival Italian is at 9:30 tomorrow morning after breakfast...