New City, New Friends, New Home

So I have been in Firenze for 4 days now and it has been very busy! Some major things have happened so far....
1. Reunion with Lizz
2. Orientation Chaos
4. New house

1. Reunion with Lizz
A very good friend from home, Lizz is also studying abroad in Firenze, in a different program. We both got into Firenze on Sunday night but Lizz had some complications (to say the very least) with her travels into Italy, so we had not figure out when we were going to find each other. Monday morning I got a message at the hotel to call her at her hotel. So I did and we decided to meet up at the Duomo at 12.30.

As I was walking over to the Duomo I ran into Labor Day protests. I figured they were probably coming from one of the main Piazzas, so I just went in the opposite direction. After a while, I arrived at the Duomo. It was still early so I walked around and when it was almost 12.30, I sat on the steps of the Duomo, hoping Lizz would see me in the sea of tourist that were there to see the beautiful church. She did! It was great! I definitely missed my friends and it was nice to have a little bit of Denver and Delta Zeta back with me! We walked around and got Lizz a phone, she showed me her apartment (3 blocks away from the Duomo, LUCKY!) and we had some Gelato. She walked me to my hotel where I was supposed to meet everyone from my program. Well, turns out since most Italians were protesting, the flights did not get in until way later. So the Syracuse girls that were there told us we could go on a walking tour and get some free gelato (WINNING) and invited Lizz to come along. We had a nice stroll through Firenze and then Lizz and I parted ways.
I had 4 roommates at the hotel.
1. Stacey - An architecture student from Syracuse, who is from Mexico.
2. Dani - A philosophy major from Santa Clara
3. Karina - A Senior from Northwestern who also turned out to be a fellow DZ!

Some people arrived in the group flights later that night, and us independent travelers decided to go out and explore. We decided to be very Italian and bought some wine and went up to Piazza Michelangelo (quite the treck I might add). We got a spectacular view of Firenze at night and enjoyed some cheap, italian wine. Afterwards some of us decided to check out a bar that we had heard of, the turned out to be a 100% american bar. They have beer pong tournaments every single tuesday. It was kind of amusing to end up in a place like that on our first night in Firenze, but it was fun anyhow.

2. Orientation Chaos
So orientation week has been... well, chaotic. There is a lot of paperwork to be done and a lot of waiting. Every single person needs a full copy of their passport and when you have 300 students and 2 copy machines..... well, you get the picture. So after a day of copying documents, waiting in line for an electronic key, a museum pass and some other things, we returned to our hotel. He had a Host Family Q&A after dinner where we meet some host moms who talked about the do's and don't in home stays.
That night we again decided to go out and found a great Irish Pub, with a great Italian feel and a good mix of Italians and Americans. We also learned that in Italy, liquors stores close at 10.00 pm. Good to know. We went out with a great group of girls from Emory, BC and Northwestern. It was a great evening. We came home not to early because we knew we had another full day of waiting ahead of us.

3. New Home!
Day two started out a little bit earlier because we all had to check out of our hotel. Our faithful crew of Independent travelers decided we should try and check out earlier to 1. Catch the first bus and 2. Avoid the procrastinating crowd. Good thing. We were able to get on the first bus, so when we got to campus there was NO LINE to get our internet set up and finish copying documents. So after that was all done, we went to meet some faculty to finish picking our classes (I managed to secure a spot in a great class called The Mediterranean Diet- YEY. ) and at 12.00 pm sharp we would find out who our host moms were. So exciting.
Sarai Glass, a great friend from home had done the Syracuse abroad program 2 years ago and had a great host mom. She told me to request her host mom because she had such an amazing experience. Well, I did and I got her! I was so excited. We all got little descriptions of our families and I was lucky that I got to meet my host mom (and go home with her) at 3.00 pm. Could not come soon enough.

At 3.00 pm we went into a meeting (yet again) and slowly we got called up. My host mom's name is Silvana Bartolotzzi and my roommate is called Molly. She goes to Frankling and Bash College. Silvana is amazing. She picked us up and was so happy to have us. We packed our bags into the car and headed home. Dragging my 2 suitcases, 1 carry-on and 1 backpack up three flights of stairs was a workout! But we arrived home! It is a very cute apartment. We have our own room and bathroom and a lot of closet space. Silvana has 2 sons. One lives here in Florence (Claudio) and one is married to a Peruvian girl an lives in New York (Francesco).  We tried asking her to point out where the house was in a map, but she said Claudio was coming over later and showing us around. She also said Francesco and his wife Tita are coming over soon for a wedding, so we get to meet him too!
Our other two companions are a very cute poodle called Pipo and a Siamese cat who has yet to surface.

Well, that turned out longer than expected, sorry!

Now I have my first home cooked Italian meal to look forward to and I am meeting up with Lizz later to plan some trips.
Loving Firenze so far!