Settling In

1/21/15

Day 5

Today I woke up and my landlord was here because our shower leaked. My roommate wanted to ask him a couple questions about it and he doesn't speak any English so I gave my speaking skills my first attempt since I've been here. It wasn't a total trainwreck so I guess that's all I can ask for, even though our shower still kind of leaks. Then we went to the dollar store and got a folder and soap and went grocery shopping again. (Did you know they sell alcohol in the grocery store?)

Apparently no one in Italy washes their face because there was no face wash anywhere. We even asked the staff of our program (Italians and Americans) and no one knew where we could find it. 

I had class with three of my best friends here since we're all in Italian 1 together. This was the second time the class met and it's still the basics so it's boring but I also never learned the grammar so it will probably still be really helpful to take the class. 

Then I had another class with two of my friends and even though it's supposed to be a great class, I'm not sure I'll like it. The teaching style and expectations are really different here. The teacher is actually American but she didn't teach like I'm used to. She went through a ton of brand new material at the speed of light on the first day. It wasn't a good start. We're apparently going on walking tours of the city but not allowed to take pictures. Not only that, but we also have to take notes while walking and can't take them on our phones. Her reasoning was something about being worried we'd just start texting but wouldn't it be us who fail the class then? Why can't we decide for ourselves? The professors here seem to treat us like children and have banned all electronics in the classroom and made attendance mandatory. I was ok with that in middle school and maybe high school but now that I've been allowed to decide for myself whether there is a correlation between my attendance and final grade, it's annoying to get used to the downgrade. I hate people telling me what to do. While this class might teach me about Florence, (which I am excited to learn about) I don't think I'll like it. But we'll see. I need it to graduate on time and I'm lucky I got in because I shouldn't have. 

In the second half of class, we took our first walking tour. It was cold and rainy. I hadn't eaten yet so I was starving. At least it was interesting. The first day of being here we got lost on our way home because we missed the turn onto our street. When we finally found it, we saw that the street sign on one side of the road says Canto del Bargello and one says Via Ghibellina. From the direction that we came, we saw "Canto del Bargello" and walked right past our street. On the tour, I found out that Canto del Bargello is actually the name of the castle-ish building on that side. This kind of makes sense because the street signs are plaques built into the sides of buildings so Canto Bargello is actually on the side of the building. 

After class, I stayed where the tour ended and took pictures for a little bit. Even though i was wet and hungry, it was more important to enjoy the moment. So far, I've been really good about prioritizing experiences over things I would normally be a baby about like being tired or hungry or whatever. I hadn't had a chance to explore the area I was in yet and it seemed like a good time to take advantage of that. 

Since Italians aren't as big on preservatives as Americans are, their food doesn't last as long. I was psyched about finding chicken nuggets last time I'd gone shopping but I found out I bought them the same day they expired. When I got home from the walking tour, I wanted to finish the pack, only to find mold growing on one. I ate the rest though. 

My cousin told me about the "Secret Bakery" here, so of course I was curious. To be honest, I cheated a little bit to find it. A group of us set out without really knowing what time it was open or even exactly where it was. In the directions we found, we were supposed to look for "the frosted glass door" and when we knocked, we were so certain we'd found it... No response. We knocked a couple more times before we walked around the outside of the building and jumped up to see in the windows. It was definitely a bakery and it smelled delicious. Defeated, we eventually left to kill some time, maybe we'd come too early. 

We wandered around Santa Croce, Piazza della Signoria, and Piazza della Repubblica for a little while. Earlier we had been at the Duomo (and I touched it!) and a promoter gave us a coupon for a free drink at an Irish pub. So we went there, got our free stuff, and quickly left in search of food. We got lucky and found cheap pizza- they had Hawaiian!!! At the end, when we got the bill, we forgot that you can't really ask for separate checks so I lost a few euros in the transaction. 

With our stomachs full, we headed back towards the secret bakery. We made it to the locked door and knocked again.

This time, someone opened the door. He didn't know what we were saying but he knew exactly what we wanted and pointed around the corner. We walked a little further into the alley and saw a couple people standing by a door. One of them said "Is this sketchiest thing you ever done too?" And a small crowd started to gather. After a second, the door opened and we attempted to communicate what we wanted to the baker. At some point I think he just gave up and went back inside. We waited a few minutes before he reemerged with bags of Nutella and creme pastries for 1€. They were so good that we went back for seconds. 

On our way home, we ran into a big group of people from our program and you know they immediately found out about the Secret Bakery because they saw our bags and sticky fingers. Oops. 

I was dead tired from nights of lost sleep and tonight was no exception. But, as usual, it was worth it because the bakery only opened after at least midnight. I got home and immediately showered. I attempted to do homework but was missing the password. I was doing pretty well- already didn't do my homework on the second day of class. Go me.