my body is falling apart. but i am happy nonetheless.

please send me mail/postcards from other overseas programs/love, etc.

Laura Weitzel
Piazza Sta. Maria Sopr'Arno
Florence, Italy 50125

still am not feeling homesick, which is surprising but wonderful in a way. my form of missing is more like little things/feelings that make me miss people from home, not the place itself.
*lately, been missing tammy (whose blog is now unavailable. what the?) when i go out to bars and see the people in our group do some interesting things (miss the gossiping), also missing the beautiful gym at stanford, and the AMAZING food makes me miss tammy's obsession with food itself.

*the city as a whole makes me miss my little hool as well--and janet whitchurch--but that is beside the point. oh to be a junior in high school again!

*im hanging out with sara randazzo tomorrow, which will inevitably make me miss theodore phuong (and maybe james...maybe)

thinking of a few other fools as well.

talking to cori lately has made me realize how disconnected i feel from people. maybe thats a good thing in a way?

Ive been here over a week now—weird! It’s been so odd in that each day goes by in a flash, but the last week has felt like a lifetime. I can’t believe that like 9 days ago I was sitting at home and now im living in some random Italian’s house WITH NO INTERNET. God, this whole lack of internet at home thing is really hitting right at my weakness. All of us are going crazy when we leave the center, and while we’re there, we spend any moment we can on the net, even making the staff stay later than 7 pm so we can do any last minute things before we face the rest of the night internetless. I really never realized how attached we all are to it and how much of our lives depends on quick access to information.

On another note, I haven’t counted but im pretty sure my mosquito bite count is well above 50. The combination of rain and hot weather has brought those little suckers out in full force, and theyre eating me alive. Apparently they go after good-smelling people, that’s the word on the street, so I must smell DELIGHTFUL.

Anyway, last night we went out to this beer pong tournament and I experienced my first Italian sexual harassment—finally, I mean geez…it was at this horrible bar with mostly just obnoxious Americans and a few sketchy Italians. After realizing we could not take it any longer, we headed down the street to the English pub that has become our home base it seems. Aron and Cameron have some nice Italian friends, so we talked to them for awhile, and had some sangria…mmmm. The people in the program are rather cliquey, I have found, at least the frat/sorority people, but theres definitely a good group of girls who I really like. In fact, it was all girls last night + alex, aron, and cameron. Alex is doing very minimal wingman work, fyi.

On a last weird note, on the way home from school tonight I saw one of the only 2 people I know who are in Florence right now with other programs!! Breena was just riding by me on her bike…weird. Exciting, though. Now she, Anne, and I can hang out!

That’s all.

frustration & fun

Friday Sept 22- Day 3

after fruitless attempts to guess the password of the only wifi network near my homestay, I am giving in and writing this entry on Microsoft Word. I went to the Stanford center for the first time yesterday and got settled into my homestay. The center is in a beautiful piazza right on the Arno (with wireless! Wee!). I was forced to move into my host mom’s apartment before my roommate Cori arrived, which was…interesting. After 2 days of being in Florence speaking English with Aron and Alex, I suddenly had to speak Italian to this old (but really sweet and very hip) Italian lady, who knows no English. Cori and I both speak very broken Italian, so most of the time we resorted to miming wildly and/or saying words in English with “o” or “a” on the end to make them Italian.

Cori and I share a bedroom. The apartment is superposh, but vespas and buses drive by the window all night, as I found out the hard way last night, so sleeping is kind of like sleep briefly….bus….sleep….vespa….sleep….bus, and so on. We had orientation today, which basically felt like NSO all over again with a smaller group of people. Everyone was introducing themselves and actually eager to talk to each other…remember those days? It’s hilarious—there are like 7 boys in the program, and about 25 girls. For once, my life is not a sausagefest, though I did find myself alone with 4 of them in a room at one point (I left quickly). Most of them are frat boys anyway, and we know I don’t like those :P

Other than the social aspect, orientation was fairly standard. We heard the director talk about how we need to take advantage of this opportunity, we heard the police talk about how we should be aware at all times, we got syllabi, and listened to a guy talk about politics in Italy for an hour and a half. We also were supposed to have lunch with our language partners (Italian university students who are learning English), but only half of them showed up. Mine didn’t, so I spent the lunch talking with Stanford students…in English.

Our host mom just filled us to the brim with food. I feel gross. Apparently Italians eat many many more courses than Americans do—we had pasta, which I was full after. Then she served us green beans and bread, then I was done, but oh no.. she pulled some meat out of the oven. UGH. Kill me.

***

Saturday

so last night we all went out for the first time...i.e. most of the 35 people in the program squeezing into bars. first we went to this English pub, which was too tiny to accomodate us, but nevertheless fun. had some sangria and wine.. mmm! also had a dude come up to me and sing "oops i did it again." ah, american stereotypes. we also went to this really sweet bar called moyo, where i paid 5 euro for a corona (never again). a slightly drunk me and 3 quite drunk others were eventually led home by a sober cori.

woo!! drunk in florence!

FIRENZZZEEEEEEE

Jet lag is a crazy crazy bitch. But, bottom line is that im in Florence. What?! Flying was somewhat harrowing- the flight to Frankfurt was oh so long (10ish hours), but pretty harmless until I started feeling nauseous towards the end of the flight. I made 2 new friends in my aisle, though- one a 20something punk girl who was going to bologna, and a 70ish year old man who spoke horrible Italian and german to the stewardesses. How I love fliyng. Then I had a 3 hour layover in one of the slowest airports ive ever been in – fucking slow Germans. After a 1.5 hour flight filled with American tourist couples, I was finally in Florence—15 hours of flight under my belt. I taxied to aron’s and passed out. Turns out alex was already there and passed out as well.

The nausea continued, sadly, even when we went to a local gelateria to use their bathroom b/c aron’s is being redone. Alex, aron, Cameron (the student advisor) and I (aka a sausage fest as usual) wandered around and they ate gelato. We’re going to get pizza soon for dinner, but it feels like 10 am to me. This is some fucked up shit, excuse my French.

Still, traveling aside, it is beautiful here, obviously—it’s Florence! Ive only been here like 4 hours and already ive seen the calcio (soccer) stadium, plenty of little pizzerias and restaurants, lots of cute old people, the funny misericordia team (ambulance) that wears neon orange jumpsuits, and lots of young hip-looking Italians. Except, the men still wear those stupid-looking man-capris and tight shirts. Gross! I prefer my men not so effeminate, personally.

Tomorrow: meeting host families and going to the Stanford center for the first time!!

-laurakay

20 something

for someone who does not like to deal with numbers, i do work best with them in email form (as tammy is well aware). and now, a stream of consciousness post to start me off.

1. teddy is a little bitch and should perhaps post more himself if he's going to criticize certain tall people.

...but, i love him and i'll miss him. (his words)

2. i made 5 babies cry today between the hours of 8:30 am and 4:30 pm. something is very wrong with that, but hey, it's all in the name of science, right? i am devising a plot to ask my semi-evil psychology prof for credit for this summer of crying babies... all this damage to my ear drums for free? I think not.

3. my birthday is in 6 days. i think i've finally reached the age where birthdays are depressing. though i am a baby compared to many, turning 20 is still scary as hell and so anticlimactic. i think my actual happy birthdays ended when i left high school...on my 18th right before starting stanford i had a car accident on the big day. turning 19 last year probably involved a 9 hour shift at Nordstroms. now i'm hitting double digits, and its not nearly as exciting as when i turned 10 (good times.. the golden year of my life)

4. florence in 12 days. shit again. non parlo l'italiano.

5. tammy's drinking her weight in alcohol in south america, and i'm expecting her to jump someone any day now. go, tammy, go!

6. ashwin thinks the fact that i have a blog is laughable but we all know that he is the laughable one.. slut.

7. and bringing it back, full circle. i love teddy kinda

pax

the wide world of blogging

just got this, am rather new to this whole blogging thing. the goal is to write (coherently, at times) about this coming fall (& perhaps beyond!).

15 days and counting til europa. shit son.

note to self: check for snakes before falling asleep on airplane to florence.