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Hi all! I've obviously been MIA for a while, but I wanted to write a quick update before I go to bed. Highlights of the past week and a half:

I moved into the apartment. Pro: I love love love my roommates. They're really cool, incredibly patient, and weird like me. It's better than anything that I could have asked for. Con: An apartment two floors below is being renovated so drilling and hammering starts between 8 and 8:30 am every morning. At least I don't have to set an alarm clock, right?

Classes at UniBo (University of Bologna) started on Monday. I sat in on two history classes, The History of Emilia-Romagna (the region in which Bologna resides) and also a Roman History class. I decided to go with the Emilia-Romagna class instead since the teacher is much more approachable, audible, and there are at least 20 erasmus students in the class. I'm also genuinely interested in the subject haha

A friend invited me to a seminar entitled The Changing Nature of Journalism Worldwide at The Johns Hopkins University satellite campus in Bologna on Monday. It was incredibly fascinating so I'll be going back to sit in on more seminars throughout this semester. Almost everything is in English, btw.

Lastly, I can't believe that I've been here for almost a month. Time has flown by so fast. I have a little less than 6 months left here which is so strange to think about. Therefore, I won't. While my Italian isn't as good as I want it to be, I notice myself absorbing certain phrases and grammar that is becoming more natural with each passing day. I owe a lot to my roommates who have been wonderful teachers to me. Fun fact: I made hamburgers and french fries for my roomies last night with my friend Margaret. It was pretty awesome.

Ok that's all for now! I need to go to bed so I can get up early to go to another seminar tomorrow. More info about that here. I've been ending each post with the promise to write more, but I'm afraid I can't promise that. It's been tougher that I previously thought to keep a blog updated while I try to improve my Italian and immerse myself in the culture here, therefore I'll keep updating when I can, but it will continue to be infrequently. Like it or lump it, as someone always used to say :)

Baci,

Nate

Buona sera everyone!!

I realize that I haven't posted anything about life in Bologna since this past weekend so I want to bring everyone up to speed!

On Monday, we started the "pre-session" grammar course with the BCSP program which is sort of a crash-course on grammar before we have our first classes at UniBO. Christine, our insegnamente (teacher), is pretty cool and incredibly helpful. She's been rectifying our grammatical mistakes in class which has already proven to be quite helpful.

For example, the name of a person's profession or title is often times created by adding a simpe suffix to the end, like -tore or -ista. The other day we talked about the word tromba, which means trumpet in English. Christine asked what is the name of a person who plays the trumpet, to which a girl responded trombatore. Immediately, our teacher fell off of her desk laughing. We had no idea why since that was a logical, educated guess. After Christine (somewhat) regained her composure, she closed the door to the aula (classroom) and proceeded to explain the difference between a trombatore and a trombatista. Turns out, a trombatore is a man who has a lot of sex (or woman, depending on the article in front of it), while trombatista is one who plays the trumpet. Needless to say, we had quite a colorful conversation afterwards which addressed a lot of simple mistakes such as that which could lead to embarrassing situations in real life.

Besides the studies, I've finally found a place to live!!!!! I probably should have started with that, but I knew that this next bit would take a bit of explaining. Anyways, I have an apartment with some really cool Italian roommates who I can't wait to get to know better. It turns out that the Italian who I'm replacing - Michele - is libertarian and so is his girlfriend, Giselle! I didn't find this out until the "second date", meaning, when I went back the second time to get to know everyone who lived there to make sure that I'm who they want to live with and vice versa. We had 10 days to find a place, and I sealed the deal finally last night (Wednesday), which was incredibly relieving.

The apartment can be found found at Porta Mascarella, which is on the north city wall. I realize that that means nothing to almost everyone so here's a bit of context: Bologna is a really old city that has had several walls built around the most dense parts of the city over many hundreds of years. Today, the part of the city that is situated inside of the biggest of the walls is called centro storico. I'll be living near one of the porta's, which is an old gate that allowed people to pass through the city wall. Porta's and porticoes are very characteristic of Bologna (more on that later).

That's all I have time for now. I'll be sure to add some more later once we check out of the hotel tomorrow and things begin to settle now. I haven't had a lot of time to tell many of you that I miss you but please know that I do! I hope to get the chance to catch up with many of you soon.

ps. there was a tiny earthquake nearish Bologna today. everyone is ok, but please pray for the future safety of everyone here in Italy. There were two earthquakes (or maybe just one and the post-tremors) last year which were fairly devastating. Thanks!

anarchyandacupofcoffee

Fight of the Century: Keynes vs. Hayek Round Two (Round One)

nathanwhitfield-blog

This has absolutely nothing to do with my study abroad... or does it? Either way, I strongly recommend it. Notte!

I stumbled upon this really cool map of how Bologna used to look like in the Museum of Bolognese History today. I think all of the churches that existed when this was painted have gold leaf on them.

As for apartment hunting, I'm getting really close! Nothing is certain yet but I'm positive I won't be homeless by the end of the week. More info when I have it. Hope all is well for those state-side!

Buongiorno!

First of all, the wifi in this hotel is the so freaking awful (#firstworldproblems, I know). But seriously, it's only possible to get about 10 minutes of usage each day, I'm assuming due to the amount of people trying to use it - a real tragedy of the commons if you ask me. The internet is already the millennial generation's drug of choice, but now since we have to be fervently looking for apartments, it's become like air to us.

I was able to find a couple posted notices on Via del Guasto on Tuesday (near the university's main street, Via di Zamboni) and made appointments to see the places over the last couple of days. The appointments have gone fairly well. There’s one place that I’m seriously considering, but given the fact that we have another week to find a place, I don’t feel too stressed – yet.

In other news, a few of us in the program learned first-hand about the Italian tradition of closing shop during the day when we went thrift shop hunting earlier this week. Usually, places are closed from about 1pm-3pm and we got to the store around 2:30ish. Little did we know that on Thursdays, the day we went, the particular store we wanted to go to closes down for the day at 1pm. Despite the bad luck, we had an awesome time navigating the city in the snow. We ended up stumbling upon this really beautiful church with some evergreen trees out front. Trees are fairly sparse in the city so seeing them covered in snow was absolutely gorgeous.

Last night, we had a pizza party at the program office which was a lot of fun. I met some more people in the program, as well as some of their Italian friends. Some of the year-long students still have exams so they’re pretty holed up right now since they’re studying so seeing them was awesome. They know nice little nuggets of information that help greatly when it comes to finding a place to live, or navigating the city, or what to order at this place that sells nutella crepes until late in the evening (much much more on this later).

I got into a conversation with Andrea Ricci, the director of the program, and a couple other people about English and Italian words that don’t translate well into the other language. For example, “awkward” just doesn’t exist in Italian. Nor does “creepy” or “creeper”. In the same token, “simpatico” which I thought just meant “likeable/pleasant” doesn’t exactly mean that since it can be applied to people who aren’t necessarily so. I have no idea how to explain it since I don’t quite understand it; perhaps I’ll be able to with time. There is, however, Rock, Paper, Scissors (Carta, Forbici, Sasso) but in reverse order, and also the beloved High Five, or rather alta cinque. Therefore, one can say dammi cinque, meaning “give me five”. It’s nice to know that some social aspects of life are cross-cultural.

Anyways, I’m going to hang out with friends and see another place today so I’ll catch you later. Ciao!

We woke up to snow today! It wasn’t as big as the snowball sized flakes we had Sunday night, but it’s still awesome. More pictures later!

Allora comincia | And so it begins!

Ciao tutti! Hey everyone! So yesterday was the official "first day" of the BCSP program (which you can learn more about here), which basically meant arrival day at the hotel. Most of the people in the program landed yesterday (Monday), but I came a couple days early so I could spend some time with friends who are doing the year-long programs. Anyways, it's been really awesome meeting all of the people in the program. Siamo in 32 (There are 32 of us, I think), and we're all living in a hotel with other guests. To make a long story short, we're the loudest people here and we've already crashed the wifi at least a dozen times. For example, I wasnt able to use the internet for more than 5 minutes today to look for apartments. Which brings me to my next point..

La caccia per l'appartemento! The apartment hunt!

One of the core components of this program is finding your own housing with fellow UNIBO (University of Bologna) students who are Italian. The catch is you have to find your housing on your own and by only speaking Italian. It's kind of nerve-racking to find your own place on your own, but it's important if you want to have a better understanding of the culture or not. We had housing orientation today (in Italian) where we went over how to find an apartment, how to set up an appointment to see the place, and what questions to ask. The deadline is the 26th, which is when we move out of the hotel. Some people will move into apartments this week, others the next. Some even after the hotel stay is over. I've made 4 different appointments so far to see apartments, 3 for tomorrow and 1 for thursday. I'm not sure that I'll fall in love with the place or my potential future roommates (which is most important), but at least I'll get experience at asking the right questions. I'm not really worried about finding a place, just about finding the right roommates. Regardless, I'll have more info on how those "dates" go tomorrow.

Ciao for now!

il volo || the flight

(I'm currently writing this as I'm flying over the Alps on my way to the Bologna Airport from Frankfurt. Talk about surreal.)

Before I jump into this, I need to say that I will fly Lufthansa for the rest of my life. I flew with them once before when I studied in Florence two summers ago and they've never let me down. Here’s a quick rundown of why I loved them this time:

The customer service. Lufthansa has nicest flight staff I've ever encountered. I couldn't have asked for more from them – ok, maybe another glass of wine, but they already served me 4 during the flight so that put me in a great mood. One of the stewardesses chatted me up about Italy and then spoke only in Italian to me for the rest of the flight. Turns out she was from Naples and could speak 5 languages. Crazy!

The food. I know this stuff is airline food, but it was damn close to gourmet. I can’t even imagine what First Class ate.

Now, I know I can’t credit Lufthansa this but, I had an aisle seat and the seat next to me was empty. HALLELUJAH! Last time I had a middle seat and it was awful. It's the little things that count on an international flight. I was incredibly comfortable this time, thanks to my seatmate who was MIA. God bless that person.

So now I’ll go all Quentin Tarantino on you and go back to the beginning.

Yesterday - or today - or tomorrow – (edit: Thursday) I'm not quite sure with all the time changes going on - I flew out of Indianapolis to Newark, New Jersey. I spent the morning packing and squishing things into my luggage before my parents (aka the Newg and Father O'Connor) took me to Indianapolis Airport. My parents - ok, my mom - is afraid I'm never coming back. I think my Dad's words were "She's afraid you're going to meet a hot Italian babe and never come back". The truth is, my return flight is July 31st, but I’m not exactly sure how long this chapter of my life will be. Let's just say I plan on returning to the States then. Regardless, spending the last couple hours in the US with my parents was the best. I miss you two already!

Indy to Newark went well. I sat next to a fellow IU student who was on his way to study abroad in Barcelona for the semester. We were both really excited for ourselves and each other. I'm sure that the people around us really loved our loud and energetic conversation hahah (I hope the rest of your journey went smoothly, Eric!). I jetted off once we landed in Newark since I only had 2 hours before my next flight. I got my bearings then made it to the terminal. The security line was incredible long, but I had Subway so I was mollified. I made it to the terminal just as boarding began for the transatlantic flight. Score! And then, as I said earlier, I found out that the seat next to mine was vacant which made things even better. 8 hours later, we landed in Frankfurt at 8:00am (midnight EST). I ran through the airport to make it to my connecting flight to Bologna since I had to go through Passport Check/Customs. I breezed through it and made it to my terminal just in time to start boarding. Score again!

Side note: If you’re unfamiliar with flights in Europe, some of them have you board on the tarmac. So when I say boarding, you get your ticket scanned, then get onto a bus that will deliver you right to the plane. Here's how it went for me:

I boarded this..

which delivered us to our plane.

Before we finally boarded the plane from the tarmac. I'm definitely not in america anymore.

The most beautiful part about the entire trip was the sunrise in Frankfurt. The sun's rays were just beginning to crest the treeline which began to warm us as we waited to board.

After we had our wings de-iced, we took off for Bologna! The landing in Italy was definitely the scariest part due to all of the fog. I literally couldn't see the ground while we made our descent until we were roughly 200-300 feet from the ground. Nonetheless, I made it safe and sound to Bologna's Marconi Airport.

Unfortunately, they lost my bag at one point during all of the connections. I had a weird feeling that that might happen so I made sure I had all I needed in my carry-on bag, just in case. (Update: After some more confusion, they were able to deliver my bag to the program's hotel later that night. Hooray!)

The absolute BEST part of the whole trip was being met in the airport by my friends Margaret and Alex, who have already spent a semester here. I wish I had taken a picture of them as they held a homemade sign welcoming me to Italia while screaming and taking pictures. It was so freaking cute. There is nothing better than seeing friends at the airport after such a long journey.

Before I finish this post, here's list of things I'm looking forward to this week:

meeting everyone else in the BCSP (Bologna Consortial Studies Program) program!

also meeting the famous hotel staff of Hotel Holiday where I'll be staying with fellow BCSP people until..

the hunt for an apartment in the city begins. super incredibly intimidating. more on this later

eating more scrumptious cibo (food)! also more on this later.

Anyways, my apologies for such a long post with all the play-by-play info; I promise that this won't happen too often! Until next time. Ciao!!