After having a difficult time sleeping on Tuesday night, I overslept Wednesday morning and did not have enough time to get ready and get to my class that morning. When I got out of the shower, I studied the powerpoint for that lecture until it was time to meet Roman at his hotel.

Roman is my cousin that came to visit for Thanksgiving weekend who goes to Lehigh University. I know him the best out of any of my cousins and we have similar interests in finance and sports. We also have a similar ambitions and outlook towards life. However, Roman can somewhat be a workaholic and ties almost every conversation topic back to investment banks. However, this also makes him perhaps the most focused and driven person I know.

I walked towards his hotel called Hotel Greenhouse on the far southwest side of town. I got lost on the way to the hotel, but I found a metro that took me directly there. Arriving much earlier than Roman, I ended up waiting in the lobby and surf Wikipedia until he arrives.

Roman arrived at the hotel and we headed off towards a pizza place on the way to my dorm. We stopped at a grocery store, so Roman could buy salami and kept going. However, it seemed like we were walking for a long time up a canal and I did not see the Navigli which is right next to my dorm. We stopped at a local pizzeria and the pizza was tasty. However, when we saw some traffic signs, we realized were in the suburbs and not even the city. We managed to catch a bus that took us back to the metro and I found my way back from there.

After arriving at my dorm, I rested while Roman checked some things on the computer. We went downtown to get dinner at a good pasta place. On the way I showed Roman the galleria Vittoria and the Duomo and there was some display of giant pink snails on the sidewalk to remind people to relax. The pasta place I wanted to eat at was closed, so we wandered around until we found another place. However, the pasta was sub par for Italian standards. I think it came out of the microwave because I saw something stuck in there while waiting for the food, and the pasta was served suspiciously too quickly. I then got a gelato for desert and headed back to Roman’s hotel. Since Roman had an extra bed at his hotel, I decided to sleep there so I can sleep without being freezing cold (no heat at night in the dorm). After arguing about random things with Roman about random things such as China’s manufacturing and James Loney’s ethnicity, I went to sleep.

Thursday morning began my Thanksgiving, which did not feel like Thanksgiving at all. I ate breakfast at Roman’s hotel and then headed back to the dorm to get ready for class. I gave Roman a Bloomberg umbrella I received from a recruiting event as an early Christmas present and then went to class. My financial markets class covered the operations of commercial banks. Roman fell asleep and it felt strange to have a class on Thanksgiving.

After class, we went to a local place for lunch. I ordered a ham calzone and Roman ate spaghetti. We returned to my dorm and watched the movie The Boiler Room about a fraudulent brokerage house. It was a pretty good movie. After that we went to Pizza OK for dinner. We both ate buffalo mozzarella pizzas, but Roman said that pizza is better in New York than Italy. Roman often compares thing with New York City as his benchmark (even more than I do to southern California). I packed for the weekend trip to Cannes back at my dorm and tried to Skype my family for Thanksgiving, but they were not there. We then went back to Hotel Greenhouse to get some sleep before Friday’s train ride.

Tuesday were Wednesday were spent primarily studying for midterms. On Thursday morning  I began my four day trip to Rome.

The train ride was smooth until the train broke down in Bologna. It ended up causing a delay of about thirty minutes. On the way to Rome, and old Italian lady sitting across from me randomly gave me a ham sandwich and a water bottle. I thanked her for the free lunch and then arrived to Rome.

At the Termini station, I wandered around a little until I found my friend Matt near the bus depot. Matt is a friend of mine from college who happens to also be studying abroad this semester. While I am studying finance in Milan, he is an art student in Rome. Like meeting up with Marte and Sofie in Norway, it has been great to be around friends who are locals and know the area I am visiting.

First I stopped by my hostel, which was right next to the station to drop off my stuff. An error from Sxipper (a Firefox app that fills out online forms for you) caused the first night of my reservation to be registered under my last name twice instead of my actual name, so I now have to switch rooms on Friday morning due to this error.

Matt had class, so I decided to audit his Greek history class with him. Matt’s school situation is strange. He goes to an institution called “UC Rome” where it is a bunch of art and history professors teach solely UC students in small classes in Rome. In fact the whole campus id just two floors in a Roman office building. I found it odd that he only went to school with other students from California and with no Italian or International students. Nevertheless, his Italian is still better than mine.

When I was told I cannot audit the class, I decided to explore Rome on my own. I first went to an old papal palace/Hadrian’s villa which is now an art museum. It was overpriced (9 euro) and it had impressive stuff, but not worth the money. It contained some old frescoes, Renaissance and Baroque sculptures, some nice views of the city, and a treasure chest big enough to fit a horse.

Country #8: Vatican City

After that I walked around until I saw the bridge to the Vatican. I crossed the bridge and decided to go visit St. Peter’s Basilica: the mecca of the Catholic church. As a Roman Catholic myself, visiting the Vatican is kind of like a modern day pilgrimage and the whole area had a strong vibe of holiness to it. Nevertheless, it was strange to cross the street and an international border at the same time. After going through airport like security I got in to St. Peter’s Basilica. First when you arrive there in person, you realize how much larger the cathedral is in person compared to your perception in photographs. The interior of St. Peters is a mix of a fine art museum, a church, and a symbol of the might of the church. Meticulously well carved marble statues from Renaissance greats as Michelangelo litter the building. Gold lines all of the walls and ornate frescoes cover the ceilings. It all just wowed me when I walked in. After the touring the interior, I went to the Treasury museum next door. It was filled with centuries of donations from wealthy Catholics all over the world compiled in this collection. After that I went under the cathedral to the papal crypt, where several of the Popes including St. Peter himself (that is why the Vatican is where it is) were buried. It was interesting to see two millenia of Popes all sharing a resting place. I then got a phone call from Matt telling me he was performing in a play of To Kill a Mockingbird by his school. Since those were poor directions, I ended up not finding the play and doing other things. Overall, St. Peter’s Basilica beats out the Taj Mahal for the most impressive building I have seem both inside and out. It kind of makes you think nothing short of divine motivation inspired Italians expend so much time, attention to detail, and resources to build such an astonishing place.

After St. Peters, I failed to find the entrance of the Sistene chapel before closing and grabbed a gelato on the north side of town. Since Matt did not give me any directions to his play, I did some more exploring on my own. I walked past the Italian house of representatives and the Pantheon. I then spent some time listening to some live music at the Piazza Navona and read a travel guide to Rome in an international bookstore. It was 8:00 and I went back towards Matt school to meet him for some pizza with his cast and crew. However, Matt was forty-minutes late so I ended up sitting there for a while listening to my iPod and watching a fender bender involving some Smart cars.

I then went to a pizzaria with Matt and the cast who were celebrating their performance. They were all middle  aged (36-60) expats except for Matt and all of them congratulated themselves for a good show. After talking with Matt and some cast members, the pizza came and it tasted great. I also ate some great panna cotta for desert. After a long dinner, I walked back towards Termini and my hostel. I saw a monument dedicated to Italian reunification and Trajan’s column. Since I was meeting Matt at 7 AM Friday morning to catch a train, I immediately went to bed upon returning to the hostel.

After class that I started conducting my finance research and self improvement projects. I  realized when I recording that weeks Wall Street University, that I still have not caught up enough knowledge about the current market climate to do a show about a non FOREX topic, so I decided to wait until next Wednesday to release WSU #11. I have also done a lot of studying for my classes and some personal research about the European Union which I will go into further detail in a political post.

I also began my experiment with twitter. As a skeptic of twitter, I wanted to test to see if I tweet every time I write a new post, will it result in any significant increase in traffic. So far it has not, but I have only released two posts since then. I will give a about six weeks and see if anything happens. However, based on what I have seen, I am very critical of twitter. There are only two things you can do. Post a tweet (same thing as a facebook status) or follow someone else’s chain of tweets. I understand it may be useful for a public figure, but what’s the difference between a facebook status update and a twitter account. Pretty much nothing. People thirty-five and over always rave about the revolutionary impact about twitter and how it’s the next hot/original thing to hit the internet since Youtube. Give me a break. Maybe the only reasons people because it is the only social network that is so simple, that old people can figure out how to use it. Other than that, I cannot think of a reason for Twitter’s hype. More on this will come when I see the net affect of traffic to the website.

After my twitter venture, I stopped by a lounge call Spazzio Fitzcarraldo to try to be more sociable. There was no line and a bunch of nice couches, but I was the youngest person there by at least eight-to ten years as it seemed to be a thirty-somethings hangout. I also noticed when I walk around here is that there are lot more young women going out with significantly older guys (10+ years and graying) than in America (even compared to Newport Beach which is gold digger city).  I left the lounge and got a gelato and then chilled.

I decided to make Friday a day off from the weeks of work which were tiring me out. I slept in really late and kind of lounged around all afternoon. In the evening I decided to go to the northeastern side of Milan to find what Tripadvisors rated as the best pizza of Milan: Pizza OK. I took the metro to Montenapolenone and walked through the street of overpriced clothing stores. Then I found a park with some museums inside. It was nice park that a had a forest like feeling and cliff sides/trees that blocked the view and noise from surrounding traffic. The park was also supposed to be a zoo, but all the cages were empty. After walking to the other edge of the park, I saw a colonial style mansion. I walked inside it and it was another one of these cheesy modern art museums. I left and walked up the street until I reached the turnoff that lead to the pizza place.

I arrived at 7:00, but they would not serve food until 7:30 so I had to wait outside. I ordered a pizza topped with bacon and it was the best pizza I have had so far in Milan and it tasted great. I found it strange that the bacon was cured like some cold-cut ham and not fried like in the states, but that is just cultural differences for you. I then took the metro back to my dorm and chilled for a while

I then went to an informal floor party a few doors down that night and got to know some more of my neighbors. However, a brief acquaintance who was there had spread a rumor around that I was some kind of geek or tool and it angered me very much (I don’t like people more judgmental than I am). I then got berated further for not drinking beer, but they seemed chill about it later. Its seems like most of the people in my building are full time students from the Eastern bloc. Most of the people there were Bulgarians or Lithuanian. I also think that Chi and I are the only Americans in the building (Chi was gone somewhere that night). I talked to them mostly about differences between the European and American school systems and some other topics. I have to give credit to foreigners from outside the Anglosphere for being able to have strong English skills. Most Italians do not speak English, but almost all of the non-Italian students speak it fluently including everyone I met on Friday night. Foreign languages are not a strength of mine, so I’m glad  the rest of the world is catching on to English. We then went down to the ground floor to play foosball and ping pong until around midnight when I went back to my room to get some sleep for an early appointment on Saturday to the police station.

On Saturday and Sunday I did more of the Weeks of Work. I finally have my permit of stay forms (it only took several debacles at the post office and three hours waiting at the police station). I then concluded my financial research and now I am caught up enough on the markets to return high quality WSU podcasts and return to my summer/fall trading competition (which got tanked by a July at the land of no internet a.k.a. Fresno, CA).  I also went to Bocconi’s Investment Banking Saturday program where I listened to pitches from Credit Suisse, UBS, and Goldman Sachs and talked to their officials about following up applications. All I left to do is to finish following up on applications and some more studying for my classes and the weeks of work will be over by Wednesday. The next question is, now what’s next?

Destination #8 Pisa, Italy

Pisa was a nice Tuscan town that resembled Florence somewhat in its atmosphere. I grabbed a fresh baked Italian waffle (I think that it may be a Tuscan thing because they were not in Milan or Venice) for a late breakfast and walked across the Arno to get to the Leaning Tower.

The leaning tower of Pisa was an impressive building that actually gained its lean by the engineers choosing a plot of land where the soil had uneven consistency. I took some pictures and walked around the rest of the complex including the Pisa Duomo, old city walls and some other Renaissance Era buildings. I went to go buy a ticket to enter the tower, but the only way you could enter was by joining a tour. The next tour was not until 12:40, and by the time it would end, I would miss my train so I was unable to climb to the top of the tower. I joined another tour group and tried to sneak inside the tower with them, but I was caught along the way and could not get in.

As impressive as the Leaning Tower was, there is not much else to Pisa. The whole city revolves around the tower including all of the major monuments being right next tower (which originally was supposed to be the bell tower for the Duomo), the museums related to it, and also the souvenirs joined this theme such as the leaning mugs and shot glasses of Pisa which were tilted as the same angle as the tower. I bought some gifts for my siblings at a gift shop and then ate some Pisa pizza for lunch. After lunch, I walked back to the train station to catch a train to Lucca.

Jared actually showed up at around 8:30 that on Friday night. He told me he tried to find me on campus, but then fell asleep before sending me a Facebook message. He dropped off his stuff at my place and went off to dinner. Before going to dinner we stopped at Jared’s hotel to pick up some of his stuff. It was called the Arco Romana, and I remember for being the sketchiest hotel I remember in Europe. First the hotel was just the sixth floor within a building of apartments. Secondly, the elevator was really creepy. It was small with manual sliding doors and jittered as it ascended up to the sixth floor. The front desk of Jared’s hotel was manned by an eleven year old kid playing Call of Duty. The desk also required that you can only have possession of your key when in the building. I sat on the couch and waited for Jared until he was done changing and getting his things. We then went to dinner at the same pastaccheria I went to on Friday and had another delicious plate of pasta with meat sauce. Afterwards we went to the train station to pickup tickets for Venice tomorrow. Jared told me that the ticket used the last of his money, because he lost his debit card on the plane and only had 50 euro left for a week in Italy. Ouch! I told him to have his mom wire him some money into his Wells Fargo account which he actually has the card, but only 4 cents in the account. We then walked back to my dorm because I wanted to go to sleep for an early morning. While I fell asleep, Jared tried to access his Bank of America account, but found out his mother changed the password.

The next morning I woke up at 5:30 AM to catch my 7:30 train to Venice. Jared and I were supposed to meet at the McDonalds at 6:30, but Jared was nowhere to be found. At first, I felt like ditching Jared, but I went towards the Arco Romana, and woke him up. Since Jared overslept, we were running late for our train. The stop by my school was under construction, so we ran to the next stop a few minutes away and caught the metro. We hurried at the station to barely make our departing train. I rested, almost got fined by not validating my Eurail pass, and finished listening to The Creature of Jekyll Island audio book (which is very interesting book about the Federal Reserve System) and got to Venice at 10 AM.

Venice was everything I expected it to be. The city whole city was afloat on a stone covered archipelago and all the buildings were tightly packed together. It seemed like a living time capsule as all of the building except for modern signs looked like it was still in the 17^th century. The water was a murky green color, yet had a shiny veneer to it that made look somewhat natural. Venice was also much cooler than Milan and the day felt nice with a pleasant seaside breeze.

Our goal for the day was to find the San Marco Square, but we took a few detours and wrong terms to fill up our day until we got there. We crossed the first bridge onto the insular parts of the city to start our quest. The fun thing about of Venice is that it is filled with tons of nooks, hidden alleys, and side roads to provide for some interesting adventures. The attraction of the city is to walk around and explore the city, so it’s great for people who like to discover things on their own. Venice also is a great city for frugal travelers, because the only expenses from going to Venice are meals and if you are away from the San Marco square, you can get good deals for food. We explored the hidden side of Venice as part of getting lost. Some things we did included finding munchkin sized doors and tunnels, crossed the Rialto Bridge, and accidently walked into mental institute while confusing it for a museum (awkward). After a half a day of wandering, we got some lunch at an Egyptian themed pizzeria called the Pyramid. We split three pizzas between the two of us and Jared ordered a corrected coffee which I learned was mixing an espresso with whisky. The idea sounded terrible and Jared ended up telling me it tasted like crap.

After lunch we continued our trek. We found a statue of an eighteenth century composer named Carlo Coldoni whose statue labeled his life from 1707-1907 which seemed preposterous (he actually died in 1793). Then we tried to go to a cathedral, but it was closed for a wedding. On our way we found some workers setting up a communist “party”. It seemed kind of hypocritical that Marxists would be throwing a party and selling food and literature, but that shows left-wing hypocrisy at its finest. I saw a tower that looked the San Marco spire, and entered an old abandoned library that led to the entrance of the cathedral. It was very impressive inside filled with old medieval church art and Romanesque sculptures. The churches in Italy to me seem to feel a lot more holy than those in America. This might be explained by the fact that I am much closer to the root of the Catholic Church than in the states. It continues to amaze me how God has been able to motivate people to build such incredible art and architecture in his honor and the cathedrals increase this reverence.

After exiting the cathedral, we thought that the square would be right by it and walked towards the coast. Out of curiosity, we walked on an industrial steel bridge to the east. We found some strange signs that said forward you will find the “hate society” and “unconditional love”. On the way we found an open warehouse that led to a modern art museum. This museum showed some pretty strange stuff including videos of torture, a man ranting about AIG, a vending machine considered art, a giant set of rings, and other modern art stuff. We walked further down the bridge that led to another art museum that was labeled as a spa and a Jacuzzi. We went inside and found a swimming pool with a red bench submerged at the bottom. We climbed over the fence to have a better look and ended up getting kicked out of the museum because they thought that we stuck our hands in the water (which we did not). We reached the end of the bridge and there stood a building that has a sign that said “Something Strange Happened Here” in big pinstriped letter. I found it hilarious and told Jared that he should put that phrase on the window of his apartment in Santa Barbara.

Jared’s Strange reaction to the museum

We then walked up the coast the other direction, ate a gelato, and asked for directions from some Dutch tourists. They told us we were going the wrong way and on the opposite side of the city. I learned that the cathedral we entered was actually the San Francesco cathedral and that we needed to turn around and backtrack our way towards the Rialto bridge to find the San Marco Square. We retraced our steps and found our way to San Marco Square. The signs were incredibly misleading and points there were signs that going in opposite directions would lead to the same place. Nevertheless we found it. I took some pictures and went inside the cathedral and then decided to rest against the wall of a construction site after a day of walking. A police officer told us to move and we went to sit somewhere in the shade. When touring the square, I found the statue of Diocletian’s tetrarchy. As a fan of Roman history, I was the only one in the square who seemed to recognize it.

On the way back to the train station Jared and I discovered unequivocally the worst museum in the world. It was called (insert here) and the best feature of the museum was the free restroom (the rest of the city charged 1.50 Euros). Their signature exhibit was a ceiling of pink and yellow lights. That is so fascinating. They also considered an ordinary looking stone gate as piece of fine art. We then crossed a modern looking glass bridge to reach the train station. Since we were early, I ate some spaghetti for dinner at a nearby restaurant and watched the boats go by at the canal. We then boarded the train and talked about our summers, families, and past and future travels. Upon arriving in Milan, we went to my place. Jared went to the front desk to contact his uncle who lives in Milan and I went to sleep.

Due to my website crashing, I lost post #1 (didn’t say much), and posts 7-8. However, I had preserved posts 2-5 that cover my arrival to Italy and trip to Florence. At the bottom of this post, I will recap posts 6-8.

Here is an archived recap of Nick’s International Adventures parts 2-6:

Country #1 United Kingdom

Destination 1: London, UK

As I am writing this post I am sitting in the London Heathrow airport. However, by the time this is published I will probably be in my hotel in Milan (It’s not worth four pounds for the Internet access required to publish in Italy). My trip so far has just been airports and sitting on an ten hour flight. Due to a lack of LA traffic, my mother and I arrived to the airport quite early at 4:00 for a 7:50 flight. This ended up in a lost of time waiting in LAX. We had dinner at Chili’s and my fajita was the worst fajita I ever had with cardboard flavored tortillas, and low quality meat. The chicken wings were awful too and tasted like teriyaki chicken nuggets. Restaurants like Chili’s, Olive Garden, and T.G.I. Fridays are what American food and chain restaurants to gain such a bad reputation.

After dinner I went to the bookstore. I debated between getting a biography of Andrew Jackson or A Year Living Biblically. I ended up getting A Year Living Biblically by A.J. Jacobs, because some of my college friends recommended it and looked really funny. It’s a story of an agnostic Esquire writer who decides to try to live for a year abiding every rule in the Bible from the Ten Commandments to the most obscure Jewish law. I read the first sixty pages on the plane and think the book is humorous and entertaining so far.

The one thing I do not like about international travel is long flights. Los Angeles to London was a ten hour flight and was horrendous. For a person who finds sleeping on a couch as “roughing it”, trying to sleep on a chair in an airplane is impossible. I stayed up the whole flight. I felt cramped the entire way and I wonder how somebody taller than me can even fit in a coach seat of an international flight. I ended up spending my flight watching part of season 2 for Chuck and listening to an audiobooks.

I then landed at London Heathrow and ate a mediocre cheeseburger for lunch. My flight ended up being delayed an half and hour. The three hour layover provided me the time to write this part of the post. Then after the layover, I boarded my flight to Milan. At this point I was so tired that I was yawning every five seconds. But due to being in an airplane seat, I could never fall asleep.

Country #2: Italy

Destination #2 Milan, Italy

After a two hour flight my plane landed. Customs was really easy and all I went through was a three minute line and a stamp of the passport. I was able to get my stuff at the baggage claim, but my mother’s suitcase never showed up on the conveyor. While my mom was panicking about here missing clothes and make up, I told her it was just got misplaced on the connection. After talking to the Malpensa lost and found, that ended up being the case and her bag was sitting at London Heathrow. The Marriott driver then picked us up in his Mercedes and we headed to the hotel. The Milan Malpensa airport far away from the airport as we went through thirty minutes of suburbs and forest before we got to the hotel. As soon we checked in I got ready to bed and went to sleep.

Last night I slept incredibly well. One thing that Marriott’s do well is their bedding. The sheets and the mattress pad felt like new and the made the bed extra sof t and comfortable. I woke up at 11:15 AM this morning. I then took a bath to wash up. Next to the toilet there is this odd shaped bowl with a small faucet. I asked my mom what this was and she told me it was called a bidet. I later learned that many Europeans use this bidet instead of toilet paper.

We then went to a bar for breakfast. In Italy, bars are different than in America. It more like a coffee shop except with a soda fountain and a beer draft. However, there are no bar stools, and they charge extra to sit down in the restaurant area, so I ate my croissant standing at the bar. After breakfast we went to the train station. After an hour wait, we caught the train to Florence. The train from Florence to Bologna bolted at high speeds of over eighty-five miles per hour. The seats were also comfortable and the trains were modern. Comparing this to Amtrak is like comparing a Mercedes to a Kia. After stopping in Bologna, the train slowed down, but the ride was still under two hours. During the train ride, I listened to some more Italian lessons, but I still did not understand when a passenger complained to us for sitting in the wrong seats halfway there.

Destination #3: Florence, Italy

We got off the train and quickly boarded a taxi. This station was less mazy than Milan. We then went to our hotel that stands on the banks of the Arno River. After unpacking, we went to a statue park where filled with Roman and Renaissance statues including a statue of Nero for cutting heads, a copy of Michelangelo’s David and some mythical figures. We then went to dinner at a small restaurant in an adjacent alley. My pizza was good, but the restaurant was overpriced and service was slow.

A common theme of Europe so far has been how everything is incredibly overpriced. I know the dollar is weak to the Euro (1.43 to 1 as of writing this), but the ways people nickel and dime you is ridiculous. First the currency exchange shop ripped my mother off of seventy-five dollars at the airport. Then every time you go to the restaurant, the restaurant charges a 1-5 euro cover charge per person. Also when they say an appetizer is for two people the restaurant charges twice the price of the stated menu price. Other annoyances include charging for public bathroom use, 10 percent value added tax on all goods, and the general prices for things are overinflated.

Service at the restaurant was also slow as it took over two hours to eat. This may be also a cultural difference. After dinner, I ate a Gelato and walked to the Ponte Vecchio (a bridge with houses and shops attached to it). Then I returned to the hotel and went to sleep.

On the second day in the Florence my mother and I woke up early to catch a tour of the Palazzo Vecchio. The Palazzo Vecchio was a castle in the heart of Florence. Our tour focused on the secret passages within the building. The palace was owned by the Medici family: a clan of bankers that was known for their sneakiness. We went inside the secret rooms of Cosmo and Francesco Medici. They used these rooms to hide rare collectibles behind paintings while using art to provide clues to what is hidden in the room. In Francesco’s room, he used it to hide his passion of alchemy from his father.

Secret room in Palazzo Vecchio

After the tour, I went to lunch and ate rigatoni Bolognese and penne pesto. The pasta was great, however it has been increasingly difficult to find any pasta not named spaghetti or gnocchi in Italy.

After lunch we went to the Galileo museum which tracked the history of the solar system theories up to Galileo’s proof of the heliocentric theory. I thought the museum was incredibly interesting as it showed exhibits from cuneiform tablets to original copies of Copernicus’s writings and Galileo’s telescopes. My mom on the other hand disliked the museum and the only thing resembling physics and astronomy she cares about is astrology.

After the Galileo museum we went to the Academic Gallery to see the statue of the David. Overall, the museum was unimpressive. The surrounding exhibits of knockoff 19th century Roman sculptures and experimental photography showings to the David were awful. We then got gelatos and walked to the hotel and took a nap.

For dinner we went to the Golden View restaurant. This place had the best food I ate so far in Italy. I ordered lobster spaghetti and a four cheese calzone. The pasta was the best dish I have eaten at a European restaurant; however the calzone lacked marinara sauce which made it taste more like a quesadilla than a calzone. Dinner runs late, if you are not in a hurry it lasts easily over two hours. Also at this time realized that pepperonis are part of American cuisine and not found in Italy. During dinner, I was hit with jet-lag and after I finished eating I walked back to the hotel to sleep while my mom got a tarot reading.

The next day, I slept in. After breakfast, my mother went shopping and I went to the Duomo. First I went inside the church and was told that I had to wait in another line if I wanted to climb to the top. So after a prayer, I left to the other line. The line initially went smoothly. However, when I reached the front, the guard would not let me in and told me to wait ten minutes. Twenty-five minutes later, they actually let me in the Duomo and I began my ascent. I climbed up the staircase, which was just stone, old, and narrow. I reached a room filled with statues of old popes, but then I walked down the hall and saw another flight of stairs. I climbed these stairs and then at the top was only the base of the dome. The interior of the dome is filled with an elaborate fresco of the fate of the soul. The fresco was filled wit detail and creativity of all the possible ways demons can eat people. Medieval and Renaissance artists seemed to always be more imaginative about the punishment of hell than the joys of heaven. Even as a Catholic myself, I think the church used these displays as scare tactics to keep people in the church since peasants had no way of actually reading the Bible. I walked around the base of the dome to find another staircase. This one was extremely narrow and with people coming down the stairs that led to a lot of sidling against the walls. As the dome curved upward the ceiling curved inward forcing me to slightly crouch. I finally reached the top after a series of false endings that resembled the third Lord of the Rings movie.

Once I reached the top I could see the whole the city from roof. I saw the rolling hills and villas perched on top of the rolling green hills of the Tuscan countryside and mountains. When people think of Italy, Florence provides the scenery and most uniquely Italian look of all of Italy. It also seems to have the most culture in such a dense area (Rome is more spread out) area. Ten minutes later I make climb down to the ground. I almost trip on the spiral of the staircase, but it was not a big deal. After the climb, I waited for my mom at the entrance of the church. After meeting up with my mom we headed to the Boboli gardens. However, my mom got caught up buying clothes and the gardens ended up closing before we could get there. After that we decided to eat. After getting lost in the alleys, we found a place. It was of good value, but the food was mediocre. I then went to the gelato shop and had one of my new favorite deserts. My desert was vanilla Italian cream sandwiched by two freshly baked waffles. After eating my desert, I went to sleep. The next day, I took the train to Bocconi and my trip to Florence ended.

The train arrives in Milan and the first thing I do is pickup my stored piece of luggage at the Marriott. After going to the Marriott, we took a cab to the Best Western Hotel Major. This is there I will be staying for the next six nights. The reason that this is the case is because during the last minute in July, I was kicked of Arcoboleno (the international student dorm) and ended up signing up for a different student dorm. However, they do not open until August 31st, and I start my language class on the 26th. As a result I lose $400, on a hotel (more Italian nickel and diming). I plan on appealing this as soon as possible to try to get some of my money back from the school. After checking in, we took the bus 90 to where we thought goes to the university. We ended up getting off two stops too late on a bus to bus that only takes you half way there. We had to backtrack for a half-hour to get to the school. The weather report said that the daily high was only 86 degrees, but the humidity made the oppressive. We finally arrived to the international student desk and got in line for registration. I ran into Austin, a girl I knew from high school and some UCSB classes, and a friend of hers but I was tired and did not feel like extending too long of a conversation. When I reached the registration, they told me they did not get my passport pictures I mailed them, so I had to remake my Bocconi ID card at another time.

We went to a bar by campus to have a ham sandwich after registration. It looked more like a lounge club with waterfall walls and with a mixed set of couches and lights, but this is Italy so bars are open all day. We then walked down Bligny Street to find an electronic store to get some power adapters. I usually not a fan of international standards, but I think the amount of different power plugs cause more confusion for no change in electrical efficiencies. For any electrical engineers reading this, can you explain what (if anything) is significant of the power plug differences across the world? We bought some adapters and Gelatos and then rested at the hotel.

For dinner, I ate at a local regional restaurant by the hotel. I stuffed myself with a two course meal of spaghetti with tomato sauce to start and big Florentine steak as my main course. The meal was great but I left uncomfortably stuffed. We then walked back to the hotel and waited for the taxi to pick up my mother. The taxi came and we said our goodbyes. After my mom left, I read a few articles on the internet and tried to sleep. However, I was restless, because I am starting school tomorrow.

This first four days of my Bocconi experience have been quite similar, so I am going to condense them into a one day narrative that will mention all of the unique things. Around nine every morning I started my intensive language classes which lasted between five to six hours. We would have a lunch break for a half hour which generally expanded to forty-five minutes and was often awkwardly the first one back to class by a large margin.

One thing that I care about that Italians do not is timeliness and efficiency. Meals routine last over an hour (up to two when I was in Florence), and the waiters seem to loiter their way around before they serve you. Class always starts ten minutes later than they are supposed and breaks are doubled. I guess I inherited some Swiss punctuality from my mother’s side of the family which does not seem to carry over to their southern neighbors. Stores and restaurants are also often close in the middle day for lunch, early in the afternoon for the day, random days of the week, and even sometimes the whole month of August. August is vacation month in Milan, and it is the first time I ever seen a major city almost completely close down for a month. I think these effects of socialism on a society along with a cultural attitude that is a little lax. With 60+% income tax rates and 10% value added taxes along with regulations that control the business hours of companies, I cannot blame the Italians to naturally take an artificially low cost of leisure the Italian government creates with this system. Not to get too political, but America will its edge as a center of hard work and innovation if we let Obama get his way with things such as healthcare and cap and trade. Italy could be a comparable example of the best case scenario of a socialized America (system works better with smaller countries).

After class I would run errands. I had to get my phone set up, train pass, ID card, school supplies etc. However, I still cannot get it to activate, so I have to go to the phone store on Monday to fix it. Also when I tried to appeal to the housing department and asked if I could pay on a lump sum for my rent. They said they would not do anything, that the housing director is still on vacation, and if I have any problems, then move into a hostel. My stuff would probably get stolen in a hostel (can’t fit two large suitcases in a locker), and I heard there was no air conditioning in the hostels so I felt good about staying in a hotel. However, going out ever meal other than the complimentary breakfast made my food a lot more expensive. After errands, I would do my homework and rest a little bit.

During the evening, I would wander around the southeast section of town and go eat at various restaurants. When it comes to lunch, dinner, and dessert, Italy’s food cannot be beaten, and I have loved every meal I’ve eaten at a decent restaurant. On Friday night, I changed things up a little but taking the metro to the Milanese Duomo area. I saw the cathedral which was nice, but not as impressive as the one in Florence. I then went to a mall like complex with large glass arches as roofing over the walkways in the square. As a fan of architecture I was impressed by the structure, but in general the city of Milan is incredibly drab an industrial looking. Even Bocconi University has an industrial theme. The restaurants around the Duomo were triple the price of the rest of the city, so I found a passteria a few blocks a way. I found rigatoni for the first time in a while (They call it maccharoni here) and it tasted great. I then walked around and explored downtown. No shops or nightlife institutions were open except for a cougar den by the Duomo and a cheap souvenir shop so I just to a walk around the area for an hour and a half. I saw an old Roman gate, Fiat car shaped tree planters parked on the curbs, and a bunch of designer displays. Around 10:30 I decided to head back. Since I had Saturday school, I could not stay out too late, so I hopped on the Metro back to the hotel.

This morning was the first time I ever had Saturday school. In California, Saturday school was an alternative to detention or a punishment to go to if you broke the law (like traffic school). I had a hard time getting up early, due to not being used to going to school on Saturday. Fortunately this the only Saturday I will ever have school. In fact when my language program ends, I will not class on Fridays either. Coincidentally half the class did not show up to class today. After school I took a nap and now I am writing this post.

Overall, I do not like Milan so far. Depending on my budget, I may expand my travel plans because there seems to not be much to do here other than nightlife and walking. So far only exchange students have arrived on campus. While I was in Florence, they moved into Arcoboleno and formed their set of cliques. I am not here to hang out with Americans, but it has been kind of isolating and lonely since I have been in Milan. I never hear about the student events/meet-ups at apertivos (mix of a restaurant and bar) until the day after. Besides all I ever hear anyone talk about is drunken shenanigans, so I probably would not get along with them anyway. However, I cannot make any judgments until my real classes start. Things will get better when I start travelling on the weekends, the town opens, and my normal school starts. Also my best friend from college told me he will be visiting Milan for a week starting on Monday so I am excited about that.

Posts 7 and 8 continue with my difficult time adjusting in Milan, exploring the city, and some cultural observations and waiting for Jared to arrive from Santa Barbara as he later would on Friday night.