Domenica 25.01.09

Today was all about organization! We decided to plan our first trip out of Milan for next weekend. We picked Roma and got straight to work on picking out hostels, booking them, and then buying train tickets. This process was made even more difficult by the fact that there are 18 people going! Good news apparently travels fast because once our core group of friends starting discussing the plans, word spread and soon additional friends of friends were all crowded into Joey's room poring over hostel reviews.

We actually ended up spliting into two smaller groups; one will arrive Thursday morning and the other will arrive Friday morning (I'm in the Friday group because I don't want to miss class on Thursday and there's no class on Fridays). Even so, it took about 2 hours to make final decisions. Then add the extra 4 hours it took to get to the main train station, ask a MILLION questions in Italian about prices and timetables, and then buy tickets one by one... Hopefully, future trips will be less hectic and much more efficient. My instinct to act as "cruise director" led to a bit of stress today :)

PS: The picture attached to this post was from one of our first days getting to know each other. I thought I would put it up so you all can see my new friends! From left to right, top row first: Aamir, Joey, Adam, Jason, Anne, Me, Natalia, Mandy, Sasha, Maricor

PPS: My address here is Residenza Arcobaleno Bocconi, Via Fratelli Fraschini no. 3, Stanza 209, 20142 Milano, Italy in case anybody wants to send postcards from their study abroad adventures!