First time at school

Today I went to the school to meet my advisor and see the school. As I walked there today, I wasn't really sure what the meeting was going to be about exactly. Even after the meeting, I'm not sure what it was about. I think it was just to get a short tour of the school and to start becoming familiar with the people I'll be working with. During our tour, I saw the staff room- where I met all of the English teachers and teachers from other departments, the main office, the computer labs that we'll have access to, and the principal's office- where I met the principal obviously. Everyone was really nice , but the first thing out of everyone's mouth was "You look so young!" and at one point, "You look like a student!" People tell me that in 10 years I will love these comments, but for now the last thing I want is to look exactly like one of the students... I also met the other American teaching assistant who is returning for her second year at the school.

The daily schedule is supposed to be finalized by this Friday, but I was told that even after it is finalized it might change anyway. Either way, I won't know which classes I'll be in any earlier than this Friday.

Anyway, besides meeting people I got my own personal code for the school wifi and a 2014-2015 calendar for the school year. For anyone who wants to visit me or invite me to visit them in their various luxurious European cities (just kidding...unless you want to?), here are the days I have off:

Dec. 8
Dec. 22- Jan. 6
Feb. 19- Feb. 21
Apr. 1- Apr. 7
Apr. 25
May 1                                  

Apparently last year there was also an October vacation but when the other American teacher asked the principal if there would be one this year as well, he said that they haven't decided yet...I repeat: Italian flexibility! You have to just go with the flow.  

Updates on previous blogs: Gym buddy confirmed. I'm going with my host sister tonight. The membership is for nights and weekends. She has been great so far and even offered to teach me how to drive stick shift. That should be hilarious. I'm not even sure it is legal for me to drive here..Anyway, I'm slowly but surely figuring out how I'll be spending my free time. Beside school and the gym, I'm really interested in taking a Spanish class and I've already found one on groupon but my advisor said that I might actually be able to take one at a local university. Other than those things, I will probably be going to Ferrara most weekends. One of these days, Giuseppe and I will take a little trip to Bologna. I miss it. Last piece of news: My phone works. Message me for my Italian number!

Weekend in Ferrara

My first night's sleep was a little strange. I started getting sleepy early and dozed off on the couch with the dogs for a few minutes before going to bed. Then I was up from 4:30am to 6:30am twiddling my thumbs, reading, and finally surrendering to being completely awake and straightening my hair. A couple more hours of sleep and it was time to head to Ferrara. I rode a motorcycle for the first time ever that day because my host dad offered to give me a ride to the train station on his. It took about 10 minutes, and even though the house is in a very city-like neighborhood, it is all fields and farms after a couple minutes drive in the car. Plus, it was a beautiful, sunny day so that was a plus. I loved it but I was still a little nervous and had jelly legs at the end. The next time I go to the station though I'll probably have to take the tram, bus, etc. From where I am, it is apparently a little more complicated to get to that particular station (Milano Rogoredo) than it is to get to the main station (Milano Centrale) but it's worth it. The prices are a lot lower from Rogoredo.

Milan is in Lombardy and Ferrara is in Emilia-Romagna, so the trip isn't so bad. The map shows all the regions of Italy. Just to give you some context, Venice is in Veneto, Florence and Pisa are in Tuscany, and Rome is in Lazio.

Anyway, Giuseppe was there waiting at the station and since we were both starving we went straight to an all-you-can-eat Chinese restaurant for lunch where tiny plates of food come by on a little conveyor belt that never stops. 10 euros per person. We went out with a couple of his friends that night but other than than we didn't really go anywhere else this weekend. I'd been to Ferrara before, but this time I couldn't get over the crazy amount of  people riding bikes on the narrow, cobblestone streets and passing by from behind and in front with inches to spare. It kind of gives the city character though. Lots of people on foot, on bikes, and only a few cars. One last adventure we had was getting an Italian Sim card. I was told it would take 2 hours to activate and we are going on about 36 now...I asked around and apparently results may vary when it comes to activating phones. I might still have to wait a couple of days. If you haven't heard from me that was why. Also, I didn't really have internet access over the weekend. Soon, it will be all set though and you can reach me easily through Whatsapp. Message me if you want my Italian cell number.

Tomorrow, I've got some more of the paperwork that needs to get done before I can technically legally live and work here and then Tuesday, I'm meeting with the advisor at the high school to talk about my schedule this semester. She said I'll probably start teaching next Monday the 6th instead of the 1st as we'd originally planned. Italian flexibility! Sounds great to me because by then I will be over any latent jet lag, have a better idea about the classes I'll be helping out with, and will have had time to get some lesson plans together. In the meantime, hopefully I'll get to know Milan a little better! My host sister is actually taking me to the phone shop again tomorrow at the mall and I actually plan on asking her to be my gym buddy because apparently she goes every day. For those of you who know me, yes, I know I never go to the gym but I figure it would help me get a routine going here. Teaching is definitely time-consuming, but I still have quite a bit of free time and I'm trying to think of ways to fill it..I know Facebook makes it seem like trips to Europe are all traveling, but if you are actually here to work you kind of need to construct a real life!

First day

My flight flew into Milan ahead of schedule and my host mom was waiting there to pick me up with a sign that said "Cindy" so that made things easy. She offered me a coffee right away but sadly, despite being in one of the most coffee-loving places in the world, I don't like coffee so she just got me a "latte macchiato" instead, along with a chocolate brioche. The literal translation of "latte macchiato" would be something like "dirtied milk", which ends up just being a drink that is mostly milk with a spot of coffee.

The first order of business before relaxing was heading to the police station to quickly fill out a form called the "dichiarazione di ospitalità". If you are a foreigner living and working in Italy, you need to go there along with your host family or landlord and basically declare that they are providing you with a place to live. My host mom is super charming, so in no time the young police officer was using his own personal machine to make photocopies of the form and our ID's. It really is helpful to have a veteran of Milan expedite some of these annoying beaurocratic things that I might have botched on my own.

After getting that out of the way, we headed home and I got to check out my room and bathroom. I don't have to share either of them, which is heavenly. My host mom's daughter is actually doing a high school exchange program in America during my entire stay here, so I am in her room. I've been told that the only restriction is that I can't take down any of the pictures of her and friends that are taped to the wall. I can live with that. 

She has another daughter who is around my age and lives in another part of Milan. She's offered to show what night life here is like, so I'm all set in that department. Finally, she has a son who is in his last year of high school and lives with us. He's a boxer so I'll probably go see a match one of these days. We've got two dogs- a 1-year old extremely energetic pit bull named Niki and an old and fragile beagle named Lola. Niki can get really persistent when she wants to play and that makes me a little nervous sometimes because her body is 99% muscle, but I am really looking forward to having dogs for a year.

I'm really sleepy so the order of events here is getting a little jumbled, but at some point I gave my host mom her gifts that I brought from America- peanut butter and jelly, brownie mix, and a cookbook called "America's Favorite Food". I got the pb and j and brownie mix because those are typical things you'd find in a lot of American houses and even though you can find all that stuff here, it is not too common and always much more expensive than it should be. Therefore, people barely ever buy them. The recipe book is great because my host mom likes cooking. Lucky me. ;)

She also helped me out with getting my train tickets to Ferrara and signing up for a Cartafreccia which makes ordering the train tickets online a lot easier. I think most of my friends know this, but my boyfriend Giuseppe lives in Ferrara and I'll be heading down there a lot of times over the weekend. So the sooner the route to get there via public transit becomes automatic for me, the better! Finally, we took a walk so we could print out the tickets and so my host mom could show me how to get from the house to the high school I'll be teaching at. It is less than a 15 minute walk and is basically a straight shot. That's about as convenient as it gets. 

Other things that are near her house: 

*A huge supermarket so if I ever run out of any toiletries or if I want to stock up on snacks, I just have to take a 5 minute walk and I'm there. 

*A dorm where there are a bunch of foreign students studying abroad in Milan who apparently pop up all the time in the grocery store. I might have to accidentally run into one of them and makes friends...

*Stops for the tram and metro.

Good first day. Tomorrow, I'm off to see Giuseppe for the weekend and then Monday I have to be back to get my health insurance and "permesso di soggiorno" all squared away. For those of you who will never plan on studying or working in Italy, don't worry about what that is. Just more paperwork I've got to get it done within 8 days of my arrival, so sooner rather than later is best. Tuesday, I meet with my contact at the school. Wednesday, I am told that I'm going to start teaching. I'm just going with the flow! 

Getting my visa

I'm writing this first blog mainly as a resource for future applicants to the SITE program or students that have been accepted to the program and are wondering where things go from there. It is kind of boring and purely informational, so if you're one of my friends or family members you're probably not going to find this one very interesting.

I've gone to my Visa appointment and will be picking it up in a few days. I'll be leaving on the 25th. Potential applicants to SITE should know that if you are accepted you won't be able to head to Italy until late September. Here is a snippet from one of the emails we were sent at the beginning of May:

"Contact the Italian Consulate at the very beginning of August. Please note that you must call the Consulate which pertains to your jurisdiction and make an appointment with them for 10 -15 September (not earlier, as the immigration quota are not published until end August/beginning of September, so the Consulate is not ready to issue visas before the beginning of September. Keep in mind that you cannot travel before being issued a visa, which will not happen before September. We suggest booking your flight for the 25-29 September, not before. ALSO, remember to book a roundtrip ticket (you need to have a return flight in order to get the visa, and a return for Christmas is considered a roundtrip)."

My visa appointment went great, mainly because I asked SITE to put me in touch with other people in the my area who had been accepted to the program as well. We made sure to double-check with each other which materials we were bringing so none of us showed up with an incomplete application.

Note: If any of you out there are reading this in preparation for your own visa appointments, I just thought you should know that the employees will be speaking to you in English. I know it is the Italian consulate, but this is really dry, bureaucratic stuff and no one expects you to have the vocabulary to talk about it in Italian! Also, the appointment from start to finish probably lasts about 5-10 minutes. You will be in and out. I should also mention that I'm talking about the Boston consulate and don't have any experience with consulates in other cities.

Federal Reserve Bank of Boston

aka

Home of the Consulate