Friday

Yesterday was a fun day.
It was Lucie's birthday. We had arranged to meet later in the day with some of her friends so I spent the morning sleeping and the early afternoon reading. I'm almost finished with sense and sensibilty, and looking forward to starting Atonement.
At 3.45 I left the flat and went on my way to the bus station. I stopped at ricordi megastores to get Lucie's prezzie. I got her "tre metri sopra il cielo" or three steps over heaven. Its a famous Italian youth romance film that has a bit of a cult here. Its a great film and the lead actor is gorgeous. I also got myself the Twilight soundtrack and the new Franz Ferdinand album, in preparation for the gig in March.
After that I carried on and got to the bus station in good time. I looked for the bus stop but there wasn't the one I was looking for. Lucie phoned me and I didn't realise that I had to get the bus to her. I then got the bus and all was OK. I didn't check the number of stops, but I got it right by chance and also they were at the stop, easy enough for me to see. There was Lucie, Julia (whos Hungarian) and another girl that I had met before whos German. I don't know her name. We then walked to Lucie's flat. It was small but really nice and nicely decorated in white. It seemed more modern than mine and her room was neat and homely.
We chatted for a while (in Italian), ate Lucie's birthday cake (coconut, it wasn't bad) and had a drink (non alcoholic). After that Julia left and it was me, German girl and Lucie. I gave Lucie her prezzie, and she loved it. We then chatted for ages in Italian and I was happy about how well I both followed and contributed, only occasionally falling into English. We talked about our recent exams, about languages, and about actors, films and books. It was great. Then German girl had to leave. Me and Lucie stayed and watched the film. It seemed that she liked it. I left at that point and Lucie went online to talk to her parents. It was all in all a good day and I was happy with my Italian.

Thursday

Right, we're actually back on track with the whole blogging every day thing. Lectures start again on Monday, so hopefully this blog will get a bit more interesting soon! He he.
So yesterday... I got up late. At half 12 I went to the main library to meet Lydia. We met there and then went to look at the courses for next week. We didn't spend that long looking but I did find a few that looked OK. Lydia said to look them up on the internet, but i'm not sure exactly how to do that. Apparantly some of the times and rooms are wrong as well. At this point me and Lydia went back to hers. We made omlette type thing for lunch. It had red pepper, onion and bacon bits in it. It was good. I had extra red pepper slices. Christina came in to talk to us as well. Then Lydia went to do more work and I went on my way home.
On the way back I went to the gym and asked how much it was. They're doing a deal until Saturday where you pay no joining fee (and other random costs) and its for 8am-3pm and its €67 for 4 months worth. I'm thinking about it. Its alot of money..€268 in all. May be worth it if I lose a load of weight though. I don't know.
Not much else has happened.

Wednesday

Righty. Wednesday wasn't one of the most exceptionally amazing of days, better than some though.
I went down to porta San Donato to get my Franz Ferdinand ticket. It cost €10 more than I thought it would, but it wasn't a problem. I was thinking about how I was going to get back in March for a gig in London (Jacks Mannequin, my joint favourite band). The ticket was easy enough to get. After that I went to see my English friends as their flat is very near the ticket shop. We chatted for a bit, I got pizza, more chat, they ate. I went home and slept. Not an amazingly interesting day. I was massively upset that the Jacks Mannequin tickets had sold out. I'm waiting for more dates.
update tomorrow.

This weekend and Monday and Tuesday

Hey everyone.
So this weekend has been ok. Saturday night I went out. Christina had friends over, so we all got together and went for a meal. We arrived at the osteria dell'orso, and it was raining. We asked, but a table for 7 wasn't going to be available for a while so we went to a nearby bar and all got a drink. It was a really nice very italian socialble place and there was alot of chatting going on. I thought Eloisa was a bit left out, due to the fact that we were mostly talking in English, but she didn't seem too put out. I finished early so me and Eloisa and Christina went to ask about the table again. We were told that we'd have to wait longer, so we went back and the decision was made to go to a different restaurant.
We all went to their landlords restaurant instead. The service was very slow, but the conversation was good, and I chatted to Eloisa a bit in Italian. I was served last, a humgungous pizza with sausage, bacon and potatoe chunks. It was delicious. Other people had muscles, or gnocci. I can't stand sea food! It seems to be the thing here though, along with other more traditional Italian dishes. Normally I finish my food but this pizza was massive and I was so so full. I shouldn't have eaten as much as I did, I was so full the whole night that I could hardly move. It tasted so good though. I had also had bruchetta (we started eating at 9, and didn't get served our main course until about half past 10!) which didn't help. I was expecting to be done and to go and see Lucie at half past 10. That caused alot of confusion, as my phone didn't send the texts I sent to excuse us.
Eventually we finished our meal (with extra dessert stuff free from the landlord) Eloisa and Hannah left us. We then made our way to the club. We arrived, found Lucie, Marco (Italian) and Julia (Hungarian) and made our way in. We got a table! and sat down. We took pictures, chatted, got drinks and waited for the dancefloor to get a bit fuller. During this time we had various interuptions from enthusaistic but rather overgroomed young Italian men. They were being nice, not pervy, so they didn't irritate me too much. Its just I still can't get used to the massive socialness, althought i've never been one for socialising in clubs. I think thats because, althought most people can't hear anything either, I have bigger problems because of my ears. Plus pubs and bars are for socialising, not clubs. I have no idea why so many people go to clubs with the expectation of pulling.
Enough ranting, on with the story. We brought a bottle of bubbly (not sure what type). We had to get it or pay for the table, and it was pretty expensive. I paid, even though I didn't drink it. Marco opened the bottle, with customary Italian florish. More drinking and chat. Eventually some people started to leave, and then we went on the dancefloor. As more and more people left it was just me and Lucie at about 1.30am dancing. We carried on late into the night and we got so tired that by the end we were just swaying around and being stubbon about not leaving until we had enough. I was still too full of food to feel very energetic. There was this really weird guy dancing by us as well. Julia went off with the guy who organised a table for us in the club. She got alot of attention, being very slim. We eventually went home, about an hour later than we normally would. I was utterly shattered.

Sunday not much happened. I slept late to catch up on sleep

Monday was the day of my exam. I woke up really early, as I always do when i'm worried and expect something. I stayed in bed until 7, and then set about getting myself ready for the exam. When I got there I had a stress trying to find the room, eventually I did and there were loads and loads of people there. I went to the next room and did revision as well as I could. Every half hour or so I would check on the queue, and it was always massive. Considering I arrived at 9, by the time it got to 12 I was very hungry and tired of waiting. When I checked the queue everyone had gone. I was confused and I saw in the room where the exams had been that there was a lecturers meeting. I asked at the main desk and apparnatly they had ran out of time. I have to do it another time. I suppose this suits me, as I was and still am very unprepared.
Monday was also Australia Day and I had been invited to a house party of some of my Aussie friends. When I went to go and see them I couldn't find where the road they live on was, despite having been down the road before. This resulted in me going up and down Via dell'independenza (a long main road) at least twice looking for it. I tried to phone said friends, but I have no credit on my phone. Eventually I gave up and came home again sadly.
Tuesday was very uneventful. I went food shopping, massive excitement! haha

Thursday and Friday

Not much been going on these last two days.
food shopping, paying rent, revising has been all really. After Monday it'll get more interesting, I promise

Wednesday

Right! Now we get onto the interesting day.
I woke up really early, as I always do when I think that I have to be up early the night before. I didn't open my eyes and I could tell it was late. I tried to get back to sleep with no avail. Eventually after about an hour, or maybe half, I opened my eyes. My phone said it was half past 6am. I stayed in bed until 7, and then was bored enough to get up and get ready. An hour later I was showed, dressed, packed (with many things to keep me occupied on the train) and was off. I didn't have food in the flat so I went early to pam (supermarket) and got some bagettes. That kept me going. The train left at 5 to 9am, and I was happy about it. The train ticket was €25, which I consider a bit steep considering the euro and the pound are equal AND that is for a one way ticket.

The train journey passed tollerably. As we got nearer to Milan suddenly the countryside got snow covered. It started with bits of snowed shovelled to the edges of streets, and then became foggy snow covered fields! I was amazed! Bologna is nothing like that at the moment. I read sense and sensibilty. Liz rang me to tell me that she'd missed her train and therefore couldn't meet me until 45 mins after I arrived.

When I arrived I thought the station was cool. It was huge and reminded me of stations like York and Liverpool. I took a picture. I went outside into the piazza and was most unimpressed. I thought that the station would be in an impressive place, but it wasn't. There was a skyscaper for the Lombardia region there, and not much else interesting. The station was the most interesting thing there. It was cold so I decided to look for somewhere to go and consult my map. There were two macdonalds there, but I went down the main road I could see looking for a side road with a cafe. I did this for a while but it wasn't very fruitful. Eventually I found one. I sat down with a drink and my map, whilst marking a bunch of churches I wanted to see! Then I got a call from Liz to say that she'd arrived. I went to the loo, which was one of those hole in the floor ones!!! and then left.

I met up with Liz at the train station, it was nice to see her. I talked about going to the duomo, and she said we should take the metro. I was going to walk, but it looked a long way (we both have little legs) and it would be warmer underground. The metro reminded me alot of the underground in London, and the rest of Milan also had a London type busy and big feel. We got on the train and went to the Duomo. If you've seen pictures you know how OTT it is, but it was interesting nonetheless. We walked around it once and then wondered what to do. We then went off to walk to find another church. I started with the map reading, then I got confused and Liz took over. This was probably a bad plan. We got lost a few times, and then finally found what we had been looking for. It was pretty, but we couldn't go inside. On the way back we found a horse statue to look at, and then we went back to the Duomo, with another random church to see on the way. We got back to the Duomo and decided to look at the shops around about. We went into the prada shop, for amusment, and then into another shop. Then Liz's friend called about lunch (this is 2pm, so Italian lunchtime), we got ourselves on the train again.

When we arrived there Liz directed us until we found a park. From there we had no idea where to go, so we waited. Eventually Liz's friend Daniella arrived. Daniella is a really sweet primary school and middle school teacher. She also speaks pretty good english (I spoke to Liz about her own talking italian, and she said "nooo, no one ever hears me talk Italian). She chatted animatedly, as Italians do, about the children and the new marking system that is causing contention. As well as this, we went to this nice Indian deli type place and got samosas, bahjis and some rice chicken dish. It was v nice food, and she chatted on. One of her fellow teachers saw me and Liz from behind and confused us with being students. They have kids up to 13 there, and as both me and Liz are near the 5ft mark I can see maybe why that mistake was made. It was nice to see her though, and she generously paid for lunch. She then had a teachers meeting and me and Liz left.

We went back to the Duomo, as it seemed as good a place to start as any. I then pointed out another place on the map, and we decided to take a metro to it again. This involved chaging trains in the middle, but we managed. When we arrived we decided to go to the museum. This involved an hour of walking in both directions getting lost. Eventually we found it. As it was the last hour before closing we got in for free! They had an exhibit on the history of Milan, which was cool. It had tons of busts and some really cool moasics that you could get really close up to. They had an exhibition on the etruscans as well, so we went to that. It was only small, but it reminded me of a few things from my lectures. It counts as revision hehe. There was another room with a massive mosaic on the floor, which we looked at too. After this we went back and went to look at the church.

This was much easier to find as it was near the train station that we had come from. It was St Ambrogio, which I had learnt about in my course, and which is famous. When we arrived I spotted that there was a massive dig next to the church. Obviously the archaeologists had gone home (this was half past 5, and these are Italians) but we got to see the trench. Big hole, nothing interesting is what it looked like to me. We then went to the church. It had a beautiful courtyard to go through before you got to the doors. The belltowers also rang at one point. It was pretty, and I took a few pictures. Inside was similar to the outside, pretty and white. It had chapels along the sides. Some were more decorated than others. I took a picture of the nice mosaic on the apse ceiling, but there was a massive altar in the way for some of it. Spoilt the picture. We went all around, and then left.

After that we went back to the Duomo and rang Daniella, but her phone was still off. We sat in front of the duomo and watched people for a while. It was cold, but not uninteresting. There was an MTV Italia crew on one of the buildings filming the square. When a bunch of kids realised this they went to the place in the centre of the view of the camera and waved alot. Liz said she saw a man with a sword, but I wasn't sure, he did have a cloak on though and looked military and severe. We then got through to Daniella, and she took a good 45 mins to get to us. When she did, we went to the nearest fast food place, as the time was near for me to go. Liz got a pizza, I got us two burgerking. It was good enough, and I felt satiated. After that we got the metro to the main train station. It was half past 8 and the nearest train was at 9. It turned out that the ticket machines were closed for cash, so I had to go to the ticket office. They both left at this point.
I got my ticket and got on the train. I was quite tired. I read more sense and sensiblity for most of the way until it was half past ten and I was tired. After Modena (the last station before Bologna) I got all stressy that I had missed Bologna and that I was going to stay the night at some train depot. This was, however, just me being very tired and silly. When I got back to Bologna I thought about getting a taxi as I was so tired and cold. I didn't in the end though, and just walked home in the dark. I went almost straight to sleep

Montag (yes, we are being German today) with added Dienstag

Righty... yesterday.
EDIT:
So, I didn't get around to doing anything on that really did I? oh well. Monday I really didn't do anything really, or Tuesday. Am a hopeless person when it comes to revising.
On Tuesday I decided to go to Milan the next day. That evening I had Nicola (Aussie) and her friend over. We watched trainspotting. They were disgusted at parts of it. Its so much easier to watch when drunk. At least they kinda liked it though. Urgh, its really not a film to watch before you sleep

Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday

So I havn't updated, but thats because i've pretty much not been doing anything other than boring normal tasks that are boring. Yet again my perchant for stating the obvious comes out there! haha
I can't think of anything interesting I did during the whole weekend until the end. I got an Italian rock music magazine, which was interesting. I'm using it to expand my Italian. Its alot more useful than English magazines as it takes me so long to read it all and understand! Value for money.
Saturday night I arranged for Lucie to come over. We watched the DVD of cruel intentions. It was as good as I remember and Lucie liked it too.
Sunday night I went to the goth pub Translyvania. It has the best aperativo. I went with some Austrailians from my classes before christmas. It was great to chat to them. We talked about lots of things. I didn't realise that Austrailia gets alot of BBC TV. I was really happy about that. We talked about languages, about food, about people. It was a really great evening. It went on until quite late (half past 11ish) and then I went home (as did everyone else).
I can't think of anything else interesting. I'll keep you updated. I've certainly doing nothing of note today.
xx

Tuesday and Wednesday

Tuesday I actually got my arse to the archaeology department to ask about exams. It seemed simple enough. I had a longish chat with the receptionist (which made me feel good about my italian). Basically I have an exam on the 26th, and my other lecturer for prehistory isn't back from christmas break yet. I'll have to find him later and ask about when the exam is.
I've also managed to finally fill my cupboard/fridge with food. Helpful.
Mostly during the day i've been re-reading the twilight books again. They're less full of tension and suspense, but they're still good.
Yesterday evening I went out! I met with Hannah, Christina and Lydia in this random Irish pub that I hadn't been to before. There were a bunch of old italian men next to us being loud and chatty. It was sweet. It was nice to catch up with Hannah. We chatted a bit about our hols. Hannah had been to Cuba, which was apparantly amazing. I chatted a bit about my holiday. Later on we discussed Lydia and her ex, and Hannahs new boyfriend. It was really nice to see them all again. We also disussed going to Milan-Bologna football match to see Beckham play, and also an Oasis concert.
After that I went to Hobby One and saw Lucie. It was v cool to see her again. I didn't realise how much i'd missed her. All the Belgians were there too. They left earlier than us, but it was still fun to dance until the end. I didn;t use my last drinks token either.
Thats all the news
Later x

Sunday and Monday

I didn't do much. Mostly chilling online.
I read Twilight again on Sunday
Monday was doing chores like washing clothes and cleaning the flat. Boring.
Tried to work out my internet connection, but its not gunna get any better than it is now. I still have some stuff to do, like upload photos.

Friday night and Saturday

Hey! Long time no type! I had an awesome Christmas break. Too much to blog about.
Friday Night I arrived back, had a quick chat to housemates. I stayed online, but didn't do too much and basically went to bed.
Saturday I went out early in my skirt as I needed breakfast. I got a comment about being cold, again. Later on that day I unpacked my clothes. I went to get money out to do a proper shop, but my card has been blocked internationally. Irritating.
Later on I went to see Lydia and Christina. It was really good to see them. We had couscous, fried veg and chicken. It was really tasty. After that we watched the Queen, which was a good film, and then Calender Girls. It was fun, but I left very late at night. I slept well