First Day of Orientation

Today was a LONG day. When I was only awake for 10 hours yesterday and to today having a 8-6 school day, it was a LONG day to say the least. Our program has 178 students! I was shocked when I saw us all together, a large majority of the program is made up of fashion students, and architecture has the smallest program right now with only three of us! One of our professors said in the spring there will be over 70 architecture students!! WELL anyway, we had a lot to learn today. Personally I think the best part of the day was when one of the local cops came to speak to us. He gave us a bunch of advice and tips, but he was also pretty funny. He says "women" is the #1 sport in Italian culture with soccer "football as they call it here"a close second. Apparently they Italian women are rude and mean and thats why the men work a little to hard for Americans. So after he taught us MANY lessons, we took a walk around Florence to learn important areas like the medical center, the hospital, the post office, AND we got to go to campus for the first time. The building is beautiful! And its in a great location. Less than a two minute walk from the duomo, and across the street there is a coffee shop, subway, gelato, mcdonalds, and a cute restaurant! But best of all it is right by a grocery store, and let me tell you. These are HARD to come by. And when you find them they are CRAZY over priced. But this one is right next door to our building and its brand new, and HUGE. So we went there and loaded up on supplies we needed. I got some peaches, grapes, yogurt, and Nutella!

Oh today i also had my first bad meal. I got a pizza from a little place right by the duomo and it was terrible (even though it looked pretty)

. It was soft and runny and EVERYTHING a pizza shouldn't be. SO for dinner we went back to the first place we ate in Florence because it was and still is the best meal we have ever had. I went back and got the same exact thing, Four Cheese Gnocchi, or as they call it Gnocchi ai quatro frommagi, Its delicious and best of all it is right on our street.