B(o)log(na)

I suppose I should give some sort of introduction, both of myself and my situation here in Italy, this being my first blog post here and all. First blog post anywhere in fact. Anyway, I’m Mark and I’m vacationi… er,  study in Bologna, Italy this semester. I’ve actually been in Italy since the beginning of the year, but I was in Siena for the first half. After my wonderful experience there, I couldn’t bring myself to kiss good Italian pizza goodbye just yet, and so I decided to stay just a little bit longer. Or something like that.

Bologna’s a lot different than Siena. I made an incredibly clever vacation joke up there (am I right?!), but the fact is that Siena really was as close to a vacation as you can get while still technically attending classes. We traveled every weekend, went to bars every night, and just generally passed those three months without a care in the world. I kid you not, a seventy-something year old Italian grandmother cooked me dinner every single night, and it was as good as you think. Better even (P.S. That’s me with her granddaughter Vittoria up there, I swear I’m not just creepy). But here in Bologna, class is a little bit more involved, and life in general is actually pretty close to what it would be if I were in Santa Barbara right now. I attend a real university, I try to intersperse the bar time with reading, I live with other students my age and am forced to listen to their awful music choices, etc. All the same stuff my loyal readers (all two of you) are dealing with. The roomies don’t even cook me dinner every night, even when I snap my fingers extra loud.

There are some differences, of course. Bologna (and apparently other parts of the world too) has what they call “winter,” where cold white fluff falls from the sky and you have to wear “jackets” and “scarves.” It sucks. I used to think I wanted to live somewhere where there was winter, but now I think I understand why my parents went from Nebraska to California, not the other way around. That and the tasty fish tacos. I also spend some of my time speaking and struggling to understand a different language, which is probably the most apparent difference. That and the egregious lack of any tasty fish tacos. Also Italian school is incredibly disorganized, but more on that later.

So that’s my life here in Bologna, perhaps not quite so glamorous as you thought. I’m pretty much just a regular university kid here, since it’s so diverse with people from  all over Europe and the world. I’m not going to say my life isn’t exciting, but I’m not exactly a rock star. You’ll see.