My City Life

Today I felt.....independent.

I woke up in my appartment alone (my roommates were in Cinque Terre visiting a friend for the day). I got dressed, grabbed nutella on toast for breakfast, then walked around the block to wait at the bus stop for the 57 Cordona, the bus I take to town everyday. I got on the bus, held on tighly as the driver squeezed around busy Milanese streetcorners, ignoring all caution. I walked all over the city, running errands, taking pictures, enjoying the sights and sounds. I had lunch at the University cafeteria (which is very good by the way). In a way it's like Saga, students do the Saga stare, tray in hand, but the food is incredible. There is always a heaping pile of fresh pasta, roasted peppers, spinach, cheeses, yogurt, an assortment of fruits.

After lunch I went shopping in the city. I had to pick up a backpack and few other things. During the afternoon as I was strolling through the Piazza del Duomo, Milanos central Piazza, this Italian man who I would say was thirty-something, came out of no where and struck up a conversation with me. His english wasn't very good and I don't speak Italian except for a few words. At first I thought, ok what does this guy want from me. He asked me about where I'm from and we talked in short simple sentances about San Francisco. He asked what I was studying at the University, and when I say "english" people get confused, and I don't knwo the italian word for literature, so he didn't know what I was talking about at all. He told me all about Milanese weather in the fall and winter and that he works 8 hours a day. I started to get anxious and wanted to come up with an excuse to leave when he started asking me about where my appartment was in the city. So I headed towards the metro as he followed me, and I took in a sigh of relief when I noticed he wasn't going to follow me down the steps. As we parted ways, I said, "it was nice to meet you, Guiseppe" and went in for the handshake. Instead, he ignored the handshake a laid a big wet one on the face. It was gross. But funny. I think all he wanted to do was kiss an American girl.

I took the metro to Cadorna station, then waited for the 57 bus going in the opposite direction, then got on, Radiohead in my ipod. I got back to the appartment exhausted from all the day's walking. Next, it was time to go to the local grochery store just around the block from my appartment. I love the wway italians do supermarkets. They are small, but they have everything you need. And everyone seems to know each other there. I even like the way the italians package their fruit, cheeses, and slices of meat. I thought I was racking up quite a bill, piling my basket high, but it came out to only be 17 euro. I purchased the following: a package of sliced swiss cheese, mozzarella balls and 6 tomatoes for a caprese salad, a package of lettuce and mixed greens, a bottle of basalmic vinegar, Ace juice (orange, carrot, and lemon flavored juice that's really good), apricot yogurt, some toasted bread things for nutella, foccacia bread, and frozen spinach and cheese filled fried thingys. Not bad.

It's so bizzare that my first experiences of truly living independently in the city are not even happening in my own country! At the store people would ask me things in Italian and I felt so bad and so stupid just starign back blankly. I was told I look very Italian today...but I'm sure if they watch my actions more closely they would see I have no idea what I'm doing! It's in the little things like hesitating to pick up your grocheries after purchasing them because you're waiting for them to be bagged, then in a split second you realize, "wait, gropcheries are bagged in America. Here, you bag them yourself and you probably only get one bag to do it."

Now my fridge is stocked, my packages are stowed away, there's laundry drying and I'm meeting some friends for evening entertainment. What a life.

Ciao!