Travel Day

Ciao raggazzi...
So far, amazing. This trip has been amazing, everything I've seen has been amazing. I'm just so excited to be here. I refuse to believe that the excitement will go away. Mark and I took a flight to Chicago and then Milano. My wisdom tooth wound was bothering me pretty badly, so I didn't enjoy it. Neither of us slept, so it was basically a marathon from this point on. My suitcase took two hours to come off the plane, so we were a little behind schedule. We took a bus to the Stazione Centrale in Milano, fumbled our way through buying tickets, and then had to wait a few hours for the next train to Firenze (Florence). We called home and ate lunch. I had to pay one Euro to go pee!! I'm still mad about that, but I did get my money's worth by also brushing my teeth and using the numbing spray on my mouth. Bah. Our train was a sleek EuroStar- fast, new, sexy. The bathroom looked like a space pod. I was assigned to sit next to a nonna, an old woman. She was waving to her family and talking to them through the glass, even though they couldn't hear her. When we sat down, we started chatting, er "chatting" (she had no English). She was really nice. I took out my needle and thread to reinforce the button on my computer case. La nonna said: "Vuoi imperare?" (Do you want to learn?) and snatched the needle away from me. She sewed that button in two minutes flat and pulled on the excess thread till it snapped. No sewing scissors for her. I thought this was very funny and thanked her, even though of course I know how to sew a button. She fussed with my scarf while I was getting up to leave the train, making sure I looked decent.
A few hours later, we arrived to the Siena train station (8pm, Italy). My body had been up for so long it had no idea what time it was, or what time zone it should be in. So since then I've had an easy time adjusting. After locating a phone (next to the coin operated condom dispenser, ha), we called Elena, the program director. She picked us up in a taxi and we zoomed up and down astonishingly steep streets, careening around corners and rocketing at walls while turning at the last second, until we reached our apartment.
At this point I was so medicated and exhausted. Mario, our roommate, welcomed us with pasta and his grandmother's sauce. It was so nice. Then we collapsed into bed.