More walking, mostly

You know what's fun? The fact that our route to the university is up six sets of stairs. That's fun. And by fun, I mean "I'm dying inside". It's ok, though, because now I can eat all the gelato I want and not feel bad about it.

Today we got up early to apply for our permits of stay- something you have to get within days of arriving in Italy- and to get SIM cards for our American phones so we can call each other if we get lost. We have a café right next to our apartment so we got pastries for breakfast, just like the Europeans.

After that was the safety talk, then orientation, then the day was ours. We got food at this really popular sandwich shop near the school. Again, I just pointed at what I wanted, and again, it was delicious. Do I know what it was? Not really, but it was very good.

Then we went on a walk in a park not far from our school, Villa Doria Pamphilli. It is gorgeous. I fell in love with this park. I'm going to make an entire post about it later.

We rested for a bit at the apartment, then got some groceries in a few little shops on our street. There's an eclectic little goods store where we got soap and such, a fruit store, and a tiny grocery place where we can get fresh bread. We picked out a few things- juice, pasta, eggs. We're going to go shopping more when we find a bigger store.

After this, we went to a tour at the university, only to find out that we'd missed it. So we decided to cut our losses and went to downtown Trastevere. It's this amazing neighborhood. You pass through a really touristy place first, where everything is in English, but if you keep going, there's these amazing little side streets with authentic stores and real local flavor. We decided to eat at one of these restaurants, our first sit-down Italian dinner. There were seven of us, at this point- we picked up a friend along the way.

The food was wonderful, very filling, and the people there were very warm. Italian waiters don't give you the bill- once you sit down, that table is yours for the night. Italians do a lot of socializing around food, and dinners can take hours as everyone casually eats and chats. So giving you a bill is seen as very rude. We had to flag down our waiter and request the bill. You also don't tip in Italy- it just isn't done, the percentage is added to the bill- but I really felt like a jerk for awhile.

By this time it was late, but we decided to go back out and see downtown Trastevere again. And it was a world of difference. When we went down there to eat dinner, around 7-8, it was very empty and quiet. When we returned, nearly 11, it was bursting with people. Italian just eat dinner later. We were down there until nearly 1, socializing. There were a lot of people there from AUR, so we'd just meet each other in the squares and talk for a bit, then move on.

Finally, we trooped back to our apartment. My feet hurt so badly, but this city is so worth it. People make jokes about Italians eating a lot- that's because they walk everywhere. My roommate's phone said we'd walked 8 miles today alone, and that was all before lunch.