My First Week In Italy | Studying Abroad, Pisa, Rome

Good morning everybody. You are currently listening to a Tall Girls podcast hosted by a tall girl named India. I hope everyone listening to today's episode is having a good day, week, month, year, whatever, And maybe before I get into this episode, I do want to remind you to check out my socials at a Tall Girls podcast on Instagram, TikTok, and Pinterest so that you can stay updated on all of the latest podcast episodes and catch a glimpse of my everyday life. Now, if this is your first episode here, or you're coming back after not listening for a while, or you just don't follow me on my socials, which you really should, there are links in the description. I'm in Italy for the next couple of weeks for US Study Abroad program. It's been about a week and a half issh now that I've been here, and boy am I exhausted. You know that video that's like no sleep, bus club, another club, another club. That's literally how I've been living my life for the past few days. And I generally don't know how much more of it I can take. Okay, maybe not like the club, another club, another club part but the bus and no sleep and constantly changing locations is so on point. So for starters. I have my Global Brand Management class four days a week at nine am. I don't even remember the last time I had a class that early. It's been like almost five years as I've had a class at nine am, and I've tried my best to be all put together in Alcador early, but it's just a struggle. I try to be at breakfast or breckie if you will, at like seven forty five bish, so I can have a good forty five mins to just relax and eat and digest my food. Maybe, but it's been I've been going to breakfast consistently later. At first i'd beat a breakfast about seven forty five. Then the next day I would get to breakfast about eight, then eight ten, then eight twenty five. You get the picture at this point. And I'm an early riser. I wake up pretty early every day now that it's basically summer. But I like to take my time in my mornings, and I like to take my time on my morning routine process which he usually takes about three hours, but now I have to kind of crunch everything into about an hour forty five, an hour and a half and it's insane, but honestly, in my opinion, this class is worth it. It's worth all the stress of trying to get ready in the morning and on time. It makes me feel like I know absolutely nothing, but in a good way, if that makes any sense. It's really showing me that I have so much more to learn. Like I'm learning the foundational brand elements and what it means to be a brand manager and the steps that go into developing a brand. And I don't know, I'm just so grateful that I'm taking this class. It's extremely engaging and interactive and all that. So, but however, I am sitting behind a girl who may or may not hate me. Yeah, the girl's saying it from me, hates me why because I keep kicking her seat in class. I mean, it's a small classroom and all of the desks and chairs are super close to each other because we did and it's not even that many people, it's sixteen people, but that's how small the classroom is. We got to scrunch everything together to fit sixteen people in the classroom. But it's a small classroom and the chairs a desk are super close to each other, and I happen to have long legs that I need to stretch out every five minutes. So I mean, I don't blame her one bit, but hey, like, what can you do. I can't help the fact that when I sit down, because this class is this class is about two and a half hours, and I just can't help the fact that just spending my knees for that long it gets painful and annoying. After a while, sometimes my legs lose circulation or just lose feeling in general. So I need to, you know, just move it about, stretch it about, YadA YadA, y'all. We only get one like ten minute break in the middle of a two and a half hours I really do need a stretch. I'm just I'm trying to be more conscious of where I place my legs. But there are times where I kick her will kick her chair and not kick her her Actually they kick the legs of her chair or kick like the bottom part of her chair where your butt sits. Yeah, oh, I feel really bad, but also not really Anyways, since I have school four days a week, and right after class I usually have to do work, and after I finished my work, I have to do my homework, and by the time that's done, it's time for a late dinner because it's about eight o'clock around that point, and just you know, hit the hay after that to get ready for the next day. So when essence, Thursday is kind of like a Friday for all of the students, and the friday and the weekend is used as a travel around and see stuff do stuff day. So Thursday night, this past Thursday night, I may have gotten a little or maybe a lot tipsy. So we were at this restaurant and okay, so we have this meal voucher thingy whatever at this restaurant that's close by where we're staying. We get twenty free meals there. So everybody's like, okay, during the week when we have school, but we're not trying to think about things like that, we would just head over there and get free dinner because why not. So this is our first week going there almost every day during the week. So and then we see the same waiters and they pretty much know of us or know of our faces at this point because it's like the same two people there. They don't have two hitty employees there, I guess you could say. So it's the same two waiters that we see every time were there, or maybe they just have the same two employees during the week. In the weekend they have to I don't know, but we've been seeing the same two waiters there every day for the past like five days. But at this point we became friendly with them. I am a weird person, but not in a bad way, and so I'm trying to learn Italian because I'm not taking any Italian classes. So whenever I'm there, I try to ask the way that was like, ha, how do you say this in Italian? Or how do you say good evening? Or have a good have a good night? Or this was delicious? I try. I try to ask them so I can learn something at least besides global brand management while I'm here, and needless to say, my pronunciation is pretty trash and they find it entertaining, and I'm like, okay, you know what, this goes both ways. I'm learning Italian and you're being entertained. But my accent sounds so American. So every time, you know, they hear me each other pronounce it, they like to laugh at me, and you know what, It's okay, It's all fun and games. At least some time that anyways, that kind of broke the ice. I guess you could say between us and the waiters, and you know now that they've they've grown on us and we've grown on them, and they're super friendly. We I don't want to say we became close because that just sounds weird. It only been like a couple of days. But that Thursday night, the waiters gave us free drinks, and the drinks were lemon cello. This is my first time I've ever had that drink, and it's really good. It was. It was really good. So I downed a few glasses. Oh, which was probably not a good idea because after a minute, like in the first few minutes, I was feeling fine, I felt normal, was like, m this is so nice, Like this tastes like lemonade with a little bit of a kick at the end of it, you know. But then all my way back, because we walked into walk everywhere on my way back, I was feeling a little I was feeling a little I don't want to say Disney, but my head was like my head was going in different directions and I was like, what's happening. But nonetheless, I am so grateful I'm so lucky that I was walking around peoples with people who made sure that I got back to my room okay, which is great. So and then you know it was I had to make it back in one piece in her halfway decent time because the next day I went to the Leading Tower of Pizza. What can you believe that? Okay? So I was supposed to go with one of the girls that I met here, but she kind of backed out last minute. Because life, but no tin, no shade, stuff happens, that is what it is. So I just decided to go by myself. And this is your sign that if you really want to do something and no one else is able to go with you, just go by yourself. You literally never know what will happen. And one of those things was I almost missed my stop. So I'm staying in Florence, but the Leaning Tower is in Pizza, so I have to take about an hour train ride to get there. Now, this is my first time trying to figure out the metro system here. How to figure out trying to figure out the train system. I've never the past week and a half, I've walked everywhere, but I haven't been out of the City, So I never really truly had a need to take any type of metro or any type of bus. So now when I purchase the train tickets, how Loo's work is that it'll show you the train station you depart from, so the train station you first get on the train at, and then it will show the train station you've chosen to get off at your destination. And for me, I was reading it as though the train takes you straight there, like you're at the first stop where you get on, and then the train just takes you straight there and that's this last destination and that's it. And it's just that one train is designated to just taking people back and forth between those two locations and that's it. But the thing is the train system or whatever, it's similar to New York City if you've ever been there. It's kind of like there's stops in between where you first get on the train and where you gotta get off. And then on top of that, the station was actually not the final destination of the train. It was just one of the stops. I was in between where I first got on and the actual final destiny nation. So I did not really process that at first. I when I first got on the train and I thought, I was just oh, it's just gonna take me straight there, and that's it, Like I don't have to do too much thinking. So because of that, I'm falling in and out of sleep on the train, and I just happened to wake up at some point to see that I was at the Pisa Central station at Pizzas and Trial Studio. I'm trying, I'm trying my best, but I just know that it was the Pisas Central station and I was on the verge of going back to sleep, but you know, something in the back of my head was like, you need to check where you are, like see how far you are from the Leading Tower, just to make sure, because you know, if we're in Pizza, like the Leading Tower is indeed in Pisa. So so I go on Google Maps, my favorite, and I'm just like, yeah, leaning to Pa and I pressed search and I remember that one of the girls who went to the Leaning Tower the previous week, I actually, yeah, how far is to walk the Leaning Tower? How far the walk is a Leaning Tower from the train station And she was like, oh yeah, it's like a twenty minute walk. I was like okay, perfect, Like you know, I've been walking half hour forty minutes everywhere, so twenty minute walk is not even that bad. So I then look up where the leaning tower is and I see that it's a twenty minute walk away. I was like, oh shoot, and that's start. I remember the conversation with the girl was like, whoa, I'm supposed to be getting off here, and the announcements was saying something in Italian. I don't know what they were saying. I just remember grabbing all of my stuff in a hurry and like trying to get off that train as much as possible. It really did quick. At that moment, I was like, maybe I should get off of this train. So thank goodness, I have long Like I practically flew off the train and made it in time before the doors closed. Awesome. Pizza is a very small? Is it a small? I don't I shouldn't say that. I literally just went to one place I haven't walked around everywhere. But it's adorable. It's it's not really like Florence where it's like super super packed and stuff like that. It's pretty chill. I like it. And then on the walk there, I walked over like a nice little bridge and all of a sudden, it was kind of like I was walking through the town and it was it was so beautiful. Then I made it to the Leaning Tower, and oh my goodness, I was speechless. I was that one American girl who was walking. I was walking towards the area of the Leaning Tower. I saw a part of it, like you know how you see part of something but not the entire thing, and you're just immediate like, oh my gosh, this is actually happening. That was me. I literally said, oh my gosh, I can't believe this. I started to making you back the other way, and I don't know why. Maybe I should have kept walking into the direction of the Leaning Tower so I could see it, but I was speachless. I couldn't. I couldn't believe that I was actually there. So it was like this big area that had the tower and two other I want to say churches. I don't know for sure. I think that's what it was, but me and everyone else was where we're interested. We're more interested in the tower, which is I don't know. That sounds kind of bad because you know, the churches are there for supposed to go into the churches. Did I go into the churches, No, I did not. Fun fact, you got to cover everything if you want to go into a church like that, especially a smaller church where they like, actually look at what you were wearing at the door. My knees weren't covered. So yeah, either way, I don't think I was planning to go in there because they weren't let me in because my knees are uncovered. AnyWho, I'm walking around trying to take photos with me in it, but it was a struggle because you know, keep in mind, I was there by myself. So it just got to the point where I just started asking random strangers to take photos of me, because why not, we're all tourists here. For the most part, I was like, yeah, I'll take a picture of you if you take a picture of me. I find that that was very strategic, so I'll pat myself on that back for that. And at one point I meant this one woman, her name is Claire, she was also alone, and she was trying to take a picture and I was trying to take a picture of myself, and it was it was like perfect timing because we both turned around and made eye contact with each other, and I was like, do you want to take a picture and then I could take a picture of you. Oh we would Yeah, do you want me to take a picture of you? Then I could take a picture, I could take a picture of me. Oh my goodness, do you want me to take a picture of you? And then you could take a picture of me. And she was like I was thinking the same exact thing. I was like, whoa, we're on the same wavelength. Yes, I am here for it. So we just took pictures of each other and she was like, yeah, do you want to stick around? Walk around and we could to take pictures of each other. I was like, oh my gosh, that sounds perfect. And we just ended up walking around together for the next five and a half hours. We both learned each other's life stories. It was great. I learned that she started her whole traveling thing when she was like twenty two. She first went to Africa. Her parents were like, scaredly, don't do it, but she went anyway. She went by herself, met amazing people, and I just started her streak of just traveling in her twenties. And then you know, she got a job, so she had to focus on that. She was really traveling. That much. But then she quit her job because you know, work life balance is pretty crap or whatever. And she's just been traveling around Europe by herself, and I'm like, why is that so cool? That's so awesome. And I'm just here thinking like, yeah, she's taking this big, humongous break from work. I'm like, as you should take a break, see the world, do things. But then she told me that she had a job interview, second job in because she had heard it. She hadn't had her first interview, and she was vite it back for a second interview next week, which is this coming week. And I'm like, wow, that is so awesome. I loved I loved hearing every second of it. But yeah, heard each other's life stories. And along the way, when we're taking pictures of me, another girl named Katia, yes Katia, who was also trying to take pictures by herself, and then she randomly came up to us and I was like, yeah, are you're trying to take photos? And me I was like of course, So that took photos of her and then after that we just learned her life story too. She just graduated from university a little bit ago, and you know, she was trying to apply her jobs that got super stressful. So she's been traveling through up for the past month, and I was like, why is this so awesome? This just makes me feel so much better about you know, the fact that you don't actually have to have it all together, just go around and do things. You know, people are also having crises in their lives too, so it's okay if you have a crisis in yours. But it was just so wholesome. It was just a wholesome moment. It was a wholesome trip. It was a wholesome five and a half hours. I really enjoyed myself, and eventually we all did part ways, and you know, we gave each other a night's hug. It's like, yeah, good luck, can take care. But I decided to stay behind a little longer because there are certain grass areas around the pizza you're not allowed to be in, But then there's others that you're allowed to be in the farthest the ones that are farthest away from the tower, which evidently makes sense because everybody's gonna be crowded around the grass area that's closer to the pizza to get pictures. But the crass areas that were farther away. People were out on the grass, so I just chilled out on the grass, tanned a little because the sun was indeed blaring that day, and then I headed back to Florence after like an hour. It wasn't as bad or as sad as I thought it was going to be going by myself. I really enjoyed that, So maybe I'll continue to go to different places by myself. We'll see. Then the next day we hit Rome, Yes, Rome, Roma, And what was even better was I actually went with people, so I didn't miss nice stop or if I was confused. We were all confused together, so that was nice. And you know, they actually knew exactly what they were doing. So I just followed for the most part, but took the train Rome. When we got to Rome and we took the Metro to the It's so weird saying the metro. It's like I'm trying my best to say train. I'm trying my best not to say train. Every time I keep saying train, somebody's correcting me I mean the Metro, and it's like, yes, I guess the metro, the metro the train. Evidently it's almost the same thing. Like, you know what I mean. But anyways, we took the Metro to the coliseum and oh my gosh, oh my gosh, my breath was taken away. I just don't think I really processed how massive that thing actually was until I stood right in front of it. In it is huge. Didn't get to go inside though, because they were just it was just a whole bunch of people just standing around, just waiting to rip people off. And I know they were bumping up those prices to get in, and I was like, I don't feel like getting scammed today. I just want to have a nice time, and you know, we were just not here for it. So we just did a little wrap around of the Coloseum, and that outside got the most touristy photos because you know, according to the Italians were such Americanaes. I'm not gonna get over that. We're gonna call ourselves the Americanas. So we did that and got something to eat afterwards. Oh my gosh. At that point, we were just so tired because the Coloseum, like I said before, it's big, so we were When we did their circle around, we did about a good like mile or two. It felt like a mile or two around a track and then they're on the walk to the place to get something to eat. There was just like a bunch of different things, like we sall this arc. I don't remember what it's called, but it kind of just reminded me of Washington Square part if you know what I mean. You know what I mean. We saw a bunch of ruins and stuff like that. Oh my god, it was beautiful and the weather held up. It was perfect. It was beautiful. So we go, we get something to eat, and you know what I learned, the Italians know how to make their potatoes. I got some fish with like some roasted potatoes, and the outside was like crunchy, and the insete was just so nice and soft, just like it was just perfectly cooked. And oh it wasn't too oily either, wasn't try It was just so good. Everywhere I go, I'm gonna try to get potatoes now. But anyway, hey, so yeah, we ate and then we handed over Wow, headed over to the Pantheon. Super crowded, super crowded, but I did get to snap a few good pictures. Didn't go inside of that either, because I think it's a temple, so you also do have to cover your knees and your shoulders. None of that was covered for me, because indeed, it did feel like ninety seven degrees outside that day, and I was like, I can't, I can't wear jeans. I can't, I can't. I'm sorry, I cannot. I refuse. So we did get pictures on the outside. It was super cool, also massive. I would definitely say the Coli scene was a much better thing to see. But I'm gonna stop comparing because you're only I only went to I've never been a room before. This is my first time in Rome, and you know what, I just got to appreciate everything that's there. But yeah, after that, we headed over to some Tierra Misu place. I didn't have anything because I was pretty full from lunch, but it was cute. She was cute, she looked really good. So that's an excuse to go back to Rome for a second time. Maybe try that tear Missu. And then we made our way to the Trevy Fountain. Oh my gosh. But on the way there, we stopped in a couple cathedrals that weren't like haggling people about what to wear. There weren't people standing in the doorway being like, you can't get it and because you're not covering up. So we were able to go in there, which is great because I was able to sit down a couple of times. That's exactly what I needed. But the artwork is just stunning and the glass walls just stunning. I cannot tell you the names of any of the paintings that I saw in there, but what I do remember is that it had like the different continents out all of the continents that just had ja, Europe, America, and Africa, those four and I had them like painted as women sitting on animals. So if you if you, if you know what I'm talking about, then that's exactly what I saw. That was one of the things that I saw. Breathtaking. Oh my goodness, got a bunch of pictures of those, because I was kind of delirious at that point and I was like, I want to look back at these when my brain is good. So I got a couple of pictures of those. Those are so cool and then m yeah, I kind of got ripped off and one of the cathedrals who wanted to see the Neapolitan crib light up and they said to put a euro coin in so we did that and it didn't light up, so yeah, it did eat our euro coin, but you know what it is, what it is. It was kind of like because they were the church, cathedral whatever was asking for offerings from people, so it's like, we don't feel bad. At least we contributed or something. Patrick that we made our way to the Trevy fountain and the crowd was way worse than the Pantheon. Everyone and their moms were there. Yeah, so the three of us were just shoving our way through the crowd, fighting little kids, arguing with old ladies in broken Italian just to get a good spot for photos. But nonetheless we take a good picks and they were immaculate. And the weirdest thing was every three seconds the security that was around there were blowing their whistles like they had They were just blowing it every three seconds, and everyone's like, oh my gosh, why are you blowing? What's going on? Because you know, we think, oh my gosh, like somebody's about to die. But what I learned was that so people were trying to sit on the fountain and apparently you're not supposed to do that, which is strange because in every Instagrammers photos at the Trevy Fountain. They were actually like sitting on the fountain, which was odd. It was like, m I don't know, maybe it's the time of day that they went, maybe it's when they went, but that we were just not allowed to sit on it at all. And anytime anybody tried to sit on it or stand on or do whatever, like, they would blow their whistle to tell people to get off, which made sense because if somebody falls in there and gets injured, that's that's just gonna look bad. But anyways, if you go to the Trevy Fountain, just know that if you sit on it, you'll get a whistle blown at you. But after we did get a lot of picks. It was nice and it was time to head back to our train, which we almost missed, which was great, but we made it and then we went back to Florence for the night. Super cool. And now it's Sunday when I'm recording this, and there's no way I'm going anywhere except the grocery store to get my packs of water and determined my paper that I have due tomorrow. I have a paper due tomorrow, guys. Then I have a midterm coming up on Wednesday. So that's fun, I guess you could say, but you know what, it's steady abroad. I really liked this class, so not too not so I just gotta get I gotta get on my grind today. I gotta get on my grind today. So even though such a beautiful day outside, I cannot go anywhere crazy except the corner store. But yeah, this past week was really fun and I really did enjoy myself. The pictures are definitely going to be hitting the social media's, so you should definitely follow me on there at a Tall Girls podcast, on Instagram, TikTok, and Pinterest, and also hit me up, send me a message, let me know how you guys are doing, how your summer. Is it summer yet? I don't think it's summer yet, but let me know how your month of June is going. I want to know. I'm curious, genuinely. A lot of you guys have been replying to my stories and telling you things and commenting, and it's like, I love it. I'm here for it. Thank you so much for just you know, even if you just send a reaction, a laughing reaction to one of my stories, I am grateful for you, Thank you so much, and thank you so much for listening to the end of this episode. This was like kind of lengthy episode, but you know how to get everything in and any last words, Oh yeah, back to the previous point. If you want to do something by yourself, or if you want to do something with people but they're just not vibbing out, just go by yourself and maybe you'll meet to Claire and Nkatia and share your life stories for the next five and a half hours. Anyways, I'm gonna go because I gotta go be a productive. Well this was productive, but I gotta be school productive. But I will catch you in the next one. Good night and goodbye.