Roma Day 1 and 2 (First Blog)

Hello Everyone!!

This is my first blog. Just so everyone knows, this blog will be a step by step of how the trip is going and what we have done thus far. We got here yesterday morning at about 9am. We flew into the airport and went through customs just fine, which was a surprise. We got picked up and they drove us to campus, woo!! When we got to campus, I was so surprised by the beauty surrounding us. The campus is beautiful and the buildings are so old and have wonderful history behind them. We had time to get ready to take a nap and get ready for lunch. Most of us spent this time unpacking and getting ready for lunch. We went down to the basement and ate lunch together as a family in the dining area. After lunch, we got a tour of the campus and did our orientation with Mike (student director) and Danilo (the Italian campus director). After orientation, which was rough to get through since we had all been up for about 36 hours straight., we went into the city of Castel Gondolfo. This is the city where right beside our campus. The walk to Castel Gondolfo is very long and it is up a 45 degree angle I swear. By the time we go to the city, we were all sweating and all out of breath but it was so worth the workout to get to it. We got a tour of the city by Danilo and saw the lake by the city, that is gorgeous by the way. Some of us went to mass and then some just went back to campus. Danielle, my roommate, and I decided to go explore the city while people were at mass. We walked around and explored the little shops and then got lost in the city. This was such a blast, we walked around down hills and found a little gelato shop to eat at. We walked back to campus and ate dinner and discussed what we were going to be doing on Monday...Monday was our first day of class which was today. We got up and got ready for the day and went to the dining area for breakfast. Breakfast in Italy is very light, it is like a continental breakfast. We then headed to class with Professor. We talked about what we were going to do that day and discussed the class for the semester. We then went into Rome!! We had to catch the train from our campus to the Roma Termini train station. We had to learn about the train station and when and where we were supposed to meet. We then went in the underground subway to the Coliseum. We took a tour of the Coliseum and the Roman Forum. Then we went into Palentine Hill without the tour guide and we were free to tour this by ourselves. These sites were completely amazing. They were a lot bigger in person than you would thought just seeing it on TV or in books. I really seeing these sites and having the tour guide there showing us around was very helpful. A little group of us went on to explore the city before going back to campus. We found a little pizza shop and had a snack before dinner at 8. We went back to campus and met up with everyone and then went to dinner. I really enjoyed today and cannot wait for tomorrow. Thank you for reading and I will blog again hopefully on Sunday.