cheese, wine, gelato.... and fun times with Italian Customs Officials

so it's been a fun first couple of days...

the food in Rome is absolutely incredible.... not that I'm surprised, but I haven't had a bad meal yet, even the "bad meals" are amazing. we are all settled into the apartment now i still need a different blanket and a mirror and we can't dial out on our phone and we need another power strip to plug into the wall and the air conditioning isn't hooked up exactly but besides THAT we're good to go.

yesterday was the first official day of orientation so everyone showed up. There are 30 kids from Penn on the program so that's nice. We all went out to a bar last night to celebrate Sam Lasry's belated bday. good times.

There has also been some stress though... what would a move to a foriegn country be without some stress? First of all, I spent 2 hours in a Vodaphone store because apparently you cant buy an italian sim card for a spanish phone.... long long story short i bought a new phone. it's a nokia. it works. thank goodness... even though it costs like 2 dollars a minute to call america, but thank god for skype (if you don't know what that... refer to a earlier posts)

Also, since I was traveling my parents sent me four boxes with my clothing in it. One of the boxes was delivered on the third attempt. Apparently Italians don't know how to roughly estimate a delivery time. ok cool. the other three boxes got stuck in Italian customs at the Malpensa Airport, which is apparently in Milan. It seems that my three boxes were a big security threat. After many conversations with Carlo, Deborah and other members of the Italian subset of FedEx called SDA Courier Express (not so much express really....) I finally sent an email directly to the customs offcials in Milan.

To whom it may concern at the Italian Customs Inport Office:

8535 9772 8622, 8535 9772 8633, 8535 9772 8644, 8535 9772 8655 are four boxes that my parents sent from California, USA to me here in Rome.I am studying in Rome for the semester. The packages were divded for the convience of packing and to even out the weight. They contain my clothing, shoes, books and laptop... everything I will need to live and study in Rome. # 8535 9772 8633 was sent through customs and is now in Rome. The other three boxes, as you know, are still in Malpensa. My mother faxed a copy of my passport to the import office, number: +39 0331 723656. I hope it went through. A more detailed description of three packages that are still being held is as follows: 8535 9772 8622 and 8535 9772 8655: the description on both of these boxes was "clothing - used" with an insured value of 1000 dollars. The reason the insurance is so high is because most of the clothing are from high quality brands and rather expensive. All the clothing is used and have been part of my wardrobe for a long time. Specifically, there are many pairs of pants, a few jackets (a black one, a marroon corduroy one, a white jeans jacket, a light green corduroy jacket.) One of the boxes has a belt. There are also some sweaters and nicer shirts for going out as well as tshirts and pants to sleep in. Also there are a number of undergarments. 8535 9772 8644: This box contains my lap top computer and the waybill says: "computer - laptop." This is my personal computer that I use at home and also when I attend University. All of these items belong to me, they are my personall effects and have all been used before. I am student who will be living in Rome until December and studying at Temple University in Rome. I have a student Visa. I arrived in Rome on the 27th and would like to please receive my boxes as soon as possible, for it is hard to get settled into the city without them. Thank you for understanding. Once the packages are shipped is there anyway to get an approximate time of delivery in Rome? Since I am a student, I have orientation and classes, and it is difficult to be home all day. Please let me know what can be done.

Thank you so much.Sincerely, Lindsey Rosin

the packages were released a few hours later. they were delivered this morning. now I have clothing. now I am happy. We're going out to dinner in a moment in Piazza Navona.

la vita e bella.... Lindsey

ps, to everyone going back to Penn tomorrow... enjoy the semester!! miss you.....