31-Marzo-2006

I like studying in Italy, granted it’s hard and I still don’t feel like I could carry on an intelligent conversation in Italian, but it’s still been alright. After being in Scotland, I don’t want to go back. It is absolutely amazing. We landed in Glasgow-Preswick and boarded a bus to the center of Glasgow. On the way there were rolling hillsides, sheep, cattle and it really had a mid Michigan type of feel to it. Lots of farmland and everything was so green!

Once we made it to the city center we saw a lot of business that we hadn’t seen in Italy. There was the infamous Starbucks where we proceeded to enter and order in English, there was a ton of fast food, but I asked Jim, our Scottish friend and he’s assured me that fast food isn’t really taking off over here. The downtown is sort of like Via Garibaldi. It’s strictly a walking street and walk we did. We saw people dressed in wind pants, gothics, and thug looking type people. I forgot what it was like to see such a variety of people. In Italy you see one type of style and in Scotland they definitely have many different flavors.

We met up with Jim at about 6pm when he got out of work. From there he walked us through a small part of town while on the way to his flat. Him and his girlfriend Jillian have just recently bought the flat and that’s good because it’s amazing. It’s a loft with two bedrooms, a nice living room and a great kitchen. I had forgotten what it was like to actually have a place to sit and comfortably be with people. The plastic chairs in our kitchen in Torino do little to set up a friendly atmosphere.

When Jillian got home we headed out to grab some dinner and had trouble finding a place. We visited three different restaurants before we could sit down. It was a nice little Japanese restaurant since the Scottish cuisine place that we tried was off limits because of a Jazz band that was playing. The dinner was great and after that, since it was raining, we stopped at the liquor store and made our way home. Jim was bound and determined to have Jeff try all the drinks that the college kids drink because of how cheap they are and their awful taste. It was entertaining to watch, nonetheless.

The only downfall to Scotland is its prices. The pound is worth double what the dollar is right now. Luckily we have a place to stay and don’t have to pay for a hotel. Jillian and Jim are great and were planning on touring Edinbrough and other fun sorts of things tomorrow.

30-Marzo-2006

I don’t like doctors back in the US but government provided healthcare in Italy really sucks. This morning I made it to the doctors with a different translator, Claudia, and sat in the waiting room for a solid 25 minutes. Then we were redirected to another waiting room; apparently it was our lucky day, we proceeded to wait for an hour. Upon being called into the room and trying desperately to understand what Claudia was saying, I was diagnosed with spider bites and eight minutes later, I was back in the rest of the hospital. No wonder people look so sick over here.

The doctor, quack that she was, prescribed me injections so that the spider bites wouldn’t get infected and some type of lotion for my arms, and an oil also for my arms. Now I’ve had spider bites before and I’m pretty sure I haven’t suffered any permanent damage. The idea of being prescribed injections definitely freaks me out. You’d think they would give me an injection while I was there, but no, I have to go get shots from the pharmacist. Do you think they actually give me the shot? Or do you think they send me home with some syringes? Needless to say, I’ve also decided that it would take hell freezing over for me to get these prescriptions filled. I’m also giving up on my bed and sleeping in my sleeping bag. If I had a tent, I’d probably feel better.

Erin and I hung out for the remainder of the day. We did some more chocolate festival; I bought a lot of souvenirs and figured out how to get to the wrong airport in Milano. Thankfully I figured out it was the wrong airport before I was on the bus there. Tomorrow we catch a train to Milano early in the AM so we can be in Scotland by 3pm. From there, who knows! But I’m really looking forward to it!! Maybe I’ll be able to forget Italian healthcare.

29-Marzo-2006

Yay for a relaxing day in Genoa. Andrea, Erin, Brian and I hopped an 8:20am train and made it to Genoa by 10:45am. From there we didn’t have any real plans except for seeing the famous aquarium. Since we were being leisurely we picked a random direction that seemed to go towards the ocean and followed our noses to the beach. It was really beautiful but an extremely wrong way from the rest of the tourist attractions. Slowly but surely we hoofed it over to the rest of the town.

The aquarium was really cool. Definitely something you could find in America, but a nice change of European scenery. We did manage to do all the churches and typical Italian sight seeing, so all in all we had a pretty packed day. I got a ton of pictures and we caught the 6:30 pm train back to Torino.

Today I woke up with some bites on my hand. Not too excited about it, but they definitely don’t seem to be the same as my rash/itchiness. I have 6 on my palm, three on the bottom of my wrist and three more on the top. I tried to find the nest, which I believe, must be in my bed, but didn’t see it. Tomorrow is the deathly scary doctor’s appointment. Yay.

28-Marzo-2006

I snuck onto the Fiat factory field trip today and it was pretty cool. We got to see the automated chasis building system and the final assembly lines for the Fiat Punto and Idea. I never would have thought that so many components could go together so quickly. It was definitely a very interesting experience.

For the remainder of the day I went all over Torino trying to see a doctor. Mikaela, my translator and also a tutor for USAC, went with me to help. We headed to the doctor and they said we could make an appointment for August. I decided that wouldn’t do me much good so the nurse/receptionist recommended that I go to the emergency room to see a doctor. Even though it wasn’t an emergency, we headed there. I felt really bad standing in line next to people who were a lot worse than I was. I definitely just wanted to leave and apologize for being such a sissy but Mikaela got me through the line and into a less emergency orientated waiting room.

I finally got to see a doctor who was a bit of a jerk. He didn’t seem pleased that I couldn’t tell him myself what was wrong with me and just had this attitude that I didn’t really like. He prescribed me a bunch of things to get from the pharmacy and also gave me the go ahead to see a specialist. So we headed to the place where the specialist was and waited in another line to make an appointment for Thursday.

I now wish that I hadn’t said anything and just sucked it up. It was a waste of a day, a waste of time and I’m just grumpier about it now. I didn’t go get the meds that the doctor prescribed because I feel like he didn’t have a clue about anything and I don’t want to go see the specialist on Thursday.

“have a nice day” – aerosmith

27-Marzo-2006

I think Garfield the cat said it best with, “I hate Mondays.” Today my disease decided that I was not allowed to even think about class and that scratching my arms off would be way better. Also, today fall registration opens up at Tech and the time difference prohibits me from being online when my chance to register begins. As the day went on I zipped my backpack open and the zipper fell off in my hand.

I went to see the program directors about my disease and then told me that Doctors didn’t operate on any sort of rapid schedule, so it might be awhile before we can get stuff figured out to the point that I could actually see a doctor. Sounds like fun. Danielle luckily made the first of possibly many appointments for tomorrow and he promised to go with me so I wasn’t stuck with a language barrier. I’m feeling better about my Italian skills but the whole conversation about itching and being disease ridden hasn’t come into my vocabulary yet.

Genova on Wednesday :-)