the hardest week of my life

I've experienced around one thousand, one hundred and forty one weeks in my life, and this one was by far the most stressful, and most difficult one of them all. Exactly one week from sitting in a Premier Inn hotel in Gatwick, I finally say things are starting to look up.

Rather than give you a chronological run down of the last week, perhaps boring you all to tears, I will just tell you about the highlights, or should I say 'lowlights'. 

Whilst we were warned of the difficulties that we would face in this first week, we just didn't expect what we were faced with. 

Emma and I arrived so optimistic, thinking in a few days we'd be settled in a nice house enjoying Bologna, partying every night and getting ready to begin University...oh how naive we were. On a side note, our hostel 'il Nosadillo' was lovely, Olga was particularly friendly, pointing out all the sights on a young persons map and offering to phone Italian-speaking houses for us. Here's a picture of the door from the inside..they are so big here in Italy. 

I think in the last week I phoned approximately 50 numbers regarding a room. From that, I had around 10-15 viewings all resulting in various outcomes (for example, the room not actually existing, being in the wrong city, people not answering the door etc). Searching for a room here involves checking 5 websites several times a day, facebook pages and walls of notices like this: 

I think I've visited every corner of this map!

It is now a Sunday and I FINALLY have a room. I am living with 6 others, I haven't got to know many of them yet, we are all different nationalities but everybody seems lovely so far!
My room is pretty basic but it will do for one year, it doesn't have a window which was a shock at first but it's actually not that bad :) There is a different colour on every wall which helps it look brighter.

Every day of the last week has been a roller coaster, thinking you have a room and then it falling through at the last minute, wandering where you are going to live once your hostel stay runs out...at one point, Emma and I were considering getting on a plane and turning back. 

Not speaking Italian has made the last week even more difficult, however living with Italian speakers, I feel my skills will improve greatly in the next year. 

There have however been some good points in the last week. Bologna is beautiful and with viewings across the city I have got to see a lot of it in the lovely weather we are having here (around 25 degrees daily). We attended a 'Tandem' event on our second day, where we met up in a bar with Tej and Olivia (fellow Leicester-ians) and we met some new people from around the world such as Claudia and Sam and tried to make new connections and friends to help learn Italian. 

We officially registered as UniBo students (Here's Emma outside the ERASMUS office..after we waited in a queue for over an hour).

We ate the biggest pizza of our lives!

In terms of University, we don't actually start until the 1st of October, so I have some time to prepare, but in traditional Italian style, it is a complicated and unorganised process. We have to research the modules online, make sure they don't clash, then if they don't, attend the first lecture, introduce yourself and ask if you can follow the course. As if all of that wasn't difficult enough, the website is in Italian, we can only take the very few courses that are taught in English and try and make up enough ECTS credits. OH and get all relevant documentation filled in, signed and faxed to Leicester.

I just want to do this.. AAAAGGRHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Hopefully now that I have a room, once I have sorted out getting a 'codice fiscale' (essentially a tax code) and the modules I will be taking, I can finally relax. I can't wait to be able to have a social life and meet new people, I think the house I am living in is filled with people who like to have a good time so hopefully when I get to know them a little more we can do things together!

Now I must end this blog post so I can go and attempt to figure out what I will be studying for the next year :/

P.S MASSIVE shout out to all friends and family who have got me through this last week online/over text/skype...specifically Josephiiiiiine ;)



Ciao for now xoxo