February 8th...

....in one month, i'll be allowed to move in to my new apt in italy. i dont' know anything about it or who i'll be living with - haven't heard back from alberto in a while. i just know it's in colorno, population under 9,000, its fully furnished but i need to bring sheets (size still undetermined) and there will be 2-3 people living in the apt with me. alberto has told me that the campus is right in the middle of town and the apartments are scattered across the reggia of colorno. apparently i had chosen to live in colorno, rather than pay the extra bus cost to commute to the campus and to live in parma where half of the students are living and i'm hoping that was a wise choice - maybe the small town option will keep me focused on my studies and out of trouble in big city parma :o)

Packing.

just went to bj's with mum to buy extremely large amounts of toiletries and whatnots that i will possibly need in the next year - who knows what the italian version of cvs is like. it's nice not to have to buy them in euro's when i get there, but they're going to take up a ton of packing space. mum: do you really need 300 excedrin pills?? yes, maybe, who knows? and picked up a bright orange wheely duffle bag appropriately branded with a "ciao" label. how do you possibly pack for a year abroad? i have no idea what to expect, what will be available in the small town of colorno or if i'll have to go to parma for every day necessities, and what i'll need for the study trips across europe. (although the weather does sound promisingly warmer than here, which is way more exciting than when i studied abroad in salamanca - of course they had the first snow fall in decades while i was there). i already threw out garbage bags of stuff, took old clothes to the second hand store, and have brought boxes and boxes to storage, but it still feels like i have a ton of stuff here - it's pretty gross how much life accumulates. and even grosser that i probably won't end up using or wearing half of what i bring. it's all anticipation, preparation, the unknown.