in the metro. Milano, Italy

“no matter how badly a thing is hurting us … sometimes letting it go hurts even worse”

instead of “a thing” read “people” and figure out the proper grammar.

I’ve been asked how is life is Milan now that it’s almost a month since I got here.

To keep the long story short, I live outside the city, in one of the north suburbs. The office is the south of Milano, that is why I need ~1.5hrs (more or less) to get there: 15-20 min walk to the train, 30 min by train,  10 min by metro and another 10 by bus, plus some waiting. I’ll get my own place, hopefully somewhere close to the city. Until then, I am glad I have my iPod and I always carry a book around.

Since I got here, there wasn’t a day passing by without Romanian presence in the news, nothing positive though. Romanians in Italy are famous for robbing tabacco and newspaper stores, killing people or raping/attacking locals and tourists. It looks like every channel here has in his main news report a “Stirile de la ora 5″ section, dedicated to Romanians in Italy. My co-workers joke around saying the only time we see positive news is when Mutu scores for Fiorentina :))

Besides that, I am still fighting with paperwork needed to make me legal here. Transition from US system to the Italian one is still in process, and my new “adoptive” country is not a very organised one - not far from Romania: a lot of beaurocracy, paperwork and a dolce far niente attitude I get from authorities. One thing I don’t miss for sure is the food, much better than the US options (Madison, WI to be more specific). Food is tasty here!

All in all, so far so good.

A couple of things got me pissed off lately:

- I caught a cold; too much air conditioning everywhere if you ask me.

- a customer calling in today, and asking, in the background,  thinking I won’t hear “why do they have to hire foreigners at insert-the-name-of-the-company-I-am-working-for-here”

- i set up an appointment with my landlord to have my apartment inspected before my departure; it was for 6:30 pm tonight. Nobody showed up. Calling the landlord office, I couldn’t leave a message - the voicemail is not set up.

- i was supposed to meet the AIESEC crowd at 7pm by the Terrace. I got there at 7:15 and I was the first. The gang decided to show up around 7:30.

Right before going to Florida, I joined Globspotter.com. I like the idea of the project: it’s like Twitter, but for travelers. To keep track of me, check here.

Come Friday, hello Florida!