not gna lie, i got pretty excited when we found the asian store in bolzano. about a 10-15 minute walk. its really small, but it has everything that reminds me of home… well… not like literally home… but the fobby parts of little saigon haha [=. now i can buy spices and sauces to make things i actually know how to make. not gna lie, i thought i would have to learn every italian food, but now i can make my fried rice and noodle dishes. (of course i’ll learn how to make pastas and risotto too, but i need my asian food fixes)
and there’s also a thai cuisine restaurant that specializes in thai, japanese, and chinese food… we’ll see about that… haha
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the university system here is totally unique. because of its unique history of where/how it was founded (lets keep in mind that this school is barely over a decade), FUB is influenced by the US, UK, Italian, German, and Austrian systems.
Unique thing #1
you have 2 weeks to sign up for classes when school starts. meaning, you don’t pre-enroll into classes like we do in the US. you can literally attend any class you want for the first 2 weeks and by the end of the 2nd week, you enroll in whatever class you want. of course, some people would enroll right away to secure their spot, and others would wait to see how the teachers are. you can try out a class/teacher and not add the class if you don’t like it…. but this brings me to Unique thing #2
#2
here, they hire teachers from all over the world. but the teachers are hired on contracts, not exactly full term teachers. for example:
the university wants to hire Prof. Bob to teach Financial Management. Prof Bob is from the UK and teaches at Oxford University. every class is given a mandatory 30 hours of teaching within a 15 week semester. Prof Bob gets to choose when he wants to teach his class within the 15 weeks. He can have 10 classes at 3 hours a class or 15 classes at 2 hours per class. these classes can by anytime during the 15 week period. if he wants, he can have a class every week. or a class the first month of school. or a class at the end of the semester. he can schedule it however it wants so that he can fly in from the UK, teach his class, and then leave. isn’t that cool? because of this i get random breaks within the semester, granted i do have a few saturday classes, but i think its worth it. the only thing that sucks about this is that if he wants his class to start after the 2 week add period, then you can’t try out his class before you sign up.
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kaitlin, samantha, and i took an excursion during siesta to Torre Druso [a tower] and Castel Roncolo [a castle] (or what we thought was Castel Roncolo)
that was what we had our eyes set on…
and that random tower in the middle
so we followed this trail that went along Fiume Talvera (a river)
when we got closer to the tower, we realized there was no path from where we were directly up to the tower. you have to be on the other side of town to get on a path to the tower… womp fail #1
vineyards everywhere…. we are definitely in wine country
when we walked further along in the trail, we realized we had our eyes set on the wrong castle the whole time. the one on the hill was wayyyy too far by foot…. (fail #2) but the trail led us to the real Castel Roncolo
uneven, steep walkway to the entrance
not gna lie, when we got up there, i was freaken tired… wow im so out of shape -_-
view from the castle
there was a restaurant and stage there. we decided not to buy the ticket to go into the castle cuz we didnt have enough money on us. we’re gna try to budget museums and stuff when it gets too cold to do outdoorsy stuff. this castle was literally not more than 2 miles away
at the castle, i saw one of the brochures that there is a castle in the city centre not far from where we stay, so on our way back, we went searching for Castel Mareccio. it was freaken confusing trying to find it. we tried asking someone, but he kinda gave us vague directions and then told us to ask someone else to make sure…….. womp…. it felt like we were walking in circles heading back towards the town center until we finally found the street… it was weird cuz there were houses all around, nothing like the other castle in the middle of vineyards.
this castle was tinyyyy… smaller than Roncolo… hollywood, you have ruined my imagery of castles…. maybe the bigger castles are in mother england?…
this place has been totally refurbished and is not being used as a convention center. they hold meeting and banquets here… even weddings
and it only took 2.5 hours to go to both castles by foot [=
we ended our excursion by buying bread at the daily market… yumm fresh bread. i got tomato bread.. which tasted like pizza w/ tomatoes.. haha
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yesterday, we found a 99 cent store (but it was really $1.66 to us americans…..) thank goodness for this place… [= got some snacks and necessities (like post its! haha) but the trail mix here is not the business.. i miss costco and chex trail mixes… oh well.. that’s why i brought 10 packs of gum to hold me over…
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we bought a bus ticket to munich this weekend of the end of oktoberfest festivities [= it was relatively cheap (49 euros round trip) because a train ticket one way is about 50 euros. i know i know.. me+beerfest when i dont even like beer what the irony… but hey, when am i ever going to be here again? much less be here during oktoberfest?
“when in rome…”
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grocery shopping again tmorw… i swear we’ve already gone twice in the week that we’ve been here. italy needs to invest in a costco or bigger shopping markets with bigger sizes of everything…….
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week 1 down, 23.5 more to go [=
