Meredith in Milan!

Back in Milan!

Well We arrived back in Milan on the Night of Easter Sunday, and I can’t say I wasn’t excited to be in my own house…  so much Irony in this statement!  I think coming home from my trip with my parents was the first time I actually realized how much I have changed and adapted, and grown to love everything about Milan and my family here!  

I was so excited to see my host parents when I arrived back home.  It was the first time I think I realized how comfortable I am here! It made me happy!

Anyway, I skipped dinner this night since I was tired and still full from lunch, which  is an unnecessary statement… Moving on:

I recounted my trip with my host parents, and soon after I headed to bed! 

I spent a few more days here in Milan with my real parents.  I showed them what they didn’t see within the first three days, and we just hung out.  We did a lot of walking!  It was good for us but I was exhausted by the time they went back, and I am sure they were as well!

We hung out and had dinner with my host family again, and on Wednesday morning they headed back to the States!  

It was a wonderful two weeks!  I absolutely loved everything about it!  I was so happy to show off Milan, My home, to my parents!  

Living the good life!!!!

Easter!

The Sunday my brother was leaving was Easter!  We dropped him off at the Airport and we headed to Lecco.  I showed them around lecco a little bit, since I had stayed there during the Christmas break, and they really enjoyed it!

From there Giorgia called me and invited the three of us up to her house for Easter Lunch!  I was excited  to see her and her family again!  Natalia had also come to stay with Giorgia for Easter.  I was more than excited to see them!   (For those of you who don’t know, or don’t remember, Natalia and Giorgia were the exchange students that stayed in Lake Tahoe last year.)

Anyway, we had a wonderful Easter Brunch with Giorgia and her family and friends, and Natalia!  It was one for the memory books!  

After brunch, My mom, and dad took me and Natalia to another little town on Lake Como for us to visit!  It was a little bit windy but it was still a lot of fun to hang out and catch up after about ten months! I loved it.  I had a great time all together, but soon after, we dropped Natalia off at Giorgia’s house and headed back to Milan!  

The lovely Vacation Part 3!!!

On Thursday, we headed to a few Tuscan villages!  I loved them!  They were beautiful, but I was excited to get to Florence! 

Friday came around and we headed to Florence!  I was stoked, and I had reason to be!  We got there and we roamed about the area.  We saw the Statue of David, where I so very slyly took a prohibited photo.  Afterwards we were all craving Gelato so we headed into a very promising (or so we thought) Gelateria!  My mom and dad split a crepe, and my brother and I ordered our gelato.  When my dad went to pay I My mom had taken a bite already of her crepe, and I just gotten my ice cream cone and they were still making my brother’s.  The total came out to 23 euros!!!!! 

We couldn’t believe they would be charging that much for ice cream!  It was outrageuous!  I handed my gelato back and my brother wouldn’t take his from the lady.  We decided we would pay for the Crepe and we would leave.  

The Italian servers didn’t like this idea and began to yell at us!  I got into my first yelling match in Italian!  We gave 8 euros for the crepe (which is still incredibly pricey) and we headed out.  As we were walking out the server yelled at us. He was using a lot of profanity which is too inappropriate to write on my blog. 

I couldn’t believe he had said what he did, but I kept my mouth shut because I knew my dad would have reacted differently if he understood.  

Apparently in Italy, the customer isn’t always right!

Moving on:  

After Florence, we headed to Pisa!  We wanted to take the dorky photo pretending we were holding up the statue.  Other than the leaning tower of Pisa there isn’t much to see in Pisa so we made it a quick trip.  We took our photo and we headed out of Pisa for dinner.  

We stayed in little beach town in which I don’t remember the name! (I have it all written down somewhere, but I just can’t remember where I wrote it down.)

It was cute, but everything was a little pricey.  I assumed its because it was getting close to Easter, and places can raise their prices…  This is besides the point.

We arrived pretty late.  It was close to dinner time and we were all hungry so we headed to a little restaurant the man at the hotel we were staying at recommended.  Dinner was good, as usual and we ate and enjoyed each other’s company.  After dinner, I was exhausted so I headed to bed early.  The rest of my family walked around the little town for a little bit.  

The next morning we all woke up at a decent hour, walked around this town and headed back to Bergamo.  The plan was to stay in Bergamo because Nicholas was flying out the next morning and we figured it would be easier this way.  

Bergamo was fun… Nothing to write home about however so we will leave it at that! 

The lovely Vacation Part 2!!!

Okay the next morning We woke up early (when I say early I mean 830) and got ready!  WE were out of the house and on our way to Naples by 9:15!  I was excited to see Naples, because I had heard great things about it!  When we arrived we looked quickly for a parking garage since driving in Naples is absolutely impossible!

We parked the car and we walked to the train station.  (Which was close)  We took a train and made it to the center of Naples.  I was a little disappointed when I saw how dirty it was, but looking past the trash it was still a beautiful place! We made it to the two castles and took tons of photos!  It was a beautiful view from the top of the castle!  Still Naples wasn’t my favorite place in the world, but I am happy I got to see it!

Next day:

We made our way to Pompeii!  I loved!  We got the audio tour (otherwise we would have been walking around starring at rocks.)  It was beautiful, and a wonderful experience!  From Pompeii we headed to a city where they sell the best Mozzarella is supposedly in the world.  We went merely to buy cheese, and then headed back and had a late lunch/early dinner.  The day was beautiful and I was loving spending the time with my family! 

Wednesday:

Today we didn’t really have much of a plan.  We were driving to visit this lake that was recommended to us.  On our way,  my dad saw a store in which sold Monster energy drinks (he was going through withdraws,) and had to stop.  We walked in, bought the energy drinks, and asked where we were.  Coincidentally we were in the little town where my great grandma was born.  We were excited and decided to go on a hunt for relatives!

As we were on our way to visit a church my grandma told me about, an older man saw us, noticed we were strangers to Italy, and asked us if we were looking for relatives.  I told him we were, we met his family (just because)  and he led us in the right the direction.  He came and found us about 1 minutes later with his car, and took us around the little town.  It was so cute, and it gave me a really good first impression of the Italians from the south!  

We sadly didn’t have any luck finding relatives, however we met a lot of really genuinely nice Italians!  and from here we headed to the lake we had previously wanted to see!  We made it just in time for for sunrise.  It was beautiful, and definitely worth the drive!  On our way back we stopped at a restaurant vicino our hotel!  It was great!  It was the best Italian food I had eaten the whole trip!  The only thing wrong with the restaurant were the babies sitting next to us that just wouldn’t stop crying, but I got over it and enjoyed my meal!  

After dinner we headed back to our hotel, and packed up our stuff because we were heading to Tuscany for the last two nights.  I was excited!