Italy just has it figured out—everything from the food, to the schooling, to the culture just seems so right. I’m really starting to wonder what America is doing wrong.

Well let’s first start with the food. Italy’s main food groups consist of wine, bread, chocolate, and pasta. If you’re at a restaurant and ask for water and a bowl of bread for the table, you’ll pay for the water but not the bread. Some of the chocolate shops stay open later than the majority of stores and restaurants. You can go to the local grocery store and get a bottle of wine for as little as 3 euros…and it’s not in a box. The thing that surprises me the most is how fresh everything is. Preservatives are nearly nonexistent in their food, and fast food or takeout is practically frowned upon. “Mom and Pop shops” are how people get their meals when they want to eat out. These shops are just a fancy way of saying family owned. There aren’t all these chain restaurants that serve the same menu and whip up some frozen meal for you. Most of the Mom and Pop shops include handmade pizzas, fresh cooked pasta, and traditional family recipes. The only time you can really find that in the States is if you’re in a Little Italy in one of the cities located close to you. But this isn’t Little Italy…It’s Big Italy and it’s great! People fill up on delicious and huge amounts of food but the country does not have the obesity problem that haunts the American lifestyle. Food is also a social thing here. Italians aren’t really found out at restaurants eating for comfort or because it was just something to do, but rather they spend time socializing with their friends or family at the dinner table and pace themselves while they’re eating.

So I guess I should throw something in here about school because you know… “study” abroad. Trust me when I say that most of my blog entries will be about my actual travel experiences, but for the sake of the parentals (who practically funded the trip…love you), or my University, or for those who believe knowledge can be obtained only from a classroom rather than immersing yourselves in a person’s culture and environment I will have a small snippet about my classes. Well…I love all of my professors. Some come from Rome others from Florence. Some are even Perugia natives who have studied all over the world, but the thing I love most about them is their vivaciousness. I’ve never been to a school where every single teacher had the eagerness to teach and the excitement to go along with it. It makes learning for me an even more enjoyable experience. I’ve even signed up for a more intensive Italian language class because I loved the teacher so much. Yes, me…a girl who practically cursed at seven years of trying to learn Spanish. But I’m thrilled. I feel like I have already learned a decent amount of Italian (or at least enough to ask how much those pair of shoes cost) and my other classes—Archeology, Italian Mafia, and Intercultural Marketing—really have me looking forward to the rest of the semester!

After only being in Perugia for two weeks, I am proud to say that most of my pre departure thoughts are not very accurate. My biggest surprise came when I developed “diversity shock.” And, yes, I do believe that is a phrase I invented but for now I am going with it. Perugia is the capital of the region Umbria, and even though it’s the capital, compared to Rome it is practically unheard of. Although, to my surprise, the rest of the world has heard of it because they’re all here. I’ll be honest, when deciding to study in Perugia, Italy I expected…well…Italians (okay, white people), but the beauty of it is there are so many countries represented in this small town it’s impossible to count. It’s not like in the States where diversity is literally categorized into four groups: black, white, Asian, and Hispanic. It’s also different in a way that most people who are black, white, Asian, and Hispanic have never been outside of the U.S. nor have they actually been a part of the true cultural experience that their ancestors were once a part of before coming to America. Here, you can be from Afghanistan, have gone to school in South Africa, taught in Saudi Arabia, lived in Greece, and now you’re in Perugia. In fact, I have met a few locals with practically that same backstory. I’ve bumped into Nigerians, Chinese, Germans, Georgians (the country…please don’t think Atlanta), South Africans, Afghani, and Greeks who now reside in this beautiful small city. I think that’s one of the things I’m going to miss the most: walking around, listening to all these different languages and seeing all these different people, and thinking “this is like the true American melting pot”—except I’m Italy, and right now that seems alright!

Location: Perugia, Italy