Ciao!

Its tragic that I am only now writing my first post. While I have only been in Florence for 4 days, so much has already happened. I guess the best way to catch you up to speed is a quick recap

OK:

1) hailed a taxi from Florence airport and arrived safely to the hotel speaking no Italian to a man who spoke no English.

2)Met Daniella, our Accent guide. Love her. She took us to Bella Donna, where I met the rest of the group. Love them.

3)moved out of the hotel and into our apartment!! Taxi driver drove away before removing all of our bags...leaving me without my most beloved item: my laptop. Daniella came to the rescue and got ahold of the taxi driver and it was returned without a scratch. Thank GOD!

4)Orientation...blah blah blah, nothing exciting

I guess I can begin my blog with last nights festivities. Let me preface that the intention of the night was to go and toast wine to the semester ahead of us. While that certainly happened it was too hard to let our "first" night go to waste. For our first independent introduction to Florence, the 7 of us girls ate at Acqua al 2, a famously fabulous restaurant, which supposedly is now also in San Diego. We Split a bottle of the house red and white wine, and split 5 different pasta dishes and 3 salads. Delicious.

We then moved on in search of lemonchello. Stopped at a small cafe/bar. Their "lemonchello" was of cough syrup consistency, neon yellow, and can only be described as a thick melted lemondrop with a hint of liquor.

Very disappointed, we went to calm our nerves at an oh-so chic spanish bar called Ovio. Outside seating was sophisticated and simple with beige canvas umbrellas and modern furniture. Inside was a madhouse of music and energy. The wall behind the bar flashed neon pink light with the most impressive display of Grey Goose bottles of every size. The bartenders made their job into a theatrical spectacle, spinning bottles, flipping fruit, and hugging one another like it was their last hurrah.

Soon befriending the bartenders, we were getting free drinks and the first on the dance floor, as Maria worked it with an interpretation of Beyonce.

It was then that we decided that dancing was our greatest priority. We said farewell to our new friends and headed in what we hoped was the right direction of Twice, a dance club people had mentioned to us earlier.

Naturally we got lost, but when an eager American asked if we needed help, our rehearsed response was to ignore and keep walking. However, this was no typical American. This was Eddy. Fabulous socialite/promoter who had no intention besides getting us in VIP. And he did. As Hilliary and him quickly bonded, it was soon after decided that he was planning my birthday extravaganza. I am obviously very excited.

Hilliary fell in love with Eddy's surprisingly straight friend, Valerie (a man) who we believe will be attending my festivities this weekend.

At a far later time than expected, Hil and I walked home and somehow managed to find our apt. thanks to our Chanel landmark and a graffiti sign that says "pills" with an arrow pointing toward our flat.

All in all, I cannot deny my love for Florence. I simply don't know how we'll survive without each other once the semester ends. :)

CIAO

Jenna