Goodbye, USA

Today is the day! It hasn’t quite hit me yet that I am about to spend six weeks all the way over in Europe. It probably won’t hit me until I’ve been there for a week.

As far as expectations and preconceived notions of Italy, I don’t have much to go on. I only hope that they are forgiving of Americans like myself who know five words in Italian and, even then, are hesitant to say them for fear of completely butchering the pronunciation.

One of the aspects of Italian culture that I am most excited about is (of course) the food (and drink). I would like to try just about everything but am also concerned that I will have no idea how to read menus in Italian. I think that the policy I am going to adopt will be to learn the Italian phrase for “the same” and hope that I am never the first to order. We’ll see how that goes.

In general, the idea of spending an extended period of time in a place that is completely foreign to me is terrifying. The language barrier is what concerns me the most so it will be nice to have someone there who actually knows what they are saying. But, despite my lack of knowledge of Italian customs and language, I am still hoping that if I keep an open mind I will leave that country having learned a good deal about life there, and with some great experiences as well.