11.5.21

Melina left the air bnb before me to catch her flight so I was left responsible for shipping a box to London of things we couldn’t pack. This made my morning very difficult.

I packed my ruck sack and the big box and barely caught my bus to the post office. Once I arrived, I waited in line and walked up to a worker to be helped. I asked if she spoke English and she immediately said no. I asked if anyone did and, annoyed, she said no again without hesitation. I tried to get help shipping the box by pointing or showing an address and using simple words but the more I tried to get help, the angrier she got until she was yelling things and me in Italian quickly and very harshly. I felt so hopefully and when she was done yelling she ignored me and began calling up the next customer. I stood in the post office with my huge bag and box just hoping she (or someone) would help or even acknowledge me but she didn’t even look my way again.

I was so overwhelmed and felt so defeated, but I walked up to another worker and asked for help. She also spoke no English but was thankfully a little more patient with me and was willing to help. It took a long time (about 45 minutes) and communications through google translate but I managed to get the box shipped (still hoping it arrives correctly).

However the stress was not over because since I hadn’t considered that it would take this long, by the time I was done at the post office my train was scheduled to leave in 8 minutes and the station was a 15 minute walk away. i sprinted a half mile with my rucksack in the heat and through many busy streets but made my train right on time. I boarded the train sweaty, exhausted, and overall not feeling my best. I got off at my stop, had some breakfast, and boarded my other train to Brescia Italy.

My day turned around when I arrived because I was meeting my friend Matteo! He did a year abroad in Denver two years ago and we went to the same high school. Him and his other friend picked me up at the station and we al went to get lunch together. We got pasta (very good) and walked to his apartment that he shared with cousin and his brother.

I unpacked a little then we headed to the city center of Brescia. Matteo showed me some cool churches and told me a lot about the city. We then met with two more of his friends- Marco and Guilia- and had some drinks at a bar while his friends practiced their English on me.

We then went up to the Brescia castle and saw a beautiful sunset. Matteo’s friends left and me and Matteo went to go get dinner. We went to a pizza place and it was very good- mine had cheese, eggplant, and zucchini flowers. After our meal, we got espresso shots with sambuca and that was very disgusting.

We then went to meet Guilia at a bar and had some drinks and very nice conversation. Around 11 we went to see some Roman ruins which were so pretty and so cool to see at night. Guilia left to go home while me and Matteo went down to a popular student bar street and met a lot of different people. We probably talked to 5 different groups of friends before walking back to his apartment.

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