Pensione Life

So most people on the program live in a pensione. There are a few doing homestay (hopefully me next semester!) but the vast majority are in pensiones. There are about 8 pensiones and they are varying distances from the school but all within a reasonable walk. Mine is called Soggiorno Laura. I love its location because there are 3 or 4 other pensiones on my street (Via Cavour!) and its close to school. A pensione is basically like a bed and breakfast, but they are each a little different. They make us lunch mon-thurs and dinner mon-wed. we get breakfast mon-fri. Each one is run by a “pensione manager”. Mine is the skinniest woman you have ever seen, and she is the only one of the staff who speaks a little English. She is very intimidating and wears large flowery jewelry. I have named her Fabiola because it fits her perfectly, but I think her real name is Chiara. Anyway, we only really see Fabiola at lunch time when she is busy literally shoving food down our throats. I’m glad I am not a boy because this woman piles leftovers onto their plates like nobody’s business and makes them feel very guilty if they don’t finish. It’s funny to watch. The meals are mostly pretty great. Lunch is my favorite, and NOT just because it’s the only meal we get dessert after. We usually have some kind of vegetable, some kind of meat, and some kind of pasta at lunch. Dinner is very similar except we get salad. No dessert though. Breakfast is a whole different story. For breakfast our options include 2 varieties of very strange cereal, pre-packaged AND pre-toasted toast (I don’t understand these things at all. They’re basically like toast-shaped croutons), regular non-toasted bread, packaged croissants, hard boiled eggs, jam, and of course nutella. I would kill for some yogurt. Or fresh fruit. Or any type of eggs besides hard boiled. Not that I’m complaining ☺ just thought you should all know what breakfast in Italy is like. The room situation in the pensiones varies from singles, doubles, and triples. I am in a triple and I love my roommates. We are having so much fun together and we share everything. This is extremely necessary since our room is very tiny and we have one closet! For three girls. Yikes. We recently pushed our three beds together (and thereby created Megabed) so now we have a little more space in the room. Our room is in the corner and three boys live next door. The six of us share a common area with 2 couches. The boys have a bathroom in their room but ours is right off of the common room. The boys also have more closet space than we do….very interesting how that worked out! Living in the pensione is a blast, there are about 18 of us in mine and we are all becoming good friends!