Ciao!

Oops, I was gonna post this on Monday, but I forgot. Here you go!

Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve written on this blog- so sorry! I’ve been caught up with school and work that I couldn’t find the time to write a reflective blog. Now that school is over and summer has started, I definitely have more time to reflect and enjoy life to its fullest. This summer, I will share my experiences in the beautiful country of Italia. Thanks to Serenella Sferza and the MISTI program, I have the great opportunity to work with Bianca Baroli at la Università degli studenti di Cagliari. Professor Baroli worked under the Langer Lab for 3 years a while back, and she is continuing her work with anti-cancer treatment with nanoparticles in Cagliari, Italy.

Cagliari is the capital of Sardinia, one of two islands of Italy. For those of you who don’t know where Sardinia is, it is right below the French island called Corisca (where Napoleon Bonaparte was born!). Cagliari is on the southern tip of Sardinia, and it takes less than 20 minutes by bus to get to the beautiful Mediterranean beaches. I haven’t actually been there myself yet, but hopefully this weekend will be the first of many trips. As far as the city itself goes, it definitely has character! Cagliari reminds me of Old San Juan, Puerto Rico with its narrow winding streets and colorful, aged buildings. You can feel the tension between Cagliari’s past and present. While the outside of buildings may look like a dusty ice cube, the inside may surprise you with modern, chic “negozi” or “trattorie”. It reminds me of Koreatown in LA.

The food so far is great. Fresh bread, meat, and juicy fruits abound in almost any small markets you go to. Surprisingly, there are a lot of pizzeria and gelateria stores around. I had this idea in my mind that pizza and gelato was “fast food”; they are not something special to eat, but more of a convenient food you would eat during late night study sessions or after a good night out with your friends. Instead, I found a pizzeria in almost every block I passed by, and over half of them are nice restaurants where you would use a fork and knife to eat it. I only went to one of these restaurants so far, and I had a delicious slice with “fruiti al mare” as my topping of choice (in other words, shrimp, squid, baby octopus, etc.). The same goes for gelato. There is one in almost every block you pass by and every Sardinian eats one after lunch and/or dinner. I had my first gelato today at a gelateria in Piazza Yenne, a bustling center where lots of high-end shops and restaurants reside. I found this gelateria from this handy book called “Let’s Go- Italy” (thanks Edna and Werewolf dancers!!) which is a travel written by students for students traveling on a budget. The store owner of the gelateria, Giuseppe, and the rest of the staff, was extremely charismatic and nice. There were approximately over 20 different flavors to choose from. I decided to try the orange cheesecake gelato, and it was definitely a nice dessert after my afternoon snack. It even had real orange zest in it! Yum.


Now lets talk about the people. The population is more diverse than I expected. Though the majority of the people in Cagliari are Italian, I have seen Indian, African American, and Chinese people who speak fluent Italian. These people are really friendly, especially if they see you make an effort to speak Italian. Also, if you go to the same store more than once, the store owners will become your best friends, and they will start calling you by your first name within a day or two. For instance, I currently don’t have internet in my room so I’ve been going to this dinky internet/fax/photocopy/money transfer place on Via Napoli to use the internet. The second time I came back to check my emails, Mario smiled widely and made light conversation with me as I bought my 30 minutes on the internet. Within 10 minutes, we talked about where I was from to if I liked his new shirt he was wearing. Mario was wearing a clean white button-down short sleeved shirt with dark wash jeans, and I told him that his outfit was perfect.

Speaking of outfits, Italians certainly know how to dress nice! As I was walking to work this morning, I see all the men with their crisp suits or work-appropriate outfits with their briefcases while the women were dressed in nice neutral pants, blouses, and heels. Of course both genders sported their (real) designer sunglasses. Some of them look like they came straight out of Fellini’s movie 8 ½. Italians who are closer to my age seem to dress as if they are modeling for an Express or Armani Exchange catalog. The one thing I noticed, to my dismay, is that most Italians like to dress in darker or more neutral colors. I, however, love vibrant and sometimes loud colors, so I have been sticking out like a sore thumb. Oh well!

For the past two days I’ve been trying to adjust to the new time change, which means my sleep schedule was, and still probably is, all over the place. If I’m not sleeping, I mainly cook or stroll along the main part of Cagliari to acclimate and orient myself to the neighborhood as I find my way to a market or a store. Today, I managed to walk through the medieval Castello district with one of the grad students named Carla on our way to lunch. This district is practically carved into a hill and overlooks the entire city. The Castello district housed several Argonese churches and Piemontese palaces, which are now occupied by University offices, bars, and restaurants. Several entrances into the district had remains of a wooden barricade that you would see in Lord of the Ring movies, which I thought was pretty exciting. I’ve never been around so much history, especially one that dates back earlier than the eighteenth century! That’s all I have to say about Cagliari so far. I am currently stuffing my face with these awesome cookies called “Ringo”, which are like Oreos but made with lighter cookies and have a nutella filling. I guess my beach body went out the window just now. I’m also watching one of two English TV channels: MTV2! They are doing a European top 10 countdown right now, and some top 10 songs include “Rude Boy”- Rhianna, “Fireflies”-Owl City, “Telephone”- Lady Gaga, and “Rock Your Body”-Black Eyed Peas.