Getting Weepy. Awww Crap. (Long post!)

So I left Canada on the 28th of December via Calgary. I enjoy the Calgary airport, back when I used to work and make money instead of being a poor student, and when I lived in Calgary, I used to take little trips around Canada and the U.S., so I'm well-acquainted with the good old YYC.
This time was much different though. I was leaving on an international flight, and I would not be returning for about 11 weeks. All the way up to my departure people would ask if I was excited to go - I wasn't. Not really. I was terrified. Absolutely scared shitless. But I knew I had to go, it was something I was meant to do.
I always thought studying abroad would be something cool to do, and when I started attending the U of A, I looked for programs I could possibly apply to attend abroad. I came across the Cortona program and thought, "That's neat." I even brought home an information booklet from the Arts office to peruse, but didn't think to apply. I figured I would do it eventually, some other year. My mom found the booklet and was all like "Dude! You should go!" and so I thought about it all summer before deciding to apply in September.
One of the reasons I applied, and it's really the biggest reason, was that my Kohkom Muriel had passed away last January, followed four short months later by my Kohkom Mary. Both women had a hand in my raising - Kohkom Muriel was my dad's mother and my only real link to him growing up. I didn't see her as often, but we were still close. She's the most generous and gentle person I have ever met. Kohkom Mary was my mom's mother, and we often lived with her and Mosom William on the rez when we were growing up. Kohkom Mary was like a second mother to many of us at times, and she never made us feel like we were burdens she had to bear when we lived with them. I always felt loved by both sets of grandparents. It was Kohkom Muriel I would talk to about my mini-adventures to Toronto or Las Vegas or Portland, though, and she was proud of the fact that I would travel on my own and told me so. When I found out I was accepted into this program, she was the first person I thought to tell, and would have been the first person I called.
So here I am, in a foreign place. I don't speak the language that well. And the first few days I was here I was frightened and wanted to go home. It was a complete culture shock getting off the plane. And totally humbling to realize you don't know that much about the world; even though I already knew I didn't know much, it was like BAM! You actually know NOTHING! Here I was, this girl from an Indian reservation in Canada, raised in the small city of Edmonton, alone in the world. I thought that I should feel glamourous! Such a globe-trotter! It didn't help that my cell phone didn't work in Italy, and the person who helped me set up my cell account with an international plan didn't tell me that my phone wouldn't work outside of Canada, and I didn't think to ask. Lesson learned. So I couldn't text or call home to speak to a reassuring voice.
It took me a long time to figure out how to call my mom from halfway across the world. I didn't have money, and since we don't have landlines in my family, I couldn't call her collect. So after a while I managed to figure things out. Thanks to a friend who willingly accepted my collect calls and passed messages between my mom and I, and then to my travel insurance company who would patch me through to my mom's phone.
So why didn't I have money in a foreign land? Because I'm really that stupid. Duh. That I don't have common sense is really what it boils down to. I had money at the beginning of December, but decided that I would use it to pay off bills. Responsibility! Yay!  I  had hoped that other money I was expecting would come through before I left, but it never did, and I'm still waiting for it. And I desperately did not want to ask my mom or brother to help, especially since their gift to me was buying part of my plane ticket. And my brother purchased my travel insurance for me. (So I owe him a few hundred dollars, and a Christmas present. My brother puts up with a lot from me. What a guy.) I even remember my inner voice, the one that's usually all like "Common sense! I has it!", telling me to just save my money and catch up on bills later. They really could have waited a month. There was also an issue with a cheque I had received before I left wherein they had misspelled my name and I didn't notice before sticking it into the bank machine, and the bank took back that money while I was in transit. It wasn't a huge amount, but would have helped a lot. Another lesson learned. In the end my mom and brother were able to send me some money, and meanwhile I spent a couple of days hanging around FCO. Fun story right?
Anyway, I ended up at the YWCA in Rome for a couple of nights before having to meet my classmates and program director on January 2nd. My roommate was an older lady who was residing there, and she was from Tunisia. She spoke very little English, and so we communicated through exaggerated hand gestures and my very limited knowledge of a Latin-based language. I spent the two days walking around, mostly in the area of the Colosseum, and to various sites like the Piazza di Spagna, Trevi Fountain, and my personal favourite, the Pantheon. (Oh the Pantheon, I fell in love with it when we studied it's structure in my Art History 101 class.) I also spent New Years Eve, counting down to midnight, with like a million other people at the Colosseum. I was on my own but had fun. I stayed long enough to get sprayed with champagne and watch people randomly set off fireworks in the street before going back to my hostel. Some of the other people staying there were up watching a New Years Eve show, eating cake and drinking champagne and invited me to join them. So I sat down and had cake and conversed with people who were excited that I was from Canada and spoke english. Then I called my mom and wished her a happy new year and told her 2012 looked to be great from where I was.
What a turnaround. What a huge spectrum of emotions to feel in a few days. I remember walking along Via dei Fori Imperiali feeling very lonely and realizing that I was in ROME! In ITALY! That's in EUROPE! and deciding that it wasn't a bad place at all to be feeling lonely.
Finally, I met with my classmates on the Monday, and met my roommate, and off we went on the bus to Cortona. I was exhausted but happy. The food we're fed here... I'm ruined for food for good! It's delicious!
My next post will have photos, I promise. Just sorting them out and deciding which ones I'll be posting.
Until next time.