Transportation

Before my exchange getting around was fairly easy and the worst part always seemed to be traffic and if I didn't want to drive I could usually get rids with friends.  Now coming to Italy I knew I wouldn't be driving and I was OK with that I had taken the bus before and I would get by.  Now that I'm here I most definitely miss my car and even driving in general but if i had a car I would have missed some experiences, so the Transportation stories:

Because none of my fiends here have cars we have to gets rides if we want to go after the buses shut down.  The morning after going to the disco one of my friends dads was driving us back, we were cruising along in the fast lane going along and some car pull in front of him so he slams on the breaks and barely misses the guy who then pulls back to the slow lane.  Once the guy was out of the way my friends dad zooms off again.  After seeing teh rapid deceleration I'm thinking wow were going pretty fast, so I lean over and look past the seat to see just how fast.  Well shit were going 180 were gonna die!!!  ...wait...thinking...thinking...  oh that's in kph not mph it isn't that fast.  Commence quick mental calculation, 60m=100k so 200k would be 120mph so its pretty fast maybe I didn't read that right.... look around seat again.  Nope its not 180 now its 220, holy shits that like 130mph and this is a station wagon, my Volvo definitely doesn't do that.  (Don't worry mother I made it home safe.)



The next is a story the has exchange student written all over it.  It was Sunday afternoon and I was hanging out with my friends in down town Pisa some how holding a conversation with my broken Italian and their broken English.  They had to leave around 5:45 so we parted ways and I set off to take the bus home.  There are 2 buses that take me home and the stops are on opposite ends of the main street so I check my bus schedule and see the next one is on the far side of town at 6:30 so I casually walk there and get there 10 minuets early.  I sit down to wait for the bus and wait and wait and wait.  6:30 comes and goes, but this is Italy the buses are always late.  So I keep waiting, 35, 40, 45, still no bus.  Maybe I missed it some how so I'll see when the next one is... 845 at this stop, nope, and 7 or 9 at the other station.  Well shit i had better run if I want to be home anytime soon.  So I set of sprinting through town.  the only areas of Pisa I know very well is the main street where there are all the shops and there for all the tourist so I'm running as fast as I can dodging through crowds to try and get to the other station.  by the time I left the first station it was 6:50 so i had to make it across town, about 3k, in 10 min.  So i finally make it to the station and as I'm nearing it at about, no exactly 7:02 I see kids I recognize from my town at the stop so i know I'm not late.  I get to the stop thankful that the bus is late when i hear one of the guys saying something about 7:20 and looking at the bus sign so i go over and look my self and in a little yellow square it says calci-7:20.  In Pisa the buses have special schedule for holidays so not all the buses run on those days and the yellow ones show those time.  I had forgot in Sunday counts as a Holiday.  Which explains why my first bus hadn't come.  The things I should know but don't know for being a foreigner.  So I settle in to wait for the bus.  around 7:20 the correct bus pulls up but now to our part of the station so twenty some odd kid run over to the bus so I follow(currently that is why I get by other people i know are doing something better imitate, that's how I eat get to class, and do most things now a days)  then the bus driver points off in some direction and the kids run off again so I follow.  there were these metal bars in the way which most people took the long way around but i just hurdled which ended up getting the attention of one of the kids once we were on the bus the kid sat down next to me and we talked for most of the bus ride, by talked i mean I laughed and said "si" when I thought was appropriate and wondered 'what the hell is he saying'.  In the end I made it home for dinner so it wasn't too bad.