"Hey... wanna go to Switzerland?"

1:25 PM, GMT+1

By the way, this will be a somewhat extensive blog.

I've been away from the blog for awhile because I was busy getting fat on Swiss chocolate. Yes, I said it.

La mia ragazza, Brittany, visited me, and we decided to visit Switzerland on a whim. The weather wasn't nice enough to go see Lake Como, and we bought tickets to go to the land of milk, honey, chocolate, and financial centers. It was fabulous.

It was an hour and a half to get to Lugano, which is at the Southeastern tip of Switzerland-- we arrived around . The train station was up a mountain, and to climb down we had to walk along these winding roads, around various buildings that had a modern (yet pretty) look to them. Just imagine walking down cobblestone roads, between old churches and modern apartments, old houses and modern parking lots, etc. We came to a straightaway, and looming there before us...

...was a massive, beautiful lake. From where we were, we could see the lake stretching into the distance, winding between several mountains until the eye couldn't follow it anymore. It was crystal-clear, and reflected the light of the various houses that rose up the face of the mountain. To our left were shopping centers, and yet they only added to the beauty by allowing their numerous, linear lights reflect off of the surface of the water. At nighttime, the moon rose between the twin peaks of the mountains in the distance, only partly obscured by the wispy clouds that passed by. The lights of the houses formed a picture without purpose, yet had all the beauty of one that did. I felt like I could lean on the railing, watching that beautiful bit of scenery for the rest of my life. I guess it might have also helped that I had my chin on Brittany's shoulder, and my arms around her, shielding her from the biting--yet refreshing--cold.

Enough of the description, though. I wanted to look for chocolate, because the lake was always going to be there. We weren't, and the stores were all closed at 5. We arrived at 5:07.

I was getting mucho angry, because I needed my Swiss chocolate fix. Brittany decided to walk into some department-type store called CoopCity, and lo and behold- chocolate upon chocolate. Upon chocolate. I pranced through the aisles of confectionary while bluebirds dropped daisies before my feet.

But seriously. Chocolate. I was hunting for this one type of Lindt chocolate that my mom wanted, but I couldn't find it. It didn't really matter. There was all that chocolate. I went and blew 20 Swiss Francs on chocolate bars, which I should send home, but if my parents fail to make a decision soon, will no longer be in existence.

We were hungry, so we ate in a Swiss McDonalds, where I got a BEEF LATIIIINO. Which was a piece of lettuce and a runty patty on ciabatta bread. There were a couple of kids playing Fifa '08 on the PS3 Mickey D's had set up.

We walked around outside and ogled at all the chocolate and chocolate pastries the closed shops had on display. Eventually, our meanderings brought us to this big white tent with a big plastic chess set. Like, big. As in two-and-a-half feet tall pieces.

We started playing chess, and I explained the game to Britt while we played. Although she didn't really need much help- she was better than she was letting on. Anyhow, we were playing for awhile and people were beginning to gather around us to watch the game. Eventually, some chubby Swiss guy smoking a cigar started to help her. Needless to say, I was destroyed pretty quickly. As I later found out, there was a chess tournament beginning in twenty minutes, and all of these people were to be the competitors.

We just sort of meandered all over Lugano before we had to head back to the train station, and ended up in the grocery next to the station. Britt tried to buy a nutella-dipping snack and failed when she came up a franc short. I spent all of my money on chocolate, so... I was unable to assist.

We went back, and that was that. Goodbye Switzerland... hellooooooooooooo chocolate.

The next day was spent wandering about the history of Milan- the Castello, the Duomo, etc. We found a museum that cost 1.50 a person, and it had a whole bunch of ancient weapons to appease the geek in me. The rest of the day was... well, really, really bittersweet, but that's a story for another time. Let's just say that Britt left on a train and I missed calcio.

So, Monday. Where to begin... we got our tests back, and I did well enough on my Italian exam. Went to go get a permit to stay, got permitted to stay, went home, and went to the gym. Where I ended up fighting with the Collegio's local boxing instructor because he asked me to. It might be a good idea to get a mouthguard sometime soon. Oh, and I went to the music room and played la chitarra for a little. I'm beginning to feel like Italians are just better at me than everything. Dammit.

Claudio, my neighbor, invited me to hang out in his room with Matteo, Luca, and Amos. I ended up taking a whole bunch of movies from Claudio to practice my Italian. We also had an in-depth discussion about linguistic differences, and slang. I was there for like three hours.

Today I sat in on an Italian class that was a level up. It was extremely difficult, yet fun. We went to an outdoor market and just hung out for a few hours. And now I'm here.