Chardaie:  The food was great, needless to say. I was really worried going over there, because I was like: All they eat is pasta and pizza and bread. I was like: I'm going to be so fat when I get back home. And I was like: Oh, well.

But, when I went over there, I ate nothing but pasta. I had pesto. I tried everything: gnocchi, all the different pizzas, all the different pastas. It really is a pasta/pizza based diet period. I tried chocolate. I ate chocolates a lot.

But the thing is, I think it's much healthier than what we eat here in America. Like they'll make pasta, but they don't load their pasta with cheese and everything that we put here in America when we make pasta.

Another thing I thought was really fascinating is that when they cook, they use like three ingredients. Their pasta would literally be the pasta boiled with a little bit of salt. They use some basil. They'll use some parsley. And they'll use tomatoes. And that will be it. And they'll make this pasta. And you're like: Oh my gosh, this is the best pasta I've ever tasted.

And "What did you put in it?" There's like three or four ingredients in the whole thing. And everything's natural and freshly grown. And it's not all of these processed foods. It's a lot healthier. And you can taste the difference. It's fresher.

Angela:  I'm quite sure.

Chardaie:  It's not as heavy as the pizza we get here. And you go over there and you order pizza, you get this huge... Well, when you first get it, you think it's huge. You get this huge personal pizza. But, it looks like the size of a medium to large pizza that you'd get here in the States. But, it's way thinner than the pizza here in the States.

When you sit down and you see it and you're like: There's no way I'm going to be able to eat this. And then you start eating it. And pretty soon it's gone.

Angela:  [laughs] When you look up it's all gone?

Chardaie:  Yep, it's all gone. And I'm like: Oh wow, I guess I could eat all of that. But I think, it's healthier. And I walked around a lot. I couldn't get fat.

I don't miss American foods, because my family's Haitian. And so we didn't grow up eating quote?unquote "American food." But, I did miss Haitian food, because I'm a fan. I'm a big fan of it all.

Chardaie:  Breakfast, they weren't big on breakfast. They would have some breads, some jam. And they have whole milk. I hate whole milk. But for breakfast, they had whole milk. But, they weren't big on breakfast at all.

The thing is: their meals, too, take forever. I remember the first week we were there, we had orientation. We weren't in the city. They took us to this country area village just outside of the city for the week, so that we could be together with everyone who's in the program before we all scattered throughout the city.

I remember eating meals. And the meals literally took three hours. Italians take forever to eat, because it's not about the food for them. It's about the conversations with the food. We'd sit down for dinner at six, and we wouldn't get out until nine. And I'd be like: Oh my gosh, this is the longest dinner.

And here in college, really dinner for me is I'm on my way to do some meeting and I just grab a sandwich from the dining hall. That's dinner for me. Because over there, you're going to sit down for three hours, they're going to bring you food very slowly [laughing], and eat very slowly and talk, and have conversation; Like: "Oh my gosh!" I also think that's why they're healthier, they eat slower, I don't know...

Chardaie:  I think that... Milan is such a beautiful city! Everybody thinks that it's dirty and there's graffiti everywhere, on every wall, because it's a trend. They go through a phase, the youth... where they graffiti everything. But, it's different than in the States, because here in the States, you're in your neighborhood and suddenly there's graffiti all over, like: "Maybe I'm in a bad neighborhood, or it's not that great of a neighborhood." But over there, it's totally not an indication of the level of safety or upscale ... ness of the area, it's just all over the place.

But, the buildings, I think... There's something like a historic and an ancient. There's something beautiful about the buildings ? even with all their graffiti; even with the pollution in Milan, there's something about going to the first single mall was built in Milan, it's called Vittorio Emmanuele; go in there, and it's like, everything's so extravagant. It's like this huge thing ? gold?covered paintings of all this color and paintings all over murals all over ? and this is just the place where you shop! They have all this Louis Vuitton, Prada.

But, it's like, everything that I feel is ... everything that they do and the art, and the buildings and all the people, is simple, but everything they do they do with the best of their ability. Like, if I buy a shirt, in Milan, for a Euro, you'd think it would be low quality; but it's better quality because despite the fact that it's cheap, or something that they're not charging you that much for it, Italians have a pride in putting out their best work no matter what, you know? Here in America if I get something for a dollar, I expect it's going to be trash, you know: "This is a dollar." The product is not going to be that great.

I think there's something about putting forth their best effort that's so valued in everything. Whether it's having a discussion with a certain person, or you're walking through the mall looking at the Sistine Chapel whatever you do. I think, it's a thing called 'unconventional beauty.' I don't like things that are normally labeled as ideal or beautiful; things that I find beautiful are things society calls horrible, or dirty, or unwanted.

And there are a lot of different corner areas in Italy, like dark movie alleys; but I like looking there and: "Oh, this is beautiful. There's something mysterious about this. And this person who was there on this corner that most people think is like [inaudible] and this person you can have great conversation with. You know?

Want more on study abroad in Italy?  Well, let's go.