elizabeth

I am very excited about the trip, but to give you a taste of the pre-departure madness, here is a sample of a little game I like to call, “freak out or don’t freak out?”

Scenario 1: Visa finally arrives after spending 7 weeks with the consulate.  The beginning date on the visa is 5 days after I arrive at customs…

Answer: Don’t freak out.  A call to the embassy revealed that the visa dates correspond to my first and last days of school (since it’s a student visa) not my arrival and departure dates.  Good to know. Crisis averted.


Scenario 2: Financial aid disperses and is approximately 4k less than my estimated cost of attendance. 

Answer: Moderate freak out.  The financial aid office doesn’t know why my tuition is being billed for on normal classes instead of the study abroad tuition, the study abroad office doesn’t know why either.  They promise it will fixed as soon as they can figure out what happened, and thank me for contacting them since “we probably never would have known about this.”  Fingers crossed that it all works out?


Scenario 3: Mobile phone from newegg.com arrives, and it doesn’t show the European mobile phone bands of 900/1800 MHz only the US phone bands of 850/1900 MHz, despite the newegg product description claiming that it would be compatible with all four.

Answer:  Freak out.  Having had nothing but good experiences with newegg, I didn’t leave time for a plan B.  I decided to call the manufacturer to find out if the phone would work in Europe or not, and they confirm that it will not.  Called newegg about returning the phone since it isn’t a quad band phone like the product page claimed, they say no returns on unlocked phones.  I say, it isn’t what I ordered, they say, we’ll get back to you on that.  I say, I leave in 7 days, they say, can I help you with anything else.  Now I have a SIM card and no phone for it, and a phone that I can’t use and can’t return.  Even if they do take it back I have to pay a 15% restocking fee and pay to ship it, even though it isn’t what I ordered.  With only 3 business days before I leave, chances of this being resolved in time are looking slim.

Also, trying to search for apartments when the sites are all in Italian has been quite a treat. Those Italian language crash courses can't start soon enough...

<3,

Beth