What were you grateful for this week?This week I am grateful for my host family and all they have done to make Italy feel like my home away from home. 

What was the most difficult or challenging part of this week?We had to cancel our trip to Santorini due to bad weather.

Tell us about a “wow” moment you had this week. I did some small chores around the house without being asked and [my host mom] really appreciated the help.

Tell us about your week! As for the week with my host family in Canale, it was pretty typical and there’s not much to report. However, my host family let me have a free day off on Friday. M had asked if anyone wanted to visit Milan, so I figured why not go and visit her again. We went to this food convention where we got to taste food from around the world. It was huge and really interesting to see how italy views the rest of the world. We tried several samples and even tried foods we never had before. The food was great, entertainment was cool and the best thing was entrance was free! Later that night we did some window shopping and had ramen for dinner.

That same night I met up with T in Bergamo and we stayed in an Airbnb near the airport so we could easily catch our flight the next morning. Our Airbnb host was extremely nice and even bought us dinner!! I was able to have a decent conversation with our host in Italian. I was honestly surprised that I was able to have a conversation. It feels good to know that I’m picking up the Italian language so well. 

Saturday morning we set off to Greece! We had plans to visit Santorini. But the forecast predicted rain and strong winds so we decided against it. Luckily our tickets to Santorini were inexpensive and our stay in Athens exceeded our expectations. We visited Acropolis, visited several Athen ruins sights and walked around the city. 

EVERYONE in Greece is so friendly and nice. We ate traditional Greek dishes and of course, Greek salad. On Sunday we finished the night at this really cute restaurant with dinner and drinks. It had live music and most of the guest eating danced and sang along to the songs. We kept thinking about how unreal the experience felt. How lucky that we got to experience Greece like that. I’m sad that we only had two days in Greece. 

But T and I are thinking about coming back to visit together one day! Which is crazy to think about because I only met her last week. She’s such a sweetheart and a great travel buddy.