Le Segreterie Delle Studente

I woke up promptly at 8, made my way to the dining hall, which is called a mensa here and had an amazing cappuccino.  I love the coffee in Trieste, it is much sweeter than in the states and is a great way to start the day.  I headed in the direction of the main campus building, and when I saw it, I was astounded.  It's enormous, definitely one of the biggest single buildings I have ever seen.  It's not too tall, but it's wider than a football field and deeper than a major hospital.  It's all made out of white marble and has statues and an impressive set of steps in front.  When you get to the top there is again an incredible view of the sea.  It is fashioned in some sort of Byzantine style that I know I learned about in my art history class last year, but I can't really remember any relevant terminology or history of this type of architecture...I will include a picture when I take a good one.

I walked inside through a giant revolving door and was immediately the picture of a flustered foreigner.  There were Italian students all over the place, talking at a riduculously fast pace, sipping espressos.  A giant board was mounted in the corner of the lobby with different electronic letters and numbers that beeped every time a number changed.  I found a sign that said, "Segreterie Delle Studente," listing all of the different offices.  Letter I seemed good for me,

"I servizi per studenti stranieri"-"Services for foreign students."  

I tried to ask a girl in broken Italian where to find this office.  She showed me to a machine in and pushed a button.  A small, white ticket came out that read I-23 on it.  I had no idea at the time that this would be the first of many tickets I would have to take for various things in Italy.  She told me something in Italian and pointed over toward another revolving door.  I thanked her and headed through the door, which took me outside.  What the fuck?  This can't be right.

I came back in and noticed that there were cats strewn all about the building.  Some sunbathed in chairs that were located next to the windows, while others roamed the halls.  I wondered if somebody fed them here, or if they just came and went as they pleased.  Perhaps the cats owned the building and the University  leased it from them.  Either way, they seemed quite comfortable inside.  I asked somebody else where to find office I, and they showed me to the elevator and pointed down.  I had to hunch over to fit in l'ascensore, which was hardly big enough for two, and I noticed that there was a little sign that said that the elevator could take a maximum of four people.  Maybe they meant four cats.

I went downstairs and saw a giant hallway with another electronic board at the end of it, and some large glass doors that led into the segreterie delle studente.  I took a seat among some Italians and watched the board change.  There were a lot of letters and numbers, but never I.  I asked somebody and they assured me that I was in the right place for the office for foreign students.  After about forty-five minutes, my heart skipped a beat when I saw I-1.  I knew this was going to take awhile and decided to change seats, moving away from the intimidating doors and the giant board.

I noticed some interesting shirts as I watched the Italian students come and go.  Many of them said random things in English, my favorite being a hoodie that read, "Alcatraz Psycho Ward," in huge letters, worn by a guy drinking a coffee with comically large purple sunglasses, tight jeans, gelled hair, and tiny pink sneakers.  After another forty five minutes, when we had made it to I-10, an Italian student sat next to me and started a one-sided conversation that gave me a chance to practice my language skills.

Pretty much all I could manage was to tell him that there were too many people here and that Monday morning was a bad time to see the segreterie delle studente.  He agreed and kept elaborating in fast Italian, leaving me nodding and saying "Sí" a lot in that confused foreigner kind of way.  His number came up and he ran down the hallway and through the glass doors so that they wouldn't skip him.

In the next couple of hours, I took to watching the ticket machine crush people's dreams. Usually somebody would walk up to the machine in mid conversation, enjoying their morning. They would take a ticket, look at it and then up at the board, and then they would begin shouting and waving their hands around, knowing they would be waiting all morning.

My favorite ticket taker was an old man wearing a checkered shirt tucked into khaki pants, with reading glasses hung around his neck and a small, red book tucked under his arm.  He paced around talking to himself, shaking his head back and forth.  Every once in a while he would read one of the signs placed around the hallway while touching the wall with an extended index finger.  He would finish reading the sign, look back at his ticket, and then continue muttering angrily under his breath and pointing at people, trying to make them understand his pain.

Finally, at about 11:45, I saw I-22 appear on the screen and I made my way toward the glass doors.  A loud beep followed and I-23 was requested at window 14, it was my time.  I walked in confidently and a young girl stared back at me behind the desk, which was exactly the same as the other 19 desks inside.

"Prego," she said, and I began reciting the lines that I had carefully been practicing in my head for the last few hours.

"Sono un nuovo studente degli Stati Uniti, e ho bisogno un username per l'internet e ho bisogno scegliere i miei lezioni."  She said a few things very quickly that I could not understand. When she saw my look of confusion she asked me my name and I told her.  She disappeared for a moment and returned, again speaking rapid Italian.  She typed something into her computer screen and showed me some information about non-EU students who wanted to take a class at the university.  I think I told her something about being an exchange student, similar to Erasmus, the European version of my type of program that everybody knows about here.  She went back into the office for a bit and emerged with another woman who tried to talk to me. 

They asked me if I was looking for a masters degree, and when I told them I wasn't, they disagreed with me and handed me a bunch of paperwork about a masters program in international economics.  When I finally convinced them that I was only twenty and still an undergrad, they showed me a list and asked if I was any of the three students on there.  Two were from The Congo and one was from Iran.  I wanted to ask them if I looked like I was from either of those places, but I didn't know how.

After enough broken English and Italian to test anyone's patience, they told me that I should try some other office.  Fuck. I worried about taking another ticket and waiting for so long again, which would probably result in me breaking into tears.  The only word I remembered was "mobilitá," and I think they told me that it was on the second floor.  

I meandered around the giant building for a while looking for mobilitá, walking up many different sets of stairs and taking more small elevators, while running into a few more cats along the way.  At some point I took a set of stairs, and found a small sign that said something about a mobility office, and it also hadthe word Erasmus on it, which I took to be a good sign.  I found the office and saw a few people waiting there with tickets.  You have to be fucking kidding me. More tickets.  At least there were only about five people waiting here, but still, I didn't understand why the people in the office couldn't just ask who was there first.  

A nice guy with a pony tail showed me the ticket machine, but it stopped dispensing tickets at 11:30 and it was almost 1:oo now.  I saw a sign with the hours of the mobility office on it, and it was similar to how things worked at the Visa office in Boston, completely inefficiently.  This office is apparently only open for about two hours in the morning, two more on Monday and Thursday afternoons, and closed completely on Wednesdays.  I wondered how they could possibly deal with all of the international students if they were only open for 15 hours a week.  I suppose they can't, and that is exactly why I received no information about where I was supposed to go when I arrived and why there is no orientation for new students.

 

I watched each person wait until their number was called, some forcing their way in when it wasn't their turn, usually resulting in an argument with a lot of hand motion and ridiculous facial expressions.  When his number wasn't called, the guy with the ponytail, who was wearing red wind-pants yelled something that was probably profane and then threw his notebook against a file cabinet. After everybody had left, a blonde woman opened the door and I didn't have the energy to try to speak Italian.

"Parli ingese?" I asked.

"A little bit, yes."

"Thank God."  I told her who I was and once she knew that I had my room key and my meal card, she told me to return at 3:15 when the office reopened after a conveniently long lunch break.

"Don't worry," she told me.  "We will explain everything."  I hope so, I thought to myself, because I am fucking depressed.