the rock face i climbed in the alps.
the mountains in locarno

getting off the train about to go climbing
chilling at the train station after pizza and climbing.

Blues to Bop music festival in downtown Lugano last night. Awesome music, great food!

The balcony that connects all the rooms on my floor with a couch at the end

Chilling on the balcony after dinner.
Study break with Nick, my room mate (left) from Connecticut and Diego (right) from Naples, Italy.

The view up the hill from our residence hall.
The view directly out of our dorm. Not too bad.

That is me on the far left with the three girls who will be going to USC with me. This is a picture from the waterfall at Valle Verzasca taken during orientation. I have never felt colder water in my life. My body was actually blue for 30 minutes after I got out because all of the water is direct glacial runoff.

This is the Verzasca Valley, where I went today. It is in the same region or state of Switzerland as Lugano but is about an hour by car. Pretty spectacular scenery. There we did some swimming in the Verzasca River and some cliff jumping into the water. Today was the closing to orientation. My first class is tomorrow at 10 am

Just climbed this mountain today...its the local mountain of Lugano called San Salvatore...not too high, about 2500 feet but it was a blast. Very warm humid day but made it to the top and feasted on a ham and cheese baguette and an apple. One more day before classes start. Signed up yesterday. I'll be in Art History 380: Picasso: His life and works, Lit 101, Calculus, French 200, and a First Year Seminar: French Myths and Gallicisms. There is also a one unit program called academic travel where you go with a professor to a region and study something native to that region. Because I love to write, I chose the trip to Geneva and Luasane, the French speaking region of Switzerland to practice my writing and to meet French authors. This trip happens right after midterms in early October and offers a nice respite to the semester. The trip will be about ten days and will allow me to practice my french.

Orientation

Throughout the past couple days I’ve had the chance to get to know some more people here. I’m living in the Girodino residence hall which is essentially a pizzeria on the first floor and apartment style residences on the second floor. My room consists of two beds, two desks, two armoires, a mini fridge, small stove, sick, and a bathroom which I share with a room mate named Nick. Nick is from Connecticut and also played football in high school, was into theatre, enjoys writing, and is fairly laid back, so I got very lucky with my room mate placement. Our room opens up to a balcony that runs the entire length of the building, connecting with the four other rooms on our floor. We have chairs on the patio and in the morning you can go outside and watch the sunrise out there. All of the guys on my floor are really nice easy going guys. Two are from Naples, Italy, one is from Denver, CO and another is from Portland, OR.

The weather has been super hot and sticky the past couple days so being dragged through different orientation sessions has been a bit of a pain and makes for long days in the sun. I’m pretty excited for classes, but it seems that it will be a very busy time here. With 15 credits, needing to do a fair amount of cooking for myself, and trying to squeeze in some small trips, the semester looks like it will be jampacked. The dorm is already a mess and I’m headed to ikea tomorrow to pick up some cleaning/organizational supplies.

Well I have finally reached Lugano Switzerland, one plane, 3 train, and a car later. I flew direct from SFO to Zurich, Switzerland (10.5 hours). On the plane I sat next to a woman who spoke very little English. After realizing that she spoke French, I began to try to use what little French I know to converse with her. Marline Millet-Marque was returning home to Grenoble, France from a two week vacation to San Francisco, Lake Shasta, and Montreal. At first I told her how I would be studying at Franklin College, and eventually our conversations led towards topics such as family, love, and the pursuit of passions. I could not understand precisely what Marline did for a living but she indicated that she was not happy with her job and that she worked in some realm of education. Her true love was the study of Psychology and the pictures she showed me of her in different countries around the world indicate that she loves to travel. She kept a She told me about her son (26 years old) who lived in Nantes and her daughter (22 years old) who lived in Bordeaux. She was a very generous woman and offered to show me around Grenoble if I ever made it over to France while I was in Europe.

Other than meeting Marline, my flight was fairly uneventful. Two meals, one movie, no sleep. I arrived to Zurich feeling exhausted, but quickly managed to grab my luggage and pick up a train ticket for downtown Zurich. From there, I took the train to the Goldau station and then made one last transfer there to catch my train to Lugano. The scenery was spectacular. As we exited the city, the graffiti and high rises gave way to pristine mountain waterfalls and lush meadows. On the train from Goldau to Lugano, I met Jeffrey Montgomery, an art dealer who lived in Lugano but took care of business quite often in Zurich. Jeffrey began by simply giving me a few restaurant recommendations at first and then we began discussing other topics. Jeffery had been raised in the United Kingdom and had been divided among a stern emotionless father and a busy, working mother. Jeffery spent many of his adolescent years in boarding school because of his parents separation that left his mother in Boston, and his father in the UK. I would say Jeffery was about 60 years old or so and had quite a number of stories to tell. He explained that he had no children and no wife but had been living with a woman for a few years now. Besides her, his companionship consisted of his two standard poodles that he said he owned because they made him look intelligent. After talking with Jeffery for about 2 hours on the train, I decided I would take him up on his offer to drive me to my hotel. As we drove away he decided he would give me a brief tour of town and the school so I could become better oriented. As we drove around in his large, silver Mercedez-Benz, I could see men in suits speeding away on mopeds and the sun setting behind the mountain. I reached my hotel and quickly cleaned up for dinner.

My French had served me well on the plane and my English did fine with Jeffrey, but here in Lugano, I struggled a bit more to communicate with the people at the hotel who seemed to be speaking predominantly Italian with a few people speaking German. In the cellar of the hotel, was a small pizzeria of sorts. I ordered a pizza and quickly returned upstairs to crash into my bed for a deserving good night sleep.

Hey everyone. My name’s Ian and I was a spring admitted student to USC. This webpage is to serve as both a way for family and friends to follow me during my semester in Europe and as an aid for future spring admitted students. As a student admitted for the spring semester I had a few options with what I wanted to do this fall. I could get a job and not take classes, enroll in a local junior college to begin taking classes, or try to enroll in a semester long program of some sort. After finding out that I had not been bumped up to fall admission, I began leaning towards the idea of doing a program of sorts. I wanted to travel so I searched for a program in which I could both acquire college credits and travel. Through this whole process my parents were extremely helpful and patient with me.

In the end, I owe my mom all the credit. She found a great program at an American school in Lugano, Switzerland called Franklin College. Franklin is a four year liberal arts college with approx. 500 undergrad students. Franklin offers between 15-20 spots for study abroad students and has had USC spring admitted freshmen attend before. After talking it over with my parents I quickly applied and was admitted. The school has been very helpful considering I did not apply to the school until about early July.

-Ian