So I am in Milan!

I'm rather amazed that I made it here to Italy, all things considered. This is my first time on the European continent. I booked my flight tickets really late (on the day I booked NWA offered round-trips at a whopping $4k). The tickets I booked involved an airport change in Chicago. The tickets I bought only allowed me to check-in for the first domestic US flight and not the connecting international one. I really only started packing 2 hours before getting on the bus to the airport. I flew through France.

So after a wild and crazy ride, I end up in Milan airport. I pick up my bag and walk to what looks like customs. I imagine a bag check, body search, endless questions. Where are you from? Why are you here? Where are you staying? Where is your visa? To which, I have prepared carefully crafted answers. Honest ones of course, just that they, hopefully, wouldn't have had lead to more questions.

The officer asks for my passport and I hand it to him sheepishly. I wonder if I will ever outgrow this extra awkwardness that plagues me when I travel overseas. He glances at it and asks me "Where you from? Singaporrre?"

"Yes."

And he lets me through. He actually lets me through. "Go." I thank him quickly and walk off, expecting a long line ahead of those tinted glass doors—more travelers, like me, waiting to be interview by immigration officers.

There are none. I walk out and realize I'm free. I try to retrace my steps mentally. I must have missed something. There must have been a gate that I needed to pass through or a counter where I had to get my passport stamped. But I followed the signs. I couldn't be wrong. Besides I couldn't waltz right back in where I had come from. That, would be travel immigration suicide.

So I looked around. Shuttles/buses to city, Taxis, Tourist information... Home free. I look around for my foxie who's graciously agreed to pick me up.

This will be the 3^rd time I have flown alone to some far away place and the past experiences have not made it any less unnerving. Each time, I've though to myself if I'll ever get used to this, or if I'll ever have to in the first place. Airports make me nervous: all the policemen walking around, taboo words you're just never supposed to say—I mean think about ("chemicals", "bomb!", "terrorist", "I KEEL YOU"), and all the ridiculous checks like shoe screening and groping.

It's been a week since I've been here. Milan is a fabulous place; just fabulous, not fantastic. The streets are lined with apparel shops, speckled with the bars, cafes, and gelateria. On my second night here, around 10 p.m., people gathered in the streets waving banners and sporting flashing red and blue lights to welcome the new tourist on the block. No really, they were staging a peaceful demonstration and what seemed like an entire police detachment followed them.

I couldn't decipher what they were protesting about. Neither can I understand what the locals say because they hardly ever speak English. I usually smile and nod "Si, si" and they gaze at me quizzically till they realize I don't speak a word of Italian. Then they usually smile back.

I'll be writing loads more about my journey as I get the time and mood to. Pictures will follow on facebook (: