Check this out. I've always lived in the language house here at Bryn Mawr, and there are three towers. Each tower has its dominant language -- French, Spanish, or German -- and then little alcoves for the smaller languages (like Russian). I'm always in the Italian alcove, which for the past 3 years was in the French tower. This year, Italian is in the German tower. So is Japanese. I think they're trying to tell us something. (Added bonus: I had forgotten how fast I can connect to the internet here. No more waiting whole minutes(!) for these boards to open.)

IGNORE the title. Guess what I got this morning? An email from a friend of mine who decides to tell me she's not coming back to school. She says she would have told me earlier, but "I didn't want to make you mad." You know what makes me mad? Waiting until the day classes start to tell me!!!! AAAARGGHH!!! Here's the real bad part: this was the girl I ate with, studied with, went into town with, etc. etc! The ONLY girl. Now I'm all alone! The only other people I know here, I know on a smile at on the street / very small talk before class / the rare phone call to get assignments. Acquaintances, not friends. Not people I can go up to and say "I know I've practically ignored you for the past 3 years, but do you mind if I had lunch with you" What am I going to do??? How could she think it was better to tell me today than 3 months ago? She said she knew she wasn't coming back last semester! Why didn't she tell me then??? Of COURSE I'm mad!! I've been abandoned! I'm all alone!

it's really not a big deal.

Sounds like a tremendous opportunity for you, Rhiannon. Seize the opportunity to make new friends. I was pretty much entrenched within a very small cluster of friends in college, then when law school came around I moved to a different state where I didn't know a soul for 500 miles in any direction. It turned out to be a tremendously liberating experience. Good luck and force yourself to maintain a positive attitude!

Nu, they moved the Italian alcove? This I should care about? When they have a Yiddisher alcove, then you come talk to me. Of course, probably, they'll put it down in the basement, with no hot water, like when first we left the shtetls for your land of opportunity. <sound of tongue being removed from cheek> I've been enjoying Leonard Nimoy and his Jewish Stories, from the Old World to the New on NPR. Last night was Leslea Newman's (a resident of my Happy 'Valley, and author of Heather has Two Mommies) A letter to Harvey Milk

I feel all alone here in istanbul too. but I leave on sunday. I'm not sure I've ever gone a week without seeing anyone I know. the carpet sellers buy me things and take me out, but I can't say that I know them. they are all liars. and I don't want to meet any more people here. it's too difficult to answer the stuff they ALWAYS ask. what are you doing here? do you have a boyfriend? where do you live? where are your parents from? I let them make up their own answers. "are you an interior designer?" "yes!" "are you from california?" "yeah." so they don't know me, either. my malevolent protector here chased away some local kid who was trying to lead me to a carpet shop. we walked by his carpet/leather store and he yelled at the poor kid. I later asked the boy what the man, who provides about 70 percent of my food each day, told him. he said that he had told him that I was HIS customer and to stay away. then he gave me this bullshit story about how he was concerned for my safety. still, it's better than ukraine.

I guess I'll be all right. I'm lucky that my family and high school friends (some, at least) are close to me (25 miles, as opposed to 500), so I can see some familiar faces on the weekends, at least. Looks like I'll be doing a lot of studying this year. Playing the piano a lot too -- I just signed up for a practice room in Goodhart (this incredible Gothic building with awesome acoustics and full-size grand practice pianos) and I'm trying to learn the second movement to Ravel's Conc. in G. Plus with 2 300-level psych courses and the GREs to take, I'll be pretty busy. Found 4 of Lagerkvist's books in the li-bary too. It was funny -- right after I wrote that last message, I go outside and what happens? I get stung by a wasp! As if my day weren't bad enough. I just started laughing... God must have it in for me. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ There is a Hebrew alcove, actually. I'll have to find out where it is before I further investigate this apparent birth of the 4th reich. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Cyst, do you think you'll be able to stand the mundane US after your global adventures?

Rhiannon, I hope things get better for you this year. Your friend is a shit for not telling you her plans earlier, and her line about not wanting you to get mad is total horse puckey. Either she was scared to tell you, or she doesn't put all that much value on your friendship. Either way sucks. That aside, the Mawrters in the German tower should be lucky to count you as a friend.

I've cried a lot today. I don't cry often. well, what is normal? I've cried maybe six times in the last year. two or three of these times have been related to plane tickets. I cried last summer at oakland airport when I found out that the airlines had fucked up and we couldn't all get on the plane to fly to the family reunion the next day in the netherlands. my brother and I got upgraded to first class and my parents got a later flight, so I guess that was ok. I cried today at the travel agency when they said that even though I supposedly bought a ticket last week, the plane was full. I can pay more to fly via budapest and leave a day early and fucking spend the night there. yeah fucking right. then I came here to the internet cafe all teary-eyed and started crying again when I was informed that I needed to have 200 bucks in cash today in kiev to get a flight back to the states. I don't understand why air travel booking has to be so fucked up all the time. it's not like a normal purchase. you make PLANS around this shit. you get other people involved. you can't just fly another day. maybe these tears were overdue. I was told that the carpet I was going to buy for my mom is not 400 but 750 dollars. I believe there was a mistake there -- they weren't purposely trying to fuck with me. but it's not like I can just absorb three separate cases of "oh, that will be an extra X hundred dollars" in one day. but what choice do I have? I promised my mother. I have to go to kiev. I have to go to the u.s. the other times I cried because I was lonely. maybe this time was some of that as well. I have to go do shitty things I don't feel like doing now.

rhiannon - there are always more global adventures to be had. maybe I'll go to south america. maybe I'll go to fucking hungary on saturday.

Rhiannon,that girl was never your friend,probably jealous of you,thank God you have friends to go out with.Cyst,if I was your mom,I think I,d just want you to come home,I was worried about you after that earthquake,you call that man your working for and tell him what,s going on,cry,cry a lot.

you're like everyone's mom, j. it's cute. the last message I got from my mom mentioned cholera, I think. my patron already said he'd buy me a black leather minidress as well as the skirt. so that's cool. if I don't go crazy my last full day shopping for friends, then I should be able to afford getting out of europe. it just depresses me to get dicked around a lot.

H...Leslea Newman is one of our authors.....we published that book Heather Has Two Mommies......shameless-ima-company-man-plug...she has a new book coming out in Jan. called Girls Will Be Girls....ok its out there it is....

Waffles, nice marketing work. Actually, I think your comments were to be directed at JusMiceElf, but I supposed it doesn't hurt to be well informed.

I'm so useless. I can sympathize with Rhiannon, but once again I have no advice to give. Because if I did, I'd have followed it myself years ago. It's hard for me to make friends, and (oh lucky lucky me!) I won't have Any of them with me when I go to school in a few days. At least I can see them in the evening, though.

The closest friend I have (in distance) is about 300 miles away. I have "work" friends, but that's different then the friends you have personally. So, a lot of vacations (hell, all of 'em) center around visiting friends. I'll be trying to get out to Seattle and Portland sometime in spring to visit my best freinds, who for some odd coincidence, all moved to the west coast. Sometimes, the conferences I go to occur in cities where I'll know someone, which is good. Otherwise, for the present, I have this place, which is about my only source of contact with people outside work. So,i think I'll be going back to school within the next couple years, so as I can regain a social life...

i started school in the last couple of weeks. i told a single friend if he wants to meet girls, go back to school....the community college i attend......OI VEY...they are so many amazing girls there.............i never remembered my high school being that way, and surprisingly UNC Greensboro (which was formerly a womens college so the ratio was still 7:3 in favor of the girls..) was never that plentiful either....hmmm....maybe there is something to be said for california girls, maybe......