Wow what a wonderful first week in Lugano at TASIS.  I love my job here.  It is very rewarding and even though I work almost all hours of the day and get very little sleep it is so worth it.  I spend my days going on adventures with the students and being a part of a very special time in their life.  All of the students who go here are very rich and some are even Saudi Princes.  There is Chanel, DG, and Juicy everywhere.  It is a very interesting the first day when the students arrive on campus.  Parents are angry that their student has to share a bathroom with three other girls and that their child has a “depressing room” even though almost all the rooms have a balcony with an amazing room.  The students even become more upset when they find out that they can’t wear super short shorts, see through shirts, ripped jeans, or name brands written across their clothes.  Tasis believes in being a respectable image to the community and they do not like how certain brand names portray women so that is why they are so strict in what the students wear.  You should have heard the uproar from the students (who were supposed to read their handbook which stated these rules) when the dean said they cannot wear name brands. 

As for my job, my boss is amazing and my coworkers are amazing so that is really helpful.  The first night together as staff we went out to a fancy Italian Restaurant and ate an extremely good meal in which I had the best tiramisu I have ever tasted.  As for my coworkers, it is funny some of the things here that go on with the staff.  There is an ongoing joke about the ripped jeans as our boss stated that when someone wears them it looks like they have been attacked by a cougar.  Also we have lots of fun together and make an effort to have dinner together and enjoy each other’s company.  The students here have been amazing and have made me feel rewarded for my work with them.  I have some students in my group from Saudi Arabia and Kuwait and they are amazing and I love learning about their culture.  They have really grown fond of me and they are constantly telling me how much they like me and one girl said “I missed you” and I asked her what she meant and she said  “I missed you since yesterday, I love seeing you and you are so much fun to be around”  I guess my excitement from being here is contagious and these students keep telling me “your so cute because your so excited and that makes me so excited”.  My students also won best photo for our group photo contest so that means our photo will be up on the tasis website for the year.

Some things I have learned while I have been here: 

There is no way I want to drive on these roads, many of them are one way and busses take them.  Today we were on the bus to go on a hiking trip and almost hit another bus going around a blind corner on a rickety road, there was no room to pull over so the other bus had to back up until there was another road to pull off on.  I am pretty scared to drive here but if I need to drive I guess I will.   

Pasta Pasta Pasta!!!!  I am so sick of it!  There has been way too many carbs in the diet here.

I probably will come back home in better shape than I have ever been in.  I live a half mile from the school and I walk back and forth to my house about three times a day so I get in at least 3 miles every day in walking just from work to home.  I also walk everywhere on campus when I am on roaming duty (checking on students) and then also on every day I do at least two sports.  Its crazy how active we are.   On top of that since I am sick of pasta I eat from the salad bar which usually consists of some lettuce and carrots, and if we are lucky tomatoes and cucumbers.  They also don’t have good dressing so I just use olive oil and vinegar and then cut up some meat and put it on my salad.  I also eat a lot of fruit so I am guessing this will be one healthy summer minus all the gelato I plan to eat.  As I sit here writing this I am on my balcony looking at the lake with the lovely house lights glistening off in the distance, I have to keep pinching myself because I cannot believe I am here!  

                                                              Lake Lugano

                                                                            Dinner

                                                               Group of us Counselors

                                                View from my room (its really pretty at night)

                                                             View of Lugano

                                                  Our winning Picture for the Group Shot

Some of the Girls in my group