Sean in Bozen
13 June 2006

I walked all around town yesterday evening; it's pretty easy to get your bearings here, because everything is relative to the two rivers thru town and the surrounding mountains. I had a very good night's sleep last night at the youth hostel and the usual European-style hostel breakfast with rolls, cheese, and all. I had good conversation over breakfast with a German programmer who is on vacation, and with a very strange German woman who talked about very strange things.

Today I met some of the folks I'll be working with. They seem nice. It's a young team; most of them are in their 20's. I got a list of all the official things I need to do, so I've been walking all over the place today, registering with Immigration, getting a tax ID number, and things like that. Many sounds of official stamps thudding on papers. Next thing is to open a bank account, and then get a cell phone.

The town is very bilingual; everything is in both German or Italian. The folks at all the offices might be speaking Italian with the person ahead of me in line, but when I say 'Guten Tag', they switch seamlessly to perfect German.

I'll have most of the week free after I take care of this stuff. There are bikes available to rent. This city is bicycle heaven: it's got great bike lanes everywhere.

Off to get some lunch!