Bienvenidos!

I'm here! After watching a drug dog sniff mine and everyone's suitcases before they entered the baggage claim (and nudging my American friends to make sure I wasn't seeing things), I got my suitcase and headed to a stuffy, one-room customs and got in line behind 30 or so foreigners to wait for the one officer to approve my forms. After making it out of the airport, our group of about 15 students met our program director and took taxis to the Central College house where we will all be staying for a week-long orientation, before some of us head to stay with locals for the semester. I was again nudging my friends upon seeing heavily armed "policia" riding in the back of a police pick-up truck. That's illegal in Madison, here the police do it! :) It is absolutely beautiful here. This morning I took a cold shower (only the first person to shower gets warm water and 7am is early enough for me!), ate delicious food and spent time learning about the city. Everything is great here, I'm just not a big fan of not being able to throw toilet paper into the toilet. Yes, I am serious. There is a trash can next to the toilet that you use. So, things are different but if I had wanted everything the same as in the U.S., I would have stayed in the U.S. right? :)
More to come...