All I could think of was that scene from Bridesmaids, where Kristin Wiig’s character tells her mom that before, when things were really bad, and it seemed like she’d hit rock bottom, things got worse.  Yeah.

So we got up early in the morning, checked out of the hotel, and headed out for a bus to my campus.  I needed to go to get a form signed by the program director to prove that I was a foreign student in order to open my bank account here, in order to give my landlord my first month’s rent when we were meeting him at noon to sign the contract.  I had put down the deposit for my apartment the day before, using a good majority of the cash I’d brought.

So my mom and I tried to figure out the bus system to get to the University.  I knew I was headed for Valletta, because we’d been told since I looked in to the program that that’s where it was.  We got on a bus that looked, by the route posted on the outside, like it was headed for Valletta.  When we got on the bus I asked the driver where to go for the University, and he told me he’d tell me to get off where I needed to.

To make a long story short, we get to the campus (finally, thanks to the bus driver’s help), go to what is equivalent of the study abroad office, and I ask for my program director.

“He’s at the other campus.”

Wait. WHAT?

Apparently, we were not in Valletta.  The main campus, where we took the bus to, was in Msida.  That meant that the apartment that we put the deposit down for was in Msida.  Which was a five-minute walk the main campus in Msida, but probably an hour-plus walk or 30 minute bus ride to my actual campus, which was the Old University Campus in Valletta.

We contacted the realtor to inform him, and thus that instead of going to sign the contract for the place we’d put the deposit down for, we wanted to get the deposit back and look elsewhere, since no contract of any kind was signed.  After being picked up by the realtor and as we took off to our scheduled appointment at noon to meet the landlord, he called ahead on the phone to fill him in.  They talked for probably five minutes, all in Maltese, then he hung up.

“This is a very stubborn man, I don’t think he is going to give you your deposit back.”

WHAT THE HELL, NO, that is not fair.  I was pissed.

“I’d like to talk to him myself,” I said, “Could you please take us there?”  My blood was boiling.

He assured me over and over that it would do nothing, to which I repeatedly told him I would try anyway.  So we meet up with the landlord.  Another long story short: dude was a douche.  The douchiest douche I’ve ever met in my entire life.  He yelled at us, told us he wouldn’t give us a cent of our money back, and never once would look us directly in the eyes.

I was so over everything at this point, running on about five hours of sleep in the last 48 hours.  I broke down.  I cried in front of him, I was so emotional.  Then my mom yelled at me for crying, and I cried more.  I was a hot, hot mess.

Yesterday was pretty shitty, but right now I’m in such a good state of mind that it’s hard for me to write in detail of how I felt then.

Things ended up turning out way better.

We had our realtor show us a place in Sliema that we’d looked at originally.  We actually, initially, wanted to pick the place, but I picked the other place because of how close (I thought) it was to our campus.  Thankfully the place in Sliema was still available.  And even better, it is literally a couple doors down from two of the girls in my program, on the same street (and I LOVE them).  And not to mention, the landlord is a complete sweetheart.  He’s this family man who picked up on the fact that my mom is crazy overprotective over me, so he told her not to worry and to contact him if I need anything.

So now, my mom is at ease (which is the most important), I’m at ease.  I love my new apartment, I’m all moved in.  And now I’m at the girls’ flat drinking a beer while they get ready so we can all go out tonight.

Right now, I’m a happy girl.  And the beer might be adding to that.

Oh, and on our little adventures, taking the bus here and there, I managed to enjoy myself and take some pictures.  Valletta, where my school actually is (I ended up going to my correct campus and getting my director to sign that form) is GORGEOUS.  I’m in love.

Also included, pictures of my new apartment.  It’s so cute, I love it.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.