In Rome

Yep. We're in Rome. It was a pretty intense (read: horrible) international travel experience. We almost missed the bus to Stansted from Marble Arch, as the concierge told me 2:45 AM and the bus came at 2:30. Luckily we made it, and got to Stansted Airport at about 4AM for our 6:10 flight. We had to wildly reorganize our stuff in order to pay for as little excess luggage as possible, but still ended up spending a ton of money on it (damn textbooks). The flight was actually fine, probably the highlight of the trip. The seats on Ryanair did in fact recline, and the windows did have shades, contrary to rumor.
When we finally got to Rome, I realized we weren't at the airport that the directions expected us to be at, but we made it here fine.
Rome is very beautiful from what I have seen so far. It rained an enormous amount earlier and we got soaked and then went out to dinner with most of the group.