Italia

Well, it was an adventure.

I spent Thursday night in Barcelona, in a youth hostel. I didn't get a chance to see much, but I did meet up with Mark Kagan. He took me to see to the Montjuic (The cultural epicenter of Barcelona, with a long history.), where I was fortunate enough to see a performance of the Magic Fountains. I know that Las Vegas has them, but this was truly spectacular. I would recommend anyone to go to Barcelona just to see the Montjuic.

I arrived on Friday afternoon in Florence, from Barcelona. I was excited, if a little tired. Starting about 2 years ago, I have reached the point where I travel at least once every 2 months, on average. One would think that I would have gotten used to it. They would be wrong. I still hate it.

Anyway, I took a bus from the airport to the city and rendezvous-ed with Marina and a friend of hers. We dropped off our stuff at our lodgings, and then proceeded to tour the town. Florence is a very old and very proud city. That became evident very quickly. What became less evident is where all the people lived. On our nighttime stroll, we saw Il Duomo (unbelievable), the Uffizzi Gallery, and we even found the pavillion of the Lucky Pig (put a penny in its mouth, make a wish, and then if when the penny drops, it lands in the grate, your wish will come true). But by 10:30, after we had dinner at really delicious and inexpensive Italian restaurant, we hardly saw anybody walking the streets. Coming from Spain, this was a little unnerving. Even in Boston, there would be people out and about on a Friday night, and this was Europe!

At 10 the next morning, we struck out again. This time, we made a small list of everything we wanted to see, instead of wandering around aimlessly. Granted, our list was a little bit optimistic, but we did manage to get to about half of everything on it. Our biggest time investment was in the Duomo. Ladies and Gentlemen, what a feat of human engineering. Although by no means the biggest cathedral in Europe, it is still a stunning and masterful monument to human ingenuity. The facade of the building was entirely unique, and gave an impression of artistic intricacy, and its straight lines with subdued hues lent the church a feeling of a far greater height than it actually possessed. The interior was equally magnificent. The ceiling was vaulted, so that there was a feeling of airiness to the back of the church that one would not have expected from a structure that was started 400 years ago. However, the greatest part was yet to come. We moved towards the front of the church, where we could see the underside of the Great Dome that lends the church its name. I took some pictures, but they can't do it justice. The artist Zuccari did a rendition of Dante's Last Judgement, so that the base of the dome depicts hell, the middle section Purgatory, and the upmost section as Heaven. It was incredible.

We climbed up to the top and took some pictures of Florence and the surrounding Tuscan countryside. Classic Italy; I'll put up the pictures at some point this week. After the Duomo, we went down and had some lunch, and then went over to the Uffizzi Gallery. Unfortunately, the line into the interior of the Gallery was prohibitive, but fortunately, the good people of Florence had an outdoor exhibit of some of the cooler Renaissance statuary. Again, pictures promised.

Next, we went to the Museum d'Opera. Time was running short (we wanted to leave by 7:30, since it would take 2 hrs. by train to get to Perugia), so we breezed through the museum in under an hour. And a shame at that. The Museum d'Opera (which is about 10 meters from the Duomo itself), has some of the most amazing art I've ever seen. Their Donatello collection is superb, and they even had one of Michaelangelo's Pietas. Extremely cool.

We headed to the train station and left towards Perugia. Marina went to sleep and I took out my copy of 100 Years of Solitude, in Spanish. Although I don't understand every word, and there are entire sentences lost on me, I think its been an excellent investment. Little by little, it is expanding my vocabulary and my sense of syntax and grammar. His Spanish is very fluid, and is structured in a way that I haven't yet encountered in class, probably because it is considered too complex for students. At some point, I'd like to go back and try my own hand at translating it. But translation is easier said than done, for example, the first sentence:

Muchos años después, frente al pelotón de fusilamiento, el coronel Aureliano Buendía había de recordar aquella tarde remota en que su padre lo llevó a conocer el hielo.

I could translate that several different ways.

Literally: Many years later, in front of the wall of the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendia was to remember that remote afternoon that his father took him to meet ice.

Kind of clunky, yes?

I think more faithfully, it would be this:

Many years later, standing against the wall facing the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father first took him to see ice.

Better, but I still want to find a more succinct way of translating the bit about the wall of the firing squad. Oh well.

Back to my journey.

We arrived in Perugia late, and I went to my hotel and Marina went home. Woke up the next morning, met up with my girlfriend again, and she showed me around the town.

I was really glad I went to Perugia after I went to Florence. Perugia is really cool because it is a university town and it is home to a lot of Etruscan architecture and ruins. Entirely cool, because unlike most things preserved from Antiquity in Europe, the Etruscan ruins were incorporated right into the fabric of the town. Aquaducts, walls, and even a genuine well. It is worth keeping in mind that the history nerd in me was pumped because the Etruscan predate even the Romans, meaning I was touching walls that had been built over 2,500 years ago.

But perhaps what really made my stay enjoyable was that I felt Perugia was alive, especially compared to Florence. At night, there were people outside, especially in the center of town. And let it be noted the center of Perugia is not easily accessible, unlike that of Florence. In fact, the city center is located on top of a mountain, with sides so steep that there are actually escalators to get there. But nonetheless, there people were. The pizza was good, so was the gelato. Plus, Perugia is cheap. Cheaper even than Granada, which is saying something considering that my host parents insist it is the cheapest city in Spain.

On Monday, my flight left back for Barcelona at 9 from Rome, so I was really hoping to get a chance to see at least a little of the city, or barring that, going to Assisi, which I was excited to discover was only 20 minutes by train from Perugia. Alas, there was no good way to get from Perugia to Assisi to Rome to the airport in a comfortable amount of time to get on my plane. I thus contented myself when my train passed through Assisi to take pictures from the train window. And I must say, I got two good ones. The first is of a fat, robed monk waddling up and down the platform at the Assisi train station. The second is of the town itself, which is actually about 5 km from its train station. Its perched on a plateau on the side of a mountain, and it shines a pretty brilliant white in the day.

I arrived at the Rome airport and had a rather uneventful trip back to Granada. Sorry if this post is a tad brief and dull, but it will help immensely when I get my pictures loaded up here. I need to go battery hunting, as my batteries died when I was in Cordoba. Also a misfortune, because I wasn't able to take all of the pictures I wanted of the Grand Mosque. But that's for later this week.

Goodnight, folks.