Trains are long and boring ugh there's no wifi and all I do is sit and listen to music and watch the landscape go by. (Don't get me wrong, I love that. It's beautiful and so memorable but spending 11-12 hours on a train in one day isn't my jam.)
But I got really nice pictures when I could. I had a sandwich for lunch. It was pretty good. Ate a lot of granola bars and drank a lot of water. So that was that day.
And then I arrived in Milan around midnight, where my teacher's friend Everardo picked me up. He's letting me stay with him until next Tuesday, when I leave for Venice. He's arranged for his nephews to show me around the city while he works.
And let me tell you,
This city is so amazingly cool.
Like I have been dreaming of going to Italy for years and years and I still get very excited when I remember "hold up I'm in Italy. Yeah I miss home a lot, but... I'm finally, actually, for real in Italy now."
I don't know. It's super cool.
So I woke up and Everardo was gone off to work- it was 10:00 after all. I had some Biscotti and juice for breakfast at the apartment and got all my... Well, everything... Together before noon, when his nephews were coming over to pick me up.
Everardo had just the most interesting cat. His name, I believe, is Kitko, and he's 20 years old. 20. And I have never seen a grumpier looking cat in real life.
Honestly. Look at that face.
He really creeped me out for a bit, because his meow is all crackly and scary sounding, but he's just a cat, after all, and once I started petting him I realized he just wanted to be loved which is good because he's such a lover.
Okay so Milan. His nephews came and brought me first to one of the old castles. You know, it was a castle. Lots of bricks and stone. Like the other castles I've been to. (Although someone will have to explain to me again the reasoning behind a blue dragon eating a "red-skinned Muslim" because I don't think I'll ever understand that. Luckily times change, right? [Southern U.S., I'm looking at you...])
There are lots of cats hanging around the castle?? And it was super cool to just see 5 or 6 cats just sitting in front of the gates having a good time.
(There are cats there...)
After walking around a bit more, we stopped by a restaurant for lunch. I always thought it was just a gross stereotype, how much pizza Italians ate, but.....
At lunch I realized how many people I see eating pizza at restaurants. Mom, I hate to say, but they were horrified when I told them that you make amazing Barbeque Pork Pizza. Astonished and horrified and insulted.
We walked around a lot of churches, and walked in front of (but not inside because that would have taken too long with the lines at the ticket booth) the main city cathedral, in the Piazza del Duomo, which is so incredibly massive. I guess it was built from the back to the front over the course of hundreds and hundreds of years, so the further back you go, the further back in time you go.
I'll find a picture of the inside online:
We visited several other churches in the area, including one to the Patron Saint of Milan, Saint Ambrose.
His skeleton was there, which was kind of disturbi-- oh. I realize we also went to a small sanctuary in one of the churches which was made entirely from bones and skulls??? Look at how scary but cool that is!!
Like you won't find that anywhere in the U.S. Suck it America. You don't get creepy churches with walls literally made of bones from hundreds of years ago.
I spent dinner today with Everardo's sister and her family, including her three sons and husband. (Two of the sons were the ones I was walking around with.)
I guess I also just assumed that the stereotype about how much pasta is eaten was also blown out of proportion.
But no. I've had pasta twice already, and I've only been here 25 hours (at the time I'm writing this.)
After dinner, the three of us started walking again, this time to the more Modern part of Milan.* This is the part wth all the really tall skyscrapers which are infantile compared to America... I'm not sure if I have pictures on my phone of them.
We also stopped by and got official Italian Gelato, which is perfect because we are in Italy, so whatever I eat is Official Italian Food.
My raspberry Gelato looked like Donald Trump. One reason I don't miss the U.S...
There was also music playing over speakers and fountains with LEDs to light up the water to play along with the music. At was such a cool experience. I loved it so much. I wish I had photos of it on my phone, but it was very low on battery so I have pictures on the camera of it.
That was the major part of my day, my first day in Italy. I can't wait for the next ones!! I know we are planning on going to The Universal Expo one day, which I guess is pretty famous. You know, being the World Fair and all... The theme this year is Food, so 145 countries each submit their own piece to dedicate to this Expo. So one of the sub topics is World Hunger and how to solve it, another is The Future of Food, there is Dietary Education, etc. I'm looking forward to it and learning a lot!
*okay so I have to explain something. I guess the "main theme of Milan" is that there are modern buildings in the middle of old ancient buildings. That's perfectly represented by this photo, right outside the castle we started at.
Everybody hates these white buildings because they stick out like a sore thumb of the ancient Milanese. So everywhere you go, there's some modern day architecture mixed in with buildings that are a thousand years old. I guess that's Milan for you!
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