So... we left Florence on a high. It was probably my favorite city so far. A must-see for anyone traveling through Italy - and for everyone who is able, for that matter! It is peaceful, much slower pace than Rome (although Rome was INCREDIBLE, too!). I didn’t feel like I had to guard my purse like I did in Rome and in general, just felt more at ease. The whole city is accessible on foot (if you don’t mind walking) and it is so beautiful! Definitely a great place for hopeless romantics like myself who like to indulge their artistic side and sit with a panoramic view of a beautiful ancient city at sunset while journaling or writing a song. AND for people who like to shop and eat well :)
We arrived in Milan for a 24-hour visit before we got on our next train to Zurich, Switzerland the next day. After getting off the train in Milan, we picked up a free map at the tourist kiosk in the train station (which has become our bff these days) and plotted out our route via Metro train and walking to our hotel - A Best Western hotel which was a ways away from the main train station. Carrying our ever growing souvenir-packed backpacks, (as we have now begun to refer to as “our children”) we headed off. We found the hotel with ease and checked in - a taste of home as it was a fairly American hotel.
Our hotelier spoke English and recommended some things for us to see. We had not researched Milan and it was actually a rather unexpected stop. We decided not to go to Venice to save some money - I can clearly see the bottom of the barrel already and we have a week in Paris still! (This is the part of the trip where we just have to get creative. When I get back to Paris maybe I’ll take my violin to the train station and see how much I can earn playing for a few hours! Everyone does it! )
We took a walk around the city, took the metro to the Duomo, or main church.
Here was the start of our not-so amazing stay in Milan. (Kelly will pick up the narrative here....)
So...we were heading up the steps to exit the metro as I asked Kim how we would know which way to go to get there, well, as soon as our eyes saw above the sidewalk as we climbed the stiars, there it was in all of its splendor! The Duomo is gorgeous - as grandiose as the church in Florence but with gothic architecture instead of renaissance. Kim immediately takes off to get some pictures and I just paused to take it in, not following her lead but just standing still a few feet away from her. Before I know it, a tall african man charmingly introduced himself, complimented me, and offered me an explanation that the bracelet he had began tying around my wrist was for “good luck” from Senegal. He had appeared as if from nowhere and was very sly as he was talking, he grabbed my left arm and started tying the thread bracelet on my wrist. We have somehow managed to dodge these swindlers, but I was stuck. He was talking to me and asking me questions...but I couldn’t find a way out and I knew the part was coming where he would ask me for money. So I am standing there with one foot walking away and he isn’t letting go of my wrist. This all happened in a matter of 20 seconds! Kim looks back, with a look of minor irritation and comes walking over - he lets go of my wrist and takes hold of hers just as quickly - asking her if she is Shakira. “Yes, yes I am.” She said with an even more irritated tone in her voice. All sweet conversation, seemingly a kind man...AND then the tables turn: his whole demeanor and voice changes as he asks us for some money saying that he needs to get coffee. We are both stuck. It‘s actually a very clever scam because you feel like if you could get the bracelet off your wrist, you could just walk away. But it is tightly secured and even as I was instinctively pulling at it, I realized that it wasn’t coming off in one piece. Feeling like the only way out was to give him some money, I reached in my purse and pulled out the first coin I could feel - 20 cents (in euros) - I was fine with giving that up to get out of this mess. Well, he didn’t like that and commented that “this is nothing” - he looks at Kim and says, “what about you? you give me money.” Kim is visibly irritated with him and she starts rummaging through her coin purse, hidden inside her bag. She wasn’t about to take it out into plain sight. She looked for a good 20 seconds with the muffled sound of clinking of coins. I knew Kim was about to be very intentional about what she would and would NOT give to him. Eventually she produces a coin and she hands it to him - completely insulting him: 1 cent. A look of total disgust comes over his face. He throws it back at her and it landed in her purse, he mumbled something as he turned away and we exited this scene. Now we laugh about it...at the time we were thoroughly irritated and inconvenienced. We no longer wanted to gaze at and appreciate the Duomo... so we thought we will just go inside and be free from these swindlers (in the meantime we noticed there were several of them working the crowd). So to the “ticket office” we went.
We step into the ticket office and realize there are 4 different types of tickets you can buy depending on what you want to see. The man running the ticket booth doesn’t speak any english so we are trying to tell him that we want to purchase the tickets for 4 euros. He isn’t understanding us but is starting to take Kim’s 20 euros and hand her a different ticket. We are trying to stop him because we realize that he is trying to sell us something that we don’t want to buy. He motions for security guards to come over since they speak english. I step aside to tell them what we would like to get and they promptly tell me that it is closed for today. Hmmm!? grrrr.... Well, fine. Kim took her 20 euro form the small hole in the plexiglass and we just walk outside. Again feeling frustrated with this encounter. We decide that we will just find a place to eat. But before doing that we thought we might get a quick picture. So I stand back in front of the Duomo and Kim backs up to take the shot.
(Kim writing now...)
As I backed up to a place where I could get Kelly in the shot with the Duomo in the background, I took a couple pictures of Kelly smiling then all of a sudden her face changed to utter disgust. “Am I doing this wrong?” I thought.... I stood up and started walking towards her curious as to why she was so.... well.... not smiling! Then I realized that she was eying a man walking just behind where I was taking the picture.... directly in my path, might I say.... and he was just walking and vomiting... taking a few more steps and then... well you get the picture. “KELLY?!? Were you going to tell me that that man was walking right towards me?!?” I asked with an urgency in my voice. “I couldn’t really say anything! I was so disgusted!” said Kelly. She didn’t realize that he would have been walking right towards me. “It was like watching a car wreck! And... I partially didn’t believe my eyes!” Kelly explained with a look of disgust on her face.
This is a picture of Kelly right before the man came up from behind me.
I looked but didn’t look back at the man... you know, the kind of thing you do when you know that after looking you would wish you didn’t? Well, I didn’t really see him in action but after that we threw our hands up in surrender to this blasted city which had it in for us. We decided we were ready for a taste of home, and eyeing the McDonald’s across the courtyard, we decided to have burgers from McDonald’s in Italy. Yes, we know it’s a crime but after what we just experienced, it seemed like the safest place to be at the moment. We didn’t feel like McDonald’s would try to scam us, be closed, throw up on us or try any other means of mocking the fact that we are tourists without a guide book on a layover in a city that we only have a free map to.
So let’s recap our time in Milan so far:
swindled and “handcuffed” by a man armed with friendship bracelets
unable to enter the Duomo - it’s closed and the ticket man tried to sell us an entrance for 3 times the price we wanted to pay.
Vomiting man absolutely ruins our photo-op moment in front of a beautiful ancient church.
Not to mention we had to pay 30 cents for each katchup packet AND we had to pay about $6 for one HOUR of wi-fi at our hotel.
That’s why this post is entitled as such. Hope you enjoyed our little rant about day 1 in Milan.
Day 2 in Milan: we had a 3:00 train so we awoke with new mercies and much hope. We thought we would go visit a castle in Milan - Castles seem to be one of the favorite spots for both of us to visit... so we hopped on the metro and got off at the stop near the Castle.
We had a truly wonderful time touring this castle and decided that this was a redemptive experience after yesterday’s DISASTER! Check out the pictures below of what we saw:
oh my...you two are excellant writers!!!
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