From the Wyo to Florence

The next day, we headed out to Florence on a very early train (and in my head, I kept singing, "my baby takes the morning train..." Eurotrip anyone?). On said train, we encountered a very creepy italian man in a linen suit who tried to put his head in Leslie's lap. Weird.  Anyway, the reasons we were on this train were twofold:

1) Florence is awesome

2) our friend from High school, Max, is in florence studying abroad

So, obviously, great excitement. Florence was a nice ch

ange from Rome, since it is so small in comparison. We discovered that to get to the city center from the train station we didn't need a bus or a metro line... we just needed to walk about 2 blocks. awesome. Our feet were incredibly greatful. Shortly, we arrived at the duomo. Avoiding the line stretching around the corner to enter the church for free, we bought tickets to climb to the top of the dome. Steps, steps, steps. Ridiculous amounts of stone steps. Finally, we arrived at the first viewing level. It was so worth it. The frescoes are really something else. The images of Hell are a bit terrifying, and then the beautiful images of heaven and angels above them will make me think twice about sinning, at least for a little while.

We continued climbing up to the second level, where you're essentially eye level with the frescoes. Well, when I tried to turn and look at the very imposing demon right next to me, I got a serious dose of vertigo. So, While 

les and des headed up more to walk around the outside of the dome, I inched my way around the last viewing level and hightailed it down. Still, I'm glad I went up, since what I did get to see was incredible. 

Later, we met up with Max at an outdoor museum next to where the David originally stood. 

He was rushing off to an assignment for his class, so we walked a bit with him, made plans to meet up later, and headed off to see the David. Often, when I see famous works of art, I'm underwhelmed. I guess you see them so often in books, you expect them to exude a holy light when you're there in person. The mona Lisa, for an example, is cool in books, but in person- eh. David is not like this. He is gargantuan. He looks shockingly human. It seems as if he is not made of marble but of skin, pulsating with mus

cle and pumping blood through the veins along his arms. Each giant toe looks so real, it's startling. I was also pretty excited to remember everything our high school english teacher had told us about him, and put it all together: He was carved from a flawed piece of marble, so his distinctive lean and huge right arm come from carving around the flaw. 

Post-David, a little awestruck, we got some lunch, went to meet max again, and walked along the river and bridge. then it was time for shopping, of course, in the fabulous leather and cashmere market. I, of course, bought a scarf. It's tradition. The thing is ridiculously soft. then we met up with Max yet again and went to dinner.

Max pointed out how surreal it was the four of us wyoming middle and high school kids, who used to eat wyoming meat market sandwiches sitting on the playset in his back yard, were sitting in a piazza in Florence together, drinking wine and enjoying the beautful breeze coming across the open terrace. We were reminiscing about high school and talking about now and the future and it all made me feel very grown up! Which, I guess we are? But, I feel better when I realize that the people I've grown up with are still people I want to be sitting in Florence with. So, we decided we'll just have to do it again in the future.

A day in Ruins (the Roman kind)

The next day (still looking back to Rome here) we woke up bright and early, semi-rested. Two of us were tired from not being able to sleep since the room was really hot, one needed coffee. Guess who? So, we began our trek back towards the phantom Roma Inn, which would have been right next to our first few destinations, the Colosseum, roman forum, and other such lovely places. On our way, we stopped for breakfast. Iced coffee and apple croissants- one of the many many reasons I love Europe. The carb/caffeine combo is a popular breakfast here and I am more than happy with that.

Breakfast at Nero Cafe

Post breakfast, we headed to the pantheon, which was amazingly cool. I wish I could have seen it before the christianization of the roman empire. The Romans would place a statue of the Gods of conquered countries in these little niches around the walls. But when it was converted to a christian structure, the statues were removed. Still, It's beautiful even so. We detoured by the Trevi fountain, yet another of those sites that is so much cooler in person than in pictures.

Post fountain, we headed for the colluseum. Walking towards it, with bits and pieces of the Roman forum to our right, I kept waiting for a painting to fall down, revealing that I was still in Missouri. haha, good trick. But it was real, amazingly. Even when I was touching it, I swear it wasn't real. I mean, the colluseum. Holy cow.

We ended up taking a tour, and our tourguide was a rather swarthy and tan italian man with a strange italian/american combo accent. The tour was interesting (factoid: fights included women fighting midgets) but I was more into jusst soaking up the fact that I was walking on the same ground as the ancient Romans. Swarthy man was not quite as interesting as that.

Our guide in the roman forum, on the other hand, was really vivacious and fun, so that tour was more interesting. Again, walking down the same stone paths that ceaser's murderers would have walked home on was surreal. i feel like I'll end up saying that about a million times. Finally, we did a bit of shopping and ended our day with Sicilian food. Fresh, handmade pasta. Incredible canoli. I'll leave you with that taste in your mouth.

Roma Inn-- the phantom menace

so, i should point out that I'm in budapest right now-- This entry is going to sound like I'm in rome. I'm behind quite a bit. We'll get to Budapest (and the rest of rome, and florence). So, pretend that I'm in Rome. Are you pretending? Good.

Arriving in Rome was interesting, to say the least. Descea and I were operating on, at most, 2 or 3 hours of sleep in the past 24. And not the good kind of sleep- the awkward, unsatisfying, neck hurting plane kind of sleep. Which made for some very delirious travelers. Just like in Dublin, the rome airport just kind of glanced at our passports, and we strolled into the country. While finding our bus (and learning a new word- uscita for exit! yay vocabulary) was easy due to english signs and helpful men in orange vests directing traffic, getting in touch with Leslie, the third part of our lovely travelling triad, was not so easy. Leslie has been in Athens the past semester, and had travelled to Rome several days earlier to stay with her friend Liz. Our phones were having some serious issues- Leslie could call us, but we couldn't call her. Oh well, no big deal. She'll figure it out when we don't bother to call her.

While waiting for Les to call back, we consider this tidbit of info she had given us: When she and Liz called our hostel earlier, the man on the phone said it was closed. Interesting. But, we had a reservation, so we assumed it was a translation error. Arriving at the hostel, Descea and I waited outside the Roma Inn with our bags, enjoying the night air while waiting for Leslie. The reservation was in her name, so we were waiting to go inside. After about ten minutes of us looking like vagrants standing around with all our bags, a man stuck his head out of the window across the street and had a little chat with us. Turns out, closed was not a translation error. Our hostel was closed. As in, shut down a few months ago closed. As in, shut down before they took our deposit and yet still took our money closed. So, trying not to panic, we waited on Leslie and then, when she arrived, headed into the hostel across the street, Ivanhoe. 

There is a simple way to describe Ivanhoe: beer, beaded door curtains, and bangin techno. The place was insane, complete with skeezy guys and red lights. So, it wasn't the worst thing in the world that they said they had no rooms available (they had been taking in all the bookings from the phantom roma Inn). Window man got on the phone and found us a place at Happy Days Hostel. oh happy day.

Turns out happy days was all the way across town near vatican city. Oh boy. Adventure, HO! So, 2 trains and a decent walk later, we finally arrived, got beds, and collapsed like the living dead. 

Thoughts from over the ocean

Writing from the tail end of a very long flight, the brain seems to linger on that groggy sensation achieved through a very bright plane and a less than ideal sleeping position. Or, should I say, a less than ideal trying-to-sleep position. There are, in fact, some noticeable after effects; namely the inability to type more than three words or so at a time without hitting the wrong key as a result of clumsy fingers and a general loss of coordination. Still, long flights and the knowledge of another flight to follow don’t cut the excitement of arriving in a different country in about an hour. From my window seat, it’s easy to see alternating layers of thin and fluffy clouds through the ice crystals crusted on the outside of my window. For some reason, I’ve convinced myself in my lack of sleep stupor that I will somehow be able to spot an iceberg in the ocean below (never mind the fact that I can’t actually distinguish ocean from air) and keep craning my neck to do so. Of course, all I get is a straight shot of burning sun to the retina. Which is super fun. Still, I spotted a low flying clump of clouds which I named “iceberg” in my head and now I’m content.

                In lieu of sleep, I’ve been reading the latest issue of Scientific American, which has of course stimulated some interesting thoughts, as it is wont to do. Firstly, I got excited to see a clipping about research on the domestication of horses in Khazakstan. Why? Well, because my adviser is in fact doing that research, and I just finished scanning about 800 pages of old books in Russian to send to him in Khazakstan to help with finishing some articles. Yay, I feel like I contributed to the greater world of science.

            Also, there was an interesting article (a column, really, just one page) on a scientist interacting with different creationists. Young earth creationists in turns fascinate and horrify me. In a sense, it’s an interesting exercise in psychology to consider how a person warps scientific and geological evidence to fit a certain theory. At the same time, I think of generations of kids thinking that dinosaurs and humans frolicked together in the garden of Eden… yikes. I suppose it feels particularly relevant while flying over to the “old world.” Of course, the really old world is in Africa with the start of the human race, not in Europe. But visiting places where the archaeological record stretches back further than the supposed birth of the earth according to young-earth creationists makes a person think.  Anyway, more to come when wireless is available. If anything, a throng of posts once I finally land my feet on Irish soil.