Venezia

Welcome to Venice!!

Mom and I had 30 hours to see the San Marco District and boy did we rise to the challenge. While I think Tuscany might always have a special place in my heart (until I visit Sicily that is!! Have to stay true to my heritage thanks to Auntie Carole), Venice is wonderful.

I think my absolute favorite part of being in Spain and Europe is that people think I am actually from there. Until I open my mouth that is, then either my accent or my lack of any Italian vocabulary give me away. But for that one fleeting second, it’s like I belong somewhere. The US might be my home, but despite my lack of any accent or response that I’m from LA, it’s always followed up by the classic “where are you really from?” Which, I must admit can get annoying after a while. So these past two weeks, when people are shocked that I’m not from there? A pretty nice change of pace.

I think I’m most proud of the fact that Mom and I navigated Venice using local transport only! We caught a water bus to San Angelo and then got very, very lost looking for our hotel lol. But look at these pictures we got in return!!

The canals may be green, but you have to admit they have a quirky charm.

We found random statues and musicians in stone and frankly I’ve been so happy I couldn’t help but dance everywhere I go. I felt like Audrey Hepburn in Roman Holiday, except this was my Venetian Holiday.

Here’s Saint Marcos Basilica. Unfortunately no pictures were allowed inside. But it was your average church, with gold mosaics as the background of all the images. Impressive for sure. I almost thought of sneaking a picture, but it’s kinda hard to break the rules inside a holy place hahaha. Honestly I don’t think Big G would mind, but there were so many monitors that they would have made me go to confession and I would get so many Hail Mary's to make up for my sins haha.

Next Mom and I ventured into the Doge’s Palace. What’s a Doge? Basically a Duke, but wears a fancy gold hat that looks like a rip off from the Persian ones.

I had fun playing around in the overly ornate halls. Basically we only got to see the formal council rooms where Venice curators tried to convince us that Venice was reigned by a republic. I’m not so sure I’m convinced....maybe a republic of rich Italian aristocrats?

Here is one of the council rooms. The middle chair being a throne for the Doge. But here’s the real question, if it looks like a republic and talks like a republic, is it actually a republic? I think my favorite part is all these council members commissioned portraits of themselves into biblical scenes which you can see in the background, I guess alluding to the fact that they uphold the highest virtues in this room? Hmmm I’d like to see the list of how many people were condemned to death, I’m pretty sure Jesus didn’t hand out the death penalty and chilled with the thieves.

It’s so pretty looking up, sometimes I forget to look where I’m going. So you can imagine me bumping into a huge crowd of stationary humans immediately after this picture and trying to apologize. I think they understood though, it’s kind of hard not to be distracted around these rooms. I wonder if they put so much art in this room especially on the ceilings so you could be a council member for 30 or 40 years and still find new things to distract you during the boring, day-long meetings. I’m pretty sure no one was paying attention to the speaker when they held council in this room!

We got to visit the dungeons and well Mom decided she wanted the hotel room to herself for the night and locked me inside!! Those iron bars were no joke.

Finally at the end of the palace tour and I had fun channeling my Funny Face around these stairs.

My new favorite thing? Finding old mirrors and taking selfies in them. I even got Mom in this one!! Remind me to look up next time though. I’m not so good at this millennial thing.

T-5 hours to go before we have to catch the water bus to the airport and Mom and I head back to San Marcos Plaza. I don’t get it, but zodiac clocks are a total thing here. I imagine old Venetians going “what time is it?” And the response being, “oh half past Leo” or “quarter after Pieces”.

We then made our way to the Correr Museum, which was basically an entire palace built for visiting Italian royalty who only stayed there for two years. Nice. However, I did finally get to see a ballroom and dance across the floor!!!

This was the “unofficial” dining room. I can’t wait for them to restore the official one. Imagine how much more ostentatious that one is!

This is a classic Venetian glass chandelier. Apparently people pay thousands of dollars for these things...they’re pretty? I guess? I wouldn’t spend my money on that. But I guess when you’re royalty it doesn’t really matter.

For our last two hours in Venice we just walked around, with nothing to do but be present. We found amazing hidden views...

And made friends with local street artists, including an  amazing water color which will be featured in my apartment!...

And just stood on bridges watching he gondolas go by. Shout out to this guy for seeing my camera and totally posing for this picture!!!

And with a last farewell to Italy we ordered two gelatos at a fancy place (I’d like to add that it was still cheaper than two single scoops at an LA place). And man was it a great sendoff.

Bellies full and hearts heavy, Mom and I ended our Italian adventure. And what an adventure it was. I already can’t wait to be back in Europe. Mom is excited to go home, but me? Well I’ve got three days before I head off to the East Coast for my last trip before law school. So stay tuned for the next adventure. And Italy, well arrivederci and thanks for not taking me out to get some cannolis ;).

Love you lots and see you stateside!

Carolyn

Last Day in Florence

Buongiorno!

Today is our last day in Florence and I want to cry. Why is it so hard to leave such wonderful cities? However, I am VERY excited because we get to see Michaelangelo’s David today!!

Actually most of our day was dedicated to this wildly talented man. We started off the morning visiting his chapel not too far away. There was a whole room built for the tombs of the dukes of the time. And each of them had commissioned a tombstone pretty much as high as the cathedral wall for themselves to be built by Michelangelo.

It’s not really much to look at from the outside. And you’d think with 300+ years of construction they would have triple checked their blueprints. Seems like someone screwed up because the stones near the keystone arch were beginning to fall. Hence the huge scaffolding and restoration attempts.

Apparently the first Medici duke, Cosimo, who basically helped make the Medicis the figures they’re known as today, was obsessed with holy relics, which is a big euphemism for dead bones of alleged holy people. It’s creepy to see them adorned with gold and packaged in the mode of a Faberge egg.

I’d take the catacombs and bone piles in Peru any day over the hundred boxes like these throughout the church. Some had fingers, others had femurs and even this skull. It was gross. The Duke, Cosimo,even used to wear them!!! He thought the holiness of these people was preserved and that their bones would give him the holy aura and powers they held? To each their own I guess. I’d like yesterday’s tiara instead, please.

The marble work was exquisite and Mom and I were freaking out over these semi precious inlays.


We finally got to some of the tombs Michelangelo was commissioned for. He seemed to have left a lot of unfinished work if you ask me. We know that he got called away by the Pope to make the Sistine Chapel  but we can’t seem to figure out how he could have left so many pieces undone. Especially when he was probably paid at least in part!!

See what I mean about each of the graves being the whole wall? This is ONE tombstone. It’s got the dude on it, then an interpretation of Dawn and Dusk. Guess who’s death? The sleeping woman of course...if you know me, you know I’m majorly eye rolling right now.

Mom and I wanted to take an easy day just really soaking in everything that Florence had to offer us. Which is how we happened upon the Galileo Museum. And you thought our neediness was reserved for art. Nope. We totally geeked out on all these ancient tools!! Look at this thing!

Basically the Medici’s commissioned plenty of scientific endeavors as well. This here is what they thought the universe looked like. The top that I had to cut off was a cross to represent God and Heaven. We have earth in the center of the universe, 7 planets rotating around it, the sun and moon, etc. All these gears actually turned and I was so, so tempted to touch it. But I was good, because we had three other floors to explore.

Following along with other wildly inaccurate truths of the time, here we have Marco Polo’s map!! I’m pointing at Persia. Which apparently is below India and above “Asia” hmmmm. Being the world traveler I am, I’m reaaaalllyyy glad we've now got this whole countries, continents, water thing figured out. Thank you Marco Polo for being a guinea pig and Wright brothers for teaching me how to fly.

As if the maps weren’t great enough, they had rooms dedicated to PHYSICS. I got waaayyy too excited to be normal. Do I remember a lot? Not at all, but once I started reading the descriptions it all started coming back and man, is it nice to see a subject without the added stresses of grades and graduating. 

I remembered how much I love the subject and had fun explaining it all to Mom. Looks like I know a thing or two after all. Thank you, Karl, for demoting yourself to teach me basic mechanics when you literally have a PhD in the subject. Were it not for you, I probably wouldn’t have gone around the machines going “wow that’s beautiful.” And to the cousins who had Karl as a teacher and are reading this, you know exactly what I mean. Every time we solved a problem correctly, he would look at our work for a moment, and as if it were the first time seeing this equation solved would pause and say “wow that’s beautiful.”

Our admission to the Academy Gallery wasn’t until 7 pm. So what do we faux Europeans do? Siesta of course! Mom and I returned to the hotel to freshen up and watched Julie & Julia. If you’ve never seen this film you should, it’s amazing and makes you want to become a chef. As a warning though, you shouldn’t watch the film if you’re hungry.

Which leads me to our walk over to the Galleria Academia. Coming to Italy, I had a list. Not of things I wanted to see, but food I wanted to eat. Here it is:

Spaghetti, Ravioli, Bruschetta, Bread, Gelato (every day and a new flavor every time), Tiramisu, Espresso, Pizza, Calzone...and last but not least  Cannolis. But here’s the dilemma, Cannolis are Sicilian, and well, we were in Northern Italy and they were nowhere to be found. And I mean nowhere, did you see that list? I’m only on day 4 in Italy and I have eaten every single thing except the cannolis. But seek and you shall find. We got to the Academy early and decided to walk around to kill time. We are literally passing construction and bus crowds and out of the corner of my eye I see a little pastry shop. When I’ve already looked in 50, what’s one more try? Well lo and behold, CANNOLI and the very last one too. Damn was it good. Thanks Big G. 

And now the moment we’ve all been waiting for! My beloved David. These pictures don’t do it justice. And as a whole Michelangelo has been rather disappointing. I mean I went to three galleries where he was featured and not one finished piece of sculpture. I was so angry, I didn’t understand why he got his name. Mom and I may fight over Da Vinci’s worthiness or Caravaggio versus a Ruben. But even after a full day of disappointing, half-finished pieces, when we saw the David, we realized that it’s true, this man was MAGICAL. This statue was the size of three men tall and don’t even get me started on width. It was huge. Something you don’t really see in the pictures. The stone was flawless and polished and beautiful. And, well, the artist more than redeemed himself that night. Mom and I just sat and stared for a really long time. And that is how I met David.

Off to Venice! We have just over 24 hours total in the city so it’s going to be quite a whirlwind, but I’m ready! One last adventure before I head home!

Xx, Carolyn