Week 13, Adventures in Toscana (Siena)

Week 13, Adventures in Toscana (Lucca)

Week 13, Adventures in Toscana (Pisa)

I thought I had a lot to say about this trip, but less is coming to mind a week after the fact. We decided on Monday that I should go to Pisa for a week starting on Tuesday to do some work with one of our partners, a startup in Pontedera.

To my surprise I found myself working alongside some of the people in the ARTS and CRIM labs that I went to visit for a half day in April. However, the engineer who showed me around in the Spring is now working with one of my old professors in Stanford. In a sense we’ve switched places.

It was a nice trip. I had fund working and my free time. I think it was probably my most pleasing week of work because I was able to spend a good chunk of time each day doing mechanical engineering with other mechanical engineers. I actually found it a refreshing change working to derive a system of differential equations to represent a magneto-electro-mechanical system despite the difficulties we were having reducing the number of variables into something we might have a chance of solving. This is a contrast to my usual days in the office which are dominated by quiet hours benchmarking technologies on the internet. However, I expect a change of pace in the near future because we just signed a contract with a client.

But I’m finding other outlets for my pent up creative energies. After sawing away on my violin for a half hour, I made an interesting concoction before sitting down to write to the blog. I don’t think this is something you’ll find in a bar in Italy, or America for that matter. But it turned out pretty good blend. I mixed 1 part lemon liquor with 3 parts kiwi juice in a chilled “midget” martini glass. I’m still exploring names, (actually I haven’t thought I should name it until I found myself writing about it,) but kiwi-tang might work.

11/12 Nov, Week 12, Venitian Isles

I woke early in my cubicle of a room to find the sun streaming though the courtain lighting up the red and gold padded wallpaper. I marched down to breakfast, and was surprised to find that they were offering more than just bread and coffee. After some ham, bread, nutella, and fruit, I grabbed some food for later, and hit the road.

First, I was off to the train station to buy my ticket home (With a reserved seat.) The residential districts of Venice is was calmer today than the bustle of the Piazza San Marco. This part of the city seemed more like a "city." From the train station I took a traghetto to the Island of Murano.

Murano had a little more of the feel of the Venice I was looking for yesterday. With only a handful of tourists, it was easy to meander the streets along the canals crisscrossing the island. I went to a few glass factories where the tourists seem to congregate, but pushed on because I was not interested in waiting in line to watch someone blow glass. I grabbed a panini for lunch, and continued strolling the streets, but now with a purpose.

After watching someone make glass horses, I decided I should by a glass souvineer. -But something more italian than the horses, dolphins, butterflies, or tableware that dominated the shops. I decided that a small soccer ball would be ideal, but I asked nearly every shop on the island without finding a single one. I began to think that the majority of glass for sale was mass-produced as you can see similarities between items in different shops. I suppose there are still some orriginal pieces to be found, but not a soccer ball. I even asked one of the glass-makers to make me one, but he didn't think he could without many failed attempts. Too bad they don't make custom glass like when you ask the balloon clown to make you a particular type of balloon hat, sword, or whatever. Any venitian glass blowers reading this blog may want exploit this business oportunity. You can start the first custom glass factory in Venice!

I had planned to go to another one of the islands off Venice after Murano, but I would be cutting it close to make the train back, so I headed back to the mainland and spent another hour or 2 wandering the streets in the northern part of the city before parking myself in a cafe to wait the remaining half hour for the train. I ordered a spritz, "traditional" drink of venice and tried to discuss some potential birthday gifts for jessica with the 17-year old waitress. She didn't have many interesting ideas.

The ride back was nothing special (as it should be), and I arrived pretty exhausted after a long, but good weekend.

11/12 Nov, Week 12, 262 Photos

I think I’ve been talking about going to Venice for more than a month now, but hadn’t been able to organize myself enough to go until today. There seemed to be nothing going on Friday, so I timed the returning of my neighbor’s ice tray that we used to make the pesto to coincide with dinnertime. They didn’t have to ask me 3 times to join them for dinner to get me to stay. We had an improvised mix of baked chicken, corn with pickled eggplant, and large nuggets of parmesan cheese with warm bread. In some ways I’m reminded of talking to Lew as we delved into the 3 social menaces corrupting our society: the automobile, television, and drugs. I could see Dante’s point as drugs being a cause for concern, but the others were less obvious.

He claims the television is a culprit because it broadcasts untruths, biased propaganda, and tells people to live in a particularly profligate manner under the guise of disseminating factual information and impartial news.

Meanwhile, here I am fighting a losing battle with an oversized fly. He’s too fast for me to kill but his unrelenting buzzing is conjuring uncomfortably evocative images of Beezelbub and the Lord of the Flies. I’ve locked him in the bathroom twice, and he’s escaped both times. I think I’m going to have to blockade the door before I can sleep.

Back to Dante’s menaces to society: the Automobile has liberated our youth to leave the shelter and safety of their towns and parents, exposing them to dangers they are unprepared to deal with. It further propagates the self-indulgent debaucherous messages of the TV, but also provides a means for people to live in such a way. -Pretty heavy for a conversation over baked chicken and spiced corn.

After dinner I went down to Vanity Café to talk to Igor and the waitresses. Igor is the door man. He’s a nice guy, and a captive audience when I’m looking for someone to talk to. The girls are more evasive after their initial salutation. I debated trying to engage them in a brainstorm in hopes to come up with a good birthday gift for Jessica, but social courage was not on my side tonight. I went inside for a poorly made drink, once I began to get cold. This time I tried their whisky sour, though it was almost acidic enough to give instantaneous heartburn.

Right, I was going to write a bit about Venice tonight, but the train ride to get was a classical “Italian experience” and should not be forgotten. I arrived at Milano Centrale ½ hour before the eurostar train to Venice at 8:30. Only, when I went to the machine to buy the ticket, there were no seats left. This was discovered this after trying 3 or 4 machines before finding one that was actually working. I’ve been riding the trains for nearly 3 months and this was the first time I was denied a ticket. But real quintessence is yet to be told. I bought a ticket for the next slower train at 9:05. While waiting I bumped into one of the other students from my class in the language school. This is the third or fourth time I’ve randomly met someone in Milan. I guess the city is smaller than it might seem. Anyway, it turned out that he was taking the same train, but getting off in Brescia after about 1 hour ride. We waited together for them to post which platform our train would depart from. With about 10 minutes to before departure the posted the binario, and we walked over to the platform to find melee of people already trying to jam their way onto the train. We worked our way though the mass and eventually got on to find standing room only. It’s a 3 hour ride to Venice, and we were going to be packed like sardines if you’ll excuse my cliché! The train left a few minutes late as the conductor waited for more people to cram their way onboard. I began to push my way though the cars, hoping to find more breathing room somewhere else. I walked the whole train to the very front. Here were 2 cops, and the conductor. The conductor began checking tickets and people began to shuffle around. (I think at least half the people using Italian public transportation at any given moment do so without a ticket.) It probably makes sense, as I’ve spent about 100 euros on bus tickets over the past 3 months but have only been checked once. I think the maximum fine is 50 euros, so I’d be up at least 50 euros if I had never bought a single bus ticket. It’s a similar situation with the train. Once people started shuffling away from the conductor, some floor space opened up, and I took a seat on the floor for the remainder of the trip. After the first stop the door in this car stopped working, and I got a chuckle watching people trying to get off and then panicking that they might be trapped on the train and miss there stop before running to another car to try a different door.

We crossed a long bridge, and finally arrived in Venice station shortly after noon. The hoards of people poured off the train, and into the streets. I grabbed a map, and hopped on a traghetto down the grand canal towards the piazza san marco. The view from the boat is nice, but I think a lot of the buildings could use a new coat of paint and some other standard maintenance. I guess the marine water must really erode the architecture.

There was a considerable crowd of people in the Piazza, and I decided that Id better book a hotel, or it might be a problem. The tourist office gave me a number for last minute reservation, and I had the hotel settled in no time and was back on the streets. First I went looking for food. I found a place selling an interesting pizza wrapped like one of those low carb things that they try to hawk off as being healthier than bread. But the pizza-wrap was pretty good, and I supplimented it with an apple as I walked the busy and narrow streets around the piazza. I headed towards the water all the way to the shipyards, but decided to work my way back via a different route. I came upon the leaning tower of Venice which is part of a church where they were having a wedding. I guess that getting married in this city could be any girls dream. I began to notice an interesting phenomena: There are a lot more females in venice than men. I noticed lots of small groups of american girls, both young and old. Im not exactly sure of the alure, but I guess it might have something to do with the water. (I also need to find the apostrophe on this keyboard!)

I climbed the tower back in the piazza san marco for a panoramic view of the city. I was surprised to fine a phone booth at the top. Im not quite sure who would be making phone calls from up there. I didnt see anyone use it... The view was impressive, but it is not entirely obvious how many canals there are from above because the building block the view of the ground. I guess flying over the city would be more interesting. Actually, I would like to go in a hot air balloon, but that is not yet an option. Maybe next time....

I worked my way around the city, relying heavily on my compass for direction, but still having to backtrack several times. It seems like the area around the piazza is a winding stripmall of painted masks and various glass paraphinalia with a focus on horses, dolphins, and gondolas. I guess the gondolas are OK, but I dont understand why they dont make something more italian. I must have asked 20 stores if they had a small glass soccer ball. But there were none to be found. I actually wonder how much of the glass is not made in china anyway.

I continued to meander my way westward and then north until I saw the main bridge over the grand canal. By now it was dark, and I spent some time trying to get a good photo of the lights of the bridge reflecting off the water, but I could not find the ideal location. I was beginning to get tired and began to look for dinner. But this area is also packed with tourists, and I thought it better to venture off into a quieter area. I saw a decent menu posted outside of a cafe in a large square somewhere west of the bridge, but when I went inside I was presented a rather different menu with prices about 2x those outside. I asked for the orriginal menu, and was given it, though I had second thoughts about remaining. However, the food was pretty good, and still came to 24 euros by the time you buy water, and pay the cover charge.

Walking home, I thought the lights on the water at night looked a lot like Epcot, but I guess it's really the other way around.

I’m sorry to have to leave you hanging, but I’m going to Pisa tomorrow to work with one of our partners for a week, and have to get to bed as I’m still tired from my adventures last weekend. I will say that out of 262 photos of Venice, I got at least 2 good shots, though I’m not calling National Geographic yet...

However, I am looking forward to this next trip to Pisa. This both my anticipation exploring a new part of Italy, and because I think these guys that I’m going to visit have done some interesting mechanical engineering. I should be able to learn at least a few things from them, and I hope they can also find value in my contributions.

Semper fi.

Como Revisited

Halloween was Tuesday, but there’s not much going on here for Halloween. I took the #823 bus to Colognio Nord and then the green metro line down to the Romolo stop in Milan to meet Tatsuo at a bar near the language school. When we reconvened with some of the others from our class last week at a “school function” they told us there would be a costume party here. I bought a pair of ugly looking teeth last minute just to have something. But this proved to be a bad choice because I was unable to speak intelligibly with this appendage, and didn’t end up wearing them much. We did the usual aperitivo routine for 5 euros and hung out with the other students.


At a certain point we were called in for the judging of the costumes. Somebody did some sort of a dance to thriller, and then they awarded 1 week of Italian lessons to the best-dressed student. I was starting to think about leaving, but met an American from Michigan and her boyfriend from Milan –an interesting duo!

I’m becoming more eager to befriend English-speaking people because we can get to know each other quicker and I’m a little weary of communication-restricted relations that are more typical of my Italian companions. I still have more to learn before I can really express myself in Italian, though I realize there is a contradiction within this approach in that I will never reach high level communication without practicing more with italain-speaking people, meanwhile it’s harder to get to know people without using some English. The ideal cases are my bilingual friends: Umberto, Verena, Paddy, and Maddy. However, there’s also some guys from the office that I see often enough that I think I’m getting to know fairly well.

So I was getting ready to leave head for the station to catch the last train to Monza at 12:30, but some of the guys from the school convinced me to stay. I actually wanted to stay later, but was a little concerned what to do if they didn’t have the endurance to stay out until the first trains of the morning around 5. However, they assured me that they wouldn’t wimp out, so I decided to stay.

I spent some more time talking to Megan and Stefano before we went to join the others from the school at another bar in the Navigli. Stefano was encouraging me to talk to other girls in the bar, so me and another guy picked out someone to try to meet. I think I understood about 6% of the conversation before giving up and gong back to people watching while the other guy continued to hit on this girl. Eventually they sat down together and I went back to Megan and Stefano. Then it was time to head to another place called Plastic. Megan and Stefano made the right choice in bailing out because there was a mob of people waiting to get in, and we waited outside for quite a while before deciding to go looking for something to eat. I exchanged some stories with 2 Brazilians that were with us, and before I knew it, it was time to get the 6:10 train back to Monza.

Nov 1 is a public holiday in Italy. I woke at noon -somewhat rested after the escapades of the night before. I had planned a lunch/dinner with the neighbors today. We had homemade gnocchi with tomato sauce and fresh ground Parmesan cheese. The secondo piatto era un carne alla California. This was a meat with an interesting lemon-onion glaze. Dessert was an apple cake, and coffee (of course). We talked about a number of things; the most interesting of which were Dante’s recollection of the Americans liberating Napoli in WWII. They also showed me a family artifact: a dictionary printed in 1877!

I had debated going to work Thursday and Friday because a number of people were taking off the first or second half of the week. Had I know sooner, I might have planned a trip to England, Spain, or Rome. When I awoke Thursday and saw it was arguably the most beautiful day I’ve seen in Italy I decided it would be a shame to spend it sitting in our gloomy office. I was telling Christine the other day that the lights bother some of the people sitting around me. Common guys…! Anyway, I decided to go to Como.

I wasted no time (except for a half hour waiting on a late train) to go to the outlooks over the lake in Brunate where the view was as spectacular as I had hoped. This turned out to be another day where I’d shoot 100+ photos hoping to get a couple of good ones. The challenge today was balancing blue sky with terrestrial resolution. It seems my camera will wash out the sky if the lighting is set for the land, or darken the land if the sky is in focus. I would like to know if this is a phenomenon unique to my camera, or if a better camera might be able to capture both bright and darker components of a scene. After a pannini for lunch, I had to decide if I would take a boat up the lake, or go somewhere else. Since it was pretty cold on the water I opted to head for the castle of San Vigilio above Bergamo to see what else I might see there on a really clear day. I was less impressed with this view, though I liked some piles of fallen leaves that had accumulated under the trees on top of the hill.

Fall is definitely here, and winter does not seem far off. I saw a forecast for snow in the Alps on Sunday, and many of our trees have already lost most of their leaves.