(188-190): Good Times

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So, something I totally forgot to mention from when I was in Athens back in April. As Kirizabeth and I walked around, there were all these guys sitting along the sides of the streets selling little toys and knickknacks. You know how McDonald's conducts studies to figure out how closely they can space their restaurants so that they don't interfere with each other's business? These guys don't do that. Then again, the sales on gummy-esque toy tomatoes that re-form after you splat them down on a surface is probably already so low that they don't have much more to fear business-wise. So, as you walk, you'll see almost a dozen guys lining a given street, sitting in front of cutting boards, and relentlessly throwing these toy tomatoes down onto them, stopping only to look up as you pass with the identical (and identically delivered) line "Hello my friend!"

Funniest visual of 2010.

(188) is Tuesday, 13 July 2010.

And speaking of visuals, here are a few more photos from the last few days.

The last couple days have been awesome. Bastille Day (French independence day*) was on Wednesday, so there was lots to do. Tuesday night featured a HUGE rave (that's techno for "dance party") on the beach at Cannes. Right on the beach. Good DJ and several hundred people just there to enjoy. It was great...!

I got home after a few hours and caught fireworks over the bay here in Juan-les-Pins. And my nifty new camera has a special 'Fireworks' mode.

(189) is Wednesday, 14 July 2010.

Wednesday was a national holiday, so no class got in the way of my sleeping in. My roommate Tiziano and I really didn't do much... We mostly hung out at the house because everywhere with air conditioning (namely the library) was closed for the holiday and my fan was the best we could do in the brutally hot weather.

But that night, I got a great bistro dinner and went back over to Cannes for their fireworks. They have an international fireworks festival going on now, with one entry per week. The next one is next Wednesday (the 21st), and I would go see it, but I have jazz tickets (more on that shortly). But suffice it to say that the display that I did catch (from a team representing the Czech Republic) featured some of the most dazzling pyrotechnics I have ever seen.

Also, just a note on the peculiarity of American film release dates in other countries. Today, Toy Story 3 was released in France. Compare that with the 17 June release date in the Czech Republic.

(190) is Thursday, 15 July 2010.

Class again today, followed by lunch at the CIA cafeteria (which is actually a good deal and very convenient). I met a few new people and hung out with them at the (open and air-conditioned) library for a bit. They're in intro-level French classes, which is cool because I get to help them out and practice being a teaching assistant for the coming school year. Also, they're very nice and a group of us are all going out tomorrow (Friday/(191)) night.

I then got dinner at Wich, a basically gourmet sandwich stand located here, not far from the center of Old Town Antibes. I took it and waited in line for one of the best concerts I've ever attended.

I don't know how well I've explained this, but Juan-les-Pins is famous for its annual jazz festival, one that consistently attracts the biggest names in jazz each year. There are 10 days of concerts on their main stage, which is set up with the audience overlooking the water (that is, if they can take their eyes off the performers). I bought very reasonably-priced tickets** to five shows. Tonight's bill had two acts, the first of which was a trio formed of saxophonist David Sanborn, drummer Steve Gadd, and organist/vocalist/trumpeter Joey DeFrancesco. They were quite good (DeFrancesco was my favorite). And their finale featured a guest appearance by jazz guitarist John McLaughlin.

The second act was George Benson and his band. They blew me away.

After this epic 3-hour concert, I left and, as I passed the town's big casino hotel, I ran into Steve Gadd and Joey DeFrancesco coming out. I told them they were fantastic, thanked them for the evening, and shook both their hands. I then got a crepe with Nutella and Grand Marnier to finish the evening. To quote Ray Charles:

Let the good times roll.

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Footnotes

* Just a historical note: Bastille Day was when the French citizens desperately broke into the Bastille prison/fortress in Paris (I don't know that it's still standing) on 14 July, 1789. A new constitution was in the works, but the people had reason to believe that they and their representatives were in danger from the absolutist regime. So, in an effort to free unjustly detained political prisoners and gather arms against the attack they so feared, a huge mass of people stormed the Bastille in what has become emblematic of French pride and tradition. And, emblematic of this lovably contradictory culture, there were exactly 7 prisoners in the Bastille that day. And none of them really mattered. And they certainly didn't find any weapons of mass destruction.

** This is one thing I will certainly miss about Europe. France in particular is very good to its students. In the United States, on the other hand, a movie theater will give you 50 cents - maybe - off of an overpriced evening ticket, and no discount during the day. But French museums will let students in for 50-100% off, and I got my jazz tickets for about a third of their "starting from" prices in the brochures.

(183-185): Lake Garda

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So, here's the timeframe at this point in our story (that being the time of publication, just after the weekend in question). This coming weekend (July 17), I have tickets for concerts as part of the famous Jazz a Juan festival, so I won't be leaving town, and the weekend after that, I fly back to the States. But, this weekend, I had nothing better to do than travel.

This was my last hurrah.

So, Lake Garda is a sizable lake in the northern middle of Italy. I figured if I was repeating one country I've been to this year, Italy probably deserved it most.

"But," perhaps you ask, "Why not Venice, Andy? Why not finish what you started last time?" Eh, I don't know. I've heard some less-than-flattering things about Venice since the volcano flummoxed everything up back in April, so I wasn't as excited to see it anymore. But I should probably answer the question behind that question, which is, "Why Lake Garda?"

This is gonna' sound stupid - and a little weird coming from me - but I wanted to see Garda because of a video game. For those unfamiliar, Pure is quite a good ATV racing game. Novice-friendly, fun stunts, but best of all, it has taken the Playstation 3's graphics capabilities to the limit. The environments are all very well-rendered, but the first level, set in Lake Garda, is simply stunning.* When I realized early last week that I was relatively close to this place, I thought: "You know what? I could go there!" So I did. Also, my folks were there years and years ago and confirmed that it is, in fact, very nice. Hopefully, after looking at my pictures (warning: there are many), you'll agree as well.

(183) is Thursday, 8 July 2010.

I spent the afternoon doing train patchwork, including four hours in a distinctly uncomfortable Trenitalia 6-seat cabin. I really don't know why these exist; I cannot think of a single advantage to designing a train car this way.

I debated titling this entry "The Kindness of Strangers" just because I met so many nice people this weekend. The first was Rolf, a Swedish guy singing in a men's choir for a single gig that night in Sirmione, the peninsular town where I was staying. When I didn't have enough change for a bus ticket, he just paid for it and, once the bus was moving, refused my persistent requests that he let me reimburse him.

I'm so not used to hotels. I had to consciously stop myself from packing flip-flops for the shower and my own towel and washcloth on Wednesday night. The Hotel Corte Regina was nice-- clean, good location, decent breakfast, very nice family running the place-- but I have gotten so used to hostels that the niceties (like my own bathroom, a TV, and clean towels every day) didn't seem worth the extra money. I also missed meeting fellow travelers, but it was nice to have my own private space (not just a locker) to come back to whenever necessary.

(184) is Friday, 9 July 2010.

At breakfast, I met Balazs, Balazs, and - depending on whether you're referring to father or son - wife/mother, Helen. They were a Hungarian family staying the weekend, and they offered me a ride to GardaLand, my destination for the day. Once there, they also offered to take me back if our schedules worked out. Very nice people.

But anyway, GardaLand is a sweet theme park... They have a few solid coasters, incredibly short lines, and a decent entry price. Best coasters I rode:

--The Blue Tornado. This one's a big feet-dangler... very fast, although a tad too wound in upon itself.

--Mammut. More traditional wooden-coaster style, though all metal and new this year. It's slower with fewer pure thrills, but makes up for it by playing really well with your expectations; each time you think it's about to end, something else cool happens, which instantly dispels the "that's it?" feeling you often get on coasters after waiting a half hour on line.

--One other coaster whose name I can't remember... it was more swooping-- just what I was looking for-- but way too short. If the Blue Tornado and this one had a baby, it would have been my ideal.

But then there was this little guy. No way was I getting on this silly, stupid, slow, sad excuse for a roller coaster:



I then took a wrong turn trying to get in line for a different one and ended up getting on this silly, stupid, slow, sad excuse for a roller coaster.


Change of subject now. The park had a whole section about the wild west and, having taken a film westerns class, I was actually impressed by how many references they nailed (the whole park was actually very well-maintained and not tacky at all). I chuckled at one stand playing the theme music to Sergio Leone's epic The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.

Which just punctuated the fact that this section took the phrase "spaghetti western" to a whole new level.

GardaLand was good, but the fact is, nobody does theme parks better than America. The common stereotype among Europeans that everything's bigger in America is true here: even the Blue Tornado (there's a picture of it in the album) is a big coaster built on small-scale design principles (winding in on itself instead of looping). Also, the entirety of GardaLand is pretty small compared to most American parks.

BUT there is one awesome thing that they have and most American parks don't, which is a SWEET aquarium. I killed my camera battery taking pictures of fish and urchins and manta rays (they have faces underneath that freak me out a little). If you go to GardaLand and they offer you the combo ticket for an extra 4€50, DO IT.

So, if you're using local buses and trains in Italy (which is kind of a stupid idea to begin with), never try to get anywhere between the hours of 4 and 6 pm. Not only is there an inexplicable vacuum in that time window of the schedule, but even the buses that are scheduled to run don't help matters. This sign makes the point unintentionally well:



In musical terms, a fermata is this symbol:



...which, when written over a note, means the musician (or driver?) plays the note for as long as they see fit. Which means, theoretically, everybody else could wait a very, very long time. Also, I heard after the fact that there was a transit strike that day, so that might explain why I had to take the most circular route possible:



(185) is Saturday, 10 July 2010.

2 weeks left now.

I got up at 4:30 to watch the sunrise... Such a good decision. See pictures. I sat on the water's edge with my feet in for about two hours.

Then, the second biggest event for the day was the ferry to Monte Baldo, a big mountain on the upper right side of the lake with a gondola ride to the top and panoramic views of much of the lake and surrounding mountains. This is why I'm here.

Here's the problem: it's summer, and the lake is kind of hazy. So the view wasn't everything I'd hoped, but the haze did make the surrounding mountains look really cool and mysterious. The other neat thing I didn't count on seeing was a steady flow of people para-sailing. Just... walking off a hillside and flying over Lake Garda.

I want to do this before I die.

So, I walked around the hilltops (often without my shirt, so as to balance the fearsome farmer's tan I've developed) for about two hours and went back down to Malcesine, the cute little town at the foot of the mountain. I found pizza and gelato and waited for my boat.

But I got on the wrong one.

I caught a boat in the next town that would take me back. But what followed were 4 1/2 hours (instead of 2, if I'd been paying attention) of cruising around the lake, stopping at virtually every town around it. It's a big lake. There are several towns. And taking up one of the two air-conditioned areas of this ferry - a mode of public transportation I should remind you - is a party which I can only describe as The Italian Bar Mitzvah From Hell.

First you've got the DJ, who is himself singing the Italian words to songs that are at their best poorly performed and, at their worst, poorly performed and recognizable. And of course, this ferry has the acoustics of a hollow concrete block, a fact punctuated (with several exclamation points) by the five or six thousand Italian kids running crazy and screaming over the entire boat, parents making no effort whatsoever to stop them. So, I listen to my iPod and take many, many photos of windsurfers and coastal towns.

And, as I do this, I can't shake this feeling... that the party's over. Garda's really nice and I'm glad I took my last opportunity to travel, but I felt like it was time I spent time with people I really like again. I've mastered traveling by myself and enjoyed doing it, but... I'm good for a while.

And I don't mean to end this on a downer note; I think that it's good I didn't feel this way sooner, and plus, a desire to get home will take the sting out of having to leave this wonderful continent. Two weeks. Good number for a countdown, I'd say. And the format of this blog makes the counting exceptionally easy.

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Footnote

* This is what I'm talking about. The game footage doesn't actually start until 1 minute in, and some of the scenery that hooked me first shows up just after time 1:24.

(180): So Much Money...

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(180) is Monday, 5 July 2010.

I think I hinted at this in the "Orientation" entry, but the train system along the Azure Coast is great. You can pay just a few euros to hop on a train (or not... odds are no one will check your ticket) to any one of several gorgeous spots along the coast. Trains are liberally air-conditioned*, and it's a perfect addendum to Antibes/Juan-les-Pins which, while nice, get a tad small after a while. This is why it's better to study here than in Aix, I figure.

So, Andrew Bost (fellow CEA kid) and I hopped on a train and when we got there, we just started walking around and taking a bunch of pictures. You can see mine here.

Monaco's cool - I'm definitely glad I went - but it's not my favorite. (Very) Generally speaking, I have simple tastes in most things and I hate the taste of casinos, so the outrageous displays of wealth were more or less lost on me (much to other-Andrew's chagrin). While I appreciate the craftsmanship and effort and talent required to produce anything as well-made as a Ferrari, I personally don't see a reason to spend so much money on a car, which strikes me as something that needs to work, work well, and work well for as long a time as possible. As long as it fits those criteria, the car could be a rickety old Honda for all I care. I feel like once I'm at the point where I can afford to spend that much money on a needlessly fancy version of something so purely functional, I need to find a better use for my money.

If, on the other hand, my wife wants such a car, that's a different story.

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Footnote

* This is a good thing, from my point of view. Not only is it hot, but if the air conditioner and I had started out by disagreeing over health care reform, the hour ride to Monaco would have been a little awkward.
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(178): Road Trip!

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(178) is Saturday, 3 July 2010.

Today, CEA had an excursion by car to Aix-en-Provence and Cassis. Here's the itinerary; I really hope this link works. Anyway, it was a pretty simple, fun day, so the pictures will probably tell you more than my dry (though mercifully brief) narrative.

Aix (as its abbreviation goes) is actually a little university town two hours away from Antibes. Funny story: I spent a few days there five years ago with my folks on our spring break trip to France.* But this time, I went to the market where I bought delicious fresh strawberries (it's that time of year and I was afraid I wouldn't get them this time around). I also browsed the shops and really lucked out on a nondescript bakery for lunch, where I had a tasty ham and olive pizza and an exceptional pain au chocolat.**

We then piled back into the car and drove to Cassis, a lovely little port town. I wandered and snapped some pictures of the waterfront before we met up again to get on a boat tour of the coast. This is worth doing because: there are lots of little inlets with hidden beaches, tucked away amid very impressive (high) cliffs. We're talking 5+ stories. And people were diving from some of these heights into the water.

So, after the boat trip, we got back in the car and stopped by a French vineyard (my first one, believe it or not) for a tiny little wine tasting before winding our way back to Antibes.

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Footnotes

* Now, that wasn't really very funny, was it. No. "Funny story" is one of those things that I notice people say about markedly un-funny statements. Or, just, that I say about un-funny statements.

** This is typical French bakery ("boulangerie") fare: pastry roll with chocolate inside... This is why I studied in France, dont'cha know.

(175): Nice

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Before we begin, here are some pictures from Antibes.

(175) is Wednesday, 30 June 2010.

After class, Kristin took us (the CEA kids) to Nice for the afternoon. We mostly walked around with a few notable highlights.

First stop was a climb up stairs on a hillside near the water for a few very impressive panoramic views. We got ice cream (those delicious Magnum bars... the one with vanilla ice cream covered in white chocolate is, in the words of Jon Fuller, my Aderol of choice) and that combined with the breeze was entirely refreshing.

We also saw a few shops and food stands. I bought and shared these deep-fried nuggets of fresh whitefish that were quite good.

We also went to the Marc Chagall museum, which apparently a lot of people don't know about. That's a shame in my opinion, because Chagall makes the single most joyous use of color among any painter whose work I've ever seen. This museum (which Chagall himself helped design before his death in the late 1980s), naturally, has a great collection, including some lovely stained glass of Chagall's making.

Here are the day's pictures.
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(167): Patchwork

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I'm catching up, I am...! Here are the day's pictures.

(167) is Tuesday, 22 June 2010.

There's one thing that really bothers me, and to explain it, I'd like you to look at this piece of my map of Europe. This is the map I used to plan out this entire month-long loop. It's not too detailed (which might explain why I've visited capital cities almost exclusively), but it serves to illustrate the following point:



You see how it's basically a straight shot from Prague to Luxembourg and then from Luxembourg to Paris? Seems like a downright elegant itinerary, right? Well, not if you're taking trains through Germany. They run a great system - very efficient, friendly, and generally effective - but they just send you all over the place. When I have to change modes of transportation (usually trains) a lot, I usually refer to the entire trip as "patchwork." Anyway, here was my actual itinerary:



So, in 24 hours, I would cover (however briefly) Prague, Offenburg (the 'A'), Strasbourg, Luxembourg, and Paris. And you've heard that...

...Oh. Oh, have you not heard? It was my understanding that everyone had heard.

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A-WELL-A EVERYBODY'S HEARD ABOUT THE BURG



B-B-B-BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG,
THE BURG IS THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG,
WELL THE BURG IS THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG,
WELL THE BURG IS THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD

A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG,
WELL THE BURG IS THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A DON'T YOU KNOW ABOUT THE BURG?
WELL, EVERYBODY KNOWS THAT THE BURG IS THE WORD!
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD

A-WELL-A EVERYBODY'S HEARD ABOUT THE BURG
BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A DON'T YOU KNOW ABOUT THE BURG?
WELL, EVERYBODY'S TALKING ABOUT THE BURG!
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG...

OFFENBURG!

...

I actually spent less than 10 minutes in Offenburg. The real highlight of the day was actually Luxembourg. Bit of background: my dad went there on a short business trip when I was about 10 and he came back and told me how it was tiny, but it was the richest country in the world and that you could go to the north tip and stand in Germany, Luxembourg, and France all at once. It captured my imagination, so I wrote a report on it in sixth grade and have sort of always wanted to visit there.

Today was my day.

I spent much of it wandering around the (very nice) shops in Luxembourg City - the capital - which is basically a smaller, cuter, brighter version of Paris. The only big difference is the grassy valley (not really a river) running through in the middle. It reminds me of Rock Creek Park going under the bridges of DC. I found a GREAT panoramic view and a bench in the cool shade not long before my train to Paris. Simply idyllic: one of my favorite spots on Earth.

There’s not a tremendous amount to see in Luxembourg, so I was right to only plan a few hours there. But I am very glad that I went.

I finally made it back to Paris, where it took me bloody forever to find my hostel. I was staying in the Montmartre area, which was a total flip-around for the Rive-Gauche guy I've become. By the way, I don't know if I ever explained this, but you hear these terms about Paris a lot and they don't really make intuitive sense. Rive Gauche is the lower bank of Paris (where I've chronicled the vast majority of my time there) and Rive Droite is the upper half, where I was staying now.

I hit it off with the receptionist, who liked my French and told me where to find a laundromat. On my first time there, I have to say I kinda’ liked the experience. I don’t like how impersonal those places are, this one was bright and clean and I like the idea of going and sitting and having time built into your schedule to read. Nowadays it’s The Clocks, an Agatha Christie mystery (not a Coldplay song). The book employs multiple perspectives, and nonlinear storytelling and all that rather appeals to me, as I'm sure you've heard me say.

Oh, wait... you haven't heard?

"Brian, don't!"

A-WELL-A EVERYBODY'S HEARD ABOUT THE BURG
BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A DON'T YOU KNOW ABOUT THE BURG?
WELL, EVERYBODY'S TALKING ABOUT THE BURG!
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
A-WELL-A BURG...

LUXEMBOURG!

BBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBB... [RETCHING NOISES]... AAAH!

PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-
PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-PA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
OOMA-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
OOM-OOM-OOM-OOM-OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOM-OOM-OOM
OOM-OOMA-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
OOMA-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-A-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW, OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW, OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-OOM-OOM-OOM-OOM-OOMA-MOW-MOW
OOM-OOM-OOM-OOM-OOMA-MOW-MOW
OOMA-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW
PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW, OOMA-MOW-MOW

WELL DON'T YOU KNOW ABOUT THE BURG?
WELL, EVERYBODY KNOWS THAT THE BURG IS THE WORD!
A-WELL-A BURG, BURG, B-BURG'S THE WORD
PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW, PAPA-OOMA-MOW-MOW...

(162-166): Prague Blog!

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It rhymes! Get it...? Why, yes, I am six years old.

There is one small but significant event I have to open with. While I was in Prague, somebody bumped into me and knocked my camera out of my hand. It then ceased to turn on.

Now, reading that, you'd think most sane people wouldn't make such a big deal about such a little thing. There are, however, three things I ask you to consider about what you'd think:

1.) This is a blog. What function do these poor little rambling websites have other than making a big deal about little things?
2.) I openly confess to being an American tourist. However, I also take great pleasure in framing my shots as well as I can and taking pictures of little reminders and oddities, in addition to the popular sites. Picture-taking has become my favorite hobby while I've been travelling.
3.) I am not sane.

The long and short of it is that my touristic habits were rather disrupted by my efforts to repair/replace my 2½-years-faithful Canon SD1000. As a result, I didn't get to know or photograph this beautiful old city* as well I would have liked. But, also as a result, I am now packing a beautiful new camera that is just like the old one, only better in virtually every way.

Here are the photos from Prague.

(162) was my mother's birthday: Thursday, 17 June 2010.

PlusPrague is a sweet hostel... very cheap (8 USD per night), clean and bright, great staff, welcome drinks and other niceties... the only problem is its relatively remote location, exacerbated by the early-to-bed-early-to-rise subway system.**

I made my way to Dancing House, located here. This is the other Frank Gehry building I foreshadowed in the Berlin entry. The building (which I love) was designed to evoke an image of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers dancing. I also understand that the former Czech president used to live in the adjacent building. As I continued walking, I decided I was already taken with this beautiful city; its weather and buildings are beautiful (so many gorgeous facades).

One thing I forgot to mention about the transportation system in Prague is that a hefty part of it is a network of above-ground trams. I have a love-hate relationship with trams. On one hand, I find them incredibly charming, and Prague's are particularly quaint (in a good way). I have no problem with the trams themselves, but the suspended wires required to power them are constantly in the way of my building facade pictures.

My next stop was The Globe, located here. This is an English-language bookstore and cafe. I know you think I'm silly for getting into Prague and basically heading right for something I could find in the states, but I can defend this one. This is a pretty famous expat spot, and browsing books and eating at their cafe made me really feel like an expat (in the cool, literary way) for the first time since I'd been abroad. Also, their food is quite good; I hadn't had a bacon cheeseburger that good (or that reasonably priced) in a while, and the peanut butter cheesecake I ordered after was outstanding. I didn't necessarily mean to stay long, but from book browsing to eating to book browsing to starting a conversation with a cute Czech girl to listening to live music in the cafe to more book browsing... I left around 10 PM, smiling from a great evening.

(163) is Friday, 18 June 2010.

One reason I chose to go to Prague was to celebrate the birthday of Kaysey Grard, a friend I met through Kirill in Paris. She had been getting a group together and I figured it would be fun to have a core group of people to hang out with for a change. So, when Kaysey and Kristi showed up, we went to the Chinese Market near our hostel. Kallie, just showing up from the train station, joined us and we browsed. This market is another place to haggle and they have a lot of knickknacks and stuff.

We got some food and drinks before going out to a few bars that night in the name of Kaysey's birthday. And one place played an amazing remix of "Baker Street" by Gerry Rafferty. The remix is here.

Honestly, the biggest thing that happened the next day was that I realized I would be in Antibes in a week's time.

(165) is Sunday, 20 June 2010.

I got up early to go look for a new camera. The stores all said the damage would be as expensive to fix as a new camera, and while I didn't believe them, I doubted any store was going to tell me differently and I needed to start taking pictures again STAT. Plus, if I was going to buy a new camera in a store in Europe, chances are good I wouldn't get much better prices than I would in Prague.***

I ultimately didn't find a camera I liked, but while wandering around the area near the big camera shop, I found this really cool shopping mall that reminded me of the railway station in the beginning of Spirited Away. It had a really cool, eerie feel to it on a cloudy Sunday morning. It has an antique feel the color of old paper and several cool stores (including a store full of old cameras). Also, I don't think its layout obeys Euclidean geography, because the various exits spit you out onto streets you don't expect in a downright baffling way.

At one point today, I felt like I was running out of steam... I've been on the road for a month, going to several extremely different places for a few days at a time. When I travel, I keep up a certain professionalism about it, a certain courtesy toward each city and the time I spend there. I plan as much as I can: how to get to the hostel, a few things I want to see while I wander, a few restaurants TripAdvisor says are good... I try to minimize the time spent online because I shouldn't waste my precious time in X-ville or Y-lin. But I am ready to spend some time doing nothing and not feel guilty about it.

On the other hand, Ristorante Carmelita was great. It may not be traditional fare, but it's cheap and the Gnocchi al Forno was filling and absolutely delicious. Find it here.

Back at the hostel, we all had a final drink before Kaysey made her way to the airport and everyone prepared to disperse the next day. It was a nice ending note.

(166) is Monday, 21 June 2010.

I got my new camera. It's wonderful. The pictures are amazing. And I had about 6 hours to take pictures of everything I wanted to document in Prague.

This included the Magical Mystery Mall (where I wandered Sunday morning), the nearby rose garden, bridges, metronome and panorama of the city, town square, a store selling crazy stuff, and trams. I took the least efficient and most touristy route possible, but I had time and a 24-hour transit pass. I also had lunch at NOI, whose delicious Phad Thai has convinced me that I love Thai food. It's here, just up the street from Ristorante Carmelita.

I had another overnight train to catch.

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Fruit by the Footnotes

* I'm told that Prague is so architecturally diverse because it's the only city in Europe that wasn't demolished by the Nazis during WWII. And be warned: you're in for another photo album with lots of buildings (but more people this time).

** And I don't get why they don't go 24 hours... Prague is something of a party city, so why don't they keep it open when people will need it most? DC is kind of the same way...

*** You have no idea how satisfying it is to go from the Euro (which, granted, isn't as bad as it was in January) and the Pound - both of which dominate the dollar - to the Czech Kurona. It's so much fun to look at the price of something, divide it by 20, and THEN decide if it's reasonable.

(159-161): Where AM I?

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To put it simply, in Amsterdam. Got the photos to prove it.

(159) is Monday, 14 June 2010.

Stacey and Robin, two of my friends from the Isle of Skye tour, happened to be going to Amsterdam and Prague the same days as me, including the same flight to Amsterdam. So, we checked into our hostels, wandered a bit, got cheap sandwiches for lunch, and eventually settled for an hour or so in a lovely little patch of grass on a canal.

Walking back was my first run-in with the World Cup. Naturally, I don’t follow sports, so I had no idea it was going on, but it was really funny to walk around while the Netherlands-Denmark game was playing to packed houses in every single bar. First of all, nobody was working today, and second, you could follow the game without watching it AND quickly locate every pub in a two-block radius from the collective cries, cheers, and other group reactions echoing in every bar in every little street.

I had gotten on a bus out of Edinburgh at 4 AM (incredible part: it was getting light out), so while I was really happy to have taken those sunrise pictures at the airport, I needed a siesta now. I did wait, though, to first make sure Netherlands had secured a solid lead of 2-0.

Stacey, Robin, and I met up again after our naps and wandered again to get dinner. We were staying near the fabled Red Light District (for those of you less familiar with the place and/or its legend, it is not nearly as dangerous as the name would have you believe). But, being what it is, okay: sex shops, fine, don’t pay them much heed, walk past the mannequins in the window, and those ones, and oh my goodness that one moved. Wait, that’s not a mannequin, that’s—

O-KAAAAAAAAY!
Welcome to Amsterdam.

(160) is Tuesday, 15 June 2010.

After my Sandeman’s free tour brochure was unclear about the meeting time and place for the tour, I wandered Amsterdam rather unproductively for several hours. I eventually found lunch at Walk to Wok, a good stir-fry place that puts Wokbar, one of my haunts near Reid Hall in Paris, to shame. It’s a little pricier, but so much better.

My next stop was Der Dampkring, a the world-famous coffeeshop where they filmed the Matsui scene in Ocean’s 12.

After that, I went on to the Van Gogh Museum… It’s a great collection, and a notably good exhibit in terms of putting Vincent in artistic context, but it’s too much money (14 euro, no student discount) and a an awkward floor plan to the exhibition rooms left you stuck behind lots of people trying to look at each painting.

Stacey, Robin, and I had dinner at Eat Mode, a decent pan-Asian place on the Chinatown street. And yes, there's only one such street. Yay multiculturalism!

(161) is Wednesday, 16 June 2010.

I took the tour, which was okay... I'd already found most of the stuff and the guide was pretty funny, but I don't know if it was worth 3 hours given the experience I already had with the city center. Definitely do it first thing in Amsterdam, though.

There were some funny tidbits, though... if you look in the photo album, you'll note some tipping houses. Since flooding used to be a major problem in this city, stores' wares used to be housed upstairs. To get the goods up and down easily (rather than risking it on those nearly vertical staircases), they used a pulley system: the hooked bars extending from the roofs of many of these buildings. But, there's also wind to consider, and if the wind blows your goods too hard into the house, you risk breaking your windows, your products, or both.

"Okay," House asks his team, "Differential diagnosis on goods breaking windows."
"Well," says Thirteen because she's my least favorite, "If you tip the front of the house forward a little, the goods will be able to swing farther without colliding into the facade."
"Brilliant-- let's do it!" Foreman exclaims.

It's not until 35 minutes and 44 seconds into the 43-minute episode that House gets his epiphany, which is to simply double the length of the beam extending from the top of the building.

I had one last thing to do in Amsterdam before catching my train. This was to get a haircut. It had been three months; I was due. But this was a cool experience; I went to the Kappersakademie, a hairdressing school. We're talking 13 euros for a semi-professional stylist's haircut (no problem when my particular style request is "short"). That semi-pro, by the way, was a lovely red-haired girl named Jena with solid English. Many of the other students were also attractive Amsterdam girls (which is kind of redundant). It was fun to watch everybody buzzing about the one big room with several sinks on hinge arms that moved to meet any one of several nearby chairs.

I like to think the haircut came out okay (hopefully upcoming pictures will let you judge for yourself), and it's nice to think that everybody gets something out of the arrangement; students practice, school gets money, I get as good a haircut as possible without breaking the bank on style I wouldn't know what to do with, anyway.

So, final thoughts on Amsterdam... Either I'm a spoiled pedestrian or they're spoiled bikers. I don't like it in Paris when motorcyclists take to the sidewalks (even to park or mount and take to the street), so the constant, omnipresent threat of being mowed down while I try to admire the scenery didn't sit too well with me. Also, they barely warn you: they ring but don't slow down: thats all you get. A chipper little bell has never terrified me so much.

I left with a tremendous respect for - but zero understanding of - this city.

(156-158): The Isle of Skye

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http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=13447283&l=32ee16ca5e&id=734690178

That is all.
.

(132-134): Andy and Sam go to Berlin

(132) is Tuesday, 18 May 2010.

Here are the photos. I refer to several of them this time around, so you might want to take a look if you don't typically.

Sam and I actually filled the time in Berlin. In fact, I’d say we should have gotten an earlier flight out of Vienna the day before. Oh, well.

We got breakfast at this really good pastry place, but tracking down the exact location again is proving quite difficult. Best I can do is tell you that it's near Weinmeisterstrasse metro.

We then hit the New Museum, which ironically housed ancient Egyptian artifacts (among other cool old stuff). Best part was the building though, which probably explains the name. There’s a big, gorgeous exposed-brick atrium in the middle if you look at my pictures. We also saw some 17th-19th century art in the next door museum, which was kind of average… and for some reason, the security guard really didn’t want me carrying my jacket in my arm. Huh.

Afterward, we wandered down Friedrichstrasse, which is the main street in Berlin (our hostel, BaxPax Downtown, was right off said street: huge bonus). We mostly found run-of-the-mill fancy shops, but then there was the VW dealership… Sam’s more of a car connoisseur than I, so he was floored when we saw a Bugatti (I'm told they're legendary, but I just see a car from a sci-fi movie) and a Bentley. There's a picture in the album of a motor almost the size of a nearby child. Cool store, though; big enough to be its own museum.

So, I’m really happy my camera battery held out for a few more minutes, because our next stop was the well-recognized Brandenburg Gate. What I liked even more, however, was the DZ Bank just to the left side in that plaza. This business building, as you’ll see in the picture, looks entirely ordinary from the outside. But go inside, and you find the work of American architect Frank Gehry, who is well known for his mind- (and metal-) bending designs. I wish I’d gotten more angles of this, but they don’t let you in past the reception.

Lunch was less remarkable than Sam’s attempt to get a recommendation. My approach: go on TripAdvisor or Zagat or something beforehand. But, since I hadn't, we were left with Sam’s approach:

“Hey, there’s the American Embassy! Why don’t we ask somebody there?”

“Sam, what the—”

“Dude, they speak English, and they probably know what’s around here.”

“Alright…”

We approach the security guard just outside the building. This is the closest I’ve been to American soil in four and a half months. Sam poses his question to the security guard outside the building.

“Well, that’s one I don’t think I’ve gotten before…!”

Sam laughs. Not that he needs a prompt to do so.

“Well, if you go through the gate, and go round the corner?” The guard instructs, “There’s a Dunkin’ Donuts.”

Dunkin’ Donuts?? Really??? Supporting American interests to the end… somebody needs to give this guy a raise.

“…And next to the Dunkin’ Donuts—”

Ohhhh, okay!

“—is a noodle box place," the guard finishes, "that’s where I usually get lunch.”

Good work, Sam.

There’s really no point to that story—we got lunch somewhere forgettable. But it was right next to the Holocaust memorial just a few steps from Brandenburg Gate, the DZ bank, and the American Embassy. The memorial is a sizeable expanse of square monolithic blocks.* The whole thing is on uneven ground, so some blocks are knee-height, while others down the slope are a good 8+ feet high. They're not all the same height, though. And it’s a grid, so each monolith is pretty close to those surrounding it, so if you were feeling uniquely disrespectful, you could hop across the top of these blocks all the way around.

By the way, if you’re wondering why this the design for a Holocaust Memorial, Sam and I weren’t sure either. I think the best explanation we got was something about how, wandering through them, you feel lost amid a grey, stone cold maze of sameness. I don't think it's one block for each person who ____ .

We then walked a ways to the Technikmuseum, a technology museum. With LOTS of boats. And, thanks to an interactive installation, we learned that Sam has no idea how to steer one.

For dinner, we were in the mood for sushi (largely thanks to a TripAdvisor suggestion on a great place moderately priced). I had sake for the first time and I actually really liked it.

(133) is Wednesday, 19 May 2010.

There’s another bakery just down the block from where we ate the day before. It’s a more impressive display of tarts and such. They had bagels and meats as well; it was a good deal for very attractive food. I’d recommend the first place over this one, but it’s still worth a stop if you’ve got more than a few days. Or if you can actually FIND either of these places...

Today’s big event was Sachsenhausen, the concentration camp north of Berlin. The weather was grey and depressing (that is, perfect). There’s not much to Sachsenhausen; just old empty buildings, maybe a spot of museum here and there, and the pervasive mood of paying respects on a huge flat expanse of land. I was observant and respectful, but I didn’t feel particularly shocked or that my world had changed. I think two things explain this; the first is that Sachsenhausen was more of a holding facility than a death camp. Thus, its horror is not quite as dramatic as, say, Auschwitz.

Now, of course, me being me, I feared for a bit that I should have been feeling something I wasn't... the shock and horror, etc. But then I thought, Sam and I knew what we were in for with this visit. It's not like we studied the holocaust as a footnote of the military history of WWII. And I think that’s a silver lining of sorts; we were already cognizant of the horrors, thanks to the help of teachers (be it in school or family) starting at a far younger age. Since speaking two languages doesn’t make me or Sam especially well-educated or cultured, maybe this does.

The other silver lining was that we saw this place with Fabio and Paul, two travelers we ran into on the way to the camp (and they had met at their hostel that morning). Fabio was from South America (I want to say Argentina, but I’m not sure) and Paul was from New Zealand. Both nice guys, and they made one of the better odd couples I’ve ever met. Paul has a pretty thick accent, so Fabio wouldn’t always understand his intonation or might not hear a word. I’ll illustrate:

PAUL: “So, where are you going tomorrow?”
FABIO: “Yes.”
[Awkward silence for a moment]

But they were fun. It was nice to have someone else to talk with on that train back to the city… I just did not have it in me to spend another hour and a half convincing Sam that he was wrong: that there was no such thing as a ninja administration office, and that even if there was, it would be hidden and so he couldn’t simply move in with millions of American dollars and recruit the ninjas for the U.S. military.

We decided we couldn’t leave Germany without hitting a beer garden, so despite the weather and consequent poor attendance, we ate at Prater Garten, which you can find here.** I didn’t like the hop-loaded beer I ordered, but the veal Wiener Schnitzel was top-notch: great meat deliciously prepared.

(134) is Thursday, 20 May 2010.

Another TripAdvisor tip was Sowol Als Auch, a café in a very picturesque neighborhood (not far from the Sushi place and Prater Garten, actually) that reminded me somewhat of the more walkable residential streets in Manhattan. Anyway, the cafe had cute waitresses, patio dining, and delicious food. I had fried eggs with shrimp and salmon and a vanilla milkshake with a hint of banana. Both were great.

And we couldn’t leave Berlin without seeing the remains of the Berlin Wall. This is one of my favorite things that I’ve seen (which explains why about a third of the Berlin photos on my computer are of this site). Not only is there so much history behind it, but it’s kind of fitting that this dark, gritty landmark with a dark, gritty past is in the middle of a gritty factory area of the city. And of course, the artwork on the wall is pretty incredible, as the photo album for this entry exhaustively proves. I don’t know if there’s a turnover rate for murals, but many were marked to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the fall of the wall last November.

After the wall, we booked it to one last recommendation, Opern Palais, for a delicious lunch. It's right here. Anyway, my sausages with mashed potatoes and kraut were very good, but Sam’s dark horse order of Currywurst stole the show. And, as the guidebooks and sites (and I) will tell you, the real reason to eat here is for the dazzling selection of homemade cakes. I had something called ‘Tree Cake’ (there’s a photo), which was tasty, but I’m sure any of it would have been good.

Sam had to book it to his flight, so we got our bags from the hostel. And of course the sun started to come out as we walked from the hostel to the metro with our suitcases. We said our goodbyes on the train platform.

But I had one more stop to make, since my flight wasn’t until the evening. As you may have guessed from my Frank Gehry comments (or maybe just knowing me), I’m an architecture and design enthusiast. So, I wanted to make a stop at the Bauhaus, a museum to the famous mid-20th century school of architects. It was a tiny little exhibit, but I liked looking at all the geometric drawings and models and examples of furniture.*** Too bad it was half under renovation and they didn’t allow pictures (that didn’t stop me). But for 3 euro, it was a nice visit. I also learned about Walter Gropius, another man mentioned in the Tom Lehrer song I linked you to in the last entry.

I left, satisfied with my last stop, the week’s travels, and my state of being in general. As I walked down the ramp from the Bauhaus, the cloudy sun and soft breeze sang through the stark green leaves—softly, and more or less in tune—and reminded me: this is what spring could be.

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Footnotes

* Think 2001: A Space Odyssey… That is, think 2001: A Space Odyssey if you’ve seen it and are still capable of sensical thought. Most people aren’t afterward. It took me months to recover, and if I hadn’t been folding laundry at the time and thereby distracted, I honestly doubt you’d be reading this now.

** I’m starting to wonder if it’s still worth it to point out my recommendations to you, as I am going almost exclusively by TripAdvisor from this point forward, and you can go on their website much more easily than sifting through my blog again. But you know what? I’m a creature of habit. And perhaps when I get to the French Riviera, I’ll discover my own favorite places again.

*** My parents have a Bauhaus chair at home, and there was one just like it on display. My father was matter-of-fact when I told him about this. Not that I knew it was a Bauhaus chair… to me, since I was four, it’s just been the cool-looking but impossibly uncomfortable and unwieldy black leather-strip chair in the living room that your butt slips through the back of because you’re four and not tall enough to sit in the chair properly.
...I suppose "Bauhaus Chair" is a tad more concise, even if some of the meaning is lost.

(128-131): Vienna, Out of Context

Ever wonder how far you can take a conversation into the realm of absurdity? Ever wonder what it would be like to have a laugh-track playing over your entire life? And do you ever wonder what it would be like if that laugh-track provided most of its own ridiculous jokes and, by laughing at its own jokes, made them the funniest things you’ve ever heard?

I often do. That’s why I spent a week traveling with Sam Seifman.

And—as if Sam’s and my brand of humor and inside jokes weren’t absurd enough already—there is one thing I need to explain about Vienna. In the various places I’ve been this semester, I understand most things I see: signs, posters, ads, you know. The cultures are reasonably close to my own, so I find most of the visual logic and cues are pretty intuitive.

Not here.

I don’t know why, when, or how this happened, but Vienna has developed into a place where, if you can’t read the captions, the pictures and ads you see virtually everywhere are bizarre and incomprehensible. This city makes no sense out of context. But you know something?

Sam and I can jam to that.

(128) is Friday, 14 May 2010.

Now that I’ve explained my angle on Vienna, you’ll probably have a much better time understanding why I took these particular photos. Key word there is “probably.”

Sam and I found our way to our Hostel in Hütteldorf (called Hostel Hütteldorf), a Viennese* suburb. The hostel was fine—best part was definitely the name “Hütteldorf”—but it was kind of far out from central Vienna. We got lunch at a place near the hostel called Weinbrunnen (which you should go to if you do stay at that hostel… not that any of you, my audience, are actually likely to, I realize).

Before our trip, we didn’t know much about Austrian/German cuisine (“brautwurst” and snickering at the term “Wiener Schnitzel” were more or less the list). But Sam has this great culinary motto, which is: “Eat where you are.” So, if you’re in a restaurant in a place by the sea, get the flounder and hold off on the steak. Similarly, don’t get flounder in Grinnell, Iowa, which is home to more corn (and corn-fed cows) than people. With this strategy, Sam always wins the “who ordered the best” game, and he did it at lunch by ordering something he couldn’t pronounce. I ordered half of a fried chicken. I’ve gotten better about trying new food, but I was really tired from staying up late to pack and didn’t feel like branching out this time.

Still, I was rather chagrined when Sam got a huge plate of delicious meats prepared in the traditional style and served with sauerkraut and I got chicken tenders. Freaking chicken tenders! I’m in Vienna and I get the food standby from when I was seven. Sam couldn’t get enough of it (and I bet you’re laughing again now, you old dog, you).

After a siesta, we wandered into Vienna proper with a map, but no real sense of orientation yet. We walked and, well, stuff snuck up on us. We saw some nice building façades, but nothing stunning until the huge cathedral at Stephansplatz just appeared! We were in the city center now, so there were plenty more cool old buildings to find, scattered about the many pedestrian streets. The twilight was nice, too, so we had a generally nice walk.

At dinner, Sam ordered this drink called a Radler, which I recommend because I’m typically not a beer drinker. This brand combination of blond beer and lemonade was delicious (does wonders to counteract the hops I hate). It came in a sizeable bottle that would last Sam the meal. I, more the cocktail drinker, ordered an aperitif described as warm and apple with whipped cream and delicious. And it was all that. But the glass wasn’t quite as big as Sam’s.

As he put it: “It’s the perfect size for a leprechaun!”**

But I had sausage and sauerkraut, which made up for it. That, and the man performing whatever words he could remember of “If I Were a Rich Man” and “Don’t Cry For Me, Argentina” on an instrument whose exposed strings you hit with mallets.

(129) is Saturday, 15 May 2010.

My daily on-the-fly planning took us to the Schönbrunn Palace and gardens. It’s roughly Austria’s answer to Versailles, and it’s no mere snarky retort.

We walked the gardens (free, and definitely a good idea if the weather’s good) and shelled out a few Euro to walk the equally rewarding garden labyrinth.*** After the labyrinth and utter tangent of a footnote, it was lunchtime because hostel breakfasts aren’t all that filling. We hopped into the restaurant on premises, where we indulged in really good hamburgers (called “hapsburgers!” Get it???) with a great sauce. We decided to get dessert, too: Sam had Sacher Torte (more on that in a bit) while I had their delicious homemade apple strudel. See the word “homemade”? That means I won at “who ordered the best.”

Back in Vienna proper, Sam and I got tickets for a tour of the Vienna Opera House. I was kind of hoping for more of a backstage/behind-the-scenes tour, but it was still really cool: that’s a beautiful building; I highly recommend you walk around there at somepoint, be it for a show or on that same tour. We got to see the tech crew putting up the set for the evening’s show, so that was something. They basically told us the history of the opera house. I liked learning more about Gustav Mahler (of whom I first heard in this song by Tom Lehrer, who sings “The Vatican Rag”), and I liked what he did with the opera. Until he became the guy in charge in the 50s, performers would just stand in place and sing an aria. “Not good enough,” says Gus. “This is a story. Y’all have to act.” So, from that point on, they do.

We got dinner at an off-the-beaten-path place (yay TripAdvisor!) called Schöne Perle (it’s German for “precious pearl” and located HERE). It’s where locals go, for good food and lighting that is low, reddish-yellow, and gives a great gritty city atmosphere. I had a pot-au-feu soup and—get ready—Wiener Schnitzel. Now, I used to think this food was funny, so I understand your instinct to laugh, but take me seriously (or as seriously as you ever can, I suppose) for just a second and read this next sentence. Wiener Schnitzel is a large, thin cut of chicken, pork, or veal breaded and pan-fried to delicious perfection and served with some kind of potatoes (often delicious as well).

Not so funny anymore, eh? Kinda’ awesome? Yeah. That’s what I thought.

So, about 154 food descriptions ago, I mentioned Sam had Sacher Torte and that I’d come back to it. Well, here we are. Our next stop was dessert at the famous Sacher Hotel, where they’ve made famous a rich, semi-dry chocolate cake with a hint of tangerine. Sam and I had delicious coffee and hot chocolate, respectively. I think Sacher Torte is decent, but you only need to get it once, and you only should get it from them.

(130) is Sunday, 16 May 2010.

“So,” Sam and I reasoned that morning, “Because we aren’t crazy enough, and because our laughter isn’t crazy enough, and because the signs around us aren’t crazy enough, let’s add more absurdity to this experience in Vienna.”

“Let’s start the day at this absurd city’s finest modern art museum.”

No decade did modern art better than the 80s. Televisions looked awful, and so the avant-garde people decide they were beautiful and a perfect medium. Films were campy but made sense, so filmmakers had to go back to black and white and film a dude standing on a rock flapping his arms, trying and failing to fly (no joke… it was hilarious). There were also 10-second films at which we laughed hysterically.

Also, the European clothing chain Humanic turned out some of the finest commercials I've ever seen. Here's one of them, and here's another!

Well, it was fun for a while, but that trip went on a little too long. When we finally came off it we were… in the rain again. Damn. We ate and wandered. I think it was somewhere in here that one of the… tentacles? of my umbrella broke. You know, one of the six parts that hold the fabric outstretched. Sam’s umbrella had broken at least a day back. I was stubborn.

By this time, we’d made a few observations about Vienna:

1.) It doesn’t really feel like a city: not many residential buildings in the main part of town, all businesses and old buildings… it feels more like a place to visit.

2.) No matter where in town you are or which way you’re walking, the city center seems to have a gravity-like effect. You always find your way back there. What helps this phenomenon along is that the city center isn’t all that big.

3.) The city’s biggest draw are its buildings and parks, both of which require you to walk around outside. Not a pleasant prospect when it was raining.

So, with these things in mind, we decided it was time to kill a few hours. Soapman hadn’t seen Iron Man 2, so we found an English-language movie theater showing it on their big screen. It was a very cool place, actually, with lots of old projectors and stuff on display. Also, they assigned seats, like in a theater theater. And you know something? After a lukewarm reaction to it in Paris, I actually liked the movie better the second time I saw it.

Dinner was an obscurely-located (not even Google can find it) place called Gäuzchen, an tavern of sorts with lots of good food at student prices. It was here that Sam and I laughed over how people from most other countries speak English better than we do. Looking at the menu, I saw a combo appetizer platter with all your standard American diner-food cravings, and I was food-homesick: fries, chicken wings, mozzarella sticks, etc. I ordered it, but the waitress gave me a tip to get something else.

“Not good?” I asked.

“Well, it’s alright; it’s just a little… uninspired.”

Good enough for me. I didn’t write down what I actually got… probably Wiener Schnitzel.

But can we go back to the part where this woman described a dish as “uninspired”? Brilliant use of the word! Most Americans (myself included) typically wouldn’t think to use that phrasing. I was going to wait on this, but I might as well go ahead into a philosophical matter now, since it’s relevant and will break up the food descriptions.

I was with Mom and Dad at dinner back in March, and after ordering everyone’s food in French, they glad-handed me about how great it was that I could do that so easily and that it was the mark of a truly educated person to be able to speak so well in two languages. And, as I’ve travelled a bit, I’ve been thinking about that. I don’t disagree with them; most Americans can’t even speak English well. But this waitress, like the many other bilingual people I’ve meet this year, got me thinking:

She’s German.
She’s bilingual, one language being English.
She’s normal.

I’m American.
I’m bilingual, one language being English.
I’m well-educated.

That doesn’t seem fair.

(131) is Monday, 17 May 2010.

It stopped raining! Everybody’s in the play! And don’t you know… that I got carried away into my favorite song by Electric Light Orchestra. But it did stop raining, so Sam and I finally got to see some of the gardens, where we walked, swapped story ideas, and sang "The General" by Dispatch.****

So, can anybody explain why there are an obscene number of links in this entry? I can't.

Lunch today was at Trzesniewski, and the place gets my award for best meal in Vienna. It’s easily found here, just off one of the main streets in the city center (there’s even a sizeable sign pointing you into the right side street). This place does just one thing: little pieces of bread with different puréed spread combinations, one euro apiece. We ordered five each and were euphorically full for the cost of 5 euro. All of these “sandwiches” were delicious… our favorites were liver, salmon and cream cheese, and egg. So, to answer your question, yes I was Jewish for the duration of the meal.

Since we were just killing hours until our flight to Berlin that evening, we decided to try the Ferris Wheel. So, we made it to that end of town and discovered not just the wheel, but a SECOND wheel. But, hold on a tick… what’s all this stuff here around the second wheel? Is that—an AMUSEMENT PARK?!?!

Um… this was kinda’ necessary.

We walked around, but despite its being mid-May, most rides were closed. We did see these huge funhouses that were several stories high and glorified obstacle courses, most of whose perils you could see on front-facing balconies. It was so much fun to just stand and watch grown men—who paid good money to do this!—walking through these ridiculous, embarrassing sets of bumpers and rollers and rotating crawl-on-your-knees tunnels and who-the-bloody-hell-knows what else. Watching was way more fun than doing would have been: I’m sure of it

We found an operating roller coaster, which was surprisingly good. I then stepped in a puddle. Sam then laughed. I got cotton candy (also kinda’ necessary at an amusement park). Sam’s marshmallow-chocolate-dessert-thing then fell on the ground. I then laughed.

What followed was just walking a huge circle around greater downtown Vienna. We saw the university building, which we hadn’t yet, and it was a very cool gothic structure. Unfortunately, the impressive-looking gothic cathedrals we passed were closed today.

After dinner at Weinbrunnen again, we got Magnum bars (but no sign of the mysterious Magnum Gold?!) before heading to the disorganized mess that is Vienna airport.

---------------------------------------------
Anybody know how to say “Footnote” in German?

* I think “Viennese” may be my favorite location-related descriptor of them all. Not to be confused with “Vietnamese,” a word for which I have no special affection.

** I don’t read German, but I bet they had a special price if you ordered it with chicken tenders.

*** I’ve been to ones where it’s just the labyrinth pattern on the ground in different colored bricks. LAME! Without walls, it’s just as silly as the scheme I had when I was four with my neighborhood friend Vito (then Christopher, nickname Christy) to trap my dad in the basement. The plan was to build a path out of blocks leading my dad to the place on the floor where he was supposed to sleep for the night. Then, during the night, I was supposed to come down to the basement and rearrange the blocks so there was no longer an exit. Trapped: no way out. Happy Father’s Day, Dad. I want you to know I’ve come to appreciate your wisdom somewhat better in the last seventeen years.

**** I love that song, but I actually prefer this recording of it by Matthew's Minstrels, a brilliant Vassar A Capella group. Note my dear former roomie, Jon Fuller, on the refrain harmony.

(117-127): Christmas in Kentucky

I think it would be fun to write a TV show-- I don't know what it would be about-- but the episode titles would have NOTHING to do with the content of the episode.

(117-127) are 3-13 May 2010.

So, before the focus of the entry, I have an issue to address, which is the difficulty I've had with uploading photos. I finally seem to be circumventing it, however.

HERE ARE THE PHOTOS FROM FLORENCE, ROME, ATHENS, AND SANTORINI.

I think I’m also going to do one comprehensive entry near the end where I give you the full directory.

Anyway, today’s goal is the record short entry: ten days in four bullet points. And three of them are about movies.

1.) I finished my Hitchcock paper. It came out pretty well: talking about how Hitchcock uses color to highlight objects important to the plot, but more importantly, to represents the personal aspects of each movie. A few examples… in Rear Window, everything outside James Stewart’s window is slightly brighter, showing how they interest him more than his drab apartment (including Grace Kelly, who is dressed in plain but bright blue jeans and a coral button-down shirt in the final shot). In Torn Curtain (underrated movie, by the way), there are small details of blue to indicate when Paul Newman and wife Julie Andrews are safe from the Germans and details of red to indicate when they’re not. Also, when Hitchcock remade The Man Who Knew Too Much in color (only story for which he did this), the remake focused on the family’s stress after their child is kidnapped, as opposed to the father’s apparent primary motive of stopping the bad guys in the original. It goes on and on… for 13 pages… in French…

2.) I turned it in and saw Kick-Ass* to celebrate.

3.) I saw Iron Man 2 a full day before it came out in the U.S. Awesome.

4.) I spent some quality time with my VWPP pals before most of us parted ways, including a second (lovely) dinner at Le Bistrot de Chez Henri (recommended in the entry titled “Days on the 10”) on Rue Princesse.

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Footnotes don’t count toward the line limit because of a rule I just made up.

* I don’t care if it was a graphic novel first; I’m pretty damn sure this movie came about because somebody got ahold of—not one—but two of my screenplay ideas, breeded them together, and let their kid play a few too many violent video games. I liked the movie—it was smart, funny, and stylish and while the violence was gratuitous, I understood why it had to be there. But go ahead: see it, and then ask me about Superhero Guy and Black Blade.

(113½-116): This is IOS!!

I have photos for you from this part of the trip! They're right here!

(113½) begins with our arrival in Ios on 29 April 2010.

We took a much faster ferry to Ios with much more comfortable seats. WAY better than taking the SAT.

We checked into Francesco's, a hostel tucked into the honeycombed walkways of Ios Village. It's got a few levels of terraces and just... what a view. The free drinks they provided didn't hurt either. We wandered a bit and got gyros, and then Liz and K-Vomps slept forever while Aaron and I got dinner with a few girls staying at the hostel.

I bolded Francesco's because-- like Stelio's Place-- it's basically a hotel at hostel prices. More importantly, though, if you go to Ios, you have to stay there. You just have to; it's part of the culture. During the off-season (the alternative is supposedly a madhouse), pretty much everybody staying in the village stays there. Everybody knows the place. It's THE party spot (and I mention this because Ios is THE party island*).

To those of you wondering why I've been taking so bloody long to turn out updates-- first of all, if such people do exist, thank you. Secondly, it is not because I have forgotten about my blog, and here is a video that proves it, filmed on location. The clip explains itself. WARNING: This video may not be appropriate to viewers who (like me) hate annoying audio commentaries on films.**

(114) is Friday, 30 April 2010.

We woke up at 1. NOW we're on spring break.

We found a delicious place near the hostel that serves breakfast all day. I had an omelette with a really good vanilla milkshake. Not all that easy to come by in Europe. I don't know the name of the place, but it's on the same walkway that takes you to Francesco's; you'll pass it anytime you approach or leave the place. It's a terrace with a wooden overhead... thing... and a great view of the beach. It's next to where Aaron and Kirizabeth were standing in the video, if you can make it out.

We wandered down to the shore and back for a few hours and found a cupcake shop. We had cupcakes while watching the sunset.

You know, this may be my most succinct account yet of a given day?

Before dinner, we got happy hour drinks at a bar called FunPub, which I recommend because the bartender is hilarious and the place-- I see no way around it-- had to have been built for people like me, who have no idea what to do with themselves in bars otherwise. This place has a pool table, darts, a movie screening room and-- this is the coolest part-- a giant game of Jenga (out of big blocks) in the middle of the floor for people to play for free. FunPub lives up to its name. That's not nothing.

It was at this point that a guy passed us shouting the title of this entry, after the fashion of Gerard Butler in 300.

We then had dinner at a surprisingly good Thai place, hung out at the hostel with other travelers, found our way BACK to FunPub, and then to another place in the village. We then made our way back to the hostel and watched The Road to El Dorado, a wonderful animated movie I hadn't seen since it came out.

And then, we... noted the time. 5 AM. Oh, look at that.

(115) and (116) are Saturday, 1 May and Sunday, 2 May 2010 respectively. As you're about to see, however, I have nothing specific to say about them.

Give or take a few details, our time on Ios consisted of eating at that breakfast/milkshake place at outrageous hours of the day, relaxing on the beach, and getting dinner and drinks at night.

I think if you're reading this blog, you probably know me well enough to know that partying isn't really my thing. Despite this, I preferred Ios to Santorini; it was greener (prettier in my estimation). Also, we got to just relax on a beach, which is kind of what we were in the market for in the first place. Goodness knows I wasn't in the market to return to Paris and write my Hitchcock paper...



Dear Icelandic Volcano,

WE WIN. SUCK IT UP.

Tenderly,
Andy


-----------------------------------
Footnotes

* I think right-hand side of this sign just about says it all:



** And my GOODNESS, my voice is annoying...

(105-109): Roma, Ro-ma-ma...

Ga-ga, oh la... la. Er, right. Moving on.

(105) is Wednesday, 21 April 2010.

Maybe I'm becoming a bitter old man, but I have to comment on how we got to Rome via the noisiest train ride of my life. There was a battalion of kids between 10 and 11-and-a-half either yelling or snapping pictures of themselves and friends and then looking at their portraits and shouting "Facebook! Facebook!" Oh, well. Only two hours' ride, and the countryside was great.

After checking into The Yellow (pretty standard as hostels go), Dan and I got a very tasty lunch at a nearby restaurant. We spent the rest of the day wandering the city and getting a feel for it in the following order:

Repubblica, walking distance from the hostel, had this really cool church next to it: big and open, very beautiful, with a pendulum (something about Galileo) on display.

The Spanish steps, where-- as always-- there were throngs of people. Today, though, a big army orchestra was playing. Apparently Dan and I picked Rome's Birthday, a local holiday, to arrive and walk around. I was especially tickled when they played this song, featured in my favorite Italian movie, 8 1/2. The steps also afford you a rooftop view of most of Rome. No city does rooftops quite like Paris, but this was still a neat photo-op.

Then there was a neat old pillar that's on most tourist maps.

We found more military music at another piazza. I was grinning because I got to hear-- are you ready for the Coldplay reference?-- Roman cavalry choirs singing.

The Wedding Cake, as most romans mock it, is a huge building built to look like ancient Roman architecture would have. But it sorta' fails. It's not far from the coliseum.

Piazza Navona was next (even a cursory look at a map of Rome will give you a sense of just how erratic our path was), and here we went to the gelato place at either 28 or 30 Piazza Navona. They're famous for Tartufo, a sphere of chocolate gelato-based dessert kept nice and cold. Worth every one of those 5 euros. Beautiful twilight was coming in on the piazza as well. This is one thing I love about Rome: the buildings are painted to catch twilight perfectly. I can't think of another city I've been to that is so beautifully suited to its natural environment.

The fountain at the Piazza Navona was under renovation, but you know what? The Trevi Fountain is a pretty good substitute. For those who don't know it, it's a marvelous (or should I say MARBLE-OUS?!) sculpted fountain depicting roman gods and other naked figures (apparently every day was Casual Friday back then). Epic site, and always full of people taking pictures and agreeing with that sentiment.

We then met up with Meredith, a good friend of mine from Vassar studying Art History this semester in Rome. She and her friends took me and Dan to this really good restaurant that I couldn't for the life of me direct you back to (it's on this secluded little piazza). Great food, though, and when you're in Italy, always get the table wine because it's reasonably priced and always good.

(106) is Thursday, 22 April 2010.

Dan and I started with the Forum ruins near the Wedding Cake and the Coliseum. Pretty cool to walk around, although like a lot of Rome's other attractions that fall into the category of "old stuff," you don't need to spend huge amounts of time there to get the idea. Very cool to see close up, though, and Culture Week was still our friend.

It is at this point in our story that Liz and Kirill finally catch up with us, after having spent 5 days in Paris's Charles-de-Gaulle airport and its environs. We found them at Termini* and took them to get settled at the hostel and course-correct for the next few days of our travel.

The next discovery was a delight. There's a little to-go pizza place just around the corner from the hostel. I'm getting hungry again just thinking about it... no, wait, I'm sorry. That's from being in Paris, where food is also good, but it's nowhere near as filling (and therefore satisfying) as in Rome. The pizza place had crunchy-crust pizza, any sort of combination of toppings, and low prices. I got a lot of pizza with cheese, pieces of potato, and bacon. REAL bacon-- not the small bits of ham that Paris tries to pass off as the good stuff. That pizza was greasy and wonderful. We would be back. I'd recommend this place, but even better than the food was this fact: pizza that good is everywhere in Rome.

We hit the coliseum next, where we took pictures and decided that the passageways in the center of the coliseum (under the now crumbled arena floor, these housed animals and gladiators/victims in ancient times) would be one of the best places in the world for a game of laser tag, especially when you fill the coliseum with spectators. Meredith then found us, and we hung out at Circus Maximus, where an Earth Day concert was happening. We all talked and eventually found dinner in the southwest part of town (across the Tiber from Circus Maximus), which is supposedly where students go to bars and otherwise hang out. We got a decent dinner at a place with crazy low prices.

Big discovery of the meal: prosciutto ham and melon. Anybody who knows me and my 7-year-old eating habits can have a good laugh imagining my face when I saw this as an appetizer. In line with those habits, it picked it because none of the other appetizers caught my interest any better. But it worked. I can't explain it-- really, I figure there is no explanation-- for why these two foods got along, but I can tell you right now that I will be living off of this combination for the next decade or so of preparing my own food.

And, because two great discoveries aren't enough today (or because 3 is the magic number), Meredith did us the great service of taking us to The Gelato Place. Now, any gelato shop that claims to be "artigianale" (meaning "homemade") is going to be good, but this place was just a charming experience. The manager is this very sweet middle-aged Italian guy who loved to smile and laugh and make jokes. My favorite part was when I asked him for a cone with three scoops, picked two (caramel and vanilla), and then got stuck on the third. I asked him what he would pick for the third flavor. He gave me this really good cookies and cream sort of flavor that, sure enough, finished the combo perfectly.** I left that shop with a big smile fueled by delicious ice cream and genuine Italian hospitality.

(107) is Friday, 23 April 2010.

We spent Dan's last day in Rome showing him as much art-and-humanities stuff as we could: today was Vatican Day. And how better to start it than being IN the Vatican with Liz's iPod and listening to Tom Lehrer's 'The Vatican Rag'.

There are a few smaller museums that actually have some really neat stuff... I was particularly taken with a few-- I want to say terra cotta?-- statues of angels that were partially broken, revealing the wire and hay on the insides. These otherwise beautiful, classical statues-- "broken angels," as I like to call them-- were my favorite image of this whole museum complex. And that's saying something, because the Vatican is the biggest small country I have ever been through. One of the reasons I probably didn't like it when I was 12... lots of hallways full of painstakingly elaborate rooms. Beautiful, yes, but the main walkthrough is so long that it gets a little gratuitous after a while. What's worse is that the famous Sistine Chapel is all the way at the end, by which time I was too tired and overstimulated by art to be able to appreciate it. And there's SO much art to appreciate in that room.***

Then there was St. Peter's Basilica, which floored all of us. So many photos...

We then walked along the river for a while and eventually found an okay dinner, which turned out to be two blocks from the super-inexpensive place from the night before. Thus, it was also near The Gelato Place, where we took this picture, one of my favorites of the whole trip:



We went back to the hostel and hung out for a while at the (very cool) attached bar, where we sipped limoncello and killed some time before Dan had to catch an early cab to the airport.

At some point around here-- probably a few days back-- I figured out how to put my camera in 16x9 widescreen mode. So emotionally satisfying.

(108) is Saturday, 24 April 2010.

You ever feel sometimes like these entries just don't end? Yeah, me too. Really, the only uniquely cool thing (the rest of it was uniformally cool) that we did was go to dinner with Judy Bachrach, mother of my dear friend Sam Seifman. She was teaching a journalism class at a Roman university this semester (which I mention because-- one, it's cool-- and two, that plot point will be relevant again in a few more entries). She made us very good pasta and sauce and then treated us to an excellent gelato place near her house.

We then caught a bus back to Termini and went book-browsing in the station's bookstore. I felt like doing some recreational reading for a change, so I picked up copies of Agatha Christie's The Clocks and Nick Hornby's High Fidelity (yes, the basis for the John Cusack movie).

(109) is Sunday, 25 April 2010.

Big event for today was the Borghese Gardens. We didn't get into the museum, but honestly, when you've got a frisbee and great weather, who needs it? Being able to say I once spent two hours throwing a frisbee in the Borghese Gardens in Rome with my friends is the best souvenir of Rome I think I could ask for.

I tipped Kirizabeth off to the wonders of Tartuffo at Piazza Navona (I got a 3-scoop of lemon, strawberry, and something called zambaione that was really good). We then got pizza and a taxi to Fumicino airport, from which we flew into Athens.

Paris excepted, Rome is my favorite place I've been this semester.

-Andy

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I want your footnotes and I want your revenge, you and me could write a bad romance...

* This quickly became one of my favorite train stations for a few reasons. There's the name, the good location on Rome's subway, and most importantly, one of those old-school information boards full of little rectangles that all flip and rattle and whir in a delightfully inefficient and dazzlingly choreographed display when even one field changes.

** By the way, you know the gelato's good when I go out of my way to record the flavors in the Moleskine that holds the details of each day.

*** Also to be appreciated, however, are the guards. Every 30 seconds, the guards call out "Shhh! No photo!" in a room where you're supposed to be silent. Sistine Chapel Security: defeating the purpose since 1929. For more funny info on the Vatican (and another link that most of you will never click on), check out this little gem.

(103-104): Florence

(103) is Monday, 19 April 2010.

Blogger seems to have confiscated my user-friendly blogging interface, which means I can't underline things and my fonts may come out looking funny. Don't quite know what the story is with this one, but my glass of Vanilla Coke and I are working on it.

So, Dan and I found ourselves awake and refreshed in Florence. First stop is the Piazzale Michelangelo, home of a fake version of the famous David statue (Dan tells me there are several about) and a show-stopping panoramic view of Florence. It's free, it's good exercise, and we had perfect weather. My suggestion as you climb to the top, though-- and I know this is difficult-- but do try to give it the Orpheus treatment. That is, don't look behind you from the steps. Wait until the lookout point. The sudden reveal is worth your patience.*

Dan and I were really hungry by this point, so we succumbed to lunch at the (relatively) pricey patio near the lookout point. One of many great things about Italian food: since all of it is SO GOOD, even the slightly overpriced stuff is worth it. I had a tasty pizza and Dan's lasagna turned out to be the best lasagna of our trip. The patio, view, and breeze were also a lovely combination.

We rather wandered back to the city... you know how they say "Not all who wander are lost"? Well, thank goodness for its corollary: "Not all who wander but are lost necessarily mind." It was a beautiful day, as I've said, and we found a nice tree-lined street and even a secluded playground that was neat to walk through. After crossing the Ponte Vecchio ("Old Bridge," full of merchants and stuff) back to town, we found the famed Duomo (yes, like Milan has a famed Duomo... I think they're a chain or something) among other cool old churches.

We then moved hostels to the originally planned Archi Rossi, which I highly recommend to hostel-goers. Fine location near the train station and great resources (best included hostel breakfast I've yet had) for a decent price. After a little siesta, we had gelato. Gelato may be the best ice cream in the world, but the cones are edible cardboard. I don't like this, but I think the idea is so that the cone doesn't distort or otherwise detract from the taste.

My high school friend Christina couldn't meet up with us for dinner, but she gave us a great tip, which I will now relay to you. Muna Ciello is on Via Maffia 31 (see here). Fun, funky place with, of course, great food.** After dinner, Christina and her friend Lauren joined us for hot chocolate at La Cite (mapped here). It's a neat bookshop/cafe/jazz hangout where a few of Christina's and Lauren's friends in their music program were playing that night. But the hot chocolate-- it's a must. They have a few flavors, and they froth it up all rich and thick. I picked white chocolate (my new favorite flavor this semester, likely for its sideways resemblance to vanilla). Delicious, just like the rest of that day.

(104) is Tuesday, 20 April 2010.

This is it, folks-- museum day. National museums are closed on Mondays, and trains taking Andy and Dan to Rome run on Wednesdays, so we had to cram it all in today. We got up early to head over to the Uffizi and beat the rush.

Yeah. THAT worked...

We spent two and a half hours in line, which turned out to be almost double the amount of time we spent actually inside the museum. And I hate to say this, given that time commitment, but I really didn't like the Uffizi that much.

Now, before you, my art-loving friends, forever abandon this blog and my company, I'd like to make my case. The Uffizi museum is famous for its collection of old art, which is my least favorite kind. You've got rooms and rooms and rooms full of old crucifixions depicted in old gold paint on old wood. I find that there are two (connected) problems with this.

1.) Anything can be old. I can paint my (now empty) glass of Vanilla coke and wait 650 years, but that doesn't mean I painted it well in the first place. That doesn't require any unique talent or vision-- that requires endurance, which, as WALL-E teaches us, any given object can have.
2.) Not only does being an old piece of art require no unique artistic vision, these particular old pieces weren't supposed to have any. This is a matter of personal taste, I understand, but if I'm going to spend my morning looking at crucifixions, send me back to the Prado, where each painting of the same thing had a unique perspective: a unique reason to be painted. The way I see it, the artists of the Uffizi's paintings didn't understand that you don't do a remake unless you've got something new to add to the original story.

To be fair (and to stop ranting), however, I suppose you can't go to Florence and not see this museum (unless you take my ranting to heart). And it was great to see Boticelli's 'The Birth of Venus'. Also-- big bonus-- our sojourn in Italy landed squarely in the middle of Culture Week, when all of Italy's state-run museums are free. If you're planning to visit Italy around mid-late April (you should), try to land it during this annual 10-day stretch.

Next stop was a private gallery with a surrealism exhibit focusing mainly on De Chirico, a founding painter of the movement. Dan and I spent a little while looking at De Chirico and Friends (the show included a few Magritte paintings as well). It was a cool exhibit, because some of the plaques accompanying the paintings addressed the movement's larger philosophical issues with sort of "Think about it yourself!" questions.***

Our final museum stop was the Galleria dell'Accademia. The big draw here, of course, is Michelangelo's David (the real David****). It's a great statue-- to be sure-- but what I like almost as much is how they don't open with it. Maybe I'm ruining the effect by mentioning it (and maybe the film major finds this more impressive than it actually is), but the reveal of this statue and where it's situated in the museum is at least as good as the masterpiece itself.

Also, the Galleria dell'Accademia has a lot of Uffizi-style Old Art. If you're hitting museums in Florence but don't want to wait on line for the Uffizi, this museum is a good pick because you'll see a smaller (but sufficient) sample of the same stuff. Or, you could book your Uffizi ticket in advance, which Dan and I didn't do.

We found a pizzeria on the east end of the city that seemed to be favored by locals. Cheap and tasty. We then savored dessert at Gelateria La Carraia, Christina's excellent pick of a Gelato place, easily found here.

I want to close this entry by reminding you that my challenge for major Bonus Points is still open, since my parents still have yet to correctly pronounce the French sentence "C'est une nouvelle année." Skype me, say it right, and WIN!

-Andy

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Tonight I gotta' cut notes! Footnotes!

* For those of you who still don't get the reference, go look up Orpheus and Eurydice in your copy of 'D'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths.' Google it if you want to, but you should also invest in the book. Seriously-- your kids will love it.

** Also, how can you not love a place-- in Italy-- whose street is Via Maffia?? It's just too perfect. And if it's not perfect enough, can we also reflect also on how that street name sounds like you could translate it as "Thug Life"?

*** One went something like, "Surrealism often finds its inspiration in dreams, even nightmares. Freud said a nightmare was this, this, and this... do you have nightmares? Do they look like the style of this painting?"

*** No, the dog Paul Anka. 50 Bonus Points if you got that one.