Alora! Café and Sun: Milano

I don't think I've ever eaten so much in my life. Or had this much coffee consistently. Here's the dilemna though: it's ALL delicious!!
Busto Arsizio, Italy (close to Milan)
I'm staying here in Milan with my friend Andrea, whom I met at Glasgow Uni and his family is wonderful. So far, everyday here has been bright, sunny and even hot (70s all the time) and absolutely gorgeous. Mediterranean time is definitely different from how we work in the US, and even in Northern Europe. Example? Well here is a typical day for me in the de Carne household...


We sleep in until we feel like getting up! So that's usually sometime after 10am... get up and have a café with breakfast. A café here is not what most Americans would think of as coffe. It comes in really tiny cups and is straight espresso to which you can add sugar and milk if you want, and it's delicious! All the people I've visited here have their own espresso makers, so you make it at home and you get it at the bar or cafe, where it's really cheap. It seems that everywhere I go, I am offered a cafe! Which is rather hard to refuse, hopefully I won't develope a caffine addiction in the space of a week and a half! Breakfast is either milk and cereal or milk and a muffin or other packaged snack that they dip in milk and eat.


Keep in mind, this breakfast is at like 11, or 12. Bascially whenever we get up! Then we have some time before lunch. We've gone meandering around Busto Arsizio enjoying the sun, occasionally popping in the library to study and investigating markets. Lunch is usually a 2 or 3pm affair, and I've been eating so much food. Today's lunch was delicios (as usual): linguini with fresh seafood (shrimp, mussels and calamari), tomatoes, garlic and something else that made it delicious. I thought that was the main course, but no! Then bread, then delicious grilled sword fish- this was amazing. Easily some of the best fish I have ever had, and no idea how she made it. Plus there was salad, but I declined, knowing by now there was fruit to follow the meal! I love fruit, and I love this Italian tradition of have fruit after every meal! So strawberries and melon were next. A fantastic way to end a meal! ....except that wasn't all... there was also a strawberry & cream tarte to eat after that!  See what I mean about the food never ending? And that's just one meal! And afterwards... a café!


To get around, people have both cars and motorcycles (just like in Barcelona), and there is public transportation. Because we are not in the city proper, we have to take about a 30 minute train ride into the main part of Milan. Tickets for public transport are very similar to Prague I think, you buy them at a newspaper or convience stall, then get them stamped or punched by a machine on the train. After the train, we hopped on the metro, very similar to Barcelona and the Washington D.C metro.


Two things that I immediately noticed about Milano? There are banks everywhere! And Vespas. I should probably have said three things and mentioned the pigeons, but that didn't seem nearly as exciting. Milan has a very wealthy district, thus all the banks, tall impressive buildings with gated courtyards full of stone, plants and beautiful architecture. And there are still motorcycles everywhere, just like Barcelona (though I think Barcelona had even more!)


We visited a statue of Leonardo de Vinci, La Galleria and the Duomo. La Galleria is a really fancy shopping center (Armani, Swarovski, and randomly and out of place: McDonalds?) with a exquisitely decorated roof and interior, though it's open to the air. the Duomo is a huge Cathedral, probably just as big as La Sagrada Familia, but with a completely different feel. It's extremely Gothique- dark impressive interiors with massive columns, statues and paintings. A huge contrast to the more modern, sun-filled Sagrada Familia.

Leonardo de Vinci!

Courtyard outside the library where students procrastinate in the sunshine

Galleria!

the Duomo

Inside the Duomo

Dinner? 8 or 9pm and once again a delicious and massive affair! Last night I was over at a friends house to watch the AC Milan-Inter Milan football match on TV and we had dinner there. My first pizza in Italy!! It was so good. Pizza is also really different here, in the obvious, it's loads-better-way, and also because everyone orders their own pizza and eats all of it! Mine had grilled veggies and sausage, yummy! Expecting more food than an entire pizza? No worries! There is cheese, sausage, and bread. Plus strawberries and whipped cream for dessert! Plus a café and biscotti (cookies).
Sunshine and food: I love Italy!
(also- our team won the match- AC Milan! 3-0!!)