June 2019
Summer travels have begun and school is still in session. Every weekend in June I am in a different country, and none of them are Germany. First it was Norway and then Italy. Next weekend is France, followed by a family reunion in the USA, before ending the month and beginning the school free part of summer in Japan. When I fly into Boston it will be my first time back in America in over a year and I haven’t driven a car once that whole time. Two years ago I never would have thought this would be my life. I am so happy with the changes I have made. You’ve got one shot at this life. You gotta live the life you want to live.
This post begins, and ends, in Milan. I flew into the Bergamo airport, not realizing it was an hour away from Milan. Though it is very easy to get a direct bus to the city center.
Below you can see the Fascist architecture of the main train station. This architecture is intended to be imposing on the common man while portraying the power of the government.
I decided to walk to my hostel from the main station and stopped at a few parks and museums along the way. This was in the Giardini Pubblici Indro Montanelli.
The Museo Pollins Pessoli is a collection in the mansion of a wealthy man from the 19th century.
These four figures represent the “four” continents of the world (as was seen at this time). From left to right: Africa, Asia, Europe, and America. Portrayals of the four continents was a common theme throughout Milan and you will see this on a more grandiose scale shortly.
That is the Italian poet Dante in red.
Leonardo Da Vinci was and is very important to Milan.
This was a pretty awesome exhibit of his various flying machines and other inventions.
This is the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II. Immaculate would be an appropriate word to describe it. The city owns it and rent will cost you over a million euros per year, so this is a nice source of revenue. Most of the shops here do not make any money on this location, it is more about advertising and prestige.
Here again you see a depiction of the “four” continents of the world (there are actually seven).
Asia and Africa
Americas
Europe
Prada made a pretty boss move to get two of the four corner locations. This corner use to be occupied by a high end bakery. Management of the Galleria only allows a store to have one location in the Galleria. So Prada bought the entire business of the Bakery and subleases this location to itself. This way the Bakery is on the lease, but Prada occupies the location.
It is fashion week in Milan next week. Louis Vuitton is ready for it.
Just liked this bookshop, especially the floor.
Dragon scaled GoT books.
The incredible Duomo di Milano. We will go inside later on. It took over 600 years to build and is made up of over 348,000 tons of marble that was moved over 100km to Milan. It is massive and can hold over 40,000 people. It was pretty hot out. I have my arms out to give my sweaty pits some relief.
This picture does this situation no justice. This lady was absolutely getting down with these pigeons and had two photographers going for her. It was hilarious. I guess three if you include me.
This is a new friend, Perin from Dubai, we met at the hostel.
I stayed at an awesome hostel called Ostello Bello. It has cool hangout lounges and so much free food. Apparently it is common in this part of Italy for places that serve drinks to also offer free food. Every night they offered anybody who walked in free bread, salad, and pasta. This was really nice because it brought in locals and I talked to a different person every night. Free food certainly creates a nice atmosphere.
This was breakfast, it was packed for dinner.
It is pretty cool how centuries old landmarks remain common hangout spaces. This is the Cologne di San Lorenzo.
Lots of food and drink bikes out along the water with beats bumpin.
Went for a morning run and came across the remains of a pride event.
I was not the only one getting in some morning exercise.
If you go to Milan, go to Starbucks. Seriously. Howard Shultz, the founder of Starbucks as we know it, got his inspiration for the concept of Starbucks from a trip to Italy.
Once you got your Starbucks, check out Apple. At lot of big brands put flagship stores in Milan. These are two of the best.
Zara was pretty well done as well.
Sforzesco Castle
Here is a closer look at San Lorenzo.
This ceiling was nice to look at and the church has 5th century mosaics.
This is the only Italian Stock exchange, Borsa, and is another example of Fascist architecture. The statue was erected after 2008.
I forget what church this was, but it was pretty cool. We saw it on a free guided tour from our hostel. While the tour was free, you could pay what you thought was fair at the end if you thought it was good. It was good.
This church was painted by a student of Leonardo and this is one of several other interpretations of the Last Supper. I had hoped to see the originals by Da Vinci, but this is something you have to book months in advance.
You can see all the animals, even unicorns, in matching pairs. Except for the dogs, the spotted dog is the artist’s dog.
People use to believe unicorns existed in the lands of northern Scandinavia and that their horns contained powerful magic. Queen Victoria even paid the equivalent of the price of a palace to buy one massive unicorn horn. What the Vikings were actually selling their southern neighbors, was narwhal horn.
The bearded baby below is the artist. They could not sign their work, so sometimes artists would paint themselves into their work.
This was my guide for the Duomo, Roberto. Roberto loves the Duomo and Roberto. Roberto would say, “Come closer, come closer, Roberto don’t bite. Roberto wear Channel. Roberto smell nice.”
Pretty incredible inside, I see why it took 600 years to build.
This man is not wearing a cloak, he is wearing his skin. He did something to offend the church so he was skinned. This statue was made to intimidate others.
The stained glass at the front of the church is many centuries old. This glass towards the back is much newer. Because during Napoleon’s coronation as King of Italy, he had massive cannons place too closely to the Cathedral and the reverberations shattered the glass.
In the top left area, in the center of the church ceiling, you can see a little red dot. That holds a sacred relic, a nail from the cross of Jesus Christ.
You can get up on the roof and walk around.
Not sure if this is a shot at Apple or not.
Milan, fashion, thread, get it?
This man loves Milan.
You can have a good time in Milan.