Il nostro week-end a Firenze

"Our weekend in Florence"

Before I delve into the details of our wonderful weekend in Florence, let me just take a moment to celebrate the fact that I am writing this blog entry on the computer in my dorm. Yes, that is correct, our dorm has internet and a public computer! Granted, this is one of four computers in the computer room and seems to be the only one with a monitor AND mouse AND keyboard that all work, and it's incredibly slow, but it's internet, and I'm happy.

The background image of my blog is actually an image of Florence, so that can set the scene for this post. Nicole and I went to Florence early Saturday morning with two of our other friends from school, Sarah and Emily. We had a very full weekend, spent the night at a hostel in Florence, and got back to Bologna last night. The first thing we did in Florence (after a little adventure trying to find our hostel during which a nice old Italian man at a parking garage and a very well-dressed man who worked at the nearby Gucci store helped us look up the hostel address) was to climb the Duomo. Our hostel was literally two minutes away from Florence's beautiful Duomo, a proximity which we never could really get over. We saw the inside of the church, Santa Maria del Fiore, and then climbed up to the top of the Cupola. The stairs were very windy and narrow, as you can imagine if you've ever climbed any kind of church, but all 463 steps (I didn't count, there was a sign at the entrance) were well worth it. It was a beautiful sunny day and the view of Florence and the surrounding Tuscan hills was spectacular.

After the Duomo, we made our way to the Bargello Gallery, an undervisited sculpture gallery with many beautiful works of art. Its most famous sculpture is Donatello's David, (sorry that picture isn't better) but there were also sculptures by Michelangelo, Giambologna, and other artists. I would definitely recommend it to anyone visiting Florence with the least bit of interest in art, the building alone (a former palace) is worth seeing!

Next on our list was leather shopping. Florence is famous for its leather crafts, including jackets, belts, wallets, purses, of every size, shape and color. We headed to San Lorenzo, where there is a big leather market. Like any market, it's hit or miss, and we ended up in a leather store nearby the market. I was shopping for a jacket in particular, and lo and behold, I found the perfect one. It's absolutely gorgeous - brown, hand-painted leather with a mandarin collar and slight embellishments like the placement of the seams along the back. And so very soft. It's a bit hard to describe...but it's fantastic. Emily wasn't in the market for a jacket but she ended up buying one as well. That night, we were both deliriously happy with our new purchases!

Which brings me to our dinner that evening. We asked the man at our hostel for a restaurant recommendation, and we ended up going to Trattoria Anita for traditional Florentine food. The four of us shared most of the dishes, and we got bruschetta, pici with meat and peas, tagliatelle with pesto, ossobuca (a soft cut of beef) fiorentina (with a type of tomato and carrot stewy sauce), and of course, Chianti. We also got salads or side dishes of veggies that we ate individually. Everything was delicious, and classically Tuscan, which was our goal.

The next morning we got up early and headed to the Galleria dell'Accademia, which houses Michelangelo's famous David. Like I'd heard, seeing David in person is an incredible experience, no matter how many photos you've seen. His scale (17 feet) and artistic perfection is unbelievable. We also saw Michelangelo's unfinished serious of sculptures of slaves, who look like they're literally bursting forth from the blocks of stone that still surround them.

Next we walked to the Casa Buonarroti, the family home of Michelangelo, where there is a collection of Michelangelo's artwork, as well as art collected by his family over generations. The most famous work of art there was the adolescent Michelangelo's Battle of the Centaurs (wikipedia couldn't find an image for this one, see if you can google it) which is another amazing study of the human body. Also in the Casa Buonarroti was L'Inclinazione by Artemisia Gentileschi, one of the few famous female artists of the late Renaissance (again, wikipedia couldn't find an image of that ceiling fresco.) Next we headed to the Brancacci Chapel, where we saw Masaccio's famous frescoes of The Expulsion of Adam and Eve and The Tribute Money. Then we headed back across the Arno River to the church of Santa Maria Novella, which houses Trinity, another famous fresco by Masaccio, as well as many other beautiful works of art. It was very much an art-filled weekend, and we felt very satisfied (as well as exhausted) that we were able to fit so much in!

We were also pleasantly surprised with how many people in Florence were willing to speak Italian with us, since it's such a touristed city that many people just speak English and we didn't expect to have much luck speaking Italian. We got many compliments for being college students there and actually speaking Italian, since it seems like there are many students who go to Florence to study abroad and don't make as much of an effort to speak the language, or maybe are just beginning to learn Italian when they get there. Bologna is good practice for Italian language skills, since you really do need to have some knowledge of Italian to get around for an extended period of time. But in Bologna we've also gotten, "You've only been here for two weeks? But you speak Italian so well!" to which we reply that we did, in fact, study Italian for two years before coming here.

So this is definitely one of my longer blog entries, but before I wrap up, I'll give a quick update on the state of my laptop. It has finally been refused by Italian customs, and is being sent back home to the US. Which is frustrating, but at least it's moving somewhere, after being stagnant in customs for so long. And once it's back home, my parents will try to mail it again. What an ordeal. But hopefully I'll get it within the next month, and until I do, at least I have functioning email in the dorm!

Thanks for sticking through this post, those of you who aren't that into art, and as soon as I can get some pictures onto a computer I'll be sure to post some of the beautiful photos I took in Florence. This afternoon I start my UniBo class, and will be able to report back on all of my classes by the end of this week.