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Published: February 20th 2010
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The Duomo
View from Piazza Michelangelo Hey Everyone!
I'm so sorry that I've been so bad with my updating my blog recently but the past few weeks I have been super busy traveling around Italy and I also got super discouraged after having typed up a whole blog and then losing it ): But I'm back with a more positive and energetic spirit! While I have 3 weeks worth of events to update I am going to do separate entries for those weeks just so that I don't overwhelm everyone with a whole lot of information at once. Thank you for being so supportive of me during my time hear and taking time out of your schedule to read my blog!
At the end of January, some friends and I made the trip to beautiful Firenze. We arrived on Friday about 2 in the afternoon after a super relaxing 4 hour train ride from Rome. While we a little disheartened to find how cold and rainy Florence was when we got there, we kept our positive spirit of adventure anyways and started to explore right away. Our first stop, or should I say climb, was to the Piazza Michelangelo. This piazza is across the river
Ciao from Firenze!
Taken from the Piazza Michelangelo from the main city-centre of Florence and is at the top of this really tall hill. To get there you have to climb what I referred to as the devil hill. While my calves may disagree, I thought the views from this piazza were well worth the effort. On our first day, the rain prevented us from having good views but on Sunday we returned when the sun was shining and we got some amazing views of the city as a whole and some neat perspectives of the Ponte Sisto Bridge and the Duomo. The pictures from that Piazza I'm sure will be ones I will cherish for a long time.
Speaking of Michelangelo...probably one of the biggest highlights from the trip was going to the Accademia to see the David. While I had seen plenty of pictures beforehand, I don't think there is anyway to fully experience the David other than to see it in person. When I first looked at it, I was just blown away. I was most obviously impressed by the sheer size of the david (which is about 14ft. I believe) but there was just something about it that made me unable to take
The Fake David
Copy that is at the Piazza Michelangelo- unfortunately you can't take pictures of the real thing my eyes off of it. I literally sat on a bench for about 10 minutes in just utter awe, amazement, and gratitude for this remarkable piece of art. I could talk about the other beautiful works in the Accademia but I think most people would admit that the David really steals the show of this museum. If you are ever in Florence, this is truly a must see. Although people who have been to Florence in heavy tourist times have often told me that the lines to get in during these times can be pretty overwhelming. But I promise it is definitely worth the wait!
No discussion on Florence would be complete without talking about the Duomo. Because of the small size of Florence itself, the Duomo is truly a beacon in Florence not only in the practical sense of helping tourists to navigate but also in a metaphoric sense of attesting to the city's deep spiritual and artistic roots. Compared to the Duomo in Milan, this Duomo was very very different. Because it is kind of in tight quarters, surrounded by many other buildings, this Duomo appears particularly large even though I'm pretty sure its smaller than the
one in Milan. The walls are very ornate, painted with very bright colors and interesting designs. Inside, the Church was a little simpler than I had expected but still very beautiful. On Sunday, we all went to mass there and really enjoyed sitting in the upper section of the church which consists of this section of pews that form a semi-circle in front of the altar. I actually had the privilege of serving as offertory collector for that mass! One of the priests just came up with a basket at the beginning and asked for help. When in Firenze right? Another neat part of the Duomo was the baptistry right across from the main church. The doors to the baptistry were absolutely gorgeous. They are made of these gold panels which each intricately depict different religious scenes. Unfortunately we didn't get a chance to climb the bell tower or the dome itself but I think the view from the Piazza Michelangelo was spectacular enough to pass on paying the entrance fee for those 2 opportunities.
Another great part about Florence was the shopping! For anyone who has been to or knows anything about Florence, this city is really famous
for its leather and jewelry markets. The jewelry is mainly located on the Ponte Sisto bridge which is a very famous bridge in Florence because of the enclosed buildings that sit on the sides of it. These buildings all are jewelry shops filled with exquisite gold, pearl, diamond and coral pieces. All of us girls pretty much swooned over the display cases for a good half hour before realizing we would never have the money to purchase any of those things... A girl can dream right?
However, we did get a chance to indulge in the amazing leather market on the other side of town. To give you a picture of the market, it is essentially one really long street where for blocks and blocks there are little carts selling bags, belts, scarves, and jackets each with a very overeager salesperson who will do anything to get you to buy their things. While it was kind of intimidating at first to have all these people yelling at you to come look at their things, as time went on it actually became kind of fun to haggle and talk with some of the vendors. After perusing a lot of the
different carts, a friend and I decided to approach one of the leather jacket vendors to look at some of his things. What I didn't realize is that a lot of the carts are merely a display for a store where they sell these jackets, so the salesperson on the street is merely trying to get you to follow them to the bigger store. So we went with this one guy and immediately he starts putting jackets on us. Coincidentally, the very first jacket I put on I absolutely fell in love with. It is a darkish brown color, comparable to my hair, that has a zipper front and 2 zipper pockets on the sides. Our group had decided that if we really liked a jacket, we would say to eachother and to the vendor that it "was just ok" so that we could potentially haggle with them over the price. But due to my poor acting skills, I don't think I convinced the guy too much but was able to haggle the price from 120 euro to 100 euro- I was pretty proud (:
Finally, one of my favorite parts of the trip was the opportunity I had
to visit with my RA from freshmen year, Elizabeth. Currently, Elizabeth is studying in Florence to get her masters in Italian so we were lucky enough to be able to figure out a time to meet and catch up. She was so sweet to meet with all of my friends and I for pizza and gelato and talked with us about her experiences of living in Italy over the past 2 years. I was so impressed by her bravery in moving to another country and was so thrilled to hear how much she has been flourishing during her time here. Hearing these stories kind of made me start to get excited for what experiences and opportunities I will choose to have after I graduate from Notre Dame. While I don't see myself moving to Italy or even outside the East Coast anytime soon (: Elizabeth's stories gave me hope that God has some wonderful plans for me too. The scary part is that that time isn't too far away.... mamma mia!
Overall, the trip to Florence was a really memorable and eventful weekend. It definitely was different from Milan and Lake Como in that there was a lot more
Elizabeth and I
It was so nice to see her! to see and interact with. I would say the only down side to Florence was its small size and sense of enclosure almost. While I think Florence is a beautiful city to visit and spend time in, I would say Rome is a more ideal place to live and study because of how much there is to do and how lively the citizens and city itself is. Well until next post, haha which may be super super soon, ciao!
Love,
Anne
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Krista Wagner
non-member comment
major babe alert!
Annie- I am just catching up on your blog-great stuff! You are a total hottie in the leather jacket-I noticed it right away in the picture before I even read the text! Love, Krista