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Venice (5.12.08 - 5.15.08)
Jumped on the train, feels good to be moving again. I love train travel. I could just tour all over Europe and stop for a night or two in different places. Heading towards Florence now.
A bit about Venice - the train goes right onto the island and that last bit going across the water feels like the north New Orleans area; mostly water and some oil refinery looking facilities. Venice is a classic post card, everywhere feels like you’re there. Seldom does every aspect of a place speak the character of that place. Mostly a place for old folks and couples. I didn’t meet any travelers or locals and felt quite lonely. I did meet my mom the second day and stayed with them in their villa on a small plaza.
Not much for breakfast, a cappaccino and maybe a danish. Lunch and dinner are usually 2 courses involving pasta. Quite an expensive endeavor for everything. Bought a salad, some chicken and a soda for $25 Euro (40 bucks!). But dinner was $15 Euro and included 2 glasses of wine, so it depends where you go. The Italians I've experienced so far are
very dramatic, fussy and dress in really expensive, fashionable clothes - even laborers. T-shirts are tight, they like stripes. Their speech is so dramatic. When they speak English, everything gets an extra syllable or two, and ends with an “e” or an “a”.
It was weird to be here alone. I did not see too many individual travelers; everyone was a couple. I probably saw 5-10 people under 35 years old. This is where you go on vacation after the kids are out of the house, shop, eat and spend money.
Being here makes me feel almost too much like a tourist. I am curious what it was I expected to be different…maybe I thought I’d meet more folks that I would relate to and could adventure with.
I extended my trip until May 28th - not sure if I mentioned that already...
I think it takes at least a full year, including summer, to really do this justice.
5.18.08
What I am learning in general from my travels in the EU:
• how Europeans have a much more fresh, current world view than us. Does distance - USA so far away - cause this? But
media is probably different in the EU & UK than in US.
• Also learning that it’s hard to say “European” when each country has such strong and defined identity. I have heard that within each country strong regional identities also exist (as in the US), but I have not been in each county long enough or in enough places to experience this. This should not be surprising, but being good at assuming things I didn’t really look so deep when thinking about the smaller size of the countries.
• Anyway I get the sense over here that arts & history are more readily embraced & appreciated here than home (duh, right?)
• They do not care about career/profession like we do. They work to live and we live to work.
• We often meansure a man’s success by what he achieves in the work place or in his career instead of by his happiness , creative pursuits, character, gifts, etc.
• Architecture!!
• Family unit is stronger here
• Enjoyment of simple things is high & pace is slower: longer meals, people spending long hours with friends, talking, sitting, going out for drinks or whatever. Makes me remember how
rushed I was in the Bay Area.
Been working on music - writing loads of fragments of music and poetry. I’ve been very successful in this goal of my journey. There are so many that tying them together and finishing them off has been difficult.
The journey has inspired me to live in more places in my life. And many questions surround this…where, when, doing what, etc. Places like: Italy, Germany, Holland, Portland, OR, the East Bay, Asheville or Charlottesville, upstate New York, New Orleans, the Midwest…keep dreaming.
Went on a nice day tour bike ride through part of the Chianti region of Tuscany, Italy the other day. It started and ended at a well known regional winery & olive oil bottling plantation (Castello di Poppiano). I thought of your trip to France last year. It would be so cool to have a 3 or 4 night leg of a travel trip getting around by bike this way. The exercise and scenery were both medicine for this aerobic-deprived city traveler.
Seeing the olive operation was intriguing. It’s probably more of a traditional/romantic endeavor than anything, as some figures I gleaned: 1 olive tree yields less than 1
bottle (500 mL) of oil, and their plantation yields +/- 6,000 bottles of oil/year on 47 acres of trees. They don’t use irrigation...not sure if that makes a difference or not.
Went to a solar conference trade show in Verona on Saturday and got company names and contact info for possible future EU work options.
5.20.08 Currently in Certaldo, Italy - 60 kM from Florence - I saw lightening bugs tonight!! I love lightening bugs, so I was very happy about this… stayed an extra 45 min or so on my ride home to the B&B I’m staying at in the countryside amongst the vines, corn and vegetable patches and olive groves, train tracks not too far away - so I’m in heaven (if you don’t know, I love everything about trains…except the lack of them in the US).
Amazing little medieval village above a small town. You take a tram to get there. Surrounding landscape is ½ farm and ½ town. Farms are olives, grapes and veggies. Very few vehicles, less than 10 so far. Living without cars = bliss. This place is an Italian version of the ideal village - see photos, better than reading
my long winded descriptions of all brick, narrow streets, alcoves, patios, archways, courtyards, small doorways, humble entrances to homes, low walls, benches, overhangs, grottos, space to reflect, ponder, pray or cry if you have to. Positive outdoor spaces built by people who cared, paid attention and were alive. A passing thunderstorm.
So much to learn here from the built environment…I wish I could bottle it, drink it and make it a part of my brain to pour out later into a village design for somewhere back home. We in the US are a wasteful society - makes me sad, ashamed & frustrated to compare. This is a village I would love to create w/ friends to inspire each other.
Next: visiting another friend of Christopher’s - Matthias - in southwestern Germany for a day or two. Then over to France for a couple days and back to London for the flight home.
Probably just one more post after this one.
See you all soon!
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