Milan & Como

Friday we woke up and left for Milan at about 8:00. We went with a group of ten people, which made it more fun and more of a pain in the ass for me, the organizer. We arrived in Milan at about 11:00 and went directly to the hostel.

The hostel was a disaster. First time staying at a hostel and it was disgusting enough to not want to do it again, but I am going to have to. Matt, Mike, and I shared a room with three other guys and showers and toilets with about 30 people.

Milan is apparently the fashion capital of Italy, if not the world. Everything was more expensive and I was possibly the most underdressed person everywhere all weekend. Models and designer clothing were everywhere. The models looked exactly like they do on TV, about 5’8” and 90 pounds. Gucci, Louis Vuittion, Prada, it is crazy how much money some of these people had. It also reinforced my opinion about materialistic items; I don’t get it and have no care for that kind of stuff. Everyone looked the same with their Gucci bags.

After getting settled we went to the Milan stadium, which was pretty Modernist, so it wasn’t very nice to look at. Then we went to the duomo (huge church) and when we walked out of the subway tunnel there were 100’s of teenage girls screaming because we were on Italian MTV (TRL). That was funny, being caught in the middle o a spectacle like that. It’s like Times Square. The rest of the day was pretty average.

That night the group of us decided to go out to a club. Michael and I were leading everyone and they thought we got lost, so they sat down and said call them when we get there. We got there and they were on their way back to the hostel, too bad for them. This club was guest list only and nothing but class and good looking people. We talked our way through the bouncer somehow, I have no idea why he let us in. We couldn’t really talk to anyone because of the language barrier, but it was fun to look at everyone. Again, jeans and a polo shirt was the most underdressed there…me, and I still looked good.

The next day we went to the top of the duomo which was pretty awesome. It was an amazing view of the city and the square. We also went to the 1300’s castle that still exists. The coolest piece of architecture we saw was an Italian Rationalist piece by Giuseppe Terragni, I’ve studied this building and it was pretty cool to actually see it in its context. Then we walked around the city the rest of the day and ate McDonalds. The nicest McDonalds I have ever been too.

Sunday we woke up and took a train and hour north to Como. Como is situated on Lake Como which allowed for some pretty amazing views. There is another Terragni piece in Como that we saw. The Casa Del Fascio was pretty revolutionary piece of architecture during its time and I have studied this a lot in undergrad, so again, it was awesome to see in its context. Apparently, George Clooney has a cottage in Como, didn't see him though.

We arrived in Florence at about 9:00 p.m. Sunday night. It was a great weekend, better than it would have been in Ann Arbor!