Italy

Sailing the Mediterranean

Once I finally arrived at the makeshift boat terminal and got the cardboard key for my cabin door (quite a feat as the port like everything else in Italy was chaotic, ramshackle and incomplete), I was extremely tired and just crashed out on the bed, watching as we pulled away for the dock toward Spain. Being on the boat for almost 24 hours gave me a chance to relax and take it easy. I wasn’t going to miss anything if I slept in or just lazed around in my room. As I was stuck for food options and hadn’t had anything decent apart from pizza in Rome, I decided to eat in the a la carte restaurant rather than the hamburger and chips buffet. The meal – seafood pasta and grilled fish (I was on the ocean) was delicious and washed down with a few glasses of a nice Pinot. The staff on the boat were helpful and asked where I was from when they realised I was neither Italian nor Spanish. As it turned out they were mostly Filipino and knew probably more about Australia than any of the Italians I had met. As I have been around Filipinos a lot throughout my lifetime I recognize the language quite well. The only other Filipinos I had come across so far were in the main train station in Berlin – a group of girls in their mid 20s (presumably students) with their mothers. I guessed the mothers were going home (perhaps to another part of Germany or the Philippines) – each was carrying about two or three boxes of Dunkin’ Donuts.

After dinner headed to the bar for a Margarita and to watch some BBC World news. Everywhere I had been since arriving in Italy did not have cable and all the programs were in Italian. The only Australian news I picked up was that yet more of Victoria was on fire – they seemed to suggest Melbourne was being threatened by the fires. I haven’t caught up with much local news – my quick hits of wireless have been used to download email and upload my blogs and photos. Hopefully I won’t return to find that the Public Service has been the target of a razor gang and I am unemployed. If this has occurred I may be offering tacky souvenirs for floorspace and offering to wash pets and cars(or even clean bathrooms – yick) to pay off the visa people. [‘One in a million’ – Bodyjar – this is one of my favourite Bodyjar tunes – I know it’s poppy but I love it].

I awoke as we passed one of the many Mediterranean Islands – unfortunately the windows on the boast were way too filthy to take snaps. I had my first call home and my first conversation longer than five minutes since leaving Sweden. Then they announced that we had to leave the cabin and wait in the bar (for more than two hours) until the boat arrived in Barcelona.

The 80s disco style bar with music to match

The dining room

On the ferry

Leaving Civitaveccia

Rome – city of monuments

Like most of Italy, Rome is extremely chaotic – everything moves at a frenetic pace and the Romans aren’t afraid to let anyone know when they’re annoyed that the pace may be slowing. After a few days in Italy, I think I have almost worked out how the traffic works. You can cut in or overtake whenever you like, as long as you are prepared to be honked at. You don’t need to slow down for pedestrian crossings whether there is someone on them or not – just make sure you don’t actually bowl anyone over. You can also queue across an intersection as long as there is the exact amount of space to fit one small car sideways between you and the car in front, And most bizarrely – you can park wherever you like without being booked or towed, including double parking and parking diagonally on a corner. [‘Music’ – The Beautiful Girls – one of the best of this genre that seemingly exploded with the rise of The Waifs, Jack Johnson etc a few years ago. This is from the Coastal Chill CD – appropriate as I am writing at sea in the Mediterranean]

It is however pretty easy to find your way around Rome (despite the multi-directional nature of most of the streets and piazzas). The Metro runs like a cross through the Roma Termini – the main station which was very close to my hostel. I hopped the Metro to Colloseo in search of the famous ancient Roman artifact. For anyone who has had trouble navigating Rome’s streets in search of this monolith, I recommend the Metro. Prepared to have to negotiate my way, I had my map firmly in my grasp. I didn’t need it. I walked out of the station and looked up and there it was. Along with the queue to get inside. And the hawkers selling all sorts of coliseum-related merchandise. And the guys dressed as gladiators with whom you can get your photo taken (for a fee). It is hard to describe the size of the Coliseum. I knew it was huge but it still stunned me when I saw it. I was content to walk around it and look through from the outside rather than stand in a queue for an hour. My main aim for this trip has been to experience the places I visit (as much as you can in a short time) rather than visit all the attractions. From the Coliseum, I wandered up the Via del Fori Imperiali and around the ancient ruins of Rome.

It was about then that it struck me. The centuries of monuments that litter Rome are not preserved in areas outside the main city – with the exception of these ancient structures, the monuments hit you as you turn around a corner. Next to the crumbling Santa Maria Degli Angeli is the Roman Piazza della Repubbica, where you’ll find McDonalds. You get the feeling Rome wasn’t preserved by design but rather by accident – that the chaotic arrangement of laneways and hidden piazzas has occurred because when people wanted to build something new, they didn’t bother replacing the old. They just built the new where they wanted to and the streets made their way around the buildings. And where the streets didn’t quite meet, they built a piazza and someone commissioned a fountain to put there so nobody would build something on the site. Now I’m sure ancient historians and Rome fanatics will correct me but that is the impression I got from wandering the streets. And there’s no mistaking the importance of the caesars of Rome. There are statues of caesars and depictions of Roman chariots everywhere. [‘See you soon’ – Coldplay – Those that know me will be surprised at the speed of this music but it is easy and I am tired and lazy as I drift on board the ferry (and I had a few vinos last night with dinner)]

After my sojourn through ancient Rome it was back to the hostel. I thoroughly recommend the Hostel Alessandro Palace to anyone traveling to Rome. The staff (mostly travelers themselves) were cheerful and helpful and the accommodation plush by hostel standards and the cleanest place I had stayed so far- hostel or hotel. Again the staff were bemused by the fact that someone traveling alone would stay in a double room and not a dorm. The guy here said he had never met an Australian who didn’t like dorms. Despite this, I have to say the idea that hostelling is a good way to meet people while traveling alone is a furphy. Most people are traveling together and while the bar/ common room is usually quite rowdy in the evening, I didn’t find people particularly receptive when I attempted to engage them in conversation. Maybe if I had’ve looked more like Elle McPherson… Anyway I eschewed the pizza on offer in search of a meatier alternative. I should have stuck with the pizza. At the trattoria I visited across the road, I ordered chicken cacciatore and vegetables – what I got was chicken broiled in lemon and butter (that was pink on the inside) and a plate of Spinach that looked like it had been boiled in oil. After this I stuck to Pizza and gelati while in Rome. I didn’t get bad pizza or gelati and you could live on it and coffee for at least a few days. Coffee is an experience in Italy too – it’s cheaper if you drink it standing up and you have the choice of the Italian way – espresso, macchiato – a double shot espresso with just a dash of milk, Americano (long black) or cappuccino. Not a flat white or latte in sight. Not even at Maccas. They have mini paper cups for espresso at Maccas and there is no such thing as a large (or grande) version of anything. And coffee comes warm not scalding as you are supposed to swallow it in a gulp (or a couple of gulps if it’s a cappuccino. [‘Chills’ – Ben Lee – I really like Ben Lee. I didn’t but then I saw him live as part of the three Bens tour (with Kweller and Folds) and now I would buy a ticket to see him anytime he came. I still don’t own any of his albums though.]

Next morning it was time to step into the Vatican City. Now the Vatican is something I wanted to see for a number of reasons – to truly see whether my youthful protests against the wealth of the church could be justified, to set foot in the world’s smallest sovereign state, and just to see whether setting foot in this holy of holiest sites would affect me in any sort of religious sense – call it the curiosity of catholic guilt. What I found was a tourist mecca, with seats permanently arranged for attendees at the two weekly appearances by the pope. And the Vatican has gone high tech (well sort of). There are four large Panasonic screens around the square, the kind you’d find at a rock concert, although these were white rather than black. The place was surrounded by street sellers hawking everything from rosary beads to medals depicting saints. No pope on a rope though I’m afraid. I was bitterly disappointed. And the single most penetrating image of the Vatican is the queue to get inside the basilica and museum which stretched almost around the whole of St Peter’s square. Apart from the fact that I had limited time and hated standing in queues, I wasn’t prepared to pay for the privilege of seeing the wealth of the church on display. And as for the idea of a separate state – there’s no border control – you can walk straight in – to the square at least. The strange looking Vatican sentries guard the other access to the Vatican – the working Vatican – which ordinary folk like myself aren’t allowed to cross. [‘Yellow’ – Coldplay – I know I shouldn’t like Coldplay but they are so easy to listen to – and beat the Spanish pop music on the loudspeaker by a long way.]

There’s also no separate currency in the Vatican anymore – like the majority of Europe, the Vatican uses the euro. They do, however, still have their own post office. And of course I did have to post a couple of post cards from there. Almost as good as a postmark from Santa but not quite.

From the Vatican I took a whirlwind tour of Roman monuments as I headed for the Trevi Fountain (of course) – the Castel Sant Angelo, the Palazzo Venezia and a couple of other random fountains. If anyone tells you things are hard to find in Rome, they’re wrong. Looking at the web of streets, laneways and piazzas that surrounded the famed fountain and the guide book description of it being in a very small piazza, I was sure I was going to circle it for ages before I finally discovered it. The key in Rome is that the frequency of souvenir, pizza and gelati shops increases as you get closer to the monuments. The more important the monument, the more street sellers and the like. If you follow this rule and follow the other tourists, you’re sure to find everything you’re looking for. And sure enough, after not too long I found the Fontana di Trevi.

It is beautiful but if you’re planning on getting that beautiful shot of the fountain glistening in the sun in a hidden piazza – forget it and buy the postcard. It doesn’t matter what time of day it is – the fountain is surrounded by tourists (and locals but mainly tourists snapping away). Somewhere, at the end of time all that will remain of human civilization is pictures of everyone in front of the Trevi Fountain, or holding up the leaning tower of Pisa or at the Grand Canyon or at the side of Bon Scott’s grave in front of every other tourist landmark in the world. And yes I took a photo of me in front of the fountain. Of course all my shots are taken by me so the monuments aren’t quite so beautifully framed (usually I have to take a couple of shots to get them and me in the same snap). After I’d found the Trevi, it was time for a final gelati, collect my gear and head for the station. I had bought a reservation the previous day (worried about the idea of Italians yelling at me for being in their seat). After an interminable wait for the train to show up, I boarded and settled into my seat. Unfortunately it was someone else’s seat. The ticket salesperson had misunderstood me when I said tomorrow. My reservation had been for the previous day’s train so I spent the hour to Civitaveccia seat-hopping. I have been confused about what date it is over the past few days and didn’t check. Moral to the story – if you’re traveling in non-English speaking countries, it pays to make your reservations before leaving home and make sure you check the dates on everything.

At the Trevi Fountain

The Coliseum (and the line to get in)

Ancient ruins

The line to get in the Vatican

St Peter’s Basilica

The first Irish accents I heard (posting letters home at the Vatican)

A nun watching the big screen telly at the Vatican

The border to the Holy See – not very secure

Religious iconography isn’t hard to find

… or depictions of chariots

Not hard to see why the scooter is the vehicle of choice

A carnival in Venice

I arrived in Venice to street performers, face painters and buskers, not to mention zillions of people in face masks and many in full operatic regalia. Purely by chance, I had hit Venice at Carnivale. The brochures had said that in the winter when the canals were less smelly, the streets would be deserted and I would be able to wander alone. Not during Carnivale. I don’t think I have ever seen so many people. It was like the Big Day Out, moving slowly through the city with millions of other tourists. Apparently at any time tourists actually outnumber Venetians in the lagoon and especially in the central areas of San Polo and San Marco. This was the first time on the trip so far that I felt like it was OK to be a tourist. Venice is a city of and for tourists from the gondoliers to the stalls selling masks and Venetian glass, it is tourism that is contributing to the city’s problems and tourism that is ensuring its very survival. Most of the Venetians I spoke to either live or work in Mestre on the ‘mainland’. [‘Blue Monday’ – New Order – this always brings back memories of The Manhattan – and blue cocktails – probably two other people reading this blog will have heard of the Manhattan. For everyone else it used to be a club above Woodstock in Civic in the late 80s.]

That was the other difference about Venice – everyone speaks English (except for the tourists from other parts of Europe. And people spoke to me. I met a Venetian guy studying computer science who is thinking about leaving Italy because of the political situation, an Indian studying in France, a group of product design students from Milan – all but one from overseas – India, Malaysia, France and Japan, and a Mexican woman who had been working as a pastry chef in Paris. As is Australia, many of the restaurant and service staff here are Indian or Asian, probably students. Italian with a south east Asian accent is an interesting sound and one you hear often. The advantage of course is that most also speak English. Of course most of the tourists I heard around me were American. And there were some cafes advertising American breakfast of toast or toasted ham and cheese. What’s wrong with pastries or brioche for breakfast I ask you? And if that doesn’t suit, there’s pizza. Good Italian stuff – it’s not like the Italians haven’t heard of pizza for god sake. The Italians may have invented it but the Americans have excelled in turning it into the world’s laziest food.

Despite its status as a tourist mecca, Venice is amazing. The web of winding laneways and alleys are like a maze, with a new discovery around each corner. Sometimes you reach a dead end, sometimes a canal edge with no bridge. Other times there’s a huge Piazza just around a corner where you are expecting to find a dead end. The famed Rialto Bridge, which has stalls and shops up both sides, was never free of people during my brief stay. It was like a huge moving mass of humanity. Similarly, there are so many people in Piazza de San Marco at any given time that you are given the rules when you arrive in Venice – no sitting or lying down in the piazza and no eating or drinking sitting down in the piazza. I suspect that rule doesn’t apply if you are eating at the tables and chairs of the many restaurants in the piazza. While the Basilica was beautifully adorned, as churches go, Il Duomo left a much greater impression on me, [‘That’s Entertainment’ – The Jam – definitely a song for Venice]

I spent hours wandering the streets – I walked to Dosudoro to find Café Blue, which was supposed to have wi-fi. I didn’t find it and later in the evening discovered an internet café with wi-fi just around the corner from the hotel. Unfortunately after an hour of it, I still hadn’t uploaded all my blogging or managed to check all my email as it was very slow and kept dropping out. [‘Know your product’ – The Saints – appropriate as I pass through Bologna, home of that most famous of Italian pastas] In Dosudoro, I came upon a piazza with a market selling vegetables and fish straight off the myriad of fishing boats that inhabit the lagoon and the sea surrounding it.

From here I wandered back though the laneways of San Marco. I decided not to use the map until I got really stuck – all the streets are well signposted and once you get on the main trail to Rialto or San Marco there are additional signs pointing you in the right direction. Most of the buildings here are three stories high right to the street or canal. However, every so often you come across a house with a garden – not a site you usually see in Venice. Apparently you see more of them on a gondola ride, when the gondoliers take you past the ‘places’ of Venice where the well-heeled live. The buildings here, public or private are kept looking like they are in some state of decay, to add to the ancient nature of the city I suppose. Or maybe because with the sea air and the water lapping at the foundations (and I imagine, the rising damp) it is just too difficult to keep the inside and outside looking good.

I decided to take the waterbus across to Lido, the city’s beach strip, where in summer the shores are crammed with Italian sun worshippers. In winter, however, the place is a ghost town and the beach is effectively shut for renovations – at least the area lined with beach pavilions or cabanas. This kind of beachgoing seems very foreign to me. What I’m looking for when I go to the beach is a strip on the south coast somewhere with as few people as possible. And with clear water and white sand. Not here – there are lots of ground up shells and the sand is a grayish brown, like the sort of sand used for construction in Australia. The ocean, like the lagoon in Venice, is a murky green and full of garbage. There are garbage crews constantly working in Venice but it is a filthy dirty place. Early Sunday morning when I rose early to catch the train, the whole place smelt like a giant ashtray after the Saturday night frivolity of Carnivale. All those small laneways hold in the smell I guess. [‘Pretty Vacant’ – The Sex Pistols]

From Lido I stayed on the waterbus to ride along the whole way along the Grand Canal. I considered a gondola ride but it is something I think needs to be enjoyed with someone holding your hand and drinking in the sights with you – there are no gondolas with a single seat. They are all made for two (with additional seats available for groups). And they cost around 100 euros. Doing it James Bond style in a water taxi was no better, and with the amount of traffic on the canals, it’s not like you would reach those kinds of speeds either.

I walked back to Rialto through Santa Croce and San Polo. Santa Croce is clearly the alternative, seedy part of Venice – the work of taggers is visible everywhere her and the are shops selling organic produce as well as fair trade stalls in the market places. It’s where you’d expect to find the Greenpeace office. And there are bars on the windows here. I found this interesting because san Polo and Rialto are no more than five or ten minutes walk away. I guess good and bad neighbourhoods are all relative – five minutes walk is like five minutes drive if there are no cars.

It was about this time, my stomach started to let me know it had been about 24 hours since I had eaten anything so I stopped by one of the pizza stalls where you can buy a slice for two euros. I ordered the margherita with proscuitto and mushrooms. It was awesome. The key to great Italian pizza is exactly the opposite of what I would normally do – the crust is thin and, like all things Italian, al dente (which makes it slightly droopy. It has just a smear of really good pizza sauce, minimal toppings and lots of really good Italian cheese.

After an hour in the wi-fi store, I got myself a mask to get into the spirit of Carnivale. Like my Halloween parties, attendees at Carnivale without some sort of costume end up feeling like fish out of water. I also picked up some other sounvenirs, including a Venetian glass necklace and headed back to the hotel. On the hotel, it was rudimentary, with a lino floor and looked like the long forgotten spare rooms at my nanna’s house. Now for a city, with water problems, Venice has some drainage issues. I was sure I was going to flood the bathroom and the shower was really only a trickle at best. And in further proof that Venice is a city for lovers, the two luxury bath sheets were twisted into two swans touching beaks in a love heart – at least I am pretty sure that’s what they were supposed to be. [‘Purple Sneakers’ – You Am I – for some reason this song, more than any other, reminds me of sweaty, smoky winter gigs at the uni bar – the old uni bar that used to stay open for an hour after a show and where you could smoke inside.]

With my mask on (which teamed oh so nicely with my backpacker chic of skate shoes, army pants, a fleece jacket and a Dr Seuss T-shirt) I headed out to find dinner. A couple of notes on my attire – Venice was Canberra winter cold, not Scandinavia cold so I retired the puffy jacket and thermals – I may need them again in the UK and probably Scottish Highlands but for now it sans extreme winter wear. And Dr Seuss is recognized in Venice – a gondolier walked past me and said ‘Dr Seuss – bella’

I decided to sit and enjoy dinner in a restaurant by the main canal with a nice glass of Chianti. As all the local seafood was fresh, I decided on an octopus salad followed by a seafood pasta. Both were superb. The baby octopus was indeed fresh, nicely marinated and likely cooked. The salad was what looked like iceberg lettuce, radicchio (the vegetable not the purple tinged hydro lettuce, some spring onions and lemon on the side to squeeze onto it. Salads in Italy come with a number of condiments – olive oil (in case there’s not enough in the salad), a salt shaker and a big black pepper mill. Yes, you get to put your own on the food here.

During dinner, I talked to the single diner sitting next to me – the Mexican I had mentioned earlier. We spoke about Mexico, Italy, Paris and Australia. Her favourite TV show in Mexico is McLeod’s Daughters (yes I cringed) and she was surprised to learn that Australians mostly lived in cities. When I told her the population of Australia was 20 million, she laughed – Mexico City’s population alone is about 25 million. Frightening really. The Italian student working in the wi-fi store had a similar reaction when I told him the slogan for the winning party in our last election was Kevin 07. Sometimes it’s hard to explain that Australians do actually take some things seriously.

After dinner I got into the street party spirit of Carnivale and had a couple of Bellinis and a few mulled wines (nothing wrong with mixing up the cultures in Venice. Then I boogied with the crowd to some house music in one piazza and some African drumming in another. By about 10:30pm it was starting to get a bit messy and I was noticing those same tendencies you see in pubs everywhere at about 4am so I headed back to the hotel to kip – After all I had to bid farewell to Carnivale at 8am [‘Jesus Built My Hot Rod’ – Ministry – the perfect Venetian tune – debauchery in a city filled with churches.]

The Pucci store – if only I could afford it

St Mark’s square with Basilica and tourists

Me in the square

ondolas and gondoleirs

carnivale!

just some of the colourful costumes

party time

not even venice is tag free

An old school design icon in Lido, Venice

What passes for a beach in Venice

Arrival in Milan, style capital

Arriving at Milano Centrale, it was clear I was in Italy – the place was loud and chaotic. As far as neighbours go, the Swiss and Italians couldn’t be less alike if they tried. The train station in Zurich had been the cleanest I had ever seen, the first to provide a waiting room for onward passengers and the most clearly signposted so far. In contrast, Milano Centrale was dirty and chaotic with limited signage and hundreds of people heading in what seemed like the same number of directions. After several tries, I found the Metro station, which while also poorly signposted and with no English instructions, had photocopied paper signs pointing to the line for Duomo station. Clearly they had gotten sick of travelers like me. None of the train attendants in Italy speak English which makes things interesting. The lady at the ticket office understood where I was heading and gestured with three fingers that it was line three. When I came out of the station there it was – Il Duomo, the gothic cathedral in all its beauty. It was one of the two things I had really come to Milan to see. And it was magnificent. And if you come to see it, make sure you see it at several different times of the day because it changes with the light. The queue to go inside was rather lengthy so I made do with the external view but that in itself was incredible. It was then time to find the hotel which was, as described, just around the corner from the cathedral about 50 metres if that. [‘Wake me Up Before you Go-Go’ – Wham – If George Michael wasn’t English, he would be from Milan. There is gold trimming on everything here. While Zurich was expensive, it was also austere. Milan, though stylish is still not worried about showing the cash that permeates the place. That’s why I say 80s music seems appropriate – in Italy if it’s not made of marble or trimmed in gold it’s painted in bright pastels.]

As Milan is one of the more expensive places to find a hotel, I was expecting something substandard. The Hotel Rio was great. The room was comfortable and came with my own Juliet balcony. The bathroom was palatial. There was a bidet and a marble bench seat under the window. I was sleeping on a latex mattress and the towels were luxurious – great big fluffy numbers. There was no bath but you get the impression the Milanese love their bathing (there were lots of shops selling luxurious towels). The only drawback was that the only power outlet was in the bathroom. At least there was power so I could charge everything (and catch up on the blogging I couldn’t do the night before).

I headed out to grab some dinner – I had penne Bolognese (the other choices were just as standard). I couldn’t find anywhere serving the feted Milanese delicacies of Osso Bucco and the like. The pasta was al dente, very yummy and washed down with a Pinot Grigio.

The next day I gave myself a well-needed sleep in and then headed to the second beacon on my itinerary – the Triennale – home of design and the Triennale museum. In the street I was stopped by two west Africans – the first (In Duomo Piazza) trying to give me/ sell me some kind of friendship bracelet and also asking whether I needed a husband. The second was further on, near the Triennale Station. He was carrying a stack of books and tried to engage me in conversation. If he was wearing a tie, I would have supposed I was about to get reeled in by a mormon. He wasn’t and I’m still not sure what his angle was. There were many more like him throughout the day. [‘Do you really want to hurt me?’ – Culture Club]

I arrived at the Triennale, had a look in the infamous bookshop and was told the museum was closed until March 30. Perhaps it was because I looked like a smelly backpacker. Or maybe it was just because it really was closed until March 30. At any rate, I didn’t get to see it. I wandered through the streets and grabbed a coffee at a café proclaiming wi-fi access. The problem was, you had to sign up for a month and pay quite a lot of euros – useful for repeat business I guess. There was a group of American teenage girls sitting at the table next to me – they spoke Italian and were clearly here studying but let me just say – maybe it was because they were teenage girls, maybe because they were American or maybe a combination of both but they drove me a little crazy. Again with the hand gestures, I managed to pay. It was actually hard to find anyone who spoke English in Milan.

After my pitstop I headed through the area around Duomo to check out the Piazzas and the shopping. The Galleria Vitoria Emanuele II was an experience – a high fashion Mecca in a glorious arcade. At the four points at its centre you could find Prada, Louis Vuitton, Bernasconi and McDonalds. Enough said. [‘I wanna be sedated’ – The Ramones – not quite over missing The Ramones museum yet. Not quite sure I’ll ever fit into my Ramones shorts again but I live in hope. Maybe all the walking will help.

Lunch was had at a small restaurant in one of the piazzas. These are clearly there for tourists but at least this one had something Milanese on the menu. I had Milanese (or saffron) risotto. While we cook risotto until often too creamy and stodgy, like their pasta, the Italians prefer their risotto al dente

One of the things that you notice most about Milan (and one of the things I love about Italian/ Milanese design much to the chagrin of others, including staff in the UC workshop) is that nothing is square. Curves are the hallmark of everything the Italians do – the city plan reveals curved streets and laneways around central plazas, some of which are round and none of this is because of the topography of Milan, as it is in Canberra – it’s just the way they like it. Even the public telephones are attractively curved. It would have been far cheaper and easier to make metal telephone box shaped – but the Milanese aren’t about easy – they’re about style… and chaos. [‘Ant Music’ – Adam and the Ants – their Prince Charming Album was the first band album I bought.]

Which leads me back to Milano Centrale. To add to the chaotic nature of the place, none of the boards were working to display travel information and nobody I spoke to (official or otherwise) could speak English. It was 3:50pm and the train was due to leave at 4:09 and I didn’t know which platform to go to. I finally found a girl who spoke English. She told me not to worry – they never put the track details up until about 10 minutes before the train leaves. Soon enough they came up, along with the moving dot that means the train is boarding. I was at one end of the terminal and the platform two thirds of the way to the other. In between was a wall of humanity. As I politely pushed my way through, I was moving what felt like an inch per second. Like the Italians, I pushed harder. I had a heavy pack on my back and no one was really likely to stop me. Finally I made it and settled in for the journey south to Venice. [‘The tide is high’ – Blondie]