Assisi

Since I was requested to describe Assisi, I'm going to delve back into that fathomless abyss also known as my mind and attempt to retrieve the memories of roughly three weeks ago. Saturday trips have become the highlight of my week. While it can sometimes be a nuisance to have your entire Saturday swallowed up by a required field trip, at the same time it's incredibly relaxing. You're handed a schedule, driven around in private buses, and dropped off in an Italian town. There you are mostly free to wander as you like.

The drive to Assisi took about two and a half hours, landing us in Assisi at about 10:30. Two hours is the perfect driving time, we students have agreed, because it gives us the ideal early morning nap. The drive was, as usual, beautiful. Everything had just started turning green and had the expectant air of Easter. I'm not sure if Assisi is actually the most medieval town we've been in, or if I was influenced by thoughts of St. Francis returning from the Crusades. Regardless, the town is located on top of a mountain and gives the impression of being able to hold up against a siege. The streets of Assisi are tinier than ever and crammed with touristy shops and homes built one on top of the other. I kept remembering that Drew said that Assisi was his favorite town, which struck me as odd because it was nothing like what I expected. I guess I was thinking that it would be very plain and austere…more of a Franciscan poverty sort of place? But ha, no...not at all. It definitely reminded me of a bustling little medieval metropolis.

All streets in Assisi seem to lead to the Basilica. It's giant. How big? Big enough for the building to house not one church but two. The entrance to the lower church is at the end of a brilliantly white courtyard flanked by continuous colonnades on three sides. Here we paused while Sarah gave us a brief recap on what to look for inside. It's hard to pay attention to mundane things such as identifications of frescos and the gradual discoloration of certain paint pigments when you’re standing in front of this giant white beast, practically oozing history out of its many doors, windows, and towers. Note of interest: this church is the third most visited Christian pilgrimage site. The second is a church in Spain, but I can't remember the first. Rome?

Inside the lower church, you're immediately bombarded with details...frescos everywhere! Chapels pressing in on you from every side! Crosses! Altarpieces! Stairs! Stained glass! Where to look?!? If I used one word to describe this lower church it would be frescos. I don't think you understand what I mean...like, they're EVERYWHERE. There is not one square inch of walls or ceilings that aren't covered in decoration. And every other one is so famous that I've stared at it for hours in art history or written about it. I made myself take the church on in a very logical and precise way, starting at one end and systematically walking through chapels until I made a full circle. Then I let myself go down into the crypt, which was drawing me with the utter simplicity of its sunken staircase.

The first turn I took led me to a museum of sorts. In it was every kind of St. Francis paraphernalia. His clothes, his sandals, letters with his signature...everything you could think of. It gives one a really weird feeling, bringing home the fact that Francis was actually a real person. Then, wandering farther, I found the chapel with his remains. The coffin was sealed and placed high into a glass covered vault, but countless pilgrims had stuck photos of loved ones into the back. To get from the bottom church to the upper church you have to climb some stairs behind the main altar (which is a very open altar surrounded by free space, so not quite as mysterious as it sounds). This spits you out into a small courtyard where you have the option of spending way too much money on rosaries in the gift shop (a 1000 euro rosary...whaaaat?) or continuing to climb another set of stairs into the upper church.

The upper church was far less interesting. Basically just a lot of frescos narrating St. Francis’ life and a blue ceiling (turning green, hehe!) with the traditional gold star motif (aka: what you did if you couldn't afford Michelangelo!). After I wandered away from the church, I really only had one hour to explore a bit of the town, which was sad because its supposed to have a lot of neat stuff in it. Meandering the streets leading back to the bus with friends and ducking into small shops was about all I had time for, however. Definitely a disappointment.

Overall impression? Cute, but touristy.

That plague better known as Tourists

With warmer weather comes an unavoidable nuisance: the tourist. Anyone who has ever traveled outside his city limits has been one, yet citizens unite in hating the tourist. Pushing his way through crowded streets, a guidebook plastered permanently to one hand and a camera in the another, speaking the few Italian words he knows loudly (because everyone knows that it doesn't matter if someone can't understand you - just speak louder and of course they'll get the point!), and crowding the gelato shop... Okay, so I realize that I fit this description perfectly, but after living in Cortona for a month and a half we UGA students feel like natives already.

We can give directions perfectly while trying not to smirk at the random tourist's obvious relief in our ability to speak English. We know that the Lion's Well is the place to be at night, but if you want to get drunk than of course you go to Tuschers first because drinks are cheaper there. We've hung out with the Canadians and know that the French have invaded the local hostel. We've convinced John Luca, the bartender at the Lion's Well to dye our beers green for St. Patrick's day, even though Italians have no clue who St. Patrick is. We know that Route 66 isn't an interstate, but a place to hang out. Especially if you want to smell like smoke until you can afford another wash machine token. And we know that the most important thing to notice at the dinner table in Toninos is whether or not there's a third (dessert!) fork in front of your plate.

I think what irritates me the most about tourists is how each one seems to think that they have some undeniable right to peer at whatever I happen to be working on. They have it down to a science: first comes the sighting, where they'll suddenly notice me sitting on a city wall or in a corner of the piazza. Next, the recognition: she has a sketchbook and a pencil - she must be an artist! Now at this point you've got the annoying people and the extra annoying people. The annoying people will march right up to you and, speaking very loudly in English with wide hand gestures thrown in just in case you still don't understand, ask if they can see what you're working on. The extra annoying people try to be a little bit more subtle: glancing at you repeatedly, they'll sidle up to you on the pretense of admiring the view. Then they'll precede to stare over you shoulder blatantly until an intense glare sends them scurrying for safety. At this point there's a predictable conclusion in which they'll make some bland comment on how it's "nice, very nice" before sauntering away. This is particularly amusing when all I have down on paper are a couple of vague lines.

Italians, mind you, have never accosting me in this way. Artists are a dime a dozen in Italy and are therefore given about the same level of attention by Italians as the hundreds of mangy cats that roam the cities.

Food for my Cupboard

March 12, 2008

Today I finally caved in and went grocery shopping. Picking up groceries in Italy is a very different experience than in the states, where you hop into your heated or air-conditioned SUV and zoom down the highway doing sixty or so to your nearest Ingles, Publix, or Super Walmart. My grocery run started out with a brisk walk down the hill. It only takes a couple of minutes to walk from Kehoe (the dorm) to town, though the walk back up takes at least ten minutes of very steep climbing.

Since I knew that I wanted to buy bread, I took the shortcut to town (so called because though it isn’t actually a shorter walk, it’s considerably less steep. This obviously doesn’t make a difference going down, but it does going up - hence the name). Unlike the main road from school that goes directly downhill along the edge of town and overlooking the city walls, the shortcut veers off to the right, cutting through the upper part of Cortona where it ultimately spits you out just outside the edge of Piazza Signorelli and, most conveniently, my favorite bakery.

The bakery is run by a youngish woman who understands enough English to make transactions easy. When it’s not too crowded, I’ll attempt to tell her what I want in Italian, otherwise I’ll just say “Io prendo” (I’ll have) and point. The store is tiny with cookies, pastries, and sandwiches behind glass in the front and different types of bread stored in baskets behind the counter. In the morning it’s hectic, with people cramming in to make their purchases, dropping coins on the counter at the same time as they’re rapidly ordering in Italian. Old ladies crowd to the counter, exchanging pleasantries with the owner and smirking at my obvious incomprehension of the surrounding conversations. Small dogs are brought in with their owners while large dogs, German Shepherds being the dog of choice, are left standing outside. Most bread in Italy is extremely hard, but I’ve found one type that’s deliciously soft and moist, which is what I usually buy. Important note: never buy more than two days’ worth of bread at a time, because if you keep it any longer than that it’ll get too hard to eat (aka: no preservatives). I learned this lesson the hard way, of course. Out the door – pull going out, don’t push! I’ll never adjust to this random oddity – and on to the fresh market.

The fresh market is held in a garage type space off of Piazza Signorelli every morning. Here you can find a wide array of vegetables and fruits for a relatively cheap price (I paid about 1,80 euro for two oranges, four tomatoes, and a lemon). A friendly woman runs this store as well, always calling out “ciao” when I enter or leave and smiling at my attempts to speak Italian. Unlike American grocery stores, Italians generally don’t appreciate customers handling the produce, so once again I merely point and call out what I want.

My last stop was Molesini’s, the teeniest grocery store I’ve ever been in that consists basically of a narrow path between crowded shelves. Since dinner on weekdays is provided for students, I really don’t buy much: fresh cheese and meat for sandwiches, some pasta and pesto or tomato sauce for a weekend meal, some cookies to keep in my room (if you try keeping that in the kitchen, it’ll mysteriously disappear), and some juice. If you ask nicely at the counter, the owner will even give you a bright red, cloth bag with the store logo on it for your groceries.

Shopping complete, all that is left to do is to make my way back up the hill. The bottom’s not too bad, but by the top your hands are aching and your calves burning. This requires a minimum five minute break next to the city wall to put down your bags and gulp in some fresh air under the guise of enjoying the view. If someone else happens to come along, of course, you pretend to be in top physical condition and boldly stride up the hill, loudly proclaiming that walking faster makes the climb go by quicker. =D

Italian Randomness

March 10, 2008

Some more random Italian facts that I have slowly learned and or experienced - I find them rather entertaining, which is why I’m putting them in here:

- Even churches close down for Siesta. Want God? Too bad, come back later. ;-)

- It’s the law in Italy that all stores and restaurants have to choose one night to be closed. In Cortona, most of them choose to be closed on Tuesday night. For future reference, this is NOT a good night to plan on spending out on the town.

- Ever wondered why Italians eat bread with their meal, yet they don’t give you plates for your bread? (at least, they don’t in Italy. Don’t judge by Italian American restaurants, please) This tradition (according to Marco) comes from the idea of family, community, and sharing one’s meal. It’s considered unfriendly for everyone to have their own plate – breaking bread together keeps everyone mingling and sharing, as does the dipping of one’s bread into a communal plate of olive oil. Kind of cool, I thought.

- Continuing with meals, I had the funniest discussion the other day with Enea, an Italian friend of mine (technically, he’s Albanian, but seeing as he’s lived here since he was really little I’ll consider him Italian for all intents and purposes). When asked why a meal is served in courses (aka: I miss eating my pasta and meat at the same time. A slab of meat on the plate all by its very own lonesome self just looks so funny!), he nearly broke his side laughing then demanded to know why Americans insist on cramming everything in their mouth together. He insisted that when you eat your pasta, meat, and veggies all together then you lose all taste. An interesting thought…

- And most importantly, cars in Italy don’t go “vroom vroom” but “broom broom” and you don’t attract cats by clucking your tongue or saying, “Here kitty, kitty,” but by saying “mici (mee-chee), mici.” =p So now I make sure to address all Italian cats with the proper phraseology. I’m sure they appreciate it.

Rambling

Today I went for a long walk. Originally the plan was to finish up the final sketches for my drawing midterm, but somehow that didn't work out. So instead I just wandered. One reason I love Cortona so much is because you never seem to run out of interesting twists, turns, side roads, or surprises. No matter how many times you walk around town, there's always more details to notice, more cool places to explore. For example: I walked up and down the steep hill leading up to school more than a dozen times before I managed to notice a giant...not small, not large, but giant...mural on the side of a church. It's not that I'm blind or completely unobservant (although that's not entirely out of the question), but there's just so much else to look at...not to mention a terrific view. I was perched on the city wall today and saw a random house with the most detailed fresco in the eaves of the roof. You'd never see that in the states. Ever.

Doors are something else that I have fallen in love with here. You have all kinds: shorts doors that not even I could go through without stooping, huge doors that Drew x 2 could walk through, doors that are so old that the bottoms are warped and the paint is all bubbled and cracked in the most interesting ways, and doors that have fabulous metalwork all over them. You have doors that lead down, doors at the top of staircases, turns set into buildings, and doors that don't seem to lead anywhere. And that's not even getting to the knockers. You have knockers designed to look like pharaohs' heads (especially popular here - not sure why), demons, faces, and hands. And the handles! I could go on all day describing them, but I'll spare you.

Then there's the architecture itself - I feel like a little kid at a playground. There are arches, buttresses, giant cathedrals, covered walkways between buildings, tiny churches, bell towers, domes, alcoves, crumbling steps, hidden walled gardens, the tiniest and narrowest streets you can imagine and big broad streets that lead to the city walls. Everywhere you turn you find something unique. The company is not bad either - young Italians couples strolling with their children, old grandma's scolding children in loud Italian, friendly shopkeepers, loud students, Canadian backpackers from the hostel, tourists in for the day, an inquisitive chicken wandering the street, and a snobby tomcat basking in the middle of the piazza.

Surprise!

Dude, if you had told me yesterday that it would snow, I would never have believed you. Cortona is AMAZING. And also the weirdest place. EVER. Yesterday, we had the windows open – it was warm and beautiful. This morning it was slightly chilly, enough for me to put on a light jacket over my t-shirt, but still warm enough for me to laugh hysterically when someone mentioned that it might snow in a couple of days. An hour later, it was snowing. Big fluffy snowflakes were falling so fast that it made the bright blue sky look crazy weird. Snow was blowing over the roof and making a hilariously odd contrast with the forty-something degree weather. Nothing was sticking, of course, but still…snow! We stood on the porch with the door open, completely baffled by this strange white stuff that was coming down. Now, a couple of hours later, it’s rather cold outside and the wind is whistling dangerously and shaking all the doors and windows. It’s supposed to rain for the next couple of days, but I’m hoping that by Sunday it’ll be t-shirt and tanning weather again. Weird.

Arezzo: a shopper's paradise

March 2, 2008

Yesterday’s Saturday trip was very different from any so far. Instead of an old walled city with lots of museums and churches, we went to Arezzo, a far more modern city not far from Cortona. The only historically significant sights I saw all day were two churches – one that had a huuuge fresco in it by some famous person or other, and the other which was just an incredibly gorgeous Cathedral with impressively tall vaulted ceilings and a gilded altarpiece. The rest of the day we spent doing *what else* shopping, of course. There was a huge antique market spread out over the entire city that we browsed as we wandered. You could find anything there: clothes, books, jewelry, old keys, furniture, bits and pieces of statues, ornate chandeliers, beat-up WWII helmets, designer purses, and even an entire bowl of dolls’ eyeballs. A friend of mine actually bought a hundred-year-old engagement ring there for his fiancée. Lest this market sounds too good to be true let me assure you that the majority of these items were overpriced. While bargaining is a necessary tool in places like that, I’m sure that many of the vendors automatically jacked up their prices for us “stupid Americans.”

Besides the antique market, there was also an entire street full of Italian designer clothing stores, many of which were having huge sales to get rid of their winter leftovers. You can guess where the majority of us girls were all day. Since most of us felt that we hadn't brought nearly enough clothes with us (only enough to completely dress a small country), there was a frenzied amount of shopping going on. Besides, there really is no better feeling than the euphoria of buying insanely expensive Italian clothes after they’ve been marked down to almost nothing. =)

The biggest pain about taking an entire day to wander an Italian city is siesta. Other than coffee shops and the antique market, from one to four-thirty everything else was closed. Most of us took this time to take a break, find a coffee shop, and just relax. Then, once the stores reopened, we hit the streets for our final hour in town. Gelato, my new favorite food group, was also a necessary purchase of the day, eaten while rambling back to meet the buses and discussing Zak’s choice of an engagement ring.

All in all, it was a splendid day. A nice reprieve from seeing city after city of old, older, and olderest monuments. Not that I don't love old monuments, of course! =D

La Dolce Vita

I’m finally starting to feel like I’m in school. With an art history paper just handed in, an Italian quiz tomorrow, and book arts homework slowly piling up to my ears, it actually feels like I’m doing some serious work here! =p You would know what I mean if you heard the kinds of announcements we have at dinner - itineraries of towns we visit on Saturdays, a notice looking for hair models for a salon in town (a free dye ‘n cut job!), a casting for a famous Italian rapper’s music video (apparently he’s gonna come to the school to find ten “interesting” faces), and on and on. Haven’t you heard? We’re not in school, we’re just here living the good life. La dolce vita! This is especially true of one class that my roommate is in – instead of meeting at the regular class time last week, they met at a wine tasting and got drunk together while discussing their readings! Now this is the way to go to school, but I digress.

I spent a couple of hours today working on my book arts homework. During class we always have demonstrations on how to make certain kinds of books, so I had to have some amount of prep work done for that. I should have made two accordion books for Thursday, but I ended up procrastinating some more. I’ll do it tomorrow.

I’ve been sitting around in the common room for the past couple of hours -basically since coming back from the studio at about five. I haven’t done anything productive (right, right, Drew. I hear you – when do I ever?). Jacob left his guitar in the common room and I’ve gone back and forth between playing around on it, bothering people (have you ever heard my lovely rendition of Home on the Range?), and learning how to play Classical Gas from Thomas. And I got soundly defeated in checkers (AGAIN) by Henry. Today is just one of those Sundays that’s very relaxed – a lot of people went to Florence for the weekend, so it’s been pretty empty around here. People have been wandering in and out and a lot of hidden musical talent has surfaced. Both Thomas and Steve are awesome guitarists, and Suzanna has a really nice singing voice plus a million hippy songs up her sleeve.

I’m trying to avoid thinking about dinner because I have no groceries left downstairs…again. And someone totally ate my cheese. I’m very upset about that. Maybe I’ll just eat Nutella. Mmmmmm….