milano

saturday june 9.

We had to get up super early to catch the train this morning because its about a 6 hour train ride and we wanted to be in Milan as early as possible. Melissa decided to come with us last minute, so her assigned seat was in a different car, but she came and sat with us anyway. Every time the train stopped we had to move around so we could all stay together (we were having too much fun to split up). We ended up sitting on the floor outside the bathroom for quite a while. The train was awesome because it had compartments like the Hogwarts express. There was even a snack trolley although they didn't have any chocolate frogs as far as I could tell.

taken from the train. they were adorable but i think they got mad when they saw me taking a picture.

arrival at the train station in milan

on the right: some kind of coconut water they had at all the little snack vendors. i had never seen anything like it..

The Duomo cathedral (not to be confused with the one in Florence, because I was looking around for the big Dome)

from far away it looks white but up close you can see all the different colors and patterns of stone.

details on the cathedral doors

inside the duomo. right: altar and stained glass, left: floors

 If you ever find yourself inside the Duomo, and you see a sign that says 'crypt downstairs', do not go unless you are interested in seeing mummified popes..it was more than a little bit creepy.

galleria v. emanuele ii-home of some very expensive shopping.

a tiny lemon meringue tart at a yummy italian cafe.

i loved the bird perching on his hand.

Santa Maria delle Grazie Church-where da Vinci painted the Last Supper.

When I was reserving tickets to see the Last Supper, the only thing left was an 'after hours' tour-where they charge you twice as much for a 30 minute guided tour instead of 15 minutes. I am so glad I did it because it was definitely worth it-and really, when am I ever going to get a chance like that again? I was so relieved that the tour was in English, I learned so much.The first thing I learned was that the Last Supper was not painted on a canvas (for some reason I thought it was.. no wonder you can only see it if you are in Milan.) It was painted directly onto the wall inside the dining hall of the church where friars ate every day. The lighting in the painting matches the lighting in the rest of the room-the wall on the right is across from a window and is always the lightest wall, This was in order to look like an extension of the room. There is actually a door that was added later going from the kitchen into the dining hall, so the part of the painting where Christ's feet would have been is gone. Da Vinci was experimenting with painting techniques and decided to paint onto a dry wall rather than buon fresco (on wet plaster), so the painting deteriorated very fast. It was restored several times until there was nothing of the original painting left to see, it was completely covered by layers and layers of new paint. You can read about the most recent restoration project here.

a few things to notice:
-Judas is the lowest and darkest person in the painting-not because he had darker skin but because he is leaning away from Christ and into a shadow. You can't really see it here but he is holding a bag of money in his hand and is knocking over a bowl of salt, which was a bad omen in Italian culture.
-Jesus' hands: on one side his robe is red-signifying his mortality and death. On that side his hand is tense and clawed, showing his anxiety and fear for what he had to do. On the other side, he is wearing a blue cloth draped over his shoulder-blue is the traditional color symbolizing deity. On that side Jesus' hand is facing up and relaxed, showing that he accepted the will of the Father.
-Three: There are 3 windows on the back wall. The disciples are clustered in groups of 3. Jesus' head and hands forms a triangle (3 sides.) This is a reference to the 3 members of the Godhead or in Catholicism, the Holy Trinity.
-Also, Peter is holding a knife. I don't remember why, I think he was always represented that way in paintings.

On the way home, it started raining.. really hard. I actually saw the lightning before the rain, so I was a little confused at first, I thought it was a concert or something. You don't have to watch the whole video but just take a look to see how crazy that lightning was!

I was completely soaked. RIP my poor hat.

sunday june 10.

First we went to church. We were planning to leave after sacrament meeting since we wouldn't understand anything but they were actually having a regional broadcast/stake conference instead so we got to hear it all in English! It was great!

After church we went to the 'castello'. We couldn't even see it because of all the scaffolding, seems like everywhere we go there is construction work going on.

 If you want to know more about the castle, you can do a little research on Google. Because I know nothing.
After walking through the courtyard of the castle we found a beautiful park on the other side.

are you sure we aren't in Paris anymore?

 Next we found a great restaurant to get some real Italian pizza! It was called 'Pizza....ok.', which we thought was hilarious.

the pizzas were enormous but so tasty. I got a pineapple and gorgonzola pizza and Melissa got a spinach/tomato and bell pepper pizza. Chloe had already eaten so she just hung out in the park and read a book. It was such a nice day!

you probably can't see anything in this picture, and I couldn't figure out how to rotate it, but what it is showing is our bill with a 3 euro charge for 'coperto'. We could not figure out what that was until we looked it up in my italian phrasebook..  apparently they had charged us 3 euros for the canopy over our table.

After lunch we found Chloe and then walked back to the hotel, it was so nice out and we loved exploring! Then Chloe and I had to grab our suitcases and catch our train to Venice. We were ok leaving Milan but sad to say goodbye to Melissa, she couldn't come with us because she was flying out of Milan the next morning on her way to Israel. Thanks for being a wonderful friend and travel buddy Melissa! xo
...to be continued...
xo Heather