Walking around Florence

Sunday 7/17/11

Again, the Duomo bells woke me up. I was the first one up which I have noticed I am doing more often than not. We had a nice breakfast and we decided to go on a walk. It is very easy to walk around here. There are so many shops, restaurants, vendor stands, markets, historical locations, viewpoints, towers, and more than any of those; tourists. I think I may actually enjoy watching the tourists more than I do looking at the buildings. Dennis wanted to have a photography day back up at Piazzale Michelangelo, so Karen, Dennis and I walked there and tried to be as artistic as possible. I think that Dennis is a flower person.. or at least Karen is, so Dennis loves to take pictures of flowers. 

More than flowers he loves to mix new life and old structure; which I also like to do, as well as take pictures of flowers. We came back, got to look at the pictures, and then everyone seemed to pass out. I wasn't very tired, so I decided that after a little washing of my underwear, and my hat, that I would go back out on my own and take my time looking at things and taking pictures. So as I wandered I tried to stay within an area where I knew I would find my way back. It is hard to get lost when you live so close to the Duomo, but still sometimes you manage to lose it in the narrow streets. The streets look largely the same. I am starting to notice subtle differences, but before long I'm sure I'll be exploring instead of mindlessly wandering. There is a problem the city of Florence has been having. Lovers buy a lock, put their names on them and hook them onto whatever, and then throw the keys into the Arno river. It all started on the Ponte Vecchio bridge where a locksmith started selling locks. It became a problem as locks are not the lightest love memento and the number of tourists that do this started to damage the bridge, so the city of Florence started removing the locks. There are a few places where you will still see locks... People still sneak them. 

There is now a 50 Euro fine for placing a lock on basically anything other than a bicycle. Also on my way home I passed where the sidewalk chalk had been going on. Since it didn't rain last night, they were back at it brushing more detail into their drawings. I took the opportunity to take a few shots as they colored and shaded. They look a lot different in the sunlight than in the streetlight. I wandered back to the apartment. I always like opening the street door to get into the stairwell, we use a little proximity card and the huge door just opens for you. All the tourists stream by wondering what's inside... So you just sneak in and the door closes right behind you. Later that night we went to church. I got to introduce myself to the small crowd attending. I met a man named Nehemiah who works with choirs in the area he is very gifted musically. He sat down and poured into the piano singing from the depths of his lungs. It was really beautiful. The acoustics of the old church made it feel like something great; and it was! They had me share a little bit about who I am and what I have been doing for the last month. There were only about 20 people in church. Dennis tells me that if you attend twice, you are a member and you will be expected to participate.. so guess who is preaching on the 31^st? Dennis said that I should just share my testimony, so that is probably what I'll do. The small congregation probably represented 15 different countries. We even had some French tourists that didn't speak a lick of English. It was nice. Then we went out for dinner to an Argentinean restaurant so Joubert and I could watch the Brazil vs Paraguay match. Dinner was good even though we didn't order anything from Argentina... We finished the game(Brazil lost) and walked home.

Monday 7/18/11

I had some good conversation with Joubert today at the breakfast table.. we didnt really stop talking until around 1pm. I looked at more maps and researched some more places that I might get to walk to sometime soon. Karen eventually let he and I know that she was needing to go to the store, so we snagged the grocery bags and went with her. 

I was going to take a walk up to an area where the old wall is still intact and check that out, but it ended up getting a little close to dinner time and we instead found a "Sfuso" which is a very cool way to buy wine in Italy. There are all these big vats that have hoses running to a spout. All the hoses pass through some kind of pump where she places the wine bottle and fills it up. I think to fill our wine bottles it was like 3 Euro each, which is pretty cheap. We made it back to the apartment; Karen was preparing dinner. Then after dinner we went for another walk. I wanted to go over to a place where some of the old wall that used to surround Florence is still intact, but it was a little farther than we were going to go, so we instead checked out Piazza de Pitti, which is just the area right outside the Pitti mansion. So the history of that is; there was this wealthy banker, who started its construction but died before its completion. The wealthy and powerful Medici family bought the building, finished the completion, and lived there for many years. It has served also as a headquarter for Napoleon, and now it is an art gallery. I would say there is nothing about the building that struck me as impressive. Its just a big building that looks like an aqueduct. We walked back across the Arno, and went to the Piazza della Republica where we watched all the illegal street vendors try to convince people to buy their things. People will walk by and if they only happen to glance at a purse... the vendors notice, grab the bag and take off bartering after them. 

Then the Police cars drive by. This is when it gets fun. Since the vendors are all illegal they frantically pack up their things onto the sheet where they are displayed and stand ready to run. If the police don't open a door, the vendors don't run. They just wait in anticipation; watching closely. Then when the car passes they lay their sheet out and begin the process of setting up all their merchandise; it probably takes them 10 minutes to get it just right. Then another police car comes through the square and the process starts all over again. It is one of the most fun things to watch. They are sort of like sheep in the way that they watch each other. When they see another vendor pack up, they all follow suit. I saw one guy pack up just to move to a new location, and the vendor next to him grabbed all his things in a hurry; very jumpy. Then with a disappointed look on his face spread his sheet back out and unpacked. When we were finished watching, we had Gelato, and went back to the apartment.