Milan: Day 1 of Sight-Seeing

It figures that in Italy's fashion capital I would completely oversleep, be woken up by the Hostel dude/cleaning staff and tour the city sans-shower and in khakis and a cute shirt. (D'oh!) Perhaps the Lord just wanted to remind me - it's not about looks.

In any case, at around 11:00 this morning, I headed out, map and Rick Steves in hand, ready to see the few sights that were open (apparently several tourist-y things are usually closed on Mondays...). I made my way back toward the Metro and then navigated my way to the Duomo (which FYI means Cathedral...which means big, huge, fatty church) which was only a couple blocks further.

I don't know what I was expecting, but it was not what I saw. I guess due to the sound of the word (duomo) I thought it was going to be a round structure, something Renaissance-y and globe-shaped (perhaps "duomo" made me think dome??) but not so much. This thing is as pointy as pointy can be. It has over 2,000 statues on the outside and about a jillion spires (pokey things). I was totally stunned. Mostly because it was so unlike what I was anticipating. I did a few laps around it and then sat down to try and mentally wrap my brain around it.

After familiarizing myself with it via Rick Steves, I decided I wanted to tour the museum to gain a greater understanding of what I was seeing. Unfortunately the museum is being restored (since the beginning of '08) and was closed. Boo. So I did the self-tour inside and was again shocked at the enormity and complexity of it all. It was built to accommodate the entire population of Milan when construction began (which is 40,000 peeps, by the way) and took like 400 years to complete (no joke). Obviously several different artists contributed to the final product and though it is magnificent, it lacks a bit of...cohesiveness (understandably). I think the most interesting thing I saw was a statue of St. Bartholomew: he was a martyr skinned alive by the Romans and is depicted as wearing his skin as a robe. It was like PDA - I couldn't help but stare.

Afterward I paid the 5 EU to climb the stairs to the top and view the city from among the many spires and statues. Needless to say, it was a pretty sweet view.

I was so enveloped in the Duomo that I hardly saw anything else today. The Galleria Vittorio Emanuele was pretty cool - essentially an "indoor is outdoor" shopping mall with huge glass domes and arches surround the Gucci store, the Prada store, etc., etc. Best window shopping ever.

The last sight I'll mention I actually spotted on my way to the Duomo this morning. It was a beautiful church with a somewhat hidden entrance and an arched courtyard. Something about it was singing, "How do you solve a problem like Ma-ri-a?" Perhaps because of the completely ramshackle morning I'd had, it made perfect sense to me.

Tomorrow I will try to finish my Milan tour before I hit the road again. Tonight I'm sharing my six-bunk room with a business woman who only speaks italian and french. As you might have guessed, our conversation has been minimal. However, despite our brief conversations, she's been nothing but sweet to me.