Milano

Yesterday, Paola and I went to Milano! First, we stopped at the Duomo, which was huge! We almost were rejected admission because we were both wearing tanktops (It was super hot outside - like 90 degrees). I had brought a cover-up (as an American tourist, I was trained to always bring something along, just in case), but then Paola had to wait outside for me. The guard told her, "look, she's American and she knows, but you are Italian and you don't!" which was pretty funny. Luckily, Paola found a shall at another entrance and was able to put that around her shoulders and meet me inside. The Duomo di Milano really is amazingly huge and very gothic compared to the cathedrals in Siena and Florence. Paola and I also went on the roof of the Duomo and saw views of the city from there.

Next, we went next door to La Rinascente, which is basically a big department store that carries a lot of big name designers. At first, Federico was going to come with us on the trip to Milan, but it's a good thing he didn't because we ended up doing a bit of shopping (well, window shopping). At the top of La Rinascente, there is a food court (well, it's a lot cooler than a food court and has a bunch of restaurants). We ended up having smoothies, but there was also this really cool mozzarella bar that had a terrace that looked right onto the the duomo.

After La Rinascente, we went to the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II (pictured), which had more fancy shops. This is said to be one of the first shopping malls. We walked through this to the Teatro Alla Scalla, or the the theater. From here, we walked to via Montenapoleone, which also had a lot of fancy shops (Paola described this to be similar to Rodeo Drive).

From the window shopping extravaganza, we took the underground to Castello Sforzesco, an old castle. Now, there are a bunch of museums there. Sadly, we weren't able to go in any, because they closed right as we got there (this was totally fine, since we were both pretty tired from so much walking around in the heat). Outside of the castle is a fountain where a bunch of tourists were dipping their feet. Paola said to me, "If you want, you can go in the fountain since you're American... I can't because I'm Italian." HAHA. I decided not to embrace my role as a tourist.

We cruised home in Paola's sweet new BMW convertable with the top down and went straight to mass (good thing I still had my cover-up!). Catholic mass is definitely something new for me (especially when I can't understand what's going on at all), but it was fine and I just followed what everyone around me was doing. After, I met one of Giacomo's cousins and Paola's sister. At home, we had spaggheti with tomatoes for dinner and homemade gelato for dessert!! Paola's cooking is delicious (and I'm kind of getting fat from eating it all... oh well, I think I'll survive).

And then guess what?! It started to rain! I've been in Italy for about a week and a half and it has rained in some way every single day.