The Tale of the 4 Cities and Capodanno

After Firenze, Daniele picked me and Taka up and we went on a grand tour by car of Italy. First stop was Pisa, where we jumped out of the car and took some snaps. Something that Taka and I started to notice about Italy as well, is that quite a few buildings lean. Not quite as dramatically as in Pisa, but enough to make you think twice about going inside them. Didn't climb the Leaning Tower however, as it was packed full of tourists and it was more fun watching them scramble about. Besides, Taka and I were a bit monumented out after Firenze.

Next stop was Rimini, where we met some of Daniele's friends and had a nice dinner. We drank "spritz" which is a mixture of Campari and white wine. They are quite strong, and come in large glasses. After a couple and all the excitement of the day, I ended up returning to the hotel to watch "Friends" in Italian. Rimini is very pretty, and the city centre is beautiful, but I think I am starting to appreciate it less now, after seeing so many beautiful city centres. I'm starting to get a bit numb I guess.

The next day, we jetted off to San Marino, which is still an independent state. It is basically a big castle on top of a hill, a very large hill, which was the obvious strategy for avoiding invasion for so long. The easiest way up was by cable-car (also the most fun way). I resisted trying to scare people by shaking the car (after my cable-car experience in Hong Kong a couple of years ago, ended up scaring myself the most). I also used a machine that punches a 2 euro piece into a pretty piece of metal that says "I love you San Marino". So trashy, so of course I had to have one.

After S.M., we drove to Bologna, where Daniele lived for many years. There is a beautiful church on the top of a hill in Bologna that is quite famous. There are over 666 steps to the top of it (this is true, I asked a Bolognese), and it takes around an hour to get to the top. It was a tough climb. I could tell because the people looked really tired as we drove past them. The church itself was fascinating. Like many Catholic churches, there are lots of opportunities to pray to saints rather than the more important deities. Kind of makes Christianity polytheistic, right? There is also a machine that you put your candles on that slowly takes them along a long metal tray and dumps them in a box at the end. Progress and technology even reaches churches I was happy to see.

We stayed in Daniele's old apartment in the city centre and had real pizza in the restaurant around the corner. Yum. Real pizza for once. Was delicious, and we went for a walk around the city later on, where we saw the two huge towers (one of them leans, see what I mean?) In the main piazza, there was a wooden effigy that was going to be burned as part of the New Years Eve (Capodanno) celebrations. This is quite common in Italy, and it symbolises the burning of the old year to make room for the new one. Sounds like a grand excuse to toast marshmallows to me. But I love fire, so was instantly attractive as well. Perhaps there would be a witch that needed burning. Ah, a witch! But more on that later.

For New Year's Eve, we went to a dinner with a big group of friends in a smaller town called Faenze. Going out in the country is becoming more popular here. The menu was a degustation, and we had about 9 courses plus wine. Some were a little strange (like cream with green olives, *ew*). But for the most part the food was amazing. I have discovered that there is a time while I am nearly drunk where I can understand Italian a lot better than when I am sober. Not certain why this is, but in any case once I do actually get drunk, this benefit is lost to an equal degree, and I struggle to understand English, let alone Italian.

After midnight, the music was supplied by an experimental burlesque group from Berlin. Firstly they strung ribbons from the ceiling, and some slightly plump ladies did a show, slinking up and down the ribbons. I say slinking, however it was more like slumping, as they weren't particularly graceful, in fact one of them had a little fall and nearly hit the floor. Still, it was entertainment. Then the singer came on. It was great, exactly how I imagined. She read bad poetry in English against a musical background, so Berlin. The highlight of her number was her song Cats on Crack, which went like: "Cats on crack, cats on crack, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow..." etc. This had us laughing in the car all the way back to Bologna. The best New Year's I've had in ages!

Meow...