Buongiorno, Firenze!

15.04 entry

The rest of my train trip to Florence was more or less uneventful - I slept for most of the night, until about 5:30 when the girls in my cabin started waking up and getting ready. They got off at Bologna, which is about an hour from Florence, so I had some peace and quiet for a little while.

My train arrived at Firenze SMN station about an hour and a half late, which I was totally fine with - I would have otherwise been wandering around Florence from 7am-3pm with my backpack and everything while waiting to check into my hostel.

The first thing I did when I got to the station was
buy my ticket to Rome for Monday. I had gotten screwed over the last two times I tried to use my rail pass for not booking far enough in advance, so I made sure to do that right away.

The second thing I did was buy a belt. Wearing the same two pairs of pants for the past week has made both pairs rather loose around the waist, and I figured this should be mitigated. I looked in the windows of very expensive-looking shops, when I turned my head and looked down an alley - and saw a street vendor selling just belts. No lie. When does that ever happen? Unfortunately, he was still setting up (it was before 10am at this point), so I walked around until I found a vendor that was indeed open. And I bought a huge, men's-sized belt. For €5.

After getting lost a number of times in the morning, I decided it would be a good idea to pick up a map. The tourist info office proved to be a good resource, giving me a free map with all the main sights (mostly churches and museums) on the back, and directions on how to use the local bus system.

Hopping on the next bus out of the train station, I easily found the ticket validation machine and proceeded to stare at it for a good 30 seconds. The directions were obviously written in Italian, of which I know roughly five words. So I gave up, figuring I could watch other passengers and learn from them.

As it turned out, none of the other passengers validated their tickets upon boarding the bus. So I figured it was just one of those things where no one really does it and no one really cares.... Or so I thought.

A man in a navy jacket approached my seat and said something to me in Italian. When I looked at him very confusedly, he said in a deep and slow voice "Your ticket, please." I dug it out of my wallet and handed it over.

A minute later, he returned. "Your ticket is not validated. You need to have validated the ticket." I tried to stammer out a mix of "I'm sorry" in Italian and "I thought I had/I didn't know" in English.

"Now you must pay the fine. Is 50 euro."

I opened my wallet to show him that it was empty. A few more "mi dispiace"s ensued.

"You have bank card?" "Si." "We get off at next stop. You take money out of machine and pay the fine."

So, I ventured to an Italian ATM with this bus inspector, was written a ticket for my misconduct, and was sent on my way with verbal instructions on how to use the ticket validation machine.

So yeah. Not a good way to start off my time in Florence.

I found a park near my hostel and hung out reading there for a while, waiting to be able to check in. My hostel was a converted convent, which was just a little bit creepy - although, not as creepy as staying in a non-converted convent, I suppose.

There was a restaurant downstairs, so I bought a ticket for dinner. At around 7, I was pretty hungry so I went to see what was going on. The cook looked at my ticket and said "oh, it is not ready yet - the water the pasta still need to boil. Come back 8, maybe 20 minute before."

After wandering around for an hour or so (I found another park and caught up on my written travel journal), I went back for THE MOST DELICIOUS DINNER EVER. Well, maybe I just thought it was because I had eaten nothing but cheese and baguette while in Paris, but still - it was amazing. Tortellini stuffed with cheese and some kind of green vegetable (they told me it was spinach, but it tasted more like broccoli) with a tomato sauce that tasted so fresh I could hardly believe it.

At dinner I sat between a boy named Simon from Denmark and a group of three girls from Quebec. I talked with both parties for a long time, and then we all went out for gelato after dinner.

So, I've had gelato in the US. It's pretty good. I like it at least as much as ice cream, and I really like ice cream.

I could probably eat gelato for every meal of my life and not get sick of it.

First of all, it's absolutely delicious. Fresh and creamy, usually homemade (the good kinds anyway, and there are tricks to tell which are the good kinds), and absolutely amazing.

Second, the variety. Every kind of fruit, chocolate, nut, cream flavor you could ever imagine. So freaking good.

By the way, I had a chocolate hazelnut flavor called Bachio and a creamy vanilla-y flavor whose name I can't remember. But they were wonderful.

A lovely ending to my not-so-lovely start in Florence :-)