Winter travels part 2: Milan

The alps, as seen from my plane.

As Talia alluded to in a previous post, almost immediately after we got back to France from the USA I left France to go to Italy. Specifically to Milan, for an academic conference where I was presenting a paper. The timing was a little unfortunate, as it meant I was abandoning an exhausted Talia with a grumpy jet-lagged baby in the middle of Paris. I was jet lagged too, but I didn't have to deal with a baby...

A tram scoots through one of the medieval city gates. Not pictured: Roman ruins, ornate basilicas, Italians.

Instead, I had to deal with trams, mopeds, and medieval architecture. And excellent coffee.

Traffic.

Speaking of coffee, and food, on my very first morning I went to a local bakery that had been recommended to me for breakfast. I walk in, and the conversation goes something like this:

Baker: [some greeting which is neither buon giorno "good morning" nor salve "hello" (or even ciao, the informal version).]
Me: Buon giorno! Non parlo italiano. ["Good morning! I don't speak Italian."]
Baker: Ah! [stream of Italian, very quick, wherein he explains what each of the baked goods on offer are made of, what they taste like, how they're cooked, etc.]

It's not strictly true that I don't speak any Italian -- I was able to piece together the gist of what he said via my knowledge of French and Spanish -- I was amused by the knowing look he gave me, and by the fact that he very kindly explained everything to me, the confused foreigner, in Italian.

It's not that I expected him to speak English (especially as Italy is one of the most monolingual countries of the EU!), but I thought he would at least slow down, use simple phrases, or something. Maybe point at a bun, say cioccolate, molto bene, 'chocolate, very good', something like that.

In any case, if you must know, I ordered a cappuccino and a chocolate brioche. They were both molto bene, although the brioche was covered in powdered sugar and was quite messy.

It turns out that Italians aren't great at French either:

It should be "crêpes".

Apart from the food and the conferencing, my main activity in Milan was wandering the city and examining the architecture. Lots of churches of various shapes and sizes!

The famous Duomo cathedral.

Another angle on the Duomo.

The tower of the Basilica of Sant'Eustorgio.

All in all, it was a pleasant break from my usual routines. The conference went smoothly and my paper was well-received. I was very happy to get home to Talia and a sleepy baby, though.

On the road to Rouen

(Title of this post shamelessly stolen from the Supergrass album of the same name. And yeah, we took the train, so it's not even that accurate.)

Last weekend, we took a short trip to Rouen - we left Paris on Friday afternoon and came back on Sunday afternoon. Rouen is a small city northwest of Paris, about 75 minutes by train. It's the capital of Normandy and is principally famous as having several medieval cathedrals and also as being the place where Joan of Arc was tried and executed. For us, it was a chance to get out of the hustle and bustle of Paris and have a relaxing weekend. For Talia in particular, it was her first time exploring France outside of the Île-de-France region.

The journey begins.

I didn't know that much about Joan of Arc before going to Rouen, so here's a rough approximation of my knowledge. The background to the story is the Hundred Year's War between France and England, which despite the name, did not last for a hundred years (it was 116 years), and was not a war (it was a series of disconnected skirmishes and battles). During this period, the English crown was trying to assert authority over (parts of) France, while (parts of) the French royal family were fighting to oppose it. Joan of Arc was a peasant girl who had a number of religious visions showing a united France, and rose to prominence in leading successful attacks in several decisive battles. (To do this, she wore men's clothes, which was regarded with a mixture of shock and bemusement.) After a while, she was captured by the English (well, allies of the English in any case), and eventually put to death (by burning) for heresy. Given that Joan quickly became an icon of French culture, a symbol of fighting for freedom against an oppressive force*, the town that was responsible for putting her to death has been, at time, a little embarrassed of its status.

[* This is part of the myth-making that I don't really understand. It wasn't as if France was under the cruel yoke of a dictator and they were fighting for freedom and democracy. This was a war to determine which unelected hereditary leader was "rightfully" the leader of France. Not particularly noble in either case.]

Nevertheless, there are a number of Joan-related activities that you can do. Principally, you can visit the 13th-century fort where she was imprisoned.

The fort where Joan of Arc was held prior to her execution.

Rouen recently made most (all?) of their public museums free of charge. Consequently, we had the following exchange at the entrance to the fort:

Man: Entry is free. Well, except for the English. You're not English are you?
Talia: No, I'm American, and he is Scottish.
Man: Ah! American! Well, you liberated us, so you can go in. And Scottish? My grandmother was Scottish, so you're good too.

(Of course, he was ignoring the fact that the Scots fought on the side of the French in the Hundred Years War, including the fact that several Scottish soldiers fought alongside Joan of Arc during the siege of Orléans.)

Once inside, there was a good selection of historical information and Jean-related paraphernalia. One exhibit featured an amusing Franglish translation:

Her "eldbows"; she is "hearing the voices"; "made in biscuit".

The statuette in question. Looks delicious!

This post would be remiss if I neglected to include pictures of the grand churches and cathedrals. It felt like you couldn't go a few paces without bumping into another huge church or medieval tower.

The trip achieved its goal of being a relaxing (yet cultured) weekend away. There are many more regions of France to explore, so hopefully this will be the first of many such excursions!

Belgium!

More catching up to do. Here are some pictures from our recent trip to Ghent, Belgium. Cindy, a friend from Columbus, lives there, and four others were also visiting, so it was like a big reunion. Our visit overlapped with the filming of a new Adrien Brody movie, so there were several extras wandering around in medieval garb. It really added to the ambiance!

An extra wearing plate armor! Rory is at the left of the picture, completely unarmored.

A load of extras waiting around for direction.

You can't see it here, but this guy was actually checking his mobile phone. Somewhat incongruous.

The movie set was inside Gravensteen, Ghent's 12th-century castle. There were several people shepherding the tourists around the movie set and into the other parts of the castle.

A view of Ghent from the top of the castle.

A reconstructed guillotine. (The blade is original!) This was in the Museum of Judicial Instruments, which is inside the castle.

The side of the castle, where you can see some of the older, unreconstructed portions.

A view of the castle's highest parapets. We had great weather!

Rory and I at the top of the castle.

There is more to Ghent than the castle, though! It's a lovely town with a collection of churches and gentle canals. It feels a little like a less touristy, more normal version of Bruges (which we visited last December).

One of the larger canals.

Alyssa, Dave, Rory, Rachel, and James.

The back of the church of Saint Michael.

The altar inside the church of Saint Nicholas.

At dinner! Rachel, Rory, me, James, Dave, and Alyssa. Not pictured: Cindy.

Rory and I outside of Gravensteen.

We had only spent three days in Paris before we hopped on the train to Ghent. For a small town, introverted person like me, Ghent felt like the perfect antidote to the hustle and bustle of Paris. I wish we could take a trip to another country every weekend, but sadly academia doesn't pay that well. I'll just have to explore the green spaces in Paris and find my own little nooks to relax in.

Photos of Scotland

We're a little bit behind with posting photos, so here are some highlights from our two weeks in Scotland!

Rory and Jeff at Doune Castle, where Monty Python and the Holy Grail was filmed

Doune Castle

The Scottish Highlands at Glencoe

Glencoe

Rory posing at Glencoe

Incredible sunset at Morar, a remote village on the west coast

Our hotel at Morar. Its address: Morar Hotel, Morar, Scotland. There was only one road in the town.

We took a ferry to the Isle of Mull, where we stayed at the Tobermory Hotel

Tobermory

We drove from Mull on the west coast all the way to St Andrews on the east coast in about 5 hours. Rory's grandparents live in St Andrews and we celebrated his grandma's 88th birthday there. This is from the top of the cathedral tower overlooking St Andrews.

The Castle at St Andrews

Highland cow hat (obviously)

We spent a week in Glasgow while Rory attended a linguistics conference. I took a bus tour one day and stopped at the Botanic Gardens and a number of other places. It was fun!

My first time on a double decker open-top bus

Glasgow Cathedral

Glasgow Cathedral

The Glasgow Necropolis is a cemetery that sits atop a hill behind the Cathedral. It's impressive to walk around. And I randomly met a woman there who not only was attending the same linguistics conference, but had also lived in Columbus and was also traveling to Paris by train on the same day as us. 

This video is from the linguistics conference ceilidh (Scottish dance). 90% of the participants had no idea how to do these dances and they still had fun!