Milan: Time Out!

Milan. One of the world’s leading fashion centers. The financial capital of Italy. A dynamic, energetic, living, breathing city. Probably the most exciting city in Italy. Whereas Florence feels like a museum at times, Milan feels cosmopolitan, but with an historic city center unlike anything you’d find in New York. And the students had five hours to discover the city, with the best guides of all: the University of Milan students.

The University of Milan has an ideal location, just steps from Milan’s historic center. After the presentations were completed, Gina led the entire group down the street to the heart of the historic center, the Duomo and the Galleria, for a quick lunch before our explorations. At this point, the students dispersed, all with their own ideas of how they wanted to spend their time.

Some stayed right at the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, affectionately known as “Milan’s Drawing Room,” where the rich and beautiful come to shop, eat, and be seen. This elegant arcade, built in 1867, was one of Italy’s first glass and iron buildings, The building is so beautiful, with it majestic glass dome, that you might overlook the upscale shops, cafes, and restaurants that line it. But this is not why the students chose to stay.

You see, when we arrived at the Galleria, they were thrilled to find that MTV was filming a live show, TLR (which stands for "Total Request Live"), from high atop one of the arched entryways. The guest of honor on this show happened to be America’s Hilary Duff. The crowd, mostly made up of teenagers and young college students, and many dressed in costume, waved banners, raised their arms in the air in enthusiasm, chanted, and shouted, all in anticipation of seeing Hilary Duff in person. Hee-lawr-ee the mostly Italian crowd shouted, over and over in synch, until she finally made her appearance. Cameras flashed everywhere throughout the crowd, which filled most of the Piazza del Duomo. What a thrill for all!

Other students headed off to the rooftop of the Duomo (more on that later), and others toured the Castello Sforzesco and were delighted to find behind it the Parco Sempione, a 116-acre English-style garden created in 1863. The park was filled with people sunbathing, playing soccer, reading, relaxing, and enjoying the wonderful weather. There was even a small carnival set up, and many of the students went on what turned out to be a quite exciting mechanical swing ride. Another group of students were absolutely ecstatic to run into the American Olympic speed skater Apolo Anton Ohno in one of the piazzas; he genially agreed to have his photo taken with them, which they will treasure forever. Things like this just don’t happen in Florence!

And what did I do? I set off with my own personal tour guide, Kim. Unfortunately, Gina had to go back to the university to attend a faculty meeting, but she left me in very able hands. Kim is American but has been living in Italy for many years and speaks fluent Italian. And what a fantastic tour guide she was! She told me that she would take me anywhere I wanted to go. My first choice? Teatro alla Scala, Milan’s opera house (that's what you see in the background behind me).

This grand opera house, which opened in 1778, is perhaps the world’s foremost opera house. Many opera singers consider that they haven’t made it until they finally perform at La Scala. As proof of how much this theater means to Milan, after it was badly damaged during World War II, along with most of the buildings in Milan, it was the first building that the government chose to rebuild, taking only three years to do so. The theater was also completely renovated in 2004. When we entered, the man at the ticket booth told us that we could go into the museum, but that the theater itself was dark as they were preparing for a performance tonight. Even though he said we wouldn’t be able to see much, we went in anyway. Approximately seven boxes were open, in which you could look out over the theater. When we arrived, they were all completely filled with a large tour group. We waited patiently until they departed and then entered one of the boxes. Even though it was dark, we were able to see quite a bit; people were moving around on stage getting things set up; and we could hear instruments practicing backstage. And then, suddenly, the lights went on. There we were alone, just the two of us in any of the boxes, witnessing that spectacular theater all lit up. As we left La Scala, the man in the ticket booth asked if we had seen the lights. When we replied that we had, he said, “I had them turned on just for you!”

Directly across from Teatro alla Scala is Palazzo Marino, Milan’s town hall since 1860, complete with a sculpture of Leonardo da Vinci in front. And I was most excited to see a bright orange Milan streetcar coming down the street between the theater and the town hall. You see, San Francisco has an original Milan streetcar that runs on the F-line along Market Street and the Embarcadero. Of San Francisco’s large vintage streetcar collection, the Milan car has always been my favorite. How exciting to see it where it actually belongs!

Our next stop was Casa Manzoni, the home of the beloved Italian author Alessandro Manzoni, who lived there from 1814 until his death in 1873. The interior has been perfectly preserved, particularly his study where he wrote and the bedroom in which he died. Alessandro Manzoni is most known for his book I Promessi Sposi (The Betrothed),which many consider to be the greatest Italian novel of all time. We arrived shortly before closing, but the gentleman who let us in gave us a thorough private tour. Of course, the entire thing was in Italian, but Kim served as my own personal translator! By the way, I have since found an English translation of the book and can’t wait to read it.

Next it was on to Milan’s Duomo, the third largest Christian cathedral in the world. Entering the cathedral itself was amazing. Even though the Florence Duomo is the fourth largest in the world, it seems tiny in comparison to the Milan Duomo. Construction of this immense cathedral began in 1386, and it was consecrated in 1418. Interestingly, though, it was not completed until the 19th century, and it took Napoleon coming in to finally complete the grand Neo-Gothic façade. There’s even one of the nails from Christ’s cross kept here, in a vault high above the altar. It’s taken out just once a year, on September 14, when the Bishop of Milan is raised up to the vault on a contraption operated by pulleys (I’d love to see that!). The rest of the time, visitors must be content to view a red light, which marks the location of the vault.

But the real reason to come to Milan’s Duomo is to climb up to the rooftop. It’s so unusual to be able to walk along the rooftop terraces of an ancient cathedral, and I couldn’t wait to do it. The day was clear, and the views across Milan were magnificent. From the roof we were also able to much more clearly see the beautiful details of the cathedral’s spires and statues, something you’d never be able to see from the ground. (One student, Gillian, aptly described the façade of the Duomo as looking like the sand castles she used to build as a child, using drippings of wet sand.) It was so spectacular up there that I said to Kim, “I just hope that we run into some students up here because I want them to discover this.” And not a minute later we ran into two of them, Karla and Katie.

After taking many pictures, we decided it was time for the traditional Italian aperitivo. Gina had just gotten out of her faculty meeting, so she met the four of us at a small café near the university (Karla also found some of her favorite, fresh coconut, along the way). We all ordered drinks and were thrilled when plates of food started arriving, all part of the aperitivo experience: small slices of pizza, quiche, bread, olives, sundried tomatoes, and, best of all, sushi! We immensely enjoyed all of these tasty treats until it was time to return to the university to meet the others. Everyone made it back safely, and we spent about an hour sharing our experiences with one another, while Gina tried valiantly to find the students’ hostels on the Milan map.

And, finally, it was time for our day to end. Although most of the students had arranged to stay overnight in Milan, five students and I had decided to catch an 8 p.m. train back to Florence. We said our goodbyes and headed toward the subway, which would take us to the train station. And hence our next adventure began…