Genova

I went to Genoa without knowing anything about it. It is a very big city and it is on the Mediterranean. Well, actually it is on the Ligurian Sea, all this time I have been calling all the water around Italy the Mediterranean, I am learning.

I met some Italian guys one night. I was walking around looking for a place to eat and I wandered into this place where some people were spending their evening chatting away like old pals (well actually they probably were old pals). Only one of them spoke English, his name was Pino. I had a lot of fun hanging out with them. To go with my dinner I ordered milk and they kept laughing that I ordered milk, they would say, "Vino! Vino!" They wanted to know how my dinner was and even though it was obvious by the plastic container and lid that it was a microwavable dinner, I said, "Magnifico!" And I told Pino to give my compliments to the chef. They laughed.

Pino wanted me to meet his friend Chichi who has traveled all over the world and is proud that he only knows how to speak Italian. We were outside when Chichi was approaching and Pino told me to say, "Ciao, Chichi! Como estai?" When I did, Chichi was very befuddled and just stared for awhile. Then Pino started laughing and Chichi could tell we were joking with him. Pino told him I was Americano and then we talked about traveling for quite a while.

I saw my Italian friends the next day and they gave me their email addresses and the address of the bar so I could send a postcard from Greece and America. I also had dinner again and this time instead of milk I had Vino! :)

By the way, I cut my hair recently.

Como

Como was the first city in Italy I visited. I stayed a night in Lucerne the night before but there is no point in writing a blog because I left my camera in a locker even though I had a picturesque morning walk along the lake. Well, back to Como. It was a beautiful train ride from Switzerland to Italy, right through the alps. I was glad I did it in the daytime to see it all, instead of a night train like my original plan.

Como was right on the lake. I pretty much did nothing but relax by the lake my whole visit in Como. I was reading a book my friend Jana loaned me when I saw her in Paris. The book is called Three Cups of Tea and it is about a man, Greg Mortenson, who after trying to climb K2 decided to start building schools in impoverished villages of northern Pakistan and Afghanistan. It took me awhile to get going on the book, but I pretty much read the whole thing on the train ride to Como and then in Como. It is a very inspiring and informative book!

Como was a great place to stay for a first time in Italy. I had pizza, gelato, wine, grapes... It is nice to be somewhere that all the food I love is so common!

Antwerp

In Antwerp I stayed with my cousin Kathy's friend Mia and Jos in their apartment on the waterfront. It was very nice since earlier that week I had camped out in Bruges, Minden, and had two nights on the train.

I was excited to see the magnificent cathedral in Antwerp, the Cathedral of Our Lady. I had previously learned about it through the Dutch painter Neeffs paintings of the beautiful interior. Also, inside the cathedral they had some impressive paintings by the famous painter from Antwerp, Pieter Paul Reubens. I also visited Reubens house in Antwerp.

Antwerp had some of the most bizzarre activites going on I had seen yet in any city. There were pub trolleys going through town, where it looked like an actual pub on wheels, and people were all sitting at the bar just enjoying the ride. There were groups of people all dressed up and seemingly trying to accomplish strange tasks; for instance one group of males were trying to get signatures on their friend who was wearing nothing but a diaper. It was quite strange.

There were lots of tempting waffles being sold on nearly every corner in Antwerp, and at first I was reluctant to give in. When I was in London the smell in the air from the waffles was overwhelmingly tempting, so I gave in and had one. The taste of that waffle did not come close to as good as it smelled. Well, completely forgetting the fact that in Antwerp, Belgium a waffle would not just be an ordinary waffle it would be a world-famous Belgain waffle, I gave in once again to the smell and was expecting a similar experience to London's. This time, however, the waffle tasted just as amazing as it smelled. It was a few days later when I was thinking about how good that waffle was that I realized, oh right a Belgain waffle, that's why it was so good.

Thank you to Mia and Jos for letting me stay with you in Antwerp! Thank you, Kathy for contacting them for me!