To Florence

Saturday 11.9.10

Had breakfast at the bar again, and said my goodbyes to Myrjam (we've since kept in touch via Facebook). After breakfast I went to Termini (Rome's train station) to book tickets to Florence. After getting tickets I went to a grocery store to get food for the journey. Outside the store I was arranging my stuff in my backpacks, and there was this woman who was missing a nose. I don't know if it was cut off or if there was some disease involved. Anyway, I didn't much pay attention to her, and was fitting all my food and whatever into the packs. Then I put my change from the store into the pack, and as soon as she heard the coins rattle, she whistled at me to get my attention and gestured with her hand that I should give her some of the money. I shook my head. I remember that it pissed me off pretty good. What makes her think she deserves any of my money for nothing? She wasn't begging before she heard the coins and knew I had cash. And she seemed to have a sense of entitlement when she motioned with her had - like she was convinced she had a right to my dough. Anyway, there are lot of beggars in Europe, and especially in Rome, and me looking quite like an American tourist, they all targeted me, but for some reason I fumed over this one for quite some time.

Anyway, when I got to the train station, I found the platforms very confusing, and ended up getting on the wrong train, which left for Florence at the same time as mine and seemed to be the right platform. Anyway, instead of the posh express train I had booked, which would have gotten me to Florence in two hours, and which I assume would have been as posh as the one I had taken to Rome, I was on a slow train that had a lot of stops between Rome and Florence, and was hot, unairconditioned, and crowded. There was nowhere to sit, so I sat on the floor in the gangway. Someone told me I was on the wrong train. I'd guessed as much. One of the ticket checkers came by and examined my ticket and told me I was on the wrong train. I said I knew. She didn't charge me or anything, though. Anyway, I sat on the floor for most of the ride, until at one of the stops this black man got off and told me that his seat was now vacant, and insisted I took it. I thanked him and did.

After a while this guy came into my compartment, and was the most passive-aggressive dude ever. He really wanted me to move out of the seat next to him so he could have more space, so he'd feign sleep and then be all up in my space - at one point his hand was literally almost in my lap. I picked it up and put it back in his seat, and after a while he pulled the same stuff. Eventually I moved far enough away from him that he wouldn't bother me and spent the rest of the ride glaring at him while he tried to sleep.

When I finally reached Florence, my tribulations continued. First off, Florence stinks. Like Rome, it is beautiful but has a terrible odor. The whole place just smells until you get used to it. Maybe it's the lingering warm Italian summer causing everyone to sweat. I don't know, but it wasn't that pleasant. Both of the hostels recommended by the people in Rome who had already been to Florence were full. Not knowing where to get Internet to look for more hostels/compare prices, I began to simply go into any place I saw. Everywhere was full, and I started walking into any and every hotel and asking whether they had space. I found no vacancies.

I headed back to the train station and asked the hotel booker person about hotels, but they were pretty expensive. The lady there told me that there wasn't much room in Florence because there was some sort of a 'congress' that week. I decided maybe Florence wasn't worth all this trouble and went to the ticket counter to book a sleeper car back to Vienna for the night, thinking I'd just skip Florence, get to Vienna early, and spend some time sitting in my favourite coffeehouses or using my museum card again. However, all the spaces on the sleeper car that night were taken. In true desperation, I returned to the hotel-booking place in the station and bade them do their worst. They found a place for me, and when they called informed me that in order to sell their vacant rooms for the night, the hotel had lowered its price! So that was cool.

I trekked to the hotel, which was a family-run bed and breakfasty-type place. After checking in, depositing my stuff, exploring the bathroom (it was down the hall from the bedroom, and if I remember correctly they have me those old-timey keys that look like a golden stick with a little notched plane at the end, it was pretty cool) I got ready to go find some food. I went to the counter where there was an old grandma-type at the desk. I began to ask about food, but she stopped me and went into another room, whence came an extremely muscular young Italian guy. He was super cool. I asked him about food and we got to talking; he was very friendly. He said 'Tonight you eat traditional Florentine food,' and directed me to a nearby place that wasn't too expensive. We also talked about Tijuana for some reason. He gave me a map and circled the area with all the bumpin' clubs, telling me that that was the place to find girls, since I was traveling alone. I thanked him and we parted on the friendliest of terms.

I went to the restaurant he had suggested. I don't remember what I ordered (sorry, it's been too long between doing this and writing it) but I think it was some sort of pasta dish, with a pitcher of house red wine. It was pretty good. The three guys at the table behind mine heard me order in English and saw that I was by myself, so they told me to come join them. They were Kirby Liu of Emory University (I later saw via Facebook that he made this website for women to apply to be his date to some dinner thing he was attending, by way of a social experiment. Not in a creepy way. He seems like an interesting, intelligent guy), Phil of Colorado and Sumit from Toronto. They were studying in Milan, and were on a weekend trip to Florence. They were extremely friendly, and invited me to spend the rest of the evening with them. I accepted and we went to their hostel with beers. In my notes for today I wrote 'Met polite English guy.' It's been too long now and I don't remember what that's about, but I have a vague impression that he was in the kitchen table area while we were sitting around.

Soon we left to look for clubs. We were trying to navigate Florence, and when I pulled out my compass they laughed and said they'd traded their previous white guy for a more useful one, I guess meaning I was resourceful since I carried a compass. We found something called Club Twice which seemed really lively, and my companions wanted to check it out. I was wearing my trademark shorts and flip-flops, and the black bouncer guys at the entrance said I had to be wearing pants and shoes to enter. I waited outside while Sumit and Kirby (who were appropriately dressed) went in to check it out. After a while they came back out and said that it was awesome and we absolutely had to go to this place, so they insisted we go back to my hotel so I could change and we could return. We walked across Florence and back to my room. The young built Florentine (hotel owner's son?) who had given me advice about dinner earlier gave me the building keys so I could let myself in after he went to bed and was very friendly and helpful despite my being in and out at god knows what hour of the morning. He seemed pleased that I was out partying and enjoying myself during my stay in his city.

We returned to Club Twice and did some dancing, and they chatted up some girls that were there. There was a fight between these two bro-y looking guys. I'm not sure what they were fighting over, but there was a sudden commotion across the dancefloor and the crowd parted for these two guys that were furiously and quickly swinging their fists into one another. I think the bouncers took care of it pretty quickly. Eventually we left the club and talked with these American girls who were at the club and were studying fashion in Florence. We finally parted ways, promising to look one another up on Facebook, the great communicator. Which I did. Facebook has proved very useful for staying in touch with people I met in Europe. I went to bed.