Day 17: Wednesday, May 7, Siena

The good news about Casa di Antonella was that breakfast was provided. It consisted of omelets, bread, a hard cheese, and cold cuts. Overall it was a pretty good breakfast and was similar to what I had gotten most mornings on my previous Italy trip.

It was Wednesday, so we headed to Siena’s market. It was a bunch of street vendors set up end to end down a number of streets. Overall it was very large. Most of the aisles were packed at about 10 in the morning. The majority of the crowd seemed to be women over 45; many had husbands along, though most of the husbands were grouped at the ends of aisles talking amicably while their wives shopped. There were the requisite number of tourists, but the market goods were obviously aimed at locals. There were also some moms with kids and some young couples. I would say that about 25% of the people (or maybe 33% of the households represented if you eliminate spouses) were carrying a bag of purchases. The goods were dominated by women’s clothes. There were a few stalls of men’s clothes and couple of men’s suits, a good number of shoe stalls (including a few that sold New Balance, Nike, etc. in boxes just like a normal shoe store), and a lot of… lingerie stalls. I’m pretty sure I mentioned before that dedicated lingerie stores are everywhere, and they are just as proportionally represented in this traveling market. It’s a little disconcerting to see 45yo moms holding various pieces of lingerie up to themselves to see if they will fit.

Il Campo in Siena as seen from what would have been a wall of a huge cathedral. The Sienese wanted their cathedral to be larger than that of their rivals, so they planned to turn their entire (large) existing church into the transept of a new church. The Plague put a stop to it.

We passed a hotel that was flying a flag that said, “The Leading Hotel of the World.” I never would have guessed that a Sienese hotel would be the world leader.

There is a small store a few doors down from us that advertises “African American” products as well as Asian and other cultural items. I wasn’t surprised except that it didn’t say “African Italian” or even just “African.” Because of its location and proprietor (an older Asian lady) I don’t think it was aimed at traveling African-Americans, so it makes me wonder what the local black population calls themselves.

During the day we saw the girls from dinner the night before not once but twice. At the end of the day we took an intercity bus to Florence. It was a double-decker, and the top deck was roasting. Fortunately it was a pretty short trip. In Florence we stayed at a place that was more like what I thought Casa di Antonella would be like: a large apartment where the host family lived there and ran the “hotel” out of their home. In this case it was a mother/daughter duo, and they were as friendly as could be.

In Rome we had gotten take-away lunches from a restaurant that also had a window for take-away pizza/calzones. (Sort of like a drive-through window for pedestrians.) We found the same place in Florence, but this was just a restaurant. We ate there on a piazza and had a very entertaining/funny manager who helped talk us through some of the Italian-only menu. While we were eating, hawkers would come through the outdoors area while the wait staff was all inside and try to sell flowers or trinkets. Later in the meal three young and obviously American girls came walking down the street dressed as if they were going out and talking loudly. They cornered the manager and asked him where a tabacchi (tobacco shop) was. He could tell he was in an awkward spot and offered them cigarettes from his box, but they refused, and after attempting to explain to them where it was one of them said thanks and rubbed her hand down his cheek. Basically these college freshman-aged girls who seemed to already be drunk and were dressed to show off created a scene that everyone in the restaurant was watching and put the manager in a bad situation. Thanks for reinforcing the Ugly American.

Siena got good reviews and trusty Rick Steves said that everyone loves Siena. I thought it was OK, but frankly I wouldn’t put it on my Italy Top 10 list. It didn’t have the benefits of being a big city, but it was big enough to make it on the itinerary for all of the tour companies and was totally touristy until local cafes got busy late at night. I must have missed something, because I didn’t leave love struck.

On the topic of touristy, I was thinking about tourism in America. I can’t think of many places that are so devoted to tourism or seem super touristy. I think one reason is that American places don’t usually translate their menus, etc. into other languages, whereas that is almost standard in European tourist hotspots. (When looking for a good place to eat we like to find places that don’t have English menus.) Also, America is so big that tourists are spread over more locations. Plus, unless you are doing an East or West Coast tour, there are few places with enough concentrated big tourist draws to merit a big tour company operation. There are some places that draw a lot of tourists (NYC and Niagra Falls come to mind). Some of the biggest tourist draws, however, are Disney Land/World and Las Vegas, and you can’t claim to have really “been to America” if you just hit one of those spots.

Just as in Paris, Italy really has no free toilets. The few public toilets are all pay toilets. In all of Europe I have seen very few automated toilets, which has surprised me. In New Zealand there were a lot of automated toilets, but almost all of them worked on motion sensor technology (and would thus flush an entire bank of toilets when you moved around) instead of the “per toilet” heat detection sensors used prevalently in the U.S.