What am I talking ?

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Tomorrow will bring a new week, and with it a new month. Usually Sunday evenings make me a bit sad cause next day I need to go work after two days of holiday and it has been happening to me since childhood. For several reasons last week didn’t go well, I started my days lazily, like not wanting to go to work yet not wanted to be in home, I didn’t know where to go. I would reach office, would do nothing and feel tired though it was only morning.

I very well know what is going inside me, why I am troubled, why I miss India and yet don’t want to go there, why I miss the city where I grew up yet dread walking through the same streets again. I can’t write that in my blog and I envy those who can at least write these in their blog and vent their feelings. I need answers to several questions that keep bugging me day and night but there is no one to give me answers and I sort of dread getting the answers.

Of late I am doing weird things, every Saturday when I make my regular trip to the library I will pick up the book “The English Patient” and would want to throw it out of the window and make it drown in the bottom of the lake, I would Google for critical appreciation of this book, I would read them and not get satisfied with any of them, I look for someone to fight with me over this book but there is no one. The soundtracks of the movie haunt me yet I keep listening to them. Please some one come to me and say that they feel the same about this book, tell me that it is a farce but beautifully packaged. Tell me that is just melodrama and far fetched from reality, tell me that you hate the book and yet can’t deny …..

I know I what I am saying is not making sense to anyone, but I am tired of talking sense, I want to be what I wish to be even though I can afford it only on this late evening of Sunday and can talk this only with my blog. I want to live like I was on those three days when I was not allowed to think or talk sense; I miss all those who were with me then, the evening when we were eating cake, drinking coffee and laughing over the news about some train accident in India, we all rightfully knew then that all this life, death, feeling, emotions are figments of this materialistic world. The irony was that we were more sensible at that time when the world thought contrary of us.

I would like to quote here the following lines of Lewis Carroll’s poem “The Walrus and The Carpenter “

"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax--
Of cabbages--and kings--
And why the sea is boiling hot--
And whether pigs have wings."

Florence - Come Fall in Love !

It was nine in the evening when I reached Florence, as I stepped out of the train coach the hot air greeted me, the air con inside was much better. It was my third day in Italy and I had started to feel the heat of summer.

Coming out of train station I saw something familiar, there was showroom of this footwear MNC ‘BATA’, it is a Czech company but has a very good presence in India and for the first time I saw it anywhere in Europe.

The print out said that I need to walk for 3 minutes to reach the hotel. I walked for about 3 minutes and reached River Arno, the sun was setting, the river was gently flowing, it was a marvelous, enough for love at first sight with this city !

Florence is an extremely beautiful city situated on the banks of river Arno, between the Adriatic and Tirreno Seas, not much of traffic, no pollution, and no noise, what would I not do to have a home in this peaceful city and live my life here.



I didn’t see any industries in this city, tourism seems to be the biggest source of income for this city. Anyway I was tired,little more walk I reached the hotel and retired to bed.

I started exploration of Florence next day at around 9am, here are the pictures.

The first monument to see was ‘The Duomo’. The construction of this cathedral began in 1296 and the dome was added in 1436 AD. The original façade was demolished in 1587 and the present façade was recreated in 1887 by de Fabris.









The dome was designed by Filippo Brunelleschi and was the world’s largest when it was made.The frescoes in this dome are the work of Vasari and Federico Zuccaro.










The next is 'Palazzo Vecchio' (Old Palace). This was constructed in 1294 AD as the head quarters for the elected members of the Republic of Florence who formed the ‘Signoria’. The Medici family (most powerful family of Florence then) moved to this palace in 1540 AD , stayed here for 10 years and them moved to ‘Palazzo Pitti’



Here is the sectional graphical view of this palace.



This is the entrance to this palace


There were some beautiful work of sculpture around this palace. This is famous ‘David’ by Michelangelo made for this palace



The following picture is of ‘Neptune Fountain’ situated in Piazza della Signoria.



This is the sculpture of ‘Hercules and Caco’



The little cupid



‘Ufizzi Gallery’



The Ufizzi Gallery is the building located between the 'Piazza della Signoria' and the Arno river was constructed between 1560 and 1580. It was originally designed to host the archives and administrative offices of the state of Florence. In 1737 it was converted in museum.

Ponte Vechio



By now few terms were clear to me, like ‘Ponte’ means ‘bridge’ and ‘Via’ means ‘road’ and ‘Piazza’ means ‘square’
The 'Ponte Vechio' (old bridge) is, of course, the oldest bridge in town. There are lots of jewelery shops in this bridge for tourists.



The shops



Palazzo Pitti

After this I on the other side of the river is Palazzo Pitti. It was constructed in 1450 AD and it was the residence of the Medici family. This has now been turned in a museum and it took me about two hours to complete the round of this museum. It was not allowed to take photographs inside so I couldn’t take any



Palace from inside




Santa Croce church

This is the most famous church in whole of Florence due to the presence of the graves of artist like Michelangelo, Nicholav Machiavelli, and Galileo.



This is the tomb of Michelangelo





This is the tomb of Machiavelli



This is the tomb of Galileo



There is also a museum inside this church.



The omni present scooters of Italy




The day was coming to end and it was around 5 pm by this time and now the only thing left in my itinerary was visit to ‘Piazzale Michelangelo’. It is the highest point in Florence and one of the most beautiful sights in world and is always full of tourist.


There is a church here as well !.
This is the view of the church from city (with full zoom)



and now when I reach this place.



Below the photograph of Florence city which I took while spending the evening at this beautiful place.













The beautiful sunset from this place








This is the Santa Maria Novella Church.



One of the most beautiful cities of earth, the city of art from where came the term ‘Stendhal Syndrome’. This is the view of Florence at night

Postponed posts

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I kept on postponing writing about my Italy trip. It seemed to be an overwhelming task, describing the six days in Italy and about 400 pictures that I took there. Finally I decided to put up one post at a time and so here is the post about my stay in Venice.

More will come later.

Reaching Venice (15th June)

I was all set up for my six day trip of Italy, I had done all the preparation, bought a new backpack , packed my stuff, made sure I don’t forget essential things like camera , battery charger, noted down my credit card numbers in one note book and the VISA emergency number for Italy( incase I lost my cards).

The flight was of 0615 hours, which turned out too early than what I had expected at the time of booking the ticket or else I would not booked it. To catch the flight I took the 3 am bus from Hameenlinna . I had about an hour left for the flight to take off after I checked in.
You can see my flight getting ready




I killed the time by looking at all the preparations that are done before a plane takes off, the fuel being filled, luggage being loaded, and catering truck putting the supply in plane.

The plane started taxing at the runway and it took off, I was seating by the side of window next seats were occupied by a nice Finnish family of parents and their 3 kids going to Scotland for their vacation. I tried to catch some sleep on the flight but it wasn’t sufficient and by the time plane landed on Amsterdam airport I was feeling weary and tired.

After a stop of one hour I once again was on a different plane on my way to Venice. It was about ninety minute’s flight from Amsterdam to Venice, and though the flight departed late by 10 minutes, we reached Venice in time.

I had not checked my backpack so I got out of the terminal rather quickly and went to the tourist office at airport, I had the printout for the direction of my hotel but I thought of cross checking and then came out. The moment I came out I got stung by the heat, I could remember the same stinging I had received when I landed in Helsinki last october and came out of airport, the only difference - that time it was cold sting and now it was hot sting.

Visiting Venice

Anyway I reached Venice, a nice Italian lady was at the reception and after the formalities I checked in the room, it was 1 pm then.


A quick shower and I was ready to explore the ancient city of Venice, I took a bus from my hotel and reached the center of Venice, Piazzale Roma,





The place was crowded with tourist and it was so good to see people around and to experience the real summer, so different from Finland. But the good feeling didn’t last too long, when the heat of the Sun started becoming unbearable, I looked around saw a kiosk and got a can of coke to chill me.

I had the list of places with me to visit but I didn’t have the luxury of Lonely planet or Frommer’s book, so I had to get a map. I looked around and saw a tourist office and to my surprise they were selling the maps there and that too a good 2, 5 Euro for map of Venice. I took one, asked the guy to locate me on the map and I fixed my co-ordinates. I walked a few steps and came to the Canal Grande, I saw the Vaporetti’s, I had seen them lot of times in movies and telly but to see them myself was a different feeling. Without a second thought I bought ticket and hopped into one, didn’t bother to ask where it was going for all I was interested in was the ride.

I saw many boats on the canal, it was so different, taxis on boat, police on boat, the boat of postal department, the delivery guy on the boat, everything was being done through boat and there were no big streets, those flashy cars and huge Lorries.

I wanted to reach Piazza San Marco, the heart of Venice (atleast for the tourist), but since I didn’t know the place, I reached the casino place of Venice, the Lido island. From the Lido island I could see the Piazza San Marco, this is the picture of San Marco from there.


After this I took a ferry and reached Piazza San Marco, this is the biggest space in Venice much different to the criss cross of streets, alleys and canals. This is also one of the busiest place in town.
See below the maze of tourist



Below are all pictures of this Piazza





Top view of this place( will tell you later where I got this top view from)



Basilica of San Marco,

One of the most beautiful cathedrals which I have ever seen, this Basilica was constructed in the 9th century.


One more view of the Basilica



side view of this



Top view of the Basilica



Palazzo Ducale

This was the old residence of one time ruler of Venice the Dogos. It has wonderful arcades and light facade. It was very difficult to capture the whole palace in one frame.



The top view of this palace


The white building next to Dogos palace is the jail where Casanova and Galileo Galilei spent part of their lives



After this I had to check out the map once again

I witnessed the traffic jam in Venice , yes in the Canal Grande, here is the picture



The Gondolas are the one of the essential things if you want to spend some quality romantic time in Venice, but mind you, they are expensive,



Ponte di Rialto

This is one of the most popular and famous bridge of Venice. The artist for this bridge was Antonio da Ponte selected after the proposals by likes of Michelangelo, Sansovino and Palladio.

Here is the bridge



This is the view of the Canal Grande from this bridge, this used to be the harbour of Venice till the earlier part of 15th century.



Opposite to Piazza San Marco is the Chiesa della Salute



The construction of this church began in 1631.


There are two important museums which are very near to this place, they are ‘Accademia’, and the ‘Raccolta Peggy Guggenheim’.


Situated in the Adriatic sea, infront of San Marco is the island of San Giorgio. Here is the picture of it among the blue sea water



The white church that you can see in the photograph above is the Church of Saint George. This church is the work of Palladio. Here is the view of inside of the church,


This island is not that busy and only three other tourist were there when I reached around 2 pm, inside the church were only me and pastor. The pastor came to me, we talked and he was kind enough to give me the tour of the whole church.
Here is the famous painting of ‘Tintoretto’(last supper)




More picture inside the lonely church. I did a small prayer in the church and lighted a candle. There were lot of other beautiful paintings in this church

This is me standing outside the church and in the background you can see the San Marco Basilica. Since I was alone, I took this picture by setting the timer on my camera and putting it on a wall, obviously the setting was not correct so the frame grazed my head.



This is one more view of the island with a little less zoom, such a peaceful sight, an island standing alone in the sea



Here is one more church, which is situated at Ferrovio, next to Santa Lucia train station. This church is known as Campo S Stefano



In the Piazza San Marco is the bell tower. The clock in this tower marks the hours, the season, the moon phases and Zodiac. There is a lift which takes you to the top of bell tower after buying a ticket of 6 Euros. I went to the top and from there I took most of the top views.

The moment I reached the bell started to ring for 1 pm I guess and the sound was deafening.



Here are few other pictures that I took from the Bell tower.



The Adriatic sea



The sea
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Here are few more random pictures I took in Venice





















The famous masks of Venice




This was the end of my two day visit of the beautiful city of Venice and on the evening of 16th I took the train to reach Florence.