The rest of Milan!

Just a little taste of Milan. More description below.  

Ok, the moment you have been waiting for...I will finally finish my elaborate description of the Milan trip.  I can't believe that was already more than 2 weeks ago.
So Wednesday morning was the viewing of The Last Supper.  After that we split into two groups and went separately to lunch and an academic visit. My group first went to a company called Well at Work.  We watched a presentation describing what they do (help companies who are having difficulties, either with low production or poor employee satisfaction and they help find ways to increase well-being in the workplace) and then we reviewed a case study and made up our own solutions to the company’s problem. Well at Work is not fully based on psychology, but they do use lots of Industrial/Organizational Psychology theories and methods.  It was interesting to see that information being put to use in a real-life situation.
 By the time that visit was over we were very ready for the delicious lunch we had at a restaurant called the Fashion Bar.  Food was great…and I got to sit in a throne.  What more could I want?

Thursday was by far the best day in Milan (and that is tough because they all were really great!).  We got on a bus in the morning and drove through the hazy Italian morning towards Lake Como, a lake and small city north of Milan, which is only about 5 km from Switzerland.  Too bad we didn’t spend an extra 10 minutes so I could’ve crossed another country off my list. Oh well I would still like to actually visit Switzerland at some point in the future.  So Lake Como…ah gorgeous, gorgeous Lake Como.  The weather was phenomenal.  We had about an hour of free time before we met for a walking tour.  Lauren and I explored the Duomo a little (different Duomo than in Milan, obviously…that is just the general name for “massive house of God”).  Then we window shopped and bought a few souvenirs.  I bought a cute Italian scarf  from a street vendor and we found some pasta and honey at a sweet little shop run by a super cute older couple.  Then we went on our walking tour and finally, our boat tour.  It was amazing.  This city is right on the edge of the lake which is surrounded by hillsides that are just packed with beautiful villas of all shapes and sizes.

If I recall correctly, this is the oldest building around the Lake area.

Lake Como is very well known for the many famous people who reside there for at least part of the year. George Clooney and his 3 villas were the most anticipated photo op of the day.  Unfortunately George won’t live there again until May and we only saw his 3 villas from far away and through the haziness.

Yeah...they are in there somewhere, I promise. 

But still…it was pretty cool knowing George Clooney spends a few months of each year enjoying the lake we were currently enjoying.  After the boat tour Katie, Kelsey, Leslie, Lauren and I found a swanky restaurant that had outdoor seating…on a rooftop balcony.  It was breathtaking.  Wonderful weather, delicious food and a great view of red-roofed Italian houses and green Italian gardens.  Gah, I miss it already.
The trip to Lake Como ended in gelato (surprise!) and the purchase of my new Swatch Watch!

Thursday evening we got all gussied up and went out to a jazz show.  Granted it was not the greatest jazz I have ever heard (I think it was a electronica/rock/sound effectsy kind of jazz…not exactly music to my ears), we still had a good time drinking wine and soaking in the atmosphere.  We decided to head back to the hotel but I was very persistent about wanting to find a place to dance.  I thought maybe we could find a club or something but we found something even better! About 2 blocks away from the jazz show we begin to hear some folksy music and shortly after that we saw a bunch of people in the middle of the square doing line dances!  It was amazing.  We quickly joined in…having no clue what we were doing and busting a gut laughing the entire time.  The kind Italians tried to explain some of it to us and we did our best to figure out which leg to kick when and how many steps to take to the right and left.  It was a hoot and a half.  I think that was probably the best bonding experience I have had so far because I got to see my friends being awesomely ridiculous, enjoying the music, experiencing a completely different culture and not caring that we didn’t know what was going on.   Thanks to the Milano Clown Festival (the actual reason of the dancing) the rest of the walk home consisted of singing and dancing and hilariously high spirits.  It was such a great way to spend our last night in Milan.

Friday was our final day in Italy.  We had one academic visit to a researcher named Fredrico Colombo.  He is a “big-wig” in the Italian Association of Positive Psychology and most of his work is based off some older theories of The 14 Fundamentals of Happiness.  I don’t have my notes right now so I will post the specific 14 steps later, but it was a fairly interesting visit.  A lot of us didn’t actual agree with the idea that happiness is as easy as 1...2...14, but it is still a great learning experience to see a professional and learn what you do and don’t agree with.
We then had some free time, which Lauren and I used as time to search for the perfect cannoli…and accidentally end up on the complete opposite side of the city than the place we were supposed to meet the class  for lunch.  We had a great time, perused some bakeries, wandered around a strange version of a farmer’s market (there were stalls with candy, meat, cheese, jewelry, shirts, scarfs, underwear and so on and so forth) and finally found a place to get cannolis.  It was then that we realized where we actually needed to be so we began a very fast paced walk towards lunch. We made it, sweaty and tired, but the sandwich I had at lunch was pretty epic with its thinly sliced smoked tuna, spinach and oranges.  I have never had an orange on a sandwich…and to make it even better, this was a red Italian orange (that seems like a major contradiction…but yes, oranges in Italy are more red than orange). But it was delicious and I am pleased I branched out a little.

And finally how could we end to trip without some final gelato?  We couldn’t.  DIS bought us all gelato and just to live it up, I had 3 scoops!  Of course I finished it all without too much trouble and was quite satiated.
Back at the hotel we had a quick wrap up session, packed our stuff and got back on the bus to the airport.
I could hardly believe it was over so quickly.  5 days in beautiful Milan was more than I could’ve asked for and it was definitely a trip to be remembered.  Arrivederci Italy…tak for all the memories.