ANDY’S SWISS TRAVEL 21

I woke up on only 2 hours of sleep and I couldn’t be any happier. At 7:30am Sasha and I started our wonderful 2 day trip to Milano, Italy.

We were so excited we didn’t even worry about eating breakfast. It took us three hours and 45 minutes to reach the Milano Centrale. However before we arrived in Milano the train was delayed because a young lady in her 20s had to be escorted out the train because her mom was beating her up. Once we arrived in the train station I was surprised, the Milano I’m use to seeing on television was not the one I saw when I got off the train. The area was surrounded by crack heads and very poor people (I felt like I was in the hood). Sasha and I immediately ran to use the bathrooms and had to pay 1 Euro each to use a nasty filthy bathroom. After we used the bathroom we sprinted to convert our money into Euros and get a map from the tourist office. At approximately 12:00pm we found a Mc Donald’s outside the train station we each ate a Big Mac meal with French fries and a coke. The food was expensive (14 Euros) – at least it tasted fresh and good.

After we were done with our meal we started walking the streets of Milano. It was a mission to get some help since 90% of the people didn’t speak English or Spanish. We were able to find a man at a Western Union office who helped us out with the map by letting us know where the tourist areas were.

As Sasha and I started walking, we felt better about being in Milano as the streets started looking much cleaner with the appearance of museums. We immediately ran into the (Natural Art ) Museum which was fabulous. The museum tour lasted about 25 minutes because we had a lot to do. Following the brief stop at the museum we started feeling like we were in heaven we started walking towards the Piazza del Duomo (main tourist area) in Milano. I felt right at home we ran into several stores (Dolce & Gabbana, Diesel, Calvin Jeans and H&M).

Finally at 2:00pm on this beautiful and sunny day our walking paid off, we had reached the Piazza del Duomo. We were walking in heaven on cobble stone roads. First thing I saw was a train with a sign that read Custo Barcelona, a famous high end fashion designer from Spain. Along with the lettering he had plenty of models in the advertisement for his fall 2009 fashion designs. The colors and the way the models posed was amazing. Once we were in the plaza Sasha and I were happy because we felt like we were in the real Milano. We went inside the Escada, Burberry, Max Mara, Giorgio Armani, Dolce & Gabbana, Bulgari and Fendi stores. Unfortunately we weren’t allowed to take pictures inside the stores (store policy). The prices were high but the clothes were flawless, now I know why Milano is considered one of the worlds fashion capitals.

Distraction settled in and we had realized we had not called our professors to notify them that we had arrived safely. Then we stopped browsing through the shops and purchased a 10 dollar phone card. The instructions on the damn phone card were in Italian, we asked several locals for help and we received none. I felt like I paid 10 euros for a phone card that was useless. Once done with the shops we wanted to go into Duomo (one of the biggest cathedral in all of Europe). The line to enter was at around 300 people; therefore instead we took pictures and had a prayer in front of the cathedral. I felt good because churches make me feel at peace and give me spiritual stability.

After we exited the front of Duomo we headed to the metro to take a 30 minute train ride to my aunt’s house. We encountered another issue we didn’t know which train would take us to her home. Luckily a Metro employee who saw us struggling came up to us; it was like God sent an angel from heaven to help us. The man spoke perfect Italian but also Spanish because he was born in the Dominican Republic. He helped us buy our metro passes and walked us down to the correct train. After a 30minute train ride and a long walk we reached our aunt’s house.

Arriving at my aunt’s house made this whole experience worthwhile, seeing her again after 16 years was priceless. She hugged me and ask me “what happened to my brown glasses” I laughed and responded that I last used those when I was 7 years old. It was a very emotional reunion; we sat down for a few hours and spoke about the last 16 years of our lives. She immediately called my mother and they both started crying over the phone because my mother thought I was joking about my whole trip to Milano. I was so happy to reunite with my aunt and seeing my older cousins Jorge (23) and Eimy (20) was cool because they are still humble as they were years ago. Later on that afternoon came in Matthias (13) and Giovanni (11) my aunt’s 2 kids from her Italian marriage, the kids were happy to see me and so was I, we had never met before. After all the joy, laughter and catch up we were finally able to reach Professor Blake-Neis. We took the opportunity to notify her we were fine.

I was tired as the night came in but reached deep within myself for energy when my aunt started cooking an Italian and Dominican meal fused together. We had some Dominican styled steak with peppers onions and pasta with melted cheese, carrots and cucumbers. Thank you Lord Christ for this meal, it was tasty and everything I had been craving for the last 20 days. Overall, today’s events were great; the day was full of laughs and happiness. I am so happy to be in Milano, its feels like an outer body experience something that words can’t describe.

Sasha and I had 1 latte marchiatto each at the main plaza while we waited for our train to come. At 2:25pm we boarded our train and it took us 4 hours to get back to SSTH. Once we reached Chur we were starving, since on Sunday’s Chur is such a ghost town, the only place open was Cindy’s Dinner. I had an all Americano burger (lettuce, beef, bacon, pickles, onions and mustard), large fries and a medium coke. The food was delicious I was surprised because Cindy’s burgers tasted similar to Johnny Rockets burgers (New York).

I will not lie – over the two days I missed my professors and classmates. Upon entrance at SSTH we were greeted by Prof. Blake-Neis, Dr. Garely, Shevy and Sarah. I was happy to see them it felt like an eternity without seeing them. We immediately started chatting with them and gave them all the details of our wonderful weekend away from Chur. Everyone on campus noticed a change even Professor Blake-Neis loved my cream Ralph Lauren Military button down. I guess the sun in Milano did me justice over the weekend. Once the long chat was done I started blogging at 11pm I was done and went straight to bed.