30
Apr

A Couple of Lasts… (Part 2)

By Abby 0 Comments
Categories: Field Trips

On the last of our Italy trips together, we visited “Central” Italy, with sites in Modena, Bologna, Prato, Lucca, and Carrara. Since the architects, artists, and planners had separate itineraries for parts of the trip, I’ll talk about the version I experienced.

Our first stop was the Museo Casa Enzo Ferrari in Modena. The museum consists of two structures: a modest brick structure (the home of Enzo Ferrari) encompassed by a gigantic electric yellow sculptural edifice (which houses the exhibition gallery, bookshop, and café). The interior of the brick structure houses a multimedia exhibition of Ferrari’s life, touching upon subjects of not only his illustrious career as driver and car-maker but also his personal life. In addition to old photographs and video relaying the events of his life, this part of the museum housed his personal mementoes, such as his journals and writing utensils. They even had a setup of his office. But the coolest part of the museum of course was the exhibition gallery, which showcased classic older models along with newer ones.

Entrance To Exhibition Gallery (left) & Up Close & Personal With One of the Models (right)

From the Ferrari Museum, we went to the San Cataldo Cemetery by Aldo Rossi, also in Modena. Personally, visiting cemeteries makes me really uncomfortable and this one wasn’t any different. I guess the discomfort rises from coming to terms with the limits of one’s existence and being surrounded by a massive complex that is created for the purpose of immortalizing the limits of human existence has the power to silence everything else, which is exactly what Rossi does with his relentless austere and orthogonal forms. The weight of the project was felt despite its incompletion. Before departing Modena for Bologna, we took a quick walking tour of the historical center, through porticoed streets to the Piazza Grande and Cathedral, with some of us stumbling upon dried fruit and fried food vendors in an open-air market around the way.

San Cataldo Cemetery

On our first day in Bologna, we took another historical center walking tour. We walked through two of the biggest piazzas: Piazza Maggiore and Piazza del Nettuno, on our way to San Petronio, which was probably the best church we visited on that trip, in my opinion, despite it being the coldest one we visited. After a quick stop at the Archiginnasio and the Anatomical Theatre, we wandered around the complex of Santo Stefano, an interesting labyrinth of a building. After missing the group meeting time following an intense lunch convo with a couple of my fellow classmates, we climbed the Asinelli Tower ourselves. Climbing that tower was a serious workout and I’m definitely not as in shape as I convince myself. In any case, once we got the windy top (seriously, that’s not a place to try and maintain any type of a good hair day), the views of the city were worth the struggle to get to the top. Following our slow descent (those stairs are not to code at all), we tried to catch up with the larger group at Carlo Scarpa’s Negozio Gavina. Now the trouble with splitting up with the rest of the group is trying to find them with limited Italian skills. So after asking a couple of locals, with enough Italian between the three of us to understand different parts of their directions, we finally found the Negozio Gavina, a former furniture store converted into a modern-day toy store. But our adventures that day did not end there. After our lunch break, we visited Le Corbusier’s Esprit Nouveau Pavilion, attended a presentation at the architecture studio of Mario Cucinella, and chilled out on the rooftop of a nearby municipal building done by the Cucinella studio.

View From Asinelli Tower

Tree In Esprit Nouveau Pavilion

The following day we made our way to Lucca, with a brief stop in Prato. In the Lucca, we took another wondrous walking tour of the center. What surprised me about Lucca was the amount of people out enjoying the city. Our walking tour took us out of the center and to part of the wall circuit, where our tour ended and our bike rides began. Several of us rented some bikes and rode a couple of laps atop the wall circuit, which was one of the best experiences thus far.

On the final day, we headed to Carrara, the town known for its marble. Our first stop: Nicoli & Lyndham Sculpture Studio. Though it was a Sunday and the studio was empty, our enthusiastic host definitely kept us entertained, as she gave us a tour of the studio, showed us some exclusive works in progress, and told us stories of rebellious workers and Naomi Campbell mispronouncing Versace in her studio. After a quick lunch break, we made the ambitious journey to our next and final stop: the Fantiscritti Quarry. Arriving several hours later than planned, we finally made it to the top, and the views of Carrara below – priceless. A couple Indiana Jones-esque rides back down, we headed on our long journey back to Rome.

View From Top of Quarry

30
Apr

A Couple of Lasts…(Part 1)

By Abby 0 Comments
Categories: Field Trips

As we head into that wonderful time of the semester, where all the tension runs high in the mad dash to finish, let’s pause and talk about a couple of lasts. A couple of lasts? Yes, even though Microsoft Word urges me that phrase is grammatically incorrect; you all know what I mean. A couple of weeks ago, we experienced a couple of lasts: our last weekend day trip and the last of our Italy trips together. Sad stuff? I know.

In our last event-packed weekend day trip, we visited three Lazio region cities: Caprarola, Bagnaia, and Bomarzo.

If you’ve heard of Caprarola, then you’ve most likely heard of the Palazzo Farnese, which is the city’s claim to fame and main attraction. As an architecture student, I’ve had to study (and draw and redraw) this particular palazzo before even coming to Rome, and honestly, it’s more epic to experience in real life than on paper. Walking up the single main road (it’s true what they said; there really is only one main road in that town), the immense mass of the Palazzo reveals itself in all its “harmony and symmetry,” from its double ramped stairways to its series of terraces. The most on point features of the palazzo, in my opinion, were the central circular courtyard and the Scala Regia, one of the spiral staircases in the complex. Don’t get me wrong. The rooms of the apartments we visited were doing the most, in the best possible way, but after going through frescoed room after frescoed room, I was done, which made it that much sweeter when we finally visited the gardens. Walking over the bridge from the palazzo apartments, you realized how high up you are, with the city at a distance away below you. But once we crossed over, it was just the beginning of our tour of this expansive garden complex. On our ascent, we passed by the manicured hedges of the lower gardens, a “secret” garden, a stairway lined with bushes and trees in full bloom, until we finally made it to the main attraction: La Fontana della Catena dei Delfini and its accompanying casino. After weaving through another maze of seriously manicured hedges, we had finally reached our destination – the upper garden. To commemorate the moment, we all jumped…for joy. Not really, but there was a lot of jumping happening, as a few of my classmates decided to showcase their athletic prowess, collaborating to create an epic photo for the latest internet craze: hadouken-ing.

View of Circular Central Courtyard (left) & Fellow Visitors Enjoying the Fountain (right)

Just Hadouken-ing at the Palazzo Farnese Gardens. NBD.

After all the jumping was done (at least for the moment) and all the troops were rallied, we moved onto our next destination: Villa Lante in Bagnaia. Villa Lante was another complex I had studied pre-Rome, but mostly in section, so I didn’t really know what to expect. Honestly, it wasn’t as epic as the Palazzo Farnese, but it was still cool to experience it first hand. However, one thing I did enjoy more at the Villa Lante than Palazzo Farnese was the surplus of water elements. That place was not without water. Every level of that Villa had a prominent water feature, guaranteed. At the summit of the Villa, the hadouken-ing craze continued; this time, even one of our professors got involved.

View Down To Lower Garden

Don’t Mess With Hascup…

The last (and shortest) leg of our day trip was in the Monster Park of Bomarzo. With only forty-five minutes to explore the whole complex, we did what any respectful group of college students does in a park full of huge sculptures: ran around like little kids let loose at an amusement park, touching everything, and climbing into and onto anything. Literally. I’m sure that one guard roaming the grounds and the other visitors were entirely amused by our craziness. And even if they weren’t, va bene, we were having fun. To conclude this day of fun, a group of us played a couple rounds of varying versions of Crocadiley-Oh-My, followed by a slippery game of tag uphill.

18
Apr

Urban Planners Compile Neighborhood Studies

By Elliot Sperling 0 Comments
Categories: Uncategorized

Many of the Cornell in Rome blog posts have dealt with our travels, our breaks, and our wonderful food nights. However, we are still students studying here in Rome. With this post, I hope to show at least what the planners have been doing in the workshop course that we have. (For planning students the workshop course is our required intensive 6-credit course that we take while we are studying in Rome).

The past several weeks urban planning students have been working on neighborhood studies of four different neighborhoods in Rome: Eur, Val Melaina, Villa Gordiani, and Quarticciolo. We spent weeks interviewing residents finding out about neighborhood issues, neighborhood facilities, the history of each of the neighborhoods, and community associations and involvement. We looked into the current and future needs of the neighborhood through our resident interviews and also through our own group assessments of the neighborhood. We conducted surveys that included quantitative and qualitative measures to describe building typology, land-use, street typology, and several other assessments. Overall the work was very rewarding, and definitely gave me an experience that I could not get anywhere else.

Of course we all did have our difficulties. One challenge that we all realized rather quickly was the issue of communication. Many of us clearly could not speak Italian at a proficient level, and so a majority of us relied on our professors and teaching assistants for translations during several instances of speaking with residents and stakeholders in the neighborhood. Another challenge was making sure that we properly understood issues in terms of Italy as compared to many of our own backgrounds coming from the United States. Many of our neighborhoods were in borgate (peripheral neighborhoods of Rome) that did lack a lot of key services and wealth. However, unlike the United States, these neighborhoods still had plenty of access to fresh foods, (the food markets were tremendously cheaper than grocery stores), and despite their peripheral nature, they still were well-served by trams and buses. In the United States many poorer neighborhoods lack quality access to fresh foods and vegetables, markets are often expensive and unaffordable for many people, and public transportation is not very good especially in the periphery of cities.

The week before we submitted our compiled 60-100 page reports (that includes the appendix) we went on neighborhood visits of all the different neighborhoods. My neighborhood was Eur, which unlike the other neighborhoods was built to be a model city planned under Mussolini. The other neighborhoods on the other hand grew as a result of Mussolini pushing poorer residents outside the center of Rome into peripheral areas. Their histories clearly shaped the neighborhoods as they are seen today. Many of the residents in several of these neighborhoods really connect to their neighborhood histories in terms of how they see the future of their neighborhoods. Our reports delved into this area and a number of other areas in analyzing our neighborhoods. We plan to highlight the totality of our research and our final reports in our final exhibition in mid May.

Urban planners gathered together for a group photo from a previous study trip

Now that the urban planners have finished final reports of the specific neighborhoods we are on to our next assignment. All of us have split off into project groups to focus on certain topics and themes in Rome that we wish to explore in greater detail. My next project group is focusing on bicycles and the bicycle share system in Rome. Other project groups are focusing on issues such as placemaking by immigrant communities in Rome, Tiburtina station and its regional connections, water resources in Rome, and another group is looking into the Romani in Rome. These topics are definitely very focused, but the context that we are looking into deals with a large part of Rome, or all of Rome for that matter. What I really like about this project and the previous projects is how we are combining our research with practical experience. To compile our neighborhood reports we explored our individual neighborhoods and conducted neighborhood analyses with residents and stakeholders. With our next report we are also interviewing certain key contacts that deal with the issues we are exploring and for many of us we are going out into the field to conduct field assessments.

02
Apr

It’s…Over. (Ya. It’s Been For A Week.)

By Abby 1 Comment
Categories: Events

By now, I can safely assume that others are settled back into the routine workflow of classes and whatnot, but as for me, I find myself still having to come to terms with the fact that Spring Break is officially over. Maybe I just need a couple more days (or the end of this post) to find some closure. My Spring Break adventures were set in the charming cities of London and Paris, one a city I’ve always had a desire to visit and the other a city I’ve been in love with since childhood.

My accomplice, we’ll just call her J-Boog, and I arrived in London at the witching hour of 3:00 AM on Saturday at our hostel in the South Kensington area, after an extensive journey into the city center from Stansted Airport. Honestly, this was my first hostel experience, so I did not really know what to expect, but it was definitely interesting to say the least. After clearing up a booking mishap with the exceptionally accommodating administration of the hostel, J-Boog and I were able to settle in a room with our fellow classmate, who was also visiting London with her option studio.

The Hour Glass, a good place to get burgers if you are ever in South Kensington (left) & The Sculpture Above The Entrance Lobby of The Victoria & Albert Museum (right)

On our first day, we grabbed a late lunch of jackets (essentially a baked potato filled with “toppings”) and burgers at The Hour Glass and visited the Victoria and Albert Museum. Though London is generally a bit on the pricier end of places to visit, one of the best aspects of the city for a broke college student are the free museums (and the quality of these free museums). The Victoria and Albert museum not only had a bunch of artifacts from Medieval and Renaissance eras and varying regions of the Middle East and Asia, but also had collections of architectural models, drawings, and material explorations (exhibits looking at techniques used with different materials).  That night looking for a place with good music to dance to, with a bit of advice from the chillest Australian guy who worked at the front desk of our hostel, we stumbled upon the area of Camden Town. At night (or at least that night) Camden Town is a hyperactive Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night of a college town (or wherever masses of college students are gathered) all combined in one, set in an abandoned-looking amusement park, if that makes any sense. Even though, we never found a dance spot with music to our liking, we did find an awesome place (the name escaping me at the moment) to eat some good doner wraps for a cheap price.

View of Camden High Street (left) & Street Art Behind A Street Vendor Stand (right)

Curious as to what Camden Town looks like during the day, we decided to spend the second day of our London adventures in the daytime version of Camden Town. Truth be told, daytime Camden Town is just as amusing as nighttime Camden Town. During the day, Camden Town is basically a large-scale open market, with not only permanent shops set up in the buildings that look like they’ve come straight out of a comic book but also open air stalls that are set up in each available empty lot. After several hours of street photography and haggling with the street vendors, we all headed to Trafalgar Square to try and catch the last bit of the St. Patrick’s Day parade. Sadly, once we got to Trafalgar, they were already cleaning up the remnants of the planned festivities; however, the people around us had only started their celebration. After a quick stop at a Caffé Nero for some mochas, cappuccinos, and a delicious slice of chocolate chip cheesecake, we walked the area and snapped pictures of the London Eye, the Palace of Westminster, the Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, and (many) of London’s infamous red phone booths. To end our night, we followed the locals and ended up grabbing a pint at a nearby pub, celebrating the end of the St. Patty’s festivities.

Trafalgar Square (far left), Locals Decked Out In St. Patty’s Gear (center left), The London Eye (center right), Big Ben (far right)

On the third and final day in London, we decided to visit the Borough Markets in Southwark for breakfast, sampling wild boar ravioli, spinach and cheese empanadas, and mini coconut pancakes.  After we had our fill, we walked along the south bank of the Thames River under ominous rain clouds, visiting the More London development and the Tower Bridge. Before heading to the Tate Modern, we got caught under the rain and decided to have a cup of coffee in the café of London’s City Hall. Once the rain passed (for the moment), we made it to the Tate Modern, with an hour to spare before the museum’s closing. Never walked through a museum so quickly but well worth it, especially the installation and sculptural exhibits on the top floor. Exiting the museum, we were met again with the cold, relentless rain, as we walked across the Millennium Bridge to find some means of transportation back to our hostel.

Tate Entrance Space (left), Tate Exterior (center), & View On Millennium Bridge (right)

The next morning, J-Boog and I parted ways with out fellow classmate and headed for Paris, where we stayed with my crazy hospitable aunt (SHOUT OUT TO MY AUNT, even though I know she won’t read this…). Although, we had arrived in the early evening, the travel fatigue hit us hard and we both knocked out early.

After several hours of much needed rest, the next morning (more so early afternoon) we walked along the Champs-Élysées (stopping at Ladurée only take pictures, since the price for a macaroon was too steep for our meager budget) to the Arc De Triomphe. After spending fifteen minutes photographing the Arc and figuring out how to get to it without being run over, we got our free tickets (France also provides free or discounted admission to a lot of its museums and monuments for people under the age of 25) to ascend the Arc De Triomphe. From the crazy view at the top, we found our next destination to visit: the Eiffel Tower. Mapless, we descended the Arc de Triomphe and blindly walked in the direction of the Eiffel Tower. On our walk to the Tower, J-Boog and I had a conversation about getting around cities, like France and Rome for example, by means of locating monuments and simply walking in that general direction. This means of getting around cities you’re unfamiliar with can be frustrating for some but could also be a fun way of discovering places you wouldn’t have found if you had a direct and clear route to a destination, such as open air food markets or discount shoe and clothing stores.

L’Arc De Triomphe (left) & View From The Arc (right)

By far, my favorite structure ever is the Eiffel Tower and the views from the top are the best in Paris, without a doubt. Climbing the over six hundred steps and taking the elevator to the top was worth it, even with the freezing cold temperatures at the top balcony. Following our ridiculous photo session at the top of the Eiffel Tower, we spotted our final destination for the day: the Grande Arche de la Défense. Reluctantly, we descended the Eiffel Tower and headed back to the Arc de Triomphe, which would put us right on axis with the Grande Arche.

Eiffel Tower (left) & Views From 2nd Floor (center) And Top (right)

There is something to be noted about the setup of the distance of the Grande Arche de la Défense and the Arc de Triomphe: it may look walking distance, but it really isn’t. It is far, to say the least. Do not attempt this walk if you are not in shape. On our hour and a half walk to La Défense, we passed by the Palais Des Congress building and crossed over the Seine River. As we walked down the Champs-Élysées (which then turned into a highway as we got closer to La Défense), we noticed the drastic change from traditional French residential architecture to modern skyscrapers. Finally reaching the La Défense area, we realized it was an entire development of recent (or seemingly recent) structures for the business district of Paris. Besides all the existing structures and the ones under construction, the area was sprinkled with large-scale installations and sculptures, an unexpected revelation that was more interesting than the Grande Arche itself, in my opinion.

Raymond Moretti Installation (left) & La Grande Arche (right)

Day two of our Paris adventures ended up being a museum day, starting with the Louvre, which honestly needs a few days to go through the entirety of its collection. That museum is honestly doing the most. The highlights of our visit included: the indoor sculpture garden, Napoléon’s apartments, the crowded concert scene to view the Mona Lisa (seriously, seeing people’s determination to get through the crowds to see this painting was more epic than the painting itself), and of course I.M. Pei’s glass triangle.  After a short, brisk walk to the mid-point of the Tuileries Garden across the way from the Louvre, we decided to head to the Pompidou Center.  Of all the works in the Pompidou, the Soto (Venezuelan sculptor and painter) exhibit caught my attention the most for its ability to create depth with simple materials and methods.

Room In Napoleon’s Decked Out Apartments (far left), The Chaos To See The Mona Lisa (center left), Under I.M. Pei’s Triangle (center right), Soto Cube Installation (far right)

Our third day was a mishmash of different sites: starting with Corbusier’s Maison La Roche in the late morning; followed by a visit to the Memorial de la Deportation, the Pont des Arts (the bridge with the love locks), Notre Dame, the Jussieu Campus atrium, and Moulin Rouge, which spanned through the afternoon into the early evening.

Maison La Roche Living Room (far left), Memorial De La Deportation (center left), Pont Des Artes Love Locks (center right), Jussieu Campus Atrium (far left)

Notre Dame (left) & Moulin Rouge (right)

The following day we arose early to make the long journey to Poissy, France to visit Villa Savoye, a building that has been engrained in our brains by our professors. I would say something about the building, but honestly it wouldn’t do it any justice. I’ll just say it’s definitely a building to experience apart from all the texts and drawings of it.  To end our day, we trooped up to Montmarte and Sacre Coeur, which I would say is the second best vantage point in Paris of the city. When we got to the top, we were able to enjoy not only the view of the city as the late afternoon sun transformed into early evening darkness but also the various spontaneous “street” performances.

Villa Savoye

Terrace View (left), View From Living Room To Stair (center), Possible The Most Comfortable Chair (right)

View From Montmartre

On our final day before returning to Rome, we spent the day at Versailles. The palace, as extravagant as it is, was a so-so experience, compared to the gardens (even in its bare state), which is just an obscene show of large scale landscaping. To get the full experience of the garden, we would need another several days (something we did not have) to get around the whole complex, which is stunt we were not going to attempt in half a day. So we settled to have a chilled out lunch in the cute restaurant on site, which I would say was an appropriate end to our exhausting Spring Break excursion.

View To Palace From Garden

As much fun as I had during Spring Break, it’s nice to be back in Rome. I guess I’ve gotten my closure…Maybe.

27
Mar

Hexameter

By Abby 0 Comments
Categories: Architecture

A little late but finally found some time from all the fun work and travel to post this… A couple weeks ago, we had Pablo Castro, co-founder (along with Jennifer Lee) of OBRA Architects, discuss his ways of not only designing architecture but also defining architecture. The lecture, which he appropriately titled Hexameter, was divided into six categories, with each category (a sort commandment or law followed) defining the prominent focus of the projects he discussed. The first category, or law, he stated was SELF. The OBRA project related to self – Villa of Captured Distance – located in Inner Mongolia, China, was part of the Ordos 100 project, a development of one hundred villas each designed by a separate architect, with the whole project curated by Ai Wei Wei. The Villa of Captured Distance embodied the idea of self because it played with not only looking at the whole (in this case the other 99 villas) in relation to oneself but also introspection.

Villa of Captured Distance

After SELF comes PLACE, or the idea of site specificity. Casa En La Finca, or House of Multiple Horizons, the OBRA project tied to PLACE, is set in an orchard in the Andes Mountains of San Juan, Argentina. The law of PLACE is prominent in the design of the spaces of this project, which are devised around the existing placement of the orchard trees.

Casa En La Finca (House of Multiple Horizons)

The third category Castro defined was SPACE. In their Centrifugal Villa, OBRA used the idea of designing space by working around a space, hollowing out the villa center and composing program and landscape around this central point.

Centrifugal Villa

Interior Shot Centrifugal Villa

Next in this series is FORM, an idea that is evident in the Oxymoron Pavilion created for the Hong Kong Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism in Shenzhen, China. Castro described this project as “an un-monumental monument,” where this monumental form was created with un-monumental material, generating the idea of giving significance to everyday things through form and materiality.

Oxymoron Pavilion

Following FORM is LIGHT, a category OBRA played with in their BEATFUSE! Project, which was the winner of the 2006 MOMA PS1 Young Architects Program. BEATFUSE! uses mesh of polypropylene stretched over a digitally fabricated frame to filter light and define the main public space of the program.

BEATFUSE!

The final law of Hexameter is TIME and OBRA introduced narrative to capture time in their Freedom Park Museum in Pretoria, South Africa. The bulba shaped museum, which reflects the shape of the Bulba tree (a container historically used as graves by the people of the community), follows a sequence to freedom from apartheid as one ascended the interior spaces, producing a living monument.

Freedom Park Museum

Freedom Park Museum Interior

Though these categories are concepts we deal with on a daily basis within the design process, it is always enlightening to see how others define and use them within their own work.

27
Mar

spring break: traveling the right way

By Elliot Sperling 0 Comments
Categories: Uncategorized

A lot of us are returning from Spring break from all different places, and, of course, with such different experiences from the places we visited. I personally made a trip to Berlin, Prague, and Budapest. Coordinating it was essential to making sure that everything would work out, and if it did not, I had back-up plans. I arranged all my dates of travel beforehand and bought all my tickets for trains and planes. I also booked all of the hostels I stayed at with two of my other friends in our program. However, some things are better planned out when you get to a place. I found these past 8 days of travel and my research beforehand provided me some great knowledge on how to do things right when it comes to  traveling in Europe.

First of all,  I found it essential to compare prices of different travel options. Flying is often the cheapest way to travel, but it is not always. This is often a mistake people make when booking cheap flights like Easyjet and Ryanair. There are instances where rail is cheaper and often more convenient. I found this especially to be the case in what is considered “Eastern Europe” by the former Soviet occupation boundaries. It is also important to take into account transportation costs, because with rail it is from central city to central city thereby avoiding unnecessary and some times expensive options of getting from the airport to the central city. However, with long distances and expensive high speed trains as the only viable alternative, rail becomes far less appealing. It really matters what the destinations are in determining which is cheapest. I did a little bit of both. I flew to Berlin and back from Budapest to Rome. I took a train from Berlin to Prague and from Prague to Budapest. The above travel plans I determined from what were the cheapest options and the most comfortable. Trains are often the most comfortable option because they allow you to see landscapes along the way, they run on a very tight schedule (trains face many less delays than planes in Europe), and they let you avoid the hassle of getting to/from airports. Buses are also an option, and they are often cheaper, but as many in our program can tell you, they can become an absolute misery to ride in. Trains are often quicker, make less stops, and do not hit traffic. European countries also put tremendous investments into their rail. So if you do travel by trains you get to see a bit of that investment.

A view from my train car window from Prague to Budapest

Berlin Hbf: a stunningly beautiful train station

In terms of hostels, always book beforehand and look for those with good ratings and close proximity to the different parts of the city. There are a lot of great hostels out there, and it only takes a little research to find them. Often times by choosing a more central hostel location there is no longer a need to buy public transit tickets, or there is less of a need for bigger cities. Part of the reason I chose cities like Berlin, Prague, and Budapest for spring break is because they are very cheap to stay in, eat in, and they are stunningly beautiful and vibrant cities. I found hostels in these cities from as low as 6 Euros to around 18 Euros a night. They were all great hostels because I checked the reviews beforehand and for one of them I waited for the price to go down to reach a last-minute special price.

When it comes time to seeing the cities I think it is important to have a good mix of tourist stuff and local stuff. You can usually distinguish between the two by seeing what kind of people are in both places. There are definitely things as a tourist that have to be done, especially if they are free. However, some things I find very unnecessary and a waste of money. Paying 10 Euros to take an elevator ride up a building when you could just pay nothing to climb up a hill right nearby and see a similar view really makes it not worth it to me. I found great views just by climbing up to the castle in Prague and up to the art museum in Budapest. The absolute worst waste of money in my opinion is tourist buses. You could just ride a city bus and use a public transit card. It would save you 10-20 Euros, and would give you a far better feeling of a place by seeing locals in front of you on the bus while seeing the scenery outside rather than seeing the locals through a stained glass bus window. Of course sometimes it is worth paying to obtain views from above (never ever from tourist buses though), when the building itself is worth seeing. In cases like the Duomo in Milan or Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, go to the top and see the view. These buildings are spectacular and worth seeing at all vantage points [Barcelona is a trip I did separately from the program].

One of the many free views offered from the hills of Prague

A view from a climb up to the castle in Budapest

The last lesson I have is to use local knowledge to your benefit. I heard in Prague that last-minute tickets can be incredibly cheap to see a philharmonic concert. So, my second day in Prague I headed to the box office and heard there was a concert that night. I checked with the person at the ticket office and discovered that I could sit in the second row and pay only 130 Czech Koruna for a last-minute ticket (in United States dollars that is about $6.50). $6.50 for a second-row seat in the Rudolfinum, one of the oldest concert halls in Europe with some of the best acoustics, to watch a Czech Philharmonic classical music performance! This concert was a highlight of my trip and it cost me only $6.50. So, seeing amazing things really does not have to be a huge expense if you hear  word-of-mouth of such a great deal as the one in Prague. There are also great student discounts in many of the European museums. I paid half-price off  what already was a cheap ticket to see wonderful art museums, Jewish museums, and Greek and Roman museums that showcase antiquity (I know it is a bit humorous to visit such museums when I live in Rome, but these museums in Berlin displaying antiquity were fantastic).

Inside the Rudolfinum

As for doing what the locals do, that is something I always try to emulate. They go to certain restaurants, shop at the local markets, and take a stroll in certain squares because they find them to be the best assets of their city. Instances like eating at a restaurant are times where you do not want to be a tourist surrounded by other tourists. You get a much better deal and much higher quality by going where locals go. Also, get ready to do some math when you travel outside where the Euro and Swiss Franc are used. Once you enter countries like Czech Republic and Hungary the conversion rates are no longer so simple. For the Czech Koruna it is about 19.6 CZK per $1 and for the Hungarian Forint it is about 235 HUF per $1. In Budapest I had to get used to paying 1400-2500 Forint for a good meal and 150-220 Czech Koruna in Prague (which after the conversion rates are so much cheaper than meals in Rome). Had my travel plans included expensive cities in Western Europe I would have done a lot more grocery shopping. The big changes in prices between cheap and expensive cities are in terms of such things as restaurants, hostels and hotels, tourist attractions (but not always), and regional and local transportation (in most cases forget about taking a long-distance train for 20 or 30 Euros, as is the case in more Eastern European cities).

Lastly, don’t forget to have at least one splurge. The last day I was in Budapest I went to the Szechenyi Baths where for 4100 Forint (still only about $17) I was given access to 7 different baths (indoors and outdoors) ranging from temperatures of 20 degrees celsius (way too cold for me) to 60 degrees celsius (2 minutes and I am out of that bath, or I would start cooking). They were mineral baths, and many of them had jets. It was extremely relaxing and felt like a real vacation. The powerful winds and the slightly above freezing temperatures also added to the experience. It was also a place I could spend hours in, which I chose not to so I could visit some other places in Budapest that day.

One of the seven baths at Szechenyi

Also, it adds to the experience to visit places with vastly different languages. I spent 4 days hearing German everywhere I went, 2 days hearing Czech, and 2 days hearing Hungarian. Hungarian and Czech are some of the most difficult languages to learn, especially Hungarian. Hungarian is not even an Indo-European language. It is more closely related to languages in Western Siberia. So, even with my ability to pick up a few words in different languages, I could not even begin to learn Czech and Hungarian. However, I did pick up a few words in German despite almost all the young people we met who knew English.

There are wonderful things that can be done over Spring break and in the end you can do quite a lot for not very much. I had an absolute blast in some of the most beautiful cities that I have ever visited, and even with a limited budget it was a fantastic trip. Of course it is hard to extend advice to all places, but I believe the lessons I learned are applicable to a lot of cities in Europe.

15
Mar

Waiting for the Pope

By mjf24 0 Comments
Categories: Uncategorized

Pat Megley, Cornell in Rome

visiting student from Williams College

Wednesday, March 13th, 2013, around 5:10 pm.

I’m standing beneath a column in the southernmost of the two colonnades embracing St. Peter’s Square. From here, looking out diagonally across the piazza, between the corner of the facade of the Basilica and the Papal Apartments, I can see the roof of the Sistine Chapel.

I’ve been here about half an hour. The sky, though overcast and brushed with rain clouds, is bright. St. Peter’s “Square” (actually a flattened circle) is a dark sea of umbrellas. A few flags wave, including an American flag, which strikes me; it calls to mind a 4th of July parade, an odd reference point for the scene before me. The rain, off and on all day, has softened to a drizzle.

Back in the colonnade, the spaces between the inner pairs of columns are filling with onlookers. There is a light but steady stream of people meandering along the corridor. It’s not as packed as I thought it might be. The atmosphere is expectant, but far from electric. The field of umbrellas out in the piazza, all rooted in place for an as-yet-undetermined duration, lend a sense of calm that balances whatever movement there is back here in the colonnade.

A few minutes ago, a reporter for Spiegel Online named Julie approached me, apparently struck by the sight of a foreigner bent over an intermediate Italian textbook. She asked me a few questions, including why I was here, and I thought for a moment. Why am I here?

Above all, for the same reason as everyone else: to see a bit of history take place.

Nearby, a couple pecks softly at each other’s lips like a refined version of a mother bird feeding her young. It’s a few minutes past 5:30.

*

5:40. The spotlights atop the colonnades have just come on, adding a touch of prime-time aura. The corridor of the colonnade is filling; people stop to watch and wait.

A seagull has perched itself on the small chimney that protrudes from the Sistine Chapel and from which the result of the next vote–black smoke means no winner, white smoke means a new pope–will be announced.

The murmur of banter, barely background noise before, has picked up. Beneath the snatches of nearby conversation there is a sound like the rumbling of a distant ocean.

I wonder if that seagull on the roof of the Chapel knows how many people are looking at it.

*

5:50. A slowly-whirring cyclone of birds above the Basilica.

A few minutes past 6. The man on standing next to me is on the phone.

“Pronto. Pronto.”

*

Next to me stands a bespectacled young man wearing a clerical collar under his windbreaker. I turn to him.

“Mi scusi, padre, ma che pensa?”

He shrugs slightly and smiles. “Non lo so.” Who does one think at a moment like this?

We fall into conversation. His name is Moritz (like Maurizio, he adds helpfully) and he’s from Vienna. He’s in his final year of studying theology at a university here in Rome–a university that, like my own high school, is associated with the Jesuits. I ask if he is associated with a particular order, and he says no; he explains that he can choose between entering an order and serving in a diocese, and that he hopes to do the latter upon returning to Vienna.

While the colonnade continues to fill, it is still far from thronged. I comment on this, and Moritz ventures that the drizzle has kept away the crowds. We wonder when the next fumo will announce the result of the latest vote. I point out that the cardinals have to have their dinner; this is Italy, after all. Moritz chuckles and agrees that the food here is very good. I ask how the food in Austria is and he remarks that Austria is not as known for its cuisine.

I ask when he decided to become a priest. He says that for him it wasn’t a difficult decision.

We continue to watch and wait as the sky grows dark.

*

A few minutes past 7. I reach into my coat pocket for a piece of pizza bianca and offer some to Moritz. He shakes his head, murmuring his thanks. I slip the piece into my mouth.

Out in the piazza, a cheer erupts: the roar of a huge crowd. The giant projection screens show smoke billowing from the chimney atop the Sistine Chapel. I raise my eyes to the roof. In the darkness, it is hard to make out the color of the smoke. But after a few moments, it is unmistakable: white.

Cheers echo across the piazza; all around us people clap. Moritz and I join in.

“C’e un Papa,” he breathes. There is something new in his voice.

*

Now the colonnade grows thick; people pace the rapidly filling corridor and walk faster, swiveling their heads intently, seeking out a line of vision to the central balcony of the Basilica. Behind the colonnade, crowds race from the surrounding streets towards the piazza.

The video screens, which for hours have remained fixed on the roof of the Sistine Chapel, now switch back and forth between close-ups of individual onlookers, smiling and waving flags (there are many more flags now) seeing themselves up on the screen and waving back, and wide shots of the piazza. For the first time, I realize how huge the crowd is: it fills the piazza and stretches off into the distance down Via della Conciliazione.

Moritz steps away and takes out a cell phone. He spends a few minutes in silence, apparently waiting on a call that won’t go through. When he returns, I ask who he was trying to call. His sister, he responds. I have a sister too, I tell him, and also two brothers.

I turn to the man on my other side, a Roman, and ask him if he’s seen anything like this before. He has, twice before. He explains that when Cardinal Wojtyła was elected Pope John Paul II in 1978, the first non-Italian pope in centuries, it was a shock. “Nobody knew the name,” the man says. On the other hand, when Cardinal Ratzinger emerged as Benedict XVI in 2005, it was the expected outcome.

A procession of Swiss Guards onto the steps of the Basilica stretches on and on; and yet, when the cardinals appear at the side balconies of the Basilica, I am surprised to find that over an hour has passed since the smoke. It is not the same place as this afternoon; the colonnade’s latest arrivals, jostling for space, angling for a view of the Basilica and talking animatedly to each other, are but a small reflection of the new energy throughout the piazza, which emits a volley of cheers whenever anyone of note appears.

And then the tall red curtains behind the central balcony part, a cardinal emerges, pronounces some words which are lost in the noise of the crowd, and announces the name of the new pope–Francesco–before retreating behind the curtain.

Who is this pope? No one seems to have caught the cardinal’s name. Next to Moritz, an impromptu conclave of priests and scruffy-haired youths speculate. Names are thrown out. O’Malley from Boston. A woman wielding a smart phone announces that a Cardinal Bergoglio from Argentina has been elected. “An Argentine,” one of the youths nods approvingly.

Above the piazza, the curtains part again, and the pope emerges–a tall, thin figure in white. He stands, looking out at the crowd, and remains in that position, still, for a long while. The cheers roll in waves.

And then he begins to speak. He offers a series of thanks, including one to his predecessor, Benedict XVI. My Italian is such that I struggle to absorb the pope’s words, but I try to catch as much as I can. He has a nice voice.

Then he leads the crowd in prayer–the Our Father, the Hail Mary. I try to keep with the Italian and mostly listen to the words spoken in unison by the pope and the countless gathered before him, to the many timbres combining as one resonating voice. I have never heard so many people gathered in prayer. In the intimacy of a shared moment, I am once more struck by a sense of sheer scale.

The pope concludes and steps back, smiling down at the crowd. A chant starts and gains strength as it echoes around the piazza: “FRAN – CES – CO! FRAN – CES – CO!” The Roman man turns to me, grinning, and recalls that when Benedict was elected, the chant went “Rat – zin – ger!”

The pope turns, as if to leave, and then turns back to offer a few more words. “Pregate per me,” he says. Pray for me.

*

I shake hands with Moritz, and we wish each other good luck with the remainder of our respective stays in Rome. Around us, people are flowing out into the larger streams exiting the piazza.

As I walk up the road behind the colonnade, I look back. For the first time, I see for myself the crowd, a single mass moving on foot, and it seems vast beyond counting.

All of them gathered to greet one man, whoever he may be.

11
Mar

We stuffed ourselves more than we stuffed the ravioli

By Elliot Sperling 0 Comments
Categories: Uncategorized

Once again we had a wonderful Italian dinner coordinated by the wonderful Anna Rita Flati. This time it was ravioli and fettucini, and similar to gnocchi night we came out completely stuffed. I learned from the afternoon that making ravioli is quite a process. First you have to make the dough, then you have to keep adding flour to it so it looses its stickiness, then you put it through a machine to flatten the dough into flat long and wide slices that you use to put the filling in. After you put the filling in you cut it with a special tool to make the ravioli shape. We kept repeating the process until we had an entire table full of ravioli. With fettucini it was a bit easier. We made the dough, then we got it to the right consistency, and then we put it through to cut the dough into long strands of fettucini noodles. Some of us also made a batch of gluten free fettucini and ravioli noodles from scratch.

Making the ravioli dough

Making the ravioli

Making the gluten free pasta

Our collection of ravioli and fettucini made from scratch

That was only the preparation, then it was on to what we all came for: the huge meal. To start off we ate appetizers of egg omelettes, cured salmon, and a delicious nut bread. We then had about 7 different types of sauces with our 7 family-sized batches of ravioli and fettucini. Some sauces had meats, others were only vegetables, and some were creamy sauces. My favorite was definitely the salmon one. As I mentioned before we finished up completely stuffed. Then dessert comes out, and somehow we always find a little bit more room in our stomachs.

Students eagerly waiting to start on the antipasti

11
Mar

A Planner Excursion to Lake Como and the Periphery of Milan

By Elliot Sperling 0 Comments
Categories: Uncategorized

On the last two days of our Northern Italy trip the planners departed on a trip to Como and an excursion to the periphery of Milan. Como is geographically located in the very north of Italy close to the Swiss border. Parts of it resemble Switzerland through the natural scenery and similar building types. It was quite an interesting place, one that has developed through a very important industry: the silk industry.

Walking through the town of Como

A view overlooking Lake Como

The first stop we made after our one-hour train ride from Milan to Como was to the silk factory museum. The museum displayed the actual machines used to make silk during the industrial revolution up until the early 1900s. The town itself developed largely due to the silk industry, and today this industry continues to thrive. In fact, the silk from Como is considered some of the most valuable silk in the world because the way it is produced. Much of the luxury silks that are used in some of the most fashionable clothing come from Como because the quality is considered much better than the other leading international producers of silk: China and India. We were delivered a thorough presentation by one of the tour guides at the museum about the history and production of silk in Como. We learned about the process of silk making beginning from the stage of the silk worm all the way to the finished product.

After our silk factory tour we had a broader discussion on how such cities such as Como truly embody localization economies. In Como, one industry is extremely dominant, highly successful, and globally competitive. Much of the skilled workforce in the silk industry is benefited by knowledge spillover, especially through the family. There is an incredible amount of local knowledge, which makes Como one of the best places for high quality silk production. When thinking about the broader regional context it becomes apparent that Milan, the fashion capital of the world, greatly benefits from the proximity of production of high quality silk used in much of the fashion clothing sold in Milan.

As with any field trip we always need at least a little bit of sightseeing when visiting these new places, so we embarked on two wonderful afternoon adventures. We spent the first part of the afternoon riding up the Funicular (train up the mountain). When we went to the top we saw a pleasant surprise: snow. We never were in any snow the rest of the Northern Italy trip as temperatures hovered around 50 to 55 degrees fahrenheit. On the top of the mountain we saw some of the most idyllic views. We were in the small city of Brunate (officially right outside of Como). After we went down back into the city of Como we went for another little ride. We took a ferry boat around Lake Como to another beautiful small city called Torno, where we took a nice walk around for about 40 minutes before returning to Como. Once we returned to Como we took off for our train ride back to the city of Milan.

The funicular

The town of Torno

For our last day in Milan we explored the suburbs. We spent the first two days in Milan mainly walking around the city center where we explored certain neighborhoods and developments. In the suburbs we went to a place right outside the municipal area of Milan: the city of Rho. In Rho is one of the biggest exhibition spaces in the world (it is the biggest in Europe), and perhaps one of the longest exhibition spaces. Even with ground-level escalators the walk took about 15 to 20 minutes to get from one side to the other. When we were visiting it was when there was an international optometry conference and the space was filled with thousands upon thousands of people in some way involved or interested in the trade. The metro trains were filled on a Sunday morning entirely because of this conference. It really helped us to understand how Milan was such a globally competitive city. Such a huge exhibition space allowed for Milan to be a notable city on the world stage. We could see how the region was internationally competitive because of the high-level of skills and craftsmanship that we could see from such places as Como and all over the north of Italy.

Learning about the exhibition center outside Milan

Our last event for the entire Northern Italy trip was a walk to a public housing development by the metro station San Leonardo. We heard a story from a local about the development and we witnessed first-hand the really high-quality aesthetic  look of the building. We were in Gallaratese designed by the famous Aldo Rossi. At least for me, it made me question why in the United States we chose in the past to house our poorest citizens in such low-quality (almost made to fail) public housing.

The ground floor of Gallaratese

11
Mar

Not Just A Long Bus Ride…

By Abby 0 Comments
Categories: Field Trips

It’s interesting that my first post is not about a stationary event in Rome, but about eight hours on a double-decker coach bus. Sounds fun, right? For most, several hours on a bus seems like an extended torture session. But eventually, the complaints of vehicular confinement subside and the adaptations to the circumstances begin. Of these forms of adaptations the first is sleep. After long days that lead into late nights, many make use of their time on the bus dozing off. The bustle of loading the bus and morning greetings fade, the personal playlist is set, the shifting to find that right position in your single seat (two if you’re lucky) stops, and slowly a bus full of people drifts into peaceful slumber. For those couple of hours, all you hear, if you’re the only person awake as I fortunately am at the moment, is the rattle and roar of the bus, the faint song playing from someone’s headphones in the distance, while the landscape that was unfolding before your eyes is interrupted by a stretch of quickly passing tunnel lights – their reflection swiftly slithering over all the sleeping bodies. When the few individuals, who’ve gotten their fill of sleep wake, the second form of adaptation ensues – work. Work, is such a definitive word, so let’s just say, they find something to do. The laptops emerge and the photo editing of the haul of pictures you took these past few days commences. The readings that were supposed to be done two weeks ago materialize. A camera or two starts snapping away at what is going on outside the bus windows. Some even pull out sketchbooks or notebooks to tangibly digest this experience. This confined space we’ve all been assigned to becomes a sort of mobile office, a moving productive center in a sense. As the remaining sleeping parties rouse from the sound of keyboard clacking and early afternoon sun filling the bus, the third form of adaptation transpires – talk. It always escalates from a quietly mumbling group in some corner of the bus to suddenly exploding into laughter, and the quiet murmur that was emanating just from the bus itself has transformed into a lively social scene. Stories beginning with “Oh my God, remember when…” circulate and the topics of last night’s dinner conversation continue to weave themselves into the present discussion. And of course, without fail, the snacks and the leftover food that is still good from two days ago surfaces, augmenting the experience of engaging with others. Then the announcement is made for the upcoming rest stop, the bus comes to a halt, and everyone rushes off to use the facilities and replenish their sustenance sources. Forty-five minutes pass and everyone reluctantly trickles back to the bus, restarting the cyclic adaptations in dealing with a long bus ride.

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