Milano and Around

City Break

I don’t think I'm REALLY in Italy yet. I am in a 'European City,' just like I am when I'm in Brussels or Munich or Paris. There are familiar shops in familiar places. There is a station and a line of hotels. There is the historical centre and the big church in the middle. There is the posh bit with nice shops. There is the theatre bit. There is the trendy bit, there is the ugly bit.

Once you've been to enough of these places you know exactly what to expect. You develop a routine, you see things in a normal way and so the whole point of travel becomes lost. Yes the shops will be different, the cathedral a different architectural design and there will be a slightly different culture, but fundamentally you are in a 'city' and it is the same all around the world. You aren't broadening the mind, only colouring in a few spots.

Not all cities are like this – Berlin, New York, Ghent – but many, many are and they're so well packaged that as a tourist you are unable to do anything else. There is no personality. The soul is buried so deep that it impossible to find.

So I go to the Duomo. Magnificent. I walk through the Prada and Armani shops. Luscious. I visit a restaurant. Delicious. I look at the people. Impeccable.

I take photos and I feel happy with myself. I am 'doing' Milan. It is as I hoped and more.

It is exactly what I should think it is.

But...but the more I walk around, the more it doesn’t feel right. Milano isn’t the catwalk model I thought. The package is not quite as it looked in the picture. The buildings, the shops, the restaurants, they are fine, but there is something that doesn’t fit the image I had been sold.

Its the people.

The people are not as they should be.

I walk through the Sforza castle, which is not exactly the Milan I expected, and emerge into a leafy town centre park – bandstand, café and boating pond et al. It is packed full of young locals, sitting around, smoking, drinking, playing football, smooching. Mouths laugh, eyes glimmer, bodies recline and everyone relaxes and enjoys the sun.

I cannot see men combing their fringe or sticking out their pecks, or women adjusting their sunglasses or crossing perfect legs. Everyone seems too happy, too busy eating ice creams or opening beers and laughing at a new joke. Pleasure is simple and unfettered. A sunny day in the park. What’s not to like?

Where are the designer labels? Where is the style and the swagger? What happened to the tight chinos and stilettos?

I sit and open my own bottle of Peroni. Why not? What else are you going to do? Pose in the mirror?

If this is an introduction to Italy then I like it already. Nothing humbles you like a good kick-about in the park.

Style and Substance

Let me put it this way. Milan does have a lot a nice looking people and, yes, most of the time they are impeccably well dressed and groomed and they smell great. However it isn’t the same as we see it. There is nothing supercilious going on. It isn’t posing.

Dressing up is the way to enjoy an evening, in the same way an ice cram by the fountain in a Piazza is the way to enjoy an afternoon. It is a good way to spend time. The idea of Milanese glamour and sophistication is true but it should not be seen as something superior or exceptional. In the trendy Breda restaurant on Saturday night, amongst extraordinary dresses and styled hair, I see the same smiles I saw in the park earlier. It isn’t a window display. It is people having fun.

So I guess this is what I have taken from my early impressions of Milan - that sitting outside your office in Prada suit eating an ice cream is a perfectly normal thing to do, and that it is better to do this in the company of others, even as an adult.

I think of the Piazzas, where this all happens. What is our equivalent?

A Hobo in Milano

I like walking around town but not going into shops

I like listening but not understanding words

I like sitting outside the Scala in my cycling shorts

I like looking at the beautiful women

I like not being a part but being there all the same.

Is this the reason I am sat her alone with no wife, no kids, no career and no house? Am I playing a solitary game? Am I too scared to ever accept the rules and join in the game?

Am I taking the easy option?

Of course not. When is riding 700 miles on your own in a foreign country ever the easy option?

It is only seems that way because I understand what it entails. Things can happen but I am no longer worried about them. They just are. When it rains you will get wet. When you get a puncture you have to fix it. When you ride up a mountain you need to work. Don’t get het up about it. Put energy in the right place. Keep believing. Not everything is in your control, but belief is. You will get tired. You will get worried. You will get scared. Embrace the chaos.

If you can do that then one day you will have flamingos in your garden.