We left Trieste a little too early in the morning. Luckily, our hotel packed us breakfast to go—the enjoyable part of our journey to the airport after the bus driver freaked out about us not having tickets in advance. Charla’s Italian got us by and earned a stop at a roadside café where she ran inside to buy tickets after the fact from a kind older lady. The journey from Trieste to Milano was short and sweet. There, we met up with Charla’s friend Patrick for coffee and second breakfast. Charla and Patrick met while they were studying together at the University of Bologna in 2007 as students of the Eastern College Consortium between Vassar, Wesleyan, and Wellesley, and they have stayed in touch across the continents, as neither one seems to stay put for too long. Patrick had just made it back to Italy some four months before and had lots to say about the city. Breakfast in Milano felt close to breakfast in Bologna—cappuccini, pastries, and lots of catching up (this time, we had a year and a half to discuss; it used to be the events of the night before at the Cassero). As Patrick left for work, we went for a walk around the city that took us by the Duomo, La Scala opera house, a few notable statues, and the oh-so-not Italian but rather Irish O’Connell’s Country Pub before heading back to the airport. Our last flight until Mongolia! After flying from Milan to London City, we decided the best idea would be to avoid the actual city of London. Tomorrow we’ll be picking up our car in the eastern suburbs, so we decided to head there tonight. After navigating London’s public transit lines (airport to Stratford, Stratford to West Ham, West Ham to Purfleet), we finally walked up to The Royal, our hotel for the evening. We arrived right as it was getting dark, and immediately grabbed some ciders from the Riverbay, the bar in the hotel, to enjoy on the banks of the River Thames with a view of the London skyline as the last bits of daylight were fading from the sky. Once it got completely dark we went back inside the bar and met two of the funniest people we’ve met along the entire trip. There was Wes, the bartender who met his American lady playing Call of Duty, and there was Jake, who had to explain to his wife how he innocently lost two pairs of pants within days of each other. The two of them kept us rolling with laughter late into the evening until we climbed up a couple flights of stairs to collapse into bed and dream about getting a car tomorrow.
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After spending so much time so close to Slovenia, we decided we just had to make the trip there; however, not knowing what to expect, we thought we’d just take a bus and spend a couple hours in the local seaside town of Koper. From the bus station we took some time to wander through the old historic city and to check out the sea. Unfortunately, Koper is a small town with not that much happening, so our explorations didn’t take up the full couple hours we had allotted until our bus back to Trieste. Luckily, we found a local pub that was selling Laškos, our favorite Slovenian beer, and we decided to try the non-export version. Much as we expected, it was fantastic! Plus, Okrepcevalnica pr Bepca had by far the cheapest beer in Europe at €2.50 for a half-liter! Once we were back in Italy, we celebrated our last Italian meal appropriately by devouring amazing pizza!
This morning we were delighted to wake up and experience the bora, or the strong winds that Trieste is famous for. The bora is strongest and most common in the winter, so we were lucky to experience it at all! When the bora is really ripping, seawater has actually been known to wash completely over the Molo Audace (the seawall we were on), and in the winter when it freezes it creates incredible wind-blown ice sculptures. We had noticed that all through town the sidewalks are lined with metal chains; it turns out the chains are there so that when the wind is blowing the pedestrians have something to hold on to! We didn’t get the full strength of Trieste’s bora, but our taste of it was pretty exciting. The wind died down later in the day, which worked well with our plans to go running along the sea wall as we had been most days of the week. At the end of our run, we discovered the Molo Audace partially blocked off and a crowd gathered in the Piazza. That evening was one of the launches for Dona Sangue Coast to Coast, a blood donation drive across the country that involved nightly music, a sailboat, and some talented drummers and flagthrowers. We joined the crowd in the Piazza for the performance, which led us back to the sea wall to hear Mike Sponza in concert at sunset. We stuck around after sunset for fireworks over the sea, a perfect next-to-last night farewell to the city.
Today we spent the afternoon taking in some of Trieste’s history by visiting the Civico Museo del Castello di San Giusto, or the Castle of San Giusto. The castle is built on one of the highest points in the city, not far from the water, and was a strategic point for defending the port. With such a location the walk up and down through the steep hills certainly counted for our cardio for the day. Built over the remains of a previous castle, construction on this castle was started in the 1400s. The views from the castle were amazing looking over the city, and its use as a defensive post was very clear. Furthermore, the castle’s armory was filled with centuries-old swords, guns, and assorted weapons that were fascinating to examine. Our evening began with a look into Trieste’s more recent history, as we attended a performance at the Teatro Verdi--1913 Trieste a Teatro, put on to celebrate a hundred years of opera in Trieste and the opening of the theater’s exhibit at the Civico Museo Teatrale “Carlo Schmidl.” The Teatro Verdi is like a small version of La Scala in Milan, and we were lucky to have great seats with other Joyce School students. After the opera, we met up with everyone involved with the Joyce School for a farewell dinner at L’Antico Panada hosted by Irish ambassador Patrick Hennessy. It was a full Italian dinner of many courses, which provided lots of time for great conversation with our friends from the week.
Trieste is a fascinating place. It feels like no other city in Italy but like them all at the same time. According to legend, it was founded by a friend of Jason and the Argonauts. More recently, in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, it was the main shipping port for the Austro-Hungarian Empire until World War I. Then, in 1918, it was given to Italy. Today, its maritime industry is more important to central Europe than to Italy, which explains why the population of the city remains so diverse. Thanks to the diverse population, there is a surprising amount of local craft beer in Trieste. Needless to say, Italian wine is wonderful throughout the country, though the domestic beer leaves much to be desired. We had sampled a few Slovenian Laškos in Trieste before we found Bire, a brew pub with a nice view of the sea. The Pils and Rossa (Red Ale) we ordered were much better than Peroni or Nastro Azzurro. The "panpizza"/sandwich and toast-shaped meat were good choices as well. The toast-shaped meat was a bit of a surprise order. Charla translated it as "meat in the form of toast," thinking maybe the meat was inserted into the toast, but Chase's guess turned out most accurate: two bread-shaped slices of meat and fries.
Fourth of July? Oops. We didn't exactly celebrate Independence Day this year (in fact, Charla hasn't for a while now), but we did enjoy another wonderful day in Trieste. As usual, Charla went to lectures and her seminar during the day while Chase explored the city. When Charla and Chase met back up after the afternoon seminar, it was time for dinner and we checked out the neighborhood by the Grand Canal. We found Fratelli di Bufala, which turned out to be a real treat. The food was great, and the view along the canal at sunset was not too shabby. Charla loved her margherita pizza, and Chase had a bit of a culinary adventure. The server pointed to an item on the menu that looked good, and was priced reasonably, so Chase just went for it. It turned out to be some amazing meat dish that defies explanation! A calzone filled with mozzarella and topped by strips of meat with shredded parmesan, it was a delicious meat feast! After dinner, Charla went down the street to a performance given by Irish tenor Noel O'Grady, whom we'd heard earlier in the week at our Irish sing-a-long. Following the concert, we were hopeful for another spectacular night at Barge Bar with Joyce School friends in tow. Unfortunately, the barge was closed. We moved closer to the Piazza Unità d'Italia to Bar Unità, where we shared Peroni and pelinkovac (a Croatian liquor that tastes remarkably like a bar of Ivory Spring soap) with the group.
Once again while Charla was attending her morning lectures, Chase sought out the unique museums of Trieste. The first one he found was the Museo Ferroviario di Campo Marzio, the museum about the railroad in Trieste. Housed in an old train station, the museum housed four tracks worth of old and interesting trains in the railyard. After spending time in the sun poking around the unique trains, Chase ended up at the Civico Museo del Mare, or the museum of the sea. This museum was focused on Trieste’s maritime history, but was surprising in that it told the entire story using intricately detailed model ships. Following the afternoon Ulysses seminar, Charla met up with Chase to go on a walking tour of Joyce’s Trieste that included the Greek Orthodox Church of Saint Nicholas, the Berlitz School (where both James and Stanislaus worked as English teachers), and one of the many apartments where James Joyce lived with Nora Barnacle in the city. Joyce’s Trieste was surely different from the one we experienced, but a cosmopolitan air persists in this city whose nationality used to change frequently. The windy backstreets of the city seem unchanged from the turn of the century aside from some of the shops and restaurants that populate them. We returned down the alley of Osteria da Marino to find piadine at La Piadíneria. As a student in Bologna, Charla adored these flat bread sandwiches stuffed with veggies and cheese (and meat for those so inclined), and after finding piadine nearby, we made this café a favorite stop in the city.
After piadine, Chase went for a twilight run along the sea wall while Charla attended Michael Longley’s reading at Civico Museo Teatrale “Carlo Schmidl.” The Museo is located right along the small Grand Canal, so the barge bar at Caffé Rossi was an ideal choice for an evening social beverage. While Charla was in her morning lectures, Chase visited the Museo Postale e Telegrafico della Mitteleuropa, or the Trieste postal museum. This museum was a pretty obvious choice, because Chase is fascinated with the world’s postal services. The museum was not geared to non-Italian speakers, but luckily one of the museum employees was very excited that Chase had traveled all the way from Alaska so she gave him a personal tour. Unfortunately, she didn’t speak English and Chase didn’t speak Italian, but they made it all the way through the museum together. This evening was one of our favorite moments with the Joyce School. We gathered at the Osteria da Marino for dinner and music led by Gerry Smyth. The osteria’s main room, which we filled beyond capacity, featured a piano and was decorated with old rugby uniforms for the team it sponsors, photographs, and sailing paraphernalia. Gerry performed several selections from Joyce’s “Chamber Music” as well as some traditional Irish ballads to get the crowd involved. We picked up one of his CD’s to listen to on our drive as well!
The Trieste Joyce School was our reason for coming to this amazing city that inspired the writer some hundred years ago as he lived and worked here as an English teacher. Organized by a group of dedicated professors, the School’s daily program featured two lectures (and a coffee break at Bar alla Motonave!) in the morning session and seminar groups on different texts in the afternoon. Most nights included some kind of evening program, which we will get to later in the blog. While Charla went to the lectures, Chase went exploring in the beautiful city of Trieste. He wandered out along the seawall to the lighthouse in the port, and then came back to meet Charla for a picnic lunch of Nutella sandwiches in the Piazza dell’Unità d’Italia. After lunch Charla went back to her seminar, and Chase explored the ruins of the Roman Theater in Trieste. The School arranged for an evening visiting the Santuario di Monrupino in the hills surrounding the city and practically in Slovenia. Reaching the church took us on a short walk further up a hill that granted us amazing views of the city and the sea, as it appeared to be one of the highest points in the area. While walking around the church area, we got to know some of the other students and lecturers at the School. From the church the entire group traveled to Milič, a local osmica that participates in the trendy agriturismo method of farm-to-table food. Osmicas are farms that are found in this local region, and they specialize in ham, salami, cheese, and red wine. While the entire group was at Milič for dinner, Mark Axelrod gave a reading from his book Borges’ Travel, Hemingway’s Garage. We really enjoyed our evening of good food and new friends.
The coach dropped us off around 12:30 AM at Heathrow at terminals 1-3, where it is also possible to take a train to terminals 4 and 5. Unfortunately, the train doesn’t run late at night/early in the morning, so we were stuck in that part of the airport for a few hours. Many folks had already found their places among lines of chairs. Clearly, none of these people had explored the terminal before setting up, as a short walk led us to the plush British Airways first class check-in waiting area, where we spent the night The hours passed quickly, and soon we were boarding our Alitalia flight to Roma in the mass of a most confusing queue/herd of people. The British attempted to queue neatly, but the Italian passengers made sure that didn’t happen. After a short flight to Roma that took us on a scenic journey over the Alps, we boarded an even shorter flight to Trieste that took us over the Adriatic Sea. Landing in Trieste, we discovered a herd of interestingly dressed people, who we later heard were en route to a music festival in Croatia. [Again, note to selves: Research festivals nearby.]
A drive along the coast brought us into the gorgeous city of Trieste, whose architecture is a mixed salad of Italian and Austro-Hungarian Imperial seaside styles. We admired the sea and the city while eating pizza after Charla checked in at the Trieste Joyce School. In true Italian fashion, our night ended with a walk around Piazza dell’Unità d’Italia and some gelato. |
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