In Firenze

Currently traveling around Italy with the family. We went to paris last friday (6/19) and flew over to novo mesto on tuesday (6/23). Then we took the train to Venice on the 25th, and we are now in Florence.

I had so much ice cream! only if all ice cream tasted like italian gelato. the yogurt flavored gelato tastes so much like pink berry :)

venice was very nice; but public restrooms were impossible to find and the signs indicating directions to the ferry were completely unhelpful to say the least. and we met lots of rude vendors... we found a nice little shop in San Toma today and ran into a horribly rude owner. my mom went inside to look around and i was browsing the window display before entering because i was eating pizza. a few minutes later my mom came out huffing and puffing and told me that the owner told her to get out of the store; my mom was holding some pizza wrapper (from my pizza) and he yelled "oil! oil! get out!;" my mom tried to explain that she wasnt touching anything with that hand and her other hand was clean. but he continued to yell and slammed and locked the door behind her. what a terrible man! he couldve said it more nicely for goodness sakes... he completely ruined our day.

I dont understand why these people are so arrogant and impolite, knowing tourists bring them so much income. i know its bad karma on my part to wish something bad upon him, but i cant help myself from hoping so. of course we also met nice people; but our encounters with these ill-mannered people completely ruined my perception of italy. maybe im just being naive, but i dont think its too much to expect a highly touristic area to be more considerate of the tourists.

in any case, venice was beautiful. its hard to imagine people attempting to construct such a place in this century.... and harder to believe that people even thought to build a city on water such a long time ago. on a different note, all that water made me think of mermaids... hehe me and my mermaid obsession.

excited to go to the uffizi gallery tomorrow. im going to have to go to sleep soon if we want to beat the long lines as much as possible. im so tired from walking around today that im probablly going to fall asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow.

ciao,
linda