Napoli Day 1

   Friday (yesterday) we took a three hour fast train to Naples -- mostly to see Pompeii, but also to get a feel for another place in Italy. Now Rick Steves claims, "Italy intensifies as you plunge deeper. Naples is Italy in the extreme -- its best and its worse." My professor says that the further south you go, the less they follow the law.  I say, it was nice to see it at this point in my life and get a little more color in my cross section of Italy, but I highly doubt I will ever come back. 

   My professor was talking about how cities were built, as if the city was a giant house -- the streets are the hallways, etc and I didn't really understand that until I saw Naples. I felt like I was intruding in someone's private home. It's not that people are rude, it's just that the city is VERY lived in and I feel like I'm intruding on their culture -- which is different than how it is in Florence. In Florence, they bring you into their culture with open arms. . . here, they just kinda ignore you.  Naples is also incredibly dirty and packed in.  They don't really preserve their monuments -- again, everything is very lived in -- so most aren't very kept up.  Oh and I feel like I take my life into my own hands every time I cross the street.  Seriously, red lights are just suggestions here. . . I feel like I've almost been hit by a car or scooter at least 10 times. And Kelsey's purse was stolen by a scooter thief. But! Aside from all the negative aspects, I am glad we came. It was nice to see how Italians further south really live. . . watch kids and families (more families than I've seen in Italy so far), see shops that are for residents, not for tourists and just kinda get a feel for it all. Naples is also the birthplace of pizza, so that was great too =) 

     After arriving in Naples, we found our hostel and checked in. It was my first time staying in a hostel and it's been really quite awesome. We had a private room for the three of us, because that's all that was available, but it's pretty awesome, cheap and includes breakfast. 

Oh, and our room is lime green =) Anyways, the people are very nice -- lots of energy and very helpful. AND WE HAVE AIR CONDITIONING! omygoodness. . . it's wonderful.  Anyways, we first went to find pizza, because we were STARVING and went to a place the hostel recommended. The pizza was delicious -- so tasty, and the crust was very light.  

However, you really can't compare Italian Pizza and American Pizza. . . they are truly two very different things. For one, you eat Italian pizza with a knife and fork -- and it's all about the sauce. So tasty. We then walked to the Archaeological museum which holds all of the art from Pompeii and is basically the only thing in Naples that Rick Steves recommends (I don't really think he likes Naples either). As we were walking, it struck me how many book shops with 1 or 2 Euro books outside there were. . . it made me very happy.  We also stumbled upon a lot of cool architecture, like this

This is a much nicer part of Napoli, where the Archeological museum was.

The museum was pretty awesome -- the art was amazing.  They also had a life of Michelangelo exhibition, which I really enjoyed. He apparently restored part of this 13 foot sculpture, which is the "tallest ancient marble group ever found and the largest intact statue from antiquity" (straight out of the guide book). It was pretty incredible. 

Also on display were some of Michelangelo's sketches and writings, which were pretty fantastic to see. These were studies for the facade of San Lorenzo (the church next to my apartment). 

It was definitely a worthwhile museum. One of my favorite parts didn't even have to do with ancient art, but was the giant open room at the top floor which used to serve as the great hall of the university.  It was massive, and just gorgeous. 

The only sculpture in here was of Atlas, but with the celestial sphere on his back, not the Earth. . . I really liked this sculpture. 

They also had every day things from the excavation of Pompeii -- like cooking tools, which I thought were pretty cool

View from the Museum of Naples

The Museum was quite tiring, and it was INCREDIBLY hot outside, so we grabbed some gelato and headed back to the hostel, to make an early night of it.  We passed this bookstore, which may give you a little taste of Naples.

We watched Gladiator which was fun in the context of where we'd been, and I worked on some things, and then I had possibly the best night of sleep in Italy. . . air conditioning is magical.