hi! eccomi. alright. in case you didn't know, this is one part of a two-parter -- go back to the most recent entry to see pictures of switzerland and florence. this entry consists of a variety of exciting adventures. and off we go...

the first is of a carnevale orange-throwing festival in a little called ivrea. basically, if hell somehow incorporated citrus fruit, this is what it would look like. this bizarre festival relates back to something long ago, something very historical that involved throwing rocks...a peasant revolution. yes. that's it. and you must wear a red hat if you don't want to die. i'm too inept to remember how it relates, so i'll steal some internet info and paste it here:

History

The Carnival of Ivrea is the only Carnival in the world which has a real plot and tells a story in which the protagonists are not mask-characters, but ideal figures, the symbols of anarchic values and actors of ancient events.
Even if the original core of the legend has been gradually adapted over the years to the requirements of the various periods, there remain two main trends of events which make up the plot.
The first goes back to the Middle Ages, when Federico Barbarossa installed the tyrant Raineri di Biandrate as lord of the town. For a long time the violence and abuse of power exasperated the people, who in 1194 rose up and destroyed the tyrant's castle, the symbol of oppression.
The same fate was reserved to another despot in 1266, the Marquis Gugliemo of Monferrato.
In popular tradition, Raineri and Guglielmo become a single tyrant, who in-keeping with the custom of the time, claimed the right to practice "jus primae noctis",in other words to spend the wedding night with the brides.
Until Violetta, the beautiful daughter of a miller, rebelled against the lord's will, cut off his head with a dagger and showed it to the people gathered beneath the castle walls.
There followed a popular rebellion, which led to the destruction of the castle and which is today symbolised by the Battle of Oranges played out between the orange throwers on foot representing the rebels and those on the carts representing the tyrant's guards.
In order to fully understand the current structure of the Festival, we must complete the plot with a glimpse of more recent history.
Up until 1600, the various districts of the town celebrated Carnival separately, holding parties that were animated by great rivalry and which often ended in violent disputes.
It was only in 1808 that the Napoleonic government, which had jurisdiction in Ivrea, ordered the reunification of Carnival celebrations and entrusted the control to a group of citizens in Ivrea.
To stimulate a congenial disposition of the town towards the government, the group was made to wear the uniform of the Napoleonic army. This is how the figure of the General came about, surrounded by the Aide-de-camp and Staff Officiers.
Only in 1858, on the wave of the renewed desire for freedom stemming from the Risorgimento movement, the General was accompanied by the figure of the miller's daughter (Mugnaia), the heroine of the Historic Festival and symbol of liberty from every form of tyranny.
Finally the obligation to wear the "Berretto Frigio" (red hat), dates back to the 19th century. It is the symbol of liberty and brotherhood inherited from the French revolutionists and must be worn to avoid becoming a target for the orange throwers.

bravo if you made it through. anyway, you're supposed to wear red if you don't want to get pelted by oranges, so here we are in all our glory:

robin, natania, catherine and claire.

once we got off the train in ivrea, we didn't really know where to go, so we followed the masses of people and ran into a little parade, where men in big horse-drawn carts were wearing football padding and were covered in orange juice, sweat and pulp. yummy! we followed these carts and finally arrived at a fenced-in area with a huge two huge banners flying overhead. one pronounced, "benvenuti all'inferno" (welcome to hell). the other, "lasciate ogni speranza voi ch'intrate" (leave every hope he who enter here [dante for you retards]). not so promising! anyway, these poor people...i don't know why they do this, but these carts go into this fenced in area and the bloodshed begins. the people on the ground and the people in the carts THROW oranges at each other. i mean, with intent to like, kill. it is not a pretty sight. look:

several times, i was splattered with orange pulp. and several times, upon unwittingly crossing the path of a cart exiting the inferno, i cowered in fear as oranges flew about my head. it was scary.

so, that was fun! onto a nicer, calmer weekend, again in beautiful tuscany. we went to the towns of pisa, and lucca. well, what can i say about pisa, except there is a big old leaning tower there. and some cute italian sailors. here are the requisite pictures:

this one didn't turn out so great. it looks like the tower is about to fall on me while i blissfully smile in my ignorance.

the dimensions of this one are better. i am so strong!

anyway, there wasn't much else in pisa, so we moved on to lucca. you've probably never heard of it, but it's about 30 minutes away from pisa, and completely fantastic. quiet, beautiful, warm and sunny...yay spring.

this is this really cool tower -- you see random towers all over italy, but at the top of this one, they planted trees! dunno why.

the third in my continuing series of "claire, pensive" pictures. she is seriously pensive over these trees. because she just got into harvard, uva and berkeley grad school for landscape architecture! wouldn't you contemplate trees in that situation as well?

a lovely little garden where we frollicked around and sunbathed, sorta, for a while.

during the winter, they move lemon trees inside to what i call a lemon hotel. so, here are some lemons. from lucca. yup.

ahh! too many pictures. after wonderful lucca, we moved onto via reggio, a small town a bit further up the coast, where a famous carnivale parade is held every year featuring these massive massive floats that satirize politicians and such. i didn't stick around for the parade, but i caught a few shots pre-parade. lots of crazy costumes here. (everyone and their dog gets dressed up during carnevale.)

don't you miss being in high school band?

this octupus um, mauled me with his tentacles. a little strange.

and this fish poked natania in the stomach with its nose. at first we thought he just couldn't see and was unintentionally running into her, but no, he was poking. i don't know what it is about sea-themed costumes that makes people so crazy!

quack.

a cool mask that was hung on a window across the street from a gelato store, where i got yogurt and lemon gelato. YUM. is there a gelato store in d.c.? i know there's one in cville.

some italian men, standing and talking in a circle, as italian men are wont to do.

this is my point of view as a crazy old italian man showered me with confetti. i feel this pictures sums up much of the country and culture better than i ever could.

i love italy.

wow. hello. it's been a long time. the duties of running around with little children all day and then sitting on my butt in front of my couch every evening watching "bring it on" and survivor have lured me away from the chore of formatting all my pictures and putting them online. but i've taken some fun ones lately, so on this beautiful spring day, i'm sitting inside, working the adobe photoshop 6.0. all for your benefit. these pictures start a while back, in early february, and start off with skiing in interlaken, switzerland and my four days in florence. enjoy!

this is where i would like to live someday, thank you very much. up in the mountains of switzerland. of course, it would help if i could actually ski. unfortunately, as tommy and julie had to deal with, i cannot. i think i was the only person on the slopes that fell and had to literally inch down slopes out of fear for my life; everyone else, from ages 5-95, was basically a professional skier and whizzed past me, laughing their european laughs.

some more beautiful interlaken mountains. taking the half-hour gondola ride up to the slopes was like entering a true winter/fairy/wonder land. totally, totally amazing and unreal.

i would put up more pictures of interlaken, but the skiing experience was basically traumatic. so i'm making a conscious choice to repress it. onwards to a much more enjoyable venue -- florence, italy, in my opinion, the best, most wonderful, most beautiful, most perfect city in the world! and they say i tend to exaggerate...unforunately, my pictures of florence are also somewhat limited, because many of the most stunning things, such as the artwork and inside of buildings, were not photographable. like david (this statue completely blew me away, as did everything else's of michelangelo's that i saw) or the fra angelico frescoes in san marco's. oh well. you'll have to do with my crappy shots instead.

this is unfortunately somewhat dark, but it's the view of the san lorenzo dome from the apartment where i stayed. i completely lucked out for florence accomodations; one of my grandmother's good friends (whose late husband was consulate general in florence about 30 years ago) let me stay in her apartment. it was basically the best place ever. one minute away from the duomo, on the third floor of an old palazzo that was right across from the medici's first palazzo. stunning views, great light, and she was the nicest lady in the world and basically fed me every moment of the day. not a bad life.

this is the inside of the famous baptistry in florence, which is right across from the duomo. it has the doors of paradise -- those bronze paneled doors created by ghiberti. the inside was beautiful -- the building is octagonally shaped and the ceiling is completely paneled in gold-burnished paintings.

these are the long steps leading up to piazzale michelangelo, about a 15 minute walk past the arno, and a place that offers this view of florence. wait for it...

nice, eh?

and look! a tiny couple is getting married.

this is the view opposite the florence side. it's some nice tuscan hills. mmm tuscany. i love you.

this is kind of a neat thing. one night, when i was talking with mrs. gordon (whom i stayed with) she told me that on one stone of the palazzo vecchio, there was a vague carving of a face. apparently, it was done by michelangelo, on a bet. that he couldn't carve a believable face on a stone. with his hands tied behind his back. but look! he could. michelangelo's stuff was so incredible... i mean i've vaguely studied renaissance art history and seen slides, but seeing his sculptures in person was indescribable.

okay! that's the end of this one. in the interest of those who don't have kickass internet connections, i'm splitting my pictures up into two pages so they'll load easier. move on to the next one...my travles to ivrea (aka hell), pisa, lucca and via reggio.