Ciao! Mangiamo!

I'm in Florence. They have hot chocolate. No, literally. It's just dark chocolate that's heated 'till it's liquid. And you drink it, and are in warm, chocolaty heaven. It's below freezing outside. You try to block the cold. You put on a coat; your hands are cold. You put on gloves; it's your neck, now. And after you're bundled up like a snow-man, the cold goes into you through your nose, routing your defenses. But you have the trump card. You slowly take your hot chocolate, sip by steaming sip. And the warmth returns to your blood, and there's nothing the cold can do to you any more.

Furthermore, they have pasta. Who'd have guessed, right? But it's so good, I have to make sure it's well known. Italians have pasta which they cook perfectly al dente. And they have sauces, which they make better than I've ever had. But what the Florentines have is Florentine beef. It sells in restaurants for roughly 40 Euros for a kilo. They make it medium-rare, and the raw bits are ruby-red. It tastes like beef sushi. The freshness is incredible. And so is the texture. The raw meat melts on your tongue. I never knew beef could do that.

And last but never least, they have espresso. The espresso here is brewed rich and dark, far stronger that anything in the States. And you take it it quick gulps, because while the initial taste is rather bitter, the aftertaste is wonderful.

So that is my experience in Florence, which is meals punctuated with viewing historical treasures.

There are other things, of course. My Italian class is really paying off. I've been able to talk to several people in the little Italian that I know. And, unlike in Paris, where they don't like foreigners to butcher their language, Florentines seem really pleased when you attempt to communicate with them in Italian.

And they have so many leather shops here. There are leather jackets, stylishly cut, in probably 100 stores, packed like sardines in the city center.

I mentioned this in passing, but the history is also impressive, in the sense that it impresses me. We saw Michaelangelo's David today. He cut the marble to look human. It's not something that is conveyed in photographs. You have to be there in person.

I could go on and on, about our discoveries, about the things that interest me, about the nice people we met. But if I don't go to sleep soon, I'll miss breakfast. And there's an espresso waiting for me tomorrow morning at the bar at the corner.