People

I started my first full day in Milan by wandering down the Corso Garibaldi, an upmarket shopping precinct that runs down the west side of Milan, linking the monstrous new skyscraper district with the old castle of the city’s original rulers. It’s been converted to mostly pedestrian use, which made the stroll very peaceful compared to the usual tension of dodging Italian motorists. Even at after 10 in the morning, it was almost eerily peaceful and quiet, and I was suddenly reminded once again of the single thing I love the most about the Milanese – they hate pointless noise as much as I do. People murmur to each other rather than shouting. Even on the phone, when the best of us give in to the temptation to raise our voices, they merely speak at normal volume. The shops play music, but it’s dialed down so that you barely even notice it’s there, in contrast to Australia, where the noise blasting out of trendy boutiques will lift you off your feet and toss you across the street. The green man on pedestrian crossings pops up silently, such that it often takes the crowd of pedestrians a couple of seconds to notice and start crossing.

I made my first stop at OVS, Italy’s answer to H&M, to boost my wardrobe basics, an area in which they excel. I ended up buying a couple of undershirts, a pair of underpants, a dark blue business shirt, a T shirt in a rich jewel shade of green that called to me, and an indigo-dye denim jacket that somehow fitted me despite being a Small.

From there I made my way to the Science Museum. Or to give it it’s more flamboyant Italian name, De Museo Nazionale della Scienza e della Tecnologia Leonardo da Vinci.

I learnt a few things:

- In Italy in the 20^th century, industrial control panels were mounted on slabs of marble, because Italy.

- The European Space Agency (ESA) has a huge inferiority complex. “You NASA bastards may have built space shuttles and walked on the moon, but we’ve… launched some satellites. So there!”

- Leonardo da Vinci was really into toxic masculinity. He seems to have designed endless numbers of war machines that were sometimes remarkable in their violent inventiveness. A chariot surrounded by rotating blades that would scythe enemy foot soldiers off at the knee? Well sure, everyone’s had that idea. Funnily enough we normally see a lot more mentions of his helicopter or his log sawing machines than his horrifying deathmobile.

- Our ancestors went to extraordinary lengths to do things we now take for granted. The arduous business of printing a book or building a boat without computers, precision tools, motors or generators is eye-opening. One of the most affecting things I saw was a small book printed with lithographs stamped on each page, designed to teach basic mathematics to illiterate merchants and shopkeepers. The idea that middle-class people wouldn’t be taught basic reading and maths as children is so alien to us, but just normal in the 16^th century.

After the museum I went for a long walk, eventually stopping in a little bistro for lunch. I had a modest portion of carbonara, a glass of very nice red wine and some aqua frizzante (Italian for both sparkling water and a drag queen somewhere, probably). I also received a little amuse bouche of a frothy tomato foam and some pane del giorno. The bill was around 23 euros, which after last night’s aperitivo feast seemed a little steep, even though the tomato foam was delicious, the wine was delightful and the bacon they used in the carbonara was heavenly. I discovered why the price was a little inflated when I wandered out of there and meandered for thirty seconds before popping out into the piazza in front of the Duomo – I’d wandered into the very centre of Milan without really noticing it.

Explorer Sam and I tried to take some pictures, but the piazza was so crowded with tourists that there weren’t any good vantage points left. The Duomo is massive, and Explorer Sam is tiny, so there were scale issues.

We then strolled through the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, Italy’s oldest shopping mall, and the mecca for every wannabe social media influencer to film herself spinning in the centre of it, in a floaty dress and possibly a cute hat. However, like the Kaaba in actual Mecca, the galleria is host to a slowly rotating gyre of human beings, and it’s hard enough to get your long-suffering boyfriend to take an unobstructed photo of you, much less have the physical space to do your diva overcome with the thrill of being in front of a Prada store twirl. You might have a chance at 7am, when sensible Italians and most tourists are still asleep, but, mid-afternoon on a Wednesday, that’s not going to happen. Milan apologises to you and your 6,143 mostly bot followers.

Later on, on Corso Beunos Aires, I did see someone who could be an actual social media star stalking down the street. Imagine an attractive, strikingly tall woman with a tiny fluffy white dog on a leash, a white fluffy coat, platform heels, and a tight slit skirt and matching skimpy halter top in flawless apricot silk. She looked like Harvey Weinstein’s idea of a glamorous housewife in her day lingerie. I couldn’t see a videographer anywhere, so I guess she was just popping out to buy a taco or something.