veni vidi vicenza

my first stop on this whirlwind tour of italy was padua (sorry for the misleading title; i couldn't think of a good pun for padua). the highlight of padua was my first stop, the capella della scrovegni, which, for some reason, is also called the arena chapel. the chapel is giotto's masterpiece; the inner walls are covered with his frescoes. i waited in a climatised room for my fifteen-minute visit during which i watched a nice video on the paintings' meaning and restoration. as the previous group came out we were allowed in.

the chapel itself was bigger than i had imagined and the frescoes were quite impressive. you could really see giotto's skill in demonstrating depth and capturing emotions. before masaccio even. he's a bit like the cezanne of the 14th century. apparently he also used relief in some of his paintings, like with leaves or tears. the sequence of paintings is like a giant comic book depicting the life of mary and jesus. but honestly even knowing what was supposed to happen it was pretty hard to follow the order. after fifteen minutes we were ushered out and, i have to say, i don't like being given a time limit with art.

at any rate i continued on, being shooed out of the adjoining museum (apparently closed that day). i walked the rest of the city, stopping occasionally for interesting buildings or spectacles. speaking of which. well, padua's known to be a big university town; the campus dominates the better part of the old city. it's the second oldest in italy and galileo taught there. (i know, i know. galileo.) at any rate students are a common site but on the particular day i was there, there was some strange sort of demonstration. in several spots there were students dressed strangely covered in foodstuffs, reading from a poster in italian. at certain times they would have to variously drink something or get hit with something (likely more food), as well just generally being gawked at. (it was kind of like when dreiss wore a baguette on his head and read dali.) italian hazing? i'm still not sure.

i continued on, finding mainly churches - including sant antonio's. he's the patron saint of the city and receives all kinds of pictures, letters and general supplications. these things as well as the devout (who have no trouble walking through you in order to get to his tomb) somewhat overshadow the giotto fresco on the wall behind it. upon returning to the main squares i found a big produce market and nearby bread/pasta shop where i bought my lunch fixings. (i was particularly proud of myself when i completed a transaction in italian and gave the correct change - "perfetto"). afterwards all that was missing was a sunny spot to eat. i turned the corner and what do i find but a group of benches in the middle of a piazza. thank you, padua. (vence could take a lesson from this).

i figured i wasn't going to top that so i traveled back to vicenza. this is where the title becomes a bit of a stretch, as i did not so much conquer the city as walk around it aimlessly and take picture haphazardly. you can't walk more than about 50 meters without bumping into a building designed by palladio. some of the bigger estates are naturally outside the city limits and the biggest of these, the villa rotunda, does not open until march. so i walked until the good lighting faded and made my way back home. that evening my couchsurfer host and two other guests shared a meal of beef, vegetables, couscous, an omelette, and of course wine. it is nice to have a home to come back to, even if it's not yours.