Twelve Hours in Milan

We reached Milan on the morning of 25th October. We had just one day to explore Milan so we were in kind of a hurry. Our first destination was the Milan Cathedral of course. Unfortunately not all of its sections were opened the day we visited, but still we could get inside and enjoy the serenity and the feeling of being in a blessed place and closer to God.

Despite the fact that we didn’t have a lot of time, we gave this Cathedral all the time it deserved. After all this is the biggest church of Italy and the third biggest in the world. It no doubt is the magnum opus of Italian Gothic Architecture and according to some reports it took almost six centuries to complete. We took a round around the Cathedral, capturing each angle of it in our brains and appreciating the hard work behind it in our hearts.

I was almost lying in front of it trying to capture a closer full portrait of it when the guard came and told that it’s not allowed to sit in front of it like that. I still am not sure of the reason, may be my feet were points towards the cathedral and its disrespectful; however I apologised and got straight.

Also in case you are from a different faith and are unaware, let me tell you that don’t wear the hoods on your head when you are inside because it happened twice in different churches that my friend was told to remove his hood from the head. However if you are a woman, wearing a headscarf is totally as nobody ever raised any kind of objection on me.

You can then roam around the Piazza del Duomo for a while. Be aware there, a lot of immigrants are going to come and fill your hands with corn kernels, and then all the pigeons will attack you. You can take nice pictures showing how birds are loving you. But nothing is for free and soon you will be demanded to pay Euros for that handful of kernels. Cheers.

Also the square is full of people who would come and brag that they can take very nice photos of you with their professional cameras. And in case you forgot your selfie stick back at home, don’t worry you‘ll find a lot there.

You will also find the The Monument to King Victor Emmanuel II in the square. I also talked about the same King in my earlier blog about Rome. After all he was the first King of United Italy, finding monuments and sculptures of him across Italy should be considered very obvious.

Nearby you will also find Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II which is the world’s oldest shopping mall and a must visit if you are in Milan.

After that we gave Parco Sempione- a park a visit. Don’t go there will very high expectations though. You can take a walk to Sforza Castle. I was surprised by the architectural style of the castle as it was somehow very different from the architecture that can be generally witnesses in Europe. It was built in the 15th century by the Duke of Milan and after some enlargements and renovations, during the 16th and 17th century it was among the largest citadels of Europe.

This fountain which is just in front of one of the Castel is a great place to sit in order to enjoy the sun (provided there is sun the day you are travelling).

We soon realized that there is not much left to see in the city itself so my friend came up with this idea of visiting Politecnico di Milano which also holds the honour of being the largest technical university of Italy. We relaxed in the lawns of the university for a while. We were then struggling with finding a coffee machine; fortunately my friend had some acquaintances there who helped us. One of his friends was so nice that she took us to her hostel and we had our lunch together.

She then took us to Bosco Verticale which translates to Vertical Forest. It is actually a pair of residential towers and is given this name because each floor in each tower houses trees which apart from keeping a check on smog and producing oxygen, also helps in creating a moderate temperature during all weathers. This is a combine effort of architectures, engineers, horticulturalists and botanists. It was something that indeed should be promoted across the globe.

We then went back to the Central Station as we had to take our next bus to Barcelona. We exchanged goodbyes and best wishes with our friend and took our seats in the bus with hundreds of memories of Italy.

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