Digital Home of Kristoffer Strom

Wednesday 08th of September 2010

Warcrafting to Milan, Italy (2007-01-12 -> 2007-01-14)

I've always loved Italy. It's just awesome! Earlier I'd been to Rome as part of my job and got to enjoy alot of stuff during that trip. But now that our Warcraft guild was dying me and my best buddy Mats decided that we should pay a visit to some of the weird italians we'd been playing with for a while now, most importantly Mario (aka Dago) who has a Zen-like quality about him and the way he says stuff.

We had taken some time off from work and were gonna fly down there on the afternoon on a friday. The first problem we had was at the airport when I wasn't really aware of the new regulations regarding liquids allowed on the plane so I got half of my shit confiscated at the security checkpoint. Only to walk 10 meters to the tax-free and buy some new stuff. After that we got on the flight down to Bergamo airport which was quite a bit from Milan. After a bus ride into central station we found a cab driver that spoke a little bit of english and off to Dago we went. I don't know if this guy chose the non-scenic route or what but the town looked really grey and dull and used. Not a very good impression but fortunately Dago was there to meet us with a big smile! After the normal chitchat we made our way out to a pizzeria that served kick ass brutally "knock my socks off" terrific pizzas! And we spent a few hours of general talking and typical male bonding. And as far as the official record shows we went to bed right after since it was midnight.

The unofficial record shows we were up for a bit more and had so much fun that I actually didn't get any sleep at all until we went up again at 11 to just... lame about. After an hour of that we went into the more posh part of town and met up with Dago's girlfriend Daniella. This was where all the fashion stores were and we also checked out the Doumo-cathedral and then just grabbed the first best open restaurant to have some nice lunch and again, kick ass brutally mindblowing good food. Then some more seightseeing and then we got into Dago's excuse of a car to go off to his home town, Piacenza. We didn't see much of that town that day (how could we with fogged up windows), but they did have a Holiday Inn that me and Mats checked into and got a an hour or two of bedtime before the real party began.

They had hired a big part of a local restaurant just outside of town and at first it was just the four of us. Then some more, and some more and even more and before the night was over almost 30 of us there. Alof of Warcraft players, some of which I'd actually played with a bit (and some I've played with ALOT!) but the old theory of "the more the merrier" was proven once again because we all had a blast. Any excuse for a party you know. And the food... there's just not enough words to describe it. Me and Mats were sitting there wondering who italians can't all be 200 kilos heavy with all this good food around. We ended the night trying to a group photo in front of their church but my camera didn't want that at all so it was very fuzzy. Then back to the hotel where me and Mats was philosophizing (yes, that's word!) until we eventually had to sleep.

On the sunday we got picked up by Dago in his... "vehicle" and stopped by a typical italian coffeeshop for some... coffee! Or in my case tea, and then we started a tour of Piacenza which was quite a beautiful old town. Then we ended up at a restaurant that served pizza slices that were humangous (or however you spell that) and we had to really work at it but it was just so good we couldn't stop eating. Then a small drive out to some medieval town that was a big tourist place really but one of those "have to do"-things down there. So we did :) And then back into the car, into Milano again and to the trainstation and the bus to Bergamo airport and the end....

Or you'd think!! As we were going to Bergamo airport I saw how misty it was and told my friend "noway they are gonna be able to land and take off in this" but when we got there it was no worries, no delays. But about 20 minutes before our flight was suppose to leave I looked around and kinda realized that there is actually no plane here. And at the stated departure time there still wasn't a plane there. 10 minutes after departure time it said "plane redirected to Brescia airport". Great. Where's that? It took them about 2 1/2 hours to transfer around 150 people from one airport to the next one, then alot of time of checking in again and the security checkpoint and boarding the flight. Then we took off at 23:59:59 which was crucial since the airport shuts down at midnight so had we been a minute later we might not have gotten home at all that night. Now we got home, just 4 hours late.

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