Southern Trip: Napoli, Italia

11.12.2008
Napoli, Italia

Our first night in Napoli, after many warnings from Cinzia about not wandering by ourselves, staying in groups, not wearing gold jewelry, and staying out of certain neighborhoods, we all went out to dinner together. Cinzia had warned us that this place was crazy, but we had no idea what we were in for! The owners knew her and gave us a good deal (pasta dish, main dish, veggie side, wine, water, and a piece of fruit for 10 €), and the entire wait staff seemed to always be yelling things back and forth to each other. Maybe they were yelling orders, who knows! The main waiter would come in, shouting and asking who wanted what dish, and Cinzia would have us raise our hands and count us. Half the time we couldn’t even hear what we were raising our hands for, so there was lots of yelling on everyone’s part. At one point, the main waiter came in, dropped a plate on the ground, and started waving around 2 raw pieces of bacon! I had absolutely no idea what was going on, but Cinzia seemed amused so we all just went along with it. The pasta was good, although it had meat that I had to pick around (the place was hectic enough, no way was I sending it back), I got a good caprese salad (tomatoes and mozzarella), and cold zucchini slices with garlic and onion. On our way out, we each threw a euro into the tip basket, which had been lowered from the ceiling on a string. Every time a coin was thrown into the basket, the entire wait staff yelled “Grazie!”…what a place!
We next walked around for a while getting an abbreviated history lesson from Cinzia. We went into the galleria, which was unfortunately absolutely full of scaffolding, and walked around to a few other buildings. We had all had a bit too much wine at dinner to be interested though, and got a bit impatient and giggly. Cinzia realized this, and led us all to her favorite bar. It was hosting an expensive concert though, so we went to another funky-looking place down the street. We sat around with both professors for the rest of the night and had fun chatting and just hanging out.
The next day was packed. Looking back now at how much we did, I can’t believe it was all within 8 hours! Cinzia sure knows how to pack in a busy day. We began by going to the city post office, a modern building built during the fascist period. I could appreciate why it was interesting, but it just wasn’t my cup of tea. Feel free to Google image search. Also, spell check just made me capitalize “Google”. I have yet to decide how I feel about that. Next we went to Chiesa del Gesù Nouvo (New Church of Jesus or Church of New Jesus, which I think is funnier). It had originally been a palace, and thus had an ugly, diamond-pointed fortified façade that looked nothing like a church. The interior was awfully gaudy. Strike two for Napoli today.
We then ventured across the Piazza to Santa Chiara, which was much more up my alley. A very simple interior, tall, thin windows, undecorated side chapels (which looked to be the original aisles filled in), and a beautiful wooden ceiling all made this one of my favorites. We didn’t spend too much time inside, but I could have spent at least an hour just sitting, looking, relaxing, and pondering. We then went into the cloister, which had a large courtyard with columns and benches all lined in yellow and blue tiles. The middle was also full of lemon trees, and the whole thing was beautiful. I didn’t have time to do a wonderful sketch, but got something down. Jeff and I sat next to each other as we sketched and lamented about how horribly both of ours were turning out. On our way out, we found a fresco of Abraham, and proceeded to take many silly pictures, because there’s a flash video online that mentions “posters of Abraham” at one point and the entire video has gained a cult following in our apartment. Hilarity ensued, let me tell you.
We took our morning coffee break (Cinzia could tell we were lagging) at Scaturchio, which she claimed was one of, if not the best, pastry shops in the city. I asked her what to order, and she recommended a little round of chocolate called a “ministeria”. I got that and a cappuccino, and soon realized that my ministeria was full of an alcoholic chocolate cream-not what I expected at 11am! It was delicious but rich, and I nibbled on it for quite a ways before finally chucking the last little bit.
Our next stop was Capella San Severo, where there were incredible statues by relatively unknown artists. Why these guys never made it big is a mystery to me-these were hands down the most realistic sculptures I’ve ever seen. The focal piece, in the center of the room, was a statue of Christ lying on a bed. He was covered in a thin, thin piece of cloth that actually somehow appeared transparent. It was unbelievable that this magnificent piece had once been a block of marble! There was another statue in a niche of a woman with clothing made of similar drapery that was just as stunning. The third piece we’d been advised to take careful note of was that of a fisherman, holding and covered in a knotted net. If the net hadn’t been white, I would have sworn that it had been twine. All three of these sculptures were mesmerizing.
We walked a ways and found ourselves in kitschy tchatchke heaven. Napoli is known for its nativity scenes, and this street was lined with those, along with tacky ornaments, little fountains that ran on their own, statues of people putting pizza in ovens and taking them out, mini crèches, tiny loaves of bread and pieces of produce, turning windmills, and everything your crazy old aunt may have ever wanted to decorate her house with at Christmas. Cinzia gave us some time to explore the street. I didn’t buy anything, but was pretty amused as I walked around.
Of course we had to have pizza for lunch, since we were in Napoli. Cinzia took us to a place that was eventually able to seat us all and gave us a good deal. These margheritta pizzas were so big they were falling off the full-sized plates that they were served on! Well worth the wait.
Next we saw two museums: the MADRE, a contemporary museum that only opened 3 or so years ago, and the Archeological museum. I enjoyed the MADRE a lot; some of it was typical modern crap, but a lot of it was really captivating. We all took the museum at our own pace, too, which was nice. It was just the right size. At the archeological museum, we saw some famous works, a collection of sexual art from Pompeii, huge 3D models of what they’ve excavated of Pompeii so far, many old glass pieces, statues, mausoleums, and other random artifacts. We definitely didn’t see it all, but I think we got a pretty good sampling.
We headed back to the hotel at our own pace to allow for a bit of shopping on the way back. Liz and I had fun browsing tights and leggings, but still cut it short getting back to the hotel, despite how much time we’d left. Oh well. Got our luggage from the hotel and got on the bus back to Rome. As we walked through the streets approaching Campo de’ Fiori (where our apartment is located), I realized that some people probably saw us with our luggage and may have thought that we were tourists coming to visit the city…but really, we had just been on vacation, and were calling Rome our HOME!

PICTURE: Napoli pizza!