Semester in Italy: Pisa; or, How My Opinion of People Somehow Sunk Lower

My school thought it would be a good idea to go to the world's biggest tourist trap. As we got swarmed by 15 guys selling cheap sunglasses when we got off the bus, I started to question their logic.

It's really depressing actually, almost the whole town is a touristy area. No one cares about the amazing university or hospital there that lead the region, it's all about the tower.

Il Duomo

The Baptistry

The Leaning Tower

Piazza dei Miracoli

Note my integrity

The square, Piazza dei Miracoli, is a world heritage site, and what no one tells you is that the whole square is tilted in different directions. That's because the square was built on a dried riverbed, and so parts are sinking into what was the river; thing is, the tower leans most dramatically. As the tour guide said, the area was very much about the circle of life: for your birth there was the baptistry, for your life there was the cathedral, for problems like illness there was the hospital, and for bigger problems there was the Camposanto Cemetery (left).

There is a legend about this cathedral about the columns. Most were stolen from earlier monuments, and in the front facade there is one red column on the second row, fourth from the right. Legend has it that if you look at that column for sixty seconds, your significant other or your spouse with be faithful to you for twenty-four hours; apparently in Italy this is a much needed divine gift.

Duomo Interior

Duomo Apse

Judgement

Bronze Doors

Another legend about this church is that Satan wasn't particularly pleased about the expansion of the church, both physically (the Duomo was expanding) and theologically. To combat these, he was said to have taken it upon himself to remove marble blocks from the structure. With that in mind, we have the Devil's Nails. The thing is that no matter how many times you count the marks, you never get the same number. This is why there is a crowd of guys physically counting.

The funny thing about the Leaning Tower of Pisa is that it leans in a few different directions. After the first few floors were built and it started sinking, a second architect a hundred years later started building at a different angle to try and right the tower. A third architect added the last floor with the actual bells, which is the closest to being straight of any of them. They prevented it from leaning further by filling the riverbed beneath it with cement.