18.4.09

Siena

We travelled to Siena two weeks ago on a fog filled morning. I was immensely hung over, and the bus was really warm.. which led to a lot of sleeping.. but from the tid bits i can remember we were basically cutting through fog the entire time. It was surreal, especially in my dehydrated state. We arrived in Siena, Marco on the whisper units, filling our head with little tidbits. We walked through the city, stopping at some highlights, and ending in the Piazza del Camp, where the Palio is held every year. The Palio is a horse race between the different neighborhoods of the city.. there are 17 in all but only 10 are able to compete. It is a HUGE ordeal here and occurs twice during the summer. The horses are blessed in the churches, people are packed in the campo.. its supposed to be really ridiculous. A delightful little detail, when the horses are blessed in the church ( each neighborhood or contrada has their own church), if the horse decides to defecate, it is taken as a sign of good luck. This is because if the horse is not even afraid of god, he/she is deemed to be so crazy/bitchy that they will most certainly win.













Notice the stools the old women are sitting on.






We stayed in the campo almost the entire day... just laying in the sun. It was fantastic.. we bought pizza, sat down and just bathed for four hours. We walked back to get on the bus, but apparently it had a tire issue which was fortunate and allowed us to explore the city some more as the sun was setting.

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