The next day, we left for Florence. When we arrived, I immediately noticed how much cooler and quieter it was than Rome. There was a brisk wind even in the alleyways and all the people were hushedly bustling about with their sweaters and sunglasses on. It had been raining, so not many people were about. We passed through a busy market district on our way to the hostel where we checked in. After settling in, we went out and walked to the Duomo and found a cheap little restaurant for dinner. The menu boasted a pizza and soft drink for only five euros for students, so we were sold immediately. We sat and each got a coke. I wasn't expecting much for five euros, but she brought out a decently large and CHILLED glass brimming with coke. I could not express my gratitude. I had a pizza with mozzarella and prosciutto, and Carrie ordered the spaghetti carbonara. When my plate came out, I could not believe how much food I was getting for five euros. The pizza was about a foot in diameter with crispy brown crust, a thick helping of a sassy marinara sauce, generous slabs of cheese, and enough prosciutto for three pizzas. I was amazed, and I ate in complete, reverent silence—until another couple came in. It appeared to be a British man and wife. The man ordered without a fuss, but the wife asked for fried fish, and the waitress didn't understand English. So, she called for the extremely charming Italian cook, who spoke Italian, French, and English very well. The woman explained again that she wanted fried fish, and he tried his best to make her understand that they only had very fresh fish and that they would cook it whole. She seemed to have trouble understanding and told him that would do. Soon, he brought out her plate with this big steaming fish on it—still scaled, but obviously fried. I looked at Carrie and said, "I will bet money she sends that back" and oh was I right. She sniffed and picked at it prissily and pushed her plate away with the b****iest frown on her face. Her husband continued to eat happily and ignored her until she started flailing her arms in the air to get the waitress's attention. She said simply, "I don't like it. I don't want it. Bring me something better." Entitled b****. And then, to improve matters, a giant group of our fellow Southerners entered the restaurant and began a series of failed attempts at being charming. A few of them offered a pathetic "Bonjur" and when asked what they wanted to eat, one girl asked if the chef would make her a Capreeshi salad. He looked confused, then said, "une salade caprese, yes, this I can make." To which she responded, "great, make that two of them! You know, dos!" and held up two fingers. I almost died. Surrounded my idiots and b****es, we paid our ridiculously small bill and escaped.

We laughed for a while about dinner and walked back to the Duomo where we stuffed our faces some more with gelato. I got passion fruit and lemon, and it was so tart and rich that I couldn't even finish it. It was too much amazing. We also went in a few shops and looked at all the crazy expensive leather jackets. Evidently, they produce a lot of leather and leather products in Florence, and nearly ever shop was selling them. We walked a little more that night and ran into three fellows who all had a beer in each hand. They obviously knew where the happenings were, so we tagged along behind them for a while and found a corner of the city with a little nightlife. We settled for a little bar called the Fish Pub where we had a few beers and the bartender gave us and the DJ (who was sitting next to us) some free shots of some gross peach flavored liqueur. There were many drunken American and Australian and British children dancing crudely and shouting at one another on what was obviously not a dance floor but rather the only walking space in the entirety of the tiny pub. After a while, we found our way back to the hostel and greeted our new roommates, three of whom were very angry and sassy Hispanic girls that we chose to ignore and who ignored us. They bickered amongst themselves before putting on their slut suits and going out for a late night as we settled in for a snooze.

The next day, we walked some more. We walked across the river and went to the very creepy zoological museum (the bizarre pictures of which are on my Facebook) and wandered for a while. We had a brilliant light lunch at a little café called Jesse's Bar. I had a Greek salad and Carrie had the pesto gnocchi. After lunch, we shopped for a while. We bought some fancy fruity teas and immediately decided that joint-ownership of a Tealicious store is in our future. Then we walked back toward the hostel and Carrie cooked a simple dinner of spaghetti while I booked hostels. A few of the other backpackers joined us in the kitchen as we opened a bottle of wine, and we all drank and chatted together for a few hours. I got a few surveys done before we retired.

That night, I was awakened at around 4 a.m. to three loud Italian men screaming in the street beneath our window, which was situated directly next to my bed. When it continued for several minutes, I stood up and leaned out the window to see what they were yelling about. I saw the three men right under my window walking to my left down the street. They were following a lone woman who walk walking briskly away from them. One of the men called out, "hey baby, wait up!" in a thick accent. She yelled back, "No, no, no, no, no!" And he said, "what, are you scared?" And she said, "No, just not interested." And he said, "What, you don't have any money?" Which to me, made no sense. She started walking faster, still saying no. And he yelled, "Are you going to make me chase you?" after which he started running, breaking away from his companions who catcalled them. The woman began to jog too, looking over her shoulder. I didn't know if I should do something, and I didn't have any way to call the police. Just then they turned around the corner, still in pursuit, and I sat back on my bed wondering what I could do. Nothing, really. Much later, I fell back into a fitful sleep. Is it still the bystander effect if there is no one else to see it? I think by definition there have to be others.

On our last day in Florence, we decided to walk to the other side of the city which was more commercial and industrial. We ate an early lunch of cheap pizza, and I had a cannoli (eat your heart out, mom). I threw a bit of ricotta on the ground for a pigeon near me, and we were soon attacked by pigeons from every corner of the piazza. We were forced to flee and continue our walk. We were looking for this Russian onion-domed building, but it was under construction, so we instead went to the central market. It was a giant food market in this iron-framed structure. We picked up some dried fruits (grapes, mango, papaya, cherries, kiwi, and apricot) and some gifts for people back home. We wound our way through the bigger market outside and bought more gifts. After shopping for a while, we walked back across the river and headed up the ridiculous amounts of steps that led to the Piazza Michelangelo where we watched the sunset.