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(A day late because I wanted to do a photo post but I am fighting with flickr to try to make albums work. There are some pictures over at my Naples2010 tag if you don't want to wait.)
My Day, by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
gement, inner age 8.
We went up to a museum on the hill on the Funiculare, which is a trolley only at a 45 degree angle, which was AWESOME. And the museum of Neapolitan culture was fine. I took a picture of Hedgie looking out over the bay from the old monastery garden.
And then we walked down about 80 bazillion steps into town, and then we had donuts, and then I was all shaky and ended up bursting into tears because I was afraid I would be letting the group down by wanting to go slower, but it turned out everyone but Bill actually needed to go slower, so that was OK. I was not feeling like a very successful baby duck when we were going too fast. So then I was really stressed, but we went to the best hot chocolate place in the entire world where it was basically hot pudding in a cup, and that made me feel better.
Then we found the bay and I sat on the wall and kicked my feet over the water, and there was SO MUCH WIND. Janette's hair tried to kill us all. And then we went to the Egg Castle, where there was EVEN MORE WIND, and I really like castles, so we'll go there another day when our legs are less dead of stairs.
Then we had pizza and I couldn't finish mine but that was fine, and we tried walking on the big main street but then I felt like a bad baby duck in the crowds again so we switched to alleys. And then we hit the Spaccanapoli (where all the little street shops are) but it was too crowded forcinnamonteal so we went back into the alleys and those were great, and we talked about how before street lights you'd only go on these roads after dark if you could afford a squad of armed torchbearers.
And then we went home. Later we went out for dinner but I just had lettuce and french fries. Lettuce! Lettuce! Lettuce! Lettuce! Lettuce!
And then I was really tired and I went to bed and I didn't need melatonin.
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Additional adult observations:
Saturday, I hit my limit. It was supposed to be Volcano Day, but it was pouring in the morning, which is not good conditions for wandering slippery ruins, so we did a museum day instead. The stairs down from the museum were an exciting challenge in downward climbing, and they used up almost all my spoons.
It took bursting into tears for me to be willing to ask to slow down. I was so afraid of being the slow one, of spoiling everyone's fun, of being the one that people roll their eyes at because I couldn't keep up. This despite the fact one of us has bad knees and another a tight Achilles tendon, and neither of those people is me. I was just the first to hit my limit out loud. It's really, really hard to safeword on a group vacation activity.
Similarly, I finally had to call a halt to how much food was being ordered for me, because the person ordering was cheerfully guessing based on his own preferences, and I was heroically eating two or three times as much as I wanted at every meal. I'd skipped dinner entirely the day before and still hadn't been hungry for breakfast. Speaking up about that was really hard, and I wasn't sure if I'd be violating fundamental restaurant etiquette by not having a massive entree in front of me at all times.
When we slowed down, I found out that a lot of my trouble reading signs and remembering images had simply been that my brain didn't have time to absorb and process new frames while moving at a Neapolitan stride; I'm too busy navigating. When I slowed down, I saw things again, and it was lovely.
If you go look at my photos, the highlights today are shrines (folk devotional shrines, usually inset in walls), activist posters and graffiti, a potato chip pizza, and a love note to my mother. Hi, Mom! My eyes keep leaping to the activist stuff. It's nice to see a city with strong opinions.
I'm posting this on day 5, which means I've actually done Volcano Day now. More on that tomorrow when I have slept, and probably also consumed a full day of castles. Short version: bodies not difficult for me; Romans being jerks still much more troubling.
My Day, by
gement, inner age 8.We went up to a museum on the hill on the Funiculare, which is a trolley only at a 45 degree angle, which was AWESOME. And the museum of Neapolitan culture was fine. I took a picture of Hedgie looking out over the bay from the old monastery garden.
And then we walked down about 80 bazillion steps into town, and then we had donuts, and then I was all shaky and ended up bursting into tears because I was afraid I would be letting the group down by wanting to go slower, but it turned out everyone but Bill actually needed to go slower, so that was OK. I was not feeling like a very successful baby duck when we were going too fast. So then I was really stressed, but we went to the best hot chocolate place in the entire world where it was basically hot pudding in a cup, and that made me feel better.
Then we found the bay and I sat on the wall and kicked my feet over the water, and there was SO MUCH WIND. Janette's hair tried to kill us all. And then we went to the Egg Castle, where there was EVEN MORE WIND, and I really like castles, so we'll go there another day when our legs are less dead of stairs.
Then we had pizza and I couldn't finish mine but that was fine, and we tried walking on the big main street but then I felt like a bad baby duck in the crowds again so we switched to alleys. And then we hit the Spaccanapoli (where all the little street shops are) but it was too crowded for
cinnamonteal so we went back into the alleys and those were great, and we talked about how before street lights you'd only go on these roads after dark if you could afford a squad of armed torchbearers.And then we went home. Later we went out for dinner but I just had lettuce and french fries. Lettuce! Lettuce! Lettuce! Lettuce! Lettuce!
And then I was really tired and I went to bed and I didn't need melatonin.
--------
Additional adult observations:
Saturday, I hit my limit. It was supposed to be Volcano Day, but it was pouring in the morning, which is not good conditions for wandering slippery ruins, so we did a museum day instead. The stairs down from the museum were an exciting challenge in downward climbing, and they used up almost all my spoons.
It took bursting into tears for me to be willing to ask to slow down. I was so afraid of being the slow one, of spoiling everyone's fun, of being the one that people roll their eyes at because I couldn't keep up. This despite the fact one of us has bad knees and another a tight Achilles tendon, and neither of those people is me. I was just the first to hit my limit out loud. It's really, really hard to safeword on a group vacation activity.
Similarly, I finally had to call a halt to how much food was being ordered for me, because the person ordering was cheerfully guessing based on his own preferences, and I was heroically eating two or three times as much as I wanted at every meal. I'd skipped dinner entirely the day before and still hadn't been hungry for breakfast. Speaking up about that was really hard, and I wasn't sure if I'd be violating fundamental restaurant etiquette by not having a massive entree in front of me at all times.
When we slowed down, I found out that a lot of my trouble reading signs and remembering images had simply been that my brain didn't have time to absorb and process new frames while moving at a Neapolitan stride; I'm too busy navigating. When I slowed down, I saw things again, and it was lovely.
If you go look at my photos, the highlights today are shrines (folk devotional shrines, usually inset in walls), activist posters and graffiti, a potato chip pizza, and a love note to my mother. Hi, Mom! My eyes keep leaping to the activist stuff. It's nice to see a city with strong opinions.
I'm posting this on day 5, which means I've actually done Volcano Day now. More on that tomorrow when I have slept, and probably also consumed a full day of castles. Short version: bodies not difficult for me; Romans being jerks still much more troubling.
