Milan Part 1

Milan Part I
I should have known we were in for trouble when no one at the airport spoke English or looked as though they particularly cared to help us in any way shape or form. The time was 11:00pm (Milan) the last train to Venice (where our hotel was) left at 11:55p. Now you might be saying to yourself, that’s cutting it awful close isn’t it Shea?” To which I say, “hogwash!” You see, misti and I did such a good job planning this trip out we were going to be there in Venice by 3pm and have a wonderful relaxing dinner by the Grand canal. Instead, thanks to a major delay by Virgin airlines, we were forced to stay in England all day long. That wouldn’t have been all that terrible had AlItalia not decided to have a pilot’s strike in 4 of its major cities forcing us to fly into Milan @ 11pm and thereby screw everything up!
But we finally arrived. Despite all the crap that it took to get here and despite how frightening the whole scene at Malpensa was we could say that we had arrived at our temporary destination. That would be one of the very few bright spots of the night.
Our backpacks arrived at baggage claim, without being absolutely destroyed by the airline workers not on strike. After picking them up off the conveyer we started to the doors. It was at that moment that we came upon one of our first planning oversights – “Where on earth is the Train station to Venice?” Unlike most of the cities, Milan’s Malpensa airport does not have a direct system of transit going from one place to the next. So, if you need to get from the airport to the train station at 11pm… good luck!
And there we stood, two touristas overwhelmed and somewhat baffled as to what to do. Fright didn’t set in for a good 10 minutes.
5 minutes later…
Misti and I start to make our way to the exit of the airport looking for someone who might just speak English. That is a more difficult prospect than you might think. I finally saw a security officer (carabinieri) and made a bee line to ask him where to go. In Italian he said… well I don’t actually know what he said since it was in Italian, but I did understand the gestures he was making. Feeling very glad to be with my wife, Mist and I briskly walked toward the door, and the awaiting gauntlet of cabbies ready to pounce on the unsuspecting individuals walking off the plane.
5 minutes later…
Walking out of the air conditioned airport Misti and I were enveloped by the thick, humid air outside. It was welcome to be out of a climate controlled environment after having been stranded in one for the better part of a day and a half. The parking lot was brightly lit and bustling even at this late hour and at that moment the weight of not knowing how to get to the train station or for that matter where it even was were really beginning to hit me. Though Misti never said it, I knew she was hoping that I knew what was going on… I couldn’t even begin to fake it like I knew.
We saw a bus and a huge line of people waiting for it and thought immediately that that must be our bus, but was quick to repress my assumptions seeing that the bus in question was no less than a charter bus and for all I knew these white hairs were all a part of some tourist group going to their hotel. I didn’t know what to do and asking seemed an adventure in pointlessness. We crossed the 4 lanes of pick-up traffic trying not to get run over straight off the plane. As we crossed I saw a huge commotion from another smaller (more city-run) bus stop, with my curiosity piqued I paused at the median to see if I could make out what was going on in the crowd across the next 3 lanes of traffic. Soon I realized there was a man wailing as if his dog was shot and police circling a spot 5 feet away from him. I started to understand what he was saying and quickly realized that someone just shot his friend (girlfriend I think). I am not kidding about this. Being a little freaked out, I was not made to feel any better when I realized that it was the police that did the shooting! At that point, I was no longer overwhelmed or freaked out, I was overwhelmed, freaked out and really afraid!
Here we are, in a city we don’t know anything about, with pretty much everything we need for the next 3 weeks on our backs and 200 euros in a belly pouch which my wife happens to be wearing.
“calm down shea… calm down… get your wits about you, this is no time to freak out. You have to figure this out… You’ve got to get out of here now. Even if that means going back into the airport… you have to get away from the crowd and get your wits about you, and you have to do that now! You cannot freak out… you have to find the train station or you’ll be stuck here until tomorrow.”
I looked at Misti and without another word grabbed her hand and we walked across the street back into the more quiet area of the airport. We got out of the mess outside and pulled maps in an attempt to figure the whole mess out. I looked for signs anything that looked like a train or a bus or… a visitor’s center! Misti saw the visitor’s center sign and lead the way as we walked to the desk. From where we were at we didn’t even know if anyone was still there, after all it was 11:25pm and the lady could have gone home for the night putting a long day at work behind her. I was never so glad to see a smiling Italian woman in my entire life. I asked if she spoke English and in perfectly understandable English she told us how to catch the next bus since we just missed the last bus, giving us a traveler’s map of Milan.
With new found confidence in the plan of attack we headed out the bus stop. We were greeted by the smiling faces of another American couple that just arrived from California headed up to Lake Como. They were very sweet and talked with us about their flight from England. They went through the same crap we did, but were wise enough to plan on staying in Milan that first night. Conversation seemed enjoyable and going well right up until the wife popped out one of her breasts to feed her young baby. (I recognize this is a natural and perfectly normal thing to do, especially in today’s freewheeling culture, I’m not upset, it was just unexpected and therefore momentarily shocking.)
With that a few awkwardly silent moments passed until our bus pulled into the station. We got on and gladly watched the bus driver put the distance between us and the craziness of the Airport. Optimism was abounding. Maybe the train would run all night, or even once or twice a night after midnight… Maybe we’d catch the last train out… maybe just maybe we’d be alright after all. The radio on the bus was playing something I didn’t understand, but it didn’t matter because the seats were cushy and comfortable. We were finally going somewhere, and as the black diesel smoke arose into the pitch night from the back of the bus I was still nervous but at least neither of us was shot!