The Last Supper

The first thing that came to my mind when I thought of Milan,
it was that the city was known as the fashion capital of Italy.

Unlike Rome or Florence, maybe Milan is not loaded with
ruined and certain historical richness.

I'd be perfectly happy if I could just shop.
Well, that's not quite true...



If the only thing I did in Milan was shopping,
probably I'd feel guilty and lame for not "seeing the city".

So, I tried to find out things to see and do in Milan.
I took out a guidebook for Italy that was sitting in the bookcase.
There were only 2 pages devoted for Milan in the book.

2 pages.

Seriously? Seriously??

And unfortunately, those 2 pages didn't tell me much.
I turned to the Internet to continue on with my research.

In addiction to the places I wrote about, I found something significant.

Leonardo Da Vinci's Last Supper.

Of course!! That's something non-shopping and historical!!
Perfect. But there's one thing...
According to the sources, it's hard to get the tickets to see it.
Yes, you have to make a reservation to see it.

The official websiteis hard to navigate through, and according to
the online availability, the dates of our stay were already booked.

I read somewhere I shouldn't rely on the information on the website,
and rather I should call, so I did.

I was half prepared to talk to the operator in Italian,
but after 5 seconds, I gave up and switched to English.
Half way through our conversation, the operator asked my nationality,
(for a possible discount, EU citizens only), and as soon as
she knew that I was Japanese, she said, "日本の方ですか？"
which means, "Are you Japanese?"
I was caught totally off guard!! We started talking in Japanese now.
Fortunately, two tickets were available with an English tour guide
on our second day in Milan. I purchased them right there and then.

2 weeks later from that day.
I received an email from the ticket center.
The email said, "Due to an anticipated national strike on the 12th,
the museum might not open. In this case, we'll offer reimbursement."

Oh great. A strike during our visit. So Italia.
Trying to find out more about this possible strike, I went online.
One website stated something like "Strikes are part of our culture."

Really? I mean, really??

Sigh.

Fine, if you wanna claim that.
I don't think it's something to be proud of, though.

The day of our visit finally came.
We arrived more than 20 minutes before our visit time (as requested.)

This is the museum entrance.

Because we arrived early, and there was nothing to do,
we explored the church that was next-door.

The inside of Santa Maria delle Grazie.

It was finally time.
There were 20 something of us visitors in the wait room.
To preserve the mural as much as possible,
they only allow 25 visitors at a time, and the doors were shut behind us
each time before opening the next one ahead.

Sorry, no picture of the actual mural here.
Photographs are prohibited inside. Too bad.

The tour guide was an interesting lady.
She told us fascinating facts about the painting, such as,
the Dominican monks created a door way in the wall,
cutting the feet of Jesus in the process.

OMG. Monks did that?!

But the highlight of our tour was when she said,
"The Da Vinci Code, is not real. The Da Vinci Code, is a novel."
To my dismay, I cannot describe the way she said it in writing.

Steven and I kept repeating this phrase,
with our best Italian-English intonation,
whenever we had the chance during the trip.

Oh, what a beautiful memory.

All in all, the visit was worth it. I'm glad that we went to see it.
Because I didn't feel any guilt dedicating my time in Milan
shopping on Via Montenapoleone after this