Monkey People in Milano

A series of beautiful photographs in Milano, Italy, along Via Dante, the Champs-Élysées of Milano, is marred by crazy tourists who can't help imitating what they see. Monkey see, monkey do?

Only kidding, of course. I put my friend Irene up to this! She's a good sport and looks nothing like the monkey in the photo. Well, maybe just a little.

La Galleria in Milano, Italy - Juxtaposition!

La Galleria is one of the earliest "malls". It's in an X shape and is enclosed except at the four entrances which are open, as you can see here.

The stores inside vary from the luxurious to the silly but nowhere is this more evident than smack in the middle, where four stores face toward the middle.

Here I present to you one of the silliest extremes to face each other. In one corner, Prada, the epitome of fashion and luxury. When you enter, there are more clerks than customers. The clerks dote on you hand and foot, flattering you and pointing you to those items that, once worn, will make people ooh and aah at you.

Directly facing Prada is the other extreme, McDonald's, the haven of hamburger-chomping and French Fry-nibbling American tourists and curious Italians, where there are many more customers than clerks, where the food and drinks will, once consumed, cause you to look less flattering, and will make people go oh-oh when they see your expanded gut.

Ah, the juxtaposition is simply...astounding!

My sister's artwork outside city hall

This is a carving that my sister made, commissioned by the city of Casina, Italy, to place at the entrance to the city hall. She is quite the artisan and quite the artist. Here she is next to her handiwork too.