Back to the north of Italy! Took the Frecciarossa fast train. It’s fast, clean, comfortable, and has wifi. It’s miles away from the only train that goes to Sicily, which is slow, poorly bathroomed, and forces you to sit with the same six people for 8 hours.
Florence and Bologna feel like they’re in a different country from the south. It’s like everything is more upkept, cleaner, and I can understand more of what people say. Spent an afternoon in Florence to see Santa Croce, which is where anyone who is famous and also Italian is probably buried. Like Galileo, Leonardo, Macchiavelli, etc. Everyone. Then a quick trip by the language school I’m starting in July, pretty much just to make sure it actually exists. It does.
Then a quick, easy train to Bologna. Bologna is a beautiful city. 
Went to see the city library, the original University of Bologna main building, and the old operating theater.
Operating theater, with muscle only guys.
The library has great chair desk things. We need these at Rice
Finally, walked through the actual campus, which seems like maybe NYU or some similar city campus. Posters, and protesters everywhere. It seemed a lot more politically active than Rice especially. Communism is very popular here, as well as being anti-fascist. We stopped at a nice restaurant to have spaghetti bolognese. Or as the menu called it: Meat spaghetti with meat ragout.
Then left Bologna for a drive to my favorite little city on a lake, Riva del Garda!