Day 2, early morning - did you know that Turin has the largest market in Europe?
We showed up on Saturday morning, not even entirely sure the thing would be open, only to be confronted with what must have been hundreds of carts set up along makeshift alleyways in the middle of an enormous lot.
The outside food area, just in front of the huge covered market, is full of fruits and vegetables and the occasional snail.
The front area is taken up by stalls selling a wide variety, while in the back you'll find the farmers selling just a few things, their crop from that morning. We saw the smallest, tenderest celery ever, along with the brightest carrots.
Sadly, not all the produce is sold in time...
Then, there's an entire outdoor area dedicated to clothing. Mostly cheap stuff, but there were good deals on socks and underwear and accessories. We saw a lot of women there wearing the head scarf.
Then, of course, there are actually two covered market buildings. The first is dedicated to fish, and has a setup I've never seen before - vendors stand in front of and behind their wares, which are displayed at a steep angle on tables. They actually throw fish back and forth - and we saw several vendors folding money to throw it from the top level down to the bottom.
A very strange way to do business - but it certainly looked like they'd been doing it that way for a while.
We haven't seen variety like this at a fish market since Catania.
Then, there's an entirely different covered building, much larger than the fish building, that's full of meats and bread and dry goods. We were surprised at the amount of sausage surrounding us - smoked sausage, German style. Turin definitely looks north more than south, culturally.
And they had Romanian wine displayed on chains. Interesting idea...
We spent several happy hours at the market, but eventually it was time for us to leave. Poodle.
Torino reminded us of its stateliness. The streets seemed even emptier, coming from the bustle of the market.
We found a really great place for lunch, under the arcades, that had a display of prepared plates. The food was delicious and fresh - we gorged on vegetables. Of course, most of them were au gratin or baked into quiches, but there were some just steamed... and stuffed with meat.
We even bought some of Torino's famous candies, the little lozenges known as pastiglie. These are raspberry flavored from Leone, and they are even now all over the bottom of Husbear's camera bag. Oops.
Satisfied, and on to the film museum! It's housed in a building originally built as a synagogue, until Torino's Jewish community decided costs were getting to high and sold the building to the city.
Torino was the center of Italian filmmaking for a long time, and I was sort of thinking we'd be seeing a lot of memorabilia for Italian films that I knew nothing about, or a dusty warehouse full of posters.
Turns out, I was much mistaken. Instead of a bunch of cheesy souvenirs loosely tied together through their connection to film, what we found was a meticulously researched, very slick new-style museum full of information about the development of pictures that moved.
As well as awesome souvenirs. I may regret not buying this. (For those of you who are scratching your heads, "parlando" in Italian means "talking.") Capisci?
The museum started with the parlor games dabbled in during the 17th - 19th centuries, including this fun flip-your-image trick. Hi, upside-down me!
Then, there were eight or ten of those binoculars that let you see in 3-D - the ones that come with cards with pictures on each side? We looked at a wedding in 1900, a glacier in 1880, and then...
PORN!
In a separate red room with a curtain saying children shouldn't go. I was mostly surprised that the women in the pictures looked like real people. Mama Bear was scandalized, I tell you.
Old-school parlor tricks are still fun, I have to say.
There was an area of he museum dedicated to memorabilia, as it turned out, with a script for Psycho, masks from Star Wars, and Charlie Chaplin's bowler hat.
As well as a little homage to Marylin Monroe.
The entire center of the museum is taken up by a huge viewing area, where lounge chairs point at two screens showing a loop of old films. A cable elevator rises through the center of the room, and around the outside are arrayed what the museum calls "chapels" - small spaces dedicated to different genres of film. An interesting idea, well executed.
The museum even has an extremely slick bar, with color-shifting tables!
After reupping on the caffeine, we took the elevator up to the roof to catch the view of Torino. It's a really large city.
By now, of course, it was time for gelato. We had passed a place with violet gelato and so went back to try it.
It sort of tasted like perfume.
We couldn't let the perfumed one be our only violet gelato experience, so we actually stopped by another place to try theirs out. Much better, more like candied violets than perfume.
After going back to the hotel to change and splash some water on our faces, we left for aperitivi. The further north in Italy you go, the better these spreads of bar snacks tend to be. Basically, you pay for a drink and you get unlimited access to their spread - so check the spread first!
Husbear got to have his first martini in quite a while. Happy guy.
This place had what they called international aperitivi, which meant that, for the first time since leaving Austin in August, I actually saw a plate of sushi. Though "sushi" might be more accurate. Whatever - it was raw salmon and rice wrapped in seaweed, and even if the rice was more risotto than sushi-style, I was still thrilled beyond belief.
Unfortunately, that's it for Torino... and even more unfortunately, for the whole of the Piemonte. That's definitely a region we'll have to make a special visit to see.
Next time - on to Aosta!
On a more specifically timely note, we returned our phones today. We are phoneless! Our landlord arrives in two hours to go over the apartment list of contents from way back in August. And the number of arguing American couples I heard on the street today walking to the train station was staggering. (I won't poke too much fun, as that may very well be us in two weeks.)
Love from Firenze, on our last day here!
