One dark and rainy day in Fiesole...

1/14/2009 5:20 p.m. Fiesole
It was a gloomy day in Fiesole, and besides going to class we had been cooped up inside the hotel all day long. Facebook and other such online entertainment had ceased to entertain, and I was pining for some real adventure. This is when I decided to go for a run, which is something that I vowed to myself that I would do during my time in Italy. Eldon had also made the same vow, so, overhearing me say that I was going running, he asked to come along. I said yes, on the condition that he wore a shirt. He pleasantly agreed to do so, and our running excursion was on. The hills of Fiesole proved to be a bit more daunting than anticipated, but, nonetheless, we made it a decent distance at a decent pace, according to my standards. We ran up to the lookout over Florence and onto the monastery grounds. Running up the hill to the monastery, I was the first one to crest, and my eyes came upon a man who appeared to be in his fifties. He was standing on a sidewalk behind a stone rail by the chapel, facing his backside toward us. I was quite taken aback to see that he was not wearing pants. Upon getting closer, he began to speak to us in Italian. I responded by continuing to run and saying in Italian that we do not understand. Eldon, on the other hand, decided to speak German for a reason unbeknownst to me. This is where Eldon and I had a minor dispute. He claimed that the man was a monk and that he was wearing a habit. I still hold my claim that he was probably a homeless man, as he was not wearing pants and what Eldon thought was a habit I thought was a stocking cap. Perhaps we shall never know. But I digress. We continued to run through the monastery grounds and came upon a cemetery. Eldon has a cemetery fetish, and I admit that I also find them interesting, so we decided to check it out. We went through the gate and had a little walk around before deciding to head out of there before it got dark. This is when we discovered that the gate had closed while we were in there. We tried the gate only to find that it was padlocked. I had a moment of minor panic at the thought of spending my night in an Italian cemetery in the cold rain. However, we found a way to climb over the wall at a low spot by stepping up on a water fountain. Relieved, we made our way back up the hill to the hotel and told our story of being locked in a cemetery to all who would listen. Moral of the story: Always read the sign that is outside the cemetery gate before entering.