"Milan l'è Milan" a Milan Travel Page by antistar

Milan is a city that seeks to impress. From the very first moment you step out of a train into the grand central station, you can see the people of this city want you to be in awe. Everywhere in the city there are grand buildings, not least of which the imposing Duomo, the third largest Cathedral in the world. Being the kind of city Milan is, the buildings are mostly showy baroque, ornate renaissance and exhuberant gothic. Even the lesser buildings away from the city center are adorned with delicate frescoes, carved gargoyles, and all manner of decorations completely unnecessary to the construction of the building itself. The people too are much like the city. They are proud of their city, some say snobbish, and always impeccably turned out. The Milanese have to be some of the best dressed in the world, perhaps even more so than Paris.

Underneath all the proud buildings, and beautiful people, Milan is a real, working city, a real financial and industrial work horse. The city is home to the Italy's main banks and stock exchange, and has key industries like Alfa Romeo. This makes the city a hustling, bustling place, often choked with people and traffic. This gives the city a bit of a rough edge, and it can be seen especially from the roof of the cathedral, where the views of the city are blighted by some ugly skyscrapers, brown suburban sprawls, and an ever-present smog which bespoils views even on the clearest and brightest of days. I was lucky enough to have a clear enough day to see the Alps from the roof of the cathedral, but as you may be able to see in the pictures, the view was almost entirely blotted out by a layer of grey muck in between the buildings and the clear blue sky above. While not the dirtiest city in the world, I don't believe I've been to a city in western Europe where the fumes filled my nose and throat with so much gunge.

Overall I really liked Milan. The people were not as snobbish as I had been led to believe, and in fact everyone I met was incredibly warm and welcoming. The city was a lot more relaxed than I expected, and there were few of the troublemakers in the city that I was warned about. The best thing about the city is just to walk around and soak up the feeling of Milan. There are wonderful buildings to admire, amazing fashion shops to gawk at, and plenty of opportunities for people watching in the street cafes. Milan is a very famous and distinctive city, with more than you can possibly do in a few days, and somewhere you will want to come back to again and again. If they could just make it a little less expensive, and cut down on the traffic fumes, it could be the best city in Europe.