Haunted Streets

Florence, the first foreign city I visited twice, just became the first I visited thrice. First time, March 2000. Second time, January 2007. Third time, July 2007. It feels like the Louvre here, but without climate control. It's possible I haven't seen any Italians, and English is definitely the official language of Florentine summers. I'm still trying to work out how this makes me feel.

Any level of tourism changes a place. At some point, that level becomes Too High, and so to me Unbearable. One senses a corruption of the place, too concerned with showing itself off than being itself, much as people do. Being here for the third time makes me less susceptible to the city's facade and more interested in its soul. It's not totally soulless—that would be impossible here—but it feels like Florence is a hooker-with-a-heart-of-gold, turning tricks to pay its way through college, where college is our collective consciousness. With all these people milling around here, it looks like Florence is doing well there. The price of high marks though is authenticity.

If we think of the physical structures of the city as its body and the people who live there as its soul, we can find a explanation for this soullesness. The people here are tourists. Their lives are not of the city, are not adapted to its rhythms, its places, its geography. Through sheer force of numbers they possess the body of the city with a maladapted soul. And this is something I find repulsive.

I have no clue if there is anything that could be done about this. I'm just pointing it out as Too Bad and recommending off-peak travel to the wise.

The gelato still tastes good though. And the language is still beautiful; none of the foreigners speak it.