Italy

 Today's foray into blogland begins in a car park in Padua, Italy!

We have been touring the country in the camper van, and revelling in the general lack of tourists, the excellent food, the cheap wine, the hospitality of Jackie's relatives (some very properly socially distanced, others, surprisingly, not at all), and the congenial average temperature - about 23°C in the daytime, and not very cold at night.  Obviously, this means quite a lot of driving.

Italy seems to have come up with an ingenious solution to the problem of road maintenance.  I think they must use a bit more concrete in the mix than is common in the UK.  Many of the roads seem to have a surface which is harder than standard asphalt, and some even have quite a concrete-like colour.  Whatever the secret formula is, it seems to give their roads an extremely long life.  They use it on local roads and autostrata alike, and these roads simply don't need any repair; even when they have cracked, sunk, collapsed into ragged ruts, or dissolved into a patchwork of potholes whose severity jars the teeth of car drivers, and reduces camper vans to a crashing, rattling, cupboard-flying-open-and-depositing-the-contents-of-the-bin-all-over-the-floor ordeal, they still don't need any repair. Amazing!

Alas, since Italy isn't especially renowned for architecture, art, literature, opera, design, fashion, Roman history, or even football, I have had to return to my go-to topic for foreign blog posts, which of course is sculpture - especially in public spaces.  

The Montagnolo Park in Bologna has a few examples of the genre.  At the entrance gate, atop a massive plinth, is this rather unsettling tribute to that most ignoble of sentiments, revenge.  The dead geezer apparently borrowed the other chap's windsurfer without asking, and completely ruined the sail; whereupon the said chap clocked the geezer a good'un and knocked him out cold.  At least, that's how I read it.

That'll teach you to ruin my windsurfer!

Inside the park there's a round pond featuring a few more pieces of the chiseller's art, displaying an odd mixture of themes.  Underwater hairdressing seems to be one of them; at least I detect a strong undercurrent (ha!).  There are also battling animals of various sorts, and mermaids, which are obviously a good excuse for the most commonplace and historically popular thematic undercurrent in sculpture.  I refer, of course, to breasts.

So here are some mermaids in the subaquatic salon, engaged in the final throes of an underwater half-head foil tint in granite greys, caught in the moment just before applying the aerosol fixer spray.  Of course, there are breasts aplenty, and quite proudly so. The customer seems quite delighted, as I'm sure are the breast-fancying public. Excellent work by our master chipper.

Close your eyes while I give you a spritz with the glue darling!

In case you're wondering what's going on behind the mermaid's tail, here's a view from the other side.  It's a lion and a snake, earnestly engaged in a fight over a dead fawn (or some such), without offering the slightest clue why.  Surely we shouldn't be celebrating this sort of apparently wanton violence?  Or is it just to show us the horrors of nature, grey in tooth and claw?  I don't know.  At least there aren't any inappropriate breasts on show.

My dead thing!

Moving on, we come to the second of our underwater hairdressing scenes, this time in the hair washing category.  Another prize-winning collection of pert breasts is on display, but this time the customer has an extremely steely gaze, which either says "I asked for black coffee and all I got is this ridiculous sea shell" or "My eyes are up here mate, what do you think you're looking at?"

Either way, its a little bit unsettling.

What do you think you're looking at?

Finally, there's another animal battle scene.  This one seems suggest a title like "When you think you've won, and then someone unexpectedly sticks a sharp object up your bum"

WTF??

Elsewhere in Bologna, the message seems a bit mixed.  This chap seems to be sitting in judgement - 

I paid for a haircut, what do you call this?

 - but maybe he's upset by the pre-pubescent asp-ects (geddit?) of this latecomer to the Bologna shopping centre breast-fest:

Hmmm...  What do you think? Is it art, or is it just a bit wrong really?

In other news; some Italian towns have a surprisingly large number of bicycles.  The picture below was taken in Padua, which is a university town, and therefore a bit of a special case, since all students everywhere are obliged to have one or more bicycles; but it does give a clue as to how extreme the situation has got there.  

quite a lot of bicycles

It's quite an old university actually, having been established some time before 1222, and so it's naturally a good place to find old bicycles, too.  As part of my never-throw-anything-away mentality, I have a special affection for those bicycles which go on forever, and thus a particular delight in still-in-use bicycles with rod operated brakes. I'm sure you do too.  Anyway, I was jolly pleased to find this one...

rod brakes

...which seems to still be using the original chain, too, judging by the state of it.

look at the the state of it!

Maybe chain covers only work if the back end hasn't fallen off.  

Anyway, imagine my delight when I found this:

This marvel of biciclettaria was made by A. Cottognoli, who not only wrote his name on the frame and the saddle, but also hand-painted it on the chain cover.  But the interesting thing is that this bike marks the very point of the transition (at least for for Signore Cottognoli) between rod brakes, and those new-fangled Bowden cables.  Behold:

See what I mean?  All the bent rods, springs and trunnions (look it up!) of a rod brake setup, and then some more of the same technology to connect up those cables.

Incidentally, the rear brake cable goes neatly into the second top tube without drilling any holes in the headstock or the seat tube.  The second top tube is welded (or brazed) in place without any lugs, even though lugs are used on the other tubes.  He can't have added that second top tube just to hide the cable, can he?  

I refuse to pollute my frame

with your ugly cable, Signore Bowden!

Hmmm....  Classy job threading it through there, though.  Respect.  

If only the chap who wired up the front light setup on hadn't let standards drop.