The ITNOG meeting starts tonight at around 18:00 at the [Naquadria] datacenter. This means we have a whole day to explore this part of Italy, and neither Marina nor I have been in these parts before. Since we have two and a half days here, we decide to spend one of them in Parma, Italy.
In the morning we have a good breakfast with scrambled eggs, toast, youghurt with berries, (blood-) orange juice, and slightly bitter Cafe Americano (filter drip style, not watered down espresso!) and with this nurishment in the belly, we program the satnav for Parma. The road system in Italy is similar to that in France: there’s a national web of paid highways, with large lots of toll booths on entry/exit; while there are also secondary roads between the cities. We decide to minimize the time and use this convenient highways: they are straight as an arrow and it’s only 57km from Piacenza to Parma.
Along the way - and I am not too embarrased to admit this - I suddenly realized that while I know and take for granted that Parma Ham comes from the town of Parma, it hits me that [Parmigiano] is also cheese from the titular province of Parma. I also learn that Parmigiano is the Italian adjective for the city / province of Parma, while Reggiano is the adjective for the province of Reggio Emilia. Check!
But wait, isn’t the suffix -ese meant to convey ‘from’, like in the phrase Piccata Milanese (a small breaded veal, made ‘in the way of Milan’)? And then I get a complete brainmelt, as I realize that the next town over, Bologna, has a thing from it, called [Bolognese], and if you are from Italy and are now cupping your face in your hands in disappointment. That’s okay, you can laugh, but both my linguistic and geographical view of Italy make complete sense now.
Arriving in Parma, we decide to check out the [National Gallery] which has an impressive collection of art. What I enjoyed the most about it, is the first part of the structure [Teatro Farnese], which is a grand theater which came from the Duke of Parma and Piacenza (the town we’re visiting from!) It has a huge wooden stage on one end, and a half-circular wooden seating arrangement on the other end, while in the middle there is a half soccer-field sized arena for the arts. It’s huge! And it smells of wood in the whole building. There’s a light show in here that shows how the stage used to be prepared and built, which runs every half hour.
The second section of this museum is the national art gallery, which is home to several hundred paintings, small and large. They’re all beautifully arranged and curated, but the route through the gallery feels a little bit like IKEA to me. You are guided through in sort of a linear path, up stairs, through floors, over bridges, and so on. It’s clear that the curator does not wish for us to miss anything on display, but I find that only some of the paintings really speak to me, while most are a depiction of Christian faith one way or another.
What I found a bit of a letdown is the state of the books in the [Biblioteca Palatina]. Although the hall was impressive, the books were very worn down, broken spines, and crying for attention. Too bad! Anyway, I’m not here to do critical reviews of Italian palaces and art :)
I’m not gonna lie, one of the reasons to come to Parma is to have the aforementioned cheese and ham. We find a little spot in town called [Rigoletto] which has a super inviting atmosphere. The waiter is clearly the (co)owner. We can tell, because there are pictures of him and a woman, presumably his wife, around the walls. They depict the couple in all sorts of poses, some culinary, some more staged. We sit under the picture from their homepage, and have some delicious food.
After the lunch, which takes us until 15:00, we decide to drive back. It’s still raining, bah, and we did not order, nor really approve of, this weather! It’s only 65km (40mi) or so back to Piacenza, but since there’s a supercharger in Parma, we take a quick detour to visit the mall it’s next to. We walk around and windowshop a little bit, only to find that twenty minutes later, we have 350km in the battery, so off we go, back to Piacenza.
By the way, every time the satnav tells us to go in the direction of Milano, I continuously giggle because of its completely broken pronunciation. It says “Me-lah-knoooooowwww”, which is both hilarious as well as embarassing for this south african / american car company.
We freshen up at the hotel and make our way to [Naquadria] at 18:00 sharp. We park the car on a nearby empty lot at the edge of this industrial zone, reminding me very much of [BIT] in Ede, the Netherlands. When crossing the road, Marina is amused at the car that politely stops for us, and she remarks “How Swiss of you!”, only to burst out in laughter after realizing that this car, in actual fact, had a Zurich license plate.
Naquadria is awesome. We get the private tour from Leonardo who shows us their first floor called DC-A, which is almost full and running at 85kW of critical IT load. Then, just in the adjacent building, they show their brand-new not-yet-turned-up DC-B which is meant to serve an additional 180kW of critical IT load. I can see the improvements that comes from their learning experience, and they are proud of what they’ve accomplished. And they should be!
Drinks and snacks are served, after which we go to a classic eatery called Baciccia just a few kilometers down the road. There’s a good seventy people or so, and the menu’s are customzed in Naquadria-purple. Marina has a pizza Quattro Stagione and I have a pizzal Al Tonno, with a few beers. Our tablemates humor us with English, from time to time. We swap war-stories and complain about or respective state telco’s (KPN and Swisscom for me, Telecom Italia for the others). It’s funny to see that, despite where you hail from, if you’re in IT: you do not love your state telco.
After dinner, we tail it to the hotel a bit early. I still have to modify my slides to fit in the half hour slot, and that’s going to take me a little bit of time. Tomorrow at 08:30, ITNOG starts and I want to be prepared, rested and not hung over :)
Pictures of the Day
