Episode 22: Giulia Millanta & Ian Lee

Giulia Millanta: That night I had a dream and I woke up sweating in the middle of the night, screaming because there were kids playing and then screaming at me and asking me to help them.

Josh Caldwell: Hello my atypical daydreamers. Welcome to the show. My first guest today is Giulia Millanta. She's a singer and songwriter based in Austin, Texas. Giulia has been in some spooky situations and today she shares a couple. But it's her last story that really makes me think that there's something greater guiding us through this life.

Giulia Millanta: So I was in England and I was touring with my friend Hamell on Trial and we were playing in this pub and it was great. It's old and crooked, especially this pub was really crooked. Like the building was just not, it was crooked. I noticed that in the green room there was a tomb on the floor and I was like, okay, well it makes sense that someone is buried here. Why not? I've never played right across the room from someone, you know, like a corpse or something that's buried underground, but that's totally cool because I'm cool with that. I'm cool with death. I'm cool with ghosts and whatever.

I was spending the night above the pub. In the middle of the night, I was sleeping in this room and there was a cello in the corner and the cello played itself. And I was awake and it's not a dream. Also, I'm a light sleeper. It wasn't like a cello suite. It wasn't that, but it was like, and nobody was in the room. And I was like, okay, that's okay. That's cool. It's not the first time. I guess England is just crowded with ghosts because it's old.

So I was playing in this convent that they repurposed and turned into a recording studio slash concert venue. The stage was actually the altar of the church. Already it's a pretty interesting setting. It was a big building and everything was gray and kind of moldy. We were sleeping in one of the nun's rooms. I remember these corridors with this horrible carpet, like the Shining type thing. Long and narrow corridors with horrible carpet on the floor. And at the end of each corridor, there was a statue of the Virgin Mary or the statue of a nun, but they were not kind of friendly looking. I remember feeling a bit uneasy.

And that night I had a dream and I woke up sweating in the middle of the night, screaming because there were kids playing and then screaming at me and asking me to help them.

Giulia Millanta: I have a really, really prolific dream life. I dream every night. I have dream journals, I write them down. So I'm used to having intense dreams. I managed to fall back asleep for a little bit. Then the next morning I was downstairs having coffee and I was talking to the manager of the venue. What was this place before exactly? It was just a convent and he's like, well, this place was yes a convent and orphanage. There were kids here and at some point there was a big fire and a lot of kids died in that fire. Every time I tell the story, I can feel the hair at the back of my neck.

Giulia Millanta: I was about to die when I was 12. I was in a coma for a couple of days because I fell off a horse and I broke my skull. It wasn't a deep, deep coma. It was one of those light ones where people can actually wake you up if they slap you or kind of shake you. So they were able to wake me up. And I remember this feeling of like, can you just let me sleep? I'm so comfortable. People were slapping me and going like, what's your name? I was like, I don't know. So I was in this light coma state for a couple of days and they were about to release me because I was doing better. After a couple of weeks I was doing better.

And then this is kind of my guardian angel story, or lucky fortunate coincidences, if you will. The chief of neurosurgery here in Florence, he was like, well, Giulia's doing fine. She's recovering and we are wondering whether we should discharge her because she's okay now. But he said, I have a son that's Giulia's age. And if this were my son, I would definitely open his skull and make sure everything is okay. I wouldn't just discharge him like this. He was a leading authority in neurosurgery. So my parents were like, okay. So they did. And it was like a five hour surgery.

When they opened my skull, they found a little tiny, teeny tiny fragment of bone resting on a vein, which was like a ticking bomb. One day I would, you know, while drinking a cup of tea, bam, it could have exploded in my head and I would have died like this. So I was lucky. But the story's not over.

Giulia Millanta: At some point I decided to go to medical school because I wanted to be a doctor and I actually became a doctor. That's a really, really long story. I started medicine, then I quit, I moved to Barcelona, I started being a musician, then I went back to Florence to get my degree that I never used. I am an MD with a degree in medicine and I never practiced, not even one day.

But the story goes that the first year of medical school, we were in the morgue studying anatomy and doing all of that, looking at bones and whatnot. We were divided in little groups and there was this guy Gastone and he told me his last name. And I was like, wait a second. Are you by chance the son of professor so-and-so that operated on me in whatever year that was? And he said, yes, that's my dad. Because you're my same age, which is why we were attending the same year of medicine, he decided and he suggested that he would perform the surgery to make sure everything was okay. So I was like, well, thank you. I think you saved my life.

Josh Caldwell: Hey, Josh here. I love making this podcast and I'd love to make it my full-time gig. Besides telling the stories, I'm basically a one-man band and that takes time. If you're enjoying the podcast, please consider becoming a patron. You'll have access to loads of great bonus stories and you'll have the satisfaction of knowing that you're supporting a truly independent podcast. Find the Patreon link in the show notes. And thanks.

My next guest is Ian Lee, back by popular demand. He's a drummer, songwriter, and he owns a tour bus company. Having been on many tours, Ian has been in some tight spots, but his story today is a real sweaty palm nail biter.

Ian Lee: So one of the things that you have to think 20 steps ahead with all driving things. It's not just like plug in the venue or the city you're playing into your GPS and go. You have to have very, very specific driving instructions and have your plans very well executed. And you might not know this, but in New York City, there are only two ways that you can get into Manhattan from outside. You can take the George Washington Bridge or you can take the Lincoln Tunnel. A bus is 13 foot one inches and the Lincoln Tunnel is 13 feet high. So when you pull a bus into the Lincoln Tunnel, you have about an inch of clearance above your bus. So if you can imagine taking a bump a little too fast, just literally that much, you can knock an air conditioner off the top of the bus. It's literally that close. I have an antenna on the top of my bus for a CB radio and it scrapes the roof of the Lincoln Tunnel.

So if you can imagine driving into Manhattan with traffic like that, and people are not exactly polite drivers there. The first time I was in my first bus on my first tour into Manhattan, I didn't know this. And I tried leaving in the Midtown Tunnel and the bus is 13 feet high and the Midtown Tunnel is 12 foot 11 inches. So it's one inch short. And I've got a bus with a trailer on the back.

I was going to the Midtown Tunnel because I didn't have a truck GPS that had the height restrictions flagged in it. Going into the Midtown Tunnel, you have three arterials. You have one coming from the east, one coming from the west, and one coming from straight on, and they're all four lanes. So you have technically 12 lanes of traffic converging on an entrance to the tunnel, all going one way. And I get across and I get down in there and there are these bars

Ian Lee: above the tunnel that I clear under on the street, and it's all midtown Manhattan. And then I pull down into the tunnel and there's a laser sight about 200 feet before you actually enter the tunnel. There's a laser sight that if you trip it, it sets off alarms. Of course, I was an inch too tall and I tripped this alarm.

Now I'm stuck in the entrance to the Midtown Tunnel in Manhattan with 12 lanes of cars around me and if I go down into the tunnel I'm going to get stuck. And of course at the time when this is happening, as soon as the laser sight goes off, the police who are walking around in the area directing traffic, they all converge on the bus with guns pulled and start screaming at me to stop and that I have to turn around. So I have to, and I'm already down in the entrance to the tunnel. The walls are on my left and my right of the sides of the tunnel. The bus with the trailer is about 60 feet and the walls, there's probably 63 feet. So I have to back up.

The cops start pushing 12 lanes of New York wall to wall traffic. Probably 12 lanes, 150 cars, five blocks deep behind them. And I've got to back in and turn around and then drive into oncoming traffic. It's one of these out of body experience things where I don't even know how it actually, like how I'm not still stuck there right now, nine years later. But it was like the most incredibly stressful. I still have nightmares about it once in a while.

Josh Caldwell: I want to thank Giulia and Ian for sharing their experiences. Be sure to check out Giulia's music. She has two new singles, a third coming out March 22nd and a full length album coming out April 19th. Also check out Ian's band, The Cle Elum. And if you're in need of a tour bus, Affordable Tour Solutions has got you covered. This podcast was created and produced by me, Josh Caldwell. Music by Visual Aid, my side music project. General support and copywriting by Miranda Caldwell. If you like the show, please follow, subscribe, rate, and review wherever you listen to podcasts. And if you'd like to financially support the show, check out my Patreon page. You'll have access to loads of great bonus stories. You can find the link in the show notes. Thank you for listening, and I hope you come back next week.