Vatican City/Rome

June 30

We toured the Vatican Museum and St. Peter's Basilica today. The Vatican City is the worlds smallest country. It is not part of Italy, but has it's own government. The head of state is - you got it, the Pope. The museum has many fine works of art, shown as a display or as part of the buildings themselves. The pinnacle of the tour was going inside the Sistine Chapel. Seeing these marvelous paintings by Michelangelo of which I have seen pictures all of my life was astounding. The chapel was actually smaller than what I had imagined. It is in this chapel that conclave is held where the new pope is selected by a large group of cardinals. St. Peter's basilica is the largest cathedral in the world. It was enormous inside and seemed to go one forever. The church was filled with sculptures, paintings and other works of arts, the most famous being Micelangelo's Pieta.
That evening, we gathered at a restaurant in Rome and were serenaded by an Italian singer with an accordianist where they sang traditional Italian songs as we celebrated our last evening in Italy. It was an amazing trip, particularly to hear the choir sing so much.

Rome

June 29

Today we visited ancient Rome. We visited the Colosseum, the Roman Forum, and the Pantheon. Our tour guide, a woman named Monica, said that Rome was a city full of "wows", and as we followed her along a street, she would say, "get ready for another big wow - Mama Mia, the Pantheon!" It was amazing to actually see and touch these ancient structures that have been around for 2000 years. While in the Pantheon, the choir impromptudely sang in the center of the building. All of the crowds of people immediately became silent and surrounded the choir, taking videos and pictures. They were thrilled with the singing. Rome is a large city, with lots of crowds and heat, so it was a different experence for us, but still very enjoyable. That evening, the choir sang at a mass at a church next to the Vatican. They seemed to fit in very well with their music. The priest of the church said that they could come back any time and sing for them. After the mass, they gave another concert at the same church. This was the last time this group of kids would sing together.

Siena

June 28

We traveled from Florence to Rome, and on the way, visited the Tuscan village of Siena. Siena is perched atop a hill, and so the entire city is made up of winding, hilly streets. At the center of the town is a large piazza, or plaza that is the location of the Palio, an intense horse race that takes place every July 2 and August 7. The town is divided into neighborhoods, each with its own mascot such as panther, snail, etc. Each neighborhood is represented in the race, and they are very enthusiastic about their particular horse winning. We saw the preparations the town is making for the race, including applying a thick layer of dirt to form a track surrounding the piazza.

Florence

Friday, June 27

We were in Florence all day. Florence has many fine works of Renaissance art from many great artists, including Michelangelo. The most famous is the statue of David. It once was in front of a government building for centuries, but about 130 years ago, it was moved inside the Acadamy of Fine Arts building. We toured the building and saw this magnificent sculpture, and viewed many other fine works of art. Brian and I and a few other students climbed the 465 steps to the top of the dome of the great cathedral here in Florence. On top there were stunning views of the city. Most of the afternoon was spent shopping, and in the evening, Lirico sang at another church. The church was so full of people coming to hear them sang that the whole back of the church was also filled with people standing. The choir did great! It is amazing to hear these kids sing in these churches. Before we left the city, we stopped by the Porcellino, a bronze statue of a boar where people stroke the snout and put a coin in the mouth for good luck.

Pisa

June 26

Today we went to Pisa on the coast, about an hour and a half from Florence, where we are staying. On the way, we stopped at the town of Lucca, where we had lunch in the charming old section of town. In Italy, they have preserved the historical old sections of town by keeping them separate from newer areas. The old sections have plazas, narrow alleys between buildings, and the buildings are never higher than the churches, which are the center piece of the towns. Many of the towns have several big churches. After Lucca, we arrived in Pisa, and saw its very famous landmark, the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Its incredible to see this after seeing pictures of it since I was a little kid. Brian and I another choir student climbed to the top. It was odd to be on this winding staircase that would alternate from leaning to the left, back, right, down as you circled your way to the top. We also toured the cathedral, or duomo, with its beautiful architecture and artwork, and we went into the baptistry, that has the amazing ability of sustaining a sound for about 15 seconds. A guide came in every half hour and gave a demonstration of how it sustained a note by singing three different notes in harmony and hearing a beautiful, sustained chord. That evening, we ate at a wonderful restaurant that closed to everyone else but us. We took up the entire restaurant for two hours, and they treated us very well. We had spaghetti, of course. Actually, I have had pasta just about every meal. It's good. I haven't had to get used to weird food here, because I have always loved Italian food. Their gelato, or ice cream, as well as their pastries, are superb as well. After dinner, we went to the Chiesa de Santa Marie del Carmine for the concert. Each time the kids perform, the Italians are enthralled and give them thunderous applause. Afterwards, the choir members mingle amongst the attendees and have fun communicating in broken Italian and broken English. We got home after midnight and were exhausted after a day full of activity.

Verona

June 25

Today, we traveled from Venice to Florence. On the way, we stopped in Verona, where Shakespeare's character Juliette was from. Her family, the Cappelli's were an actual family here in Verona. You can see the balcony made famous in the play, "Romeo and Juliette". Millions of Shakespeare fans come here and sign their name on the walls of the entrance into the courtyard over which the balcony overlooks. We also toured an ancient Roman arena, almost entirely intact for over 2000 years. THey now use it for concerts, operas, etc. We were careful to stay in shady areas, because the temperature was over 100 degrees!

Venice

Tuesday June 24

We woke up early and went into Venice by 8:00 AM and toured the Basilica of St. Mark as well as the palace of the Doges. Venice was one of the most powerful cities in the early Rennaisance perioed, and they city elected a leader or Doge, to govern the city along with a Senate. The palace was beautiful, but not elaborate like some of the castles where kings lived and ruled. We also had time to wander around town and ride a gondola. I had so many scenes from different movies I have seen, such as "The Italian Job" as we went through Venice. It was fairly crowded with tourists, and I was amazed that I actually heard more Americans speaking than any other nationality, including Italian. The Italians, of course, worked in the shops, but they almost always spoke English as well. We went to the glass factory and watched them blow glass for beautiful Venetian glass goblets, pitchers, glasses, you name it.

As wonderful and charming as Venice is, the highlight of the day was hearing Brian's choir sing in one of Venice's renown churches, the Chiesa de San Rocco. When I heard his 18 member choir sing to a packed audience, particularly the songs written specifically to be sung in these churches, I felt chills down my body and had to wipe tears from my eyes. I noticed that many of the other parents there had similar reactions, too. The audience was thrilled with the performance and were touched too. Most of them stayed for the entire 1 hour concert. As the choir was singing, I thought about how these people are listening to these kids who came half way across the world to sing to them. We get to look forward to 3 more performances in different cities during our stay here.

Venice

Today is my first opportunity of posting anything on my blog for our Italy trip. Internet is not that available here, and I had to wait until we got to a hotel with wi fi access. So I'll summarize our trip so far:

Sunday-Monday, June 22-23

We met at 3AM at University High School and boarded a bus to Sea-Tac airport, arriving there at 8:30 AM. We then took off at 2PM for Paris, France. Our flight took us north over Canada and southern Greenland, and since it was the Summer Solstice, the sun never set the entire flight, even though we flew throughout the night and arrived in Paris at 8:30 AM Paris time (9 hours ahead of Pacific Daylight Time). Brian and I didn't get any sleep on the plane, so we were pretty tired. After a layover of 4 hours in Paris, we flew to Venice and checked into our hotel. After freshening up a bit, we went into Venice for the evening and enjoyed a nice walk around the town. Venice is unique, because the only mode of transportation is either on foot or by boat. THere are many charming shops, walkways and obscure little alleys throughout the city. We ate dinner in Venice and then at 9:30 PM, went back to our hotel on the mainland. BY the time we went to bed, we had been up for about 36 hours straight. Needless to say, we didn't have any troube getting to sleep that night.

We're Off!

It's 2:50 AM and Brian and I are ready to go! We travel to Seattle by but where we board an Air France jet to Paris, arriving tomorrow morning at 8AM, then to Venice in the early afternoon. It's going to be a long day.
We're traveling with the University High School's Lirico Chamber singers for a 10 day tour of Italy. It's going to be fun! I hope I can gain access to the internet to post something on a daily basis.

Welcome

I've decided to start a blog to share my upcoming Italy trip with family and friends. More to come!