Monday, May 5, 2008

Well, our 2008 adventure began even before we boarded the plane this time, because of course we were on Alitalia Airlines. Though their phone agents are wonderful and helpful and charming, their e-mail notification system (when the schedules change or the planes are broken or the flights are canceled . . . which is OFTEN) sucks! I won’t bother to fill you in on the gory details, but suffice it to say that instead of leaving by limo (HUMMER, NO LESS!) at 4:30 AM on Sunday, we left an hour earlier than that, groggy from barely a half-nights sleep, and headed for DIA.

Once we checked in, all was uneventful, and we arrived at the lovely Hotel Pendini at about 1:00 on Monday afternoon. Ten women, a reasonable number of bags, and not one was lost in the flight pattern, Denver, JFK, Milan, Firenze!

A bit of an orientation walk for some, a nap for others, and then dinner at Il Porcospino, where Franco was charming as usual, the dinner was delicious, and we all fell into bed soon after returning to the Hotel.

Tuesday, May 7, 2008 – a very busy day. The Pendini serves a wonderful and varied breakfast and we all gobbled ham, cheese, yogurt, cereal, croissants, espresso, etc. Then we headed over to the Duomo and Battistero to meet our guide, Elena, from Tours by Roberto. We listened to her extensive history explanations, which included answers to our varied questions, for three hours as we walked together on a beautiful morning.

She finished her tour at the Palazzo Strozzi, just a block or two from the Cantinetta Antinori, where we indulged in a delicious lunch before walking to my language school (see last September’s entries), where the staff had graciously invited us to two one-hour language lessons with my privato, Leonardo. He is delightful, an excellent teacher, and remembered everyone’s names after only one introduction!

When our lesson was completed and the second fiasco (finding the right bus stop after asking five Italians who “didn’t know” . . . (non lo so), we eventually got on Bus #12 to visit the Piazzale Michelangelo and the Church of San Mineota. Mass with the chanting monks, views over the entire city of Florence, a gelato on the way from one to another, and weather we would have paid big money to get, but which was free of charge . . . what could be better!

Dinner on our own, and six of us wandered to an old haunt of Barbara Leyendecker’s art-study days, Il Pennello. Low key, small ristorante, delicious! Of course . . . remember, we’re in ITALY!

Wednesday, May 7 – another breakfast and out to the museums day. Our first appointment was at the Accadamia to see the spectacular David, Michelangelo’s masterpiece. I never tire of looking at this magnificent statue, and sat for awhile on a stone bench directly in front of him, writing about his presence in front of me.
Below: Ponte Vecchio on a brilliant day!

We were able to make our way slowly and separately to the market at San Lorenzo and the area around the Capelle Medici before our appointment at the chapel at 12:30, so I bought the tickets for the group and walked across the cobblestone street to Il Porcospino again. It was 11:00 a.m. and the restaurant wasn’t open yet, but Franco was there in a t-shirt and baseball cap and he made me a cappucino, guided me to an outdoor table, and kissed my cheeks in appropriate Italian style! One by one the rest of the group wandered in, got a bit to eat, and took their tickets to the Medici Chapel while I checked my e-mail, returned to Il Porcospino and ordered some lunch.

I said, “Pasta con ragu” and Franco shook his head. “You can get that anywhere. Let me make you something special, dear.” So out came three large homemade ravioli with ricotta and artichoke, covered lightly with a bit of meat sauce. My usual Caprese salad (see photo right here . . . makes you HUNGRY, yes?)
and a glass of wine, plenty of still water, and I was set. I sat there until 2:30, waited for the rest of the group, and headed back to the language school for our second language lesson.

This time three of the women didn’t attend, and Leonardo amazingly named everyone who was around the table, and the two who didn’t come! We all had great laughs, attempting to communicate in Italian, some people not ever having studied a word of Italian, I with my meager language lessons.

I was pleased to find that more of my Italian knowledge surfaced than I had thought possible, and we again had a wonderful experience. This time, we had leisure time to walk back to the hotel or stop in shops or have a quick cappuccino/espresso, etc. We all met back at the hotel at 6:00 to prepare for our dinner at Il Latine (do you get the picture . . . fun, food, museums, food, lessons, food, food, food), a truly unique dining experience. I’ll save the description of THAT for tomorrow.

At least now I have caught you up to more than the first three days of our travels.

Ciao!

Joannah

So . . . Friday, October 12, a beautiful day (we could have used that sunshine while we were searching for property with a lovely view in the countryside!) and we pointed our car southwest toward Assisi, another new town for us. We arrived there in the early afternoon, parked near the top of the town and walked down a bit to the beautiful church. We explored the upper level, then the lower one, watched the tourists pay the priest so he would say masses for them and their loved ones.

Of course, as usual we then stopped for cappucino and a bit of a sandwich before we lugged our tired bodies back up the hill to the parking lot. Winding down and down and down, around and around the hill to the main road, we moved west toward Lake Trasiemeno, where we had stayed 10 years ago, and then to Cortona.

Cortona is just inside the Tuscan border, the location for the book Under The Tuscan Sun (also the movie location, actually). We decided perhaps we might look for a place to stay there, since it was late afternoon. I knew exactly where I wanted to park in this beautiful hill town, near the main Piazza, and my little guide book suggested a reasonably priced hotel. I just hoped I could find it!

The road up to Cortona is confusing because there are many points of entry through the old walls and many little parking areas. But I kept guessing correctly, miraculously enough, and we came out of the winding road to the main part of the town, JUST EXACTLY where I wanted to be. I commented to Neil that I thought we could get a Cortona map and find this hotel my book recommended.

We got out of the car, made sure we had the requisite parking sticker, and when I turned around, there, right in front of us, was the hotel. Beautiful, perched out on the edge of the hill, overlooking the beautiful valley far below. And they had a room, a lovely room, as well as a sunny dining room overlooking that same valley.

We could not believe our good fortune. We checked into our room and could hardly wait to wander through the town. I bring my Italy Women to this lovely place, but Neil had never been here. We decided to find a restaurant way off the beaten path and take our time getting to dinner. The restaurants up in this town don’t open until at least 7:30 or 8:00 so we couldn’t have been in a hurry if we had tried.

I found my favorite coffee and drink bar, one that has delicious little appetizers served on trays with the drinks we order, and everything was so good that we ordered a second round, peach bellinis, I think, with a bit more food. We wandered through the streets, down one little lane and another, reading menus, checking out the atmosphere, looking for the restaurant that looked least like we would see even one American in it!

We succeeded in choosing just the right little place, with a party of local young people celebrating something at the table next to us, and a group of Brit/German travelers on the other side. I ordered everything in Italian, we had a wonderful, inexpensive bottle of wine with our food, and a really decadent set of desserts. The only photos I have are of the nearly scraped-clean plates, Neil’s with trails of dark chocolate, of course, and mine decorated with traces of raspberry and cream.

Thursday, October 11. Cupramontana

After eating dinner at a restaurant in town, recommended by our host, Cristina, we made our way back to our B & B, had a glass of the wine made just downstairs from our room, and went to sleep. In the morning we awoke to a lovely breakfast in the dining room just outside our bedroom and then we were off for the day. We were to meet Peony downstairs and she would take us to her husband, Peter. From there, we would visit several dilapidated country houses in the area, just to begin checking out the real estate. And of course, this is the one day it was drizzly, foggy, with almost no visibility. But it was the only day we had left in Marche, so we took what we had.

Peter and Peony were delightful guides through the crumbling stone beauties of the Marche countryside, and after a few wanders through mud-ridden fields, a stop at a coffee shop, and a quick peek at a little (tiny!) apartment at the top of a chapel in a neighboring town, we continued our search for the perfect “handyman’s dream” on the hillsides. Just for our dreaming purposes, of course, at least this trip.

At the end of a long day, we returned to our room, cleaned up, and drove to Jesi, a larger town about 12km from Cupra. We found the recommended restaurant, Settima Cielo, (7th Heaven) and had a perfectly delightful dinner in a room full of families, young people, all Italian, almost no English spoken at all. Wonderful! More practice for my meager language skills. I’m beginning to be quite impressed with myself!

Back to Cupramontana, sleep, another delicious breakfast on Friday morning, pack up and head toward Umbria and ultimately Tuscany again.

I know, I know. It’s been too long. But I promised.

Wednesday, October 10, 2007. Urbino to Cupramontana . . . we awoke to a bit of rain over the Marche countryside, but still, we were in Italy, so any day is a glorious day!

Packed up our overnight bags and checked out of the little hotel, Albergo San Giovanni, walked up the narrow cobblestone street into the piazza and got our cappuccino, croissant, and cheese for breakfast. Finding our way back to the elevator in the mountain that takes one down the hill, through the mountain rock to the parking agent, we opened our maps and headed out, not sure where the next adventure would lead us.

We had spoken to a real estate agent and his wife, Peter and Peony, transplants ten years ago from Munich, and they recommended two B & Bs farther south on the path we had chosen through The Marches. I had contacted both of them this morning: one man apologetically said he and his wife were taking their first vacation in three years, so their rooms were closed for three weeks. The other, Girandola, owned by a Belgian woman I think, had no room for us, but gave us another contact in Cupramontana, , the town in which the real estate couple live.

I called. Got a grandmother who spoke no English, and her Italian was in a LeMarche dialect. I asked whether she had a room, and she said yes. That was the end of our mutual understanding of one another’s Italian. I then called Girandola back, and the Belgian owner offered to be the intermediary for us. By the time she was through helping us, we had a reservation for the Cupramontana B & B. The grandmother and mother spoke no English, but the daughter/granddaughter would be there to greet us in the evening.

So off we went from Urbino toward Gubbio, just over the border from LeMarche to Umbria), one of the names I recognized from all the reading I had done before we began our trip. We headed toward the “centro”, always a good bet, parked in the first spot we found, and began to – yes, trudge up another picturesque cobblestone street to the top of the village.

As we came to a corner, we heard raised voices (Italian raised voices, so “raised” is putting it mildly!) and saw two women and a man walking. The dark-haired young couple with a dog were arguing with a blond woman. We could only imagine the topic – and imagine we did . . . a jilted blondie confronting the “new woman”? or perhaps blondie had been a dalliance for the man and now he severed his illicit ties with her . . . who knows? But we could hear their “raised voices” even after we turned the NEXT corner.

And at the top we discovered, to our delight, a lovely enoteca which also served a very light and delicious selection of lunch plates. (As soon as I find the business card, I’ll come back to this entry and add the exact name of the place and the owner). The owner, a handsome young man, had worked for GE for five years so his English was excellent. So was his taste in the wine in his shop, as well as his personal collection of some very exquisite bottles of Italy’s best – displayed in the shop as well with signs which said “Private Collection” on them. Of course he and Neil had a lot to talk about while I munched happily and slowly on the variety of cheeses and other antipasti sitting on our table. We tasted a wine of the region, Sagramontina, I think, and spent much of the afternoon in this lovely little place.

After our long lunch, we began to walk DOWN and DOWN in another direction, just realizing that we had come into the town not in the center, but at the very top. The “centro” had a lovely park (and lots of tour buses) but we stopped at the Information office and got a map of the village so we could find our way back to our car! Then it was time for us to drive back toward our B & B and take a rest.

When we arrived in the town of Cupramontana, it took three passes down the main road and back again . . . and again . . . before we spotted the sign for Cerubini on a corner. Parked the car and tentatively entered what looked to be a little vendor for wine and a few other strange goodies (a roll of something (figs, it turned out) wrapped in a grape leaf . . . ). Cristina, the granddaughter, greeted us warmly and showed us to a lovely, spacious room on the third floor with our own gleaming, spotless bathroom. The price was 30 Euro per night per person including breakfast. A great relief after our expensive Venice stay. We decided to stay two nights instead of one, and Cristina beamed. Turns out this B & B idea was hers, and the two immaculate rooms and bathrooms on our level of the building had just recently been completed, so she was excited with her new venture.

We followed her back down to the “shop”, where the village men began appearing, in and out without interruption. It was the end of the day and they had come to buy the wine made by the three generations of women. Cristina’s a young exuberant girl/woman in sweat pants and t-shirt. She and her mother run the wine shop, where they sell Verdicchio (a white wine), Anastasia (a red named for a little niece), and olive oil from their farm. Her father and brother are out in the countryside harvesting grapes, and the grandmother sits grinning at the table in the tasting room. We settled ourselves at a little tasting table with grandmother (my phone partner earlier in the day), the mother, smiling but no English, and Cristina, whose English, coupled with my Italian, resulted in a similar conversation to the one I had the evening before in the Urbino restaurant. Delightful, hilarious, and heart-warming. God, I love this country!

I am determined to finish this, though I’ve been home and gone twice since Italy. Perhaps a day-by-day summary will be best at this point.

Tuesday, October 9, 2007: Last night we ate our final meal in Venezia with Scott and Nina. The old Italian man who helped us find the laundromat yesterday also showed us a little restaurant, out of the way of the tourists, and encouraged us to try it. We met several other people who looked longingly at the menu at Trattoria ai Giardinetto da Severino on Ruga Giufa, so we decided to make it our last Venitian repast.

Our waiter was hilarious, constantly telling us that a particular dish came with “raspberries from Knotts Berry Farm”! I don’t know where he got that phrase, or whether he once visited the US and ONLY went to Knotts Berry Farm, but despite the fact that he had a huge group across the hall to wait on (and therefore was less than properly attentive to OUR table), he endeared himself to us with that repeated humor.

This morning we got up early to say goodbye to Scott and Nina in the breakfast room, and walked them to their vaporetto stop so they could meet their train at the Venice Station. Then we had a leisurely breakfast ourselves, at Hotel Bel Sito, and followed vaporetto suit an hour later. We disembarked at the rental car station, picked up our car from AutoEurope and began our drive to LeMarche.

When the rental car agent asked where we were going to go, I told him we would wander through LeMarche for a few days. He raised his eyebrows and smiled. “LeMarche . . . che bella . . . and wild . . .”

We followed the smaller roads, near the ocean’s edge, stopped for lunch at a ristorante whose wait staff (and clientele) spoke no English at all. A good sign for a good meal. No turistico specials. I knew I wanted to head for Urbino first, the largest town in the north of LeMarche, and we arrived there in the late afternoon. Parked the car outside the old city walls, as usual, and began our ascent on the street inside the closest archway. When we arrived at the “centro”, we indulged in a cappucino first, got our bearings, found a recommended and inexpensive hotel (a GREAT relief after the expense of Venezia) and reserved a room.

When we checked out the bathroom, Neil commented that there was no shower. I walked the three flights down the stairs to the reception area, where the elderly woman who registered us was dismayed, in Italian, and I couldn’t quite understand her answer to my question about the “doccia” (shower). Finally, Neil had an idea, we trudged back up the three flights of stairs, and there, between the bidet and the sink, on the wall, were two water handles and above them, a shower head. No enclosure, no special spot for the shower, just a drain in the floor.

We encountered a shower like this occasionally on our early trips to Italy, and it always took us one good soaking to realize that before we turned the water on, ALL the towels, toilet paper, and anything on the countertops had to be REMOVED from the room or they too would get a shower. That problem solved, we returned to our car, to drive it to an overnight lot at the other end of the city.

Now Urbino is a beautiful hilltown with 15,000 permanent residents and 22,000 college students. Can you imagine the energy in a place like this? Beautiful palaces, churches, piazzas built perhaps 600 years ago, and the energy of 22,000 young people, happily studying in this amazing environment! I wish I were 20 again, for specifically this reason. Otherwise . . . it was too hard to be that age and I wouldn’t want to repeat the experience!

We wandered through the streets, got to the hotel again and shed our bags, and went into the ristorante attached to the Hotel. Antipasti, pasta, lamb (agnello), panna cotta for dessert, and a delicious wine called Lacrima d’Morro d’Alba (The tears of Morro d’Alba). Deep purple, rich fruit flavor, with a unique austerity underneath that was so different from any other wine I have ever tasted.

We sat next to a student and her parents during dinner, and began a bit of a chat. She had a touch of English, I had my primitive Italian, Neil and the mother kept quiet, and the father asked me question after question, carefully, slowly (for an Italian, this is a lesson in EXTREME restraint!) and in fairly simple language, so I could understand most of it. Between my half-assed Itali-english responses and the daughter’s matched mixture, we had the kind of interaction I could NOT have had without that two weeks of language school in Firenze. If I never learn another word of Italian, I will be grateful for that experience and several like it in the following days.

Early to bed, after a long day of driving, and the prospect of three more days of automobile exploration throughout this “wild” region.

More tomorrow.

were at their best yesterday. We had an absolutely spectacular day in Venice. Bright blue sky, sunny, and about 70-75 degrees . . . my perfect weather. Neil and I found a laundromat in a less touristy part of town, and were led right to the door by a local old couple, who then told us about a wonderful little restaurant out of the mainstream, which we will go to tonight with Nina and Scott. We wandered that neighborhood, found authentic mask shops, not the schlock, and did our laundry in between exploring the tiny tiny side streets along the canals in that part of Venice.

After the laundry, we met our group of 7 other friends (a great traveling group, along with the others who were with us in Sicily). I had arranged a Venice Tour of the Doges Palace, Bridge of Sighs and Church of San Marco for them. Got them started, joined Neil back at the hotel and headed across the Accademia Bridge to the Peggy Guggenheim Collection Museum, a wonderful little gallery with all the usual 20th century suspects . . . Magritte, Pollack, Picasso, Kandinsky, etc. And a beautiful sculpture garden.

Back with the group to do some eating in little holes in the wall near the grand canal, and then four of us went to a Vivaldi Four Seasons concert in the Chisa San Vidal, performed by 7 enthusiastic string musicians, all young Italian people. The experience was the highlight of our week, I think, though we’ve had many exceptional days of traveling.

Tomorrow we leave for LeMarche with a car, and will wander that region until Saturday. Unfortunately, I haven’t loaded my photos from Venice and the last part of Sicily, so can’t post them here, but I will do it when we get to LeMarche.

Ciao.

Woodswoman

and I apologize for not writing to this site all week. I am finally at the only internet spot on the western half of Sicily, without going into the depths of Palermo, and this internet spot is about 40 miles from our villa, named Torre Castelvetrano. (I don’t think this site is able to do the proper paragraph spacing again, so Ashley, if you are reading this, please try to fix, and otherwise, I’ll try later when I ahve more dependable service.)

We arrived at the villa, all 15 of us, in four cars in the late afternoon last Saturday. The town is a fairly large but non-tourist town, and that turned out to be quite nice, actually. Our villa, difficult to find at first, is absolutely BEAUTIFUL, with lush grounds, palm trees, a very nice pool and a wonderful covered sitting place near the peach groves.

The olive groves are on the other side of the villa and guest house, and the caretaker and his wife live on the grounds as well. We have six bedrooms and four bathrooms in the main house, and a 2-br, 2-bath guest house, all in that old stone and tile roof construction that is so typical of Italy and some of France.

One of the delights we hadn’t counted on is a family of cats . . . we can’t quite figure out who the mamas are, because even the largest of the cats is quite small, but we have identified perhaps eight or nine little kittens, 6-8 weeks old, and of course they were just being weaned, with no real skills yet in catching the lizards, so . . . we are feeding them. Angela, Nina and I, the real cat lovers in our group, have been mixing little kibble, water and a bit of milk in two large cereal bowls, twice a day, so they won’t starve.

Hoever, now we’ve discovered that the caretaker and his wife are feeding them as well, so they’ll be fat cats if we ever come back here again.

Since the group is so large, we don’t try to do everyting together, but so far, Neil and I have wandered the ruins of Agrigento on the south coast, visited the little town of Selinunte, which ahs its own ruins, our closest grocery store, and some lovely restaurants with fresh fresh fish, since it is also on the coast.

We have tasted wine in Marsala, consumed lots of bottles of the local wine during the past week with everyone’s exuberant participation, and eaten lots of fresh fish, bread and cheese.

Neil, Brad and I went to Mount Etna on Wednesday, the largest active volcano in Europe. Took nearly 5 hours of driving (I’m the designated driver in Italy, for our car, at least) then about 3 hours on the mountain, including the cable car ride up to 2500 meters, the little van up to about 3000 meters, and the walking around the volcanic dirt and rock at the volcano site. Then down the mountain again, into the town of Nicolosi, through Gravina di Catania, a stop to look for dinner in a beautiful village on a hillside in the middle of the island called Enna (no dinner – restaurants don’t open here until 8:00 p.m.) and back to our villa by about 9:30 p.m.

A long day, but I didn’t want to come to Sicily and NOT see Etna.

So today it’s back to Marsala to a Mailboxes, Etc. to ship some things back home, grab tomatoes to add to our lots of lettuce for dinner, and then some relaxing time at our lovely pool before packing up and preparing to depart by 9:00 a.m. tomorrow.

We then head for Palermo airport, turn our cars in, and disburse to our various next destinations. Some will go back to the US, and some of us still have Venice and Tuscany. Neil and I will stay 3 nights in Venice, rent our car there for the exploration of LeMarche, and then, as I’ve said in the past, one last night in bella Firenze before we leave for Colorado.

Must go.

Take care.

Woodswoman

I finished my last day of language school today, and I received my certificate for passing 60 contact hours of Intermediate I. I took my private teacher out for a quick caffe-wine break . . . he had caffe and I had the wine, because he had to leave quite soon to get his car, his wife and his son to a doctor’s appointment. Didn’t want to drive with any wine in him. Good choice.

At any rate, I’m nearly packed, actually, all packed but for what I’ll need in the morning . . . toothbrush, blow dryer, etc. I leave early early tomorrow for a train to Rome Termini and then to the Fiumicino airport to meet Neil so we can fly to Sicily together. It will be good to see him after two weeks of being here without him. Somehow, being gone in the States, away from one another, isn’t a big deal, but this time, he would have so much enjoyed wandering around Firenze and it would have been fun to have him here.

Still, I do like being alone on a trip like this, at least for awhile, and with the language school all day, it was best that I did it this way. I will definitely return next year for more classes, and look forward to joining our friends in Sicilia tomorrow afternoon.

Won’t have great internet access on that island, but I’m sure I’ll find some places to keep this site somewhat up to date.

For now, Ciao!

Woodswoman

I cannot believe that I only have three days left at my language school. The first week left me confident and full of new language abilities, which I seemed to use quite well this weekend.

Monday found me (as I looked it up) cerebramente morte . . . brain dead, as I read it. But my private teacher, Leonardo, informed me (in Italian, of course), that “cerebramente morte” is a medical term . . . for a REALLY, ACTUALLY brain dead person. I, he cheerfully told me, “sono in coma!” (I’m in a coma.) Like Neil’s favorite joke about my mother’s favorite singer, Perry Como, whom Neil renamed “Perry Coma”.

So, for the first two days of my second and final week at la scuola lingua, sono in coma. My brain feels over-full, there are too many words I keep forgetting, and I felt so frustrated yesterday, because I thought I SHOULD have been doing better, after a good first week. But all the teachers say this is normal, and Leonardo reminded me that I was not in school for the weekend, and that one loses 50% of what one learned the first week . . . during the weekend. As he says, “E’normale” so I, in frustrated Italian, responded, “but what about when I leave the school and just go HOME??? How much will I forget there?”

Leonardo reassures me that if I continue to listen and read and talk and learn, I’ll be fine. I said today that I would have to spend three years here studying the language before I would feel confident, and he said, “No, quattro mese (four months would do it, he thinks). So . . . that would be impossible, but I am more determined to continue my study at home. I’ve got some regular books (kids stories, The Prophet, The Little Prince, and some short stories) written in Italian, and there’s always Front Range or CSU.

So here I am, with three more days of lessons, and then two weeks of practical application with Neil and our friends, in Sicilia, Venezia and LeMarche, before we return to our own English-speaking country.

And I’m going to complete my staff photo representation here with one of Leonardo, since I hadn’t gotten around to taking a photo of him until yesterday. E’ insegnate privato (my private teacher).

Time to go see a couple of things on this side of Firenze before dinner with my host family.

Ciao!

Woodswoman

of language under my belt, I:

1) negotiated all my questions at the Florence train station IN ITALIAN, and the attendant actually understood me, gave me my printed train schedules, etc.

2) wandered around Lucca this weekend (a lovely town about 90 minutes’ train ride from Florence)looked for things, bought things (not much, just paper), ordered a meal and a few pastries and a bottle of water from various venders, asked directions, sat at a wonderful rehearsal for Haydn’s Nelson Mass, which I found when I stumbled into the Chiesa di San Michele in the heart of Lucca. I asked one of the musicians (at their break) the title of the composition, whether I could see his sheet music for a minute, etc. . . . all in italiano!

3) Even tried looking for a CD by an Italian group while I was in a CD store owned by an older couple. We had an actual discussion about exactly what I was looking for.

I am truly amazed. I just hope that after this next week of immersion and a couple weeks of actually surrounding myself with situations and people who only speak Italian (while I’m traveling with 14 other people who do NOT speak Italian) . . . I hope after all that, I can come back to the Fort and start really listening to and reading Italian on a regular enough basis, with a dictionary, that I can keep up with what I’ve learned. I’m already making lists of preposition translations and other words we use all the time, which I can’t keep straight in italian at this point.

BUT IT WILL GET BETTER!! This school is excellent, the teachers are very helpful, though they don’t speak any English to us at all. They just keep explaining and explaining a concept or phrase or word until one of us says, “oh, you mean ______?” and they’ll beam and say, “Si, Signora!” or whatever.

So . . . I have one more week, and will hope to increase my ability to speak and understand at least 2-fold from last week.

Now: Lucca . . . is a lovely small city, and the “old city” is surrounded by stone walls, as many Italian towns and cities are, but THIS wall has a walking path all around it, with green, trees, little parks, all on top of the wall. The Italians use this wall surrounding the city like Central Park. They are riding their bicycles, nursing their babies, holding hands with lovers, sitting on the grass with picnic baskets or bags of food from the alimentari and frutta e vedura shops, etc.

I didn’t really take a list of palazzi to see, but chose yesterday to walk around the streets, people-watch, and find the one church I did want to enter, Chiesa di San Michele. Of course by the time I got to it, it was closed for mid-afternoon, but I wandered, got something to eat, and went up on top of the wall, sat under a tree, and read for a bit.

Then I almost just left the old town for my B & B, which is about a 20-minute walk outside the walls. But no, I went back to San Michele, and there, inside the church, between the altar and the pews, were 15 string musicians and their conductor, rehearsing a Haydn composition which was so lovely, I thought I would weep. The acoustics in the church made even the musicians’ mistakes a joy to hear, and the conductor would sing in certain parts, to stay on the track of the composition (which turned out to be a Missa – a Mass).

I was in the first row of the available seats, and sat for an hour, watching the conductor stop the musicians, correct them, have a discussion with the first violinists or the cellists, etc. and then start again. It was hypnotic . . .

Soon an Asian young woman showed up and the conductor stopped rehearsal for a moment, greeting her warmly. She moved to the very front of the area, and began to sing just a bit with the music. I realized this must be some sort of chorale piece, and wanted so much to know what it was, when it would be performed, etc.

When they took a real break, I walked to the Piazza San Michele, where there was a kiosk specifically for information about all the music events that are happening in September. Apparently this is a big-deal month for some reason, and there are many opera performances, as well as smaller concerts in churches like San Michele.

To my dismay I discovered that the “real” performance of this Hayden Missa is tonight at 5:30, but I had to be back in Florence this afternoon. So I went back to the church, whose main doors were now locked, remembered that there was a side door I had seen earlier, and snuck in there. Now inside the rehearsal area were perhaps 20 musicians, the strings joined by an oboe, an organ, and a few other things, and about FORTY chorale singers, plus two sopranos (including the young Asian woman, of course) and two male singers.

So again, they were rehearsing, and I comforted myself with the reality that I was sitting here in the working rehearsal, though I wouldn’t be in Lucca tonight for the full performance. I’m going to order this Missa through Amazon as soon as I finish with this post.

The other accidental concert I discovered was in a smaller church, St. Cristofo, and the program was with a mixed group of a cappella singers from Norway! Singing in Norwegian, Italian and English, four mini-groups of singers, with a Norwegian and an Italian doing the comments between the programmes. A day for music, sunshine, and wandering in bella Italia.

I’m not on my own computer, so I won’t attempt to post any pictures now, but tomorrow, when I have my own laptop operating at the school, I’ll make another attempt. Looks like my daughter has commented with a tip for loading photos, coming to my rescue yet again in this voyage through travel blog experiences.

So for now, ciao to all.

I’ll be back here on line in another couple of days.

Woodswoman