Spring Break

The boys completed another week of character building at their respective schools.  They finally made it to Easter Vacation, a ten day break.

Unfortunately, after school, I was called in for a conference with Tom’s math teacher.  I knew it was going to be a doozy, so I asked Signora Paola, the boys’ tutor, to accompany me.  As a teacher herself, she is part of the inner circle of Italian educators.  Beyond that advantage, she is intelligent, fair, and understands Tom.

We wait in the halls of San Paolo Middle School.

By 1:15, we entered the meeting.  We got an earful, and with it, I gained a greater understanding of Italian culture, something I should be grateful for, I guess.  The good news is that Tom got the highest grade on his math test that any 6th grader earned all year.  But he still didn’t show his work, which she didn’t like.  And he complains about the uniform, which she also didn’t like . . . among other things.

Oh well, he still gets three more months to adapt.

That afternoon, we caught a train to Pisa and began our vacation.  As it turns out, it was New Years Day in Pisa.  (They celebrate once on January 1st and once on March 23rd.)  Completely by accident, we reserved a room on the second floor of a hotel overlooking the Arno where the grand firework display was held at 11pm.  We seriously had the best seats in town, especially considering the pouring down rain drenching everyone below.  It was a spectacular show with music and two barges (one on either side of our windows) blasting off fireworks for 25 minutes.

A room with a view

The next morning, we walked to one of Italy’s most famous monuments, the Leaning Tower of Pisa.  We circled around, climbed to the top, and joined hundreds of others in assuming unoriginal poses in front of our camera.

Trying to straighten the tower

Pisa is big and festive and famous all smashed into one town.  I loved it, but after one day, I was ready to leave.  It’s like a party and hangover all in one.

Next we went to Lucca, a sweet, soft, small, walled Tuscan town.  Not only the name of the city reminds me of Luke but the streets too.  They were full of pink bikes.  One of my favorites was similar Luke’s first bike.

Another pink bike I liked was owned by a woman who gave us an impromptu tour of the outside of Puccini’s house-turned-museum the day we showed up after closing.

However, not all of Lucca is gentle.  We visited The Museum of Torture which I thought sounded entertaining, but turned out to be a huge bummer.  While it was a well-done exhibit, it left us all sick to our stomachs and hopeless.  It’s hard to believe that humans were (and still are) so capable of such psychopathic brutality.  It made my thumbs and tongue hurt, as well as my shoulders, bum and boobs.

We tried to calm the disquietude by heading, yet again, to Trattoria Gigi, maybe the most charming little restaurant we’ve met.  In three days, we ate there three times.

This afternoon we left Lucca.  After stopping in Florence for a few hours to look at Michelangelo’s house, we caught a train to Rome and met my parents at the airport.  They are spending the second half of Spring Break with us as well as two additional weeks.  In preparation for Easter, we are planning on soaking up Catholic monuments including the Sistine Chaple and tons of churches.  This Sunday we will return to Perugia for a traditional Perugian Easter celebration which includes an unusual breakfast of hard boiled eggs, cake with rainbow sprinkles, and red wine.

Gramma and Grandpa with the kids here in Rome

Candles

Today at Santi Apostoli

Six years ago, Luke died.  Suddenly and unexpectedly, he stopped breathing after an insidious bacterial infection took over his body.  On that day, we started lighting candles.  That little bit of light gave us something to look at.  Now every year on February 17th, we get together with friends; we talk about Luke; we miss Luke; and we always light candles.

We are lucky here in Italy because there are candles everywhere.  Every city has a hundred churches.  And every church has a corner where candles wait for a prayer.  We started our day in Florence with our great friends Kelli and Oliver, then tonight we will return to Perugia.  We will light candles along the way.

The Duomo in Florence

I don’t completely understand the allure, but I know it must be done.  I want to strike a match and say his name.  I want to leave a sign.  I want fire.  These candles are our little messages in the dark.  They are our mysterious, small, hot, dangerous intentions.  They are quiet testaments to our hope and our heartbreak. And today they are proof that while I may not believe in God, I believe in something stronger than myself.

Matt in Santo Spirito

Ray, Oliver, Tom and Kelli in Santa Croce

Even though it’s still morning for all our friends and family back home, we have received so many emails.  They come with pictures of candles.  There are flames across the world for Luke.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Immersion

The Italians have their eyes on the BIG ONE tonight.  Here Tom and Milena are studying their lottery ticket.  They’ve decided to share the winnings 50-50 in the hopes that Tom and Heidi can move here permanently.

We have just two days left before my aunt and uncle return to the States.  I really wish that all our guests could stay for so long.  They’ve been here nearly a month.  We’ve had so much fun without ever feeling rushed.  We’ve had time to show them all of Perugia, several Umbrian towns, and then two extraordinary spots in northern Italy.

An afternoon at Perugia’s San Pietro Basilica and medieval gardens

Visiting the art and antique fair in Arezzo.

New Year’s Eve in Venice. We joined thousands in Piazza San Marco for the countdown and the shower of champagne. The crowd was so massive we needed to hold hands to stay together. Even so, we lost Matt for a while. New Year’s is crazy, so much so that over 350 people were injured in Italy. We returned to our hotel by 12:30 and watched the chaos from the window.

By now, Tom and Heidi have been here long enough to meet Italians and experience true Italian livin’.  They have made friends with our friends.  In fact, everyone who meets them wants to hang out.  This week Signora Paola, the boys’ tutor, invited us over for dinner.  And no experience is more authentic than eating a meal in an Italian’s house.

We showed up at 8pm, which is customary since Italians like to eat late.  Paola and her husband live outside Perugia on a small farm.  They have olive trees and a big garden.  As we arrived, Paola’s entire family was waiting for us.  We met everyone including her husband, two sons, daughter-in-law and granddaughter.  The table was full of drinks and appetizers, so we sat down immediately.  Paola’s husband, Willy, poured his homemade hot pepper apertif, which was made from infusing garden-grown peppers in alcohol for several weeks.  (We liked it so much that they later sent us home with a bottle.)  Then platters were passed and we filled our plates with chicken liver crostini, pieces of pork head, fennel and grapefruit salad, anchovy and egg crostini, pecorino cheese with an assortment of homemade spreads, and potato chips.  We were all full before the official first course.

Then Paola served plates of mushroom pasta while explaining that her mother-in-law foraged the mushrooms out in the woods herself.  New bottles of wine were opened.  Knowing the boys weren’t mushroom fans, Paola offered a meat and tomato pasta for them.  The next course was wild boar with a side of broccoli rabe.  We were stuffed before the first bite; however, each dish was so good, we continued to eat and eat and eat.  Next came a plate of oranges drizzled with olive oil, salt, and pepper.  One bite and I was convinced that this is the best way to enjoy a slice of orange.

For dessert Paola and Willy offered five different kinds of cookies and three home made after-dinner-drinks.

Before we left, Paola’s son performed some magic

Tom got to be the magician’s assistant but still couldn’t figure out any of the tricks.

While I would never have enough courage to cook an Italian meal for Paola, I asked if she would consider visiting us in the United States.  She agreed, so  maybe  someday we can return the favor.

Italian Stars

Milena and Sergio on top of the world

We’re in the Dolomites.  We are surrounded by towering, jagged, snow dusted mountains.  Specifically we are staying outside of Cortina d’Ampezzo in northern Italy with friends from Perugia who come here during their winter vacations. They are giving us the red carpet treatment.  We are seeing things, tasting foods and visiting places we would never have experienced on our own.

Milena and Sergio found a hotel for us near their cabin.  We are tucked in the woods. We wake up to coral sunrises on the powdered sugar mountain peeks.  It’s a fairy tale.  During the first day here, we rode a chairlift to a nearby sledding park.  The kids were required to wear helmets which turned out to be a good thing because Tom took off before mastering the the lesson on “brakes.”  Moments later we watched the second biggest wipe-out of the day.  Matt raced down quickly and put the pieces back together.

I hung out with the less adventurous where we watched the sledding and joined in the tradition of drinking cups of “bombardini” (little bombs) which are a delicious mixture of hot rum, eggs, sugar, and cream.

Over one of these bombardinis, we met a good friend of Sergio who lives here year-round.  He and Sergio share a passion for astronomy.  We got to talking about stars and quickly came to recognize that their shared passion extends well beyond a hobby.  Alessandro devotes much of his time to Cortina’s planetarium and mountain-top observatory.  Sergio started working with him about 12 years ago.   Then in 2009, Sergio created a computer program that allows anyone in the world to manipulate Cortina’s impressive telescope via the internet.  Through this program, one can search for  planets and supernovas at home (with the understanding that all findings be reported back to the observatory, of course).

Sergio asked Alessandro how things were going since they last spoke.  Alessandro announced that on December 24 he discovered another supernova.  Congratulations were given, and then plans were made to take all of us stargazing that night.

But the highlight began with our moonlit walk to the Col Druscie Observatory.  After a short drive up the mountains from Cortina, we left our car and hiked 30 minutes up a snowy trail to the peak.

View of Cortina from the observatory. (Photo courtesy of Alessandro Dimai http://www.cortinastelle.it/)

We entered the control room and ascended to the dome where the equipment is housed.  One by one we then climbed a ladder to peer through the lens of the telescope.  Alessandro pointed it first to the moon and cautioned us to take short turns so we didn’t damage our retinas with the brightness.  Then we looked at Betelgeuse and finally Jupiter and its moons.  Between visual destinations, we asked hundreds of questions ranging from the magnitude of the universe to the age of stars to the composition of comets.  My uncle showed such aptitude for astronomy that Alessandro and Sergio took a break in the stargazing session to open an account for him on Sergio’s on-line program, “Sky on the Web”.  It turned out to be just as interesting to observe the workings of this website.  And now my uncle can aim Cortina’s telescope anywhere he wants and download his own pictures of the heavens.

Col Druscie Observatory (Photo courtesy of Alessandro Dimai http://www.cortinastelle.it/)

Sergio, Matt and Alessandro in the observatory with the kids

The control room: a tutorial on skyontheweb.com

It wasn’t until 9:30 pm when we finally recognized how hungry we were.  We slid down the mountain on our coats and ended up at the coziest restaurant imaginable warmly perched on the secluded mountainside.  We tasted three northern Italian specialties including beet ravioli, bread balls in broth, and deer gnocchi.  The kids stuck with buttered noodles and then started falling asleep.  We were all in bed by midnight.

While it seemed impossible to compete with the rare opportunity of the night before, Sergio and Milena succeded.  On our last day in Cortina, we met for lunch at Malga Misurina, a dairy farm outside of town.  The driveway was so snowy and slippery that we needed a forklift to rescue us and bring us the top of the hill where everyone else was waiting to order lunch.

Everything we ate had been grown or raised on the farm.  We shared ten plates of cheeses, salami, sausages, pork ribs, polenta, bread balls with speck, and cabbage salad.  Later, we took a snowmobile–pulled sled beyond the tree line to the summit of Tre Cime and then rode individual sleds down a 1-mile course. It’s hard to describe.  It was fast.  It was fun.  It was incredible.

 

Our Company

Matt’s sister and brother-in-law are visiting until the end of the week, and my aunt and uncle are here for almost a month.   We’ve filled our days with short trips to nearby cities and lots of time here in town.  We been both tourists and residents in Perugia, and it’s been so much fun.  It’s different having such close family here.  There is so much understanding each other.

Everything is more detailed with eight people.  With everyone’s background and perspective, we notice more.  Take beer, for example.  I think Umbria makes good beer.  I can appreciate the labels and pretty bottles.  But with the help of Tom and Heidi, who grow hops and make their own IPA, we are learning to recognize the subtleties of each Umbrian brew.  For the first time, the local beer is more than just “good.”  It’s complex and colorful.  Some even have hints of coriander (which I never would have detected in a hundred years).

Grocery shopping and dinner is more interesting too.  Since we are twice as big, we get to eat more.  The other day for lunch, we bought eleven types of cured meats, five types of cheeses, three different breads and four Christmas desserts.

Four seasonal desserts: a tiny Christmas panatone, a plate of almond cookies, a eel-shaped, almond-flavored torciglione and slices of white, almond torrone.

Some other highlights this week included a day trip to Assisi.  All eight of us squished in the car and drove to the woods high above the town to see where St. Francis lived and prayed.  Later we had lunch, walked to the famous cathedral, saw St. Clare’s entire preserved body, and visited the 2000-year-old Roman temple.

Yesterday, while the boys were at school, the adults visited the nearby city of Deruta.  We talked with the ceramic craftsmen and bought more plates.  We toured a three-story nativity display that featured the works of 40 artists.  On the way home, we got stuck in traffic and were a half hour late to get the boys from school.  I had to call the landlady of Tom and Heidi’s apartment to ask her to pick them up.

Group photo with Monica from Maioliche Artemisia

This morning we went shoe shopping.  Deanne, Heidi and I looked at a pair of plastic high heals.  The salesman pointed out that they smell like Starbursts when you wear them.

We have two more days before Richard and Deanne leave and about two weeks of plans to fit into that time.   Richard is throwing an Italian wine tasting tomorrow night.  Uncle Tom’s going to make beef tongue.  There’s an ancient well down the street we need to see.  Plus a Raphael fresco.  Then a castle.  And some Etruscan tombs just outside the city wall.  And if there is time, we are going to try and cook black truffle pasta for dinner tomorrow.

A Short Visit to Spoleto

Sunday afternoon in Spoleto’s Piazza del Duomo

Last week we drove to nearby Spoleto for the night.  We didn’t see much, however, because we were holed up in the hotel for half the time helping the boys with homework.  Tom had hours of math while Ray was studying ancient Greek history.

But the little that we saw was fantastic:

The Aqueduct:  I’ve been trying to wrap my head around aqueducts since I first saw one 25 years ago.  This week, I finally grasped the fundamentals and cleared up two decades of misconceptions.  While I knew that aqueducts somehow transported water to thirsty towns,  I never could visualize the process.  Why the arches?  Where is the water?  I thought that maybe the aqueduct worked like some sort of  bridge under which water flowed.  Then later, someone told me that water streamed up and down the arches in a maze of pipes (and I believed her).  Finally, this week, after an afternoon of Google searches,  I learned that the arches are just part of the aqueduct (albeit the only readily visible part) whose purpose it is to support the the pipes that transports water. I learned that aqueducts can be many miles long often tunneling underground. I also learned that water doesn’t run perpendicularly under a mulit-arched bridge (duh), but rather along the top of the structure on a precisely constructed, steadily flowing, slightly tilted, downward slope.  It’s simply a feat of gravity (and the ingenuity of the ancient Romans) that ensured the success of aqueducts.

This is Ponte delle Torri, the famous aqueduct of Spoleto and the highlight of our weekend.  The structure is 230 meters across with a footpath on top.  Unfortunately, at least once a year, someone jumps.

Standing nearly 80 meters high near the top of the aqueduct.

Once we crossed, we went for a little walk in the woods. Ray was super excited to find what he thought was an underground piece of the aqueduct.  It actually had water flowing through it.  Could it be?

The Town Cathedral:  Next, we went to church, or in this case, the piazza in front of the church.  There are two things the boys really miss in the crowded, stone hill towns of Umbria:  grass and wide open space.  So when we descended into the spacious, sunken Piazza della Duomo, the boys took off running.  Rather than spend our time lingering over Fra’ Filippo’s famous fresco, we played freeze tag.

Finally, the last place we had to visit before heading back to Perugia was Il Tempio del Gusto, a trattoria that came highly recommended by a friend in Perugia. In addition to spaghetti carbonara, saffron risotto and roasted duck, we ordered a traditional Umbrian plate of cured meats, pecorino cheese, toasted breads and a sampling of olive oils.  Spoleto is known for having the best oil in Umbria so before leaving, we stocked up.

The Colosseum

I saw the Colosseum a long time ago and I wasn’t especially looking forward to another visit.  It’s a ruin.  It’s old.  It’s crowded with tourists.  It’s associated with a confusing array of tyrannical and heroic emperors.  And it comes with too many numbers:

Number of years to complete: 10

Date of completion: 80 AD

Height: 144 feet

Cubic meters of marble used: 100,000

Number of entrances: 80

Number of animals killed: a million

Number of men killed:  thousands and thousands

Number of tourists each day: 10,000

However, somehow during this visit to Rome, it made an impression on me; not in the geeky history book way or in the architectural epiphany sense, but more along the lines of sentimental.   And I mean that in a good way.  I was moved by the ancient lives lived in its heyday, and I was struck by the evidence of humanity and emotion.  I know it’s cliché, but this monument bridged the span of time for me.  I felt close to spectators and gladiators.   By the end of our week in Rome, I spent two guided afternoons in the Colosseum, once with my family and once with my friend Rose who just arrived from Seattle.

Both times, Lucia was our guide.  She whizzed us past long lines and into the upper corners of the Colosseum where small, preserved artifacts lay.  She took us to her favorite display of graffitied marble.  We imagined an impassioned fan carving the name of his favorite gladiator or a picture of the day’s events.

Lucia

While feeling a little disturbed at the sheer number of violent deaths that occurred in the arena, Lucia reminded us that life was super tough for the ancient Romans:  Infant mortality rates were high, crime was rampant, and the constant conquering of territories took many lives.  So the Colosseum battles simply gave the citizens a worse scenario than their own.  It was entertainment.  It was a show complete with scenery, trap doors and costumes.  And since everyone was welcome, even women and slaves, it bonded the citizens and kept up moral.  Tom said he always thought the futuristic scenario of the Hunger Games could never happen, but then he pointed out that it already had.

Contrary to popular belief, not a single Christian was executed in the Colosseum.  The gladiators were often slaves; some had been recently captured, others were trained professionals.  They would battle each other (or exotic animals) to the death.  If a gladiator managed to survive, he could win his freedom and become a Roman citizen.

I thought a lot about Russell Crowe and kept wanting to refer to the movie when we were touring, but that’s kind of embarrassing.  However, Lucia pointed out the The Gladiator is pretty accurate in its depiction of second century Rome.   There were only two things that were blatently  false:

1. While Emperor Commodus did participate in gladiator battles, he wasn’t killed by a gladiator.
2. Gladiators weren’t as handsome as they were in the movie.  (How does she know?)

Rose and me.

Florence 23 years later

Florence back in 1990 with my mom, Stacia and Kelli

Twenty-three years ago, I spent my junior year in Florence.  This week I took a few days by myself for a little reunion with this incredible place.

Every hotel in Florence claims to be centrally located.  This dense city is tightly packed with a wealth of paintings, architecture, food, history, sculptures, craftsmanship, fashion and tourists.  I can’t imagine a greater concentration of art and admirers anywhere in the world.

During the two-hour train ride from Perugia, I wrote down a list of all the things I wanted to do in Florence.  It quickly became apparent that three days is not enough time to get it all done.  It was time for an honest talk with myself.  Could I return from a stay in Florence without going inside the Duomo?  How shameful would it be to walk by the walls of the Uffizzi without going in to awe at Bottecceli’s Birth of Venus? Could I possibly pass up the chance to see the David in person?  The answer was yes, because when it gets right down to it, eating, shopping and aimless walking sounded like so much more fun.  (I can’t believe I just admitted that.)

Before setting out, I tried to look up some of the best streets to window shop.  As luck would have it, I found the website of Maren Erickson, an American woman offering shopping tours of the finest in Florentine leather, silk, paper and gold.  I met her at Piazza Santa Croce.  We hit it off immediately.  It turns out she is from Seattle but lives here six months out of the year.  (In fact, her daughter worked at my husband’s real estate company last year.)  Bottom line, we had a blast.  She took me to some of the most incredible stores where I met some people who have worked in the trade all their lives.  It was so fun to breeze by all the tourist traps of mass-produced, cheap goods and find the best that Florence has to offer.  

Ricardo in his silk store selling gorgeous scarves and ties

Nino’s shoe store. That’s him in the middle. Maren is on the right, and the cute girl on the left helps find the right fit.

After a couple hours, we stopped for an apertivo and decided to meet later for dinner.  So after a long walk through familiar streets and nostalgic piazzas, I met Maren on the site of an ex-prison converted-into-trattoria where we enjoyed a long, long dinner.  It was one of those nights where the problems of the world were solved, and I felt sure that I was in the company of a wise philosopher (and at times was one myself).  I’m sure it was due in no small part to the bottle of Chianti that we ordered, but nonetheless, we had such a good time that we made dinner plans for the following night.

Big meals were sort of the theme of my stay.  The next afternoon I planned my day around a solo lunch at Zeb.  A friend from Perugia told me that it’s one of the best spots in town.  I was the first to arrive at this tiny place and sat at on one of the 15 stools surrounding part of the kitchen.  Behind the counter was Alberto and his mom, Giuseppina.  They were super sweet to me and called me “tesoro” (treasure) when they dropped off a new plate of food.  I went completely Italian on them and ordered every single course offered (pasta, meat, vegetables, dessert, coffee). I managing to finish every bite, more out of appreciation than out of hunger.  I loved it all.  The best plate was the pici al pesto.

The counter at Zeb

Mamma Giuseppina and Owner Alberto

Before dinner with Maren, I took my stuffed self to a couple alternative museums.  The Salvatore Ferragamo museum had a really cool Marilyn Monroe exhibit featuring all the shoes she owned by the famous Italian designer.  I also learned a couple things about Ferragamo himself.  For one thing, he studied anatomy so he could know how to build the perfect shoe.  Then I headed to Palazzo Strozzi to peek at a 1930’s art exhibit.  I don’t know much about designer shoes or 1930’s Italian art, so both made me feel a little clueless.  Then I took a long walk up to Piazza Michelangelo which looks out over the entire city.  And who should I see but a copy of the David!  I got a little Renaissance art after all.

The next day I had to pack up and head home.

I left Perugia kind of nervous about traveling solo.  Sometimes I feel self-conscious when I’m walking around by myself, or especially when I go out to a restaurant alone.  There’s no one with whom to share the new experience, and there’s no one to look at when I eat.  Sometimes I had to fight the urge not to think of myself as a bit of a loser.

I decided there are two virtues I’d like more of: courage and confidence.  The past few days taught me that courage is a choice.  I can identify my fears and consciously face them.  (This trip offered some opportunity for that.) Confidence, on the other hand, is not a choice, but is a result of acting courageously.  In other words, self-assurance was earned once I confronted my fears.

Gubbio

For the past month, weekends have been dedicated to travel.  We’re only here a year, and there are so many cities to see.  On Saturdays, we usually meet the boys at school and head out for the night.  While we each have different interests and priorities, we’re learning how to explore new places together.  Gubbio proved to be a good attempt, but left much to be desired.

In theory, Gubbio is a must-see.  Our guidebook describes it as the most thoroughly medieval of Umbrian towns with picture-book pretty streets.   It also hosts a 900-year-old festival every May called the Corso dei Ceri.  It’s considered one of the most lively, rough and exciting festivals in Italy next to Sienna’s Palio.  I thought a town with this kind of edgy, competitive spirit might appeal to the boys, so we booked a room for the night.

Once we arrived, we knew we’d need to make some compromises with the kids if we wanted to spend time meandering up and down cobblestone streets while stopping into the occasional museum or church, so we found a hotel with a pool.  Unfortunately, the pool seemed designed more for meditation than Marco Polo.  There were contemplative, soft-edged shapes emerging from the ceiling and corners; there was droney spa music everywhere; and there were doors leading to hydrotherapy tubs that were restricted to adults only.

To make matters even weirder, big bathrobes and yellow flip flops along with swim caps were required in order to enter the pool area.  There were video cameras keeping tabs on everyone.  We saw a man get in trouble for not wearing his swim cap.  And I got in trouble for letting the boys jump in the water and make a splash.

After a few hours of quiet swim time, we figured it was fair to start our city tour.  We misjudged how close the historic center of town was to our hotel, so by the time we arrived at the main piazza, the kids were ready for bed.

On Sunday, we got smart and rented Elf.  The boys stayed in the room for nearly two hours watching Will Farrell while we explored Piazza Grande and tried to get into the Etruscan Museum before it closed.

We met the boys back at the hotel for lunch where, to our disbelief, they were each served a small glass of prosecco (yet another indication that the staff was not used to children.)  Ray was excited; he’s often asking us for sips when we pour a glass.  Tom, on the other hand, never wants to taste wine, but he made an exception.  Later he commented that while he didn’t like the taste, he kept wanting more.

On our way out of town, we finally found something for everyone to enjoy: a tram with little cages that lifted us to a church perched on the highest lookout over the city.  Inside was the nearly completely preserved patron saint of Gubbio, San Ubaldo.  He was suspended in a glass coffin above an alter.  The only thing missing were his three fingers which were cut off by his manservant as a memento to their friendship.

Cortona and The Lamentation

Piazza della Republica, Cortona

On the steps of Palazzo del Comune

Last week we went to Cortona for the night.  This Tuscan hill town is right outside Perugia.  We could have gotten there in half an hour if it wasn’t for my lame suggestion to visit The Mall.  “De-mol,” as pronounced by the Italians, came highly recommended by several well-dressed locals we know.  This designer outlet sounded promising, but all four of us quickly melted down as we browsed though Gucci bags, Prada shoes, Valentino dresses and Armani jeans among crowds of bargain hunters.  A good deal was still 300 euros for something small.  We left empty handed after an hour.

We reached Cortona at sunset and found our hotel after several embarrassing wrong turns including one which took us down a pedestrian-only street that intersected the main piazza.   Then immediately after, we took a second turn heading straight into on-coming traffic and dirty looks.  I watched Matt’s confidence behind the wheel quickly deflate.  But when we finally arrived, it was all worth it.  This hotel ties for first place with the one in Taormina.   Our room was bright and colorful, spacious and sweet.  And the best part was the little private terrance in back.  We could have spent the whole trip sitting out there.

Views overlooking Tuscany and Umbria.

Outside the hotel is the central square, Piazza della Republica.  And down the street is the Duomo which faces an unassuming stone building housing the best museum we’ve seen yet.  (When I say “we,” I mean we parents.  Tom hated it.  The only things worse than another museum would be another big church, he said.)   While the paintings were still all religious with lots of gold highlights, something about this place was different.  The pictures were huge and bright and accessible, and we were the only ones there.

The stone courtyard in front of Museo Diocesano

There were two rooms on the first floor, one featuring Fra’ Angelico’s paintings, including The Annunciation.  The other room was devoted entirely to Luca Signorelli.  This was my favorite.  I’m not an art student nor even much of an art appreciator, but I was moved by these paintings, and every time I looked at Matt, I could tell he was too.  He said it best, “It feels like we are looking at something important.”

There was one picture in particular that got our attention.  It was called Lamentation Over the Dead Christ.  It was a scene so desperate and sad and familiar:  Jesus is dead.  His friends just un-nailed him from the cross and are surrounding his body with loving arms and profound grief.  His mother is holding his body, another woman is holding his hand, and another has his legs.  Behind them are others, equally distraught.  One woman is supporting Mary’s head between her hands.  It looks loving as well as hopeless.  Growing up Catholic, I was surrounded by these images in church and school, so much so that I developed an immunity to their drama.  But having distanced myself from the dogma, the rules, and the declarations of faith, I now see the humanity of this event.  It didn’t look like a Christian Bible scene celebrating divinity and salvation, but rather a depiction of the powerful human emotions involving love and loss.

It was a welcome connection with our son Luke and the experience we’ve shared with our friends and family for the past five years.

After standing in front of this painting for a little bit, we saw a sign nearby with a paragraph about Signorelli’s art.  It acknowledged the brilliant anatomical accuracy of Jesus’ body in Lamentation. It further revealed that after Signorelli’s own son had died of the plague, he used the body as a model.  Reading this gave new meaning to the artwork and exposed a degree of catharsis to the painting.  This fact furthermore explained not just the anatomical accuracy, but the emotional accuracy as well.

 

Naples, Pompeii, and the Almafi Coast

A view from Castel Sant’Elmo

Driving into Naples boosts my adrenaline, not only for the inevitable wrong turn, sudden one-way streets, and jarring onslaught of honkey horns, but because the city and people effuse a sense of vibrancy more than any other place in Italy.   This town is reckless, tough, complex, mysterious, superstitious and sometimes comical.  It would make a great setting for a Scooby Doo episode.

It’s a big city, the third largest in Italy.  It is laid out like a plate of spaghetti with miles of roads noodling in every direction.  Cars and motor scooters zoom up and down and sideways with no concept of staying within a lane.   The bordering buildings decorated with graffiti often rise high enough over the streets to block out the sunlight.  Laundry hangs from nearly every window, but it’s hard to believe that anyone is ever inside because the sidewalks and cafes are so full.

This is my fourth visit to Naples.  I know I’m here when I see an entire family brazenly swerve through traffic on a single moped or when a stranger approaches and reminds me to hold my purse and camera tightly or when every block I pass displays a shrine honoring Jesus or the neighborhood Catholic saint.  The four days passed quickly here.  And as we drove out of town with white knuckles clutching the steering wheel, I wanted to plan another visit.

At first glance, Naples doesn’t strike me as beautiful, but there is so much to love, and the most obvious is pizza. Naples claims to have invented it.  Whether or not that is true, it is undisputedly the best in the country.  We had a great lunch at Da Michele, a 130-year-old pizzeria that offers only two choices: margarita or marinara.  We arrived to find a crowd amassed at the entrance with customers waiting for a table.  We got a number and within an hour,  we were ordering three pizzas.

The crowd in front of Da Michele

 

If you look carefully at the wall behind Tom, there’s a picture of Julia Roberts during her last visit.

During the rest of our stay in Naples, we visited churches, climbed to the top of a castle, spent an hour t00 long in the archeological museum, and ordered lots of coffee and gelato.  The boys’ highlight was a little street called  Via San Gregorio Armeno that was lined with shops on both sides selling tiny figures for nativity scenes.  While there was the occasional Baby Jesus, most of the items for sale were more Neapolitan such as little pizza ovens or a group of old men playing cards and other incongruent accompaniments to the stable and shepherds.

Tom liked the figurines with moveable, electrical parts. 

After three days in the city, we decided to take the train out to Pompeii.  This, of course, is the ancient Roman city that was buried in ash and toxic gas from Mt. Vesuvius back on August 24, 79AD.  What’s so amazing about this place is that all the details of daily life have been preserved so well.  We saw the locker room of the bath house, the ovens of a bakery and the beds in the brothel.  There were so many similarities between this ancient life and ours, but we wondered how the people couldn’t save themselves.  Our tour guide explained that most of the 20,000 inhabitants did escape after the initial explosion, but the following day, around 2,000 came back to collect their belongings, and that’s when a second eruption occurred.  Eventually, the city was covered in 5 meters of ash and debris, but  it was the poisonous gas that caused the most death.  Our guide assured the boys that it was a painless death, and that the Pompeiians just got very sleepy before nodding off forever.

The ruins of Pompeii with Mt. Vesuvius in the background.

 

Modern statues on the ancient columns

 

At the edge of the Forum

And finally, we spent an afternoon on the Almafi Coast before heading back to Perugia.  We figured that since it was only about 45 miles from Naples, we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to see Italy’s most beautiful coastline.  We had no idea that the traffic would keep us in the car longer than the beach.  When we finally arrived in Positano, a small village perched on the steep Almafi cliffs, we were dying for a cold drink and a beach recliner.  After parking the car, we hiked down 342 stairs to a cute restaurant overlooking some chairs and umbrellas for rent.  We ordered wine and marinated anchovies then took a quick dip in the Mediterranean Sea.  The Almafi coast is not only famous for it’s beauty, but for it’s lemons.  It’s said that the people here take better care of their lemons than their children.

This is Lo Guarracino, serving seafood, pizzas and lemoncello.

 

And the view from Lo Guarracino into the blue sea where we would soon be swimming.

 

On our way out of town, we pulled up to a road side lemonade stand and ordered four glasses of lemon granita for the ride home.

Road Trip (last stop): Mantua

There have been a couple spontaneous decisions during this little trip, one of them being our  final destination.  When we asked for suggestions before leaving Bellagio, the waiter, hotel manager and pool guy unanimously agreed we should visit Mantua (Mantova in Italian.)  So we set off.  Before today, all I knew about Mantua was that Romeo was forced to move there after killing Tybalt.  But now I also know that roast donkey is the local specialty.  And I know what it tastes like, too.

As soon as we arrived, we booked a tour with Daniele.  He’s a guide we found on the internet.  The first stop was the Cathedral of Sant’ Andrea.  This is a pretty big church for such a small town.  But there’s a good reason.  Daniele explained: Back when Jesus was nailed to the cross, some drops of blood fell to the earth.  They were later collected in a jar and brought to Mantua.  This church was built to house the holy relics.  Unfortunately the containers were lost over the years.  But fortunately, they were found again in a different area in Mantua.  And so another cathedral was built.

We didn’t get to see the blood because there was an earthquake last May and many of the rooms which display art and artifacts are under renovation.  But we’ll be back because this was one of our favorite Italian towns so far.  I loved the tiny winding streets, the four interconnecting piazzas, the pumpkin tortelloni, the sparking red wine , and the lady who owns the hotel where we stayed.  Our one-night excursion turned into two.  But I would have liked to stay for a week.

On Sunday evening, our northern Italian trip ended.  We arrived home to find a dead bat on the living room floor.  Later that night, the power went out.  Matt was able to find the fuse box on the ground floor while I stayed in the apartment.  We communicated with text messages until the proper switch was flipped.  And after hiking back up six flight of stairs, it went off again.  It was definitely time to open that souvenire bottle of lambrusco we brought back from Mantua.