Venice
The roads, or rather, the waterways of Venice complete the absolute stigmatic movie version of what I imagined the city to be. I took water busses from place to place through the Venezian Laguna and the Grand Canal. I watched gondolas fill canals, the width of a mini-coupe, and I breathed in the highly sophisticated street music. Literally, street musicians playing classical music wearing tuxedos and bow ties.
For the first time since I began my travels, I shopped plentifully for gifts and spent hours looking in shops at the highly advanced Murano glass, and masquerade stores.
On the island of Murano, one could roam the wide streets and canals with ease. Since it is not a part of the main tourist island - where the Galleria alla Academia, Piazza de San Marco, or the Rialto bridge are - there was no rush or congestion. But there were shops, full of locally blown glass that has been part of a tradition dating back to the 1700s. Murano is the pioneer for glass blowing and mails their art all over the world. I saw beautiful glass flower chandeliers, glass statues of peacocks and horses, glass clocks and tea sets - all with advanced decorative art and colors burned into the design. I even had the opportunity to watch glass blowers do their work as they gave me a quick educational breakdown.
And now I'll break it down for you, in case you're interested.
To become a Murano glass artist, one must train under a Master glass blower for 15 to 20 years. There are only 20ish masters in the world and they all work on the island of Murano. There are certainly more than that who are trained in the techniques, but they wouldn't be Murano Glass Masters. There are also plenty of apprentices who bowed out and never became Masters. But still having trained for 10 years or so before getting the master status, whose to say they aren't masters in their own right?
I came across one of the dropouts when I was near the Santa Maria Gloriosa de Frari Basilika (the Frari for short). He trained over 30 years ago as an apprentice in Murano glass blowing. Now, he and his wife own a small shop where he creates his very own Murano designs right in the shop. I was mesmerized for a little while, looking at all the long colorful sticks of glass that would later become birds, trees, earings, horses, and more.
The only thing about Murano glass that I found to be quite the turnoff, was that there is tons of waste from the artistic creations every day. And no recycling. This is art after all, who will use a piece of junk to remelt it and create somethigg new? Apparently no one. Not even to donate somewhere for the city to make drinking bottles. Nothing. Because it is a world renowned mass producing industry, I was more than a little disappointed to learn about the harm it is doing to the environment.
So we move on.
One of my favorite parts of Venice (other than the window shopping and leather browsing) was the Frari Basilika. I had studied Titian (Tiziano) in a couple different art history classes, and so standing in the splendor of the Frari I was in the presence of the tomb of Titian and over the altar was his masterpiece of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary. Since my mom had been to Venice before, I was excited to guide her through the streets to a place she hadn't seen. I was even more excited to see her look full of awe and curiosity when we entered.
Milan
The capital of the northwest of Italy, is surprisingly not much to be desired. It may be the fashion capital, but only for reaaaaally wealthy people. My mom and I walked up and down the fashion district streets on our first day. The most fantastic part about it was the elevorate window decorations and displays. Some brands had mosaics in the windows, some had beautiful lanterns and chandeliers hanging, and a surprising amount of them currently have some kind of forrest design with trees. Some of it though, was a little appalling to me. In windows of countless high class Italian brands were leather for babies for thousands of dollars, leather pants for maternity, toddler manequins in tuxedos and minks. I wonder if for the maternity pants they would have to buy a new outfit for every trimester. How is a pregnant woman going to wear skinny-leather pants? And how is a baby going to not ruin a fur white dress?
It felt like such a waste. But it was a waste that was at the bud if the jokes my mom and I made for the rest of the day.
Aside from the phenomenal archetecture of the Duomo, and the amazing art created by names like Da Vinci, Titian, Crespo, Tiepolo, Bellini, Polo, and Caravaggio, my mom and I had the most amazing and intimate experience at a local restaurant. A place not very touristic, and with hardly any English speakers, my mom and I enjoyed a delicious homemade meal. The waitress, who i menioned in my previous blog entry, was so patient and full of light that I left her a note in Italian telling her just that. My mom and I enjoyed the experience so much that we returned to the restaurant the next night. The waitress, Maria, was not there. As it turned out though, her mother Teresa, and her uncle Antonio are the owners. Teresa and I had an interesting conversation in Italian and Spanish about the history of her restaurant and she told me that everyone who worked there was family! I told her how much I loved Maria the night before, and Teresa asked me if I was the one who wrote the note. Hold the phone, Maria was so equally-as-pumped about our positive interaction that she went home and told her mom about it? How amazing is that! I told Teresa how I hoped God would bless her family and her business because they are all so full of love.
During the meal my mom and I had admired the Teateo alla Scala opera certificates that hung all over the restaurant. (Teatro alla Scala is a world renowned house of classical opera, and we couldnt get tickets because it is currently closed and only showing on Sundays.) Teresa must have overheard us admiring them, because when we paid and went to thank her before leaving, she insisted on giving me a certificate! She hugged and kissed us (something not usually done with tourists) and sent us on our way with a gift! How amazing! I really never cared about going there for the food, it just felt so warm and homie at the Da Cecco Ristorante Pizzeria.
The warmth of people is enough to make a fire.
The next day, mom and I created our own day trip to Lake Como. Where we got to ride the steepest funicular in Europe and hike a little in the Italian Alps.
So now, we end in Rome and I will make some quick summaries from there. Italy, more or less, was full of friendly hospitality, however we encountered a lot of tourist haters as well. Particularly in Rome. I don't blame them, since Rome is so overpopulated and crowded with tourism, its probably easy to look at someone visiting as someone taking advantage of a culture. In Saint Peter's Basillica 25,000 tourists pass through Vatican City and the Basilica every day. Don't even bother trying to get a bite to eat over there because, as I've learned, where there are tourists there are exploitations of tourists - high prices, and fake authenticity (meaning, you get a veiled view of the culture the exploiters think you should see, or will make them more money).
The first night we walked around eating gelato and Roman pizza. We passed the Trevi fountain, which was surrounded by tourists in mourning because the fountain is currently covered in scaffolding. All around were women crying saying things like, "I traveled around the world to come see this." Probably should have checked the internet, ay? Just like mom and I didn't think to reserve our tickets 2 months in advance to see da Vinci's "Last Supper" in Milan, so we missed out.
This time, I didn't make the same mistake of doing things last minute. So, the first thing I did was go to the Santa Maria della Vittoria church to see Bernini's sculpture of The Ecstasy of Saint Theresa. It is one of my favorite sculptures because it is so authentic by being faithful, beautiful, and a little risque at the same time. Saint Theresa is being pierced by a happy little angel. The story that Bernini depicts is found written by saint Theresa in once of her journals of a vision she had.
Beside me, on the left, appeared an angel in bodily form.... He was not tall but short, and very beautiful; and his face was so aflame that he appeared to be one of the highest rank of angels, who seem to be all on fire.... In his hands I saw a great golden spear, and at the iron tip there appeared to be a point of fire. This he plunged into my heart several times so that it penetrated to my entrails. When he pulled it out I felt that he took them with it, and left me utterly consumed by the great love of God. The pain wasso severe that it made me utter several moans. The sweetness caused by this intense pain is so extreme that one cannot possibly wish it to cease, nor is one's soul content with anything but God. This is not a physical but a spiritual pain, though the body has some share in it—even a considerable share.
After Santa Maria della Vittoria, I went to San Luigi dei Francesca where 4 of Caravaggio's best known masterpieces are kept on permanent display. The church, like all 400 churchs in Rome, was art in and of itself. Beautiful.
Amazing as these were. The best part of Rome, aside from seeing La Traviata Opera, was our tour of Saint Peter's Basilica, and a cooking class that we left Rome for.
The Vatican, having been crowded and congested, was still such a gift to see. All over Rome and Vatican City I saw fountains and sculptures by Bernini, Barberini, and Michelangelo. Inside I saw frescos and oil paintings by Rafael, Michelangelo, Botichelli, Da Vinci, Giotto, Caravaggio, Bellini, Titian and many more. Enough beautiful, perfect, and gifted art pieces to make my eyes pop and water. A truly blessed feeling to be in the presence of magnificent brilliance and talent.
I even snapped a "selfie" in order to stealthily capture the famous "Gensis" fresco that covers the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.
A "fresco" is a particularly difficult type of painting to do because it is plaster. Michelangelo took 4 years of his life to paint something he initially refused to do by insisting he was only a sculptor. For 4 years, he made square foot by square foot of the painting, permanently twisting his back and causing problems with his hands. To make a fresco, one must create a small wet section of the plaster, add color, and let dry. Once it is dry nothing can be changed, it is then part of the building wall. It must be a perfect design and perfectly executed.
It was breathtaking.
Walking into St Peter's Basilica was equally breathtaking. In the center over the alter is a 10 story tall bronze gazebo sculpture made by Bernini from the bronze roof shingles that used to be on the Pantheon. Romans were pretty upset with that Pope.
I don't have a picture, but its once of those things, like all of the art I saw, that cannot be justified through a lens other than the eyes. Inside the Basilica were small chapels to the sides of the center walkway where I was blessed to venerate San Papa Giovanni Paolo II (Saint Pope John Paul II) and San Papa Giovanni XXIII (Saint Pope John XXIII)'s bodies. They are on display in a tomb. I chose not to venerate the remains of Saint Peter in the burial area below the church, mainly because I was quite exhausted, but also because I don't need to stare a dead body in the face in order to venerate the life that it was once filled with.
This was our second to last day in Rome, and it was a quite long day of walking.
On our very last day we went to a village in Manzzano. Population: 50.
There we participated in a cooking class alongside a fantastic Argentine couple (Marta & Enrique). The bubbly local Italian woman who taught the class, Monica, struggled with her Spanish, and my mom was the only one who didn't speak any Spanish. Nonetheless, we all were able to communicate and my mom was able to understand most of the conversation.
During the class we learned how to make traditional meat bruschetta, village pizza, different pastas and raviolis, and tiramisu.
It was a perfect ending to my time with my mom and in Italy.
Now, I admit I rushed through this blog a little bit towards the end. Reason being, I am now in Morocco with both of my parents traveling the country and taking in all of the new and interesting things. Everything is a hundred miles a minute and Italy feels like 600 years ago (but really 3 days ago, and that was a bad Renaissance joke since everything in Italy is from the 1400-1600s).
I am loving it and feeling so blessed and grateful to have this adventure and to be with my parents. There will be sooo much more to come so stayed tuned!
Thanks for reading
cheers
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