We had breakfast delivered to our room again at 8:00 because we needed to head off to meet Jeffrey. Christy was very tired, so I did end up eating by myself and then heading off to the market. It was a lot more set up when I got there than it had been the day before, and I spent time taking photos of the octopus, squid, tomatoes, plums, nectarines and flowers. I really enjoyed my time there alone. At the end, I ran into Christy, so we headed back together to meet the group on the middle of the Rialto Bridge.

While we were waiting for the group, I just stood there watching the sun come up and the light flow over the buildings of Venice. I liked watching people on their morning commute via boat. Some of the people working on the boats amused me because they would go about driving their boats with a cell phone and cigarette in hand. I was very amused to watch it all.

Jeffery spent the morning with us in a church called The Church of the Glorious Saint Mary. I really enjoyed the church. It was elaborately decorated. We got to see some paintings that I really enjoyed. We also fulfilled an Aegean Center tradition of throwing a red rose on the grave of the founder of opera music. It was really fabulous. The church was very amazing, it definitely did help me add more pieces to the puzzle I’m working on called the Italian Renaissance.

After the church, I got together with Matt, and we headed out to Torcello. We had a good boat ride together just relaxing and talking about frivolous things. When we got to Torcello, we went in one of the churches and then walked around taking photos before we ran into a group of Aegean Center students. He went up in the campanile with the group, and I stayed down and took quite a few photos. I was impressed there was such a fabulous church in such a remote location.

I decided to head off to Murano and maybe look at some glass. On the way, everyone went their separate ways, so I ended up on Murano with Lindsey. We walked around for a while, but since I had spent a little time there the day before, we looked only a little and walked back to the boat to head to meet everyone for dinner.

I got back a little early, so I took off alone with my camera to take photos of people riding in gondolas. I got some gelato, and had just a really nice walk before dinner.

We met everyone at 6:30, and we were going to go to dinner, but a lot of people wanted to go in gondolas, so a group of them got together to do that. I went for a walk with Georgie to find a supermarket because I was pretty sure that I wasn’t going to go out to eat for dinner.

When we got back from the market, we caught up with everyone getting off their gondola ride, so I decided to go and head out to eat with Mark, Matt, Liz, Marilyn, etc. I decided finally that I was going to eat, so I ended up eating an entire pizza by myself. Matt and I went for a walk to talk about some girl problems while we were waiting for the food to come, and I did the best that I could to help him out.

At dinner, the food was not very good. It was actually very comical. The service was very bad because the waitress did not speak English and wasn’t will to work with our Italian. She got almost every order mixed up and tried to pass off a meal with polenta and cuttlefish on three people in the group. It was kind of comical. We ended up just laughing about it.

I went to the bar with the group after, but decided the best thing was to again be the boring one and head off to bed alone. It was just fine.

After the long morning, it was time to get up and get going again. A funny thing to think was that it was in fact the anniversary of September 11, 2001, and I thought to myself as I woke up in the morning that I was very glad to be in a country that wont be spending a lot of time buying in the drama of the whole thing. I took some time to remember that there was definitely some work still left to be done in the world and again vowed to renew my purpose in that. I think that was a just remembrance of the day.

We were supposed to meet Jeffery at 9:00 at the door of the Academia. We were also told that before that if we wanted to do something interesting that we could walk to the market to take photos. Christy and I had breakfast delivered to our room at 8:00, and we left early to head to the market.

Venice looks amazing in the morning light, and I took photos of the local people getting up and getting ready for the day in their beloved city. The market was still setting up, but I did take photos of the vegetables and fruit in the morning sun, and I was quite happy with some of the photos that I did take. Christy and I admired the boats all going down the canal, and I watched the local people take gondolas across the river. It was very lovely.

We took the boat to the Academia stop, and we ran into Liz and Jeffery in the coffee shop right next to the museum. It was fun. We spent time talking to them because we were early, when John Pack and John Van Buren showed up. I was surprised to see John because I didn’t know that he was coming. I was glad to see him though because I knew that part of the scholarship John was able to give to me was in part due to the kindness and determination of John Van Buren. He is an amazing man, and he deserved to spend time in Venice with us. I was told that he was actually going to spend the rest of the Italy session with the group, which was very nice.

The Academia Museum did have some very good masterpieces in it, and we had a lot of fun looking at them. I must say that I am a Florentine Renaissance woman. The Titian paintings were interesting, but I can’t say that I am the biggest fan. The paintings we did look at helped me to piece the Renaissance together in my mind, and a lot of them are Masterpieces. It was a very enjoyable museum visit.

After the Academia, Jeffery said goodbye to us for the afternoon. Part of the theory of having so much free time was so that we would be able to go out and get a feel for Venice on our own. I decided with Christy that I wanted to go out and visit some of the islands just outside of Venice. One is known for lace called Burano, one is known for glass called Murano and one is known for its church called Torcello.

I used my map and some advice from Jeffrey to head on out to the islands. Unfortunately, we took the long way, and we ended up going from stop to stop transferring boats, and it took us about two and a half hours to get there. At that time, it was too late to be able to go to Torcello and have a lot of time to go to the museum, so we went to Burano, and it ended up being the best decision.

I do have to say that Burano was one of my favorite places on Earth (even close to Bruge and Paros). All of the houses are colored and the method of transportation is still boats because it is built on canals outside of Venice.

There were almost no tourists there, so we had the place to ourselves. We walked around the entire island, and it was really wonderful. I have a lot of photos of the colorful houses.

Christy took some photos of me, so it is even documented that I did go there.

We decided to head over to Murano because Burano was so cool, but by the time we got there, we were so tired that we ended up just heading back to Venice to be with the group.

When we got back to the hotel, we ran into a group that was going out to eat, so we decided to tag along. We found a nice but expensive restaurant in a quiet area. The food was not very good, but it was nice to sit out in Venice and have some good time with friends. I had pasta with tomato sauce and some bread.

After dinner, I was headed off to bed to avoid any more drama like that of the night before.

It was time to go to Venice. It is very often one of the major important parts of the Italy Semester for the Aegean Center, so we were all very excited. I had always heard very bad things about Venice about how dirty it was and how the canals were all smelly. Having my expectations very low had me very surprised when I got there because it was very amazing.

We got up early and then took the coach bus from the front door of the villa to the Florence train station. I had been trying to stop taking medication for my morning sickness, so I hadn’t taken it the night before. The trip on the bus was very hard. I was sitting up front, but despite my best efforts, I was feeling very ill and unhappy. As the bus wound through the back streets of Florence, I felt very sick, and was dizzy.

We finally arrived at the train station in Florence, but I was feeling very ill. We had quite a bit of time before the train was to leave, so all of the students were allowed to leave their bags with Jane, who was at the station as a guard, and they were given free reign to go and do something exciting. I was not feeling good, so I just sat in the train station with the bags and felt awful. Eventually, I did manage to get up and take a walk, but on my walk out of the train station, some man ended up spitting on me, so I had to walk to the park across the street and get that figured out. Needless to say, it was not really exciting having someone spit on me in the middle of the train station when I was not feeling well.

Eventually, all of the students returned, and we ended up on the three-hour train to Venice. I was sitting with a very lively crowd, and I was playing games with them in between heading to the bathroom to throw up any attempts to eat food that day. We played a game that was a lot of fun and had a hilarious result. I will keep it in mind for future reference, but we had quite a lot of fun.

I was so surprised when I stepped out of the train station in Venice and saw that canals. People were really being carted around in gondolas and there was so much that was going on that was exciting.

Of course, we had little time to get to our hotels and check in before we had to head off to meet Jeffrey and the group for a tour of the church.

Our hotel was in a very lovely location right off the Rialto Bridge. Venice is so amazing. I hope now looking back that I have taken enough photos for myself to be able to remember exactly how lovely the city is. It is full of canals and amazing buildings. The city had been built in such a lovely style because the Venetians at one point in history were amazingly smart and unconquerable. They had conquered quite a bit of Europe, and in every area that they conquered they brought back treasures for themselves. The city is built on a sand bar and is almost impossible to attack, so it has a very lovely appearance because it could afford it and because there was no danger of it’s treasures being stolen.

The hotel was very lovely. It was a three star hotel, so it was decorated in a very nice way. I made a comment to some of the other students that John did a very good job booking the hotel because I definitely wouldn’t have chosen such a nice place for myself if I were traveling to Venice alone. It was nice to stay somewhere nice when we were on the road.

The students all headed to meet Jeffery for the afternoon lecture. We were going to go to St. Marks Square. The square was beautiful. It is definitely one of the most famous areas in the world, and it was loaded with pigeons, tourists and pigeons on tourists. The buildings around the big church of St. Mark were all very nicely built. Of course, a city with so much money would hire an architect that could do such a rich city justice.

We looked at the façade and the campanile of the church. The façade is amazing and is covered in expensive mosaic with a lot of gold. It is very impressive.

The church is so popular that it was very strict about its entrance and the route you were supposed to take when in the church. There was a mass going on, so we were filtered quickly through the church quietly with a large crowd. Even though we were battling the crowd, it was amazing. The church had a feel very different than the feelings I had gotten in other churches. It was much more like the Hundred Doors Church on Paros.

After walking around the church, we went to the top of the church to a museum that was filled with all kinds of original works from the church. Also, it gave access to the balcony that ran around the top of the church, so we were able to go out on the balcony and get a better view of Venice. I took quite a few photos from up there even though I was feeling quite tired.

When we came down from the church, we spent time looking around the square. Jeffrey spent time explaining the architecture of the Duke’s Palace that was right next to St. Mark’s Church. Jeffrey also pointed out the architecture of the building right across from the Duke’s Palace because it was built as a fantastic library. We ended the tour next to the water where there were a lot of picturesque gondolas.

I was just simply impressed by the afternoon tour. It gave me more information about Venice, and got me in the mood to spend three days there.

After the tour, Jessica, Christy, Matt, Danielle and I headed off to get some food. I shared a pizza with Christy, and it was pretty good. We had an enjoyable evening.

After dinner, everyone wanted to go out to the bars, so I followed along with them to see if someone would want to walk me home a little later. We found a bar that was able to charm them all into staying, so a while into the night, I left and went back to the hotel alone.

Christy stayed behind, and I ended up letting her into the room later that night. Apparently, she had more to drink than she wanted, and we spent part of the night handling her being sick in between her telling me about some of the drama that had occurred with the other students while she was out with them.

The drama of that night was enough to last for quite a while.

We had the chance to sleep in on Saturday morning, but of course, there was an exciting alternative, which I decided not to pass up. Christy and I got up early and decided that we were going to go into the central square in Pistoia to see what the market was like.

We were told that the market had been going on continuously for hundreds of years on Saturday mornings. It is a good place to go and hang out with friends, but it is also a good place to find wares and clothes for a much cheaper price than may otherwise be available.

Christy and I decided to go and hang out down there and see if we could get some good photos, but we also decided to do some shopping.

We got there early enough that they were actually still setting up, and we spent about an hour and a half walking through all the booths looking at clothes and jewelry and kitchen wares, etc. It was a lot of fun. I ended up buying a sweater that has long sleeves and that has a very flattering shape that I will be able to continue to take advantage of when I have a much bigger belly.

At 10:00, we all met at the office of the commune to go and meet with the mayor. We were taken up into the 700-year-old building for a nice meeting. He gave us a talk in Italian about how important it is to continue quality inter-cultural communication to avoid things like 9-11 in the future.

When we were done with the mayor, he gave us gifts of hats, pens and miniature cutouts of Pistoia. Then we went and had some good food.

The afternoon was time to be off and get some things caught up. I spent some time working on my journal, but when I got tired of writing, I ended up spending the rest of my time out on a blanket next to the fountain in the back reading my book about having healthy children.

It was nice to lie in the sun and talk with my friends.

When the sun got lower in the sky, the wind was blowing, so Christy and I decided to take a walk around and see if we could make ourselves photographically useful. We took a walk around the outside walls of the villa where we found another farmhouse with a garden. I spent some time photographing the beautiful grapes that were in that garden. We walked around, and I took photos of the olives and the olive trees.
We got trapped in the outer walls of the villa, and the only solution was to climb the fence at one point. We decided to climb the gate because it was the most sturdy and had the most places to grip and stand, but the top was very pointy. I made jokes with Christy about her allowing the pregnant woman to climb the fence, etc. It was kind of funny.

When we got back to the villa, I ran into Morgan. I asked her if she wanted to model for me, and she said yes. I ended up taking her into the fields of olives in front of the villa and photographing here in the late afternoon sun. I think that I got the effect that I was looking for. Just when I told her that we were done, the sun went down. I was satisfied.

Dinner that night was spaghetti, mashed potatoes, green beans, chicken, fish, salad, cheese, fruit and cake.

After dinner we skipped Dante and ended up talking about the Venice trip we were about to undertake. We got a general itinerary and then we studied our maps so that we wouldn’t get lost.

I was very tired when we were done talking, so I went directly to bed.

We went to Florence for another adventure into the wonders of art that it has to hold. Jeffrey set it up so that we had a spare morning to do whatever we wanted before we were to meet at 12:00 for our reservation in the Uffizi.

A group of us decided to get up early and head to the Academia to see the David and all the other treasures there. We took the long trip in to Florence and headed in that direction. Since we got there pretty early, the line wasn’t that long, but it was definitely a slow-moving line. We stood there for quite a while waiting to get in, and we were finally able to manage it.

I was told that there was a lot of things to see in the museum, but it was smaller than I thought. We were immediately filtered into a room with about 8 unfinished sculptures by Michelangelo. At the end of the room, was a dome with the David sitting in it. The image of that sculpture stole my attention even though I was trying to look at the other works. I finally decided to pay attention to the demanding sculpture before looking at and evaluating the others. I was quite thrilled to see the David. I had just finished reading Michelangelo’s autobiography by Irving Stone, and it seemed that the creation of the David was so important to him as an artist. I think that it really deserved the place that it got. There were a lot of people there looking at it, but it was worth the crowd. I was so moved by the experience of being there that I was almost in tears. I was in the room with a living, breathing piece of art from 500 years ago. In fact, we went to see it on the 502 anniversary of it’s unveiling by the artist himself. When I return to Florence after this trip, I will be visiting the David again.

When my attention had been sucked dry by the masterpiece that is the David, I was able to look at and evaluate the unfinished works by Michelangelo from different projects. I got to see a lot of the unfinished figures that were to go on to Pope Julius’ tomb. I also got to see the first unfinished sculpture that he was commissioned by Florence to do of the 12 apostles. He got called to Rome before he was able to finish even one, but I got to see that one.

After the Academia, we headed over the Uffizi. We were going to be in there for 2 hours looking intensively at paintings that were the important turning points in the history of Art. Jeffrey took us to the first room, which showed the first paintings before the Renaissance, and then led us through all the way up to the Baroque. I saw paintings by, Giotto, Ucello, Leonardo Da Vinici, Fra Angelico, Filpo Lippi, Boticelli, Carravaggio, Titian, etc.

The work that I saw in the Uffizi really moved me. One of the most important things for me was the fact that I was able to stand in front of many Boticelli paintings that I had admired and studied for years and years. One of his major paintings was missing, but I was able to see Venus and Primavera. The intense emotion at seeing those paintings in person really overcame me, and I was unable to choke back the tears of joy. I got to spend a good deal of time in front of them, and I felt like the connection I had made with Boticelli earlier on in life strengthens.

We spent some really intense time in the museum, and it was relaxing to finally be filtered out through the gift shop. I did take the chance to actually stop and buy some post cards of the art that I had seen that had inspired me.

We walked back to the train station slowly ensuring a stop at the best gelato shop in Florence.

I used the Internet in Pistoia to my great frustration. That experience made me decide that I would not attempt to use the Internet until we get to Paros. When I got back to the villa, I talked to Jared on the phone, which was very nice.

Dinner was corn grits, rice with zucchini and celery, fried grits, calamari and shrimp, fish, salad, cheese, fruit and coffee cake.
Of course, Dante followed Dinner.

I had talked to Liz about getting up early at some point and going down to look at the beautiful light of Pistoia. I was excited when she announced that this was going to be the day.

We met earlier than all the other students and headed off on the bus together. It was nice to see the photo group together, but I must say that it is a lot bigger than it has been in other semesters, so it may be interesting trying to vie for time with Liz. I’m sure that I will be able to manage though.

The photo class walked around Pistoia for a while looking at the way that the light hit different buildings in different light. We then spent quite a bit of time evaluating and photographing two particular subjects.

I eventually convinced Liz to take us to the food market. Even though the lighting wasn’t the best, it was fun to take some candid shots of people as they buy and sell food. I enjoyed my time there. The class then headed off to the photo store called Foto Lux in Pistoia.

We met Jeffrey later on in the morning in front of one of the churches. He took us in. It was a very simple church. I liked the feel of it though. It wasn’t big and full of ornate things, but it gave the feel of a holy place and the art in it was fabulous. One thing of note was the masterpiece of Della Robia . Della Robia carves things out of terra cotta and then glazes it to look like marble. The sculpture that we saw by him was really nice.

When we left the church, we went to another building that has been turned into a museum. It used to be a church, and in a recent restoration, it was discovered that there were some really amazing frescoes. They were well preserved. We spent quite a bit of time looking at them and trying to make out the scenes that they depicted.

We headed up to the villa at about 13:00. Lunch looked really good, but of course I was not feeling well, so apples became the lunch for me.

After lunch, we had more basic lectures in writing, drawing, photography and art history.

Dinner was corn grits and mushrooms, fish, chicken, carrots, potatoes, salad, cheese and fruit.

We read more Dante after dinner.

We spent the day in Pisa. We had studied so much about other art in the area that I had completely forgotten that I was going to see the leaning tower of Pisa as well. I got really excited about that on the way there.

It was of course a very early start as usual on the days that we go out away from Pistoia. We have to catch two different buses to get to the train station and then take the train for an hour or so to get to our destination. Of course, because we want to see as much as possible, we start out early and stay as late as possible.

When we got to Pisa, we got out of the train station and got a chance to look around. Since we walk around the cities we visit and don’t use public transportation (because all the things we want to see are near the center anyway), we took a long walk through the city on the way to the Duomo.

Of course, along our long walk, we all stopped to get some coffee, use a bathroom, eat pastries and stock up for lunch. We stopped at a café that Jane swears has the best pastries in the world. She doesn’t eat wheat, but once a year she makes an exception when the school stops at that café, and she has something to eat. I decided that I should be trying it out as well, so I had a pastry. It was pretty good, but being pregnant doesn’t help with my tastes, so I have to reserve judgment on things I’m not craving until I’m no longer pregnant.

On our walk, I got a chance to take some photos. We walked over the river, and that was a beautiful view. Mostly, I was using my Woca, but I do still have some digital shots to work with.

Eventually, we ended up at the Duomo. The Leaning “Tower” of Pisa is in fact just the campanile (bell tower) for the church. We walked around the church and got to take a good look at the tower, the church and the baptistery. They are all very beautiful in style, and it was in fact the building that paved the way for a new style of architecture called Pisa Romanesque. The main features are rounded arches with green and white candy stripes. It sounds really dumb on paper, but when you see it as the façade of many of these beautiful buildings, it looks glorious.

We looked at the facades of all of the buildings and talked about the campanile. When we were done with that, we headed into the Duomo to have a look.

It was a very crowded building, but it was worth having a look. We got to spent time looking around with Jeffery asking the usual questions. How does the space feel? What does it look like? Is the style Gothic, Romanesque or other? What year was it built? Does it have columns or pillars? What was the space designed for? What do the capitals of the columns look like? This style of teaching really gets you to understand what you are looking at so that eventually you ask yourself the questions before he even starts talking.

We then spent some time looking at another one of the famous Pisano pulpits.

The Duomo was really fantastic because it had so much going on in it, and you could just tell that when the city was flourishing as a port for Italy that it was able to invest its wealth into great works for the city. The church is just crammed full of incredible things. I wasn’t feeling very well, but I did my best to stay with the group and get as much as I can, but I do tell you that it is possible to get a lot out of just sitting quietly in a church and observing the space and the art.

We then headed to the baptistery. It was built in a similar way to the Duomo, so it was easy to understand. We went into the space, and it was just wonderful. There wasn’t really a whole lot of art and other things compared to what we had just seen in the Duomo, but it was still nice. There was a very good sculpture of Saint John that I liked. We spent a lot of time looking at another Pisano pulpit.

When Jeffrey was done, he sent us upstairs to look around. I just went up there and sat down because it was so nice. I took a lot of photos of the architecture and other things, but it was really nice to sit up there and be able to look at the building from another angle.

We took a short break for lunch, and I ate what I had stored up from the coffee shop as well as some yogurt I had brought along. A group of us then decided to go and take photos holding up the Leaning Tower of Pisa. They were kind of touristy, but also a lot of fun.

After lunch, Jeffrey took us to an old cemetery to look around and see where the Pisano father and son had gotten the inspiration to make such beautiful pulpits (from Roman Sarcophagi). We looked around, and it was just a great place to take photos. We stopped and looked at one of the frescos that were really important to Pisa. It was huge and beautiful. The cemetery had been bombed in one of the World Wars, and the cemetery and the frescos on the wall were put back together piece by piece. It was really admirable and showed the quality of human resilience. I was impressed, but also very glad that it was done. We then looked at a lot of graves and sculptures. They were even restoring some of the other frescos, and I got a chance to watch. It was really fun.

We decided to head home. It was pretty late in the afternoon. Of course we went by a very good gelato shop on the way, and it helped purk everyone up.

Dinner was Spinach tortellini, Rabbit, Peas, mashed potatoes, salad, cheese and fruit.

We read Dante after dinner with Jeffrey, and then I headed off to bed.

It was another day in Pistoia. The program alternates one day in Pistoia and one day out in the world touring. We headed off in the morning to town with Jeffrey. When we were in Pistoia the first day, we were not able to see the altar for the Duomo, and we did not see one of the other churches. That was the mission to be accomplished for the day.

We spent a lot of time in front of the altar, and it was beautiful. The altar contains a relic of the finger bone of one of the important saints. It put Pistoia on the pilgrimage map to have such a relic, so Pistoia made the appropriate response of building a very expensive altar for it.

The altar is made of pure silver, and is about six feet wide and nine feet tall. I wish that I had a photo of it, because it is fantastic. It contains stories from the life of Christ as well as from the life of the saint whose relics it contains. We spent a lot of time in the room with Jeffrey going over the stories and the quality of the workmanship. I’m glad that Pistoia made the decision to commission the work because it is very beautiful.

After that, we headed over to another church. It was a small and minor church, but it is nice to experience churches of different caliber when you are walking around learning about the history of a culture. Even though the church was small and private feeling, it had a lot of great works of art. We spent a lot of time looking at and evaluating the pulpit that has been made by Giovanni Pisano. It was beautiful. We got some other time to look around the church, and I must say that I would have been happy to worship in it if I were a Catholic Pistoian.

After our trip with Jeffrey, everyone headed home. I started to conceive the idea that I am going to use for my journal, and I got to work on it.

In the afternoon, we had classes. Liz taught the basics of photography and then Jane taught us all how to draw circles and straight lines. Of course I need more practice. Drawing is like torture to me, but I must overcome that feeling and be able to do it with some skill before I leave.

After dinner, we read Dante with Jeffrey. It is very fun to be able to read one of the works of a man with such a legacy in history.

The program definitely starts out with a bang. We had only been at the villa for a day and a half, and we were already off on our first adventure in Florence. What a day it was. As usual on these adventures, we had to get up early to catch the bus that connects with the next bus that then connects to the train that goes to Florence. I was tired, but I figured I would be able to manage. I had been not taking my Unisom, and I was definitely suffering the consequences.

When we got to Florence, Jeffrey of course stopped off at the local coffee shop. I ended up buying a sandwich that I was sure was going to be my lunch, but that really ended up being my after breakfast snack. I got a chance to visit with Darla while we ate.

When we were done with the coffee, it was time to get down to business. We got a chance to stand outside the Duomo and Baptistery in Florence. The whole group got to stand up very close and touch the bronze doors on three sides of the Baptistery. We got to see copies of what Michelangelo named the “doors to Paradise,” and which I would absolutely agree. After looking at the outside, we went to see the things in the Museum of the Works of the Duomo.

The museum stands where the work yard for the Duomo used to stand. It is the place that the block stood for so many years before Michelangelo was asked to turn it into the David. It was also the place that he then stood and carved the years while he was making the David. It seemed to be a sacred workshop to me because it was the area where such a wonderful work of art was stored. The museum had a million things in it that were complete masterpieces. You would have to look a complete listing of the things up online. I was able to see the Deposition that Michelangelo was carving for his own tomb, which was very memorable. I also got to see a pulpit by Donatello and one by Nicolo Pisano. Donatello had some other sculptures in the museum, which were nice. The museum also had many drawings and other tools that had been used to make the dome. Brunelleshi himself had used many of the tools. That was very fascinating.

I got to see the last sculpture by Michelangelo that was meant for his tomb. It is a beautiful thing to stand in front of, and I was surprised at how amazingly it had been worked. It was the first sculpture by him that I had ever seen.

The original bronze “doors to Paradise” were in the museum, and the group got a chance to walk around and look at them up close. We got to look at the stories that they told as well as learn more about the Catholic religion (which most of the group [myself included] is very ignorant in). The doors were absolutely fantastic.

There was a lot of other good work in the museum, but it is too much to talk about here.

We then split off for lunch. I went with most of the group to get sandwiches. When we were done, we had gelato as the best gelato store in the world. It was really amazing, and all I have to say is that I learned how to navigate myself there for the future.

After lunch, we met and went into the Duomo. It is such a big church. One thing that really amazed me was the fact that there were no pews or places to sit. The marble inlaid floor is the original floor. I couldn’t help but think that it was the floor that Michelangelo stood while listening to the lectures by the famous, but evil Savonrola. The dome was very high, and is covered by beautiful paintings. There are too many things in the church to go over here, but all I have to say is that it is a must-see church. It is one of the most beautiful in the world, and the dome is just excellent. I think that if I lived in Florence that I wouldn’t want to worship anywhere else.

When we were done in the church, we went to the Baptistery across the street. The building for the Baptistery is very old, in fact, no one knows how old. It is for sure the oldest building in Florence. It has been ornately covered from head to toe in marble, so it is just beautiful. The entire ceiling on the inside is covered in mosaic. The dominant color in the mosaics is gold—real gold. It must have taken a long time to put the mosaics up, but it was really great to see them. They have been well taken care of. Jeffrey pointed out the Bible scenes to us, and it was a really big help. I just sat there admiring the ceiling as well as the environment it was in. The font was very incredible, and was of course where all the Florentines have been baptized. It is just an amazing building.

After that, it was late in the day, and we were all tired. We just made our way home. The day was very hot, and on the train, I ended up sitting in the sun for quite a while, and it made me very sick. I was not happy by the time I got back to the villa

Before dinner, we had an hour lecture from Peter Abbs. He talked about creativity. I realized when listening to him that a lot of what he said rang true, but I had a different understanding than I think he wanted me to have. I think that things can sometimes be looked at too complexly, and I came out of the lecture very confident of myself and where I was going with my art career. The whole thing only made me much more sure of what I was doing and why I was doing it.

Dinner was great, but I was only able to eat apples because I wasn’t feeling good. Judy noticed, and she ended up bringing me some Ricotta, which worked well with the tomatoes I could get my hands on. I was much happier.

After dinner, Jeffrey talked a lot about Dante, and we started to read one of his short works. It is translated into English that is old fashioned and a little more proper than I am used to, but I was glad to be back to reading and learning from Jeffrey.

We got up in the morning and took the bus to Pistoia. The idea was to show us all around and tell us where the main and important things were. We found the Internet café, the coffee shop, the bus stops, the chocolate shop, the main churches and places of interest, and the piazza where the market is held. We went on a tour of the main church, the Duomo as well as the baptistery for the Duomo. I learned a lot about the history of Pistoia. It is such a nice, quiet town, and I was so surprised to see no tourists. It was very easy to navigate, and I am so glad that the Aegean Center uses it as its home in Italy.

We came back in time to have some really good lunch at the villa.

The rest of the afternoon was spent in classes doing orientation and going over the general syllabi of the classes.

Dinner was, of course, very wonderful, and I was honored to be at the table eating such a delicious Tuscan meal with such good company.